Wolf Bride (31 page)

Her husband was lying on his back by the fire, one arm flung across his eyes as though to shut out the flickering glow. His jacket and boots were gone, his shirt was unlaced, and his short dark hair was dishevelled.

She thought he looked thoroughly exhausted, as though he had just climbed out of another woman’s bed. Jealousy pricked at her as she looked down at him, noting the dark stubble on his chin, the sensual line of his mouth – and his weary pallor.

Wolf was a player and a libertine, she had no doubt on that score. But was there anything left over for her, and if there was, could she ever be satisfied with that? To be the one he returned home to, not the one he went to for his pleasure?

She must have made a noise because he stirred. His arm fell back, then his eyes opened and met hers. That deep, intense blue gaze that always left her fighting for breath.

‘Eloise.’ There was a wealth of heavy, ironic meaning in the way he said her name, as though he were saying ‘Trouble’ or ‘Danger’ instead.

‘It’s gone the middle of the night. Master Beaufort must have retired to bed long since. Where have you been?’ she asked coldly, and dropped her skirts when she saw his gaze slide down her body to her bare legs and feet.

His mouth twisted at the question, as though she had amused him. ‘Elsewhere.’

Her heart winced in pain and her breath hissed out, already knowing the answer before she asked the question. ‘With Mistress Langley?’

Wolf opened his mouth to reply, then closed it again. His eyes held some shadow which she interpreted as guilt, though he sounded more angry than guilty.

‘Why don’t you go back to bed, Eloise? I shall not disturb you but sleep out here tonight.’ Wolf sat up and swung his legs to the floor, then reached for his wine cup, which she saw was still dark with red wine. ‘Forgive me if I woke you.’

‘Drinking again?’

Her voice was stormy, accusing.

Wolf looked up sharply, then shrugged and put the cup to his lips. She saw his throat swallow, then he lowered the cup, still looking directly at her. ‘As you see.’

It was a challenge, she realised. He would drink whenever and whatever he wished. What was she going to do about it? Nothing, she thought wildly. Nothing.

‘Why did you play drunk with the king tonight?’ she demanded.

His eyes narrowed. ‘What?’

Her guard wavered and then abruptly dropped before his penetrating gaze, for she was too tired to fight him anymore. Instead she looked at him without dissimulation and let his physical spell work its mastery over her. There was no point pretending anymore that she did not want whatever crumbs Wolf might offer her when he had finished with his other women.

But she was still angry with him, and her pride would not allow her to fall to his feet in abject surrender.

Her body ached for his, yes. But he would have to take it. She tried to tell him what she wanted with her eyes, and guessed from the way he looked back at her that he had understood. Or understood that she was offering herself to him, at least.

‘Wolf, please . . .’ she managed thinly, barely holding onto her strength and self-control. At that instant nothing else mattered but that he wanted her back. ‘I need you.’

Something flickered in the hot blue depths of his stare. Then he stood and took her arm, firmly steering her back towards her bedchamber.

‘What you need is sleep,’ he muttered. ‘We both need to sleep tonight. It will be dawn soon.’

She could feel the heat from his body, her senses tingling at his proximity. She had been dreaming of him in her sleep, she remembered now. He had been inside her in her dream, so male, so demanding, and she had not pushed him away but urged him on, whispering in his ear, even riding atop like a wanton.

She flushed, glad he could not read her thoughts. Though in truth she would not mind if Wolf crawled into bed with her, then rolled her over until she was lying on top. The thought of controlling him in bed was heady, intoxicating, like the rich red wine he had been drinking and that she could smell on his breath.

‘Wolf,’ she whispered seductively as he pushed her before him into the darkened bedchamber.

‘No,’ he said tightly.

‘Yes,’ she insisted, not easily distracted from her goal. ‘You are my husband, are you not?’

He did not answer, but watched her in silence.

Eloise turned swiftly before he could leave her again, her mind made up, her hands dragging at his loosened shirt, tugging it over his head.

To her surprise, Wolf did not stop her, though his chest heaved as he stood before her, naked to the waist.

She had forgotten to close the shutters properly last night when she had fallen alone into bed, exhausted and still dressed, and now the milky light of dawn was creeping through the window slit.

By that light she admired his powerful chest and shoulders, running her fingers down his belly towards the leather bulge of his codpiece. His breathing increased, his eyes on her face, then he made a hoarse noise as her hand found and caught his cock, squeezing lightly through the codpiece.

‘Eloise . . .’

‘Hush,’ she told him, then pulled on his hose, releasing his cock. It sprang into her hands, thick and veined, already stiffening as her fingers closed about him, inciting the flames of desire she had tried to dampen down. ‘Oh, Wolf.’

‘You would take me into your bed, madam,’ he said harshly, ‘believing me a drunk and an adulterer?’

She sank to her knees before him, her hunger for his body so all-consuming that she could think of nothing else.

‘I do not want to hear what you have done,’ she whispered, meaning every word at that moment, and laid her cheek against his body. ‘Only what you will do with me.’

His shaft jerked, and she turned her head slightly, sighing as she took the mushroom-shaped crown into her mouth. His skin tasted salty, so masculine and enticing. He grew in her mouth, slowly stretching her lips, and with a strangled moan she shifted position, accepting more of his thick root into her throat.

He suddenly grabbed at her hair, pulling her closer. ‘All of it, then,’ he ordered her, and the silken authority in his voice made her shiver as she obeyed.

She sucked him in deep and let him withdraw slowly, his root hardening until it was rock in her mouth, the skin startlingly velvet against her lips. His breathing grew more rapid, and he began to thrust lightly in and out of her mouth, not hurting her but expertly showing her how much more she could take.

Daringly, she cupped his balls, taken aback by how large and powerful they felt, and rolled them gently in her hand. He exhaled sharply.

‘God’s blood,’ he muttered.

She looked up at him in the early morning light, and his blue gaze hooked onto hers. The flame in her heart burnt more intensely at that look, making her his slave, his chattel, his lover. Yet even as she thought that, she knew Wolf was as much her slave in bed as she was his, for the same flame burnt behind his eyes.

He stroked her hair, watching in apparent fascination as his thick root slipped in and out of her mouth. Her throat was held open to his shaft, her fingers stroking his balls, and with every inward thrust she made a tiny wet moaning noise that would not be silenced.

Suddenly he withdrew from her mouth, leaving her lips parted; she could still taste him on her tongue.

‘Here,’ Wolf insisted, and turned her rapidly in his hands, positioning her so that she was kneeling on the bed. His hand tangled in her hair, dragging her head back so he could kiss her from behind. Their mouths met with a violence that shook her. Then she felt his cock pressing between her thighs, and moaned against his mouth, lost in a maelstrom of desire she had never known before.

He released her hair, then began to fuck her from behind with long, determined strokes. Grasping her hips, Wolf stamped himself on her flesh again and again. In that position, she could feel his cock rubbing back and forth against some sweet place deep inside, the constant pressure driving her out of her mind, her hips snapping back against his, her lips mouthing his name.

‘Wolf,’ she managed, gasping as though she were dying. ‘Yes, yes.’

Eloise closed her eyes tight, jerking with passion, her entire body shattering in pieces as she came, surging powerfully against him. There was a dark well of joy in front of her, and she fell straight into it, head over heels, tumbling breathless through space.

It was like dying, she thought in a state of wonder. Like dying and being instantaneously reborn, with new skin and new eyes, born afresh into a world of pleasure.

When Eloise managed to open her eyes again, he was still fucking her, driving even harder inside. His hand gripped her neck, holding her still as he thrust and gasped, his breath tortured, taking her with all the desperation of a condemned man. It felt like their last time together, he was riding her so hard, so intensely. And his intensity seemed to burn into her too, scorching her flesh, devouring it until she was nothing but bones and blood beneath him, barely clinging to life.

Suddenly Wolf groaned and thrust deep, rolling and jarring his hips against hers, his heavy cock beginning to swell inside her. She hissed as his seed pulsed out in long, frantic bursts, flooding her cunt, wetly seeking her womb.

Everything blurred to a milky haze as she came for the second time, arching backwards onto his cock with a high-pitched cry.

Some time later she stirred, feeling him leaving the bed, and sleepily put out her hand to stop him.

‘No,’ Wolf ordered her when she would have followed him, not letting her rise. His hand cupped her breast softly, rolling her nipple back and forth. ‘I have business to attend to this morning. Stay in bed, get some rest. I will instruct Mary not to rouse you before noon.’

Then he was gone.

It was late morning by the time she rose from her bed, a bright spring sunshine lying warm across the floor. Mary helped her into one of her richer court gowns, a soft yellow silk with velvet trim and a high, jewelled bodice, then Eloise made the possibly rash decision to leave their apartment chambers unaccompanied. She knew Wolf would be angry, but she would be damned if she would wait in forever for her husband to return.

Mary stared when she asked for her best outdoor shoes. ‘My lady?’

‘I am going to walk in the gardens. It is a fine day.’

‘But the master . . .’

‘My shoes, Mary,’ she insisted. ‘And if news comes of my sister’s whereabouts, be sure to run and find me. I will be walking near the river.’

Feeling braver dressed in her court finery, long hair coiled up under a gold net, and with a book of Italian poems in her hand, Eloise descended to the palace gardens. The day was warm, with only a slight breeze from the river, and she was soon breathing in the sweet fragrance of young herbs and flowers growing along the pathways.

Eloise drew off her glove and stooped to rub a tall spike of rosemary against bare fingertips, letting its pungent aroma fill her senses.

She took the riverside path, trying to concentrate on her book of Italian poems as she wandered alongside the palace walls, but in truth deep in thought.

Wolf’s lovemaking had such a powerful effect on her body she found it impossible to throw his offences in his face when he took her to bed. Her own weakness unsettled her, made her wonder if she deserved to be married to a cheat and a liar. But perhaps that weakness was part of life at King Henry’s court, a tacit acceptance of ‘doubleness’ that kept courtiers’ heads on their shoulders.

On such a glorious spring day it was even harder to remind herself of the darker side of the king. To look out across sunlight dancing on the river and remember that, in the Tower of London, the slender-necked queen of England might be looking out of her prison window at the same river, wondering when her last day on this earth would come.

‘Eloise!’

She turned clumsily on her heel, taken off guard by the shout. It was Simon. He came striding towards her along the riverside path, thinner and more pale than she remembered, but otherwise as handsome as ever.

‘Simon,’ she responded, and curtseyed, unsure how to greet him after the manner of their parting. Then she had been on her way to marry Lord Wolf, to all intents a forced bride, her heart still smarting from Simon’s lack of interest in her fate. Now she was a married woman, and to speak too freely with him might occasion gossip of a kind she could not afford at court.

Yet his was the first friendly face she had seen since her arrival, and he must have been badly frightened by the accusations he had faced. What harm would it do to speak with him for a few moments?

‘Dearest Eloise.’ Simon bent his head to kiss her gloved fingertips, shooting her a wry look as he straightened. ‘Though I suppose I should address you as Lady Wolf now. How are you, Eloise? I have often thought of you up in Yorkshire with your brutish soldier husband.’ He admired her jewelled gown and the exposed swell of her breasts with undisguised lust. ‘And now you are returned to court.’

‘As you see,’ she agreed cautiously.

Simon seemed cheerful enough, but his pallor told her he had not fared well at the hands of the king’s inquisitioners. She wondered if he had been confined to the Tower, knowing they suspected Simon of adulterous liaisons with the queen. If so, he had surely been released without charge, for she had no knowledge of any intimacy between Simon and Queen Anne.