Chapter 29
Damien had no idea how he managed to act appropriately detached at the wedding reception. He had been anything but unmoved by the sight of his bride in another man’s arms.
By the time they reached the inn where they would spend their first night alone, his baser urges were escaping the polite veneer he had worn at the wedding. He wanted to have her, to show her that her place was with him.
He gathered her against him the instant they stood alone together in their chamber. The seed pearls on the hem of her bridal gown clicked lightly against his ankles as she shifted her weight. Damien’s hand moved up the small of her back, drawing at her laces. “For your sake,” he said, “I won’t behave like an uncouth schoolboy in our bed.”
She lifted her face to his. “No?”
She looked disappointed. The sweet weight of her body against his made his blood smolder. He was dying to undress her. “An uncouth man, yes,” he said, tilting his head as his hand continued untying and unwrapping her wedding gown. Slowly. Deliberately. He would undo her undergarments next. His demons protested against his restraint. He ordered them back to hell and heard their mocking laughter.
“Damien,” she whispered, her mouth so tempting, so close to his. “The innkeeper has set a dinner for us on the table.”
“I noticed.” Under the silver covers on the table waited the light meal of beetroot salad and roast pheasant that he had ordered. Damien, however, did not have an appetite for anything but his wife. He had been ravenous for her all day. “Are you hungry?” he asked her.
“Not at all.”
“Good,” he said, and then kissed her with a practiced languor that tested his will more than it did hers.
A game of passion well played did not always need a single winner, and they no longer needed to impress anyone.
“I know nothing about the art of love,” she whispered as if she’d read his mind.
Her gown and undergarments fell away from her body at Damien’s determined efforts to disrobe her. “Do what your instincts advise,” he said in amusement. He lowered his gaze. He had every intention of taking his own advice. Eventually. But . . . had she stolen the air from his lungs? “What is the first thing you would like to do?”
Her voice had a husky sweetness that stirred up his demons again. “Put on a robe and run away.”
“But you can’t run away. Neither of us can. And honestly, Emily, do you really want to?”
“Ask me in the morning.” She backed up a few steps toward the bed. “How long do I have to stand here in the nude?”
He studied the sculpture of her body, the soft breasts and rose-brown tips, the flare of her hips, and the shadow at the apex of her thighs. He had not guessed how perfect she would be beneath her bridal gown. He had not guessed how badly he could want a woman who had confessed that her instinct was to run from him.
“It doesn’t matter anymore how we came to this place. Today we were wed.”
“To appease the world.”
“It is a commitment, nevertheless,” he said, his eyes raking her again with unmistakable intent. “In a few minutes we will take another irrevocable step.”
Her lips parted, but she said nothing. He would be patient, even though his body demanded instant gratification, a rough taking to calm his blood.
He drew a breath, swore to himself he would not overwhelm her. She was vulnerable, yes, uncertain what he would do to her. But in a heartbeat his need had weakened him. Even worse, he felt a reluctant fondness for her that couldn’t be dismissed as the result of circumstance. Was it possible that their marriage was meant to be?
Aside for her one deception, and he really hadn’t been her intended victim, she had been honest with him. She had agreed to his demands with good sense.
He hoped she would be in a good mood in the morning. He glanced back to make sure he had locked the door.
During the time he turned around, she’d found the dressing robe that Winthrop had laid out across the bed, thoughtful fool that he was. Emily was lifting the black silk to her shoulders when Damien reached out and took it from her hands. She retreated into the bed curtains. He followed until she had no recourse but to stand her ground or drop onto the mattress.
She stood.
There would be no pretense of modesty in his marriage.
“You have beautiful hair,” he said, taking another tentative step toward her. “Why don’t you pull it loose?”
She raised her hand, tugging at combs that fell to her feet. The gesture drew his eyes to her breasts, and his body reacted in a primal manner. Outwardly composed, he removed his dark coat and his neckcloth and placed them on an empty card table.
“There,” she said, shaking her head. “Is that what you wanted?”
In the next moment he was standing in front of her. She gasped, pulling her hair over her breasts.
He went down on one knee, sliding his hands up from the back of her thighs to her bottom. She bent to put her hand on his shoulder, an artless move. He stroked his fingers down the cleft of her rump. He pressed his cheek to her soft tuft of hair beneath her belly. He could have died with want for this woman.
“I have no idea what you are doing on the floor, Damien, but if you release me I will assuredly join you. I’m having a problem standing on my own. I would prefer the—”
“Bed.” He rose, grasping her by the wrists. “Or would you like me to kiss you until we are both incapable of making a conscious decision as to our destination?”
He ran his hand up her inner arm, curled it around her nape, waiting for her response. She had closed her eyes. Was she shaking because she was eager for her initiation? Aroused? Apprehensive? “One day,” he said, “you will be bold enough to ask for what you want.”
“I doubt I’ll ever be as bold as you.”
He smoothed his other hand down her neck to the peak of her breast, rolling the tip between his forefinger and thumb. “Does this please you? Is my touch too hard, too light? Tell me what excites you. I can be as good or bad in your bed as you like.”
She bit her lip, answering him with silence. He dipped his head to circle his tongue around one elongated nipple. She bowed at the waist, lost her balance. He steadied her with one arm, and with the other lowered her to the bed. Her hair fanned out across the coverlet. She looked like an offering—pure, corruptible—and, better yet, she looked willing to be his wife in every sense of the word.
“I need air,” she whispered, closing her eyes.
“I think you need a kiss, and after that a long night of lovemaking.”
She laughed. Thankfully, he didn’t need to persuade her. She was only too grateful to oblige his whims. At least so far. “What if I admit I’m already exhausted and wish to sleep for a few hours?”
One corner of his mouth lifted in a decadent smile. “You won’t know what it is to be tired until we’re both unable to move. Why don’t you kiss me and reconsider?”
“A kiss? Why not?” She rose a few inches from the bed and offered him her mouth. The moment she did he teased her with slow, light brushes of his lips against hers and then rolled onto his back. “You are indecent at heart, husband or not,” she said in breathless resentment. She drew the edge of the sheet over her breasts, as if that would stop him. “And you have the advantage of being properly dressed.”
“I might be indecent to the core.” He lifted his hand to unfasten his waistcoat and wool trousers. “But,” he added, “you still have the advantage, believe me.”
Emily sank back against the pillows while he pulled his shirt over his head. “Nudity is supposed to make us even? I’ve never felt more susceptible in my life.” She chanced a look at his erection as he threw his clothes onto a chair.
Her gaze followed the hard lines and dark hollows of his body. How well made her husband was. The candlelight cast his figure in bronze as he was revealed to her. He seemed to be more lean muscle than anything else. Strong. Firm. Lovely. She smiled inwardly at the thought. A lovely, indecent lover.
So this was the card that had been dealt her. Passion.
Wasn’t he what she had asked for? It wasn’t love. Was it all he wanted? Did the thought even enter his mind? Not at a time like this.
He lowered himself over her, bracing his weight on one arm. She felt his other hand skimming her inner thigh, reaching her wet cleft and caressing her there with feather-soft strokes of his knuckles. The steady friction made her flesh swell and ache for the ending that he withheld from her. Heat pulsed inside her, where she needed to feel all of him. Yet she didn’t know what to ask for or whether she could wait before pleading for some relief.
“This is nice,” he whispered as he pressed a finger inside her. “Tight. I’ll try to stretch you a little before I put my cock inside you.”
Her cheeks felt hot from the words he said. Her body was his playground, and he knew that sucking at her breasts while forcing another finger into her body would madden her. He knew that the sensations bombarding her would strip her of her reason. She wanted him. Inside her. Touching her everywhere. Her body grew taut with the sensual tension that she could not endure much longer.
“Why are you torturing me?” she whispered restlessly.
“Torture? I’m just making sure you have enough room to take me without hurting you too much.”
She caught her lip in her teeth and stared down at the knob of his shaft. She watched his other hand reach down to spread her sex completely open. Damien stopped moving. Her eyes lifted to his to acknowledge the invitation.
“Please,” she whispered, her hips moving, her breathing uneven. “I want you inside me.”
He slid down her body without warning, holding her thighs apart with his hands. For a moment Emily thought he was backing onto the floor. But then his head lowered between her legs. In shock and bliss she felt his mouth settle on the bud of her sex. He suckled hard, his tongue flicking below as his hands pinned her hips to keep her from lifting off the bed.
What degradation. How could she have anticipated the pressure that built in her lower body, that made her writhe against his face? The feelings he unleashed were too intense. She whispered, “Stop. I need to breathe. Stop for a minute. Give me time to think.”
He didn’t stop. “I can’t,” he explained as his fingers pushed deep inside her, and his mouth ate and teased her without the smallest show of mercy.
“You don’t understand. It’s more than I expected. I didn’t know it would feel like this.”
“You haven’t felt anything yet.”
“How can you say that?”
He raised his head briefly to stare into her eyes. “You haven’t felt me inside you.”
“You—” Her voice broke on a groan. He was breathing hard, too, but at least he could breathe.
“Hmm? What was that? I couldn’t quite make it out.”
She fought her impending release even as she shook in need. She was his wife. It was his right to unravel her. And the day would come, she vowed, that she would do the same to him.
Innumerable knots tightened in her belly. Despite her apprehension, she was desperate for him. Her body knew, lifting, moving, opening to take the length of him.
“It will be good,” he promised, and the knots inside her broke, the pleasure of her release beautiful, unbearable, a rush of sensation that left her shivering and so mindless she didn’t realize that he was between her thighs. In a haze she heard him whisper to her to put her legs over his shoulders. She obeyed. An instant later she felt the fullness of him forcing inside her, and she was his.
“Look at me,” he said with an urgency that she would not have understood an hour ago. She looked up at his face as he caught her wrists in his hand and strained into her. His body went still before he whispered her name. He pressed deeper and deeper. He moved faster, harder, until he thrust a final time, and he was hers.
He shuddered, exhaled, and buried his face in her hair. She didn’t move. Her body might have resisted at first; it was embarrassing, unfamiliar, but he fit perfectly inside her like the missing piece of a puzzle.
She liked the feel of Damien’s body imprisoning hers. Could she be dreaming? She felt as if she were half-awake and yet drifting in a dream. Would she ever become as uninhibited as her husband? She couldn’t deny that what they’d just done had felt natural.
Would he view her differently from here on? Would they mate again before the morning? She wondered whether he’d mind if she squeezed out from beneath him to wash herself in the dark before he stirred again. She wanted to brush her hair. She also yearned to touch his body and learn every inch of him.
She wasn’t quite ready to disturb this unexpected intimacy or to arouse all that dormant sexuality. She felt altogether possessed, taken. Ploughed. That was the vulgar term the village boys used to describe the deed. It made a woman sound like a field.
Could she have conceived Damien’s child after their first lovemaking? She didn’t doubt his virility. How many times had she heard Iris warn the younger maids? “It is entirely possible for a man to put a bun in your oven the first time he tries. Many a girl loses her maidenhood only to realize a month later that she’s to become a mother.”
At least Damien had married her before ploughing—she smiled at the word—her.
“Emily,” he said, his voice slurred with sleep. “Stop doing that.”
“Stop doing what?” she whispered.
“Stop smiling and playing with your hair like a siren. You’re asking for trouble if you don’t.” He rolled onto his shoulder, staring down at her face. “What is it?”
“I didn’t realize I was smiling.”
He raised his brow. “I shall take it as a compliment.” He studied her face and the shape of her against the sheets. “I only have to look at you like that and I’m hard. Are you too sore?”
“Are you wanting to plough me again?” she asked quietly.
“Am I—” He laughed. “Yes. I am.” He ran his hand down her breasts to her belly and then between her damp thighs. “Do you mind if I don’t wash our scent away yet? I find it pleasant.”
“Like an animal,” she whispered, trying not to laugh.
“Yes.” He hesitated. “What a shame you are still too tender to ride me.” He brushed away the hair that hid her breasts from his view. Emily felt shivers deep in her own stomach as he bent his head to kiss each sensitive peak in turn.
“Ride you?” she whispered.
He glanced up, his eyes rueful. “Not yet. I have to remember that you are to be tenderly used our first few times in bed. I am long estranged from innocence. You make me forget that fact.”
“You make me forget a great deal myself.”
“I’m struggling,” he said, sliding his knee between her thighs, “to keep my depravity under control for as long as I can.”
“If what happened in bed is an example of what you consider self-control, I am in more trouble than I thought.” She went quiet for a few moments, working up her courage to whisper, “Damien? Have you done this many times before—ploughed other women?”
“If you use that word again, I will start to think of myself as an ox. I don’t know how many times, to be truthful. Not as many as you appear to think.”
“Tell me again how you became wealthy.”
He smiled. “I wanted fortune more than anything. I worked hard. I fought. I invested, until one day I realized I was nothing but a marauder with fine ancestry. I suppose I was as interested in plundering as well as ploughing at the time.”
“Isn’t that what most gentlemen are like?”
“Yes. But I grew tired of it. So did the woman I was going to marry.”
Emily’s eyes widened. In a neutral voice she asked, “You were engaged?”
“Until I lost everything. She married another man.”
“Oh. How very cruel of her.”
“It was kindness, in retrospect. It allowed me the freedom to do what mattered the most.”
Emily desperately longed to know everything about the woman who had first captured his heart. “Do you still love her?”
“Let me put it this way. I’d sooner kiss the innkeeper’s arse than kiss her again.”
She sighed. “Romantic sentiment just rolls off your tongue, doesn’t it?”
He stared down at her with a darkly unapologetic smile. “Do you want a poet or a protector?”
There, that was blunt. Well, at least she recognized it as honest. “I’ll take a protector for now. If we live to a good old age, then we can write poems to each other.” Emily knew he was tired, but he seemed to be in a mood that was receptive to her questions. “What did you do before I met you?”
“My past in foreign service is hard to explain to a young woman who has never left England,” he said. “Several years ago at the urging of my cousin, Heath, I was asked to find out once and for all the fate of Heath’s youngest brother Brandon, and Brandon’s friend Samuel. The family had been led to believe they’d been murdered in Nepal.”
“And they hadn’t?”
“I pursued false leads until at last, in prison, a guard’s daughter gave me reason to hope that they had survived. It was an Englishman, Samuel’s uncle, who had ordered their execution. Their bodies had never been recovered.”
Emily was silent.
“All I discovered was one mystery leading to another until ultimately the end of the search led me back to England. I thought I would put my financial affairs in order, meeting up with old friends and family, when I was asked to become involved in crushing the conspiracy, which meant assuming a false identity.”
“Of course you accepted.”
“Yes.”
“Are you one of those men who need action and purpose all the time?”
“Emily, go to sleep.”
? ? ?
She closed her eyes. But now Damien was awake and full of his own questions. Would his wife prove to be another mystery he’d spend the rest of his life trying to solve?
He looked down to see that she had drifted off to sleep in his arms.
Was it possible that a woman, like a flower, could physically blossom before one’s eyes with the right exposure? He was far from a poet. But he had to admit that Emily had either brought out his vulnerabilities or her hidden talents.
Now he had to wonder who had pulled the wool over whose eyes and who, when every last layer had been bared, they would become.