She was different. Not a woman who gave herself lightly.
Bloody hell.
No true gentleman would consciously risk ruining her reputation this way. Maybe this said something he’d suspected all along about his character.
Up the stairs with swift stealth, he passed the first doorway, and then he saw the line of light under her door. The knob turned quietly in his hand.
The soft glow of a single lamp illuminated her lush form, clad in a rich blue silk dressing gown, her fair hair shining and loose now, a silvery fall down her back to the womanly curve of her hips. She was standing at the window, and the curtain dropped from her hand as she whirled around with a gasp when the door clicked shut. “I didn’t hear you coming.”
“Five years in Spain fighting the French gives you certain unique talents.” His gaze swept over the femi nine furnishings of pale yellow silk covering walls, the floral pastel hues repeated in the thick patterned rug, the ornate bed hung with velvet, a Queen Anne armoire in the corner. Her dressing table was remarkably unclut tered, just a brush and several crystal bottles of perfume, but then again, someone of her fascinating beauty did not need an assortment of cosmetics. He turned and said bluntly, “I could still leave.”
“Do you want to leave?”
“No.”
“Good. For a celebrated rake, you are considerably too polite.” Madeline’s smile was languorous and, unfortunately, far too alluring. “I’m finding this conversation redundant, my lord. I am not an innocent maiden. No irate father will seek satisfaction, and there is no outraged husband in the background. I don’t understand your reservations.”
No, she didn’t. They weren’t entirely selfless either. Her reputation wasn’t the only issue. His reservations were not only about the inevitable notoriety an affair with him would bring her, but also his ability to stay detached.
I needn’t bare my soul
, he reminded himself sharply, her closeness and undressed state bombarding his senses and causing a primal masculine response as old as time.
She was his for the taking, and God knew he wanted her.
“Very well,” he agreed with a wolfish smile, walking slowly across the soft, expensive rug, predatory and willing to accept her assurances.
Maybe
, he thought,
she is more worldly than my impression of her. . . .
No
, he immediately corrected as he noted the small tremble of her soft lips. He was excusing himself so he could make love to her without the requisite repercussions of a chafing conscience. But at the moment he didn’t care.
“It’s been so long,” she whispered as he stopped before her and caught her waist with both hands, pulling her close.
“Since me?” Damn all, he
was
jealous.
“Since anyone. Kiss me.”
A year.
Why the idea of her abstinence inflamed him, he wasn’t sure, but a small voice in his brain acknowledged part of it was a sense of male possession. That was too disturbing to address when his erection was already swelling from just her proximity and the scent of flowers drifting from her hair. “Is that my first order?” he said with lazy insouciance, one finger lifting to trace the delicate curve of her cheek. “If so, I am your obedient servant.”
He lowered his head, his mouth first just brushing hers, touching, seeking, before he settled into a long, sultry kiss. The clasp of her hands drifted up to his shoulders, and he felt the pressure with pure pleasure, his cock stiffening against the confining material of his breeches.
If I am a fool
—and he was certain that was the case—
so be it
, he thought as he kissed her, their mouths melding with a sensual intensity that managed to sweep the breath from his lungs.
Madeline made a small sound of protest when he broke away, but it slid into a sigh when he abruptly lifted her in his arms, took three long strides across to the bed, and deposited her on the fine linen sheets, already turned back for the night. His fingers flew to his cravat. “Forgive the impatience, but please tell me you have nothing on beneath that robe.”
“Nothing.” She tugged at the sash and the material parted.
While not an inexperienced man, his breath still caught. Madeline was the epitome of sensuous female allure, with her tumbled fair hair, ivory skin, and provocative curves. Opulent, rose-tipped breasts; long, supple limbs; the dainty patch of pale hair between her thighs; her face slightly flushed with evident desire—it all caused his hands to momentarily halt in the haste of ridding himself of the impediment of his clothing. The way she looked at him also cast a spell, as if she was wanton and wanting, but also still somehow an uncertain young woman risking a great deal. The implied trust was humbling.
He didn’t deserve it, but then again, he wouldn’t betray it either. During the war he’d learned honor wasn’t as nearly black-and-white as modern society portrayed it to be. The blurred boundaries of that elusive commodity surprised him, but in the end he thought it came down to making choices a man—or a woman, for that matter—could live with. He’d also learned that gender did not define courage or intelligence.
There was no question of asking her again if she was sure she wanted this. The repeated question implied she didn’t know her own mind, and he was sure now she most certainly did.
How fortuitous that they desired the exact same thing.
His coat dropped to the floor. Boots went next, and then his shirt, so hastily unbuttoned he lost patience at the end of the process and just jerked it over his head. When he unfastened his breeches and pushed them down, her gaze was riveted to the surging length of his erection as he moved to the bed and joined her. He propped himself up on one elbow and trailed his hand over the curve of her shoulder, looking into her eyes. “I think my enthusiasm for your invitation is undisguised, my lady.”
“Despite all your hedging,” she teased, her glorious eyes holding him captive. “Who would think a notorious rogue so difficult to seduce?”
“I didn’t notice it took much effort on your part.” He leaned forward and brushed her hair aside to nibble on her earlobe. She smelled like heaven and woman, which was a heady combination.
“On the contrary, it took a full year.” She tentatively ran her fingers over his bare shoulder and down his back. Her eyes drifted shut as his mouth drifted across her temple. “I thought I’d forgotten . . . but seeing you the other night—”
The genuine emotion in her voice made him stop her speech with a searing kiss.
Neither
of them had forgotten, unfortunately.
But for once, I am going to concern myself with that tomorrow
, he thought, drowning in the pleasure of tasting her, drawing her close so their naked bodies touched, his erect cock hot against her thigh. He was tired of being so guarded, so . . . jaded. Some part of her needed him, and, God help him, he needed her.
All night
, his mind reminded him.
Now
, his body answered, the force of his need causing sweat to prickle over his skin. “Forgotten what?” he murmured against her mouth. “This?” he teasingly licked her lower lip.
“You. All of you. I tried, but I couldn’t.” A sigh brushed his cheek.
Her words arrested him, albeit momentarily, his fin gers brushing the swelling fullness of her bared breast, measuring the erotic weight of the pliant flesh, his thumb caressing one perfect rosy nipple. The implication was he was different, special, that she’d not taken another lover in all that time because
he
was the only one she wanted enough to invite into her bed.
Disquieting to a man who preferred detached, so phisticated lovers.
Or do I
, he wondered, as she tentatively traced the line of his jaw and then rose to follow the path of her hand with small, artless butterfly kisses. Obviously she had enjoyed a healthy sexual relationship with her hus band and she wasn’t shy in bed.
It was useless to keep trying to analyze the situation, he decided as she arched into the intimate possession of his hands, her nipples peaking against his palms. Nuz zling the valley between her breasts, he began to titillate her senses with practiced purpose, licking, tasting, gen tly sucking until he heard the telltale increase in the ca dence of her breathing. Then he kissed a sinful trail down the delicate curve of her rib cage, across the plane of her stomach and lower, first cupping her hips with his hands before spreading her legs with the pressure of his palms.
“An entire year?” he murmured against the silken skin of her inner thigh. “I think I am obligated to make it worth your wait, my lady.”
Her answer was a shudder as his practiced fingers gently parted the folds of her sex and he pressed his mouth to the most strategic spot to inflame female arousal. Madeline moaned, her hands flying into his hair as he teased with the tip of his tongue and at the same time slid one finger into the heated satin of her vaginal passage.
“Luke.”
It was gratifying to hear his name said in that throaty tone, unlike her usual cool contralto.
It took very little time to coax her into a satisfyingly vocal climax, her soft cries echoing through the darkened bedchamber, her slender body quivering against the ministrations of his mouth. With a triumphant grin he rose, positioning himself between her open thighs, the tip of his rigid cock testing the receptive give of her female entrance. “Let me know when you are recovered enough for this.” He pushed in a fraction, sucking in a breath at the exquisite warmth and tightness of her body. “Would it be ungentlemanly of me to hope it’s soon?”
There was no question of it: she’d denied herself too long, tried to put aside secret desire for the practicality of everyday life. Languid in the aftermath of exultant sensation, Madeline rubbed the muscular shoulders of the man poised over her and whispered, “I’m ready whenever you are, my lord, and it seems to me you are very”—she reached down and stroked his erection lightly—“ready.”
The inward hiss of his breath at her touch was telling, as was the hot-blooded look in the storm-gray depths of his eyes. Luke leaned down, took her mouth in a tempestuous kiss, and surged forward to full penetration.
She gasped at the forceful invasion, and he instantly went still. “I didn’t hurt you?”
“No.” It was true. The last thing she was feeling was pain. He impaled her so thoroughly she was stretched, filled, possessed, but it was deliciously pleasurable. Almost as delicious as Luke himself, his nude body hard and lean under her questing fingertips, his skin just touched with a sheen of perspiration, the amber silk of his hair brushing his shoulders. Those sculpted, handsome features so many—
too
many, she thought with illogical jealousy—women admired were taut now as he peered down at her. “You’re sure?”
“You just feel . . . enormous.” Her smile was deliber ately enticing and she lifted her hips, taking him a crucial fraction deeper.
“Now, that’s something a man hates to hear.” His laugh was a small burst of breath.
She didn’t have enough experience to know the variations of male endowment, but she thought he was probably larger than most. Certainly he was bigger than Colin, though he was also inches taller and wider in the shoulders. . . . Not that it mattered; her husband had given her pleasure in bed even on her wedding night, when she’d been nervous and awkward. . . .
No, she wasn’t going to think about what she’d lost
now
. This night was for her—the selfishness assuaged by the growing conviction over the past few years that she was not interested, in a personal sense, in making a second dynastic marriage just so she could belong to another man. Colin had been wonderful. She had been lucky. Luke Daudet could fill the void in her life and he wouldn’t demand more from her.
It was very different from her marriage, but, in short, a perfect arrangement.
Wasn’t it?
With playful enticement she grazed her nails across his firm buttocks. “Hmm . . . Altea, if you wouldn’t mind ...” She wiggled just a little.
He made a low sound deep in his throat and began to move. Slowly at first, with control, his warm breath fanning her cheek, his eyes half closed in concentrated pleasure. It was sleek, it was glorious, and the friction of sex into sex so decadent Madeline couldn’t suppress small pants of enjoyment that were probably unladylike in extreme.
She didn’t care.
Pleasure gripped her body, holding it prisoner. Each inward glide was exhilarating, each withdrawal made her inner muscles clench in protest, and the brush of his hair against her hands where they clutched his shoulders added another layer of sensation.
Her already aroused body surrendered first, the or gasmic tide a drowning flood. Her thighs tightened around his lean hips and every muscle went rigid in the pulsing splendor of the moment. Luke responded with a low, telling groan as his tall body stiffened, and at the very last moment he withdrew, the hot, liquid rush of his ejaculation spilling across her thigh as he shuddered in her arms.
Breathless, entwined, his face buried in her outspread hair and his weight balanced just enough on his fore arms so he didn’t crush her, neither of them spoke for several long moments, until he lifted his head and gifted her with his mesmerizing smile. One eyebrow lifted in a lazy arch. “I hope that was worth waiting for.”