by Jenna Jaxon
“Good evening.” She’d parted from him barely an hour since, yet it was as if she saw him after a long absence, drinking in every detail.
Riotously curly dark blond hair had been brushed into calmer waves glinting burnished gold in the firelight. Clear blue eyes burned with an ardor she’d never seen before, turning his eyes darker, almost black. His dark blue banyan covered his broad frame, hinting at the power hidden beneath. The edge of his robe had fallen open, revealing part of a smooth chest that she longed to stroke. The promise of his heat started a hunger in her veins and she swallowed and stood up.
“I forgot to order this to come up with our meal,” he said, striding to the table and placing the bottle beside their plates. “I thought we should toast our marriage properly, once we have a proper marriage.”
“I’d like that, Jack, more than you can know.” Awkward and suddenly shy, she laced and unlaced her fingers. What should she do? Suggest they eat or suggest they…
Her husband took the decision out of her hand when he appeared in front of her, seized her head in firm but gentle hands, and kissed her mouth.
They had kissed before, to be sure, but this time Jack took complete control. His lips sank onto her with a possessive force that sent a shiver down to her toes. This was a different Jack than before. She didn’t understand what had happened or why, but simply gave herself over to this delicious stranger with the newfound knowledge of how to please her.
Cradling her head, he tilted his until their mouths melded as one. He licked her lips, trying the seam lightly, then more urgently until she opened for him, welcoming him inside.
Her legs threatened to buckle as he deepened the kiss, exploring every inch in bold strokes, making her core throb with slow, rhythmic beats. Sliding her arms around his waist, she pulled him closer. When her breasts pressed into his chest, he rewarded her with a rumbling growl.
Oh, how she longed to explore his whole body, inch by steamy inch, to tease and taste him. Still she held back in hopes he would ravish her instead. She wanted to know that he wanted her as badly as she wanted him.
As if reading her thoughts, he ran his fingers lightly down her arms, bringing every hair on her body to attention.
He brushed his hand down her side, and she had to stifle a giggle.
“You’re ticklish.”
“Apparently so.” Delightful tingles continued as he drew his fingers down to the tips of her breasts, jutting against the soft silk of her robe.
He touched the very tips of his fingers to her nipples, like butterflies fluttering on them. They hardened instantly into taut peaks that sent streaks of heat to her core.
Moaning at the delicious sensations, she drew a deeper breath. “You’ve changed, Jack.”
“Have I?” He leaned forward, placing his scalding lips on the side of her neck, the exact spot that sent a sizzle through her veins.
“Yes, oh, yes. There.”
He sucked the tender flesh into his mouth, massaging it with his tongue until she rose on her toes. The unsure, rough tactics of before had given way to a confident, experienced lover. She had no idea how the transformation had happened, but she intended to enjoy it.
“Does that please you, milady?” He kissed his way down her front, edging open her robe to get to the swell of her breast.
Before he could open her robe, she grabbed his hand. “Not quite yet, my lord. My surprise awaits. You must not spoil its unveiling.”
Desire darkened his eyes to sapphire. “I await it with great anticipation, I assure you,” he said, his voice husky and rough, so different from anything she’d known before.
“What has happened, Jack? Why this sudden change?” She backed away from him, head cocked. “I love it, I do, but I don’t understand it.”
“I am finally free, Alethea.” He stepped back, seemingly taller, bigger, stronger than ever before.
“What do you mean, free?”
“I mean that until now, I have been bound and in the dark where you are concerned.” He stared at her, looking her up and down.
An eerie sensation assailed her, as though he regarded her the same way as she did him, as though he had never seen her before.
“You asked me to marry you, to take you and your child without a word for what you wanted from our marriage other than the protection of my name. I didn’t know you, did not know anything about you save your circumstances and even that was incomplete. Early on I realized your feelings for me were deeper than I had supposed. But without your trust of me, how could my feelings for you be allowed to deepen past an almost ever-present lust? I could not, with the speaking of a word, go from acquaintance to lover. For some men that is no problem. For me it was. I needed your trust. I needed you to want more than my name, I needed you to need me.”
“But I loved you,” she broke in. “I have told you so before.”
“If you had loved me, you would have trusted me with the name of your seducer. You would have allowed me to avenge your honor, as I have now finally done, or will do on the morrow. That, to me, is the true test of love, Alethea. Allowing me to act with honor on your behalf.”
Dropping her gaze, she rubbed the toe of her slipper on the soft blue and gold carpet. “I can understand that now, I think. But I only wanted to keep you safe, Jack.”
“Safe is not always the best choice, my dear. As you are about to find out.” He grabbed her and pulled her to him until the tips of her breasts brushed his chest. “Dangerous has charms as well.”
“Oh, yes, I can agree with that.” She paused as his lips ravaged her neck once more. “But here is a change too, my dear. Whatever has made this difference? You are suddenly confident where before you were hesitant.”
Raising his head from her neck, he grinned at her. “Again, freedom, love. Freedom from the fear I would hurt you.”
“Hurt me?”
“In the carriage, in Sussex.”
“Well—” she waved that away, presenting her neck to him again. “That was likely due to the jolting of the carriage.”
“No, it was my ineptness and inexperience. I had no idea what I was doing that night.”
She leaned back peering at him. “No idea? Of course you knew what to do, I just thought…” Frowning, she gave herself a little shake. “I thought you didn’t want me because I wasn’t a virgin. Because I was ruined. When you were rough with me I believed it was your way of punishing me for my folly.”
Taking her hand, he drew her to the bed and lifted her onto it. When they had settled onto it, he took her hand again. “I am terribly sorry you thought that of me, Alethea, although in the circumstances I can see why you did. The truth is far, far from that.”
“But if you didn’t want to punish me, why did you act like that? Either cold or rough?”
He grinned and squeezed her hand. “I have not been entirely truthful with you either, my dear. Now you have told me your secret, I believe I must make a confession as well.” He glanced about the room, his face turning red to the tips of his ears. “When I said just now I didn’t know what to do with you, it was the truth. The literal truth because…I have never before lain with a woman.”
She couldn’t have heard that right. Her mouth slowly opened and she shook her head. “That’s impossible.”
“I’m afraid it’s true.”
“I don’t believe you. You’re saying you’re a—”
“A virgin. Yes.” He sighed. “A long story including an overheard conversation, my father’s advice, and a lifelong commitment to doing the honorable thing. I will tell you another time, but suffice it to say this is the reason I have been so restrained around you, especially after Sussex. Ever since that night in the carriage I realized I had no idea how to make love to a woman. So I have been desperately trying to acquire that knowledge.”
“You mean you had no idea what to do?” That shock
ed her more than anything she’d ever heard. Even she, in her innocent state before Fitch, knew the rudiments of what happened between a woman and a man.
“Well, I was aware of the basic how. I would have been very able to accomplish the deed.” His eyes twinkled as her cheeks heated this time. “I cannot believe it would have been a very pleasant experience for you, however. To the finer points of pleasing a woman, I had no idea, no skills. What most men learned by the age of sixteen or so, I’ve had to catch up on in the past few weeks.”
“How is your education coming along, if I may ask?” What on earth had he been up to? From what she’d seen so far, it had worked wonderfully.
“You will be the judge of that shortly.” He grinned and kissed her hand. “I hope to be top of my class.”
She laughed, but curiosity got the better of her. A niggling suspicion dawned, one that she would rather not entertain. Still, his actions in the carriage this afternoon told her he’d done something. “Can you tell me how you came by this new knowledge, Jack?”
“I suppose you could say in the usual ways. Books.”
Her eyebrows rose.
“Lectures.”
“From whom?”
“You might not want to know. And finally, today, a demonstration.”
“What?” She catapulted off the bed and faced him. “You demonstrated your sexual prowess to whom?” Then the horrible truth dawned and she narrowed her eyes, ready to kill him. “Or perhaps I should ask with whom?”
Jack slid to the floor, headed to her when she dodged for the other side of the bed. “Alethea.”
If he had bedded another woman after months of avoiding her bed, then he’d better go elsewhere for the rest of their lives. She whirled around, trying to slip past him, but he blocked her escape. In desperation, she flung herself onto the bed.
Before she could scrabble across it, he pounced on her, pinning her there.
“Get off of me.” She tried to elbow him in the ribs, but he just chuckled in her ear.
“Unruffle your feathers, my love. I can explain, if you will hear me.”
“I suppose I can listen.”
“On good advice, I went to the House of Pleasure today.”
“You did what?” Struggling anew, Alethea still couldn’t move. Worse, she could feel his hard shaft, poking her right where she’d wanted it to be all these months. And here he was boasting of his visit to a brothel. Boasting to his wife!
“I went, but I did not play you false.”
“What do you mean?” She tried to twist around to see his face, but he wouldn’t move. “Release me.”
“Will you hear me out?”
She didn’t want to, but perhaps she owed him that much. She’d not been a saint, God knew. She nodded and suddenly his weight was gone. Sitting on the edge of the bed, Alethea wrapped her arms around her chest. “What do you mean you did not play me false? Did you lie with a woman?”
“No. I went there thinking I must, if I was going to learn what I needed to know, but when given the opportunity, I sat in a chair and I talked to her and I watched her only.”
“Really?” Did he truly expect her to believe this?
“Yes, in truth, I never touched her.” He dropped to his knees. “I swear you my oath, by all I hold dear, I have touched no one today save you. And no one before you.”
“But how—”
He rose, his eyes riveted to hers. “The woman I saw told me things. Like where women’s bodies are most sensitive. How they like to be touched there.” He ran his finger lightly down her arm and she shivered. “How to give them the most possible pleasure. She had a lot of information, and I think I remember most of it. But I swear to you, the entire time my only thought was how to do all these delicious and wicked things to you.”
“Truth?” How could she believe it true, except that her husband was a man of honor? If he said that was all he had done, she must believe him, else their marriage would never achieve the happiness she had envisioned.
“Truth indeed. You are the only woman I will ever desire.” He wrapped his arms around her and the evidence was there, pressing thick and hard into her. “I wanted you to be the one and only woman I make love to,” he whispered.
Slowly, she slid her arms around him. “Somehow I never believed that my husband would be the virgin when I married him.”
“Nor did I.” He chuckled in her ear. “Shall we dine, or would you prefer to satisfy our other appetites first?”
“Our dinner is the last thing on my mind at the moment.” She kissed him, his sweet response driving everything else from her mind.
“I agree, love.” He swept her up in his arms. “Why think of food when you look good enough to eat?”
“Oh, wait. My surprise. Put me down.” She wriggled, trying to get out of his arms. After all the trouble to get this nightgown, she was going to show it off to her husband no matter what.
Groaning, he set her down on the floor. “I’m intrigued by what could have come in such a little package, Alethea, but is this really the time?”
“It is the perfect time. Get up on the bed.” She shooed him toward the already rumpled bedding.
“Will the sight of this garment make me swoon?”
“It very well might.”
“Well then.” He hopped up on the mattress and lay back, propping himself against the pillows. His banyan fell open, revealing long, muscular legs from feet to mid-thigh, a strategic halt she would bet Goliath on. “I think I’m prepared.”
Smiling widely, though her hands were cold with nervousness, Alethea tugged the belt of her gold silk robe just enough to loosen it. Violet and Madame Angelique had demonstrated how best to reveal her purchase. She had blushed fiery red at the time, but now she held her head high, her gaze fixed on Jack’s face.
Inch by inch she twitched the robe over her shoulders, shifting her weight from hip to hip until her shoulders and the thin straps beneath showed.
A glance further down Jack’s reclining figure told her he was paying attention. The folds of his banyan stirred just at his hips. So far, so good.
With a deep breath, Alethea dropped the garment covering her new negligee—a French term, Madame Angelique had said, meaning neglected. The way Jack sprang up in the bed, his eyes wide, his breath coming in shallow panting, persuaded her she’d not be neglected tonight at all.
Madame Angelique had adapted a loose morning gown to fashion a garment whose only purpose was seduction. The fine opaque batiste, dyed any color desired, was designed to be worn over nothing at all.
Alethea’s negligee, crimson and gold, covered her from shoulders to knees in an opaque cape with sleeves dripping with gold lace. A chemisette cupped her breasts but did not cover them, instead pushing them forward to tent the filmy striped covering. The dagged bottom of the chemisette reached just below the coppery curls covering her sex, though the tabs rippled when she moved, sometimes hiding her, sometimes not. Slowly she walked toward him, terribly aware of how the bottom of the chemisette whispered over her lower curls and bottom. Showing him everything in short glimpses.
“Do you like Madame Angelique’s efforts, my lord?” Not that she needed confirmation. The stirring beneath her husband’s robe had turned into an eruption. His banyan stuck out, silk resting atop his very stiff member.
“I think Madame has a long career of design ahead of her,” he said in a voice so husky she could scarcely hear him. “I suspect we will be her best customers.” He held his hand out and she proudly walked the rest of the way to him, enthralled by the way his gazed was fixed on her body.
He wanted her, desired her as no other man ever had or ever would. And he would have her as no other man ever could.
In Violet’s recital of her woes, she had mentioned how she had seduced her husband, who at one point had not wanted intimacy with her either. Her friend h
ad given her sound advice and instruction on what she should do to keep her husband interested. The negligee was only the first step.
“How may I please you tonight, my love?” She stopped at the foot of the bed, just out of reach.
“Come a little closer love and I’ll show you.” He sat up on the edge of the bed and pulled her to him. Leaning over for a searing kiss that stole her breath, Jack nuzzled her neck, once more sending chills throughout her, and murmured, “After tonight, no one in this family is going to be a virgin.”
Chapter 25
“I may not even have to take this off of you.” Jack lay Alethea back on the pillows, pulling her arms away from her sides, one by one, kissing each finger before he placed her hands gently on the covers. There was so little of the gown, that it gave him more than enough places to play with her luscious body. It was a shame to remove it from her. Not that he wouldn’t want to see her completely naked before him.
His cock liked that idea as well. It sprang up every time he touched Alethea, it seemed, but gazing at her was proving no better. Everything about this woman excited him. Perhaps because she was the first woman he’d ever touched, but he didn’t think that was all of it either. He’d looked at other women before, even some in taverns who were buxom and trying to arouse men to earn a few more coins than their regular pay. But he’d never had such a strong urge to touch one, to claim satisfaction for himself, and give it in return. One look at Alethea in this state of undress, however, and he had to concentrate on something else to keep his cock from seeking its nest and ending it all right now. He’d waited too long to spend himself in mere moments.
Grasping her left leg, he ran his hands down her calf, smooth skin from top to toes. The toes he lingered over, massaging them one by one. She squirmed and giggled as he hit ticklish spots, then went to her right leg, wanting to touch every inch before he’d done with her.
“I want to see you, Jack. All of you.” She reached out and snared the belt to his banyan.