A Passionate Endeavor (26 page)

All gentle, flowing curves and long slender
limbs just waiting to be touched and awakened. He sucked in his
breath, praying for control.

Without thinking, he drew his shirt over his
head in one swift motion. Her gaze lowered and her eyes widened. He
must patiently arouse her anew to dampen her fear and replace it
with yearning. He stroked her arms and felt gooseflesh.

Nicholas knew without glancing that her legs
were clamped together. He stroked her slender thighs over and over,
trying to relax her.

“Dear heart, open yourself to me,” he
whispered into the delicate shell of her ear before gently biting
her small earlobe. She trembled for a moment and released the
tension in her legs, allowing him to spread her legs wide. His
fingers sought her sensitive point of pleasure, stroking and
massaging with the lightest of touches until he heard her breath
quicken. Her flushed face began to twist from side to side, and he
knew she was in a complete heightened state of arousal, lost to the
world around her. His fingers continued their erotic dance, skin to
skin, as he slowly circled the entrance to her and delved into the
edge beyond.

“Nicholas, Nicholas. Oh, I need… I need…
something,” she whispered. “Please…”

The time was ripe, the air heavy with
unrelieved tension. He moved his body to cover hers, forcing her
legs even wider with his own. With tender longing, he entered her
slowly, stretching the small, tight, very virginal passage until he
met a barrier. God, but she was tiny, and she was like a delicacy
before a starving man. She had become very still and tense all over
again. He longed to gorge himself quickly, but did not.

He withdrew to massage the sensitive point of
pleasure for long moments, and lowered his head to taste her
breasts once again. The tension in his body was tight as a bow, and
he could wait no longer. He must have her.

In one long, swift movement, he entered her
as gently as he could muster and drove past her virginity until he
could feel her inner muscles constricting all around his full
length. He felt such exquisite pleasure it was almost painful. He
paused and allowed her to get used to his invasion of her tiny
body. He swallowed and prayed for regulation of his senses.
Nicholas raised his head to look at her. Her head was pressed back
deep into the pillow, her puffy lips opened in unfeigned desire,
her eyes closed.

“Are you all right, Charlotte?” he asked
raggedly.

Her eyes opened ever so slightly. He was lost
in their gray depths of emotion.

“Yes. Is it over?” she asked, it seemed to
Nicholas somewhat sadly.

“No, my dear, it has just begun.”

“Oh… Am I expected to do something?”

Nicholas smiled, glad the momentary
distraction tempered the raw edges of his desire. “No, but I
daresay if you move, this will be over before it has begun.
Charlotte, you make me feel like an inexperienced boy, unable to
muster any kind of control.”

He watched a small smile tease the corners of
her lips. “I am glad I please you.”

He kissed her dimples and began the ebb and
flow of a slow rhythm that made her eyes widen in surprise. He
edged up her legs with his hands to wrap her limbs around his back,
and then urged her to bind her arms around his neck.

She was all petite, charming femininity. As
he drove into her, branding her as his own, he felt her body
tighten about his own. Her small arms gripped his back in an effort
to draw him deeper, deeper still. Then suddenly her body stilled,
and at the peak of its straining she called out his name.

“Nicholas, Nicholas… Oh,” she whispered, her
breath caught.

He stroked deeply once, twice, then broke
through the final fraction of an inch to fill her and release his
seed into her very core. It felt like a release of years, powerful
and overwhelming. He longed to crush her to him and burden her with
the sudden realization of his great love for her.

He closed his eyes. That was the word. It had
been so thoroughly wrapped up in a desire to protect her and
nurture her that he had failed to see his feelings for what they
truly were. He loved her. And he would love her always.

The question was whether he loved her enough
to let her go, to let her live her life to its full potential
without him to hold her back. He was not sure he could do it.

“I am afraid I am too heavy for you. You are
so small.”

“Don’t go. Oh, please don’t. It feels
wonderful having you hold me,” she said.

“Ah, my Charlotte,” he said, and bit his
tongue to hold back the words he longed to say.

He rolled off her and pulled her into his
arms on her side. His shoulder provided a solid pillow. He longed
to close his eyes and drift into what he was sure would be the most
peaceful slumber, but he resisted.

“Would you like me to stay with you here
tonight? Or shall I return to the abbey and leave you in
peace?”

“Would you mind very much if I asked you to
stay?”

His heart surged with joy. “Not at all. It
would be my pleasure.” He pressed her body closer to his own and
felt himself falling, falling into a blissful state of peace.

She would never be able to fall asleep. Not
on this, the most momentous day of her life. She would not be able
to or want to miss a moment of feeling his arms around her. She
felt something she had never experienced in all her years. She felt
cherished. Oh, he did not love her as she loved him, but she did
feel he treasured her, and she prayed she had performed her marital
duties adequately, even though she knew he had done everything. It
was a pity she would not have the chance to try some of the
suggestions Alexandre had made.

She felt much more bold now that she
understood the actual process, she thought in her traditional
methodical manner. She had not realized conjugal relations could
bring such unexplainable yearning and gratification. Now she
understood why it was required to finalize a marriage. The act
bonded two people together, body and soul, in a fashion impossible
to reverse. Impossible to forget.

How could she live the rest of her life near
him without wanting to experience this ultimate act again and
again? It would become an obsession, which would lead her to
madness.

She must accept his offer to live away from
him or she would end up losing every ounce of pride and be reduced
to begging for his attentions. But perhaps, just perhaps, he might
not spurn her touches, this night only. She must make memories to
last a lifetime.

And so it went.

He did not ignore her tentative touches. The
rest of the night was filled with patches of sleep for him in
between gentle lovemaking instigated by her. She forced herself to
fling away the last vestiges of her bashfulness by touching and
exploring every perfect feature of his body, first with her hands
and finally, at moonset, with her lips, following his example. She
was unsure who was more surprised by her boldness, he or she. But
she hoped desperately that she had pleased him. He had groaned and
whispered his delight over and over. Oh, please let him want to
make love to her again after this one night.

She was very sore, but it was a pleasurable
feeling nonetheless. She felt very womanly, very content. As the
unwanted first tentacles of dawn groped through the curtains in her
small bedchamber, she worried that by prolonging the sweet agony of
the pleasures of the night she had not satisfied her thirst for
memories, but whetted her appetite for more.

She turned her head to find his half-opened
green eyes staring at her.

“I must look a fright.” She touched her
tangled locks.

“Quite the opposite. You look a veritable
goddess of… of desire,” he said, with a slow, devastating smile.
“There, that is your first compliment today. And no, I see your
look. You are not allowed to negate any compliments.”

It would be very, very easy to allow herself
to become reduced to the status of worshipful slave to him.

“All right. But I shall repay you with a fine
breakfast, if you will allow. I gave Doro the day off, as I could
not bear to see her knowing looks this morning. So I hope you will
be satisfied with day-old bread and coddled eggs.”

“I can see you would be useful on the front
lines by your willingness to cook the morning after your wedding
night.” His eyes twinkled.

Charlotte marveled at his rugged virility.
His muscled, bronzed form lay against the white bed linen in all
its tempting magnificence. Even the healed gash on his thigh and a
various assortment of battle scars added to his powerful magnetism.
His eyes darkened as he watched her looking at him.

He reached for her and dragged her against
him once more. “But, I think I must have one last taste of you
before anything else, and besides, it isn’t anywhere near morning,”
he growled into her willing ear.

It had been easier to lose her inhibitions in
the complete darkness when the candle had guttered. In the dim
stillness of dawn, she observed his fully aroused male state and
swallowed. She looked into his eyes and caressed his whiskered face
with her small hand, so happy that he wanted her despite the
reality of the receding shadows.

Suddenly, he stilled. “I think, perhaps, I
have overstayed my welcome. Charlotte, you are too good. You must
be very sore and uncomfortable. Come, my dear, if you will see to
our breakfast, I will see toward a bath for you, my tender-hearted
bride.”

She looked down at the traces of blood on the
sheets and felt shy again. She hastily rearranged the bedcovers.
“As you wish. But I am very willing, more than willing to
accommodate you first.”

He stared hard at her, and finally pulled her
once more into his arms, giving and taking in an age-old fashion
that brought secret tears to her eyes in the final throes.

“
It was, perhaps, one of those cases in
which advice is good or bad only as the event decides
.”

—Jane Austen

I TOLD you,
ma cherie
, that you must
leave all timidity out of the bedroom,” Alexandre said, while he
slashed through the face of the clay bust he had been working
on.

“Zut, alors. This is the most frustrating
craft. What if we relieve our tensions instead, by me showing you
some of the ways you could attract that cold-hearted Englishman
back into your bed?”

Charlotte sighed and continued to rework the
noble forehead of her clay model. “Alexandre, I know you mean well,
and that you are flirting with me to tease me out of my mopes, but
really, I cannot find any humor in your comments today. I am
sorry.”

“Ah, but you do not know me very well, then.
I do not flatter where I do not see potential. And I find the idea
of teaching you a few methods of madness quite, quite intoxicating
now that you are a more, shall we say, experienced coquette? I
promise you I could lead you to heights unknown,” he said with a
wicked grin. Alexandre wiped his hands on the cloth, giving up his
creative efforts. He came around behind her and placed his arms
around her waist. “You are enchanting,” he whispered into her
ear.

She swatted him lightly. “And you are nothing
but a charming tease.”

He nibbled at her neck and blew a kiss under
her ear. Funny, it did not feel as pleasant as when Nicholas had
done the exact same thing to her two weeks earlier.

Since then, after moving into the oppressive
abbey and witnessing the departure of her brother, Charlotte had
spent more and more time in her private clay room, away from her
rooms in the abbey, which Nicholas never attempted to enter. For
the first three nights after her wedding night, she had waited for
him in her chambers, sure he would cross the threshold to take her
in his arms again. They had shared so much that first night. She
had been sure he would come to her. But, he had not.

On the fourth night, she had fortified
herself with a large glass of secreted brandy and had gone, with
shaky spirits, to his door and knocked loudly. Three times. He had
refused to answer. So, she had her answer. He did indeed want the
marriage of convenience he had originally proposed.

Alexandre fluttered light kisses on her neck,
bringing her back to the present.

At that precise moment, Nicholas chose to
cross the threshold of her sanctuary with nary a knock of warning.
Her damnable cousin chuckled and released her after languidly
running his hand down her arm, perilously close to her breast.

Nicholas stood stock still, taking it all in
without a word. “You have remarkably bad timing, my lord,” said
Alexandre. “And you, sir, show a lamentable lack of good
judgment.”

Charlotte had never seen Nicholas appear so
coldly contained. “You misunderstand, Nicholas. Alexandre was just
keeping me company while I worked.” She knew her voice was not well
modulated. “He meant no harm.”