Delphine held his gaze, unaware that she was holding her breath. She was acutely aware of the contours of her body, her breasts and nipples hardened by the cool wind, and by a desire that descended on her like the mist over the sea, banishing her senses, blocking out all save his handsome face, his black curls, and the soft, velvety richness of his voice.
‘Is that what you want?’ she whispered.
‘No, because if you did, I would be unable to do this.’
He kissed her then, not forcefully but confidently, as one sure of his welcome. His lips were feather-light, his tongue ran along the crease of her lips. ‘Kiss me back.’
Her lips parted beneath his, inviting him to taste. She closed her eyes, groaning into his mouth. His tongue slipped inside, teasing and tantalising, sampling her softness, laying claim to all she offered with a possessive, consummate skill. Delphine pressed herself closer.
For the duration of the kiss, the fire burned between them, flames leapt and a gentle magic held sway. Then very slowly, very deliberately, Stephen drew back a little, his lips barely an inch from hers as he waited until her lids fluttered open. For a long moment his eyes held hers with penetrating intensity. The dark-blue depths were as enigmatic as they were challenging and Delphine felt an answering frisson of excitement. The darkening in Stephen’s eyes warned her he was aware of her brief response. Holding tight on to his control, he released her; when he spoke, his voice was harsh.
‘Go back to the house, Delphine. I shall follow in a moment.’
Her eyes searched his. She was slightly bemused by the sudden change in him. Then she backed away. ‘As you wish.’
Her soft reply reached him as she turned away. He watched her go. She did not glance back. Drawing in a deep breath, Stephen turned towards the sea, watching the orange ball of the sun until it had slipped below the horizon. He sighed, running the tip of his tongue over his lips. Delphine’s kiss had been as erotic as he remembered.
He did not often feel ashamed of his actions, but some devil had goaded him to speak sharply to her. He had begun to feel drawn to her, protective towards her, and he did not like the feeling. His present mode of life suited him and before Delphine had become his wife he’d had no ties, no regrets. And most importantly, no emotional involvements. A familiar ache returned to strike at his heart. He crushed the memories he had thought long buried. He had sworn never again to trust a woman. Once he had been capable of love, the kind of love Delphine had spoken of so passionately. There had been no doubting her sincerity and he had been wrong to mock her opinions, to judge her by the standards of another woman.
Delphine was nothing like that scheming bitch Maria. Angrily he thrust away the memory of the beautiful, perfidious señorita he had fallen in love with in Spain. The mere thought of her brought a bitter taste to his mouth. He deliberately banished Maria from his thoughts, as he had banished her from his life. He knew the folly of placing his trust in womankind.
Chapter Five
Delphine’s head had been in a whirl as she had walked back to the house. Somehow, despite all her efforts to hold herself aloof from Stephen, there were times, like now, when a gentle camaraderie sprang up between them and she found him impossible to resist. Yet his sudden change of attitude had confused her.
She was disappointed when he did not come to share their evening meal; although she lingered, hoping he would make an appearance, he failed to do so. Feeling deeply hurt, for she was acutely aware that he would be leaving for Portsmouth in the morning, it was with reluctance that she sought her bed. She curled up tightly under the quilt, hoping she could find oblivion in sleep, for only in sleep would she find a release from the pain and confusion Stephen had implanted in her heart.
* * *
She hadn’t been in bed ten minutes when suddenly the door swung open. Turning her head towards it, she was startled by the sudden brightness. Stephen was standing in the doorway, a lighted candle in his raised hand. It cast harsh shadows on the strong planes of his face. He entered the room, closing the door softly. A heavy lock of hair dipped carelessly over his forehead. His shirt was open at the throat, his black trousers clung to his well-muscled legs. His expression was hard with barely controlled emotion and he loomed over the bed, large and dangerous.
Delphine’s heart leapt with fear, yet her breath quickened with excitement. Gasping with surprise, she sat up, her hair tumbling about her shoulders. The lace at the neck of her nightdress was stark in the dim light. Hot blood stained her cheeks and her eyes fixed on his face were almost black.
‘Stephen,’ she whispered, ‘please leave.’
Ignoring her request, without speaking, he placed the candle on the table beside the bed and in seconds he’d divested himself of his clothes, lifted the bedcovers and slipped in beside her. Taking hold of her shoulders, he pulled her down beside him. Pushing her nightdress aside so that it clung to the crests of her breasts, the heat of his lips laid siege to her senses and her head rolled back. The scent of him was intoxicating, musky, a lingering trace of horses and leather, but above all eternally male.
‘Stephen,’ she repeated, unable to believe what he was doing. She felt the surging thrill of danger in her veins. What had happened to put him in such a state?
‘Damn you, temptress,’ he uttered hoarsely, cupping her face and looking deep into her eyes. ‘With your hair all adrift and your beautiful eyes so wide—you look like an angel,’ he whispered, his mouth against hers.
‘But—I…’
‘Not now.’ His mouth covered hers in a stormy, demanding kiss, silencing any protest she might make, his passion overriding his self-control. Releasing her lips, Stephen slid his hands to the ribbons on her nightdress. Her skin was warm and silky smooth against him and the intoxicating scent of her encircled him.
Delphine trembled as she eased back to let him divest her of her nightdress; the harsh intake of his breath as he gazed at her nakedness was the sweetest accolade she had ever heard. When his lips left her mouth to kiss the pulse beating below her ear, a moan rose from her throat.
‘Hush, Delphine, my angel,’ he murmured, pausing and looking down at her lovely face, her eyes large and melting with desire. ‘I know you want this as much as I.’
She knew what he was doing, casting that spell of his again with the dark velvet voice and magnetic eyes. She could feel her strength to resist him draining away. The blood pounded in her head. As her eyes remained locked with his, she forgot where she was and some kind of madness seized her. The magnetism of their glances made the air between them shimmer.
Delphine pressed herself closer as he kissed her forehead, her throat, her cheeks. There were no protests, only Stephen’s lips on hers, on her body, both dominant and tender. Her senses were besieged by the feel of him, the power, the strong beat of his heart beneath her palms when she tangled her fingers in the thick curling hair on his chest. She moaned softly under his exploring, practised hands, his fierce, fevered kisses, his tongue teasing her breast, moving across her ribs and down across her hips and stomach, until she was writhing from the pleasure they evoked. She cried out as his kisses gathered intensity, fanning a fire that seared her very soul. Fervent ardour possessed them and Delphine clung to him, giving herself wholly to his passion, becoming enmeshed in its intensity. Sliding her arms about his neck, she pressed her soft breasts against him, feeling his manhood against her, gently searching.
Stephen tilted her hips and the thrusting heat of him entered and filled her. Guiding her legs so that they locked about him, he took what he wanted mindlessly, driven by a violent compulsion to have her. He took her with urgency, with a hunger that stunned and aroused him.
Delphine matched his rhythm, her body moving in mindless, shameless pleasure, every nerve in her body screaming for release, but he held himself back, driving deeply into her, refusing to deprive her o
f the same pleasure she was affording him. Her eyes were closed and she was moaning softly with desire, desperate for something she didn’t understand, afraid to have it, afraid to lose it. And then she went up in flames as their release exploded simultaneously between them, groaning with the extravagant splendour she was making him feel.
Whatever had driven Stephen to bed her was forgotten as he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her with him on to his side. Loath to draw apart from that heavenly sanctuary, his throbbing heat remained inside her. A fine film of sweat glistened on their bodies as they lay entwined. She was magnificent, exquisitely soft in his arms, and her pleasure had been as great as his.
‘Have you changed your mind about me, Delphine?’ he asked softly, turning his face into the luxuriant curls of fragrant hair that spilled across his shoulder, inhaling the delicious scent of her.
‘In what way?’ she murmured, sighing deeply with contentment as she ran her hands over the muscles of his back.
‘About hating me?’ He laughed softly, his breath warm on her face.
‘I don’t hate you, Stephen. I never said that.’
‘Then has my lovemaking given you reason to like me a little more?’
She smiled, snuggling into him. ‘I’ll tell you tomorrow,’ she whispered. ‘Morning is a long way off, so you have ample time to redeem yourself.’
He chuckled softly and, with a twist of his body, brought her up astride him. As she bent her lips to place them on his, she saw that his expression was as guarded as ever, except that the tension had gone from his face and there was a softening in his eyes. No words of affection had been spoken, nor had she expected them or uttered any herself. But as she moved her hips and took one of his nipples between her teeth, she felt the leap of his response within her and gloried in her power to bring pleasure to this enigmatic man.
* * *
Night still shrouded the land when Stephen opened his eyes. The candle flame flickered in the draughts that sneaked into the room and bounced eerie shadows across the ceiling as it illuminated the figures within the bed. Delphine was curled up against him, her head resting in the curve of his shoulder, her arm flung across his chest. Her hair was spread across the pillows and his shoulder. He gazed down at her in wonder and his heart turned over at the sight of her lovely face. She was deliciously warm, soft and rosy in slumber, her dark curling lashes sweeping her cheeks, her face serene.
He had been driven by lust when he had sought her out in her room. Now he felt a protectiveness so profound that it shook him to the depths of his being and looking back, the sweet memory of her response to him touched him deeply. She was as open and generous in her lovemaking as she was in every aspect of her life.
He could succumb to the temptation of a beautiful woman as easily as the average man, but he had never experienced anything like what he was beginning to feel for his wife. He had never experienced anything of a woman’s love that had nothing to do with sex—not from his mother, nor the devotion of a nurse or nanny—and certainly not from Maria. In this moment of calm he realised that there had always been an unidentified, repressed hunger within him for female contact—physical, mental and spiritual.
He was stunned. He had thought life had given him compensation of immunity because of his yearning all his life to make the military his life. Now it appeared that he was instead the victim of an insidious affliction. He felt like a man dying of thirst, given his first taste of water. He had vowed not to touch Delphine until he returned from Spain. But just a short while in her presence and gone was the reserve, the restraint he exercised over all aspects of his life. He shook himself in irritation, ashamed of his thoughts. What was it about him that a beautiful woman such as Delphine should bring out every wicked, shameful trait he possessed?
And now here he was. All his self-esteem had been set aside; he had been trapped by a guileless girl like a green lad barely old enough to control his urges. Every minute he remained with her, her hold on him would grow stronger, and before he knew it he would be hard pressed to withhold his amorous attentions. He would become enslaved, then destroyed. It was a situation he could not even begin to contemplate at a time when his mind was occupied with returning to his regiment.
But suddenly returning to the army had lost its appeal. He knew Delphine played a part in his disillusionment and in a way he blamed her for it. He would delay in leaving for Portsmouth no longer, where he would embark for Lisbon.
* * *
Delphine awoke in the big bed. Opening her eyes, she stretched luxuriantly, a sleepy smile curving her lips. Reaching out her arm to the right of her, her fingers encountered soft linen and the edge of the mattress, nothing else. She was alone. Stephen had gone, leaving her body feeling cold and exposed. Desire stirred within her, her body flushing as memories of the previous night coursed through her. Her lips still felt bruised by his kisses. She could still taste him, could feel his body imprinted against her own. Any moment he would return, she would see his smiling face and again they would make love.
But he did not return. Delphine rose from her bed and dressed, her mind preoccupied with conflicting emotions. At home in London her maid would have brought her breakfast, pulled the curtains back and prepared her bath. At Tamara, devoid of servants, she would have to do all that for herself until the house was fully staffed.
* * *
Encountering Alice in the hall, she enquired after her husband.
Alice shrugged. ‘He’s gone, my lady—went early, he did.’
‘Gone? Gone where?’ Delphine demanded, though she’d heard the servant plain enough.
‘Back to Spain.’
‘Spain!’
The news hit her like a physical blow. He had not simply gone to call on his neighbours or journeyed back to London to visit friends, which would have been bad enough. No—he had abandoned his wife as soon as he had taken what he wanted from her. Without notice, he had left her here alone, and gone to a foreign country to fight a war.
She stood frozen in the draughty old hall for a moment, trying to get her feelings under control. He lacked even the most basic decency to say goodbye to her, to assure her he’d be back—after how long?
‘Of all the self-centred blackguards,’ she muttered, unable to find a satisfying word with which to complete the sentence. If he walked in now, she would be tempted to hit him over the head with a blunt instrument.
However, forcing her mind to travel along more rational lines, she was forced to concede that he had done no wrong. Had he not told her he would have to leave before dawn for Portsmouth? Concerned for her welfare, initially he had wanted her to remain in London with her family and friends until his return. It was her father’s refusal to comply with this suggestion that had led to her abandonment here in a cold, draughty house surrounded by strangers.
Wandering through the empty rooms and eerily echoing passageways of her new home, desolation seized her and she was pierced by an unfamiliar sense of loss. She did not want to want him, but she did. She couldn’t help it. How could he have done this to her? Why had he left her? And why should she care? What did it mean? She really didn’t know him at all, but his leaving had left her feeling bereft and strangely empty.
That day Delphine did the most courageous thing she had ever done in her life—she faced up to her new life at Tamara, concentrating on the realities of her future. Stephen was a soldier and she could not, did not expect him to give it all up for her, not when there was a war to fight. She was not the only woman whose husband was away from home fighting in the Peninsula, so she would have to make the best of things until he came home, and then… She could not think beyond that.
* * *
This had been a time to forget the old and seek out the better moments of whatever life had to give. With this attitude she had concentrated on the practicalities of adjustin
g to her new position and duties. Until the servants came back, there had been work to be done.
And so it was that after many weeks, with every floorboard and every stick of furniture polished, Delphine found herself becoming a part of Tamara. New friends began to claim her time, inviting her to this and that, and on the whole she liked them very well. She always presented the calm and untroubled face of a lady of the manor who had nothing more to worry her than the ordering of her servants, the making and receiving of calls, the ordering of gowns from her dressmaker and the entertainments and charity events at which she wore them.
Tamara, this private place, became a world unto itself, a haven against the battle being fought against Napoleon across the sea. Though she sat at her desk and composed letters telling Stephen of day-to-day matters, his sporadic replies were stilted. In one of his early letters he told her not to be offended or think badly of him for not writing more often, since his regiment was always on the move. At least she knew that he was well and he always wished her well, but there was nothing in his brief letters to indicate the passion, the desire, the need he had demonstrated on his last night at Tamara.
At night she fought the loneliness of her big bed, surprised by how much she missed having him beside her. The pleasure and the intensity she had experienced on the night he left were now too painful to contemplate, but however hard she tried not to think of him at all, the very act of trying not to brought him more swiftly and powerfully to mind.
* * *
She had been at Tamara for three months when she realised she was pregnant, putting the whole household in a state of excitement. After the initial shock subsided, excitement raced through her and she laughed deep in her throat, feeling wonderful. A baby! She was going to have Stephen’s baby! Her pregnancy also gave her the perfect excuse—along with the wet and blustery winter weather—not to travel to London for Rose’s and Fern’s weddings, which were set to be a truly grand double affair according to her mother’s letters.
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