by Reid, Stacy
He leaned against the edge of the large desk, his face washed with carnal intent. “Afraid?” he asked with provoking amusement.
She narrowed her eyes. “Never…. merely wondering if I should order you to strip as well.”
Appreciation lit in his brilliant eyes, and his soft laugh brushed against her skin like temptation itself. Lifting her chin, Sophia removed her boots and stockings, stripped from the trousers, and knee-length drawers. She shrugged from the jacket and dropped it to the floor and removed the waistcoat. Only the shirt remained, and its edges brushed over her bottom like a lover’s caress.
“Remove the spectacles…and the wig.”
She complied and even took it a step further, drawing several pins from her hair until her tresses tumbled in a loose wave down to her back. Sophia sat on the sofa and gripped the edges as inexplicably shyness almost overwhelmed her.
Her lover’s smile faded a little, growing softer, more intimate. The deep blue of his eyes glinted with wicked knowledge, and he prowled over to her. William lowered to his haunches and peered up at her. He encircled her left ankle and pushed up until her knee bent, so she sat with her leg drawn up, the sole of her foot flat on the edge of the cushion. Her breath hitched when he leaned across, his beautiful eyes holding her captive, and repeated the action with her other leg. Her entire body blushed when his gaze dropped to her revealed sex.
“So lush, pink…and already wet for me.”
A queer excitement rippled through her stomach. She expected him to touch her there, but he did not. He shifted, resting on his knees before her. He leaned in, and the touch of his tongue on the back of her knees as light as butterfly wings. Tension tightened low in her belly, and her pulse raced. He went higher with his light kisses, and Sophia gasped at the wickedness of it.
“William?” she moaned desire, and uncertainty pulsing inside her.
He nipped along the insides of her thighs, then applied the tender ministrations of his lips. Then he was there, at her open sex, with his wicked tongue, which slid through the tender folds of her quim with erotic precision.
He slid his hand underneath her bottom, gripped, and pulled her even closer to the edge of the well-padded sofa. Her breath came in shuddering gasps, and a sob rose in her throat when he licked her again. He held her legs wide, bent and licked in one heated swipe before drawing her nub of pleasure into his mouth and sucking hard. She screamed, shivered, and slapped a hand over her mouth.
He showed her no mercy. Sophia gripped his hair, her weight dropping back against the plushness of the sofa. Nothing should ever feel this good but also so agonizing.
“William, please!” she wailed.
She sobbed his name, undulated her hips, whispers and hoarse cries ripping from her throat, and he never released her from under the lash of his tongue. The exquisite sensations built steadily, overwhelming her senses.
He came over her and roughly ran his lips to her neck, where he bit hard. A jerk of her shirt and buttons burst away. He nuzzled her collarbone and then lower capturing her nipple with his mouth.
Trailing his hands down, he cupped her neglected breasts, which felt so heavy and swollen with desire. He rolled her nipples between his fingers, pinching and pleasuring her. Desperate to have him in her, she pressed her hand between them and reached for the flap of his trouser. Soon his thick hardness rested in her palm, and she gripped him tightly.
He groaned in ecstasy.
He held her gaze as he entered her slowly. Her breath caught at the tight, stretching sensation as he pushed deep inside her until he could go no deeper.
“I love you, so damn much, Soph,” he said his voice dark with desire.
Words of love hovered on her lips, and the realization they were there struck fear in her heart, and she shivered in the cage of his arms.
“No,” he said, taking her mouth in a raw domineering kiss. One that seared her insides with molten heat. “Stay with me. I do not want these doubts in your eyes, my darling, only feel what is between us.”
He withdrew, so that only the tip of his manhood nudged her entrance, and then plunged deep. Her hoarse scream slid over them. For an instant, they both lay unmoving, then he dipped his head and pressed the softest of kisses at the corner of her lips. A deep ache of want and complex needs filled her soul.
“I love you,” he murmured again, awe in his voice as if he held a treasure in his arms. A very strange but sweet twisting ache stirred in her belly, and her heart quickened.
His voice caressed her like a physical touch, soft, smoky, soothing, sensual.
“Love me, William,” she pleaded, kissing the wildly pounding pulse at his throat. “Take away the doubts I feel rising in my heart.” She hated the still lingered in her and she wanted to remove the shadows in his eyes. He mattered to her so much.
He started to move with savage sensuality within her, and she cried out, glorying in the pleasure-pain that spread through her tender core with each snap of his hips. He snaked a hand below her stomach and pinched her clitoris between his fingers. For endless minutes, Sophia became lost entirely in the taste, the scent, and the feel of him. Wonderful shocks of sensations speared her senses, and she orgasmed in an exquisite burst, shaking and gasping. He rode her through her convulsions of pleasure, and soon he found his release deep within her body.
He eased from her and shifted so that she sat atop him. She wilted onto his chest, relaxing into the haven of his embrace, her body still shivering through the aftermath of such untamed loving.
* * *
It had been three days since William had returned with Sophia to Hawthorne Park. There was a heaviness inside his chest, for each night, he confessed his love after they had pleasured each other, and instead of love growing in her eyes, they were shadowed by doubts and fear.
They lay in the drawing-room on a chaise longue by the fire, and she was only clothed in a billowing white shirt which hung to her knees.
“William,” she began hesitantly, and ice congealed in his stomach.
“Yes?”
“I…I cannot keep staying here. I must return to Hertfordshire. My aunt is traveling down in a few days, and I will need to be there to greet her.”
Silence blackened the room. He had known he could not keep her there forever without marriage.
“I’ll miss you,” she said in the fraught silence.
“Do you plan to never see me again? He chided. “I thought you said affairs lasted for years.”
Relief wilted her shoulders, and she twisted atop his chest. The ice deepened. This was what she wanted—an affirmation their affair would continue further not the tender sentiments he had been bestowing each night. The hollowness in his heart spread, and his hands tightened on her shoulders.
“William?”
“I understand you must go,” he said gruffly.
There was an odd sheen of tears in her gaze as she stared at him. “I’ve been thinking about wintering in France this year.”
Another harsh blow to his chest. “I see.”
“Would you…would you come with me?”
The air whooshed from him audibly. “As your lover?”
She smiled shyly. “Yes, I am a thousand pounds richer, and I’ve heard the French are less judgmental of affairs de Coeur. No one there would know we are not man and wife.” She lowered her eyes as her cheeks pinkened. He could feel the beat of her heart against his chest. His Sophia was anxious.
The door swung open without the courtesy of a knock and anger snapped through him. Who would dare!
He snapped his head up to see his mother frozen in the doorway, her face a mask of astonishment and anger. William eased a blushing Sofia from his chest. “I am certain the butler told you we were not to be disturbed,” he said icily.
“So, it is true,” she accused, stepping further into the room and slamming the door closed behind her. “I saw a shocking damming piece in a scandal sheet in Bath! My good friend Lady Palfrey asked me who is this Miss Knightly t
hat you would chase her and create a spectacle of yourself. How dare you bring this … this woman to Hawthorne Park and betray everything your father—”
“Silence!”
His mother flinched as if the raw anger in his voice had flayed her skin.
Her hands fluttered to her throat, and she had the temerity to stare at him with wounded eyes. He turned to Sofia who had lifted her chin in defiance, even if her cheeks were stained red with her mortification. Her lips were swollen, and her hair mussed, quite revealing evidence as to what they had been doing earlier. “If you will but grant me a few minutes with my mother.”
She stood on wobbly legs, bent and tugged on the scattered trousers. They had raced across the estate a few hours ago, and when the soft misting rain had started, they had returned to the drawing-room to play chess but had been distracted by their sweetest passion. Sophia nodded regally and spun about and made her way from the room without acknowledging the duchess.
“What rudeness!” his mother snapped. “But that is to be expected from someone so lowborn and vulgar and willing to act the whore.”
William faced her and stared at the woman he had once loved with his entire heart. He’d always know her to be kind and thoughtful of others, but that seemed to only extend to those of similar affluence and blue blood. “You will never speak another crude word about Miss Knightly ever again,” he incised with chilling authority. You lied to me.”
No shame glowed in her eyes. “And I do not regret it,” she said firmly. “Or you would have foolishly married that—”
“I hope one day I will be able to forgive your despicable actions! I am ashamed of you, deeply!”
She paled and swayed alarmingly, but he did not rush over to her.
He moved closer to her, uncaring of his state of disarray. “I never imagine my mother…the woman who kissed my knees when I scraped them, who first taught me about love and kindness could hold such contempt and prejudice in her heart. You told me she was dead.” All the agony he’d endured crowded his throat, and his breath hitched audibly. “I mourned her,” he said gruffly. “I screamed for days…months, and when the pain was unrelenting, whisky became my companion. And you knew she lived.”
Tears slipped down her cheeks, but he was not moved by this evidence of some regret. “I believed her to be a passing fancy. Nothing more.”
“And does that justify your wicked deceit.”
“William—”
“Miss Knightly is the woman I love with every part of me.”
“And does she love you?” she began scathingly. “Or does she love your wealth your influence, money and—”
“She loves me,” he said with quiet force. “And hardly gives a damn I am a duke.”
His mother lips parted, and her eyes glowed with shock. “You asked her to marry you?” she asked in a bare whisper. “Your promise your father—”
“How dare you try to control me through a man who is dead!” he snarled, anger throbbing through him in riotous waves. “My father is dead, and I will not be bounded to by his prejudices, nor will I allow you to have a say in the woman I take to be my wife. I love you, mother, but you will respect my wishes without interference for I will not hesitate to walk away from you.”
“William!”
“You will leave Hawthorne Park and only return upon my invitation. And mother…that might never be.”
She swayed, pressing a hand to her chest as if unable to move. Concern bit through him, but he swallowed down, refusing to be manipulated by her. She had cost him so much with her wretched desire to select his wife.
As he made his way to leave, his mother flushed her back against the door and splayed her arms wide.
“I’ll not hesitate to lift you and drop you on your fundament outside!”
Sophia was determined to leave him, and William was at a loss as how to convince her to look past her fear and choose him. But he had to try and had no time to waste on his mother’s theatrics. William feared she was not ready to choose him now, but he would chase her to France. If he gave in now and kept pretending only an affair would do, nothing would ever be good between them in the future. He’d already laid a farcical foundation by not courting her, but stupidly taking her to be his mistress.
No more. She needed to risk a gamble, and he prayed it would be on him.
Chapter 11
Sophia hurriedly dressed in her most serviceable gown and walking boots. Temper simmered in her veins at the duchess’s rudeness, and she was also angry with herself for feeling mortification at being found undressed in William’s arms. Fixing a hat atop her tightly bound hair, she made her way down the stairs.
“You told me you were seeking a wife… a duchess,” his mother’s voice echoed through the thick oak paneling of the door.
Sophia faltered, a hand lifting to her mouth. William was seeking a bride. Why did the notion hurt and frighten her so much? His response must have been calm and measured, for she did not hear him, but a shrill rebuttal came from the duchess, “You cannot mean to marry that social climbing upstart!”
Anger whipped through Sophia, and before she could think it through, she wrenched open the door to the drawing-room and spilled inside. William’s face was cast in cold anger and discomfort traveled through her heart to see it.
“William, I recalled you told me your mother was ill with a malaise. And please bear in mind what I told you about losing your loved ones when least expected. While it is not her business, and she does not deserve an explanation, I believe it will greatly relieve her stress and very likely collapse if you inform her of the truth about us?” she said, ignoring the duchess for she truly did not care for her and would not deign to give her a scrap of her attention.
Silence fell, and miraculously even the duchess seemed to have lost her tongue.
“My intention this year was to take a wife. It was one of the reasons I was at Lord Huntley’s ball. To dip my toe in the marriage mart. I do intend to marry. Not to anyone but you.”
The duchess swayed, and Sophia stared at him helplessly. Those softly spoken words had lodged themselves deep inside of her. Her heart started to pound as the awareness this was not a simple affair for him scythed through her. “I…I…I cannot marry you,” she whispered, her voice breaking. “I only wanted a discreet affair, that is all.”
Her heart squeezed at the admission and the hunger that had been beating inside for more quivered.
The duchess did not seem capable of deciding on what she wanted, for now, she carried the expression of one deeply affronted. “You…you dare to deny my son…a duke?”
Sophia exhaled, twining her own hands together, squeezing hard. “I told you at the beginning, William. This…whatever we have can only be temporary…only an affair. It is the only reason I came here.”
“I know,” he said, and in his eyes, she spied something tender…and patient.
“I will not love you!” she cried. “I’ll not risk my heart to such pain ever again. Don’t you dare expect it of me, William? Don’t you dare!”
“Sophia…you already love me.”
The soft, confident words were a brutal blow to her chest, and she stumbled back, staring at him. She bit down on her cheek, dragging in a hard breath, resisting the tears that threatened to overwhelm her. “Thank you for these last couple of weeks. I’ll treasure them forever. But I have nothing more to give.”
She turned to walk away, and he said, “Sophia…wait,” arresting her movements.
Her heart pounded, her hand on the doorknob, she turned her head and met his stare.
“I fell in love with you the first time I saw you playing in the forest with a puppy chasing you. When I was told you died… I died too. I tried to drown away thoughts of you and how deeply I loved you in liquor, vice, and work. Nothing changed. Everything inside became hollow and empty. I resolved to take a wife and fulfill my obligation to the title, but I never cared whether I would ever be able to love that mythical lady…for I had nothing more to
give. Until I realized you were alive. Everything that had been painted in grey and coated in ashes and bleakness was suddenly filled with color and purpose. For you my heart beats gladly…with you my soul is happy. I too despair the day I might lose you…but those intervening years Sophia…they can be filled with happy memories…memories that will keep us going through life if we were to ever lose each other. It is better to live our love than deny it because of fear,” he said hoarsely, laying his heart bare to her in a manner she had never imagined he would.
He took a step forward. His eyes contained a flash of challenge that stole her breath. “Will you meet me in the middle, my love?”
Her heart was a slow thud inside, and she imagined loving him with every emotion in her heart and losing him. Her knees trembled, and she leaned her side into the door. The pain of it was too much to even think of such a situation. “No…I…I cannot, William.”
He flinched. It was so subtle, but she caught it, and her heart broke even more.
A gasp sounded, and Sophia’s gaze switched to the duchess. The duchess had a hand over her lips as her gaze volleyed between them, an unexpected awareness dawning in her eyes.
Acting on the instinct of flight, Sophia wrenched open the door and rushed outside. She hurried toward the butler.
“Sir, I am leaving Hawthorne Park immediately. Please have my belongings packed and delivered to Countess Cadenham’s home in Hertfordshire.”
Surprise widened his eyes. “Should I call around the carriage for you, Miss Knightly,” the butler intoned gravely.
No, that would take minutes she could not spare. Minutes where William might drag her upstairs and…she closed her eyes, shutting off her wild imaginations. What she needed to escape was the fear and panic clawing at her throat.
“No, I’ll be fine.” There was a path which led from his estate to Mulford. It might take her hours to walk it, but she would make it there and possibly impose upon Squire Blagrove to loan her his carriage to take her home.
Sophia rushed forward, and the butler opened the door. She made her way to the eastern side of the estate and started on the track that would lead her to the forest and then to Mulford.