In that moment all Tess knew was that he felt very strong and sure, holding her, and that her head was spinning from the bumbo and that she thought her knees might give way at any moment.
“I think I do,” she murmured, and he smiled, the dazzling smile that always made her feel warm through and through.
“This morning you trusted me,” he said. “I am glad that you have not changed your mind.”
“I’m scared,” Tess said. Her tongue really was running away with her now. “I want to try but it terrifies me.”
He shook his head slightly and she fell silent.
“You don’t need to be afraid of me,” he said. “I’d never hurt you.” His expression changed. “I’d like to kiss you,” he said. “One kiss. That’s all. May I?”
Excitement laced with fear coursed through Tess again, as sharp and fierce as the kick of the drink.
“Always so polite,” she managed to say. “You do not simply take what you want.”
Owen’s eyes went so dark with lust that she knew exactly what he wanted. Knew, too, that she should not play dangerous games with him when she could not follow through.
“No.” He sounded constrained. “I ask first.”
Tess felt another shiver of anticipation. Could it really be so easy to forget the past? A ripple of apprehension shook her, chasing away the excitement. No, of course it was not. She could play these games because she felt safe with Owen, but once it became serious, once it became real, the fear would return and swamp her and drive away all pleasure.
“Trust me.” His fingers swept across her cheek, a feather-light touch. There was a smile in his voice. “Close your eyes.”
She obeyed. Her heart was beating light and fast now, with nervousness, not anticipation. She waited for the touch of his lips on hers. He would be gentle. She was sure of it. She was also sure she would feel nothing at best and would run screaming from him at worst.
The pad of his thumb brushed the fullness of her bottom lip and she gave a little gasp of surprise, then his lips were covering hers.
Tess waited, stiff in his arms, her back rigid, feeling nothing at all. Despair welled in her.
Owen was kissing her softly, persuasively, with such tenderness that it made her want to weep. That was not, she was sure, the reaction he would want, nor the one he was accustomed to from the woman in his arms.
Nothing. She felt Owen pause, and knew he was about to withdraw. She felt hollow and cold, distressed to have lost all the lovely warm promise. Owen’s lips moved on hers again and then—she did not know how it happened—she felt something shift deep within her, something instinctive that she barely understood. She felt herself tremble and heard a tiny sound that she realised was hers. Her lips softened and parted, she found she was pressing closer to Owen rather than drawing away, and then he was kissing her again and this time it was not gentle at all but hot and fierce. He tasted of rum and spice and something else delicious, and Tess’s head swam and the floor most definitely shifted beneath her feet in a way that had nothing to do with the tide.
In a second it was all over. Owen released her so fast that she had to grab the edge of the table to steady herself.
“I’m sorry.” He was breathing as though he had been in combat. He rubbed his forehead, looking dazed. “I was expecting a rejection.”
“And you could not deal with a response instead?” Tess arched her brows. There was a new emotion stealing through her, wicked and powerful. It shocked her to recognise it as triumph. Extraordinary. But she could not deny that the confusion in Owen’s face made her feel very good indeed.
His gaze came back and focussed on her intently. Desire flared in his eyes. He took a step towards her.
It was then Tess felt the fear. It was swift, visceral and it ambushed her with ruthless intensity. She caught her breath on a gasp and took a hasty step back, bumping into the wood-panelled cupboard, setting the glasses clinking. Owen caught her arm to steady her but then released her immediately.
He leaned the palms of both hands on the table. His mouth twisted into a rueful smile. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Don’t look like that. I have no intention of pouncing on you like an untried youth.”
Tess put a tentative hand on his arm. “I didn’t intend to tease,” she said uncertainly.
Owen’s expression lightened. He covered her hand with his, brief and reassuring. “I know, sweetheart.”
The endearment filled her with sweetness. “It’s new to me,” she said. “And…” She hesitated, wanting to be honest, not provocative. “I did like it very much when you kissed me.”
She saw the light leap in Owen’s eyes “We could try it again,” he said, a little huskily, “if you would like.”
“May we?” Tess said.
This next kiss was better, almost startlingly so, so good it shocked her. It was as though she had learned so much already and had a hunger for more. Her body responded instantly this time, with no hesitation or fear. Owen kept the kiss frustratingly light, his lips a mere whisper against hers, but even so when he released her the cold day felt hot and Tess shivered a little with emotion.
Owen took her hand in his. “Come along,” he said. “I am minded to show you the Blackheath Caverns before we have dinner and return home.” He looked around the dusty mess room. “I would not consummate our marriage here anyway. There are almost certainly ship’s lice. And weevils.”
“I thought that weevils lived in biscuits,” Tess said.
“You are remarkably well-informed on the habits of maritime parasites,” Owen said. “I knew you were a bluestocking all along.”
“So are you going to keep her?” Tess asked, as Owen helped her down onto the quay. “She could do with a lick of paint, poor creature, but she’s a beautiful ship and she deserves all the love you can give her.”
Owen looked at her quizzically. “Do you think so?”
“Oh, yes,” Tess said. She ran her hand along the shabby peeling paint of Sea Witch’s side and tried to imagine her crashing through the Atlantic breakers, the wind whipping through her sails and the sun beating down, or nosing her way through the Arctic ice under a frozen blue sky. The thought excited her. She was not sure why. She had never been interested in travel before but now she was hungry for it. She wanted to sail beside Owen and see what the world had to offer.
“She’ll take every penny of your fortune,” Owen warned her. “And then more. It’s a monstrous extravagance owning one’s own ship for pleasure rather than industry.”
“I don’t care,” Tess said. She pressed her palm to Sea Witch’s side. “I think I may have fallen in love with her. And besides,” she added, “you will need to escape sometimes, Owen. I feel it in you. You cannot be tied to the land for too long or you will start to feel trapped.”
She saw some expression shimmer in Owen’s eyes and then his hand came up to touch her cheek and he twined his fingers in her windblown hair.
“What a wonderful woman you are, Teresa Rothbury,” he said, and there was a tone in his voice that Tess did not understand. “I’ll see the broker next week,” he said. “Make all the arrangements. If you are sure,” he added, with another keen look at her.
Tess nodded. She was sure. But she wished that Owen had said he wanted her to journey beside him.
The drive through Greenwich to Blackheath was fascinating, through the narrow cobbled streets with ancient taverns on the corners and the shops with their signs swaying in the breeze. After a few minutes the older, more cramped backstreets gave way to wider tree-lined avenues and grand mansions.
“It’s like a miniature version of Bath,” Tess said, craning her neck to study the crescent of elegant houses that formed Gloucester Circus. “Except that it has a whiff of gunpowder and salt and leather about it.”
“So you do travel outside London occasionally then,” Owen said.
“All the world goes to Bath,” Tess said. “It’s fashionable.”
“I’d like to be a country gentle
man,” Owen said, as they passed a row of neat villas with well-kept gardens. “It would have suited me much better than a viscounty.”
“You can be a country gentleman at Rothbury Chase,” Tess said.
Owen laughed. “I didn’t want twenty-thousand acres,” he said. “That seems greedy. I don’t need so much.”
There was such a warmth in his eyes when he looked at her that Tess’s heart tripped a beat.
“I like these outings with you,” she said. “When we did this before we wed it felt as though we were becoming friends. Naively I thought how good it was to have a male friend. But now…” She stopped, trying to untangle her feelings. “I feel as though I have lost you in some way,” she said slowly.
Owen shifted along the carriage seat and took her hand. “Why can there not be friendship between us?” he asked.
“Because men and women generally cannot be friends,” Tess said.
“As I recollect,” Owen said, “you were the best of friends with your first husband.”
“That was different,” Tess argued. “Robert and I had known each other from childhood. In most cases, however, other things get in the way.”
“Other things?” His brows rose.
“You know what I mean!” Tess said. “Sex always gets in the way.”
She saw that Owen was trying not to laugh. The amusement danced in his eyes and lifted the corner of his mouth. “You mean you do not think we will remain friends if we sleep with one another?”
Tess was starting to feel very hot and bothered. She wished she had not introduced this topic of conversation at all. Talking about sex was one of the things that she never did, second only to not doing it. Sitting in the enclosed space of the carriage, holding Owen’s hand beneath the pile of rugs, felt cozy and intimate but there was an edge of something else to it now as well, something sensual and hot.
“You are twisting my words,” she said.
“I beg your pardon.” He sounded extremely courteous. “Correct me.”
Tess made a little huffy sound. “Now you are making fun of me.”
“On my honour I am not.”
Tess dared a quick look at him and saw he could not quite banish the glimmer of amusement from his eyes. She felt a strange, giddy, sliding sensation inside her as his fingers interlaced with hers.
“I swear it,” he said. “I am…fascinated…to hear your thoughts on the relationship between us and how it might change if we…ah…make love with one another.”
Oh. Tess’s breath caught. She wished Owen had not used those words. Her mind translated them instantly into pictures of erotic excess. She felt very heated. The giddy sensation had transmuted into a tight coil of excitement in the pit of her stomach. Her lips parted. She felt no fear now, only an intriguing sense of what might happen.
Owen was watching her, his eyes so intent on her face it was almost like a physical touch. His thumb was brushing the palm of her hand and it was creating the most delightful sensations in her.
“Teresa,” he said. “You won’t lose me, if that is what you fear. We will still be the best of friends. Our marriage will simply be—” He paused. “Different.” His voice dropped. “Better, possibly, if you find you like it.” There was a thread of amusement in his tone. He brushed the hair away from the hollow of her collarbone. “My worship of your body,” he said softly, his eyes intent on the slow, sensual stroke of his fingers against her skin, “as well as my sincere admiration for your mind.”
Her mind, Tess thought dazedly, was in danger of splintering into tiny pieces if he carried on like this.
My worship of your body…
She gave a tiny sensual shiver, remembering the way she had felt when he had kissed her on the ship, remembering that shift of sensation deep inside. Her body twitched again in recognition. It shocked her. Somewhere she possessed a knowledge she had not even guessed at.
“I would like to worship every curve and every hollow you possess,” Owen whispered, “with the touch of my hands and my lips…” This time his mouth brushed her throat and Tess felt the echo of that touch in the pit of her stomach. The images rampaging through her mind now were setting her on fire. She did not understand what Owen was doing or how he could make her feel like this. His fingers were against her cheek and his touch felt good, as gentle as his next words. “There will be no more fear or revulsion,” he said. “I promise you, Teresa. There will be nothing but pleasure.”
The tight knot of heat in Tess’s belly intensified. Instinctively she leaned into the caress of his fingers as they fell to the hollow at the base of her throat.
“You like me touching you,” Owen said. “That’s good.” There was an edge of roughness to his words that unsettled her nerves. And she did like it. She was shocked at the knowledge, shocked by her reaction. She was so accustomed to thinking herself cold, but this heat in her blood was like a fever. Yet from the first, she had liked Owen touching her; his palm against the arch of her foot when he had helped her with her slippers outside the brothel; his hand on the small of her back when they had visited the Picture Gallery. Her heart contracted as she realised the truth.
She not only liked him touching her, she ached for him to touch her. She wanted him.
She closed her eyes and allowed the fear to empty from her mind so there was no thought, nothing but sensation, and when Owen’s mouth claimed hers a second later she felt pleasure so hot and sweet she almost groaned aloud. She recognised the taste and touch of him now and she craved it. When she felt the tip of his tongue coaxing her to open for him she parted her lips and allowed him in, and was at once lost in the mysterious feelings created by each delicious sweep of his tongue against hers.
Nothing but pleasure…
She felt starved for him, pressing closer into his embrace, hearing Owen groan against her lips with a ragged need that was an echo of the emotion that drove her.
The carriage jerked to a halt, almost depositing her in Owen’s lap. Not that she would have minded.
“We are here,” he said. His voice was a little hoarse. “I’m tempted to drive around in circles for a while but we had better not. I have no intention of consummating our marriage here any more than I had on the ship, and if I do not exercise a bit of control that is exactly what will happen.”
“You are very particular,” Tess said. She sat for a moment trying to work out how she felt. The overriding sensation was one of strangeness. Her body felt thwarted with wanting. It was the most unfamiliar and curious feeling. Just as the kisses on the ship had ended too soon, so she had started to want to explore the feelings this kiss had aroused. Owen had definitely stopped before she was ready. She wanted him to kiss her again, for longer, thoroughly, properly or perhaps more improperly. A wedge of frustration lodged inside her.
“Are you going to join me?” Owen was waiting to hand her down from the carriage.
“I suppose so,” Tess said, sighing. “Though why you imagine I should wish to explore some sort of cave is quite beyond me.”
“For the same reason you wished to ascend the Monument or visit Greenwich,” Owen said. “You like being with me. You said so yourself.”
“Such arrogance,” Tess said, biting her lip to repress a smile.
Owen swung her down to the ground and kept his arms about her for a second. “You know you like me, darling,” he murmured, his lips nuzzling her ear. “You have just shown me how much.”
“I do,” Tess said. “I confess it.” She put a hand on the nape of his neck and brought his mouth down to hers. “I think,” she whispered against his lips, “that I am discovering something I enjoy almost as much as sightseeing.”
Kissing Owen in the open air made her feel as wicked and carefree as a young girl, she discovered. It was a very long time since she had felt so light and alive. Her lips parted to allow his to fit them and delicious sensations swept through her again. Oh, she had such a curiosity about this now. It all but consumed her. Cold snowflakes drifted down to melt against her
face as the hot, languorous desire took her.
“Teresa,” Owen said, pulling back, “we will become a tourist attraction in our own right if we carry on like this. Besides—” Tess heard his voice change as he felt her shiver in the bitter winter breeze “—on a practical note, it will be warmer underground.”
“I had heard that Greenwich was an indecorous place,” Tess said, allowing him to take her hand and lead her towards the entrance to the caverns. “Now I know it’s true.”
The attendant took Owen’s money and handed him a candle. Tess followed him down the deep steps cut into the rock. As they descended under the white archway of chalk the air grew warmer and the shadows deeper.
“How frightfully gothic,” Tess said, shuddering as the caverns below glowed ghostly white in the candlelight. “When were they discovered?”
“They were rediscovered a few years ago,” Owen said, “though no one knows when they originated. Perhaps they were quarried by the Romans.” He held the candle high as they reached the bottom and the natural light receded to a speck above their heads. “They hold dances down here. See the chandelier?”
As Tess looked up, a stray draught of wind blew down the steps and set the chandelier tinkling like ghostly music. It doused the candle flame with a soft puff. Far above them the door slammed shut. Immediately the darkness closed around them and with it came a damp chill that seemed to seep from the walls and sink into her bone-deep. Tess shivered. Suddenly she felt much colder in the unrevealing gloom. Her memory was full of darkness, of a door closing and the light being extinguished. She fought the fear but it pressed in on her. She gave a little gasp of panic.
Owen groped for her hand. “Are you all right?” he said urgently.
“Yes.” Tess’s teeth were chattering. “I’m sorry. I am scared of the dark.”
Owen gave a soft curse. “I was a fool for bringing you down here.”
“No!” Tess squeezed his hand. “You said it yourself, Owen. I cannot spend my life in fear.”
Owen drew her close. His arms were strong and comforting around her chilled body. Tess’s world steadied.
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