The Wallflower Wager

by Dare, Tessa

  She flopped back on the pillows and groaned. “You’re supposed to be dangerous and passionate. Not principled.”

  “I’ve made a career of ruining fortunes, but I’ve never ruined a woman. I damned well won’t start with you.”

  “I despise that word. Ruined. As if passion is an unforgivable transgression, and virginity is the only measure of a woman’s worth.” She looked at him. “Is that what you believe? That making love tonight would make me worthless tomorrow?”

  “Of course not.”

  “But it might make your property worthless tomorrow. Is that it?”

  “No. I’m not thinking of that at all.”

  In fact, he’d forgotten it completely. His financial interests weren’t the reason for their bargain anymore. At some point, he’d stopped caring about the damned house, and he’d—

  He’d started caring about Penny instead.

  “Nothing could make you less valuable tomorrow. But this might make you less marriageable tomorrow. If word got about.”

  “After the masquerade, word may already be about.”

  He cursed. “Don’t remind me.”

  “What does it matter?” She propped herself on her elbow. “Perhaps I’ll never marry. Perhaps my brother will cut off my funds. I have a bit of money stashed away. I have friends. Why should I care about my dwindling marriage prospects? I’d rather seize control of my life, be free to do anything I wish.” She teased her fingertips through the hair on his chest. “And making love with you is the first item on my list.”

  “Don’t tell me this nonsense about having no prospects. You could have all the prospects in the world, if you wished them. And something tells me you will wish them. Someday. In your heart, you must want to have a family. Children to love, to make feel at home. That talent shouldn’t go unused.” He touched her cheek. “Don’t foreclose the possibility. You deserve good things. Promises. Tenderness. Love. Everything you’ve ever dreamed.”

  “Lately, all my dreams are of you.” She kissed her way down his neck, nuzzling against his skin.

  Desire and conscience warred within him, and there was no doubt which side was losing the battle. He slid his hand around her rib cage, feeling for the closures of her frock. “There could be consequences,” he murmured against her ear. “I’d be a blackguard to ignore that.”

  “I’m fully aware of the risks to my reputation. As well as the risks to my body and my heart.”

  Good God, her heart?

  Her heart.

  “I want you, Gabriel.”

  Such a simple phrase, and yet it summed up the yearning of a lifetime. All these years of anger and striving, and he’d longed for nothing more than this: to be wanted.

  Desire kindled in his chest with a ferocity that stunned him. Scared him.

  As he wrestled to conquer it, he caught a flicker of doubt in her eyes. It was the final blow. Honor waved a white flag of surrender. He would never let her feel a moment’s doubt. Not if he could help it.

  “That is, of course . . .” She bit her lip. “If you want me.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Penny waited in quiet agony for his response.

  “If I want you,” he echoed. “If.”

  “It’s your choice as much as it is mine. If you need time to consider, I—”

  “If I need time to consider?”

  In the flash of a moment, he had her on her back. Penny lay beneath him, breathless.

  His dark eyes held hers. “The only thing I’m considering is precisely how to remove the word ‘if’ from your vocabulary.”

  “Oh.”

  “First, I’m going to strip you naked. I’m going to stroke every part of you with my hands. Then I’m going to paint your body with my tongue. By the time I’m done with you, you will never—ever—ask if I want you again.”

  “Very well. If you insist.”

  He growled through a begrudging smile. “You little minx.”

  He kissed her more deeply than he ever had before, sucking her tongue and gently biting each of her lips in turn. His raw desire made it clear that in all their previous interactions, he’d been holding back. Now she would experience the full, primal force of his passion.

  She couldn’t wait.

  He rolled her onto her side and started on the buttons of her frock. Her impatience was extreme. She couldn’t remember exactly how many buttons there were, but judging by how long this was taking, she guessed the number to be seventy-eight, at minimum. His fingers plucked at the laces of her stays, pulling them through the grommets one by one until the corset fell away from her body.

  “For heaven’s sake. Hurry.”

  He took pity on her, grasping her chemise and splitting it down the middle. She saw his own shirt land in a heap at her side.

  He rolled her over again and helped her work the stifling black shroud down her torso and over her hips, wadding it up and tossing it aside.

  She lay naked to his view, save for her stockings.

  Her black silk stockings.

  He stared at them. “My God. Where did you . . .”

  “Emma dyed them for the occasion. It wouldn’t do to be a black cat with white stockings, would it?” She reached to untie her garter.

  “Don’t you dare.” He ran his eyes over her body. “I have never seen anything so enticing in my life.”

  He ran his hand up her calf, over her knee, and up the sensitive slope of her thigh, until he cupped her mound in his palm. She gasped at the shock of pleasure. His fingers caressed her gently, stroking up and down the seam of her sex, teasing her with light passes until she was breathless.

  She reached between their bodies, feeling for his trousers buttons and tugging at them with eager, inexpert fingers. At last, his placket fell open, and his erection sprang into her hand. Hot, hard, and heavy. She explored him the same way he touched her—skating her fingertips up and down his length, marveling at the silky softness of his skin and tracing the intriguing, yet entirely unfamiliar contours.

  “Let me see you,” she whispered.

  He rose up on his knees, and his male organ jutted toward her.

  The dark hair on his chest arrowed straight toward it, like a signpost indicating a point of natural interest: this way to the manhood.

  As if it could be missed.

  Rude, large, framed by dark hair, and impressively male. No surprises, really. It simply looked like a part of him. An intimidatingly large part of him, considering what was about to occur and where she hoped he would put it. But it wasn’t foreign or frightening. As was the case with all the other parts of his body, she found it bold, strong, unabashed in its nature, and arousing in the extreme. One more facet of a man she was coming to know and hold dear.

  Perhaps even coming to love.

  She curled her hand around his shaft, stroking up and down his length—the way she’d seen him do in the inn. He winced, but in what seemed to be a good way. He permitted her only a few easy strokes before pulling her hand away.

  “Any more of that, and this will be over before it’s even begun.”

  “We can’t have that.”

  He shucked his trousers, tossed them aside, and returned to her, covering her nakedness with his body and settling his hips between her thighs. She arched against him, silently pleading. Once again, he made her wait.

  He kissed her neck, suckled her breasts.

  He reached between her thighs. “Let me kiss you here.”

  “Why?”

  “Mainly because I suspect you’ll enjoy it, and I want to give you pleasure. If you climax now, the pain will be less later. But also because I truly, deeply, very very much want to taste you.”

  She smiled. “Then by all means.”

  He ducked his head, and his whiskers scraped against her inner thighs as he settled between them. His broad shoulders pushed her knees apart, and he worked both hands beneath her hips and lifted, tilting her to the most favorable angle to receive his kiss.

  For a moment,
the intimacy was too much, too uncertain. But when she heard his deep moan of satisfaction, her hesitancy disappeared.

  His tongue glided up the seam of her sex.

  Oh. Oh, God.

  She gripped the pillows on either side of her hips, sinking her fingers into the tasseled brocade.

  The fireworks overhead were nothing to the sensations exploding through her with every pass of his tongue. He parted her with his thumbs, opening her to his explorations.

  He centered his attention on the bundle of nerves at the apex of her cleft and worked it with his nimble, flickering tongue.

  Penny’s head rolled back, and she closed her eyes, surrendering to his erotic talent and the delicious, mounting pleasure. She twisted her hand in his hair and arched against him, seeking more contact, more joy. Climbing higher and higher, until she was dizzied and wary of looking down.

  The pleasure rocketed through her, exploding into sparks of bliss. He rose up on his knees and took himself in hand, guiding his erection to where they both needed it to be. At the heart of her, where it belonged.

  “Please,” she begged.

  When he pushed inside her, it hurt. He held her while she breathed, stretched. She sensed his struggle, the tension in his body.

  “Are you—” A strangled noise. “Is it—”

  In answer, she placed her hands on his back and pulled him deeper.

  He moaned. “Penny.”

  He thrust deeper, working his length inside her in slight, inching thrusts. With his last push, he buried himself to the hilt, wrenching a cry of surprise from her chest.

  “I’m well,” she assured him. “It’s fine.”

  “You’re certain.”

  She nodded. “I’m fine.”

  As he set an easy, tender rhythm, the words rocked through her mind like a chant.

  I’m well.

  It’s fine.

  It’s good.

  So good.

  I’m yours. Yours. Yours.

  His pace quickened. He lifted her hips, angling her to take him deeper. His thrusts drove home again and again, each dig of his hips accompanied by a rasping, desperate sound. With a curse, he withdrew from her body and took himself in hand, stroking himself to completion.

  Then he slumped against her chest, heavier than bricks. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and held him tight, stroking her fingertips lightly down his back. Tears pressed to her eyes, but she forced them back. He’d mistake them for sadness, rather than joy.

  There were no more fireworks overhead. No booming explosions or crackling lights. Only ragged breaths and pounding heartbeats.

  The past, the future . . . none of it mattered. There was only this moment, this man. This one heartbeat, and then the next, stringing together to make this life.

  A life that belonged to her. At last.

  After rolling aside, Gabe observed her through the haze of fireworks lingering in the air. He believed she’d truly wanted this. He wouldn’t have made love to her if he hadn’t.

  But that was before. It remained to be seen whether she’d feel the same way after.

  “Gabriel.” She rolled onto her back and stared up at the sky. “Ask me how it feels to be ruined.”

  “How does it feel to be ruined?”

  He watched a grin spread across her face. “I have no idea.”

  Gabe exhaled, and the knot of dread in his chest unraveled. “So you’re not regretful.”

  “Regretful?” She all but bounced to a sitting position. “Not in the least. I am delighted. I’ve wanted that since . . . since we met, I think. But I couldn’t have imagined I’d ever work up the courage.” She pressed her hand to her mouth and laughed. “I just lost my virginity on a rooftop. To”—she made a two-handed gesture at his nude body—“you.”

  Gabe folded one arm under his head. He supposed he would take that as a compliment.

  “Emma, Nic, and Alex will never believe this.”

  “Hold a moment.” It was his turn to bolt upright. “Surely you don’t mean to tell them.”

  “I tell them everything. Almost.”

  “Yes, but . . .”

  “Why shouldn’t I tell them? Do you think I should be ashamed?”

  “No,” he answered. “But they will think I should be.”

  “Honestly, I’m not certain I could hide it. They’ll guess the moment they see me.”

  Yes, he thought, it was likely they would. She was giddy, blushing. Radiant. Nothing could surpass his pleasure at knowing he’d helped put that look on her face. Not even the blood-stirring, soul-shattering climax he’d barely survived a few minutes past.

  “Don’t worry,” she said. “They’re my closest friends, and they wouldn’t tell a soul. It’s not as though I mean to put a notice in the Times.”

  This phrase gave him pause. Maybe she would expect a different notice in the Times. An engagement notice.

  He cleared his throat. “So what are your expectations, moving forward?”

  “Expectations?”

  “Your hopes. If you have any.”

  “Oh, I do.” She ducked her chin and looked at him through a golden fringe of eyelashes. “I hope we can do it again.”

  He stared at her, marveling.

  “Not right now, necessarily,” she hastened to say. “I know you must be fatigued. Another day would be fine.”

  He couldn’t help but chuckle. With a flex of his arm, he drew her into a kiss—a kiss she returned with equal passion and a breathy, erotic moan. Despite her adorable concerns for his “fatigue,” he could have risen to the challenge of another performance, easily.

  “Good God,” he said. “What have I unleashed?”

  “Me.” She lifted his hand and kissed it. “I’m in control of my life and my body, and you can’t know what that means. I’m not sure I know what it means. But I’m all anticipation to find out.”

  So am I, he thought. Bloody hell, so am I.

  He stroked the hair back from her face, admiring her beauty when bathed in starlight. She seemed an entirely new woman.

  She startled. “Bixby. We have to go home. He’ll be needing his walk.”

  Well, then. Perhaps not an entirely new woman after all.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Several days later, Penny sat at Nicola’s kitchen table, staring at the fresh-off-the-presses copy of the weekly Prattler.

  “I can’t look,” she said.

  “Do you want me to read it?” Nicola reached for the newspaper.

  “No.” Penny slapped her hand over it. “I’ll do it. When I’m ready.” She looked at her empty plate. “Are there any more biscuits?”

  “Between you and Bixby, the kitchen is bare.”

  “Oh. Did you have any plans of baking more?” Penny asked hopefully. “It might help.”

  Everything seemed a bit easier to face with a plate of fresh biscuits.

  She tapped her fingers on the newspaper’s front page. “I don’t know why this is so difficult. It’s not as though I can change the contents by waiting. What’s printed is printed. I am either a scandal or a spinster already, depending on what’s inside.”

  “Actually,” Nicola mused, “while the paper remains closed, you’re both.”

  “Both?”

  “Right now, you’re both a scandal and a spinster.”

  “I’m so sorry. I’m afraid I don’t follow you.” Penny frequently had difficulty following the twists and turns of Nicola’s mind. Everyone did.

  Nicola’s eyes went unfocused, as though she were staring at the distant horizon. One that only she could see. “Imagine you took a cat,” she said slowly, “and sealed it in a box.”

  “Seal a cat inside a box?” Penny was horrified. “I’d never do such a thing.”

  “Of course you wouldn’t actually do it. I’m only trying to illustrate a philosophical conundrum.”

  “What sort of philosophical conundrum requires a person to imagine suffocating cats? Surely there’s a better illustration.”
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br />   “You’re right. I’ll think of something else.” Nicola set aside her tinkering. “Penny, if there’s anything you need to talk about, I’m always here for you. I know I’m not as sympathetic and comforting as Emma or Alexandra.”

  “Nic—”

  “Don’t worry. I’m not disparaging myself. I simply know my talents, and that’s not one of them. However, I’m always here to listen. And when it comes to matters of the heart, I’m not completely inexperienced.”

  “You’re . . . you’re not?” Penny stared at her friend, amazed. In all their years of friendship, Nicola had never, not once, mentioned a sweetheart or a suitor. Much less being in love.

  With a shake of her head, Nicola picked up a gear and turned it over in her hands. “Men can be terribly distracting.”

  A thousand questions crowded Penny’s mind, but before she could ask any of them, the clocks began to strike the hour. From all around the house, they were bombarded by chimes, cuckoos, pendulum strikes, and clanging bells.

  Nicola owned a great many clocks. Or rather, Nicola’s father had owned a great many clocks, and Nicola couldn’t bring herself to part with a single one of them. Although the hourly mayhem had a way of interrupting conversation, Penny never complained. How could she? A woman who took in kittens by the dozen had little room to criticize.

  Today, it could have been worse. The clocks didn’t go on too long this time, as the hour was merely three o’clock in the afternoon.

  Goodness. Three o’clock in the afternoon? Penny had been sitting there for ages already.

  No more dithering.

  She reached for the copy of the Prattler, opened it to the society pages, and briefly squeezed her eyes shut. Strangely, she didn’t know what to wish for. Perhaps Nicola had the right of it, and Penny had been delaying this because she enjoyed being a wallflower and a temptress—and she resented that society wouldn’t let her be both.

  The days since the masquerade had been the most thrilling days of her life. While she and Gabriel awaited the verdict, they’d made use of the time in a variety of passionate, and increasingly inventive, ways. It was as if all the clocks had stopped, and they’d carved out a secret haven free from prying eyes or consequence.