I wouldn’t draw attention to my drawbacks, but I was in hope that now that I was taking regular exercise and returning to my old ways, my appetite would return and I could regain some weight. I wanted to alter my pose to conceal the points that I was less than proud of, but he stepped forwards and lifted his knee to rest it on the high mattress.
“You’ve changed. But you’re always you, and you’re the woman I want above all others.” He knelt and swung his other leg up so he could join me on the bed, lying by my side but not touching me. He laid one hand on my waist, softly, as if afraid to touch me. “We’ll get there, Rose. Between us, we’ll have all we lost, and more.”
“Yes.” That sounded good to me. It sounded wonderful.
He gave me a little push. “Now lie back while I become reacquainted with your beautiful self.” His smile turned more wicked, an edge of intent sharpening his gaze. I rolled over onto my back, and he leaned over me. “You, my dear delight, are still as alluring as ever, still as frighteningly seductive. Frightening because I find myself thinking of you at the most inopportune times and find it difficult to suppress it. Even when I was at my most concerned for you, the darker, deeper side of me wondered if anyone could ever compare to you in bed. The answer, in case you were wondering, is no. I can barely remember them now. I don’t try anymore.”
I felt secure enough to scoff. “And you with all that experience?”
“Experience is nothing.” He punctuated each word with a kiss, dropping them on my mouth like morning nectar. “Not when we improve every time we’re together, every time we touch. Knowing that, I had to suppress what I wanted to do, what I needed.”
“You don’t have to anymore. Richard, my love, never do it again, please.”
He bent lower so my nipples grazed his chest. By the increase in sensitivity, I knew they’d hardened for him. I yearned for more, wanted him to touch them with his hands, tease them as he knew so well how to do.
“Anything for you,” he murmured, and as if unable to help himself, took my mouth in a deep, ravishing kiss. He explored my lips, my teeth, caressed my tongue like he’d never tasted them before. I answered. Now that I had permission to touch him, I wanted everywhere, everything. All at the same time. I wanted to saturate myself in him so that no part of my body wasn’t covered by his.
I sighed in sheer delight when he moved down to my belly and circled my navel lazily with his tongue. “It’s like making love to a fairy,” he said, the hum of his voice creating delicious vibrations on my skin. “And do you still taste the same?”
I tensed because he headed so slowly down that I thought I might go mad. He gripped my thighs when I wriggled, wouldn’t let me lift up to hasten the tasting. His chuckle told me how much he was enjoying the tease. Without further warning, he swiped his tongue from front to back in one savouring lick. I squirmed and cried out, “Oh, God!”
He ignored my increasingly frantic protests and continued in his self-appointed task. He tasted me thoroughly, tracing his tongue over every part of my most intimate flesh. Prickles of sensitivity increased to shards of sheer sensation, making my back arch and my breath arrive in short, hard gasps. When he took the pearl of flesh at the front fully into his mouth and sucked, it was a matter of seconds before I screamed his name and exploded in sharp, violent pulses.
I lost sense of time and place. Richard spun me into a world I hadn’t visited for some time, one I had yearned to come back to, one that belonged to us alone. And I went alone. I had wanted him to come with me, but next time we’d go there together. A place where colours were more vivid, touches more intense, where it was never cold.
He lifted, and I felt a momentary chill before the heat of his body covered mine. Then I was deliciously enclosed, surrounded by love, the hard muscle of his sex pulsing between us.
It pulsed a little more than it needed, throbbed against my stomach then came a warm, wet gush as he released his long pent-up desire for me.
With a groan, his head dropped, his damp hair tickling my forehead, his breath heating my cheek. “Ah my love, my love.” His regret sounded all too evident in his words. “I’m so sorry.”
I swallowed my disappointment, which wasn’t as great as his by the sound of it. “Don’t be. Please. You’ve given me such pleasure already.” I put my hands on either side of his head, urging him to look at me. His bright blue gaze bored into mine, but he said nothing. “We’ve begun. We have all the time in the world. We just left it too long, that’s all.”
He laughed, but I heard the tremor behind it. “You mean I did.”
“No. Whatever we do, we do it together.” I wouldn’t let him take the blame he seemed so eager to shoulder. “You took time to pleasure me beforehand, and if you had just decided to pleasure yourself and try to take me along with you, it wouldn’t have happened.” I didn’t know that, but I didn’t care. “We may wake later.”
He smiled, but I hadn’t completely dispelled his concern. I could see it in his eyes and in the tiny crease between his brows. “We may,” he agreed smoothly and rolled off me. I reached for the handkerchief Nichols always left by the bed and put myself to rights, deliberately keeping my actions practical and efficient. Then I performed the same office for him, cleaning him as I might clean a child, with gentleness but no emotion of any kind. I dropped the cloth over the side of the bed without looking, and before he could turn away from me or leave the bed, I curled into his arms.
I couldn’t prevent my sigh of pleasure when his arms closed about me. I wouldn’t have suppressed it had I been able to do so. I wanted him to feel my happiness. With the release he’d given me came ease and relief because of our togetherness. I had felt increasingly separate from him in the last few months, and it had scared me. Very much. I couldn’t bear not being with him, but being with him and yet apart would, I realised now, be far worse.
He held me tightly, and although his tension remained, we would recover from that soon enough. I knew it. When I raised my head, he bent to touch his lips to mine in a gentle kiss. I lifted my hand to cup the back of his head and feel his hair, and I deepened the embrace, trying to show him how much I loved him.
The last of the tension left his body in a deep wave of relief, and I tucked my leg between his, feeling his strong protective embrace like coming home.
We slept.
I awoke a few hours later, when dawn had begun to seep through the darkness of night. I lay on my back and watched the sky outside, wondering what was wrong, what had woken me. We always slept with the bed drapes open and with the curtains open too, when we could, because Richard preferred it that way. I had learned to enjoy the sight of dawn on the occasions that I woke. I had missed the sight, for when I slept on my own, Nichols closed the drapes for me. That was one way I’d known when Richard visited me in the night, when I woke and found I could see out into the sky. I suspected he had sat in the chair by the fire and watched me, but he hadn’t done that recently. Only during the first month of my recovery.
He could have closed them before he left, but I think he wanted me to know he’d visited me. Trying to keep some path open between us, afraid of closing it. Now I had him—I lay in his arms, mine encircling his strong torso—and we were together once more.
A stirring in my belly made me roll over and head for the dressing room. As well I remembered where it was in this strange place, because I barely had time to get there before most of my dinner returned.
I was kneeling over the pot, retching in the aftermath, when I realised someone was holding my hair back, gathering it out of the way. Richard. I must have been tremendously ill because I hadn’t noted his entrance. “I’m sorry,” I managed.
“I don’t have the least idea what you might be apologising for.” His tone of mild reprimand held tenderness too. He twisted the long rope of my hair so it would remain clear of my face, and I felt him slip something under it. He’d secured a ribbon around it.
The next wave of sickness arrived and by then Nichols had ro
used. Richard was holding my shoulders steady, and I drew back to accept the damp cloth Nichols held and wiped my mouth. Although Richard appeared perfectly calm, I felt his concern, and I feared it might turn into something worse, back to the state of extreme anxiety.
“I’ll come back to bed in a little while,” I told him. “But I would really appreciate something cool to drink.”
“You shall have fresh, iced water,” he said. “I will see to it directly.” I knew he’d ensure the water had been boiled, to make it safe. I loved the way I could trust him.
When he’d gone, I heaved a sigh, but I didn’t have much free time because another wave came upon me, and this time it was worse.
Nichols had fetched fresh pots. I needed both of them, and by the time I had done, I was shivering, despite the mild weather. Nichols threw a robe over my shoulders and went to the door when a gentle tap fell upon it. She murmured to whoever stood outside and returned with a can of hot water. “I’ve roused the kitchen and ordered a bath drawn, my lady.” She crossed the room to the washstand and poured some of the water into the china bowl, watching carefully for any splashes. “But there is something else, first.”
She put the can down on the floor. Steam wreathed around the rim, and I stared at it while I sat on the stool, waiting for the next attack. Nichols put the used pots outside the room and came back in with more. Some poor soul would no doubt dispose of them. She reached into the pocket of her robe and drew out a small screw of paper. I eyed it with suspicion, and I was right to.
Nichols met my eyes when I lifted my gaze to her face. “Ma’am, I’d like permission to purge you.”
I knew my maid—she wouldn’t put me through this without reason. But I wasn’t a child, here to take direction. “Why?”
“Because the way you were retching just now put me in mind of something else. It could be a simple matter of bad food—Carier is conducting enquiries in the kitchen,” she said. I groaned. No doubt the whole house had roused. I hated the fuss, but it was too late to complain now. “I just remember seeing someone in a similar situation, ma’am, and even if it is bad food, the purging will help you to recover faster.”
It would empty the bad food and prepare me to accept new. “Nichols, I feel tired and weak at the moment, but I won’t stay in bed any longer than I have to. Do you understand?”
“I do, ma’am.” She had seen much over the last few months, and while I wouldn’t dream of complaining to my maid, she understood. At the top of her profession—and well able to care for me in other ways too, with her services as a bodyguard well established—I knew I could trust her decision.
“The bad food will not weaken me if I eat properly tomorrow.”
“That it won’t, ma’am,” she agreed. “All the more reason to clean you now.”
I prefer not to recall the following hour. Enough to say that by the end of it I was completely empty. Only then did Nichols allow me to drink a glass of water, which Richard had gone down to the kitchen to supervise the boiling and cooling of, and a similar glass stood waiting on the nightstand in the bedroom.
The bath came as a blessed relief, and I let Nichols do everything necessary until I heard the door click quietly and knew she’d let Richard in to see me. I schooled my face into a tired smile, hiding the exhaustion and the hint of fear deep inside. I would trouble him with them if my suspicions came to a firmer conclusion, but they could easily be a result of my overactive imagination, rather than have any truth. I needed to reassure him. I was his weak spot, so I had to be strong for him. And I did feel better, if somewhat feeble. My stomach ached, but it didn’t feel queasy any longer. Bathed and my hair freshly washed, I went gladly into his arms and let him put me to bed.
“Carier has begun investigations,” he murmured. “I may have to dress myself for a while.” He sighed. “The sacrifices a married man has to make!”
I chuckled and drew back the covers on his side of the bed, remembering not to hold my breath while I waited for him. To my relief, he shed his robe and climbed in next to me. I wanted his arms around me and I got them. “That, my love, will be the day. Carier will be there for you tomorrow.”
Chapter Ten
Waking up with Richard had a special sweetness to it, one I’d missed, a sweetness laced with a trace of excitement. We used to talk about our day, even if we were going our separate ways, on our own business, and we’d meet again before dinner to discuss how it went. The pattern of our days could be predictable sometimes, but the content never so, and after the turbulence of our lives recently I welcomed a chance to settle into a comfortable routine. But that extra touch meant we might choose to start our day a little later.
However he insisted I stayed in bed that day. “I wouldn’t hear of you rising.”
“But I feel perfectly well now. Just bad food.”
He leaned up on one elbow and cupped my cheek. “For me. Stay here for me.”
“Not all day, please.” I groaned. “I’ve spent so much time in bed, I’m tired of it.”
He sighed. “Let me see what Carier has discovered. It’s probably just food poisoning. Since you feel so much better now it’s more than likely. But I want to make sure.” He paused. “Take Lizzie with you if you go to the gardens, not Joaquin, and stay indoors until tomorrow.”
“Jealous after all?” I didn’t want our progress to intimacy halted in any way, so I agreed to send word to Joaquin that Lizzie had asked me to accompany her.
He kissed me again. “No, merely concerned for you. Dress and rest today. I have promised you not to treat you with too much care, but had I been as violently ill as you were, I would certainly wish to rest the next day.”
It took an effort to recall that he had always treated me with such careful concern and it wasn’t a result of my recent illness. It had better not be. “I’ll stay until you’re satisfied. But I wanted to see the gardens today. I want to redesign the gardens of our London house. Perhaps I could do it Portuguese style.”
He laughed, and I loved to see the sparkle return to his eyes. “With box hedges and bushes clipped into odd shapes? Not the whole garden, if you please, sweetheart. I’m fond of the flowers.” The distraction removed the anxiety from his face, and as he bent to kiss me, I felt much happier. He would return to this bed tonight, or we would use his. Not another night apart, I was determined on it.
Truthfully, after such a violent bout of sickness, I was more glad than I wanted to admit to spend the day in gentle, indoor pursuits. But I felt much better, and I took that as a sign of my general return to health, not just a recovery from an unfortunate stomach problem.
The next morning, Lizzie brought me my breakfast tray, refusing anyone’s help. “It was the only way I could get to see you,” she confessed, dumping the laden tray on my lap. She ignored Nichols’s stifled tsks as she removed the tray and put it on a folding table she’d erected on the other side of the bed. My maid poured tea for two and placed a plate of toasted, buttered muffins within reach. My stomach responded, and I gratefully chose one and took a savouring bite.
“I thought you were close to death,” Lizzie said. “But you look well settled to me now.”
I glanced at Nichols and grinned. “My maid insisted on purging me. It left me tired, empty, but recovered.”
Lizzie choked and placed her hand over mine. I could have used it for my tea, but I let it lie for now. “I’m so sorry, Rose. You arrive in Lisbon to convalesce and the first thing we do is give you bad food!”
“Was it the lemon cream?” Only I partook of that dish, so I thought it likely, if no one else had fallen ill. And even in October, this weather was warm enough to turn cream. Unseasonably warm, even for Portugal, Paul had told us.
Lizzie bit her lip. “I’m so sorry.”
“Unless you prepared it yourself, I don’t think it could be your fault.” I took another bite of the muffin, and after I’d swallowed it, wondered aloud why Nichols hadn’t brought up some preserves to go with it.
“I thought we’d start plain, ma’am,” Nichols replied, not in the least abashed. I never expected her to be, but I preferred her straightforward care to Richard’s fussing. Or rather, his gentle, meticulous concern.
I frowned. “I suppose you’re right.” I glanced at the tray. “At least we have enough here. Would you like a muffin, Lizzie?”
She laughed. “No, thank you. I ate earlier. Babies tend to rise early, and I like to see little Paul before he starts his day.”
I could tell from the increased animation in her face that motherhood suited her. More than it did me, perhaps. The depth of my love for Helen and now the boys had shocked me with its intensity. I hadn’t expected to adore my babies quite so much because I had never been enamoured by children overmuch. My nephew Walter, a few others, but I hadn’t deliberately sought their company or always welcomed it. But Lizzie had. She’d always loved children, sharing their games and secrets, and having one of her own, the first of many, I guessed, would make her very happy.
“How many times do you see him every day?”
“More than I should, some of society believes.” She grinned. “Not that I care.”
“How about Paul?”
“Paul doesn’t care, either. He has enough respect and wealth that he doesn’t need to, and he wants only to see me happy.” Her smile widened. “Besides, he is as besotted by his son as I am.”
“And you hope for another?”
She cast me a sly glance. “Actually, we might have achieved that. I’m waiting to discover. It’s early days, and we mustn’t count on events.”
“Counting the days instead?” I laughed when she glanced at Nichols. “You can rely on my maid’s discretion.” I didn’t have to look at her to remind her, I knew she’d say nothing. With the servant network as tight as the one above stairs, it was good to have two servants we could rely on to keep their own counsel, but it was rare. We had to assume that most of what we said in the presence of others would reach other ears sooner or later. In time, I’d find similar trustworthy attendants for my children. Allies were important.
Lisbon: Richard and Rose, Book 8 Page 11