Candice Hern (26 page)

The funny thing was that he'd only just discovered all this about himself. He'd always assumed a biddable young bride was what he wanted, an unformed girl who could be molded to suit his requirements as a wife, as a marchioness. But Beatrice had changed all that. He'd come to realize that
she
was the sort of woman he really wanted. Needed. A woman like Beatrice. No, not
like
her.
Her
.
He wanted Beatrice.

He watched her across the room at another card table. Lord and Lady Marchdon had set up their large drawing room, and several other rooms, with tables for cards, and many members of the
ton
were in attendance, including Beatrice and Emily. There was no serious gambling involved. It was all very proper with only pennies for stakes. Thayne had never much enjoyed playing whist, and he was having difficulty concentrating on the play. Lady Emmeline Standish was his partner, and though she must surely be aggravated at his mistakes, she was every inch the proper young lady and never complained. In the last hand, he'd led trumps when he had only one trump card, causing them to lose the hand. Thayne muttered a Persian oath, but his partner merely smiled and gave a resigned shrug.

Somehow he managed to finish the rubber and paid their losses to the other couple. He was too wound up to play any more, and so he excused himself from the next hand, and invited Lord Newcombe to take his place. Lady Emmeline's eyes brightened. Did she have a tendre for the fellow, or was she simply happy to have a partner who would be awake to every play?

Thayne had once considered Lady Emmeline as the one he might choose as his bride. He liked her. She was very pretty and would have made a fine marchioness, he had no doubt. But he had other plans now, and was anxious to put them into motion.

If only this damned party would end.

Some time later, it did begin to break up and guests began departing. He watched Beatrice and Emily make their farewells, and Thayne did the same. He took a moment to apologize to Lady Emmeline for being such a disappointing partner, claiming his mind had been elsewhere.

"No need to apologize, my lord," she said. "I quite understand." Her eyes had darted toward the doors, where Beatrice and Emily had just passed.

Good God. Did she know? Was he so transparent in his desire for Beatrice?

No, it was more likely she thought his mind was on Miss Emily Thirkill. Thayne stifled a groan. Was there still gossip about them? Expectations he thought had long been squashed?

Damnation. He had to make matters right, and quickly. Tonight.

When he found his carriage among the throng of vehicles, Thayne impulsively gave the driver Beatrice's Brook Street direction. He wasn't sure what he was going to do, but he had to speak privately with her.

When the carriage turned into Brook Street Thayne experienced a twinge of panic. What if she hadn't gone home? What if they had gone to another party instead?

He heaved a sigh of relief when he saw her carriage pull away. She was home.

Now what?

He alighted from his carriage and sent the driver back to Doncaster House. Thayne could walk the short distance later.

After he'd done what? Come to her door at one o'clock in the morning and announced himself? No, that would not do. He was being foolish. He ought to begin that walk to Park Lane now, and be done with it.

But as he stood across the street, watching the house like a moonstruck idiot, he saw her. Only for an instant, but candlelight most definitely glinted off red hair in one of the third-floor windows.

Her bedchamber
.

His groin tightened. She would be in there undressing, letting her hair down, getting into bed. How he wished he could be there with her.

And then he noticed it. The large tree right outside her window. The tree with thick, sturdy-looking branches within easy reach.

Thayne smiled. Serendipity again.

He waited for what seemed like hours, but was probably only twenty minutes, until all candlelight had been extinguished. Then he made his move.

* * *

Tap tap tap
.

Beatrice sat bolt upright in bed. "Who's there?" She had not been quite asleep when she heard a sharp tapping. She tossed back the cover and slid out of bed.

She opened the door, but found no one there. She stepped into the corridor but saw nothing. All the other bedroom doors were closed and no telltale light shown beneath any of them. How odd. Perhaps she really
had
been asleep and only dreamed the tapping.

She was about to crawl back into bed when she heard it again.

Tap tap tap
.

It wasn't the door at all. Someone was tapping on the window. Good heavens. Had Charlotte been up in the tree again? At this hour? She would have that child's guts for garters, by God. What was she thinking?

She went to the window and flung back the curtains, ready to do murder. She unlatched the casement, pushed it open, and said, "Charlotte, is that you? I swear I will –"

"No, Beatrice, it is me."

Gabriel! Here?

Sure enough, there was his dignified lordship perched on a branch just outside the window. His teeth gleamed in the moonlight as he grinned like a fool.

"Gabriel, what the devil are you doing here? Get down from that tree at once."

"I could not wait two weeks," he said. "Or even another day. Step aside, my love. I'm coming inside."

And before she could stop him, he'd swung himself with athletic grace from the limb to the window ledge, and climbed through the window. He pulled the heavy curtains closed behind him, brushed off his waistcoat and breeches, then stood smiling and pristine as though he'd just entered a ballroom.

He reached for her, but she brushed him away. "Are you mad?" Anger spread like a fever along her shoulders and down her back. "How dare you, Gabriel? How dare you come to my house, to my bedchamber, when my daughters are asleep just across the corridor? My
daughters
, Gabriel! What if one of them hears you or sees you? For God's sake, what were you
thinking
?"

He reached for her again and captured her this time. He imprisoned her against him, her hands flat against his broad chest. "I was thinking I could not wait another moment to be with you again. I was thinking that if we were very careful and very quiet, no one would know I had been here. I have been thinking of nothing else for days but how to contrive to be with you. But most of all, I have been thinking I could not live another day without holding you in my arms. Without kissing you."

He bent his head and did just that. Despite all her misgivings — and they were legion — she found herself melting into his kiss, everything within her dissolving into liquid. Traitorous body! She could not resist him, even in her anger. His tongue found hers, tangling wet and urgent in a kiss so potent her knees almost buckled.

He broke the kiss at last and nibbled his way along her jaw and throat and neck. "Gabriel," she said, drawing out the first syllable in a kind of moan. "We should not be doing this. Not here. It's not right." She was angry with him for being so reckless, so rash, so arrogantly heedless of her perfectly reasonable objections. And yet she arched her neck to give him better access and snaked her hands into his thick, dark hair as his teeth nipped and scraped along her throat.

"It is always right between us," he said between nibbles, "and always will be."

So persuasive. So irresistible. Her wits deserted her entirely when his hands slid down her ribs and around to cup her bottom. She felt his arousal straining against his breeches, and wanted it, wanted him. She no longer cared where they were or how wrong it was. She wanted him. Now.

"All right," she said. "All right. You win. But only this once, Gabriel. I will not risk it again. And we must be
quiet
."

Beatrice tugged up her nightgown, pulled it over her head, and tossed it on the floor. She shivered when the cool air hit her skin. Or maybe it was simply in anticipation of what was about to happen.

"I want to see you." Gabriel went back to the window and pulled the draperies aside. Moonlight poured into the room. "Ah. Beautiful. Your skin is like polished marble in this light. Your hair like burgundy wine. But please, no plaits tonight. Let your hair down, my huntress."

She unbraided the thick plait that hung down her back while Gabriel undressed. She shook out her hair as he stood before her, naked, perfect, gloriously male. He gathered her loosely in his arms, his proud erection rearing between them.

"Let me love you," he said, and kissed her tenderly.

He took her hand and led her to the bed, pulling her down beside him. They already knew each other's bodies well, and Beatrice entwined her legs with his almost without thought. They kissed and stroked and fondled, leisurely, savoring each other without hurry. Finally Gabriel rolled on top of her.

"I adore your breasts," he said as he squeezed them together and flicked the tip of his tongue over each nipple. "I love the way they feel, the way they move, how deliciously soft they are. Why are you laughing?"

"They're soft and they move because they're no longer young and firm, and yet you seem to find that an asset."

"I do. They're perfect. Womanly, not girlish. Like you."

He made love to one breast, then the other, licking, stroking, sucking, taking the whole nipple into his mouth and curling his tongue around it. Beatrice felt her pulse race against his mouth.

He did not stop with her breasts, but used his lips and tongue all over her body. By turns tender and ravenous, he lavished her flesh with miracles such as she could never have imagined before he came into her life, miracles she now craved with a desperate hunger. She gave herself up to the pure, mindless sensation that coursed through her veins, hot and bright.

Finally, he trailed his tongue down her belly and into the coppery curls covering her sex. Parting her, he thrust his tongue deep inside her, and Beatrice arched up into his mouth, dizzy with sensation. His finger — no, two fingers — replaced his tongue, which he set to pleasuring the tiny nub just above. His tongue on that oh-so-sensitive spot made her squirm, but he held her legs apart, forcing her to accept the pleasure.

An agony of tension gripped her body, savage in its power, then all at once the spike of pleasure speared into her, sharp and hot, emanating from that delicate nub of flesh he circled with his tongue and radiating to every inch of her body from her toenails to the roots of her hair. She bucked and twisted and clamped her lips together in a valiant effort not to cry out in her helplessness.

He held his mouth in place until he felt her go limp. Then he crawled up her body and kissed her, allowing her to taste herself on his tongue, to share in his pleasure of her.

He lay atop her and molded her softness against his harder frame, loving the feel of her beneath him, skin to skin, hers silky smooth, his ... not. He grasped her hands and lifted them to rest on either side of her head, threading his fingers through hers. Gripping her hands tightly for support, he shifted his hips so that the tip of his cock was pressed on the same spot where his mouth had just been.

Her eyes opened and looked into his. A low hum of passion sounded in her throat as he moved against her.

"I shall die again," she murmured. "How many little deaths can a person withstand?"

"A thousand. A hundred thousand. A lifetime of
les
petites morts
." He shifted again so that he was at the opening of her sex, her
yoni
. "At least once more tonight." He pushed inside her, slowly, until he was buried to the hilt in the sleek, hot wetness of her. He closed his eyes and savored the simple pleasure of being fully joined with her.

There would be nothing fancy tonight, nothing exotic. Tonight was about love, about connection, about sharing. Just a simple, pure, exquisite loving. He held himself above her, still gripping her hands. He looked into her eyes as he began to move. Slowly out. Slowly in. She smiled and moved with him. She rotated her hips and squeezed her inner muscles in a way that almost pushed him over the edge. He increased the tempo slightly, still holding her gaze and her hands.

"More," she said. "Harder."

And he complied. He drove faster, setting up a rhythmic, damp timpani as their hips met, retreated, met again. He felt her body tense. She gripped his hands tighter and arched her neck. Her face twisted into a grimace and her breaths became shallow. His own panting became more ragged as he thrust harder and faster. But he never let go of her hands and he never stopped watching her. And so he had the singular joy of watching her face as she reached her climax. Eyes closed tight, teeth bared, every muscle tense. And suddenly she was transformed. Her eyes opened wide, her mouth formed a perfect O, and a sort of wonder suffused her face as her body writhed and peaked beneath him, while he pumped and pumped and pumped.

His own release came quickly. He was so enraptured by hers that he almost did not pull out in time. He pressed his cock against her belly, still pumping, as his climax ripped through him.

* * *

Beatrice lay nuzzled against Gabriel's shoulder, content as a kitten in a basket. He had cleaned her up, as he always did, then slid under the sheets with her and tucked her up against him.

"I should be angry with you," she said, "but that was so lovely I almost forgive you."

"Almost?"

"It was still a bad idea, Gabriel, and you must promise you won’t do it again. What if Charlotte or Georgie were to wander in and find us like this? It's too dangerous."

"You're right," he said. "But I have an idea for making things easier for us." He turned on his side and lay facing her. "Marry me."

Beatrice gave a little jerking start. He could not be serious. But she gazed into his brown eyes and saw that he was. "Oh, Gabriel."

"You know that I have promised to marry this year, and you are the only woman who suits me, the only woman I want."

She was shaken by his sincerity. Despite Wilhelmina's suggestion that he might make her an offer, Beatrice had never expected it. Never.