Soon enough he’d wrapped his greatcoat around them both, his hands inside, gliding up her back to undo the ties of her chemisette, one after inevitable one.
Talented fingers slipped through the gap in back and caressed her through her shift, up, down, and up again to run his fingers along the edge where her skin burned at his touch. All the while his mouth moved down her neck to its juncture with her shoulder.
He tugged the front of her chemisette and followed it with his mouth when it slipped across her breasts to fall to her waist. His mouth clamped over one breast, wet through her shift, and sucked, gently at first and then hard and demanding. A sharp clenching deep inside overtook her. Lily found it hard to breathe. Impossible to think.
“Glenaire,” she gasped.
“Richard,” he murmured against her skin. He clamped one hand on her derriere and held her in place while his mouth found her other breast. She came up against the hard ridge of his arousal and slumped forward, leaning over his head.
I need to touch him. I need— She slid her hand down the neck of his shirt.
He shot up, yanking his shirt from his pantaloons. She pushed it up until she could kiss the places her hands explored. His hands—
Ah, talented hands!
—touched the sensitive skin above her shift, then inside to tease her nipples. When her hands slid to the waist of his pantaloons, he moaned deeply.
“Wait!” Cold air, sharp and icy against her overheated skin struck her damp breasts when he pulled away. Something rustled in the dark. She groped though the maelstrom of desire for her moral compass. She failed to find it.
He came back before the madness receded, swept her up in his arms, and captured her mouth. “Clean,” he said against her lips.
Lily lifted her head, confused. He kissed her again.
“I found a bin of clean straw,” he explained. She kissed him back, teasing the side of his mouth with her tongue. His mouth held hers when he lifted her off her feet and swept his coat from around her shoulders.
He spread the coat and lay Lily on it. In seconds he lay on top of her, his weight both warm and welcome. He pulled the edges of the coat around them both. His hands and mouth drove all thought but one from Lily.
More. I need to touch you more. I need to be touched. I need . . .
His mouth explored her, without the shift now, that garment pushed down to her waist. She gripped his hair with one hand and ran the other down the corded muscles of his back.
When a tug alerted her that he had loosened her skirt, she started to rise up so he could pull it down. Instead, he yanked it up to her waist, urging her to relax into the cocoon of his coat. One hand caressed her inner thigh, sending waves of heat through her womb. Her hands moved restlessly under his shirt.
Fingers fluttered through the curls between her thighs and caressed her where she already felt moisture. She reached for the fall of his pants, but he stopped her.
“Not yet,” he murmured. “Almost.”
One finger slipped inside her. Another followed. She drowned in a sea of unfamiliar sensation. His hands caressed until Lily clung to him, desperate and unable to contribute to his pleasure.
“Richard?” she murmured, her voice rising at the end. “Too much, too . . . Oh.” Waves of pleasure left her blind. Mute.
When she returned to awareness, she felt him, hard and hot, press against her moist opening.
When did his pantaloons disappear?
He took her mouth and entered her a short way. When he pulled out, vague disappointed filled her. Could that be all? No. He did it again. And again. When he slipped in and out in shallow thrusts, her pleasure began to build again. Lily gave herself over to it until, in one hard thrust, he entered her completely.
Pain tore through her, igniting red sparks behind her eyes.
Lily cried out in pain.
Richard went rigid. He’d just taken her virginity with one vicious thrust and little care.
Damn it woman, why didn’t you tell me you were untouched?
He forced himself to stay still, head down, panting.
I assumed, the business with Volkov—I assumed . . .
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she gasped.
Unwilling to withdraw, afraid to hurt her more, he focused on the sound of his own breathing.
“I heard the first time—” she began. “But I didn’t—”
He started to withdraw. Her hand on his buttocks pressed him back.
“Don’t stop, now,” she murmured. “The damage is done.”
Damage? Is that what this is?
“Really, Richard. I think you’re not finished.”
I damned well am not. The feel of her hands drove him mad. He began to move in her.
“Are you sure you’re all right?” he rasped. He couldn’t have stopped if he tried.
“I will be, Don’t stop.” She trailed a hand up his belly. The feel of it drove him to move again, gently at first until the madness overtook him, and he finished what he started.
As he fell, satiated, to her side, he heard her moan softly. He prayed the moan meant pleasure. He owed her that at least.
Damn, damn, damn.
“Why the hell didn’t you tell me?” His words sounded curt to his own ears. Why didn’t I pay more attention?
She didn’t answer. He choked back a curse.
“Are you—” he began.
“Fine,” she mumbled. She turned her face away. He let her. A moment later he curled himself around her from behind and pulled her close with one arm.
“Sleep,” he said. “We have much to deal with tomorrow.”
She lay very still. He hoped she slept. He did not.
What hold does this woman have over me? I never lose control. Never. But he had; he had ravished a respectable young woman.
Another thought struck him. I didn’t even take precautions. Richard was no monk, but he kept his liaisons discreet. He used every precaution he knew to prevent fathering a child. So far he had been successful.
He had never approached a respectable young woman with so much as a stolen kiss.
Irrationally, he resented her for it. Where was the damned woman’s common sense?
As soon as the sky lightened enough to see, long before dawn, he rose and began to assemble the remains of his clothes. He pulled up his pantaloons and picked up his shirt.
“Is it morning?” Lily’s voice, muffled by his greatcoat, interrupted him.
“Almost. The earlier we get to the Park, the better.”
He turned his back to her and examined his shirt. A particularly nasty stain covered the front. It would have to be burned.
“I need help,” she murmured.
At least she isn’t wailing.
He pulled the shirt over his head and turned to her. She lifted her shift back into place, covering her sweet breasts, but she groped in vain to fasten her chemisette. He would have her clothing burned also.
He knelt, closed the garment with a few short movements, and rose abruptly. He did not need the graceful slope of the back of her neck where she held up her glorious auburn hair to lure him to her. That dance had been done, binding him to her with silken cords.
He put on his jacket and handed her hers. The tailored riding habit did not look at all alluring. Yet, here he stood, his life in tatters.
They would marry of course. Not once in the entire night had he conjured a way out. They would marry. He pulled her to her feet and watched her fasten her skirt.
“We may still make Chadbourn Park before anyone rises if we set out now,” he said.
“Except the servants,” she retorted.
“They don’t matter. We can contain the scandal.” He picked up his coat and swung it around her.
<
br /> She looked up then, hopeful.
“We will marry of course,” he told her. “Quickly, but not so abruptly as to cause comments.” He walked toward the door, expecting her to follow.
“I beg your pardon,” she called out to him. “We will what?”
He turned on his heel. “Miss Thornton, you will be the Marchioness of Glenaire. That is far from ideal, and the difference in our state will no doubt cause talk. We will have to endure it.”
“Why?” she demanded. “Why this ‘far from ideal’ demand? Has Lady Sarah refused you?”
“Don’t be coy, Miss Thornton. You have led me into folly at every step. After last night I have no choice. I shall have to marry you. My family—”
“Your family would have kittens if I married you, which I will not.”
“You have respectable, if not the highest, breeding, you will show to advantage when properly dressed, and you will do well as a diplomatic hostess. My family, I was going to say, will have to deal with it.” He stalked away. “So will you.”
“I will not,” Lily shouted after him. He ignored her.
She isn’t a fool. She will leap at the chance to be a marchioness. Does the damned woman think she deserves poetry also?
Chapter 8
Arching one’s back, Lily found, did little to stifle an ache when jostling along rough roads in a farmer’s cart. She brooded in solitude on the back of Framer Justice’s wagon, legs dangling, her back to Glenaire who appropriated the rough bench up front. She added that to her list of grievances.
Chadbourn Park, they had been told, was not far “’f you take th’road that avoids th’village and up the back lane.” An hour had passed during which Lily had plenty of time to nurse those grievances.
I will not tie myself to that insufferable boor even if he begs.
A vision of Glenaire begging brightened her spirits considerably. It did not, however, change her views. While she blamed only herself for succumbing to his advances—to her own turbulent passions, if she were honest—his insulting offer stuck in her craw.
This episode may bring disaster down on my head, but he’s a fool if he thinks he can order my life. I will manage the thing myself no matter what he says.
The wagon bumped around a rutted turn and slowed. The outbuildings of Chadbourn Park emerged beyond the fields. People bustled about their business; a groom led a horse past. He looked at them with little curiosity.
We must look like the village beggars.
Glenaire jumped down and came round to help Lily. The farmer saluted them and went on his way with shouted greetings to acquaintances as he went.
“We’re too late to sneak in unnoticed,” she lamented.
“By servants perhaps, but I will not have the family see us in this state, nor my staff,” he said.
Before she could object, he pulled her into the stone barn that also served as the earl’s stables. When she could make out only one worker in the gloom at the far end, she seized what little privacy they had.
“Let me clarify this before we go any further,” she hissed. “I will not marry you.”
Richard opened his mouth to speak; she held up a hand to quiet him.
“The guests are gone. Your staff is discreet. The earl and countess will accept any story we tell them. Sahin Pasha took our horses. We immediately set out for the Park. We got lost. Period.”
Glenaire listened, intent.
“Nothing. Else. Happened,” she ground out.
“You could be a duchess one day,” he retorted through clenched teeth.
“What makes you think I want that?” she demanded. “Not all of us live to be fawned over.”
He gave her what she had come to think of as his “Lord of heaven and earth” expression, chin high, eyes sharp.
“You could be increasing,” he said in clipped tones.
Heat crept up Lily’s neck. Pregnant? Pray God, no.
“It won’t matter,” she lied. “In that event, I will manage the thing. You needn’t concern yourself.”
“I beg to disagree. In that unfortunate event, we will ‘manage the thing’ together. Do you understand me?”
The full force of his authoritative stance hit Lily in a wave, but she stood her ground.
“Perhaps. For now, however—”
“Richard, what on earth? You look like you’ve been dragged through the pig sty backward!”
“Sheep,” Glenaire growled, his eyes on Lily.
Her heart skipped a beat.
“Just as bad,” Will chuckled. The “worker” had materialized as a very amused Earl of Chadbourn. “You’ve done interesting things with that shirt,” he said.
Lily tried not to think about where the shirt had been.
“No one would believe this if I told them,” the earl persisted. “Glenaire, the Marble Marquess, has straw in his hair and mud on his face.”
“You will tell no one,” Glenaire said in quelling tones.
Will bit his lip, suppressing laughter, but sobered quickly. “We were worried when you didn’t come back,” he said while he surveyed Lily with open curiosity. “Stewart sent men to search. Is there a story here? I hope it’s a good one.”
Glenaire repeated the story Lily suggested with few words.
“You’ve been walking all night?”
“Until we found the Justice farm, yes,” Richard said. His haughty expression brooked no contradiction. “We will, of course, want to hide the fact that we were gone all night if possible.”
Will looked at Lily kindly and nodded.
“We need to get Miss Thornton into the house, seen by as few eyes as possible,” Richard went on. “And into the care of your countess.” He no longer called her Lily.
“Give me a moment. I’ll find work for my people and clear out a path,” the earl said. He left them alone.
Richard started to speak, and again Lily stopped him. “You will bring my father home,” she demanded.
“I have already arranged it, as you know. I’ll have Volkov watched. You needn’t fear him,” he responded.
“There will be no marriage,” she repeated. “I will not have it.”
“Very well, Miss Thornton. Let it be on your head, but you will tell me if there is a child. You have no choice. My child will not be born outside of marriage.”
There are always choices, Lord High and Mighty. Not always good ones, but choices nonetheless. Most men would accept my decision with relief.
“I could dine out on that story, you coming in looking like a bedraggled sheep-boy,” Will hadn’t stopped laughing at him all day. It had become one more thing to hold against Miss Lilias Thornton; she had made him a laughing stock.
Richard sat—bathed, groomed, and trussed in a pristine suit—and sipped the earl’s fine whisky. His hair had been cleaned. His nails had been filed. His clothes had been burned. A hefty bonus calmed his valet and removed all trace of the horrid night.
Not all so horrid. He shook the traitorous thought away.
“My couriers will reach London quickly, but I suspect Sahin Pasha sent his ahead on Mercury. They will be at sea to Thessaloniki by nightfall or tomorrow at the latest, tide and wind permitting. I am sorry about Mercury.”
“We don’t know that he’s gone for good,” Will pointed out. “I have hope Sahin will recall himself enough to return my property.”
“Perhaps. He has other priorities.” Richard tried to keep the conversation on the diplomatic mess, not his night on the road. “They’ll kill the agent, of course, and possibly unleash more unrest. Russia may find the need to avenge their man.”
“Or they may take care of Volkov for going rogue,” Will suggested.
“Perhaps. It depends on how successful it turns out for them. In chaos they
win either way.”
“Catherine pronounced Miss Thornton fit. No harm came to her as a result of your misadventure,” Will put in abruptly, searching Richard’s face.
Richard broke eye contact and made his face a mask of indifference.
“Most of society would consider her compromised,” Will ground on.
Indifference fled. “I consider her compromised. I made an honorable offer. She refused.”
Will did not hide his astonishment, although Richard couldn’t be sure if the offer or the refusal surprised the earl more.
For a moment Richard feared his friend would ask awkward questions. He glared until the earl looked away and changed the subject.
“Catherine quite likes the woman,” he said. “She believes there will be little talk and any that arises easily squelched by the Countess of Chadbourn and the sister of the Marquess of Glenaire.”
“Georgiana?” Richard asked, “I shouldn’t be surprised. My sister has become the advocate of self-willed women everywhere.”
“She gets no help from your mother, however,” Will grimaced.
Richard’s sister Georgiana and her husband, who were estranged from his parents, kept a house in London in addition to their home in Cambridge. Their salon had a wide list of devotees among the more intellectual set. The duchess preferred to think they did not exist.
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