Marcus took her fingers in his, kissing her fingertips. With his other hand he slowly, carefully loosened her gown, watching it slip over Elsie’s bare shoulders to reveal pale, gleaming flesh. ‘You would have been extraordinary.’
She was beautiful. Beautiful beyond compare, despite her condition—no. Because of it. She was flushed, ripe, her breasts swollen, her darkened nipples stiffening as the gown slid slowly to her hips. Marcus took a step backward, taking her in, his cock hard as iron against his thighs.
‘You… you look angry again.’ Elsie laughed. ‘Have I done something wrong?’
‘No.’ Marcus looked at her from head to foot, burning for her. ‘Not at all.’
Angry? He was furious with himself. Furious for not telling her, all those weeks ago, that he hungered for her in a way that was damn near terrifying.
Curse his shyness. Curse his timidity even now. Elsie had suffered under the illusion that she was not wanted, prized, treasured beyond all measure—and now it was his duty, his vocation, to make her see that she was wrong.
‘What must I do?’ Elsie’s voice trembled.
‘Come here.’ Taking his hand in hers, Marcus led her to the bed. ‘You… you must let me make up for lost time.’
Lost time. All of it had been lost time; the time Elsie had spent longing for Marcus, doubting him, doubting herself. Time collapsed in on itself, creating a soft circle of pleasure, as they sank onto the crisp white sheets.
Everything took both an eternity and an instant. Her fingers on Marcus’s bare chest as he pulled his shirt over his head, his bitten-back gasp as her fingertips ran over his nipples. His hands on his breeches, pulling them downward, as Elsie let her own dress fall into a cotton puddle at the bottom of the bed.
The feel of his cock in her hand, hot and rigid. His kisses, kisses down the valley between her breasts, then moving over her nipples with such fierce attention that Elsie gripped the blankets in her fists, moaning aloud. His hands on her thighs, stroking her, soothing her, moving to caress the new curve of her stomach as he moved one finger downward.
Elsie gasped as he stroked the patch of dark curls between her thighs, coaxing her open, feeling her wetness—her heat. Heat that only grew the more he stroked her, the more he stared into her eyes.
She wanted him inside her. Wanted him desperately. How could anyone want someone this much?
‘I…’ She bit her lip as another wave of sensation ran along her inner lips, Marcus’s fingertip opening her. ‘I want more.’
‘As do I.’ Marcus looked down, an unexpected mark of tension on his face. ‘But I cannot have you frightened, or uncomfortable, or—’
‘Or remembering.’ Elsie cupped his face, kissing the furrow on his brow. ‘Is that it? Remembering my last time?’
‘I… I do not wish you to remember something that caused you such difficulty, and such pain.’
‘You are not him. This is not then.’ Elsie moved to him, caressing him, kissing him with all the fervency she had. ‘With every moment that passes here and now, a moment from that time is undone.’
‘My wife is a philosopher.’
‘No.’ Elsie smiled at the clearing of the tension on Marcus’s face. ‘But she has read many stories.’
As he came to her again, warm and hard and ready, she tried to unlearn the story she had told herself ever since her first encounter of this kind. That she was unsatisfying, somehow, fit for transactional pleasure and nothing else—that it would be painful, unpleasant, even with a gentleman who was perfect in every respect…
No. This was different. She and Marcus Bennington were a blank page, a new story, and she would never know the ending if she chose to be cowardly.
‘How will you be most comfortable? I—I cannot have you underneath me.’ Marcus gathered her into his lap; Elsie sighed with pleasure at the feel of him, strong and constant, his rigid shaft pressed to her stomach. ‘How do you wish to be taken?’
What a question. The last gentleman certainly hadn’t proposed such a considerate way of doing things. Elsie paused, ashamed at her lack of knowledge, before deciding to listen to her body.
She was trembling. Quivering at the heat of him, his nearness. Leaning to murmur in his ear, biting her lip as her swollen nipples grazed his bare chest, Elsie spoke with a catch in her throat.
‘Like this. May I be taken like this? Is it even possible? The Cappadene Club should offer a course of instruction for new workers. I am so fearfully lacking in any sort of carnal skill.’
You are a virtuoso, and I am your instrument. Made for you. You need no instruction—we will learn together.’ Marcus kissed the tip of her nose, shifting forward; Elsie gasped as his cock slipped her parted thighs, nudging against her entrance. ‘And yes. I can take you like this.’
‘Then do so. Please.’ Elsie leaned against Marcus’s shoulder, hiding her face as she spoke. ‘I… I have been dreaming of this for so very long.’
Marcus did not reply. He cupped Elsie’s chin in his hand, moving her face so that their gazes met.
His eyes had always been the most transparent part of him. Elsie had always been able to observe the changing, complex patterns of his moods, even if the patterns were indecipherable. Now, his stare was as legible as the simplest story.
I love you. That was what she could read in his eyes, as plain as the nose on his face. The sentiment, clear and shining, was as terrifying as it was perfect. Elsie opened her mouth, ready to respond to the unsaid—and stopped, a deep shiver of pleasure running through her, as Marcus sank himself inside her.
Oh. That was what the first thrust was meant to feel like. Slow, patient, ruthless—an exploration, a claiming, of her very deepest self. An explosion of fireworks with every inch. Elsie arched her back, a broken cry of pleasure on her lips, her core tightening around Marcus’s cock as her body welcomed him home.
More and more and more of him, thick and unrelenting, stretching her to her limit as her nerves sang with bliss. Marcus’s grunt of pleasure mingled with hers, a delicious new music as he slowly came to a halt.
‘Christ.’ His low, harsh whisper sent a wicked thrill through her. ‘You—’
‘I know.’ Elsie curled against him, tightening around him, fire racing through her body. ‘I know.’
She bit her lip, gasping as his teeth grazed her neck. Raw kisses, deep kisses—this was what she needed now, what she craved, to keep the shining thread of pleasure between the two of them unbroken. Down along the line of her neck, across the shadowed ridge of her collarbones, down further still to her breasts. Elsie whimpered, grinding against Marcus as he drew her nipples into his mouth, first one, then the other, lavishing the same attention on her as he had when they had first run into this room.
Now it felt better. Indescribably better, with him inside her—with his hips beginning to move beneath her, creating a deep, uncompromising rhythm.
‘Don’t stop.’ Elsie gripped his hair tight enough to hurt, suddenly terrified that it would cease. With every thrust came a new awareness of how good it felt. How right. ‘Please, don’t stop.’
‘I can’t stop.’ Marcus’s voice was full of lust and anguish. ‘I would—I would be slower, but I—’
‘Don’t be.’ Elsie moved against him, kissing him, pressing her teeth to his bottom lip. ‘Don’t.’
It couldn’t be slow, or patient. They had been slow and patient for months—never touching one another, standing close to one another. Never daring to do this: the ultimate expression of sentiment. What Elsie had been craving for so long, so very long, without even knowing how it was properly done.
Her last encounter had been cancelled out. Erased. With ever new thrust of Marcus’s hips, every new spark added to the blaze at the centre of her being, Elsie knew that time was being undone and remade. With every hard, raw kiss, every tremble of his fingertips as he gripped her waist and thighs, something was building that would destroy everything that came before it.
Her body was beyond her control. S
he kept tightening around him, gripping his cock as if afraid that he would leave her. Marcus’s thrusts grew deeper, less steady, driven by the hunger Elsie felt moving through her too. Everything was frantic, animal, desperate—but oh, the pleasure was hot and black, like the heart of a storm, and she needed more of it. More and more and more, knotting the base of her stomach, her core aching and wet with the want of it.
‘I’m going to—oh, Christ.’ Marcus’s teeth were hard on her neck; Elsie quivered at the pleasure-tempered pain, moving faster still. Yes, if he kept his mouth there, punishing her as he pleasured her, the storm would break. ‘Elsie.’
‘Marcus.’ Elsie whimpered his name, keeping it in her mind like a talisman as the storm began to break. Burning, vicious bliss cascaded over her, wave after wave breaking over her as she moaned, crying out, clinging to him. ‘Marcus.’
Marcus’s cry mingled with her own, a deep, low growl. His fingers dug into her flesh, holding her, claiming her; Elsie threw her head back, biting her lip to muffle her cry, as she felt him finish deep inside her. Taking her, possessing her—creating a different past.
She collapsed against him, shivering as the pleasure overtook her again. Softer this time, more lingering—and Marcus’s hands on her shoulders and back, soothing her through it, his voice in her ear bringing her back to herself. Only after a long, long embrace, the tension in her body flowing away, did they lie back on the bed with clasped hands.
Elsie closed her eyes. As the final waves of pleasure slowly ebbed away, reality came flooding back.
The child was his, now. That went deeper than logic. They were connected now, united…
… but they could never be so, in the eyes of the wider world.
She had broken her own heart, and Marcus’s into the bargain, by insisting upon this mad escapade.
She would regret it later. In an hour, in a day, she would have to extricate herself from such a painful situation. She would have to remind him that it was impossible, completely impossible—that stories, as attractive as they were, were not reality…
… but not now. Not with the night stretched out ahead of her, in the arms of the man she loved, and reality postponed until dawn.
Did every man have nights like this? Marcus doubted it. He couldn’t understand how society worked, how it kept functioning, if every man had such paradise waiting for him in bed. No-one would ever manage to make it past the bedroom door, or put on their shoes, without diving back into the blankets and giving himself over to pleasure.
It wasn’t even the moments of carnality, as splendid as they were. It was the moments between: the long, starlit stretches of time when all he and Elsie did was look at one another, and kiss, and murmur sweet secrets into one another’s ears. Those few, precious minutes were what Marcus, to his shock, needed more than breathing.
But nights didn’t last forever. When Marcus woke from a short, dreamless hour of sleep, the first light of dawn creeping underneath the door, Elsie was no longer next to him. She was sitting by the remnants of the fire, fully dressed, the pale severity of her face a reminder that what they had created was a fantasy.
Marcus sat up, his voice thick with both sleep and panic. ‘Elsie, please—’
‘Don’t tell me not to go. Don’t tell me not to tell you why.’ Elsie turned to him, her eyes brimming with tears. ‘Because if you tell me not to go, and mean it, I will fall into your arms and lose everything I have worked for. I will throw myself away. If you love me, don’t say anything at all.’
Marcus kept silent. With a dull roaring in his ears underneath every word Elsie spoke, he listened in fraught, desperate silence.
‘I was ready to work at the Cappadene Club. If I had not found myself with child, I would have done without a backward glance. A second thought. That it how much I value my independence—the independence I fought for, the independence my parents granted me with many bitter tears. I will contribute to my family on my own terms. If that makes me a monster, so be it—I have had time to grow accustomed to the idea. I have always been too well-read to be a servant, and too rebellious to be a shop-girl.’ Elsie bowed her head, smiling sadly. ‘Of course, I was not a woman of pleasure for long enough to find out all the ways I would have been unsuited.’
‘I love you.’
‘And I love you. And this—this child, my child, is now our child. You may provide for it as you wish, or not.’ Elsie bit her lip, pausing for a long, painful moment. ‘But—but I cannot be kept by you. I cannot be a courtesan.’
‘You would be my wife!’
‘A courtesan who has seen a church.’
‘That is a vile thing to say.’
‘No.’ Elsie’s voice sharpened. ‘It is vile to pretend that we are on an equal footing, even here and now, when the house my parents toil in is owned by your best friend. That you would not have me completely beholden to you, body and soul.’
‘Most wives welcome such a condition.’
‘I know.’ A tear fell down Elsie’s cheek. ‘I know.’
With a wince, she slid the ring off of her finger. The ring Marcus had found for her; the ring he wore himself, putting it to his lips when he knew no-one was looking. The ring purchased for a trick, a feigned marriage… but it was only as the shining gold circle fell to the floor, the sound slight but definite, that Marcus realised just how wholly he had believed in the myth he and Elsie had created. The story they had told one another.
She was right. It felt wrong, wrong in all the ways that mattered.
But she was right.
‘I will go to the kitchens now, where my mother is sleeping. She and my father will forgive me. They will not forgive you, but there is nothing I can do about that. I… I will defend you, but it will not work.’
Marcus spoke hoarsely. ‘I understand.’
‘I know you do.’ Elsie paused. ‘Goodbye.’
‘Please don’t say it.’
‘I have to.’ Elsie bowed her head as she rose. Marcus gripped the blankets in his fists, furious and helpless. ‘I wish I didn’t. But I do.’
With a last, lingering look, she turned away again. Marcus watched her go, watched her slip through the door like a ghost, closer to tears that he had been since childhood. Laying back on the bed, burying his face in the blankets, he let out a raw, low cry that shivered through him like a blow.
He didn’t quite know how he managed to return to his rooms at the Hall. He didn’t know how he managed to shave, with a silent Peterson dressing him to perfection, and greet the other members of the party at breakfast. He didn’t know how he managed to avoid James, who kept looking at him like a bloodhound searching for clues, but he did.
He didn’t know how he managed to live through the day, quietly going about the business of leisure, until invented concerns at the office of the Cappadene Club had him safely in his carriage, returning to the metropolis.
He didn’t remember the next day. There were only images that came in snatches; a bottle of brandy, Peterson’s concerned face, murmured whispers of a fever. Marcus knew it was no fever, but was too weak and silent to shout the alternative.
It was a broken heart. Nothing more, nothing less. And broken hearts could be remedied, if he kept rigid control of himself from this moment onward. The horror that consumed him, the sadness that brought grey to even the brightest of skies, could be considered a test of fortitude.
That thought was comforting, for a week or so. He could go about his daily business, admittedly with a heavy heart, and manage to put Elsie out of his mind. He could sleep at night, even if he woke up every morning with a lump in his throat.
It was only when he looked at the pile of books on his desk after another week, books he had been planning to take to Elsie, that the lump in his throat grew too large to ignore. Large enough to bring tears to his eyes, and a flood of self-recriminating curses to his lips.
He had denied himself her love for so long. Then, the moment he had pursued it, the reality of the situation had slipped arou
nd his neck and strangled him.
Why could she not simply agree to be kept? Kept safe, and loved, and in finery?
Because she was Elsie Harcourt, independent to a fault, and he loved her exactly as she was.
Despair had driven him to drink for a night, gambling for an hour, and the lure of an opium pipe for ten queasy minutes. When all of those avenues to oblivion had been tested and rejected, Marcus knew that there was only one thing for it.
He had to talk to someone. Someone close to him, who had more experience in affairs of the heart. The only possible candidate was James Hildebrande—which was why Marcus was sitting in the opulent study of the Hildebrand townhouse, looking awkwardly at James as he threw a scrap of paper on the fire.
‘Well.’ James let out a low whistle. ‘That explains your unusual behaviour at the Hall.’
‘Yes.’ Marcus shrugged. The room was warm, he knew in abstract, but he still felt cold inside. ‘I suppose it does.’
‘And she’s a Cappadene girl?’
‘She… she was going to be.’ Marcus tried to smile, but failed. ‘I met her first.’
‘Wait—is she the girl from the night I met Catherine? You were carrying around a scrap of scarlet for weeks!’
Oh Lord. He’d noticed. Marcus spoke steadily, hoping he wasn’t blushing. ‘Yes. A ribbon of hers—nothing, really. I stopped.’
He hadn’t. The ribbon lay nestled in his waistcoat pocket, where no-one could see it.
‘This Club is becoming a stalking-ground for Cupid and his arrows.’ James shook his head, leaning back in his chair. ‘You and she are the very twins of Catherine and I, in this respect.’
‘Hardly.’ Marcus looked at him with a raised eyebrow. ‘I will never be as… forthright, as you are. I certainly wasn’t as forthright with Miss Harcourt.’
‘You’re terribly polite for using the word forthright. Catherine has certainly used choicer words in the past.’ James smiled. ‘I take it you didn’t disrobe in front of her without knowing her name.’
A Courtesan's Comfort: Dukes of the Demi-Monde: Book Three Page 5
