She puffed the cigar and handed his to him, then shared a sip of wine.
“I wish life allowed us the pleasure of multiple experiences in the same time. For I would already be—well, worshipping you with my body. And we would be discussing the last books each of us read. And we would be attempting to reason through a solution to Ray’s completely justified frustration over this world. And we would be dancing with the rest of the Trelawneys. Forgive me, my love, for my selfishness. I couldn’t bear sharing another moment of your company with anyone.”
“Is that all? I mean, things you want to do tonight?”
“No, in fact. I would love to have a bath with you, but neither of us is dirty.”
She laughed to herself at his logic.
“I would also enjoy weighing anchor and leaving this strife-riddled colony behind. But at this moment, in truth, there is nothing I would rather do than be lying here with your lovely round arse against me. It is the sharpest masochistic pleasure to know I need only unbutton a button or two and lift your shift to thrust myself deeply inside you.”
His voice was a low, hypnotic murmur at her ear, and he lightly kissed her there, his mouth warm and open.
“And the longer I hold off, the greater the thrill. And also, come to think of it, I look forward to going to sleep, as I will likely wake up with my mouth on some lovely part of you.”
She puffed her cigar, noting by the timbre of his voice that he wasn’t through daydreaming.
“Or we could be over at the table, sketching out our home. It should be done soon, so they can get started.”
She looked up at her husband—and then she saw how he watched her. He lightly kissed her forehead, then brushed her lips with his. “How dear you are to me. You are my life.”
Then he leaned back, his eyes narrowing as he inserted the cigar between his teeth and glanced at her with purely sexual desire. His free hand slipped underneath her shift, skimming upward over her curves as a deep sigh escaped him. Then he closed his lips around the cigar and puffed, and as swiftly his roving hand left her.
“I could not have fashioned a woman more perfectly suited to me, to my every need, were I sitting at God’s footstool with a list—as at times I suppose I did. I love your heart, your shyness, your boldness, your adventure, and your woman’s voluptuous body that makes me mad with pure lust. I love your brain perhaps most of all—your quickness, your wit, your curiosity about everything you encounter. So it leaves us here: what the hell is the meaning of that riddle?”
She laughed aloud, delighted at the ode he had just written on her heart in that soft, husky voice. “I will tell you, but first you must copy down what you just said, so I can look at it when we’re apart.”
“I shall write you no letters, because you’ll never leave my side. Now. Tell me the meaning.”
“I thought you wanted to figure it out. It hasn’t even been, what, fifteen minutes?”
“You’ll find I am not a patient man when you in particular are teasing me. It enflames my desire for you—that I’ve done well to contain, today. I’ll make no promises if you continue.”
“You know, smoking isn’t safe for you, even if you don’t inhale, but you are just unforgivably sexy with a cigar.”
He dismissed that, distracted with the riddle. “You said that you and Mrs. Adams were both born in the same town, but she’s thirty years older because you left town a day later?”
“No. We’re from the same place. Think spatially.”
His eyebrows drew together. “You’re not speaking of geography.”
She sipped her rum and gazed at the stars.
“One more clue.”
“The answer is in the rest of it.”
“Thirty years older, a day later … Time.”
Her eyes widened as she touched the tip of her nose.
“What does your nose have to do with it?”
She laughed softly at the petulant distrust in his expression.
“All right. But you have to promise me that you trust me. And you also have to promise you won’t tell anyone. And if you think we should tell Rashall, just let me know first.”
“Out with it!”
“I was born in 1991. My sister, Rachel, was born in 1988. Camisha is my sister’s age. They visited Colonial Williamsburg one day. They traveled back in time to 1746. My grandmother and I took a day cruise in the Bahamas, but a storm came up and I was washed overboard. And you know what happened after that. I also have a younger sister, but I don’t know where she is. Ah. I should stop now. You’re doubting my sanity.”
He was staring out the window, and he quickly shook his head. “Perhaps your sobriety.”
“Speaking of, we’re almost out of rum. Should I refill?”
“Most definitely.”
She reached for the bottle, and he took over the task for her, putting out his cigar in the ashtray.
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
“And why?”
“Maybe Camisha can explain why Rachel came. Knowing Camisha, knowing the modern world we left behind, I believe she came so she could make minor improvements in the world. Like the things she does with the babies who die. I do know Rachel fell in love with your brother, Grey, and returned with him to the twenty-first century. And his traveling to another time enabled him to free his slaves.”
“So he’s actually alive in another time?”
“As far as I know.”
“How do you know all these things?”
“Ruth doesn’t know I know it, but she keeps a journal. When she was still enslaved, she could neither read nor write—but Hastings taught her how, and over time, she opened the school. Back in my old life, Nan had a magnificent book called The Trelawneys of Williamsburg. It’s a collection of all the journals in a leather-bound box, to appear like a grand old family Bible.
“The only problem is that one journal is missing. From this time period, for the next six years.”
“What happens during that time period—that is, historically?”
She hesitated. “First of all, I’ll always tell you the truth. If I can’t tell you something, for a good reason, I’ll tell you that, and I know you’ll trust me. But I will tell you that in the next year, Thomas Jefferson will write a document declaring this country’s independence from England, and that all men are created equal. Congress will sign it—each man—and a war will be fought. We will win our independence.”
He sipped from the rum and passed it to her, and she drank.
Excitement gleamed in his eyes as he considered her words. “To think, all men at last declared equal. The madness of human beings owning one another, over.”
“No.”
“You said—”
“Bronson, my darling, please promise me you’ll say nothing, do nothing to try to change this. It may mean I have to go back to my old time.”
He shook his head. “Just explain. You know I’ll do nothing without our agreement.”
“Do you know Thomas Jefferson?”
“I do. Tom and I were quite close as boys. We attended William and Mary together. I attended at a younger age, having been a voracious reader for many years. We studied philosophy together.”
Marley felt a shiver steal over her.
“Are you chilled?” he asked, tucking her close against him.
“No. It’s simply intriguing. Your ideas and beliefs were formed by the same men who informed those of possibly the United States’ most important founder—”
“Whose most important founder?”
“That’s what our country will be named. He’ll write the Declaration of Independence in the coming months, and in it he will include a clause attacking slavery. He will assign blame to the King for blocking every attempt to halt or impede slavery, and he’ll address Dunmore’s proclamation freeing slaves who fight for the British. It’s a strong stance against slavery.”
He didn’t attempt to fill her silence.
“His stance
will fail. South Carolina and Georgia, as well as those in the north who have ties to the slave trade itself, will refuse to sign the measure unless he strikes the offending passage.”
“And he’ll strike it.”
“Bronson, this is exactly what Camisha mentioned to me earlier as something that she would never attempt to influence. If Jefferson sticks to his guns and leaves it in, we may well never become the great country that I assure you we will become.”
Watching him struggle with this impossible truth made her ache for him. He drained the rest of the rum and carefully made his way out of the hammock, leaving her ensconced in the velvet. Without him cradling her in his arms, she quickly felt how cool the room had grown.
He crossed the room and, after a trip to his water closet, he returned to the room and refilled the wood stove. She came to her feet unsteadily—way too much rum—and made her way to the water closet.
Ah. No arguments here about seat up or seat down, she thought, remembering Jimmy and Nan bickering over the topic. The seat was simple, wooden, with a hole in it. Form following function, if she ever saw it.
She returned, and a smile came to her lips at the sight of Bronson on one knee beside the copper tub. He’d placed a host of candles on the table near the tub, and even now swirled a hand in the water, inhaling the aroma of jasmine filling the air. His hair was wet and curled like flowing gold in the candlelight. His shirt hung open, and she leisurely enjoyed surveying him. The basin held the water where he’d bathed.
“I missed watching you wash. It’s become one of my favorite pastimes.”
“Come.” He held a hand out to her, his gaze on her tender. “Let me instruct you of others.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Marley joined Bronson at the tub, resting her hands on his shoulders, loving the face looking up at her. She traced her fingertips along his cheekbones, his strong jawline, and the curve of his lips. Then she slid her fingertips into his curling, wet hair, drawing him near. He lowered his head against her abdomen and inhaled deeply. Self-consciously, she shrank away from his seeking mouth, his frank enjoyment of her.
He laughed, a deeply sexual sound as he looked up at her. “My shy Merrilea. I will know every inch of you tonight. As you will know me.”
The warmth of his innocent examination filled her, and he leaned away, his hands rising between her thighs to roll down first one stocking, then the other.
An awkward, inexplicable embarrassment filled her over her near nakedness. He had seen her body more than once. It was scarcely concealed now. The first time she had ever seen him, she had lain very nearly naked in his bed.
His large, strong hands skimmed underneath the hem of her shift and upward, lightly tracing a path that left her aching for more of his touch, even as he lifted the shift entirely off her and threw it toward the closet.
“What about this?” he asked, lifting a hand toward the pillbox around her neck.
“Oh, yes.” She removed it and placed it on his dresser.
His eyes sparkled with arousal and even a lighthearted amusement. “How I shall enjoy this night,” he murmured, holding out a hand for her above the tub.
She smiled mysteriously, hesitating, and grasped his shirt at the collar, easily pushing it away. He complied with her request, and his shirt drifted atop her discarded shift.
She lay her hand in his, enjoying the sight of him in the candlelight—still sun-browned in late autumn. She stepped into the water, lowering herself there, loving him for the utter, sweeping luxury. The jasmine oil filled the air, and she breathed in its romantic aroma.
“It’s heavenly. I’ve never known such a luxurious bath.”
He gently steered her shoulders backward so she relaxed against the lip of the tub where his own body leaned, leaving a most comfortable pillow.
She luxuriously rubbed her head there, turning her face to the side against his trousers, feeling the rise of him hard and long against her cheek. Without thinking, she opened her mouth and dropped kisses along his length with a sigh.
His hands rose from her shoulders to her face, his fingertips thrusting into her hair, as he almost imperceptibly pressed himself closer to her mouth.
Then, he turned her head away and reached for a small cloth on the lip of the tub. Dipping it in the perfumed water, he moved it lightly over her cheeks, down her throat, over her shoulders and down her arms to her fingertips. He caressed each part of her body; the lightest touch of his strong hands on her shoulders licked the arousal in the center of her body.
She noticed the slight tremble in his hands as he released her and drew the cloth back to her collarbone and down, into the deep valley between her breasts. He lifted the cloth above her breasts and squeezed out the water, watching the drops of water lazily course along her nipples. She arched her back toward his hand, but he merely continued to tease her—first with the falling water, then by trailing the cloth across one hardening nipple, then the other. Her nipples were fully erect, aching for his mouth.
“Are you cold, my darling?”
His whisper was low in her ear – and then his warm breath blew down, caressing her nipples.
“Oh … good gosh … no, not cold,” she murmured.
He laughed, then lowered his mouth to her shoulder and nibbled lightly, drawing kisses along a line to her ear. “I should so love to suckle at your lovely breasts.”
His words enflamed her, and she looked toward him, capturing his mouth in hers, kissing him with hungry seduction.
“Is it wrong to feel such decadent pleasure? I did not know such feelings were possible.”
“Merrilea. I merely worship thee with my body.”
He reached for a bottle from the table and let a single drop fall into his wet hand. Silently, he rubbed his hands together; the smell was different—a sharp mint.
Encircling her with his arms, he lay his hands flat over her upper chest then slowly drew the lightly tingling oil down to her breasts. She lifted her breasts free of the water, offering them up to his touch, her own hand reaching back to fondle him through his breeches. She fumbled at the buttons—there weren’t many—but then his hands were on her breasts, and she cried out as he knowingly, exquisitely, spread the oil to the tips of her breasts. Her erect nipples grew even stiffer, standing out for his mouth, and she gasped with the sensation.
“Oh, God, it’s so hot!”
“Does it burn?” he murmured teasingly, deep in her ear.
“Yes.”
“Here?” Lightly, he pinched her nipples, then caressed her breasts, hefting their weight in his hands.
She gasped. “Mhm. Oh, yes.”
One hand left her breasts and she cried out in disappointment until she felt it gliding downward across her stomach. The slight tremble she’d noticed earlier in him was gone, and he was making love to her with the deft knowledge of an experienced lover.
With an expert hand, he parted her thighs, placing one gently against one side of the tub and the other against the other side. His touch light, he used the cloth to lightly stroke both her legs, even as his other hand continued touching her breasts.
Then he casually abandoned the cloth, his lean, strong hand caressing her thighs. The fire of the peppermint oil cooled, and his hand slipped along her inner thigh until he reached the place that radiated heat.
She heard his long, low sound of appreciation as his fingers lightly played there. All at once he crushed her against him, his mouth kissing her ear, one hand encircling her waist, the other closing over her rounded hip.
A moment later he gentled, forcing himself to release her as he moved to the other end of the tub. She was moved as he took another drop of peppermint oil and massaged her feet in the humblest of ministrations.
He put her feet back in the water, placing his hands on his hips. She lazily licked her lips as she investigated his chest—perhaps his most beautiful physical feature, she thought.
He reached for a towel as he stood, and held out a hand to her. Ris
ing to her feet, she stepped over the side of the tub onto a small towel he’d placed there. Holding out her hand for the towel, she was surprised to find a wicked smirk on his face. “You’re joking?”
“Very well, then.” She held out her arms, her elbows bent and her hands lifted in a queenly flourish, presenting herself for his attendance.
He quickly patted her arms, her back, her breasts, then knelt to dry her legs.
And then he lay the towel aside and would have lifted her in his arms.
“No,” she said. “Kiss me.”
She saw that he heard the imperious note in her tone, and with a lift of an eyebrow, he gave a deferential bow. What made a kiss from Bronson remarkable was as much the anticipation as the kiss itself, and she was pretty certain he knew that. Despite playing along with her game of ordering him about, he took his time; even for a true queen, she knew, he would savor each moment.
Meeting her gaze, he raised his hand to cup her face and lowered his mouth to hers, tasting lightly, then returning and delving more deeply. His fingers slid into her hair, tilting her head up as he drew her body full-length against his, as his hands slipped from her hair down her back, cupping her hips even as she impulsively lifted her thigh, twining her leg around one of his.
He lifted his head. “Aye, I will kiss you, and well. You might prefer to lie comfortably in our bed.”
A smile tugged at the corner of her mouth at the phrase.
“Kiss me.”
He bent to taste her breasts, his lips and teeth lightly nipping. Then he suckled, dividing his attention between them.
She gave soft sighs at the intensity of sensation, certain he was not doing it to pleasure her, but because he enjoyed it.
And then he dropped kisses along her flat waist, her lightly rounded belly, and lower. He easily slipped his hand to the back of her knee, throwing her thigh over his shoulders, and dipping his mouth between her thighs. She heard—she felt—his soft groan as his lips and tongue played along the outer flesh there, and she went weak in the knees.
He caught her just in time, and she fell into his arms.
Immortal (The Trelawneys of Williamsburg Book 2) Page 29