The small bite of pain only added to her pleasure. She loved the way he let himself go and only held on tighter to her. She opened fully, absorbing his brute force with wickedness. He withdrew abruptly. Air swirled through the space between them when a moment ago they’d been one.
He wrapped those long fingers around his cock. “Where?”
Her eyes went wide. She knew what he was doing, preventing children. He could have deposited into the blankets, but she was struck with the sudden, instant need to see. She spread her fingers wide across her stomach. “Here.”
He gulped hard. Still his hand stroked his prick, to the crisp dark hair at the base and then up to the top, where he was swollen and red. Twice was all that was needed, then his release spilled across her skin. She touched it though she knew she shouldn’t. Sticky and so very hot. The moment managed to be both depraved and right.
On a contented sigh, she let her head fall toward the bed. Ian collapsed beside her so they were shoulder to shoulder, looking up. Their chests rose and fell on fast pants in tandem.
She felt...strange. Deserted, though she’d shared this brilliant thing with a man she was coming to care about. Maybe it was having to be alone in her body when a moment ago she had held him inside herself. She’d lost something and gained a new part of her soul. New knowledge about what she was capable of that was quite frankly majestic enough to be frightening.
One of her hands was now sticky with his release, so she reached into the small and narrow space between them with her other hand. It felt like a tiny miracle that his hand slid toward hers as well. Their fingers laced together.
She had to lick her lips in order to be able to talk. Her voice had gone raw. “I understand now.”
“What’s that?” The barest curiosity sounded in his voice. He turned his head toward her. He looked as blasted as she felt. She took a measure of pride in that.
“What?” She’d lost her train of thought, already thinking about his body again. About exploring him at her leisure. While she’d needed to be rid of her virginity, she couldn’t see indulging in a life of sin and vice. If nothing else, the risk was too high. Experimenting along these lines too many times would eventually net her a child—the very thing she’d set out to avoid.
That didn’t mean she couldn’t have at least one more turn.
His mouth curved into a bit of a smirk. He rolled onto the shoulder nearer her. He loomed so well, she wanted to nestle into the shelter of his body. “What do you understand?”
She gave in and entwined their legs. It took her a second to find her thoughts again. “Why they put such proscriptions on such intimacy. Try to convince women that it’s horrible.”
He coiled a lock of her hair around his finger, then let it trail and drape over her breast. It tickled. She shivered. He admired his handiwork with a pleased grin. “And why is that?”
“Because my only regret now is that I didn’t do that years ago. Women would run rampant.” She failed at holding back her teasing giggle.
“You didn’t know me years ago.” He flicked a glance at her from under his dark lashes. His eyes glowed with mischief. “I believe this is where I’m supposed to be offended.”
“How delicate men can be at times.”
“It’s true.” He dropped soft kisses along her shoulder. “Completely fragile. It’s the real reason no one talks about how good sex is. Because I’d break if you were to kick me out now.”
She let her fingernails scrape under his hair. The strands were rough silk. The best part was when his eyes drifted shut. “Might you cry?”
“Maybe. A manly sniffle, perhaps.” He flashed her his most cheeky smile. “I could create a tear or two if you thought you might kiss it away.”
She pushed up on her elbows enough that her mouth nearly touched his. “Gather up your ballocks and kiss me yourself.”
How could he not obey? Before Lottie, he hadn’t kissed while smiling, but now he seemed to do it often. She tasted like sweetness and salt, everything good. Manhandling the back of her neck wasn’t intended to hold her still. It was so that he could touch as much of her as he could manage. Any space between them was space wasted.
The kiss turned so slow, it was like being drugged in the best sort of way. Deliberate touches. Already Ian’s prick was waking again, as if he were a randy boy who’d recently figured out what women were.
He was coming to adore Lottie, her humor and her shine. The very qualities he’d once thought were only gilding, he now realized were fully her. She might lie, but only to protect those most tender parts of her soul. She needed an ally. In this whole wide world, she seemed to show no one her real self.
He wanted to be that person who knew her and protected her and who kept her safe from the rest of the world.
His hand wound deep through her soft hair, his mouth on the heaven of her lips, Ian suddenly realized he had exactly what he’d been looking for. A woman who could keep him twisted up in their life together for the rest of eternity. If he’d found himself a regular country girl, he’d have been bored inside of six weeks. That would never happen with Lottie. She’d always keep him alert.
In the meantime, he would be able to kiss her whenever he wanted. Feel the delicate curve of her waist and ribs. He liked the dip between her breasts. The way her flesh was resilient and elegant.
As he traced his mouth down her neck, heavy on the lips and teeth and tongue, headed with intent toward those berry-tipped breasts, there was a shift in the air. Not sound so much, not at first. A breeze whispered over his bare back.
“Lottie, are you awake, my dove? I had an epiphany about the depth of two dimensionality in my paintings, and I wanted to talk to you about it.”
Lottie flinched, jerking upright. “Mama, get out.”
Jesus Christ. Ian flipped them and scrambled for the tangled sheet. He yanked it over their bodies, but he rather thought Lady Vale was far enough down the long, narrow room she wouldn’t see anything.
It helped she intently studied a book in her hands. “What? Is there a problem?” she asked, without ever looking up.
Lottie slipped out the other side of the sheets, shrugging into a diaphanous robe. She tossed a frantic look back over her shoulder, but besides sinking farther into the bedclothes, Ian couldn’t see a damn place he could go. Her bed was set alone, with no furniture directly about it. He’d look for a dressing room sort of door, but all that stuff was piled near the front of the room, where her mother was. Exactly where he didn’t want to be.
Out the window, maybe? Except he was starkers and they were three floors up. He shrugged, pulling the blankets past his waist.
She rolled her eyes and held a finger to her lips. Sure. He was going to chatter away any minute.
She scurried toward her mother with her hands fluttering as if trying to provide a distraction. “It’s past two in the morning. Can’t we discuss this tomorrow?”
The older woman pointed at something in the open pages. “It’ll leave me if I can’t get a grasp on it. See this? It’s Caravaggio’s. He had it, three hundred years ago. I’ve been a fool.”
Lottie took her mother by the shoulders, gently steering her back toward the door. “Where is Nicolette? Didn’t she administer your medicine this evening?”
“I rid myself of it when she wasn’t looking.” She looked up, blinking. “Is there someone with you?”
Lottie shook her head, frantic. “I’ll meet you downstairs if you like, Mama. If we discuss it in your studio, you’ll be able to show me examples.”
“There is.” Lady Vale craned her neck to the side, trying to see around Lottie, who was equally insistently trying to block her view. “A man. Have you a man in your bed?”
Lottie’s hand went to her head, and Ian could sympathize. Pressure and tension pinched hard over his skull. He fisted one hand in the blankets. He hadn’t ever enjoyed being helpless, and at that moment he completely was. He nodded, though he wasn’t sure if she’d be able to see it through the
shadows and the length of the room.
He rather wished his trousers weren’t on the floor next to the chaise. “Good evening, Lady Vale.”
“Sir Ian,” she cooed. She waved, twiddling her fingers. “How marvelous to see you again. I should like you to come to dinner some evening. I haven’t yet properly thanked you for saving me that day.”
He inclined his head, as near as he could get to a bow from his position in Lottie’s bed. “Name the evening and I’ll be there.”
“Wonderful. And do you have family?”
Ian hesitated over the truth, but it wasn’t as if she couldn’t discover the information if she set out to find it. “My mother and sister are in town.”
“Bring them as well.”
“Mother,” Lottie said with no small measure of exasperation. “You simply cannot.”
She flipped her hand in a dismissive gesture. “What? Am I supposed to yell at you? I should never dare be so boring and provincial. Though I suppose you should be thankful your father isn’t here. He’d be rather displeased. In fact, I believe you and I should agree to keep this our little secret. And you, as well,” she directed toward Ian.
“As you say,” he agreed, thankful that she couldn’t see his expression and the grin he held back. The whole scene had an air of absurdity he’d have expected to see in one of Shakespeare’s more ridiculous plays.
“Mama, you have to go,” Lottie said with stressed emphasis. She kept looking back over her shoulder as if wishing Ian would drop through the floor.
So much the worse that he couldn’t oblige her.
Lady Vale went out on a push and a rather gentle shove. She continued chattering the whole time, going on about the menu for the dinner they’d have, with a random segue for Lottie to remind Lady Vale to talk about two-dimensional skies the next morning. Lottie agreed.
Then she shut the door. She turned back toward the room, but that took the last bit of her energy. She sank against the wood. Her fingertips rose to her forehead. “Oh sweet saints,” she muttered.
Ian shoved out of the bed and stalked toward her. “Did that really, truly happen?”
“She’s right. Be thankful it was her and not my father.” She spoke with her eyes closed and her head back against the door.
“Didn’t you lock the door?” He passed his trousers and grabbed them, pausing only briefly to pull them on. Raw wool rubbed over his ass. At this point he didn’t care.
“She must have stolen the key. Again.” She opened her eyes and looked at him imploringly. “I am so sorry, Ian. I’m sure that was humiliating.”
He shrugged. Finally close enough to touch, he wrapped his hands around her upper shoulders and pulled her face into his bare chest. She went surprisingly easily. “It’s all right. I suppose someone else’s engagement must have started on a more embarrassing note, though I can hardly imagine how.”
She stiffened body part by body part. Her shoulders were first, then her spine straightened. Her neck was last, drawing her cheek away from its press against his chest. “Engagement?”
“That’s what I said.” He hadn’t planned anything of the sort, but once the opportunity arose, the idea felt right. Maybe part of him had only been waiting for the excuse. This moment. “It’s the appropriate response to such a discovery.”
“Don’t say such things.” She pushed away, shaking her head. Though the sash of her robe was already tied, she knotted it. “An engagement would be foolish. People would only talk behind our backs when it ended.”
“Who says it has to end?”
She smiled as big and bright as she ever had. “Why, I do, of course.” She cupped his jaw. Her touch was gentle and silken. “You don’t want to marry me.”
His hands framed her narrow waist. “It’s not the worst sort of option either. Marriage is one of those inevitable sorts of things. Why not with someone I enjoy?”
She stretched up on her toes and brushed a gracious kiss over his mouth. Her arms draped over his shoulders, and after that first gentle kiss she pushed deeper. Swept her tongue over his in what could have been either promise or farewell.
“It’s certainly not inevitable. I’m not marrying anyone. If I were tempted by your sweepingly romantic declaration,” she said with a dry measure of humor.
“Why not marry?” And why was there an inexplicable twinge in the lower regions of his chest?
Her smile wavered enough that he wanted to touch her supple cheek and make the shadows lurking behind her eyes go away. “Because with marriage comes children. And for the women of my family, children bring the madness. I can’t do that to anyone. I’m the last of our line. It’ll end with me.”
Chapter Seventeen
Lottie had desperately attempted to talk both her mama and Ian out of the dinner. She spent hours in her mama’s salon, holding an apple so that her mother could sketch it in the right light, all the while talking. Trying to convince her that this was pointless and a ridiculous idea that was begging for trouble. Mama would be bored with such provincial company.
She’d had Ian meet her at the school, where she’d done exactly the same thing, though she’d left out the argument about less-than-sufficient polish. He’d sat in the chair across from her desk with his hands folded over his stomach and an intent look on his handsome face. Then his mouth had drawn down into a frown that emphasized his strong nose. For a moment, she thought he’d agree. Until he snatched her by the waist, dragged her onto his lap and kissed her senseless.
Once she’d been breathless and clinging to the open plackets of his jacket, he’d said no. That her mother had issued the invitation and he’d accepted. It wasn’t her place to withdraw. Not to mention, Etta would be well served by meeting the people who would see her launched to society the next week.
Then he’d left, claiming business to attend to. His sister and mother had to be taken to the shops to ensure they had sufficient wardrobes.
She hated being ignored.
Which was why she crossed her arms over her chest and tapped her toes, standing in the open doorway of her family’s seldom-used formal dining room. “Mama! Do you at least promise to behave?”
Lady Vale came to a halt at the head of the table. Her armful of dyed-purple ostrich feathers fluttered like fingers. “Of course I will. How can you ask me such with bald rudeness?”
Lottie sighed all the way from the bottom of her stomach. “Of course, Mother. I’m sorry.”
As far as Lottie was concerned, it was a legitimate concern. Her mother always meant well. Always intended to behave. Then she’d end up halfway into a bottle of brandy and halfway out the upper-story windows with her skirts hiked to her waist.
Mama looked perfectly put together. The slim-cut gown skimmed over leanness that spoke well of a woman her age. The dark purple skirt was close over her hips and pulled up in the back to a graceful bustle with swags of rich material.
Lottie’s dress was quite similar in shape, narrow-cut at the hips and with a bustle. But where her mother had purple cording along the hem and bodice, Lottie had knotted silk flowers of pale white in contrast to the dark green silk dress. They outlined her bosom and swept down to curve around her waist. Every single one had been set intentionally.
They’d been chosen to torment Ian, to make him want to touch her. Because she’d liked so very much being touched by him. Yet in the past two weeks, he’d kept it almost...superficial. She felt absurd calling it such when she lived for the feel of his mouth on hers. They snuck kisses whenever they had a chance, but there it was. She wanted more. Strange distance dwelled in the space between them, and she wasn’t sure where it was from.
Nor was she sure whether she really wanted it to go away. She couldn’t afford to become any more involved with Ian. The friendly, affectionate level they maintained had to be enough.
Her mama went back to arranging the slender feathers in an artistic grouping of vases that ranged down the table. “There.” She stepped back with a measure of satisfaction. “It’s
the small details that bring a picture together.”
“Small?” Lottie eyed the feathers dubiously. They towered three feet over the table, and the gold-tinted glass of the vases would be difficult to see through. Lucky the dinner guests would have the companions next to them to speak with.
“I wish your father could have been here,” Lady Vale said as she brushed off her fingertips and headed toward the front parlor. She made a beeline for the sideboard filled with crystal decanters.
Lottie’s stomach flipped as she watched her mother pour a tiny glass of sherry. Hopefully that would be it. She nibbled on the inside of her bottom lip. “Father had business.”
Mama shot Lottie a very amused look over the edge of her glass. “As you say.”
So what if she wanted to believe Father had business at their estate in Derbyshire? It didn’t seem like an evil fiction. He probably was doing some sort of business while there. It would be difficult to avoid the estate manager all together, after all.
Besides, sometimes she barely blamed her father. She could do with a holiday in the country now and then. If it weren’t for the school to run, she’d have fled for their family’s estate as well. Or farther. Run away to the south of France to go mad in peace.
Except when the butler ushered in Ian and his family, she knew that wasn’t true. Her heart gave a tiny leap into her throat before delving to her toes. It lingered there, sickly and a little pained.
Why in the name of God did she have to be so happy to see Ian? He looked handsome in the usual white-and-black combo of evening wear. Precisely starched collars framed his sharp jaw. His bright eyes sought her out across the room. “Lady Vale, Miss Vale. Please allow me to introduce my mother, Mrs. Heald, and my sister, Henrietta.”
The requisite bows and curtsies and greetings went around before Lottie’s mother gave a wide grin. “How lovely it is to meet you, Mrs. Heald. I am ever so grateful for your gracious raising of Sir Ian. If it weren’t for him, I’d be buried in the family crypt four weeks past.”
An Indiscreet Debutante Page 16
