“A proper woman would hardly have done what you just did.”
Embarrassment colored her own cheeks. “How dare you.”
She tried to step back, but his grip on her tightened. His body was an unrelenting line of masculine strength. “How dare I? What is it you want, Emily? To go wandering about with your perfect little ponce? Until he can politely ask you to be his bride? And then it will be a honeymoon of courteous thrusting that will leave you unfulfilled.”
She slapped him. The thwap of her hand across his cheek was not half so satisfying as it would have been without the glove, but his head still jerked to the side.
“What would you know of my fulfillment?”
His eyes were dark when he bent down and whispered, “Everything.”
*****
Hudson Wright's proposal came two weeks later, after a series of very proper dates and an appropriate amount of time seen in the company of one another. They had attended three dinner parties, on gala, two luncheons and a picnic in the park as a pair. It had all been very proper, and Emily had not had a single attack during their wooing.
Owen had not bothered to accompany them, but Lady Wright had been a willing chaperone. She had, of course, been appropriately absent when Hudson had gone to one knee and offered his grandmother’s ring for Emily's finger.
“You would make me a very happy man if you would consent to be my bride.” He smiled up at her.
He looked, she admitted, exactly how a man ought to look when he proposed to his lady. His hair was carefully styled across his brow, and his suit was neither rumpled, nor perfect. Everything looked posed for some painter’s romantic work.
“Oh, Hudson,” she whispered softly, just as she knew she should.
It was absolutely perfect, and yet her heart did not hammer inside her chest, and her breath did not come short. All she could think about was Owen.
In truth Owen had not been anything but perfectly polite since their evening encounter. Damn him. He had declined to attend any parties, he was unnecessary in the wake of Lady Wright, but since when had he cared how necessary he was?
He was ignoring her, and she knew it.
“Emily, is something wrong?”
The way that Hudson said her name told Emily that he had called her at least once before.
“No, no. Of course not.”
She fixed a smile to her lips and bowed her head in a pretty show of happiness. The fact that it was just a show made her heart ache. Owen would never have approved; Hudson didn't seem to realize.
“You surprise me,” she finally said. “I had not expected your proposal so soon.”
His smile wavered. “Is that a no?”
“Of course not, you are very dear to me, and I have grown very fond of you.”
He shifted and she realized that his leg may be getting sore kneeling in such a position for so long. How long had she been thinking about Owen?
“I have the growing suspicion that there is a 'but' in your statement.”
She took his hands in hers and drew him unto the couch next to him.
“May I ask a favor of you?”
He placed the ring on his knee, it glittered up at her like a pretty promise.
“Of course, Emily.”
“Will you kiss me?”
The look of shock on his face was almost amusing. He blushed. Had she looked so shocked when Owen had said the same words to her? Oh, almost certainly.
“A kiss?” He swallowed.
“I'm sorry, perhaps I should not have asked. Forgive me.” She stood up and she felt his fingers close over her wrist.
“Wait,” he said, his voice barely a whisper, “it is hardly too much to ask.”
He drew her back down unto the couch. One arm wrapped around her back. Emily expected to feel something akin to what Owen had made her feel, but she felt nothing, not even a tingle.
His lips touched ever so lightly to her own. It felt more like a warm breeze than a kiss. She tilted her head at the same time that he did and their noses scrapped uncomfortably against one another.
“I'm sorry, I don't...” he tried to explain.
“No, no, perhaps if I...”
She took his shoulders in her hands and she tilted her head. She tried to draw on some of the passion that she had felt. The second kiss was somehow even more awkward than the first.
She felt him pulling away. His lips were smiling.
“Oh, Emily...I mean...Miss Crawford...I...”
“Oh!”
They both jumped when Lady Wright burst into the room. Her massive form seemed to loom over them.
“Oh I am so happy for you both!” Lady Wright placed a large hand on either one of their cheeks. “I knew that you would say yes, of course! Anyone could see that you two are close. Oh, Hudson, you have to put the ring on her finger, didn't you know?”
He turned his gaze on her, she could almost feel the apology in them, and she understood. They were, after all, sitting very close to one another on a couch having clearly just shared an intimate moment, even if it was a poor one.
He looked in her eyes, clearly hoping for her to acquiesce. She nodded in assent and he slipped the ring on her finger. He pressed his lips to her cheek and whispered. “It'll be alright, I promise.”
Emily wasn't entirely sure that it would.
*****
When Owen found her, Emily was crying. She hadn't a clue how long he had been standing in the doorway. The rain currently pounding against the study window, and her own morose, masked the sound of his approach. By the time she was aware of his presence it was too late to pretend that she was doing anything but sobbing into the very pillow that she had thrown at him the night that he had ruined her.
“Emily? What happened?”
Anger surged through her with all the power of wildfire. She glared at him. Her eyes were swollen and red and she was sure that her nose had gone a distinct shade of cherry. Emily could not bring herself to care.
“You did!” she snapped. “You happened.”
“Did I?”
“Don't, don't you dare stand there and pretend to be frigid and cold. I thought you didn't like lies.” She sat up. Her heart felt tight in her chest. Her throat was already closing, and her hands were shaking. She was perilously close to an attack and she knew it. “This...this is...is all your fault!”
She couldn't breathe. Her head felt light. It must have become apparent because Owen surged into the room. His hands wrapped over her shoulders.
“Emily, you need to breathe.”
“I...” She heaved in a breath through a tightening throat. It burned. Her anger swam beneath a wave of fear. “I can't!”
“Emily, please calm down. You can yell at me all you want, just relax first.” He was trying to keep his voice as typically flippant as always, but even she could pick out the note of disquiet in it.
She shook her head hard enough that her already messy curls tumbled out of their pins, and yanked herself away from him. “I can't breathe...”
“Look at me, Emily, look up.”
Her gaze filled with his glorious eyes. They were so lovely, and filled with steadfast concern. For a moment, just a moment, the storm of emotions ebbed.
“Breathe with me.”
He placed her hand on his chest. He took a long slow breath and she struggled to do the same. In and out, over and over. Each one was easier than the one before. The storm abated.
“There we go,” he whispered. “There we are.”
“He proposed.” Her legs felt heavy beneath her body, and unwilling to hold her up in the wake of her rampant feelings.
“And you accepted.”
“No,” she said. She shook her head again, feeling the weight of her hip length hair sweep over her back.
“Emily, you are wearing his ring.”
She looked down, and saw it glimmering there. How had she ever seen diamonds as warm? They were filled with cold promises. “No, you don't understand.”
; “Are you engaged to Hudson Wright?”
She blinked. “I honestly have no idea.”
He laughed, and it was an oddly manic sound that seemed to come from a bleak place within. “Curse you, woman.”
“I love you.”
“Do you?”
“I have no idea.”
“Curse you again.”
He kissed her like he could devour her from the mouth down, and she melted. His kiss was nothing like Hudson's, though she hated to compare them. There was no awkwardness to the brazen way that his mouth slid over her own. His tongue delved between her lips to taste her, over and over again. She drowned in his own intoxicating favor of wine and spice.
He pulled back to let her breathe.
“More,” she begged. “Oh, Owen, more.”
He pushed her unto the chaise and pulled her dress away from her body. In moments sunlight, muted by the misty gray of rain clouds, was spilling across her bare skin. His mouth sank along her body, over her neck and breasts and hips. He left nearly no part of her untouched, unworshiped.
“There you are,” he groaned, when his fingers slid along the wetness of her sex. “There is my demure little vixen.”
His fingers plunged inside of her, opening her body to him. Deep pleasure swam through her, crashed through her. Yet all it did was fuel the storm of her need.
“Owen, I need more.”
“Tell me, tell me what you need.”
She wrapped her legs around his hips, and pulled him to her. Emily felt his length pressing inside of his breeches. She thrust her hips in wanton desperation.
“Take them off.”
He hesitated. “Emily, if they come off I can make no promise to your purity.”
She gripped his face in her hands. “I do not care. My purity...take it. I want them off.”
He made a sound more animal than human and jerked his pants down his hips. The next time he lay over her she felt the hot press of his blunt tip.
“Oh yes, Owen, yes!”
“Are you sure, Emily. Say it, tell me that you are sure.”
She thrust her hips towards him, enamored of the wet glide of his masculinity across her cleft. “I am sure, Owen.”
He buried his face between her breasts and she felt him nudge himself against her opening, still he hesitated. She wrapped her arms over his back and tugged him closer.
“Don't stop now.”
“God, Emily, you are my undoing.”
He slid into her. Emily expected to feel pain, but it never came. Perhaps her body was too willing, or his fingers had been preparation enough. All she felt was her own wetness and the glorious heat of him inside of her. He moved and she groaned. Her hips arched towards him with ardent abandon.
“Oh, Owen, yes!”
She was aware of everything, his breath on her body, the tickle of his hair along her neck. The long line of his chest as he moved over her, again and again. She lifted her hips to cup him to her.
“More, oh God, Owen, more.”
And more he gave her. His hands slid beneath her body and lifted her from the chaise so that only her shoulders were mated to the fabric. He surged forward over and over again. She could no longer determine where he ended and she began, nor could she bring herself to care. Her body had never felt more alive.
“Emily,” he grunted, his voice near to breaking.
“Yes,” she told him. “Oh yes.”
One hand fondled her breast and her eyes rolled back as the rough tender tip of her nipple scrapped along his palm. Her skin felt too tight for her body.
“Please,” she whimpered.
“Fall with me,” he gasped. “Fall with me, Emily.”
She could do nothing else. She felt the hot flood of his release inside of her and she gave in. With a final surge of his body, she broke into a thousand pieces.
*****
She was not sure when she dozed off, but when she woke he was still inside of her. The light from the study window had turned gray with a late hour, casting shadows across the room. She pressed her hand against his shoulder and he roused.
“Emily?” he asked.
“Well who else?”
He swallowed once before quipping, “Might have been a scullery maid.”
“You are not half so funny as you seem to believe yourself.”
“True. But I am twice as funny as most and that is enough.”
“Fine, now please remove yourself from my person, I would like to breathe.”
“As you wish.”
With a move that she could not have performed on her best of days, much less in a state of half wakefulness, he rolled off of her and sprang gingerly to his feet. She curled her legs to her chest and watched him search for his trousers. He was a gloriously built man.
“What do we do now?”
He glanced up at her. “What do you mean.”
“Come, now Owen, now is hardly the time to joke.”
“I am not joking.”
A cold feeling began in her belly. “I have already said you are not funny.”
“I am not attempting to be. Emily, I made what I wanted abundantly clear.” He stopped looking for his garments, and instead gave her a steady glance.
“I, I don't understand.”
“I told you that I did not want to get married,” Owen offered.
“Well, yes, of course you did. But I had assumed...”
“I also told you that I was many things, but I am not a liar.”
Her heart felt too small inside of her chest, small and breakable. Without understanding the 'why' of it, she pulled her chemise over her otherwise naked body.
“So, you will not marry me?”
“No, but that does not mean that we cannot be together, Emily. I will not push you out of your home, we can stay here and be together.”
She shook her head, as much to clear her angry thoughts as to tell him 'no'. “I cannot do that. I am...I am a lady.”
His brow shot up his forehead. “Oh?”
She opened her mouth to give a retort, but another voice stopped her.
“Emily?”
Hudson's shocked face filled the doorway. How she had forgotten about the door was well and truly beyond Emily. She knew what it must look like, with Owen standing in the middle of the room wearing nothing but his shirt, and she wearing only her chemise. Their scattered clothing a clear indication of their late afternoon activities.
“Oh, Hudson, I...I'm sorry.” She should have said more, but no words would come out of her throat.
“We were to go to the Avington's soiree tonight, I...the butler let me in, I've been waiting...”
Her stomach sank. Why the butler hadn't come to her, or why he hadn't sent Hudson on his way was well beyond her understanding right this moment. It didn't matter.
“I...can't.”
“That is clear. I will...excuse me. I should leave.”
Hudson swept out of the room.
“I told you he was a ponce.”
Emily brought her hand clearly across Owen's face, this time the slap, unmuted by gloves, was truly satisfying. He said nothing as she stormed out of the room.
~*~
The Briarmont gala was everything an end of season gala ought to be, bright, and cheerful and filled with new couples who were adamantly engaged in showing off who they had managed to snag. Emily wasn't sure that she had ever been more depressed to see couples together before.
She had arrived without escort, which had already caused a stir, and managed to corner Hudson Wright in the Briarmont's rather resplendent music room.
“Hudson, we must talk.”
“No, Miss Crawford, I am not entirely sure that we do.”
He was angry, and she could hardly blame him. He paced across the span of the music room, clearly not sure if he would leave her there or yell at her.
When he had worn himself out, he plopped unceremoniously onto a piano bench. He looked pitiful, and she realized that she hadn't just hurt him, she had
broken his heart.
“Was it the kiss? Was it so terrible?”
She thought it was very unfair that he asked. He had been there, after all, he knew exactly how terrible it had been. Still, perhaps it had only been so terrible for her because she had had something terribly wonderful to compare it to.
“There was nothing wrong with the kiss. It is only that I hadn't realized until that moment that my heart belonged to another.” She moved to sit next to him on the bench, he slid to one side to afford her enough space.
“Why him? If there were a man who were gentler, or wealthier, or even more willing to marry you I would understand. But he...he is not any of that.” He splayed his hands on his knees, looking more at the floor than to her.
“I don't know,” she answered as honestly as she could. “He is a difficult man, he is stubborn and he is most uncouth. I do not know why I care for him, but I do.”
“You made a fool of me.”
She looked down. “I know. Does it help if I say that it was never my intention?”
“No, not really.” He sighed and looked down at his lap. “Did I do something wrong?”
“No, oh of course not! You were perfect. You are perfect.”
“And yet you are not going to wed me.”
“No,” she shook her head. “I'm not.”
“You will wed him.”
She felt tears fill her eyes. “No, it does not look as if that will happen either.”
It was a mark of just how kind a man Hudson was when his concern colored his features. “Emily, what do you mean? He...well...he..”
“I am supremely aware of what he did, but Mister Harding is adamant that he has no desire to be married, not even to me,” her tears filled her eyes. “Forgive me, I don't mean to...to..” She found that she could not finish her statement.
“Oh, Emily.”
He wrapped one arm around her shoulders and bent his brow to hers, offering a kerchief for her tears. She took it. For a long time, he simply held her as she cried. She had not the first clue what she had done to gain such friendship from a man.
“I know that there is not love between us. But there is, I believe, friendship.”
THE HEALING HEART Page 42
