by Eloisa James
She lifted her arms and started pulling out hairpins. She had worn her hair in loops and curls, and her mother had dictated no powder . . . a choice she now understood.
“I’ll help.” A long stride put him at her side. He pulled out a hairpin. “There are tiny silk roses on each pin. I didn’t see that.”
“Lavinia,” Viola said. “She takes great delight in dressing all of us. She adored this sudden wedding.” She tipped back her head to see his face. “I must warn you that I will be a frightfully expensive duchess since she will want to dress me, but if I ever spend too much, you must tell me. I can rein her in.”
He shook his head. “Lavinia—if I may refer to her as such—is a genius.”
His hands skimmed her head as if butterflies were gently touching her. With a silky swoosh, her hair unwrapped and fell down her back. He made an inarticulate sound that made her smile.
Devin pulled the last few hairpins while she gathered chestnut locks and pushed them behind her shoulders.
“The gown itself comes off first. It’s pinned to the sides of my bodice.”
He stilled for a moment, and his nimble fingers brushed her collarbone. “I like this gown.”
“I thought it was slate blue,” she said, starting to pull out the pins that held it to her stomacher, “but Lavinia says it’s robin’s egg blue.” Viola made herself stop, because she was prone to chattering from nerves.
“I think it’s the color of juniper berries,” Devin said, somewhat surprisingly. A moment later he carefully drew the gown away and draped it over a chair. “The stomacher next?”
“No, the gown petticoat,” Viola said, putting her fichu to the side and untying the bows that held on her petticoat. There was a swish as folds of blue silk relaxed to the floor. She stepped forward, out of the puddled cloth, and turned to face Devin, chin high.
“Now the stomacher.” She began pulling pins from the stiffened triangle of embroidered fabric. “And then the panniers.”
Devin gave her a fascinated smile. “I feel as if I am unwrapping a present,” he said, once the panniers were off. He began working on the back lacing of her stays.
It had taken two maids a good hour to dress her this morning; Devin was much faster, perhaps because he had more ambition.
Finally Viola wore a chemise, along with high heels and clocked silk stockings that tied with a bow. Her chemise was nearly transparent, with a very low neck to make certain that no hint of white peeked from under her gown.
Devin’s eyes caught on her breasts. “I can’t think what I did to deserve this,” he said, in a stupefied, wry voice that made her laugh.
“I am the mere miss who became a duchess!” she pointed out. Her eyes traveled from his head to his legs, and desire flared in her veins again like heady wine. He was much more than a duchy, but she couldn’t find the words without sounding silly, like an awed child.
Devin stepped forward and took her hands. “I always knew that I could buy a beautiful duchess. You didn’t want to be a duchess, and you married me anyway. You didn’t want to be a spectacle, and yet you kissed me on the street. You wanted a vicar, not a duke.”
“I wanted to marry you,” Viola said. “It was absurd of me to even look at a betrothed man.”
A look crossed his eyes too quickly to interpret.
“I didn’t really want to marry Mr. Marlowe,” she said, trying to be clear. “He was safe, perhaps more so because he was betrothed.” She cleared her throat. “Are you . . . are you going to remove your breeches?”
“If you will allow.” He dropped her hands and unbuttoned the fall on his silk breeches.
“I know what is to come, though my mother might have forgotten some important details. Such as the fact that you—that men—have nipples. Do you . . . is there anything else I should know about?”
Chapter Twenty-three
A smile began somewhere in the region that Devin vaguely considered to contain his heart and spread through his whole body, searing desire replaced by amusement. “You do know about this?”
He ran one of his hands down the front of his silk breeches, where his tool strained toward her, desperate need making him harder than he’d been in his entire life.
Viola’s cheeks were stained berry-colored, but she followed the path of his hands, her lashes fluttering. If she had no idea that men had nipples, then she had never seen a naked man.
Of course she hadn’t. She was a lady.
“I am not quite an idiot,” she said with dignity, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. “I’ve seen my baby brothers when their nappies were being changed. But they were always wearing chemises.” She paused. “You do not look like what I remember.”
Devin didn’t let himself roar with laughter because her comment was dignified, but inside joy bubbled up like lava. He slid his breeches down and stepped away.
“Definitely not the same size,” Viola said faintly.
“It grows as a man grows,” he said, curling his hand around himself, a rough movement meant to remind himself that the whole day stretched ahead. Viola might change her mind about consummating their marriage today.
What happened next was up to her, not him.
Viola might be shy—but she was brave. He saw that courage now, the steel backbone of a woman who is unflinching in the face of the unknown—because she raised dazed eyes to his face, caught hold of her chemise, and pulled it over her head.
Her body was revealed to him slowly: slender legs, plump thighs, a downy nest of chestnut hair between her legs, a gorgeous curve to her hips, breasts . . .
His breath caught in his throat and his tool spasmed in his hand.
The chemise fluttered to the ground and she stood before him, cheeks red, wearing only stockings and exquisite blue shoes. Acting from instinct, he knelt at her feet and said, “My lady, may I remove your shoes?”
She nodded and placed an impossibly small foot in the palm of his hand. He removed both of her shoes, set them carefully to the side, and reached to untie the bows that held up her stockings. They fell down her legs, light as gossamer on the wind.
He stayed where he was, looking up at her, bringing her hands to his lips. “I would have gone on my knees to ask you to marry me, Viola. I want you to know that.”
“You made your intentions very clear.” She smiled and sank to her knees in front of him. “You like the fact that I didn’t want to be a duchess. I like the fact that you chose me, even though I wasn’t the woman you intended to marry. I’m not a duke’s daughter by blood. I don’t have golden hair. I’m not important, or exquisitely beautiful, or wildly admired. I’m notorious only for having thrown up in a lemon tree.”
“You are everything I want,” Devin stated.
Viola took a deep breath and his eyes flew to her magnificent bosom. Her breasts were full, shaped with the delicate precision of a deep-belled flower, topped with furled nipples.
“Your nipples and mine don’t deserve the same name,” Devin said, realizing his voice had dropped into a deep register he scarcely recognized. “Yours are exquisite, and mine are no more than flat coins.”
“I like yours,” Viola breathed.
He waited and she leaned toward him, erasing the empty air between them. Her lips rested on his for a moment before his arms swept around her and he licked her lower lip. She opened instantly, arms winding around his neck.
With a murmur, he rocked back on his heels, bringing her with him, their mouths fused in erotic discovery. Devin rose with Viola in his arms and turned to the bed, still kissing.
He laid his duchess gently on the bed but she clung to him so he followed, enfolding her in his arms, aligning their bodies—his hard planes and her ripe curves.
Still they kissed, every stroke of a tongue enflaming erotic desire that already rioted in their veins.
“Jesus,” he gasped sometime later. He was half on top of Viola, elbows on either side of her head, kissing in a way he’d never experienced before. It was overwhe
lming. The first kiss they shared—a sweet meeting of mouths, albeit meltingly erotic—was a distant memory. These kisses were feverish, their hearts thudding through skin that had never felt thin until this moment.
Viola’s eyelashes fluttered and opened. She looked dazed and exuberant, lustful and curious . . . all emotions expressed without words. Her hair tumbled in wanton curls around her head.
“I don’t know why people don’t kiss all day long,” she said in a stunned voice.
A choked laugh burst from his chest, but her hand was running down his body, leaving fire in its wake. He shifted to his side and curled his hand under her right breast. Her nipple was coral red, like a holly berry on a snowbank.
“There are other kinds of kisses,” he growled, his mind clocking how inarticulate he was.
Viola’s eyes widened and she nodded.
After that, the world splintered into gasping moments: her body twisting under his, the first moan that broke from her lips, the first time he allowed his hand to slip between her soft thighs, allowed a finger to dip into her heat, stroked until she arched off the bed, the ivory curve of her body giving him a fierce wish to pull her beneath him—but no.
He waited, clenching his teeth, showering her with kisses, coaxing her desire higher and higher until with one startled cry she broke, shaking in his arms, burying her face in his shoulder.
Devin caressed her throughout her deep pleasure, memorizing the rosy hue in her cheeks, her gasps, the way her eyes changed from feverish to slumberous.
“That was better than alone,” she gasped, as he waited, cradling her, wanting her to speak first.
He rarely laughed. Was marriage to Viola going to change him into a chortling type of fellow, one whose mouth was constantly curved?
“Hmm,” he said, choking back laughter, bending over to kiss her again.
“I like your hair,” she said drowsily.
“No going to sleep,” he said with sudden urgency, adding, “Unless you’d like to stop there, Viola, because we can. Stop. There’s tomorrow.”
“I was thinking how many tomorrows we have,” Viola said softly, turning toward him. Her breasts swayed, making his tool pulse against his stomach. “I’m glad we didn’t waste time with courting, Devin. That would have taken weeks or months, and all those days would have been lost, when we could have been spending them in bed.”
Devin had a feeling of vertigo, as if he were standing at the precipice of a mountain, not sure how he got there, staring down into the depths.
His wife was watching him, bright eyes shining, talking of tomorrows spent in bed. It felt impossible, on some primitive level. And yet here she was.
He ran a hand down Viola’s curves, over the sweet round of thigh, dragging a flat thumb over her most intimate part. She shuddered all over.
“Wait!” she cried, grabbing his wrist.
He pulled his hand away as if it had been burned. “Of course.”
“It’s my turn,” she said huskily.
Chapter Twenty-four
The one thing that her mother had impressed upon her was that Viola should not play the role of a fainting maiden. “You have the chance to be much more,” Ophelia said firmly, the night before. “I see it in Devin’s eyes. He doesn’t expect you to do more than lie back and accept whatever happens—what gentleman does?—but he will celebrate it if you take initiative.”
“What does that mean?” Viola had asked.
“Follow your whimsy,” her mother had said, smiling. “And remember that Rome wasn’t built in one day.”
To Viola’s mind, if Rome had been filled with men like Devin, it might well have gone up in a day. She rolled on her side, allowing her eyes to savor all parts of him. After a woman has shrieked in a man’s ear, she can stop worrying about whether she looks like a lady.
A lady doesn’t ogle.
Viola ogled.
Devin had large, shapely, broad shoulders, and strong legs. Golden hairs glinted on his chest and on his legs, and even in a slender line down his stomach.
“It’s as if you’ve been gilded,” she said, reaching out to trace that tantalizing line with her finger. Under her touch, his stomach clenched.
He made a rough sound and reached forward, wrapping a hand around himself.
“May I do that?”
He cleared his throat. “Certainly.” His hand fell away.
Viola reached out and wrapped her hand around him, just as he had. She tried tugging, as he had, and a wild sound broke in his throat. A pulse of triumph went through her. She wasn’t lying around like a wilting violet! She was—she was—
“What am I doing?” she asked, perplexed.
“There are many terms that apply,” Devin said, his voice strangled.
A primitive instinct took over and Viola’s hand tightened on the silky skin. All her senses were alive, delighting in Devin’s groan, in the way his body arched toward her hand, the way his hand tightened on her thigh as if barely controlling himself.
“Enough,” he said a moment later, wrenching his heavy-lidded, intense gaze away from her hand. She let go reluctantly.
He reached for her breasts, and while she was still startled by the erotic ache that followed the brush of his fingers, his mouth followed. After that, moments passed in a blur of pounding heartbeats, shattered moans, and aching limbs.
Every time Viola felt a flash of embarrassment, she would feed her courage not with a muttered phrase but with the look in her husband’s eyes. With the thud of his heart, the tremble in his fingers as he touched her, the way his thick shaft seemed to grow harder every time she caressed it.
His desire was in every growled word, in his hard kisses, in the longing she saw in his eyes. Culminating in the moment when he braced himself above her and said, “May I?”
It was like their marriage vows but more intimate, more quiet, perhaps more heartfelt.
“Please,” Viola breathed, having shed her embarrassment.
His fingers slid once more between her legs, and she said, “Yes.”
Devin gave a choked laugh that might have been a groan, tucked her under his body, and slid slowly into her warmth.
Her eyes widened as he slid home, and he asked, “Too painful? Shall I withdraw?”
“No,” she said with a gasp. “Well, not much. I hadn’t imagined . . .”
But she didn’t finish the thought. It pinched when he moved, but she couldn’t pay attention because an erotic storm was gathering in her veins, slowly, like huge storm clouds building in her body, forerunners of an all-encompassing tempest.
Devin lavished kisses on her face and eyes, coaxing her into kissing him even though she couldn’t pay attention to more than his slow movements, each one sinking deeper into her, as if she were unlocking a door that he longed to enter.
All the time the storm built until Viola couldn’t think, as fierce need dictated that she not lie quietly any longer. She just couldn’t. Following instinct, she bent her knees and thrust up awkwardly, meeting his stroke, a pant breaking from her mouth.
“Am I allowed to do this?” she gasped.
One look at his expression and she felt no shame. Every feature was lit by ferocious desire and the oath that broke from his lips built the storm higher until she was panting, reaching for it, her fingers biting into his arms as she tried to match his strokes, arching to meet him.
He reached down between them, brushed his fingers against her—and the storm broke and she cried aloud, shaking, her body losing the rhythm they had established.
Devin looked down at his tousled, beautiful, erotic wife and lost control in the act of love, for the first time in his life.
He dropped his head and thrust forward, blind to everything but the feel of her, the perfume of her skin, the tight grip of her body.
He lost himself, and only hours later realized that perhaps he had also found himself.
Chapter Twenty-five
Viola woke as twilight was darkening the room. Purple shadows
gathered in the corners of the huge bedchamber; she blinked, wondering where she was. The shelves lining the wall came into focus. Chamber pots. She was in the duke’s bedchamber.
Her duke’s bedchamber.
One could even say that those were her chamber pots. Her mind boggled, thinking of where such a collection could find a home, but the sound of deep breathing jolted her from that housewifely thought.
She turned stealthily, remembered pleasure echoing in small aches and twinges.
Devin was lying on his stomach, head resting on his arms, face turned away from her. His shoulders bunched with muscle, covered with smooth skin that still appeared gilded, even in the waning light. It was curious to her: She would have assumed that his skin would be as creamy as hers, untouched by sun.
She had heard that her stepbrothers threw off their shirts when they were breaking horses, but since she shunned the stables, she had never seen it herself.
Another embarrassment to chalk up to her shyness: Had she visited the stables more often, she might have realized that men were adorned with useless nipples.
Last rays of sun were slanting low, gleaming on his round arse. She’d never given the faintest thought to men’s posteriors. And yet . . .
And yet.
Devin’s was surely the finest of its kind. In fact, she decided in a rush, his entire body was the finest of its kind.
Without a word, he opened his eyes, rolled to the side, and ran a hand over her shoulder. And over her breast. His hand curled and he let out a low male sound of appreciation.
“You sound like me drinking hot chocolate!”
His thumb gave her nipple a lazy caress, making Viola shiver. “Are you hungry?”
“Yes. How can your hair look elegant after a nap and . . . everything else?” she said, almost crossly. He appeared to have just emerged from the hands of his valet, whereas she didn’t need a mirror to know that her hair had erupted around her head in wild curls.