"You know why, damn it." His gaze bore into her, the smoky blue of storms and night. "You always try to make me forget everything by offering me what you think I can't resist."
"You've got it all wrong— I'm the one who wants to forget." Her voice caught on a sob. "Please, Anthony. For tonight, just help me forget."
He raised his hands to her shoulders, and she feared he meant to push her away. But then he caught her head between his hands and brought his mouth to within a hairbreadth of hers. "You're a witch, do you know that?" he said hoarsely. "A witch masquerading as a bluestocking."
"Then I'm a fitting consort for a beast masquerading as a gentleman."
Fire leaped in his eyes, and a choked laugh escaped him. "God save me, but I'm going to regret this in the morning."
"Morning is a long while off," she whispered. Then she kissed him.
He froze, and she thought he might refuse her. Then an inarticulate sound erupted from his throat, half growl, half moan, and his lips took hers.
His kiss was savage and needy, everything she could have wanted and more. He ravaged her mouth with heady thrusts of his tongue, and when that no longer satisfied him, he swept his hands down her neck to shove her gown free of her shoulders so he could strafe her bared flesh with urgent, openmouthed caresses.
She was almost as fierce, yanking on his coat until he shrugged it off, then removing his waistcoat as he dragged down her corset. His mouth seized her breast and sucked it through her chemise so ardently that the warmth she'd felt while inhaling nitrous returned, leaping to flame inside her, licking along every nerve.
Then everything began to move swiftly. Too swiftly. He tore at tapes and buttons, divesting her of her gown and corset with amazing speed, then kicking off his shoes and jerking off his trousers.
When he reached for the ties of her chemise, she caught his hand. "Wait, wait, wait!" she cried.
A sudden anger suffused his features. "Now you want to stop?"
"No! That's not what I mean."
He thought her experienced, and she couldn't tell him otherwise or he wouldn't make love to her. But neither could she run headlong into it as if she knew everything. She had to slow him down without revealing her inexperience.
Then it hit her. "I want a good look at you." She nodded to his shirt and drawers. "I want to watch you undress." That was certainly true.
Judging from his rakish smile, she'd hit on a reason that he liked. "Whatever you say," he rasped. "As long as I get to do the same when you're done."
"Of course."
As she backed up to get the full view, he shucked his shirt, then paused to let her look her fill, his rapid breaths making his magnificent chest rise and fall like a buck's at the end of a hard run. A line of hair bisected the slabs of muscle down to his navel and beyond, disappearing beneath his drawers.
He reached for the buttons. "Shall I go on?" he asked impatiently. When she nodded, he removed his drawers in one swift motion, taking the stockings with them.
As he straightened, she swallowed hard. "
That
is certainly interesting."
"Interesting?" A dark amusement resonated in his voice. "If I didn't know better, sweetheart, I'd think you hadn't seen my privates before. But you did get an excellent view in the garden pavilion."
But not so eloquently displayed. He ambled toward her, and she watched in fascination as his ballocks swung with his gait, an integral part of the wealth of muscle and bone that was his body.
That's when maidenly alarm struck her. Not because his thrusting flesh looked any more daunting than before, and not because she feared it wouldn't fit. Nature made a man's penis to fit inside a woman— she knew that logically.
But logic didn't tell her
how
it fit or how to make it feel comfortable, not to mention pleasurable. Even that cursed harem book hadn't told her that.
He reached for her chemise again, and she blurted out, "It's not the same."
A smile touched his lips as he untied her chemise. "What isn't?"
"Seeing a man's privates and seeing him completely unclothed. Except for artist's renditions and statues, I've never seen a real man entirely naked."
His fingers froze on the ties. "Never?"
Drat it, she was supposed to be experienced. But she couldn't invent details about some imaginary lover, not now, not with Anthony.
"It's hard to undress fully in a carriage," she said obliquely. That was a bald statement of fact. If he took it as something else, at least she hadn't lied to him.
His face cleared. "I should have figured that your incompetent lover would take you in a carriage. It's just what a blackguard would do."
He sounded so…so
moral
she had to laugh. "Why do you assume he was a blackguard?"
"He seduced and abandoned you, didn't he? That's what a blackguard does."
Guilt choked her. "And you've…never done anything like that."
"Absolutely not." His voice grew husky. "But I don't want to talk about him." He dragged off her chemise, then removed her drawers. "Tonight is for us."
Silently she agreed. Tomorrow she'd do whatever she must, but tonight was theirs. And the ardent way he scoured her nakedness made her feel, for once, as if she truly was his.
"You're a witch, I tell you." He lifted his fingers to caress the curve of her waist, then the swell of one breast, before wrapping his hand in a long lock of her hair. Bringing it up to his lips, he pressed a worshipful kiss to the silky strands. "The most exotically beautiful witch I have ever encountered."
The extravagant compliment embarrassed her. "You sound like Stoneville."
"Don't say that," he retorted, his eyes suddenly solemn. "I've never been more sincere in my life." He tugged her into his arms. "You're a wonder, Madeline Prescott. Anyone who told you different is a liar and a fool."
Then he kissed her, a soul-searing sharing of mouths that made her badly want to believe him. But how could she? She wasn't a "wonder"— he only said that because he thought her pretty…and experienced and easy to seduce. Once he realized that his tastes were more sophisticated than hers, he would lose interest. For now, he found her amusing, but it could never go beyond that.
And yet…
Other men who'd found her pretty in Telford had balked when they discovered that her pretty face hid a peculiar and clever female with a fascination for very unfemale things. Anthony had not. Didn't that mean something?
She clung to that as he backed her toward the bed. And when he tumbled her down upon it and covered her body with his, then kissed her again, slowly, sensually, she allowed herself to believe that he truly did find her a wonder.
Because she wanted desperately to lose herself in him tonight, and that would be easier if she could believe he cared for her. That he felt even a tiny part of what she'd begun to feel for him. So she wrapped her arms about his neck and gave herself up to the delicious sensations of his tongue teasing her nipple, the exquisite delights of his hand stroking her below. Within moments, he had her gasping, straining against him, wanting more.
"I begin to believe that the rumors about nitrous being an aphrodisiac are right," he groaned against her breast. "I want you, sweetheart. Now."
"Yes," she whispered. "Now."
He pushed her thighs apart with one knee, then halted, lifting his head from her with a pained expression.
"What is it?" she asked.
"Damnation, I forgot something." Pushing himself off of her, he left the bed.
Feeling self-conscious splayed naked atop the coverlet, she crawled between the sheets, then propped herself up on one elbow to watch perplexed as he searched his coat pockets.
"I promised to protect you from disease and such," he explained, "and I mean to keep that promise." He rummaged another moment, then shot her a quick grin. "Ah. French letters. I knew I'd brought them."
Before she could ask why on earth he would want to read foreign letters at a time like this, he unfolded a silklike tube that had tiny ribbands hanging from it.
"What in heaven's name is that?" she asked.
"A cundum." He cast her a rueful smile. "It's the only way to be sure you don't conceive. It's not foolproof, mind you, but fairly reliable."
She stared in rapt fascination as he pulled it on over his aroused shaft. But when he actually tied the ribbands close to the base, as if dressing his penis, she couldn't prevent the laugh that escaped her.
He scowled, his erection flagging a little. "You're not helping, sweetheart."
That only made her laugh harder. "I'm sorry, it's just so…odd."
"So says the woman who refers to lovemaking as mating," he said dryly. As she struggled to restrain her amusement, he stalked to the bed, looking annoyed. "Do you want to prevent conception or no? Because I'd just as soon dispense with the whole thing, trust me."
She fought back the giggle rising in her throat. "No, no…preventing conception is good. I certainly want that." This was probably not the time to ask him how his cundums were made and such. Forcing a serious expression to her face, she said, "Forgive me, it's just the lingering effects of the nitrous."
"Nitrous, my arse," he muttered as he pulled down the sheets, then stretched out on his back beside her. "That stopped affecting you half an hour ago, admit it."
His arousal was swiftly waning, thanks to her, and that was the last thing she wanted. Especially now, with him displayed so gloriously naked beside her. "That's not entirely true…" She pressed her hand to his chest, marveling at how his muscles bunched beneath her fingers. "I still have that tingly feeling it roused."
With a quirk of his eyebrow, he glanced at her. "Tingly feeling?"
"You know," she said coyly. "Here." She laid his hand upon her
mons
, where she'd dreamed of his touching her again ever since that day at Mr. Godwin's.
That was all it took to return the heat to his gaze and rouse his penis anew. "Ah," he rasped as he began to fondle her with deft strokes, "
that
tingly feeling."
"Yes," she breathed, "oh, Anthony…"
His mouth sought hers, hungry, eager, while he delved inside her below with first one finger, then two, each caress maddening her further. Within moments they were back to where they were before, him kneeling between her legs, parting her thighs…replacing his fingers with something larger and thicker.
Lord help her, they'd come to the deflowering already.
As he eased inside her, she fought the urge to resist, knowing instinctively that would only make it more difficult. At least he took care with her. And it wasn't too awful, just an intrusive pressure in an unexpected place.
Still, having his penis inside her was more intense, more intimate than when he'd stroked her with his fingers. And when he thrust, burying himself deeply, she was grateful his eyes were closed, so he didn't see her sudden grimace at the sharp pain that apparently signaled the loss of her maidenhood.
He didn't seem to notice, thank heaven. Indeed, it hadn't been nearly as bad as she'd feared. It didn't compare to the awkward fullness created by her being joined to him down there.
"Good God, you're so tight," he whispered, the words hot against her brow. "You feel incredible, sweetheart."
"So do you…" she managed to choke out.
Incredibly thick and uncomfortable. What a disappointment. She should have known that his talk of pleasures would come to nothing.
Then he began to move, in and out, in long, slow strokes. At first that seemed uncomfortable, too…until his repeated pressing against her
mons
roused a strange urge to squirm against him. When she did, a faintly pleasurable sensation shot through her that was so delicious she tried it again. And again.
With every motion, the sensation intensified a little. How intriguing.
"Here, sweetheart," he gasped against her ear as he pulled her knee up to shift her position. "You're so much smaller than I'm…used to. Put your legs around my waist. Yes, like that."
Sweet Lord in heaven.
That
was more like it.
Now he was pounding right against that aching spot he'd been fondling before, and excitement uncurled throughout her senses, opening her to him. Something broke free inside her, rising toward the surface like the first bubble floating up from the bottom of a water tank heated to boiling.
"That's it, my sweet wanton," he said hoarsely as he thrust harder, deeper. "You're…so tight, so warm…God save me…you really are…a witch."
"No such thing…as witches," she pointed out.
A strangled laugh escaped him as he gazed down at her, his black curls plastered to his brow from his exertions. "You never…cease to amaze me."