Edmund repeated the words with a firmness that told everyone present he knew and appreciated the solemnity and permanence of his words. Then he slipped a ring on her finger. Although she felt his presence in her mind, he didn’t deepen the contact or speak to her in that way that had become so personal. Only they shared emotions at that depth.
She smiled as they knelt to receive Communion, then retreated to the pews as other people lined up for their taste of holy bread and wine.
Did immortals believe in this new, upstart God? Portia certainly did, but what of the true Ancients, the people who might have lived longer than Jesus? She had never met one, but her parents assured her they did exist, although they were rare and didn’t often go out in society.
Such philosophical concerns did not keep her long. She was sitting next to her husband, a man who looked at her with adoration, a man she loved with all her heart.
Portia couldn’t remember a happier time.
So far they had only exchanged their formal vows. As the service ended with a blessedly brief sermon and blessing and the congregation stood, he leaned closer, then he offered his arm.
“Thank you,” he murmured to her.
She had no chance to ask him what he meant until they had taken their places in his carriage, which was drawn up outside the church. The two bay horses stamped and their breath heated the chilly spring air. The sun was still out, but rain clouds threatened. She would be glad to get indoors.
“What did you mean?” she asked when the footman had closed the doors on them and they had a modicum of privacy.
“I meant thank you. For trusting me, for loving me and for becoming my wife. I won’t let you down,” he said softly. “I have vowed it.”
“I didn’t hear that part in the service.” She smiled, attempting a small tease.
“You’re hearing it now. I love you, Portia, so much. In a few hours I’ll show you how much.”
If she had imagined being with him would assuage the longing growing inside her she was very wrong. The journey to the house was accomplished quickly, but she kept her hand in his. Once they had passed the village he tugged her hand. Willingly she went into his arms.
He kissed her, his lips caressing hers with care, but as soon as they touched, she felt his banked-down passion. It burned through him as it did her. They would have to wait, pretend they were civilised for a few hours yet.
“How long?” she asked when he finished the kiss, only to nibble slow, tiny caresses down her throat.
“Not long. If I had my way, I’d take you straight to bed. I don’t care what it seems like or what people think. I only want you.”
“And I you.” She drew a sharp breath when he kissed her breasts on either side of her cleavage, but he would find them hard to free today. Jane had ensured Portia was well laced and her new gown fit her like a glove. Neither eventuality made for easy disrobing. She shuddered. She wanted it now, wanted to show him her body, give it to his care.
He licked her, his tongue creating a damp path between her breasts. “My love,” he murmured. “Let’s ignore the wedding guests. Show them that we are too eager for each other to wait.”
“We can’t.”
With a groan he drew back and leaned heavily against the squabs, but he kept hold of her hand. “You’re right. We shouldn’t antagonise the neighbours. We have to make our home here, at least for now.”
“What do you mean, for now?”
He glanced at her, and for once he wasn’t smiling. “I have to visit Scotland sometime. My mother did indicate she wanted to give my sister a Season—”
She broke into his words. “You have a sister? Why did you not tell me?”
He shook his head. “I’m not sure.” When she would have pulled her hand away, he gripped it tightly. “I love Aurelia, but my mother has treated her like the favoured child, so I knew she was—safe. I told you my mother and I didn’t get along very well.”
Portia nodded. “And I wondered how that could happen.”
He didn’t explain. “My sister is mortal, and she could have been hurt, had my mother decided to use her. So I went away, determined to learn everything I could, and then return to take care of her. I have received regular reports, letters from her and from friends. She’s well and properly cared for. I need to find that out for myself.”
He had a mortal sister? What must that be like? “Can’t you convert her—make her like us?” There was a way. Her father had told her. They mingled their blood. He’d also told her ichor, the substance that ran through the veins of immortals, was poisonous to mortals.
Edmund shook his head. “It’s impossible. She failed the test, or so my mother told me. I have reconciled myself to what must happen, but I can’t deny it makes me sad. I want her to have a mortal husband who will make her happy.” He paused and bit his lip, turned his head to stare out of the window before he turned back to her. “She doesn’t know about us—I mean our immortality. My mother requested it. I saw her reasoning to be sound and agreed. What good would it do Aurelia to know what we are? In addition, how could she live with us in that circumstance? My mother has chosen to lose her youthful appearance and age with her so that she may care for her.”
When he pressed her hand against his leg, Portia didn’t pull away, but spread her fingers over the warmth beneath the matte blue satin. He needed her; she sensed it in the sharpness of his mood. “I would not have married you if you were mortal and unable to be converted. I am selfish in that, Portia. I was so relieved when you turned out immortal.”
Portia stayed silent, her head reeling with the news that she had a sister-in-law she knew nothing about. “How old is she?”
“Twenty-five.”
She asked the question she’d been avoiding. “How old are you? Really?” She had considered herself accustomed to people who could count their age in three figures, but not when it came to her husband. She had decided she could live with his answer, her love would carry her through.
“I’m thirty-one. Truly.”
She couldn’t help it—she threw herself into his arms. He hugged her, laughing, and when she lifted her head, kissed her. They forgot everything then, their invariable habit when their lips met.
They were still in the embrace when the carriage stopped. He glanced outside and reluctantly separated them. “We must go in. Let me show you the house.”
Portia thought she’d seen the house and prepared herself for the sight of this delightful place she would call her home. When she walked into the hall on the arm of her new husband, her gasp reverberated around the walls.
Paintings decorated the once-bare walls and a fire crackled in the grate, the brassware gleaming. Rugs were scattered over the floor, expensive new rugs in shades of terracotta and cream.
As Edmund led her through the rooms of her new domain, Portia’s wonder grew. Downstairs the parlours and offices glowed with attention. Every window was draped in silk and each room had an air of careless luxury.
He took her upstairs after she’d handed her cape, gloves and hat to a waiting footman. The formal rooms held furniture Portia had only dreamed about. Elaborately carved and gilded chairs and sideboards, pier-glasses larger than any she’d seen in her life. The main drawing room was wholly feminine, the sofas upholstered in an extravagant cream that would hold the dirt like few other shades. She didn’t ask how they were to clean it. At this moment she didn’t care.
Then he took her to the library, its previously empty shelves lined with volumes from the ancient to modern. He opened a case and showed her a medieval prayer book, the illustrations like jewels, precious on the pages, showing the daily activities of an age long gone by. She leafed through and gave it back reverently.
He pressed it into her hands. “This, like everything else in the house, is for you. I made this for you. You were in every stroke of the paintbrush and every choice I made.”
His laughter rang around the room. “Wherever did you get that idea from?”
“A fairy story my father used to frighten us with on dark winter nights.” She smiled reassuringly at him. “Although he always took us on his lap and assured us it was only a tale when he’d done.”
“Ah. Well, I have no past wives or skeletons. I had this house stripped, so I can assure you the only bones are wooden ones.” He took both her hands and drew her closer. “I have the greatest desire to strip you. Will I have that wish later?”
From her understanding she thought a married couple separated to prepare themselves for the night. It appeared they weren’t going to have a traditional wedding night.
“Not for a moment,” he said, as if he read her thoughts, though she’d buried them deep. “I don’t want to part for a minute more of today. Or tomorrow, my love.”
He captured her mouth in a kiss. Her arms went about him, the rough fabric of his coat abrading her fingers, his hands caressing, growing bolder with every stroke.
While they were standing there, they became aware of voices in the hall below. She pulled away, and he caught her hand, winding his fingers about hers. “Not a minute,” he repeated. “We should go into the drawing room and greet our guests. They’re preparing the dining room for the wedding breakfast.”
Chapter Eight
Portia hardly ate any of the food placed before her, although they were the finest delicacies available that season. Not until Edmund filled a plate for her with his own hands and urged her to eat, leaning to murmur in her ear, “You’ll need the sustenance, sweetheart. Eat up.” They could have seen her fiery blush right at the other end of the substantial room. He had a large dining table, made larger by the addition of several leaves, so fifty people sat together to celebrate the nuptials of Mr. Welles and his new bride.
Fortunately the bride and groom weren’t expected to stay until the last guests took their leave. The ribald comments were hard to bear as Edmund escorted Portia from the room, after thanking everyone for making his wedding day so memorable.
Upstairs lay their bedroom and heaven.
He took her to the room with the butter-yellow drapery. At least that hadn’t changed much, except for the addition of a suite of silver-and-crystal dressing table furniture and a large mirror on the wall between the two windows.
“The only thing I’d change about this house is the windows,” he mused, leading her over to the bed. “I’d prefer them much larger. Now, my love, unless you have any objections, I’ll try to negotiate my way inside the cocoon you’re wearing. It’s a very beautiful shell for an even lovelier inside.”
She laughed. “I’m not a worm. Cocoons enclose silkworms. Nobody concerns themselves with the worm, only the cocoon.”
He smiled and kissed her hand. “I stand corrected. Then I will say only that you are the most beautiful worm I’ve ever seen in my life.”
Their shared laughter eased the tension gripping her now. However much she had yearned for this moment, she still didn’t know what he expected of her or had more than the vaguest knowledge of what would happen. She understood the biology of the act, but not the other parts. The emotions, and the way she had to conduct herself. Tension made her belly flutter and her breath catch in her throat.
He paused in the act of smoothing his hands over her gown and lifted them to rest on her shoulders. “If you wish, I’ll call your maid and you may prepare in your own time. I want nothing to mar your happiness today, so if that is what you want, then I’ll leave you for a while.”
She clamped her hands on his waist, her fingers digging in to the fine fabric. “No, no, I don’t. It’s all a little strange, that’s all. I don’t mean to be missish—”
His smile warmed her to the tips of her toes. “You’re not being missish. It’s a new experience. However much I want this, you have to want it too. If your apprehension swamps that, then we won’t have the experience I long for. Sweetheart, tell me what you want, and it will happen.”
She bit her lip and released it. He watched, hunger in his gaze. “I want you, Edmund. Only you.” It felt right to her that they share their first night together with nobody else interfering. Even a maid.
He unfastened the first hook and eye holding her gown to her stomacher. “Sweetheart?”
She lifted her gaze to his face. “Nobody else. Just us.”
A slow smile curved his lips. “Very well. I should tell you that I’m straining at the leash, in case you haven’t guessed, but I will be careful if it kills me.”
Shocked to hear herself laugh, nevertheless part of the tension unwound in her. She wasn’t the only nervous one here, albeit for different reasons. He didn’t want to hurt her. She didn’t care. She should tell him. Reading minds was all very well, but putting something into words added a new dimension to the meaning, permanency, in the nature of committing herself.
She took a deep breath. “I want you to strip me naked and touch every part of me.”
His fingers shook, but he continued to unhook her gown. “Then our desires coincide. I want to taste you too.”
This was like a game of dare. “I want to feel your bare body against mine.”
He took his hands away long enough to shrug off his coat and toss it away. “I want to feel your breath hot against my cheek as I bring you to orgasm.”
“I want to—oh!”
He eased the shoulders of her gown off, and slid the sleeves down. Once free, nothing prevented the garment from falling to the floor in a soft swoosh of silk. She should care about the lovely thing. She didn’t.
“What do you want to do, my love?”
“Show me so I can do it to you.”
Her stomacher followed the gown, a little heavier because of the arrow pinned to it. “Everything,” he said. “You own me. You may do whatever you wish with no barriers. Every part of me belongs to you, is devoted to your pleasure.”
He murmured the words and his breath touched her ear before he licked the rim. She hadn’t realised how sensitive her ears could be. When he nipped the lobes, immediately soothing the tiny shot of pain with his tongue, she sighed his name and curled her arms around his neck. Finding the black velvet ribbon holding his hair back, she tugged it loose.
Fair locks, so pale they were almost silver, tumbled over her hands in silky disarray. They should have been feminine, but the very fineness emphasised his rampant masculinity. She tangled her hands in the strands, pulled gently, revelling at the catch in his breath that told her she was affecting him.
He had her petticoats, first the elaborate top one, then the under-petticoat, then the hoop, all falling away from her. “Petals,” he murmured into her ear, his voice intimately soft. “I’m plucking your petals.”
This time she yanked harder until he tipped his head back to meet her gaze, turned stormy now. “You’re teasing me. Petal plucking?”
“Well, it rhymes,” he offered.
“With what?”
His laugh rang around the room. “Guess.”
She did and was mortified. Her blushes heated her cheeks and when she looked down, her breasts were a rosy pink too.
His gaze followed hers. A low growl rumbled in his throat. “Beautiful.”
Bending, he licked her breast, tasting it as he’d promised, and then kissed it. Succulent, he murmured into her mind. Sweet.
Shivers racked her. She’d never imagined using mental communication in that way. The thought of what they could do now that they didn’t have to stop and could freely explore everywhere and anywhere made her tremble in anticipation. Her paucity of imagination was now remedied by the fecundity of his. He sent vivid images to her, of him kissing her naked body, his touch linge
ring over her quivering flesh.
When he lifted his head, his eyes were dark, heated with passion. He turned long enough to sweep the elaborate butter-yellow cover down the bed, followed by the quilt and blankets, revealing the white linen sheets at its heart, the unspoken invitation so intimate.
“Madame is almost ready.” With a wicked smile he finished stripping her, faster than he’d removed her outer clothing. Obediently she turned for him to unlace her, which he did with a rapidity that shocked her. Even her maid couldn’t do it so fast. It dropped to the floor, thumping on top of the stomacher. Then he turned her around and dealt with her stockings and her shoes. He paused to examine her garters. “‘Health, wealth and happiness’?” he said, reading the legend on one of them.
“My sisters sewed them for me.”
“I see.” He turned to the other one. “‘Pleasure, peace and prosperity’. Very laudable. I think we’ll concentrate on the first of those for the time being, shall we?”
She appreciated that he folded them carefully and put them aside, her mementoes of the day. Her shoes came next, the pretty buckles discarded, and he helped her step out of them. He grasped her ankles and pressed a soft kiss to the instep of each foot before he placed them on the oriental carpet by the side of the bed. The rug cushioned the impact of the hard, polished floorboards.
Only her shift lay between him and her bare skin. He got to his feet, grasping the hem of the knee-length garment and bringing it with him. “Arms up, my love,” he said tenderly. She did as he asked, letting him remove the feather-soft lawn and cast it aside.
He gazed at her, enthralled. Although she had an instantaneous urge to cover her breasts and groin, she clenched her fists and forced herself to stay still. To let him look.
“Oh, you are lovely,” he said, his voice barely above a breath. A fire blazed in the grate, but still she shivered. When he reached for her, she braced herself for his touch, her vulnerability painfully obvious.
He stroked her upper arms in a soothing gesture. “Get into bed, sweetheart. Let me look at you while I undress.”
Arrows of Desire: Even Gods Fall in Love, Book 3 Page 12