When he stopped, abruptly, suckling at her she almost did cry out.
Fortunately, he was only shifting position so that he could kiss her mouth again. In gratitude, she wrapped her arms round his neck again. The material of his waistcoat abrading her bared breasts felt so utterly right that she found herself arching herself against him to increase the friction.
She hadn’t thought her body could experience more pleasure than he’d given her so far. And yet every new thing he was doing kept on stoking her higher and higher.
The feel of his hand on her hip was making her squirm under the barrier of his leg. As though he knew exactly what she needed, he moved his hand round to the apex of her thighs, at the same time as sliding his leg lower down hers.
When he pressed the heel of his hand against the exact spot where her desire was growing the strongest, she felt as though she was going to explode. She wanted to do something with her legs. They were pressed too tightly together. And she couldn’t move them, to relieve her aching need, not only because Lord Deben’s leg was holding them down, but also because her skirts were just too restricting.
She was almost beside herself with excitement. She’d heard the phrase before, but she’d never experienced it. Her whole body was writhing and yearning, just as though it wanted to be somewhere else, even when just here was the most enjoyable place it had ever been.
She needed … she needed … Oh, thank God, he was reaching down and sweeping those bothersome skirts out of the way. Now she could hook one of her legs over his, and turn towards him a little … No, he did not permit that. He pushed her on to her back again, though he rewarded the boldness of her left leg by caressing her bared thigh, then sliding his hand under her knee and bending her leg still further so that he could push his own between hers. Then somehow he’d managed to slide his hand up the inside of her thigh and he was pressing the heel of it against her feminine mound again.
But this time it was bare flesh to bare flesh. And he didn’t just stop at rubbing against her, but slid one finger inside her, then began to push it in and draw it out, mimicking the mating act. She gasped in shock. It was indecent. She was sure what he was doing to her was indecent, but her whole body was clamouring for more. She was aching with wanting. Trembling with it.
And a strange, compelling tension was building where he was so skilfully manipulating her with his fingers. She moaned and clung to his shoulders as he ground the heel of his hand against her once more.
They had gone too far now for her to protest that this was more than just the kiss she’d agreed to. All she could manage was another tortured moan as her hips bucked against the heel of his hand, which he was circling at the apex of her building pleasure. And though part of her was a little shocked at what she’d instinctively done, it had felt so right that she bucked again, more deliberately. And again. And he kept on pushing against her and thrusting into her. And then instinct took over completely. It was like being on a runaway horse, with no stirrups and no reins. All she could do was hang on to its mane until the beast itself decided to shudder to a halt.
Though she was the one who was shuddering. And pulsing. And something like lightning was striking from the place where she was bucking against his hand, streaking up her spine and radiating throughout her entire body. Only it wasn’t over in a flash, but kept on pulsing and flaring, until she thought she would not be able to bear the exquisite radiance a moment longer.
Then she rather thought she might have screamed, but somehow Lord Deben had his mouth over hers and was swallowing the sound even as she uttered it.
And then, instead of a peal of thunder, a wave of total bliss followed in the wake of the lingering lightning, rolling her over and over and washing her up on the shore where she lay gasping for breath.
Now was the time to bring all his planning to fruition. They didn’t call it the little death for nothing. She lay sprawled amidst the cushions, panting, her arms limp at her sides, thighs lax, lips parted, her eyelids lowered as though she didn’t have the strength to open them fully. She was barely capable of even voicing a protest, let alone making a move to defend herself.
He could have his breeches open and be inside her before she was even aware of what he was doing. And then it would be too late. The brief pain of losing her virginity would rouse her from her stupor, no doubt, but since she was still quivering from the bliss of her first orgasm, he’d soon be able to reduce her to mindless compliance again. She had not the experience to resist the power of what he could unleash in her body.
Oh, yes, he would make sure she enjoyed it.
Physically, at least.
Afterwards—well, when she was capable of thinking straight and her moral senses returned—he would reassure her that of course he would marry her.
She wouldn’t refuse him, not once he’d taken her virginity. The act would make her his. Irrevocably his.
She was so honest, so straight about things like this, that once he’d had her, she could never marry another man. She’d feel obliged to confess to anyone who might propose to her that she wasn’t a virgin, and even if the man was prepared to overlook it, she wouldn’t.
Besides, by the time he’d finished with her, he would have convinced her that she’d only capitulated because she’d fallen in love with him. She’d seize on that excuse to salve her sensitive conscience, and then … yes, then she would be his.
He slid his hand from between her legs and went to unfasten his breeches.
But the action roused her a little. She stirred and turned her head to look at him, and smiled at him, shyly.
Trustingly.
His fingers stalled on the second button.
Nobody had ever trusted him before, because he was such a complete bastard. Not in the way his siblings could be described as bastards, because of what his mother had done, but because of his utter selfishness. He was a bastard by nature. He’d always done whatever he wanted, without considering anyone else’s feelings. He’d habitually taken women for sexual gratification, then despised them for letting him use them.
But this was worse than all of that. Worse than anything he’d ever done before.
He was about to abuse Henrietta’s trust by robbing her of the most precious thing she had—and he didn’t mean her virginity. It was her very freedom he wanted to steal from her.
How could he forget the way she’d burst out of her hiding place, determined at all costs to stop Miss Waverley from forcing his hand? She’d stood up for him that night, although he was a stranger, because she hated injustice. She hadn’t been able to stand idly by and watch a wrong being perpetrated.
And this was how he was repaying her—by planning to rob her of her own freedom to choose whom she would marry.
Seducing her would be the worst kind of betrayal. She would feel as though he’d turned on her. It would shatter her trust in him, thereby destroying whatever small amount of goodwill she’d come to feel for him to date.
It would doom their marriage to misery. It would never be enough for him to just possess her: he needed her to love him.
He needed her to love him? He shook his head. No—it couldn’t be. He’d accustomed himself to the thought of her being in love with her husband, that was all. He’d inured himself to the prospect of humouring her when she displayed affection for him openly. He did not need love. God, he’d lived long enough without it. What difference could it possibly make now?
All the difference in the world.
And she could never love a man who could stoop to such tactics to get what he wanted.
Had he really thought he could despoil her and then expect her to forgive him?
Or that he would ever have been able to forgive himself?
Even if he ever managed to convince her that he’d acted out of desperation, that he’d felt physically sick when she’d announced her intention to end their relationship, that he’d panicked and thought he would do anything, whatever it took, to keep her, this was a line no dece
nt man ever had any excuse for crossing.
He couldn’t hurt her like this.
For the first time in his life, Lord Deben had discovered there was something more important to him than getting his own way.
It was Henrietta’s happiness.
He could not be the man who betrayed her. Hurt her. Abused her trust.
Dammit, but she was far too trusting. Why wasn’t that aunt of hers taking better care of her? She ought to be protecting her from bastards like him, not letting her wander off on to moonlit terraces and into darkened rooms where God knew what could happen to her.
With a tortured groan, he scooped her up and settled her on his lap. He pulled her head into his chest so that he wouldn’t have to bear that trusting look for one more second.
And she, being what she was, promptly heaped coals of fire on his head by snuggling against him, trusting as a child, and looping her arms round his waist.
‘Was that … was that … what was that?’
‘That, my dear,’ he said ‘was your first orgasm.’
‘I … I was only expecting a kiss. I suppose … you did so much more because you wanted to punish me …’
‘Did it feel like a punishment?’ He was the one who should be punished. He could not believe he had almost stooped to such measures, simply to get his own way.
‘At times,’ she admitted.
‘You enjoyed it, though.’ Whatever else he might be, he reflected savagely, he was a consummate lover.
‘Yes. Though I suppose …’ she began tentatively. Unfortunately, as she went to lift her head, the movement brought the soft curve of her hip up against the full aching urgency of his erection.
‘Don’t do that,’ he said sharply, setting his hands to her waist and lifting her off his lap. He was only restraining himself from doing what would make her hate him by the thinnest of threads.
‘And don’t enquire into my motives. I am not proud of myself,’ he said grimly. It was pathetic to attempt to excuse what he’d almost done by claiming he was desperate. He should not have allowed himself to become desperate. Not long since, he’d sworn no woman would bring him to his knees, but his desire to possess Henrietta was so strong that it had almost driven him to an unconscionable act. He’d never wanted anything, or anyone, as badly as he wanted her.
Except, it appeared, her respect. He could easier live without her in his life, than do anything that would make her despise him.
‘I had better tidy you up, so that you may return to your duenna without looking as though you’ve been half-ravished,’ he said. He hoped she wouldn’t notice that his hands were shaking as he did up her fastenings. Fortunately, she wasn’t looking at his hands, but at his face.
‘I am not at all sure,’ she said in a small voice, ‘that I am capable of returning to the ballroom …’
‘You will be in a moment or two,’ he said bracingly, trying not to be moved by what looked suspiciously like moisture forming in her eyes. ‘Here,’ he said, plucking a handkerchief from his pocket and thrusting it at her. ‘Use this if you mean to become emotional.’ He knew he sounded harsh, but at least it had a bracing effect on her. She took the handkerchief mechanically, crumpling it into a ball rather than using it. And hanging her head.
‘I don’t think,’ she said, her cheeks suffusing with colour, ‘that I shall ever be able to walk again. My legs feel like cotton.’
‘Wine,’ he said abruptly, getting to his feet and walking to the study desk. Apart from anything else, it gave him the chance to do up his breeches again before she could notice he’d undone the first button.
‘I brought some in, hoping to set a mood.’ He winced. How could he have been so blind? Treating her with the same casual cruelty with which he’d treated so many other women? And expecting her to smile at him gratefully afterwards, perhaps thank him for the skill with which he debauched her, then embark on a marriage based on trickery and power play? She deserved far better. When he’d decided he wanted to marry her, it was to get away from all that. Start a new life, a healthy life, where loyalty to one another played a pivotal role.
He poured wine into two glasses. Maybe he could never break free from his heritage. Maybe he was such an inveterate rogue that he’d never be able to live in the full clear light of Henrietta’s moral standards.
She ought to marry a man who was worthy of her. He rammed the stopper back into the decanter. Someone who would value her, someone she could respect in turn. Someone whose life hadn’t been so irrevocably tarnished by vice.
‘But now it can serve a better purpose,’ he said, tipping his drink down his throat before returning to the sofa.
Henrietta took the glass he extended to her with fingers that trembled and drank with gratitude.
‘I think I owe you an apology for this interlude,’ he said. What he’d actually done was bad enough, but his apology was for what he’d planned.
‘No. You do not,’ she said, lifting her chin to stare back at him with her open, trusting eyes.
‘Yes, I damn well do! Though at least it ought to act as a warning to you not to go apart with a man whose character is as stained as mine. With any man. You cannot trust any of us. We are none of us much better than brute beasts.’
Her eyes widened in shock.
‘However,’ he said, returning to the decanter, and pouring himself a second glass, ‘let me reassure you upon one point. On this occasion you escaped paying the full penalty for your dreadful naïveté. You are still a virgin. You need not fear your husband, whoever he may be, will know that you have had a sexual encounter.’
Because his back was to her, he did not see the stricken look in her eyes. And by the time he turned round, she’d managed to cover her hurt. It wasn’t just the implication that she’d deserved to be treated with contempt for breaking the rules that decreed no proper young lady should ever be entirely alone with a man. The wound which she thought might never stop bleeding had been inflicted by the casual way he’d spoken of a future husband. Whoever he may be. Which meant that he had no intention of it being him.
Stupid to feel devastated. She’d always known he had no thoughts of making her his wife. He was so far above her, socially, that she might as well dream of getting a proposal from the emperor of the Russias.
‘Can you stand yet?’
His impatience to get rid of her gave her a solid motive for attempting to get to her feet. And once she was on them, her own pride stopped her from tottering across the carpet, flinging herself on to his chest and begging him not to send her away like this.
She knew he’d wanted to do much more. He’d begun to unfasten his breeches before thinking better of it. And even she, inexperienced as she was, could not fail to see that he was still massively aroused.
It couldn’t have been easy for him to call a halt. Especially since he was not used to exercising any self-restraint. If she were one of his usual women, it would all have reached a natural conclusion by now and they would be sipping wine together, laughing and chatting comfortably.
No wonder he was so angry with her. Perhaps if she explained that she wouldn’t demand, or even hope for, a marriage proposal from him, he would push her back down on to the sofa and carry on where they’d left off.
Though all that would accomplish, in the long term, would be her degradation. Her family would be dreadfully disappointed in her, should they ever find out, and as for him—he would despise her.
And she didn’t think she could bear that, on top of everything else. Better not to make the offer. At least then she could walk away clinging to the few tattered shreds of what remained of her dignity.
With an expression of exasperation, he started to twitch her disordered clothing into place with deft fingers. Removed pins from her hair, tweaked curls and fixed them back in place with a dexterity that spoke of years of practice, while she just stood there, incapable of either moving or framing words.
He hadn’t had any trouble framing words. He’d given her quite
a trimming, although she’d detected concern at the back of it. He’d rebuked her in the same way her brothers would have done, had they caught her doing something stupid and dangerous.
So he did care for her. Just a little bit.
If he didn’t, he might have just used her to slake his needs, before walking away and leaving her to deal with the consequences alone.
But he hadn’t. He was still, to judge from the state of his breeches, quite uncomfortable, yet he was tidying her up, ensuring she could return to her world without a stain on her character.
For him, that amounted to quite a sacrifice.
It made her love him all the more.
When he eventually stepped back and surveyed her appearance with a critical eye, she wasn’t trembling any more.
It was amazing how swiftly the body could recover, when inside she felt as though she was dying.
‘Go on, get out of here,’ he said harshly. ‘Even your aunt might start to notice you missing if you loiter much longer.’ And he didn’t know how much longer he would be able to resist her if she kept on standing there looking so woebegone. He would be sweeping her into his arms and on to that sofa, and condemning them both to hell for the rest of their lives.
‘F-farewell, then,’ she stuttered, then turned on her heel and ran to the terrace door. Fumbled her way through the heavy velvet curtains, and rattled the key in the lock.
Don’t go …
The plea died on his lips as she finally managed to get the door open and fled through it, out into the night.
Leaving him alone. Utterly alone.
He sank on to the sofa and buried his face in his hands.
Chapter Twelve
Henrietta did not go to Lady Carelyon’s dress ball. Lord Deben ensured she had no need to, by disappearing.
At first, most people said he must have gone to one of his estates to lick his wounds in private, though some maintained that was nonsense, he wouldn’t care about a skinny little nonentity that much. He’d probably just gone to the races.
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