“All is resolved,” Emilio announced, taking Elena’s hand. “Come, we must find your father.”
Delighted by the relief evident on her new friend’s face, and overjoyed for Santiago, Valentina threw decorum to the winds and linked arms with her beloved.
Buoyed by the swell of Valentina’s breast pressed against him, Santiago bent his head to whisper in her ear. “Judging by the crescendo of excited voices, we’ve caused a stir.”
He was tempted to nibble her earlobe, but Manuela’s disapproving glare deterred him.
Valentina squeezed his arm. “I think they’re excited for Elena and your brother. A society wedding will be a reassuring sign things are getting back to normal after the occupation.”
“And the appearance of a long-lost brother rumored to be a pirate and betrothed to a beautiful woman hasn’t captured their interest?” he teased.
The blush that spread across her delectable breasts had the predictable effect on his manhood. “How would you feel about a double ceremony?” he asked, wishing he could whisk her away to the Santa María and have done with the strict formalities expected of noblemen and women.
The leisurely fluttering of her fan suddenly became agitated. “I would love that, but…”
“It was Emilio’s idea.”
She had no chance to reply when a hush fell as de Funes and Melchor mounted a small dais at the front of the hall.
“Good evening to you all,” the governor announced, spreading his arms wide. “It’s my unexpected honor and pleasure to introduce illustrious guests. My old friend, His Excellency Felíx Melchor, erstwhile Governor of La Florida, and his daughter. They have finally made it safely to Cuba after the harrowing ordeal of arranging the evacuation of Spanish citizens from San Agustín, and weathering a hurricane en route.”
Melchor bowed in acknowledgment of the loud cheering and applause that ensued, then raised his hand for quiet to be restored. “I thank you for the warm welcome you have afforded my daughter, Lady Valentina, and myself, as well as the hundreds of refugees from San Agustín. I wish to make it known that without the courage of Capitán Santiago Velázquez, we would not be here today. As time goes by, you will no doubt hear details of the difficult experiences we encountered, but, for the moment, I would ask you to recognize the hero of the hour.”
Santiago fervently hoped no one ever found out about Valentina’s kidnapping. His crewmen would take the secret to the grave.
He’d never asked if she’d been violated, and it made no difference to his feelings for her. However, malicious rumor could destroy an innocent person, as he well knew. He squared his shoulders, his heart thudding in his ears as people cheered and whistled.
“You’re blushing, Santi,” Valentina teased as she too clapped her hands together.
“I just wish my father could have been here,” he rasped.
She nodded to the dais where Emilio and Elena had taken their places next to the governor. “You have the next best thing,” she said.
It was true. Emilio’s pride was evident in the set of his shoulders and broad smile as he too applauded. Santiago swallowed hard. His father was, in fact, present.
A hush fell again when Ambrosio cleared his throat. Every head turned to look at the dais. People were anxious to at last bear witness to the announcement they’d come to hear.
“It’s my distinct pleasure to stand before you and announce the betrothal of my daughter, Elena de Funes Villapán to Don Emilio Antonio Velázquez de Vallirana y La Granada. As you all know, Emilio is head of the Velázquez Mercantile Shipping Company of Sevilla. Please join with me in welcoming Don Emilio to our family.”
The guests responded with enthusiastic applause. Shouts of Felicidades echoed off the high ceiling.
Emilio’s happiness was plain to see on his grinning face, but suddenly Santiago saw something else. His brother was looking straight at him, as if…
Of course! How could he have been so blind? For Emilio, Santiago was the father figure, the family representative. He elbowed his way to the front. “Señores y señoras,” he began.
The hubbub quieted.
“In the absence of our late father, I congratulate my brother and declare how honored we are that the beautiful Elena is joining our family.”
The cheering resumed, but it was the gratitude and pride on Emilio’s face that warmed Santiago’s heart. Their bond had been tested and proven strong.
“I love you,” Valentina whispered when he rejoined her.
“Te amo, también,” he replied.
Her grip on his arm tightened when her father stepped forward and held up his hand for quiet to be restored. He beckoned Emilio to his side and shook his hand. “I have no wish to intrude on this young man’s special evening, but I’m afraid I can no longer keep the secret, that everyone knows anyway!”
Emilio laughed, as did everyone else.
“It is a happy coincidence that my daughter has also become betrothed recently, to another member of the illustrious Velázquez family, Santiago Fernando.”
Before the crowd had a chance to react, Emilio spoke. “I am proud to share this happy occasion with my older brother, and I bid Lady Valentina welcome to our family.”
Santiago and Valentina were urged to the dais in a swell of cheers. He didn’t think his happiness could be any greater until his brother declared, “And I think we should have a double wedding.”
Becoming One
Three weeks later, Santiago carried Valentina over the threshold of the opulent chamber allotted to them in the Governor’s Residence.
“Our wedding is apparently the talk of La Habana,” he said as he sat her down on the edge of the enormous bed. “Probably one of the last in the Basilica de San Francisco de Asis.”
“Why?” she asked, reaching up to unpin the long lace mantilla from her head.
He put one knee on the bed and stayed her hand. “I’ve wanted to do that since I saw you walking down the aisle with Elena.”
She leaned back, enjoying the feel of his fingers freeing her hair. “The weight of it trailing behind me made my head ache.”
“It gave me an ache too,” he quipped, “but a pleasant one in a different part of my body.”
His words sparked a thrill of desire that spiralled through her. In the weeks they’d spent preparing for the wedding, Santiago had spoken openly about what happened between a man and a woman during sexual congress. There had never been a hint of censure about her spending time alone aboard a ship with Maitland and Montserrat. It apparently made no difference to his feelings.
She suspected his primary motive was to counteract Manuela’s dire descriptions of marital relations. Now, she could scarcely wait for the promised rapture that joining with him would bring. But she was nervous, too. “So, you were saying it’s the last wedding?”
He removed the mantilla and laid it carefully over the back of a nearby armchair. “Ambrosio tells me the Cubans no longer want to use it as a church.”
“Because they are building the new cathedral?” she asked, the heat rising in her body as he knelt to remove her shoes, then her hose. No man had ever seen her bare feet, except her father when she was a babe.
“Partly,” he replied, brushing a kiss on the toes of one foot, then the other. “But mostly because the British used it for Anglican services during the occupation. They feel its sanctity has been defiled.”
In an effort to calm the wanton sensations his kisses caused in very private parts of her body, she thought back to the ceremony. Walking down the long aisle, glad of Elena’s presence beside her, she’d glanced up at the impressive domed ceiling supported by twelve enormous columns, filled with a sense of rightness. “Surely they won’t destroy such an imposing building?”
He shrugged as he stood. “The monks still live in the seminary, so I suppose not. They’ll find some use for it. But enough of this talk of churches. You’ll have to explain how to get you out of your lovely gown.”
She wagged her finger.
“You should have let Clara undress me, as Manuela insisted.”
“Ha, ha,” he replied with a wink. “Not a chance.”
Santiago thought it a great pity the magnificent church in which he’d been wed was fated to be shunned. But an inner voice gloated; he could, in future, boast of the historic importance of his wedding.
Ever the arrogant Spaniard, he chided himself.
What man wouldn’t boast of the elaborate nuptial ceremony?
He’d been impatient to confirm vows to Valentina he’d thought never to make to any woman. Sí to love, sí to respect, sí to protection, sí to fidelity. He was humbly content to dedicate himself wholeheartedly to her happiness.
The only regret was that his late mother wasn’t there to walk down the aisle with him and Emilio in the Spanish tradition. However, they’d agreed that sharing the momentous occasion with each other was a consolation.
Bringing his errant thoughts back to his delectable bride, he touched his fingertips to the drawstring pouch peeking out from her enticing cleavage. “Shall I begin with this?” he teased.
She stayed his hand and thrust out her chin. “Ha! You give me the thirteen arrha coins as a sign of your support, then take them away,” she retorted.
The seductive flash of amethyst eyes intensified the ache swelling at his groin. Being teased by an intoxicating woman was arousing. “The traditional coins are a mere trifle compared to what I plan to bestow upon you.”
“The treasure, you mean,” she taunted.
He took her hand and pressed it to his arousal. “I want to join my body to yours, to give the most intimate part of myself to you. This is the treasure we’ll share, Cariña.”
Her nostrils flared as she squeezed with just enough pressure to make his cock swell. “I want you, Santi,” she breathed.
He nuzzled her neck, then sucked the earlobe he’d hungered to taste for weeks.
The prospect of leading this innocent in the dance of love was humbling. The fiery passion he knew lay within her, just waiting for him to ignite—that was enough to make a man strut around the chamber, crowing like a rooster.
He’d been rock-hard since she’d startled into his arms when they emerged from the basilica to be greeted by a loud burst of celebratory firecrackers.
He’d managed to control himself during the banquet, politely handing out cigars to the two hundred male guests, his gaze all the while on Valentina presenting tiny vials of perfume to the ladies. His expression probably mirrored Emilio’s. His brother looked ready to pounce on Elena as she moved gracefully from table to table with her new sister-by-marriage.
It penetrated his erotic haze that Valentina was wriggling to be free of the gown. “Careful,” he warned, helping her lift the black silk over her head. “You’re going to tear it.”
“I don’t care,” she wailed.
His little Valentina was in a hurry to mate with him! The notion, and the sheer black camisa that clung to her perfect curves, undermined his resolve to go slowly, to be patient. He laughed as he shrugged out of his jacket and tore off his shirt. “I’ve never been a patient man,” he confessed, putting his hands on her hips and pulling her to him. “Especially when I want something badly.”
He peeled the lacy straps of the camisa off her shoulders. The flimsy garment slipped silently to the floor, baring his bride to his gaze.
A thousand words to describe her beauty galloped through his head. Statuesque, noble, dignified, perfect, a work of art…
Then she pierced him with her amethyst gaze, put her palms on his chest and murmured, “Plunder me, my pirate.”
“Mine,” was the only word that mattered as he cupped her breasts and lowered his head to suckle at her bounty.
Valentina preferred the naughty side of her that Santiago had unleashed like a genie out of a bottle. As far as society was concerned, she would enjoy being the paragon of virtue she’d been raised to be, the mother of well-behaved children. With Santi she would be wild, wanton, free. Valentina, Goddess of Sexual Pleasures.
He suckled her nipples to the point of driving her mad with want. “I love that,” she said in a husky voice she didn’t recognize, hoping he’d put his mouth on her secret place as he’d promised. She’d thought of little else since he’d whispered of the ecstasy awaiting her.
Breathing became difficult when he scooped her up, carried her to the bed and commanded, “Open your legs.”
She obeyed without question, eyes widening when he unfastened his trousers and eased them over his hips. She reached out greedy fingers to touch the thick lance that sprang forth, but he shook his head. “Patience,” he teased.
Dropping to his knees on the carpeted floor, he put his arms around her thighs, pulled her to the edge of the bed, and licked her womanhood.
“Santi,” she whispered, pulling free the ribbon that secured his queue. His hair fell around his face, silky on her thighs.
“Wait,” he rasped. “It gets better.”
She moaned when he suckled, then licked, then suckled again. The moans turned to strange mewling sounds she’d never made before when his tongue darted inside her body.
The ecstasy he’d promised was coming. She felt it in every fiber of her being, tasted it even. The sensations flooded her, turning her bones to liquid when he slid a finger inside, then out, in and out, all the while suckling, suckling.
The wave carried her higher. She closed her eyes and cried out, awed by the intensity of the euphoria sweeping over her.
It needed only…
Her eyes flew open when a hard, warm thickness penetrated slowly, filling her fuller than she’d ever imagined possible.
She stopped breathing when pain sliced into the pleasure.
His heart pounding, Santiago was glad of a chance to pause, to relish the incredibly prideful satisfaction of being the first to possess Valentina. “The pain will pass,” he reassured her, not certain he could hold still for long.
Her answering smile had the predictable effect on his hips, but he forced himself to go slowly, to enjoy the sublime heat of every thrust and every retreat as Valentina’s pulsating sheath gripped him, matching him stroke for stroke.
He growled when she closed her eyes. He sensed her release building again as his thrusts became more demanding, more urgent. “Look at me,” he rasped.
Their gazes locked.
He drowned in amethyst, pumping his seed as far inside his beautiful wife as he could. She keened her bliss as a wild gasp emerged from his throat. “Mi tesoro.”
Buried Treasure
Valentina came awake slowly. She’d never shared a bed with anyone, but it seemed perfectly natural to wake up lying on top of a male body. She hadn’t expected to sleep at all, but she and Santiago had succumbed to exhaustion after hours spent learning how to please each other.
However, she should stop drooling on his shoulder.
She tried to move, but a strong hand kept her firmly in place, then began stroking her arm. She relaxed into the blissful cocoon, letting her husband’s heat seep into her skin.
Eventually becoming restless, she crouched and nestled his maleness between her breasts.
He gathered her hair gently in his fist. “You tempt me, Querida,” he whispered. “I would like nothing more than to spend the day in bed with you, but de Funes and your father are hosting a luncheon in our honor.”
“Not until noon,” she murmured, trailing kisses down his belly as she crawled backwards, hungry for another taste of him.
“It’s already eleven o’clock.”
She rose up on her knees and stared at him. “What?”
He splayed his hands on her thighs and laughed, his brown eyes bright with mischief. “Now that’s a sight I want to wake up to every day.”
She looked down at his elegant fingers and realized she was completely naked, tousled hair hanging like a cloak around her shoulders, her rigid nipples pleasantly sore, the blotchy evidence of his lustful kisses all over her body. “I’m a wreck,” she
wailed.
He sat up, put his arms around her waist and licked a nipple. “You are the most beautiful woman in the world, and you are mine.” He moved to reveal the bloodstains on the sheets. “Here is the evidence,” he crowed proudly.
She sobered. “You never asked me.”
He narrowed his eyes. “About what?”
“Maitland, and Montserrat. Nothing happened, but most men would have cast me aside.”
“I am not most men,” he replied. “I was reassured you didn’t behave like a woman who’d been ravished when you were rescued. In any case, it wouldn’t have made any difference to me—except I’d have been determined to banish the memory and show you the delights of sexual congress.”
She arched her back, her heart bursting with love. The proof of lost virginity was a source of pride. Her most private place throbbed for need of the lance standing proudly erect between her knees. She put her hands on his broad shoulders. “I can’t get enough of you,” she admitted. “What have you done to me?”
“Simply awakened the woman within, my love.” He winked. “The buried treasure.”
She lunged for a pillow, but he took hold of her wrists. “I’d love to tussle, but later, warrior princess. Now, a bath.”
Pouting, she slid off the bed, squealing when he smacked her bottom playfully. “Hurry, we don’t want to be late. People might gossip.”
Santiago followed his bride into the baño, amused by her confusion as she stared at the empty bathtub. “Don’t worry,” he assured her, hefting a large tripod cauldron. “The footmen brought the water up fifteen minutes ago.”
Eyes wide, she crossed her arms over her breasts. “They carried it through the chamber? While I was still asleep?”
He emptied the contents into the tub, smugly aware of her eyes on his backside. “I made sure they saw nothing.”
“But…”
Pirates of Britannia Box Set Page 32