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She let her senses drift on the pleasure of his kiss, the lovely feel of his body hard against hers, the intruding thigh between her legs, the large hands roaming her body at will.
Ever since he had caressed her feet in the billiard room, her body had been on fire, her mind a senseless mess of conflicting and confusing thoughts. She wanted this, even if she was beyond the pale to him except in this most basic of passions.
Tonight she would have her desires fulfilled and out of the way, so she could plan how next to proceed without regret for what might have been.
His tongue licked her lips and pressed against the seam of her mouth. She opened to him, tasted brandy smoky on her tongue.
Her breasts felt heavy and full, the place between her thighs moist and tingling; she tilted her hips, increasing the pressure of his thigh and was rewarded by his brief indrawn breath.
She uncurled her fingers from the fabric of his robe and slipped them beneath, to run her hands over his broad expanse of chest.
She’d seen much of him in the billiard room and again as he lay naked on his bed with his eyes closed.
She’d been surprised but grateful for the candles’ revealing light. His body was gorgeous, his male member thick and large; she could feel it now pressing against her lower abdomen as his hand brushed up from the indentation at her waist to cover her breast.
She let go a long sigh of pleasure and a satisfied sound of male approval rumbled in his chest.
It sent a shiver down her spine.
Her fingers splayed across the warm silken skin of his chest, felt the roughness of hair and the puckered skin of his scar.
She longed to touch it with her tongue, taste it with her lips, but right now his mouth was taking her senses to new heights of arousal. She slipped her hands up to his shoulders and thrust her tongue in his mouth.
He groaned and swept her up in his arms, breaking the kiss. She looked up into his face.
‘My bed or yours?’ he asked.
‘Yours.’ She laughed. ‘It is closer.’
‘A sensible woman indeed,’ he murmured, his dark eyes hazy with passion and glinting with amusement.
He was so bloody handsome. It wasn’t fair.
But he was hers for now. And she would make the most of the one night he’d granted.
He frowned.
Had he sensed her regrets?
She smiled and licked her lips. ‘What now, you great gormless statue?’
At that he threw back his head and laughed out loud. He strode for the bed, pressing her back against the mattress, and gazed into her face. ‘Did I tell you how much I adore that tongue of yours?’
‘For what it says?’ she asked, fluttering her lashes. ‘Or what it can do?’
‘Hades,’ he muttered under his breath and swooped down for a kiss. Their mouths melded, blissfully fitting together. Her thoughts scattered as he plundered her mouth and she clasped her hands around the back of his neck, holding him tight, as she devoured the slick silkiness of his tongue in her mouth. She sucked.
He stilled.
Had she been too bold? Gone too far? Would he think her completely wanton? Her heart beat hard against her chest as he broke the kiss. She let her hands fall away as he drew back, his low-lidded gaze sweeping her body, his lips curving in a sensual smile of approval. ‘You are a feast for the senses.’
The words struck a chord low in her belly. Flutters tormented her feminine core. What was he waiting for? Suddenly shy, she twisted her fingers in the curls falling over her shoulder, staring at the strong column of throat emerging from his robe, at the rise of his angular cheekbones. In daylight they made his face look hard and stern, but now they made him look like a fallen angel.
Her angel. For one night. A yearning she did not expect pulled at her heart. Such yearning had no place in her life. She pushed it away and opened her arms to him.
He untied the cord at his hips, and discarded his robe in one easy movement. The scar across his chest gleamed white in the candlelight. It crossed sculpted muscle and striated ribs, missed his navel by an inch where it sliced a path across a stomach ridged with tight muscle to come to rest at his hipbone.
And below, the evidence of his desire, the engorged member jutting from wiry black curls, a dark tip. Proud and very male.
She sucked in a breath and raised her gaze to his face. His expression was dark, harsh and full of seduction.
She reached up and traced a finger down the scar’s length, from just above his left nipple to his right hip, where the skin jumped beneath her touch.
‘Ticklish?’ she asked.
Mischief gleamed in his dark eyes. ‘If so, be prepared for repayment in kind.’
Her skin tingled as his hot gaze seared every inch of her body. In a moment of weakness, a slight edge of fear that this dark angel would steal more than she was prepared to give, she covered herself, her breasts, her groin.
His brows lowered. ‘Unlike you to be shy, sweet Merry.’
What could she say? She hid behind rough words, yet none came to her tongue. She felt weak with yearning.
‘Will you stand there all night looking, then?’ Perhaps not completely undone. She brought her arms up, stretched like a cat, feeling the peaks of her breasts against the soft muslin of her nightgown.
He grinned. ‘Ah, sweet tormenting witch.’ Leaning over her, a hand each side of her head, he brought one knee up on to the bed, a tall man, with no need for the step. He nudged his knee between hers, a gentle insistent pressure of warm skin and hard bone.
No going back. She opened her thighs. Gave him room. Gave him leave. Her breath left her in a rush of anticipation.
Half-on, half-off the bed, he hung over her, his dark eyes searching hers, seeking assurance? Permission? She raised her hands, cupped his cheeks, felt the roughness of beard and drew him down.
Blissful kisses rained from his lips, a touch on her mouth, her chin, her cheekbone, her eyelids, between her brows. Each kiss fired heat low between her legs, her body ached to feel him within her, her breasts longed for his touch and all the while featherlight kisses seared her face.
‘Lovely, Merry,’ he murmured in a low growl at her ear. His tongue traced the swirls. Her skin thrilled and her insides shivered. Never had kisses felt so sweet, yet the brush of his lips promised so much more.
Panting, she tugged at his shoulders, wanting him closer, hard against her, his bulk weighing her down. She ached.
The strength in his shoulders resisted her feeble attempts to drag him on top of her. She raised herself up to press against him, feeling the prod of his erection against the softness of her belly, the press of his chest against her breasts. ‘Charlie,’ she moaned.
‘Yes, love?’
The amusement in his voice flared her temper. She struck at him with her fist and fell back against the pillows. She glared up at him. The muscles in his upper arms bulged with the effort of holding his weight. She shoved at his arm. ‘Don’t tease.’
Dark lashes swept down and rose again, revealing wicked laughter in their depths. His mouth curved in a smile so sensual her insides tightened beyond bearing. ‘What, Merry? Is this to be naught but a hurried encounter, a quick nibble, when I would savour the banquet before me?’
‘Sometimes,’ she whispered in sultry tones, ‘the table is cleared before you can taste.’
‘A threat, Merry? Are you playing the tease?’
The edge to his tone gave her pause. This was not a man she could manipulate. He liked to be the one in charge as much as she did. Mayhap more.
If she wanted him, she would have to take what he offered.
She clawed her fingers through the rough hair on his chest and tugged. His jaw flickered. Curving her lips in what she hoped was a smile as seductive as his own, she peeped up at him from beneath lowered lids. ‘This is a banquet for two, is it not?’ She lightly pinched his nipple between her fingernails.
His eyes glazed. His chest expanded on a quick breath. ‘It is.’ His voice sounded ragged.
‘Then I would taste, too.’ She let her hands wander over the smooth contour of his shoulders, felt the slight tremble deep in his bones as he held himself still, looking down at her face. Desire warmed his eyes, while restrained power tensed his jaw. Control.
A man with a will of iron.
Her fingers traced the contours of the arms bracketing her head against the pillows; her palms warmed to the heat of his blood beneath the satiny smoothness of his skin. A pulse beat in his strong neck, a hard beating throb that echoed in her own veins.
Once more she raised herself up, but not to take, to give. She licked along the artery. Blue blood for the son of a duke. She nuzzled against his neck, sweeping her tongue across the salty skin, sucking and nipping. His breathing roughened. Not so much in control as he would have her think.
She nibbled his earlobe and breathed into his ear.
He groaned and pressed closer, encouraging her tongue deep into the orifice. Controlling again. Demanding.
She pulled away.
‘Witch,’ he muttered. ‘Will you torment me?’
‘No more than you torment me,’ she whispered.
He took her mouth in a hungry plundering kiss.
Strength surrounded her, his body a wall she could see nothing beyond. It filled her vision, and her mind. He was powerful male. Beside him, she seemed feeble.
Vulnerable. Her heart picked up speed. Trickles of fear rose up from her belly. Her wanton yearnings had almost destroyed her once; she should not let it happen again. Even so, the kiss overwhelmed her senses, carried her upwards on currents of air, rising in twisting strands of pleasure and the pain of need.
A hand, large and firm, cupped her buttocks, caressed the curve. A finger dipped lightly into the crease. A titillating sensation through the fabric. She gasped into his mouth.
He squeezed and kneaded her bottom, while his erection pressed against her.
The teasing fingers travelled down her thigh to her knee. They bunched the gown, easing it upwards. Yes. Now they stroked the bare flesh above her knee, little circles travelling up her thigh, bringing her gown higher, while his kisses numbed her mind to all but his touch.
The fresh scent of his soap and the musk of male arousal dizzied her senses. The longing to submit to his greater will made her limbs languid and heavy. She was pliant in his arms, a shadow of herself. Overpowered by his skill.
His to mould and to shape. It felt lovely.
Chapter Nine
Charlie longed to see her naked. The fine lawn of her shift, the satin of her robe, hid little, yet veiled enough to send his imagination wild. The torment of not possessing her left a growl low in his throat.
He slipped the robe off her shoulders and down her arms. Long, slender, white-skinned arms. He kissed the inside of her elbows, one at a time, smelled the scent she’d placed there earlier, lavender, inhaled it to the depths of his lungs, knowing he would never smell that scent again and not think of Merry.
Eyes half-closed, she lay with her black hair spread over the pillow. He lifted her hand, kissed each finger. The pulse in her throat beat hard and fast. Her breathing quickened.
So sensual. So feminine. So desirable.
He tugged the hem of her nightrail free and she raised her arms to help him lift it off. Her breasts, full and round and high, left him in awe. He filled his hands with their bounty, marvelled at the whiteness of her skin and the firmness of the beautiful flesh.
Beautiful. Rounded. Firm and proud. The peaks were dark, a soft shade of brown, puckered and tight from the exposure to cool air.
He puffed out a breath.
She wriggled.
‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘I have been waiting to see these all night.’
He swirled his tongue around first one tightly budded nipple and then the other.
She moaned.
He felt her dampness on his thigh pressed between hers. Oh, yes, she wanted him as much as he wanted her. Desire shone like a bright flame between them, glowing on their skin and heating their blood. The pulse at the base of her throat urged him on, yet he was loath to let it flare and all too soon die.
He suckled.
She speared her hands in his hair, pressing his mouth to her breast. He caught her by one shoulder, supporting himself and holding her trapped, teasing her other breast with a flicking thumb.
She cried out her pleasure. The shudder of her body as the shocks of pleasure held her in their grip drove him beyond control and into the darkness of his own urgent need.
He widened his knees, opening her thighs. Her dark curls were damp. He guided himself to her entrance.
‘Merry,’ he commanded. ‘Look at me.’
She lifted her eyelids. Her full lips smiled. There was yet one more thing he needed. One thing he needed to know.
‘Say my name.’
She licked her lips. ‘Charlie,’ she breathed.
He slid deep inside her. Knew her as only a lover could know a woman.
Her heat closed around him in welcoming warmth. He kissed her mouth, probed with his tongue as he moved his hips. She clutched at his shoulders, digging her nails into his skin, tilting her hips, rising to meet his every thrust as he stroked her insides. He watched her submit to the pleasure.
The urge to drive into her, to bury himself deep and simply let go, jolted through him.
He fought for command. Battled for the will to lead her from one little death to the next without taking his own. He was known for it. Anything else was unacceptable.
He slowed his breathing.
Clung to control by a thread with each warm slide into her depths, each slow lingering withdrawal.
He breathed deep and slow, the body and the mind in perfect harmony. Energy building to peaks, then rippling away in muscle and bone.
‘Charlie?’ She ran her fingers over his chest, tweaked his nipples, raised herself to suckle.
His breathing faltered, distracted by the sight of her glorious black tresses against the whiteness of her shoulders and the generous exploration of his body.
Her touch felt wonderful. Not giving or taking, but delightfully shared.
She lifted her legs high and took him deeper.
The pleasure hit him hard and fast. A breath caught in his throat. Breathe, damn it. He twisted his hips, grinding himself hard against the yielding heated flesh.
‘Oh, Charlie.’
The sound of his name on her lips, the feel of her luscious body around him, her legs tight at his waist, sent him over the edge. He succumbed to the urges beating in his blood.
He pounded into her. Mindless. Feral.
The climax built. Hit him hard. ‘I can’t Merry you have to’ He pumped his hips and caressed with his thumb.
Her eyes widened. Her body trembled. Her inner muscles tightened around him. Gripped him, as her fingers gripped his shoulders. He gazed into her face, saw the strain and the reach. Her eyes opened wide. She let out a cry as she fell apart.
Undone by the glory of the utter bliss on her face, unable to contain his own race to the finish, he pulled clear and spilled against the covers.
Oh, what did she do to him? He felt like an inexperienced lad. Vulnerable. Without control instead of bringing her to greater heights, keeping her in a state of ever-increasing arousal, until he decided to let her go.
Dear God, he’d almost spilled inside her body.
Aware of her laboured breathing, he turned on to his side and gazed into a face dreamy with satiation. Eyes closed, she lay utterly relaxed, her face still flushed; the scent of their lovemaking perfumed the air.
Her eyes drifted open. ‘Mmmm,’ she murmured, her chest still rising and falling. ‘That was good.’
Bloody hell. He was leaving in the morning and one night with Merry was not nearly enough.
‘You are glorious,’ he said and pulled her into the cradle of his arm, let her head rest on his shoulder. His pounding heart slowly quieted, her breath tickled his chest and his own breathing slowed to match hers.
Cosy and warm and deliciously replete, Merry woke to light filtering through her eyelids. It must be morning.
Time to get up. She opened her eyes.
The room was ablaze with candles. They burned on the tables each side of the bed. And on the mantel. Beside her the sound of another’s deep breathing. The gentle inhale and exhale from Charlie. She glanced over at the window. Still dark outside.
The last thing she remembered was him saying he wanted to watch her sleep when she suggested they snuff the lights. Carefully, she eased on to her side and gazed at the man sprawled beside her on top of the covers. He lay on his stomach, his flanks and broad back gilded by candlelight. She reached out to run a hand over the beautiful skin, then whipped it back, touching her lips with a fingertip. He looked so relaxed, it seemed a shame to disturb him. Even if the little flutters low in her abdomen suggested he might very well like it.
She glanced at his face, at the full lips, relaxed in sleep, the dark crescent of eyelashes, the slash of brow, the rugged features.
Delicious. A gorgeous man.
She raised up on her elbow. He looked younger in sleep. Less world weary. Less drawn. Less severe. Closer to her own age than she’d thought.
The clock on the mantel struck the quarter hour. She glanced over and saw it was past five o’clock. Very soon Brian would come to make up the fire and find her here. She’d asked him to take over the task from Beth and Jane. She didn’t want Tonbridge propositioned again. Not by them, anyway. She quelled a small smile.
Nor did she want to start any gossip.
The ripple of concern over the bourgeois Miss Draycott and her brief girlish love affair in those long-ago schooldays would be nothing to the scandal of being caught in a marquis’s bed.
Her first indiscretion had been with a boy. Charlie was a man. A beautiful, wonderful man who knew how to please a woman.
She stretched. She really should return to her own room.
Their mutual passion had been nectar from the gods to her, but might have seemed passing ordinary to him. A sow’s ear, rather than the silk purse in her mind. Hopefully, Tonbridge wouldn’t betray her indiscretion. He was much too much the gentleman.
What did it matter? After today, she would never see him again. A pang beneath her ribs halted her breath.
Sadness, when she should be feeling nothing but sated. A longing for what could never be. How futile. How unlike her since she’d grown up.
She retrieved her robe from the floor beside the bed.
Charlie sighed, but didn’t waken. Just as well. He only had to look at her with those dark eyes and sweep away any semblance of reason.
She slipped on her nightgown, thrust her arms into the sleeves of her robe and knotted the tie. She glanced around the room. It was dangerous to leave candles burning unattended. The thought of a fire made her skin crawl. The house in Skepton had taken but minutes to burn. The girls had been lucky to escape with their lives. She took the snuffer from the mantel and tiptoed around the room, quickly extinguishing them all.
Unfortunately, Charlie didn’t seem to notice her departure. With a rueful smile at her continuing feeling of regret, she opened the door and peeped out into the corridor. All quiet. And dark. With no sound from her bare feet on the runner, she ran lightly back to her own room at the end of the hall.
She jumped between the cold sheets and shivered.
It would have been nice to stay next to Charlie. For them to wake up together. Like husband and wife.
The faint memory of sitting on her parents’ bed in the early mornings, drinking chocolate like a real grown-up lady slid into her thoughts. They’d been so happy. Before the fever had struck.
Afterwards, everything had changed. Poor Grandfather had been so sad, so worried about what to do with her.
She snuggled deeper beneath the sheets and closed her eyes. If only things could have been different. If only she could have been a lady like her mother, as Grandfather had hoped, Charlie might have gone along with her proposal. Betrothed to a marquis. Merry Draycott. What a thing. She couldn’t help but chuckle beneath her breath. She hugged her arms around her body. Imagine meeting such a gorgeous man on the road across the moors.
The vision of her phaeton, shafts upright in the ditch, brought her upright. Deliberately damaged.
Her stomach roiled. Her heart raced, rising in her throat to shorten her breathing. Fear.
Saints above, she’d never sleep now. She couldn’t go back to Charlie, admit her terror. He’d use the knowledge to impose his will.
Shivering, she got up and lit a candle to keep the dark thoughts at bay. She stared at the flickering flame. Was that why Charlie kept his candles alight when he slept? To keep away evil?
It would have to be something terrible to trouble such a powerful man.
Numbers were her escape. She picked up the accounts ledger she’d put aside earlier in the evening. It would either put her to sleep, or she would get her morning’s work done before first light. She must find a way to increase production, or she would have to let employees go.
Why was everything going wrong now? Were all the naysayers who had wrung their hands in horror at her inheritance of the mill right after all? Was it impossible for a woman to run such a large enterprise as Draycott’s? Should she have abided by her uncle Chepstow’s wishes and put everything in his hands?
She sighed. Grandfather would have solved the problem in an instant. Look out for t’coppers was his motto. Was that what she was doing wrong? Looking out for the pounds?
Dash it all, she would not be beaten.
She opened the ledger at the beginning. The answer had to be here.
Cold. Alone. Charlie opened his eyes.
Darkness assaulted his gaze. Silence his ears. A band tightened around his chest, cutting off air. Sweat trickled down his back. His heart thundered. He lay rigid. Still. Suffocating.
In a bed?
Why the hell was it dark?
The candles must have gone out. Darkness had woken him. He threw back the covers and drew back the curtains from the window. It didn’t help.
He gathered the supply of candles he’d left ready with shaking hands. He brought down the candelabra and struck the flint. A candle flared. He inhaled a deep calming breath.
He held the flame to the candelabra. Its candles hadn’t burned down, they’d been snuffed. Some time ago by their length.
He glanced at the rumpled bed. Merry must have doused them when she left.
Why hadn’t he awoken then? He had slept through her departure. Were the nightmares finally gone?
He rubbed at his breastbone and stared at the window. A faint trace of grey in the darkness of the room. He wanted to cheer. He felt rested. For the first time in years, energy coursed through his veins at the thought of a new day.
He’d made love to Merry, wonderful passionate wild love, and fallen asleep. God, he’d lost complete control with her, behaved like a green boy with his first woman.
She had climaxed deliciously. He hardened, wanting her again.
It wouldn’t happen.
Their lovemaking hadn’t changed her decision. The two things were not connected. She wanted him gone. He was to drive away and leave her to face the danger alone. Impossible. Yet what choice did he have unless he agreed to her suggestion that he pose as her future husband.
He groaned. If his father ever learned of this new adventure of his, Robert would be outcast forever. But leaving Merry in danger was out of the question. He already had enough guilt to carry. What he’d done to Robert. His failure at Waterloo.