by Candace Camp
“Are you?” Charity quirked an eyebrow at him as she continued to strip off her gloves. He came toward her, one hand extended, his face set. Charity slapped her gloves into his palm as if he were a servant, then turned unconcernedly and walked away, untying her cloak as she went. “You might as well sit down, Simon. I am not going anywhere until I’ve finished what I came here to say.”
“There is nothing to say.” Simon clenched the gloves in his hand; they felt incredibly smooth and soft to his skin, and Charity’s scent lingered on them. Heat flickered to life in his abdomen. Hellfire and damnation! Why did the girl have to come here?
Charity slid her cloak from her shoulders and turned to face Simon, revealing her shimmering white satin ball gown. Standing there before him, her snowy-white shoulders and the tops of her breasts exposed by the low neckline of the dress, she looked pure and beautiful, yet damnably tempting, as well. Even the fire of anger in her eyes as she faced him was arousing.
“I think there is,” Charity replied, fixing him with her level gaze. “You see, you and my father may have agreed upon breaking our engagement, but I did not. I still intend to be your wife.”
She started toward him, skirts swaying seductively. Simon’s eyes were drawn involuntarily to the expanse of her bosom above the neckline of the dress; the soft flesh of her breasts jiggled with every step she took.
“Don’t talk nonsense,” he said, a trifle weakly. “Put your cloak and gloves back on, and I will drive you home.”
“No,” she said reasonably. “I am not going home.”
“Stop it.” He could barely force the words through his constricted throat. His mouth was dry, his skin searing. “Your reputation will be ruined if anyone discovers you visited my house at night.”
“Yes, I know.” Charity’s smile was soft and beckoning. “That’s why I’m not leaving.”
She stopped only inches away from Simon. Her hands went to his chest and slid slowly up to his shoulders and around his neck. He could feel their warmth through his lawn shirt, traveling over his flesh and igniting a flame wherever they touched.
“Doubtless you made a mistake when you agreed to marry me instead of Serena,” Charity said softly. “I believe I told you that I always get what I want. Now, I’m afraid, you are stuck with me.”
She went up on tiptoe and brushed her mouth against his. Simon drew in a harsh breath. “Charity, stop it. You are playing with fire.”
“I know,” Charity replied huskily, and pressed her lips into the hollow of his throat.
A shudder ran through Simon, and he put his hands on either side of her face and tilted it up. He gazed down into her eyes for a moment, his eyes dark and heated, and then he bent his head and kissed her.
His mouth was like fire; his tongue probed deeply. He kissed her with hunger and need, as if time itself had stopped. He told himself that he would kiss her just once, so that he would have this memory to savor through the empty months ahead. But her mouth was so sweet to taste, her response so deliciously eager, that he could not pull away after only one kiss. His mouth took hers again and again, his tongue plundering the treasure there. His breath seared her skin.
Finally, with a low groan, Simon jerked away from her. “No! Sweet Lord, Charity, you are killing me. I would be the worst sort of rogue to take you now. I cannot. But neither can I stand much more of this. You must go.”
Charity shook her head slowly, a sensual smile lingering on her lips. She had felt his hunger for her. She was sure now that he wanted her, and that fact gave her courage. She reached up and began to unpin her hair. The heavy mass of hair began to slip out of its moorings, curling and tumbling. Charity tossed the cluster of flowers aside and combed her fingers through her heavy curls.
Simon watched her silken hair twine around her fingers, sliding through them to fall caressingly over her shoulders. Desire rippled through him. He wanted to plunge his hands into the loose tresses, to feel their satiny fire against his skin, to bury his face in her hair and breathe in the sensual scent of her. His fingers moved involuntarily at his side, and he had to clench his hands to keep from reaching out to stroke her hair.
Charity shook back her hair, sending the waistlong mass rippling down her back. Then her fingers went to the top button of her dress. Trembling faintly, she pulled the tiny pearlescent button from its hole. Simon’s eyes widened, and he drew in a breath sharply. Charity went on to the next button, and the next, carefully undoing each fastening until the dress parted and fell back, exposing still further the creamy mounds of her breasts, now covered only by a thin chemise.
Simon swallowed, unable to move, unable to speak. He could only gaze, enthralled, at her breasts, round and succulent, pressing against the cloth of her undergarment. A tiny lace frill topped the chemise, grazing the smooth white skin; the tops of her breasts swelled above it, inviting his touch. Below the lace, the large, dark circles of her nipples were visible. He could see their centers peaking as he looked at them. A long shudder ran through him as he thought of how they would respond to his touch. His lips. His tongue.
Air rasped through his throat. He felt as if he were on fire. “Charity,” he whispered hoarsely. “Please…”
Charity’s fingers paused on the buttons, already down to her waist. The bodice sagged, the little puffed sleeves looping around her elbows, the sides gaping open to reveal her entire upper torso, clad only in her chemise.
“What?” she asked softly. “You do not like it?”
He made a low noise of frustration. “Bloody hell, woman, you know that is not the reason. You are driving me mad.”
Charity continued her steady assault on the buttons. “Then you should let me finish. Let me relieve your madness.”
“No! Charity, this is insane. You have to stop. I will ruin you! And soon I will not be able to stop myself from doing it.”
“I do not want you to stop.” The dress fell from her with a swoosh, settling onto the floor at her feet, leaving her in only her petticoats.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHARITY REACHED for the ties at her waist. One by one she unfastened them, letting each petticoat fall onto the growing heap around her. She stood at last in her pantalets and chemise, blushing, but not covering herself before Simon’s avid gaze.
Simon’s eyes traveled slowly down her torso, then to her legs. It was the first time he had seen her legs, even covered as they were by cotton, and the blood pounded in his head. He knew that he was on the verge of losing control. He should leave, get out of the room; it was the only way he could keep himself from taking her. But he could not tear his eyes away from her. He could not make himself turn away.
Her hands went to the ties of her chemise. She tugged, and the little blue satin bow came undone. The cloth fell apart, almost to her nipples. Charity’s fingers slipped beneath the ribbon and pulled the laces out, one at a time. With each tug the cloth gaped a little more, until finally the two sides were completely apart, showing a swath of white skin all the way down her torso. She reached up and took each side between her fingers. Simon’s breath caught in anticipation.
Then she stopped and said huskily, “No, wait. You do it.”
Simon shook his head, but even as he did so, he stepped toward her, as if pulled by a force greater than himself. Only inches away from her, he managed somehow to keep himself from reaching up and tearing off the flimsy chemise. Charity took his hands and brought them up to her stomach. The touch of her skin was electric. Simon felt the jolt all through him. She looked up into his face; he could see the dark, hazy passion in her eyes, in the fullness of her lips, the softness of her face. Her lips were parted slightly, and she breathed in fast, shallow spurts. Her cheeks were tinged with pink. He read all the signs of desire on her, and it made his loins tighten and ache.
Her hands were on his wrists now, and she guided his hands up under the chemise. The thin cotton slid across his forearms as she moved his hands slowly upward. He began to tremble. His fingers touched the unders
ides of her breasts, and every constraint that had held him broke. He groaned and shoved the chemise back. For a moment he stood, gazing at the firm globes of her breasts, crested by the tempting dark pink nipples. He cupped her breasts, squeezing the soft flesh, delighting in the look and feel of her.
“Beautiful,” he murmured thickly, then bent and swept her up in his arms.
He carried her to the sofa and laid her down gently upon it. He knelt beside the couch and bent over her to take one nipple in his mouth. He circled the nipple with his tongue, feeling the delightful hardening. His hand covered her other breast, exploring its softness and the contrasting hard thrust of the nipple. He suckled harder, and Charity moaned and moved her hips, raising them up off the couch. The passionate noise shook him. He could no longer think, could only feel the desperate need surging through him.
Moisture flooded between Charity’s legs, and she was embarrassed to know that Simon must be able to feel it, but he did not seem to mind, but only stroked and caressed her all the more. Everywhere he touched her, fire played across her body. Charity had come here for the sake of their marriage, but now she found desire taking over her body and shoving out all thought of anything else. She wanted him, needed him, in a way she did not quite understand. Her body moved involuntarily, her hips circling against the sofa. When he jerked down her pantalets in frustration, she did not even feel embarrassment; she only lifted her hips to help him and kicked the garment off over her feet, tumbling her slippers off with it.
Simon’s fingers slid softly down the inside of her thigh and back up, then traced the crease between her thighs and hips, moving ever closer to the hot throbbing ache that lay at the center. Then, when Charity was moaning and writhing, he touched the slick satin folds, opening them to his questing fingers. She groaned deeply as he explored her, touching her in a way that she had never dreamed of. She gasped with surprise when his finger entered her. He began to stroke rhythmically, in time with the suckling of her breast, and the fire within her began to pulse harder and faster, filling her with longing. He found a little hard nub of flesh between the folds and stroked it, sending a shocking pleasure through Charity. She moaned and moved against him, urging him on.
Finally he straightened up and looked down at her, his eyes going from her moistened, reddened nipples down her slender torso and on to the curve of her hips. He watched his hand on her, between her legs, hearing the soft sighs and moans coming from Charity as she moved against his hand, lost in pleasure, and he had to bite hard on his lip to keep from disgracing himself right there. His heavy-lidded gaze moved farther down, to the stockings that still clung to her legs, held up by lacy white garters. The sight was almost unbearably exciting. He rolled the garter and stockings down each leg, pausing to plant kisses along the soft flesh of her inner thighs.
“Please, please…” Charity sighed, reaching back to grasp the arm of the sofa and arching her body up toward him.
She did not have to ask again. Simon tore out of his clothes, throwing them haphazardly on the floor. He had never before felt such driving need, such pulsing hunger. It was only with the greatest effort that he kept hold of some remnant of control, knowing that Charity was without experience and he must treat her gently, not take her in a hard, wild rush as he wanted to.
Charity’s eyes widened as he stood and pulled off the last of his clothes, revealing the swollen shaft of his manhood. “Simon…”
“No, don’t fret,” he reassured her huskily, settling onto the couch above her.
And, indeed, the desire in her was too urgent for her to hold back, even for the pang of trepidation she had felt on seeing him. She wanted him; she ached for some unknown joy that her body told her he would bring to her. There was a strange emptiness inside her, a yearning for completion that made her open her legs to him when Simon moved between them. He slid his hand beneath her, lifting her hips a little, and then she felt his flesh probing at the very gates of her femininity.
Charity gasped, her eyes flying wide open. He bent and kissed her, his mouth consuming her as, slowly, he entered her body. It was a strange and wonderful sensation, somehow exciting and scary and exactly what she was yearning for, all at the same time. There was pain, too, and she stiffened, but Simon soothed her with kisses and soft murmurs.
“Shh…Shh, my love…” he whispered. “I will go slowly. I’ll take care of you. It will not be so very bad.”
She relaxed, trusting Simon, and gave herself up to the strange sensations. There was a flash of pain, a tearing, and Charity gave a little cry. But then he was deep within her, filling her in a way she would never have imagined possible, and she knew that this was what she had been aching for. He began to move within her, and Charity realized that there was more to it, and that what he did now was even more pleasurable than the satisfaction merely of feeling him inside her. She gasped as he pulled back, then thrust in again, and this time there was almost no pain, only a sweet pleasure, a shock of fulfillment. He thrust again and again, enveloping Charity in the pleasure of the rhythm, the heightening desire that ran through her. She was panting, almost sobbing, wanting something so desperately that it clawed at her.
He reached down between their meshed bodies and found once more that magical little button of flesh, and suddenly Charity exploded into pleasure. It washed over her in waves, and her body shook, unconscious of everything except the joy flooding through her. Simon cried out above her and plunged deep into her, clutching Charity tightly to him. Charity clung to him as they rode out the storm of their passion.
For a long time afterward, they simply lay there, spent. At last Simon shifted and turned, pulling Charity on top of him so that she did not feel the pressure of his weight. He kissed her shoulder, damp and cool from the heat of their lovemaking.
“You’ve sealed your fate, my darling,” he murmured. “You are mine now, and I will not let you go.”
Charity, who was exactly where she wanted to be, just smiled.
The banns were read the following Sunday in the little church at Siddley-on-the-Marsh, and Simon and Charity were married there two weeks later. Simon had taken Charity home after their lovemaking and waited with her for her parents to return from the ball. Lytton Emerson had been struck dumb by Simon’s terse confession that he had taken Charity’s virtue.
But Caroline, his wife, had turned a shrewd look in Charity’s direction and said dryly, “Somehow I doubt that you were entirely to blame, Lord Dure.” She had shrugged and sighed. “Ah, well, it hardly matters. ’Tis all the same—you two have to be married now.”
Caroline had mourned the elaborate plans she had had in mind for the wedding, but Charity hadn’t minded a bit. She liked being married in the little church that she had attended all her life, and it was enough for her to have her family there, and Venetia and her husband. It didn’t even bother her that the dress she wore as she walked down the aisle was not a new one, encrusted with seed pearls and drowned in layers of lace. She had all she wanted as she looked down the aisle at Simon, standing at the altar, his eyes dark and smiling as she came toward him.
They went to Deerfield Park, the country seat of the Earls of Dure for generations, after the wedding. Closed in their carriage and away from the throng of relatives that had surrounded them for the past two weeks, Simon pulled Charity into his lap and kissed her thoroughly.
“Ah, thank God! I had begun to think I was marrying your mother, not you.” He buried his lips in her neck. “I haven’t even had a chance to touch you.”
Charity giggled. “That’s exactly why Mother’s been so constantly around. She wants to make sure that there’s not a repeat of my scandalous behavior until she gets me safely installed as Lady Dure.”
“It’s driven me mad.” Simon cupped her breast, caressing it through the material of her dress. “I think it’s been even worse since the night you came to my house. Before, at least I didn’t know precisely how pleasurable it was to make love to you.” He kissed his way up her neck to her ea
r and began to nibble on its lobe.
Charity shivered, the familiar hot ache blossoming between her legs. “It has been the same for me,” she murmured, making a little choking noise as his tongue delved into her ear. “Oh, Simon…”
“Mmm-hmm?” he answered distractedly, his attention elsewhere, as he bunched up her skirts in his hand until he found her leg. He slid his hand up her leg, shoving yards of material out of the way. Still, it wasn’t entirely satisfying, as her pantalets lay between him and her skin.
Blood pounded through him. All he had to do was touch her, kiss her, even look at her, and he was immediately, achingly hard. Though he might jest about it now, he had spent the past two weeks on tenterhooks, remembering their lovemaking and wishing that he hadn’t been so guilt-ridden that he took her home immediately afterward to face her parents.
“Take off your underthings,” he whispered hoarsely.
“What? Here?” Charity sat up straight, looking startled. One glance, however, into Simon’s hot, passionate eyes made her melt inside, and she quickly moved off his lap and onto the other seat, where she reached up under her skirt and wriggled out of her pantalets. “My petticoats, too?” she asked.
Heat stabbed his loins like a red-hot poker. “I care not. Come here.” He reached out and took her by the waist, guiding her onto his lap again, but this time so that she sat astride him.
Charity’s eyes opened wide, but she settled herself on him, moving a little, as if to find exactly the right place, eliciting a groan from him.
“Minx,” he murmured, in a voice that sounded not at all displeased, and kissed her.
Their tongues intertwined in a long dance of love, while his hands slid eagerly over her clothed torso. His thumbs traced the buttons of her nipples until they were hard and engorged, pressing against her dress. He moved his hands to her legs, sliding up them from the ankles, underneath the petticoats and dress, caressing her smooth, bare flesh, until at last he reached the heated center of her.