"The rooms are not yet ready. I told Polly and Roberts we'd wait in here." He glanced up at her. "Are you hungry?"
She shook her head and sat back down. They'd eaten a large meal at the coaching house where she'd tried to fix the chimney. She rested a small chin on one hand and relived that misadventure. So much smoke. She shook her head.
"We have no cook and no butler," he said, "so it's just as well you're not hungry, I suppose."
"You could always cook," she suggested with a smile.
He scowled at her.
Still no sense of humor. She sat there idly twisting the pillow fringe and looking at the green and gold room. The pale green sofa and chairs formed a circle atop a deep green Aubusson carpet that matched the malachite bordering the dark wood floors and trimming the hearth and mantel. The room was more formal than the salon at
Belmore
Park
, more fragile and stiff. Sitting on the sofa was akin to sitting on a block of
Aberdeen
granite. She cast a quick glance at Alec. He didn't look any more comfortable than she felt, but she wondered if it was from the hard furniture or the awkward silence in the oppressive room.
She craned her neck and squinted at the ceiling.
"Orpheus and Eurydice," Alec said in an offhand manner.
"Hmm?"
"The scene on the ceiling." He stared at it, too. "Remind me not to look back."
"Hmm? Look back at what?"
"Nothing."
She searched for something to say to fill the awkward silence. "You mentioned your grandmother. What was she like?"
"I never knew her, only of her. She died before I was born."
"And your mother?"
"What about her?"
"What was she like?"
He seemed surprised by the question, then stared into his glass before answering, "Regal, efficient, beautiful—the perfect duchess."
His mother was the perfect duchess. Everything Joy was not. She bit her lip and tried to summon some pride. It was somewhere near her toes.
When she glanced up again he watched her over the rim of his glass. She was reminded of their distant dinner at
Belmore
Park
. He was staring at her mouth. His eyes grew uncomfortably dark and penetrating. A moment later he looked away.
He wanted to kiss her, she realized and closed her eyes in thanks. The power between them was still there. She could feel it; she could see it in his eyes. It's my move, she thought. This is my chance. She stood up and slowly walked toward him. "Would you like another drink?"
He raised his tense face to hers and was silent.
"Your glass is empty." She pointed to it. "I'll refill it."
He looked at it, but before he could answer she plucked it from his hand and sauntered over to the brandy cart, refilled it, and sauntered back. She held out the glass.
Look at me, Alec.
He took the glass without a glance.
So stubborn. This called for drastic measures. She reached up and quickly pulled the anchor pins from her hair.
Her hair tumbled down, and she heard his soft intake of breath. She looked at him.
He held the glass halfway to his lips, his motion frozen.
"I've lost my hairpins. Do you see them?"
"No." He took a deep drink.
She shook out her hair so it floated behind her. "They must be here somewhere."
He stared at the wall, taking deep slow breaths, and she bit back a small triumphant smile, then knelt on the floor in front of him and crawled around searching, making sure her hair swished over his bent knee.
"They couldn't have just disappeared." She sat back on her heels and flung her hair back.
His knuckles were white.
She reached up to touch her hair and watched his gaze follow her hand. He raised the glass to his lips.
Don't fight it, my love,
she pleaded silently.
Please, please, kiss me
. She watched the battle being waged between his obstinate will and the hot pleasure that burned between them. He closed his eyes, and she held her breath, thinking she'd lost again.
He set the drink down.
"Do you suppose the pins are in your chair?" She reached over and started to put her hand down the side of the chair, giving her head a shake so her hair fell over his hand.
He grabbed her wrist.
She smiled.
He didn't.
Witchcraft should be so intense, she thought. She could feel the physical pull of this man as if an iron chain bound their hearts together. So powerful it was that she wondered for a brief instant if she had started something that even the strongest witchcraft couldn't handle.
He rose, never letting go of her wrist. Kneeling before him, she raised her face and looked up at him. His other hand moved toward her face and traced her cheekbone, then her jaw. She felt as if he could see inside her, see her heart open and needing, see the love she felt for him, her quaking knees, her pounding heart, and see her fear—the weak part of her that was afraid he'd never love her.
He paused to touch the mole above her lip, then ran his fingertip along the seam of her mouth. Her lips parted. His finger slipped inside and touched her tongue. His eyes grew dark and hotter. They touched—hard male finger to soft and damp female mouth. They were two feet apart, Joy kneeling, Alec standing. Their breathing increased; they exhaled slowly. This force, this magical gift that existed between them, was everything.
Her body was damp, her blood flowing thick. Her heart drummed along to its own excited beat. The tip of his finger tasted salty, like the air off the wild Scottish sea. She was home.
He drew his fingertip back, turned away and dipped it into the brandy, then brought it back, letting the droplets fall like honey onto her lips. "You are a witch," he said, then pulled her to her feet, and his mouth closed in, his tongue stroking out for a quick taste of her brandied lips. He groaned a deep growl of defeat into her mouth and drove his tongue inside, filling it thickly.
Her arms curled around his neck, and she pressed her body against him, needing his touch. She could taste the bitterness of the brandy, but it was sweetened by the flavor of Alec. Her Alec.
She breathed in his scent. His hand closed over a breast, and he grumbled another groan of male pleasure into her mouth, a deep primal sound that she could feel clear down to the heart of her womanhood.
He whispered something against her lips, then flicked open the front buttons on her gown, one by one by one. His hand dipped into her bodice and cupped her, his warm rough palm rubbing circles against the tip of her breast. She pearled in response, then threaded her fingers through his hair and moved down to touch his ear and trace the hard length of his strong neck. It was damp. She could feel the abrasive stubble of his beard, feel the hard lines of his jaw, the warmth of his skin—everything that proved he was real, that he was male.
Her hand slid downward and stopped over his heart, then she was lost in the thrusting rhythm of his deep kiss. His hand left her breast, the other hand left the back of her head and he gripped her bottom and lifted her up off the floor and against him. He rocked his hips slowly.
"Now," he said. "Here. Now."
She nodded against his neck.
He walked her back against the closed doors and pinned her there with his hips. His hands slid to the backs of the thighs, and he placed her knees on either side of his rocking hips. His hand slid down the fabric of her skirt and then up underneath.
She moaned when his warm hands slid over her stockings and touched the bare skin of her thighs. The dress rose with his hands, with the tender touch and stroke of them.
His hips moved and she slipped down the door. He raised his hips, sliding her back up. "Tighten your legs around me."
She pressed her knees against his hips and his fingers found the heart of her and plied their magic. He touched her, stroked her, played with the core of her until her body seeped tears of response.
His hand left her to open his trousers. A moment later she felt his power, his strength, the thick fullness of him sliding into her as smoothly as if they were and always had been one.
She gave a ragged cry.
"Hush." His voice was hoarse, his head bent, his breathing labored.
Her eyes drifted closed, and she savored their joining, knowing this was the ultimate gift between man and woman. His lips moved across her face like light summer rain. Slowly he circled his hips and rocked, filling her, then pulling back.
"Too slow," she murmured against his lips.
"Never too slow, Scottish. You'll see. It's never too slow." His tongue stroked her ear, and he inhaled. Chills ran down her neck and over her arms and breasts.
She pulled at his shirt, opening it, wanting to feel his chest against hers.
He thrust deep, and she tightened her knees, gripping him. She pushed his shirt aside. He thrust again, agonizingly slow and deep. Their chests touched.
It was his turn to groan.
His hands slid higher and rubbed and gripped her bare bottom, then stroked her from the point where they joined backward, touching every bit of her private flesh with the tip of one male finger. Every time he moved into her he plied that stroke so privately that her need unfolded, spiraled, slowly with each penetration, with the stroke of that finger, and now the thick hair on his chest played havoc with her breasts, teasing and tickling and making her pucker with life.
His hands gripped her bottom tighter and he moved in hard slow circles that pressed her nether lips even tighter around him. He groaned into her mouth, something private, earthy, and male.
And stopped moving.
"No! Don't stop . . . please."
He said something, but she couldn't hear, couldn't do anything but feel. He pulled back and thrust deep, again and again, suddenly moving with the speed she craved. Her pleasure spun upward with each thrust of his driving hips. Harder and harder he moved, faster, and the door thudded with each plunging stroke of him, over and over and over . . . .
The beat picked up more and more, deeper, stronger, rattling the door hinges. He bent his head again and kept on thrusting, the meter unchanging. It started then, the glimmer that grew and grew with each motion of him within her, that wonderful journey to ecstasy. Higher and higher she rose. He moved deeper and seemed to swell within her. The noise of door hinges, the deep thudding movements faded, and that delicious glimmer grew bright until she screamed into his mouth and pulsed so hard around his shaft that she almost ached with each throb.
A moment later she smelled roses.
"Damn, but this is good," he growled in response and pulled her knees higher and sent her over the edge again and again until she could hardly tell one release from another. She opened her eyes and saw pink petals raining down, hundreds of them.
"The roses," he rasped against her lips and circled his hips faster and faster.
The petals lit on his bent head, stuck to the dampness of his neck and back, where his muscles grew taut and bulged with the drive of his motions. Still he rocked inside her until finally he pulled almost out of her and drove inside with a shout of triumph. An instant later his life pulsed into her.