The wind was howling fiercely and the rain lashing bitterly against the windows as Marcus stood to put another log on the fire. A quick glance at his pocket watch revealed the hour to be well past midnight, but despite his bloodshot eyes and the shadows beneath them, he did not feel tired. Moving to the narrow stretch of windows that looked down across the valley he watched the storm in silence, his thoughts hidden behind a mask of indifference.
He had been sleeping poorly ever since he had come to Woodsgate, and for that he blamed his wife. He could not close his eyes without seeing her face. He could not walk into the bedroom they had once shared without inhaling her scent. It was here they had come after they were wed and it was here she had shyly given him her innocence. She was everywhere and no where, haunting him as no ghost ever had.
Perhaps he should simply grant her the divorce and be done with it. She would return to London and he could remain at Kensington in peace and quiet. Their paths would rarely, if ever, cross. But that would not, he grimly suspected, purge his ever present thoughts of her.
Suddenly feeling restless, Marcus turned to the liquor cabinet and poured himself a glass of scotch. He knew he drank too much, but it was the only thing that seemed to numb the ache inside of his body. Settling into a generously upholstered leather chair that faced the fireplace he sipped the drink slowly as he wearily contemplated what had brought him to his point.
He and Catherine had been so bloody happy in the beginning. It had been his fourth season, her first. Initially he had been drawn to her because of her beauty, but his interest had only been further aroused by her charm and wit. She was intelligent and amusing; entertaining him endlessly with stories and poems during the long walks they took with each other in the beginning of their courtship. When he had stolen his first kiss from her in the shadows of VauxhallGardens during a ball she had actually slapped him full across the face, and then had the gall to lean forward and kiss him. It was, Marcus realized with a faint smile, one of his fondest memories of her. Taking another liberal sip of scotch, his expression abruptly darkened as he recalled the events that had transpired shortly after their wedding.
He had brought her to Woodsgate for their honeymoon, where they frolicked like children during the day and learned the secrets of each other’s bodies by night. His wife’s shyness had thrilled him, but it had been her sensuality that stunned him.
Marcus had never claimed to be a saint, and had bedded his fair share of women before marrying Catherine. He had anticipated his wedding night to be filled with tears and vapors, as most virgins were wont to carry on in some dramatic fashion before and after the deed was done, but he should have known better. Nothing about Catherine was ever typical, and their wedding night had been so exception. She had winced when he penetrated her, but then it had been her grasping arms, not the thrust of his hips, which had drawn him into her fully.
“Do you want me to stop?” he had gasped, his face strained with the effort of holding himself back. Her sweet, innocent kisses and wandering touches had aroused him beyond measure and it was all he could do to stop himself from taking her like some rutting beast.
Unable to express the feelings that were building up inside of her she had looked up at him pleadingly and with a low chuckle he had dipped even further inside of her before pulling back out, causing her eyes to round and her breath to catch.
“Is that all?” she had whispered, her voice thick with ill disguised disappointment.
“No,” Marcus had replied huskily as he lowered his head to nuzzle between her breasts. “That is most certainly not all. Climb on top of me, darling.”
“On top of you?”
“Yes. Like this,” he had said as he deftly rolled them both over and held her astride his hips. Her hair had rained down like a golden waterfall, grazing the tips of his nipples as she remained poised above him, uncertain of what to do next. Capturing her lips in a searing kiss that left them both breathless, Marcus gently positioned her over his swollen manhood.
“You can… do it like this?” she has asked uncertainly.
His grin had been positively wicked. “You can do it any way imaginable, love. Now ride me. Yes, that’s it. Oh, yes,” he had gasped as she established a thrusting rhythm with her hips, “yes, just like that.”