Historical Jewels

by Jewel, Carolyn

  “It’s all right, Foye.”

  There wasn’t any possibility of going back now. Foye smiled and lowered himself in order to taste her, sliding down to kiss the inside of her thigh and then her quim. So much for restraint and reserve. Her skin was salty, and he didn’t give a damn about much but seeing to her thorough pleasure. He slid farther down and nudged her thighs apart. “Lovely, Sabine.” He breathed the words against her skin.

  Her sex was warm and damp for him, and when he kissed her there, she tensed, but not with fear, with desire. “Foye,” she said on a long, low inhale. “My God, keep doing that. Please.”

  He was happy to oblige. He adored bringing a woman to climax this way. The taste and texture against his mouth and tongue never failed to arouse him, the pleasure that ended with them both sated.

  He listened for the changes in her breathing, waited for the tension in her body to tell him she was close, and adjusted touch and kiss to bring her to the point where her body would belong to him, when she would allow herself to surrender to her body, to pleasure, and to him.

  After he’d brought her to climax, he pulled himself over her, careful to keep himself well above her. Sabine gazed at him with sleepy, pleasure-sated eyes. His cock brushed her belly, he could not help that contact while he lowered his head to her breast and still kept his weight off her.

  She groaned when his teeth found her nipple, a light scrape, a touch, a sweep of his tongue around and across the taut nub that meant she was responding to him. She arched against him, and before he could think, he pressed his cock against her belly, imitating the motion he would make when he was inside her.

  Her legs came up, the soft, sweet inside of her thighs brushing against the outside of his. He fell deeper yet into his own arousal. He pulled away long enough to reach out and drag his mattresses next to hers. When he’d done that he rolled onto his back and brought Sabine over him to straddle his lower torso.

  “Foye,” she breathed.

  Just the sound of her voice aroused him. He bad the loveliest view of her body this way. He slid his hands from her belly to her breasts, palming them. Her short hair swung forward past her temples until she arched her upper back, filling his hands. His fingers tightened on her, plucking at her nipples. She clasped his wrists with her brown-dyed hands, then brushed her hands along his forearms.

  “Foye,” she whispered as she looked down and into his face. She wasn’t afraid of him. Not at all. Not afraid and not repulsed. “When you touch me…” She drew a breath. “It’s so lovely. You make me feel…unsettled.” She bit her lower lip. “I need you, now, I think.”

  He managed a smile at her. “Now? Are you certain?”

  “Please, Foye.” She tightened her hands around his wrists. “I don’t want to wait any longer.”

  Hell, he could barely speak he was so out of his mind with desire for her. He pushed himself up, holding his weight on one arm while he put her on her back. With her supine, he bent his head to kiss her mouth then trail his lips down her throat to her breast. Her nipple budded hard when he tongued her. He reached between them and put a hand around his cock, and oh, hell, he was close.

  “Sabine,” he whispered. So close. So close to sliding his cock inside her. “Sabine, tell me this is what you want.”

  She looked into his face. “Fiend,” she said. “You torture me on purpose. I’ll never forgive you for this. Never.”

  “Tell me,” he said, settling his belly against hers. “I want the words from you.”

  “Yes, Foye! I want this with you.”

  He put his mouth by her ear, one hand planted on the mattress near her shoulder, holding his weight. “I’m going to put my cock inside you,” he said. “I’ll be inside you, warm and snug, and it will be the moment I’ve lived for since I met you.”

  Her hands rested on his shoulders, moving lower, sliding over his chests, touching him, burning him. “Stop torturing me.” She bowed against him. “Beast. You are a beast.”

  Foye pulled back his head. “Listen to me.” He waited until she opened her eyes. “I’ve not made love to a virgin in a very long time. If I hurt you, it’s because of your maidenhead, not because that’s how it is for women. It’s just this once. Only this time, my love.”

  She nodded, and then he let go of himself and got the head of his cock at her entrance, very aware that he was bigger than she was. He pushed his hips forward, and, he pushed through her maidenhead with very little trouble and just hell, his foreskin slid back with the friction of entering her, and he flew to an even higher level of arousal. She was hot and tight around him, and it was all he could do not to drive himself as far into her as he could.

  With one arm around her body just above the slope of her hips, he rocked forward. He went slowly because she was very tight, and she arched her throat and he watched her mouth open on a moan of pleasure. She put her hands on his shoulders, fingers angled toward his back. “Now,” he whispered. “Now, Sabine. I love you.” He held her, and with a single thrust, he penetrated fully, and God help him, he adored the sound of her breath catching in the back of her throat, and the give of her body to his. She enveloped him, hot and slick around his cock. Heaven. Bliss. He was inside her where he had dreamed of being for far too long. Jesus, he was at the edge of his control.

  His. She was his at last.

  “Are you all right?” he said. Her body was tense against his, and he didn’t want to have hurt her, though, of course he must have. Her fingers gripped him hard, digging into the skin of his shoulders. His balls were tight, and he had to fight the urge to thrust. Sabine drew in a long, trembling breath.

  “Foye,” she whispered. She twined her arms around his neck. Her fingers tangled in his hair and brought his head down to kiss him. He fit his mouth over hers and kissed her back.

  Yes.

  He drew partially out with a backward tilt of his hips and upward pressure from his free hand on her hip. She slid her hands to the top of his shoulders, not pushing him away at all. She bent her knees again, and her inner thigh brushed his hip. Foye pushed into her again, muscles tensing as their bodies merged.

  “Like that,” he said. “Hell, yes.”

  Heaven. Considering that he was a large man, and she was so small and elegant, they fit together very well. When he was all the way in again, he stayed there, wanting to be sure she was all right. But she was slick around him, and he wasn’t mistaken in his interpretation of her groan. She opened her eyes, and they looked at each other.

  “Foye,” she said, settling a hand on his cheek. “Oh, Foye.” He pressed forward, and his world narrowed to just the two of them. “Foye,” she whispered. “Why are you torturing me like this? Am I as awful as that?”

  “No, Sabine,” he said when he had the wits to speak. He slid deeper inside her. “I am torturing you because I intend to see you break apart while I watch. I am a selfish man when it comes to your pleasure. I intend to see it all.”

  “Beast,” she said with a smile.

  Words filled him, a dozen, a thousand, a hundred thousand, but he couldn’t speak a one. He put his palms on the mattress at the top of her shoulders and drew back, then forward, slowing watching her face the entire time. His breath hitched as his foreskin slid back, exposing the sensitive head of his cock to her body. “Sabine.”

  Her answer to that was a tilt of her pelvis that sent his cock sliding inside her, into the warmth of her body. The sensation was so exquisite he forgot everything but that. But her. Their bodies matched very well. This was all he could manage. Just the two of them, just his body inside hers. Her eyes took on a drugged look, and he thought he’d expire just from looking at the way her expression changed. She’d caught on to the essential motion, and damn her, she’d learned already how to move so as to drive him mad.

  He slipped a hand between them and found the exact spot that would bring her to climax. “I adore your body,” he whispered. “Your breasts, your mouth, your eyes.” As he, too, hurtled toward orgasm, she le
aned in and kissed the side of his throat. His hips were moving harder now, faster, and when she did break apart, he threw back his head so he could watch, and then he let go of himself, and it didn’t matter that he came inside her because in the morning he was going to marry her anyway.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  When Sabine opened her eyes, Foye lay past asleep less than a foot from her. She was, for a moment, disoriented and wondering how the marquess had gotten into the pasha’s palace, let alone into her room. But then she remembered, and the familiar fell away. He’d gotten her out of the palace and away from Kilis. They were in Aleppo, in a khan, and last night they had become lovers.

  She had no idea what time it was, except that it was no longer night since there was enough light for her to see the room and, very clearly, Foye’s face. She could study him without rudeness or worrying that he would misunderstand the reason for her stare. He knew too well the ways in which others found his features inelegant. She thought he didn’t know well enough the ways in which he compelled. He’d pulled his quilt up to his chin and slipped one hand underneath his cheek. The butt of a pistol protruded from the edge of his pillow.

  In repose, his features still had that ill-fitting jumble but the sight made her heart feel light—and anxious. Looking at him now made her belly shiver with the recognition that she wanted him again. She wanted his arms around her, his mouth on hers. How interesting, though, that she did not find him unattractive now, when he was not awake to imbue his face with sheer force of personality. His beard was growing, dark along his cheeks and the line of his chin. Thick, dark lashes lay on his cheeks, and his hair was disheveled. He was a very large man, but only in the way that one man is taller than another.

  He lay between her and the door. Quite ready, she was certain, to die for her should they be discovered by the pasha’s men. What other reason was there to make a barrier of his body? Godard would be—she caught herself. Her uncle was dead, and a part of her wondered if the pasha hadn’t played some role in his illness.

  If Foye had come for her even a day later, she was convinced she would already have been beyond rescue. But Foye had come for her. On his own. Despite all her letter writing and sending Asif to Aleppo with a letter for the British Consulate. Foye had come. Not some official from the Levant Company nor anyone else in an official capacity.

  She reached out and touched his cheek with her fingertip, to a spot above the whiskers growing. His skin was warm. She was a fallen woman, this time in truth. Lord Foye was her lover. Sabine brought back her hand and saw his eyelids lift.

  “Good morning,” she said. “Though perhaps it’s afternoon.”

  “Sabine.” He caught her hand and brought her fingers to his lips for a kiss.

  The angles of his face came together in interesting ways. She could no longer look at him and see him as unattractive, though she knew others might think so. There was too much intelligence in his face. Too much honor. Too many memories of his face as he came to pleasure with her. He threw aside his covers and reached for his clothes. After some searching, he extracted his watch from his waistcoat and consulted it. He stood barefoot on the rugs covering the floor, unconcerned by his nudity, while he wound his watch by the light coming in through the windows.

  Foye, Sabine thought, was a magnificent man.

  “Mid-morning,” he said, still with his back to her. He peered out the window. Camel bells tinkled in the interior courtyard; a few of the beasts protested. Men’s voices, the cadence of the local languages, Arabic and, though she did not speak the dialects, Druze and Kurdish, too.

  “The time?”

  “Thirteen past ten.” He consulted the watch again. “And fifty-three seconds.” He snapped the watch closed. “I suggest we dress and find some breakfast. I want to send one or two men out to see if there is any sign of Barton and the others. Or the pasha.”

  How strange it was to be lying in bed, conversing with a man who happened to be standing before her naked, as gloriously lovely as Michelangelo’s David. She knew his body, the texture of his skin, his taste, his scent, the sound of his voice as he whispered in her ear.

  She knew his temperament, too, that he was calm and possessed a sharp intellect. That he would do what he promised. He was the Marquess of Foye. A nobleman. And he claimed to love her.

  He fixed her with a penetrating gaze. “When we’ve found something to eat, you and I have business to attend to at the consulate.”

  “I wrote to them about Godard.”

  “Did you?” She could see him assessing that. “Before or after Godard died?”

  “After.”

  “Are you certain your letter was delivered?”

  “I gave it to Asif.”

  He nodded. “Then they’ll know of his death. We’ll need the official documentation in England.” With a frown, he said, “They ought to have sent someone to investigate. I wonder why no one came?”

  Sabine shrugged. “Perhaps they did, and Nazim Pasha sent them away.”

  “Then what good are they?” He stood there with his hands on his hips. “Useless. Worse than useless if that’s what happened.”

  “Who knows what lies the pasha might have told them?” She sat up, keeping her blanket around her. She felt unaccountably happy. “Do you intend to tell them Nazim Pasha demanded a ransom for me?”

  “That and more. Detaining a British citizen against her will won’t be looked upon kindly,” Foye said. “No matter what they think of the man.” He clasped his hands over his head and arched his back in a long, luxurious stretch. Every muscle was on display. There was not an ounce of excess flesh on him. When he was done, they ended up looking at one another. He smiled. “What are you thinking, Sabine? That I am shameless?”

  “No.” She put her chin atop her knee. “I am thinking that you are beautiful.”

  His smile turned serious. “Thank you, Sabine.”

  “Come here, Foye.”

  He did, and holding and touching him in the brightness of morning made her heart overflow. Afterward, Sabine held him close and tried to memorize the way he felt in her body and in her arms. The scent of him, the texture of his skin and the taste. The way she felt safe and adored and physically sated. He pulled away with a charming reluctance.

  “I wish we could stay here all day.” He traced the line of her collarbone with the tip of his finger. “We could forget the world outside and spend all our time making love.”

  “That would be lovely.” She pressed her hand to his cheek, and again her heart hurt at the happiness. “Very lovely.”

  Foye dropped his head and kissed the underside of her throat. “Mm. Sabine. What is it you do to me?” He lowered his body to hers, his weight on his hands by her shoulders. “I think you make me very stiff,” he said with a wicked grin.

  “Is that proper, my lord? I think that sounds very improper.”

  “Mm. I think it’s proper, my dear.” He dipped his head again. “Lovely, lovely Sabine. You make me properly stiff.”

  “What an unhappy occurrence. If you were to ask me. Is there something I can do to help you with your condition?”

  “I wonder.” He nuzzled her throat again. “Can you? Would you be willing to try to give me some relief?”

  “I’ll endeavor, effendi.”

  “What an excellent servant you are. Remind me to raise your wages next quarter. Now, my lovely dragoman, will you let me have my wicked way with you again?”

  “Oh, yes, please,” she said. She meant it, too. With all her heart.

  “My pleasure,” Foye replied. He used his thigh to nudge her legs apart, and since she now knew what he intended, she shifted, and he pushed inside her. And yes, he was very much bigger than she was, and she loved the difference between their bodies. He felt good inside her, so very good, that before long she wasn’t thinking about much except for Foye and the place where their bodies joined. His eyes flashed, but she knew he was being careful. Too careful. There was more he wanted from her.

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nbsp; “Foye,” she whispered. “I know you won’t hurt me. I know.”

  He paused and dropped his head to her. “I never would. Never.” She arched against him, but he didn’t let go of his restraint with her. “Sabine. My love.”

  She held him when he came and knew with an ache in her heart that she wouldn’t ever be the same without him.

  “It’s time we got you dressed,” Foye said later when they had their breath back. “It’s two days to Iskenderun. The sooner we’re on our way the better.”

  “Trussed, you mean.”

  “Yes, trussed. What a sin that is.” He dropped a kiss to her breast, one then the other. “I won’t be able to ogle your bosom.”

  Sabine sat up and between them they transformed her back to Pathros, and then she helped him become the very proper and alarming Marquess of Foye. He kissed her after he was dressed, too, and her heart melted at the tender way he held her.

  “I don’t know how I’m going to keep anyone from thinking I’ve unnatural affections for you,” he said.

  “Don’t joke about that,” she said.

  His expression turned serious. “Before we leave Aleppo, Sabine, we will be proof against the pasha. There’ll be no need for subterfuge.” He smiled broadly. “I’ll be forced to give Pathros the sack.”

  “Are you sure that’s wise, Foye?”

  “I don’t think my wife would tolerate my involvement with the boy.” He put his hands on his hips. “Do you?”

  She widened her eyes. “You mean us to be married? Here? So soon?”

  “The Consul here can perform the ceremony, Sabine.” He frowned. “We did nothing to prevent conception either last night or this morning. And that is not a circumstance I would have allowed if I had not intended to marry you, and quickly, too.”