Slowly he turned her in his arms, and then he kissed her again, this time with slow ardor, his hands molding her close, and Elizabeth kissed him back, helplessly caught up in the stirring sensations his kiss always evoked, her arms sliding around his neck to hold him clasped to her . . . and the moment they did, he swung her into his arms, his mouth still claiming hers as he carried her through the doorway and into his spacious suite, where a huge bed stood upon a dais.
Lost in the stormy kiss, Elizabeth felt her legs gliding down his as he gently lowered her against him until her feet touched the floor. But when his fingers pulled at the ribbon that held her gown in place at her shoulder, she jerked free of his kiss, automatically clamping her hand over his. “What are you doing?” she asked in a quaking whisper. His fingers stilled, and Ian lifted his heavy-lidded gaze to hers.
The question took him by surprise, but as he stared into her green eyes Ian saw her apprehension, and he had a good idea what was causing it. “What do you think I’m doing?” he countered cautiously.
She hesitated, as if unwilling even to accuse him of such an unspeakable act, and then she admitted in a small, reluctant voice, “Disrobing me.”
“And that surprises you?”
“Surprises me? Of course it does. Why wouldn’t it?” Elizabeth asked, more suspicious than ever of what Lucinda had told her.
Quietly he said, “What exactly do you know about what takes place between a husband and wife in bed?”
“You—you mean ‘as it pertains to the creation of children’?” she said, quoting his words to her the day she agreed to become betrothed to him.
He smiled with tender amusement at her phrasing. “I suppose you can call it that—for now.”
“Only what Lucinda told me.” He waited to hear an explanation, and Elizabeth reluctantly added, “She said a husband kisses his wife in bed and that it hurts the first time, and that is how it is done.”
Ian hesitated, angry with himself for not having followed his own instincts and questioned her further when she seemed fully informed and without maidenly qualms about lovemaking. As gently as he could, he said, “You’re a very intelligent young woman, love, not an overly fastidious spinster like your former duenna. Now, do you honestly believe the rules of nature would be completely set aside for people?”
His fingers slipped beneath the satin ribbons that held her shimmering gown on her shoulders, and he eased them off.
Ian felt her tremble beneath his hands, and he put his arms around her, only to have her stiffen more. “I promise you,” he whispered, mentally cursing Lucinda Throckmorton-Jones to perdition, “that you’ll find nothing disgusting about what happens between us in this bed.” Realizing that the suspense was going to be worse than the actuality for her, he leaned down and blew out the candles beside the bed, then eased her satin nightdress off her shoulders. She flinched at his touch, and he sensed the jumbled emotions running through her. Tightening his hands on her shoulders to stop her from pulling away, he said quietly, “If I’d thought for a moment all this was going to come as a surprise, I’d have explained it to you weeks ago.”
Oddly, it meant a great deal to Elizabeth to know that while Lucinda—and everyone else, evidently—had guarded the facts from her, Ian would have trusted her with them. She nodded jerkily and waited in stiff tension while he unfastened her gown and sent it sliding down around her ankles, then she hastily climbed beneath the sheets, trying not to panic.
This was not the way Ian intended his wedding night should be, and as he removed his clothes by the light of the single candle burning across the room, he was determined that it would at least end as he intended. Elizabeth felt the bed sink beneath his weight and drew her whole body into the smallest possible space. He moved onto his side, leaning up on an elbow, and his hand touched her cheek.
When he said nothing Elizabeth opened her eyes, staring straight ahead, and in her agitated state, lying naked next to a man who she knew was undoubtedly naked as well, she was a mass of disjointed emotions: Wordsworth’s warnings tolled in one part of her mind while another part warned her that her own ignorance of the marital act didn’t relieve her of keeping their bargain; she felt tricked somehow, as well.
Lying beside her, Ian put his hand on her arm, his thumb stroking soothingly across her arm, listening to her rapid breathing. She swallowed audibly and said, “I realize now what you expected from your part of the betrothal bargain and what rights I granted you this morning. You must think I am the most ignorant, uninformed female alive not to have known what—”
“Don’t do this, darling!” he said, and Elizabeth heard the urgency in his voice; she felt it as he bent his head and seized her lips in a hard, insistent kiss and did not stop until he drew a response from her. Only then did he speak again, and his voice was low and forceful. “This has nothing to do with rights—not the ones you granted me at our betrothal nor the ones this morning in church. Had we been wed in Scotland, we could have spoken the old vows. Do you know what words, what promises we would have spoken had we been there, not here, this morning?” His hand slid up to her cheek, cupping it as if to soften the effect of his tone, and as Elizabeth gazed at his hard, beloved face in the candlelight her shyness and fears slid away. “No,” she whispered.
“I would have said to you,” he told her quietly and without shame, “ ‘With my body, I thee worship.’ ”
He spoke the words now, as a vow, and when Elizabeth realized it, the poignancy of it made her eyes sting with tears. Turning her face into his hand, she kissed his palm, covering his hand with hers, and a groan tore from his chest, his mouth descending on hers in a kiss that was both rough and tender as he parted her lips for the demanding invasion of his tongue. Her arms went around his broad shoulders, and he pulled her against his full length, clasping her against his rigid thighs while his tongue began to plunge into her mouth and then retreat, only to plunge again in an unmistakably suggestive rhythm that made desire streak through Elizabeth as she pressed herself closer.
He rolled her onto her back, his hand sliding caressingly over her breast, possessively cupping its fullness, then teasing her nipple, grazing it lightly, until it stood up proudly against his palm. He lifted his mouth from hers, and Elizabeth felt an aching sense of loss that was replaced by sweet torment as he slid his mouth down her neck to her breasts, nuzzling them slowly for endless moments before his lips closed tightly over her taut nipple. She moaned as he increased the pressure, her hands tangling in his hair, her back arching in helpless surrender, and all the while his hands were sliding and stroking with skillful reverence over her, heating her skin and making her ache with incomprehensible yearnings.
He kissed her flat stomach, trailing his lips ever lower, his tongue plunging into her navel, a low laugh coming from his chest when she gasped and gave a leap of surprise; then his hands slid lower, curving around her hips, his lips nuzzling closer to the curly triangle between her legs, deliberately taking his time. Elizabeth belatedly realized what he was going to do and panicked, her hands tightening. He hesitated, and she sensed his reluctance to stop an instant before he ignored her and kissed her there, too, but swiftly. Then he leaned up and over her again, his mouth at last claiming hers in another endless, drugging kiss as he drew her tongue into his mouth and his arms encircled her. She thought he would take her then, but the kiss continued, filled with exquisite promise and wild hunger. Rolling onto his side, he took her with him, his hand gliding down her spine, holding her hips pressed to his, forcing her into vibrant awareness of his raging desire. And then he gentled the pressure against her mouth until he was lightly brushing his parted lips against hers. By the time he lifted his head, Elizabeth’s breathing was shattered, her hands were clutching his shoulders, and her heart was pounding like a maddened thing; again she waited with a mixture of excitement and fear for him to take her. Ian felt her escalating tension, and although he was already desperate for release, he brushed a kiss against her forehead. “Not yet,�
�� he whispered.
With a physical effort Elizabeth forced her eyes open and looked at him; what she saw made her heart beat almost painfully harder: In the candle glow his face was hard and dark with passion, and the eyes gazing at her upturned face were blazing with it—and yet there was as much tenderness in them as there was desire. The combination made her ache with sudden yearning to make him feel all the exquisite things he was making her feel, but she didn’t know how. Instead, she did the one thing she knew he liked: Spreading her fingers across his smoothly shaven jaw, she gazed unashamedly into his eyes and achingly whispered, “I love you.”
His eyes darkened, but instead of speaking he caught her wrist and drew her hand to his chest. Elizabeth knew a moment of disappointment at his silence—and then she realized what he had done: He had pressed her hand against his heart so that she could feel its violent pounding and know that he was as wildly aroused as she. Her eyes filled with wonder, she gazed at him, and then, because she was suddenly filled with an urge to really look at him, she lowered her eyes to his broad, muscled chest with its light furring of dark hair. In the dim light his skin glowed like oiled bronze; his shoulders and arms were hard with bunched muscles. He was, Elizabeth thought, incredibly beautiful. She started to move her fingers, then hesitated, not certain if it was proper to touch him, and raised her questioning eyes to his.
Ian saw her uncertainty. “Yes,” he whispered hoarsely. Elizabeth realized that he was dying to be touched, and the knowledge filled her with a mixture of delight and pride as she slid her hands over the rigid muscles of his chest, watching as they flinched reflexively in passionate reaction to her feathery touch. He felt, she thought, like bunched satin, and she brushed a kiss near his arm, and then with more daring she kissed his nipple, touching her tongue to it, feeling his sharp intake of breath, the reflexive clenching of his hands on her back as she continued sliding her hands lower. In fact, she was so engrossed with the pleasure she was deriving from pleasing him as she pressed languid kisses down his chest that it was several seconds before she realized that his hand was no longer sliding up and down over her hip, but that it was forcing insistently between her legs.
Helpless to stop the instinctive reaction, Elizabeth clamped her legs together, her stricken gaze flying to his as nameless panic shot through her. “Don’t, darling,” he whispered thickly, his hot gaze on her while his fingers toyed amid the springy hair, stroking. “Don’t close against me.” Hiding her face against his chest, Elizabeth drew a shaky breath and forced herself to obey, then moaned with pleasure, not humiliation or pain, while the stroking continued and became increasingly intimate, and she wrapped her arms tightly around him when at last his finger slid deeply into her wet warmth. “I love you,” she whispered fiercely against his neck, and the sweetness of her yielding was almost Ian’s undoing.
Shifting her onto her back, he covered her mouth with his and began to increase the deep thrusts of his finger. When her hips started to move instinctively against his hand he eased himself between her legs, his rigid shaft poised at her entrance. Desperate to sheathe himself in her and simultaneously dreading the pain he was going to cause her, he lifted her slim hips to receive him. “I’m going to hurt you, sweetheart, because there’s no other way. If I could take the pain for you, I would.”
She did not turn her face away from him or try to twist free of his imprisoning grasp, and what she said made Ian’s throat ache with emotion. “Do you know,” she whispered with a teary smile, “how long I’ve waited to hear you call me ‘sweetheart’ again?”
“How long?” he asked hoarsely.
Putting her arms around his shoulders, Elizabeth braced herself for whatever pain was coming, knowing as he tensed that it was going to happen, talking as if she could calm herself. “Two years. I’ve waited and w—”
Her body jerked and a sharp gasp tore from her, but the pain was gone almost as quickly as the sound, and her husband was already easing deeper into her tight passage until she was filled with his heat and strength, holding him tightly to her, lost in the sheer beauty of the slow, deep strokes he was beginning to take. Guided by pure instinct and a wealth of love, Elizabeth willingly molded her hips to his and began to match his movements, and in doing so she unwittingly drove Ian to unparalleled agonies of desire as he held himself back, determined to ensure her climax before he had his own. He began to quicken his deep thrusts, circling his hips, and the young temptress in his arms matched his movements, clasping his pulsing shaft in her tight warmth.
Elizabeth felt something wild and primitive building inside her, racing through her veins, jarring through her body. Her head moved fitfully on the pillow as she waited for it, sought whatever it was that Ian was trying to give her as he drove into her again and again . . . and then it exploded, making her gasp against his mouth and cry out.
His shoulders and arms taut with the strain of holding back, Ian thrust into her in short sharp movements, matching the spasms shaking her and pulling at him. The instant they subsided he tightened his arms around her and drove into her full length, pouring himself into her, startled when the groan he heard was his own. His body jerked convulsively again and again, and he clasped her to him, breathing in deep pants against her cheek, his heart raging in frantic tempo with hers, his life merging into hers.
When a little of his strength returned he moved onto his side, taking her with him, still a part of her. Her hair spilled over his naked chest like a rumpled satin waterfall, and he lifted a shaking hand to smooth it off her face, feeling humbled and blessed by her sweetness and unselfish ardor.
Several minutes later Elizabeth stirred in his arms, and he tipped her chin up so that he could gaze into her eyes. “Have I ever told you that you are magnificent?”
She started to shake her head, then suddenly remembered that he had told her she was magnificent once before, and the recollection brought poignant tears to her eyes. “You did say that to me,” she amended, brushing her fingers over his smooth shoulder because she couldn’t seem to stop touching him. “You told me that when we were together—”
“In the woodcutter’s cottage,” he finished for her, recalling the occasion as well. In reply she had chided him for acting as if he also thought Charise Dumont was magnificent, Ian remembered, regretting all the time they had lost since then . . . the days and nights she could have been in his arms as she was now. “Do you know how I spent the rest of the afternoon after you left the cottage?” he asked softly. When she shook her head, he said with a wry smile, “I spent it pleasurably contemplating tonight. At the time, of course, I didn’t realize tonight was years away.” He paused to draw the sheet up over her back so she wouldn’t be chilled, then he continued in the same quiet voice, “I wanted you so badly that day that I actually ached while I watched you fasten that shirt you were wearing. Although,” he added dryly, “that particular condition, brought on by that particular cause, has become my normal state for the last four weeks, so I’m quite used to it now. I wonder if I’ll miss it,” he teased.
“What do you mean?” Elizabeth asked, realizing that he was perfectly serious despite his light tone.
“The agony of unfulfilled desire,” he explained, brushing a kiss on her forehead, “brought on by wanting you.”
‘Wanting me?” she burst out, rearing up so abruptly that she nearly overturned him as she leaned up on an elbow, absently clutching the sheet to her breasts. “Is this—what we’ve just done, I mean—”
“The Scots think of it as making love,” he interrupted gently. “Unlike most English,” he added with flat scorn, “who prefer to regard it as ‘performing one’s marital duty.’ ”
“Yes,” Elizabeth said absently, her mind on his earlier remark about wanting her until it caused him physical pain, “but is this what you meant all those times you’ve said you wanted me?”
His sensual lips quirked in a half smile. “Yes.”
A rosy blush stained her smooth cheeks, and despite her effort to so
und severe, her eyes were lit with laughter. “And the day we bargained about the betrothal, and you told me I had something you wanted very badly, what you wanted to do with me . . . was this?”
“Among other things,” he agreed, tenderly brushing his knuckles over her flushed cheek.
“If I had known all this,” she said with a rueful smile, “I’m certain I would have asked for additional concessions.”
That startled him—the thought that she would have tried to drive a harder bargain if she’d realized exactly how much and what sort of power she really held. “What kind of additional concessions?” he asked, his face carefully expressionless.
She put her cheek against his shoulder, her arms curving around him. “A shorter betrothal,” she whispered. “A shorter courtship, and a shorter ceremony.”
A fresh surge of tenderness and profound pride swept through him at her sweetness and her candor, and he wrapped his arms tightly, protectively around her, smiling with joyous contentment. He had realized within minutes of meeting her that she was rare; he had known within hours that she was everything he wanted. Passionate and gentle, intelligent, sensitive, and witty. He loved all of her qualities, but he hadn’t discovered the one he particularly admired until much later, and that was her courage. He was so proud of the courage that had enabled her to repeatedly confront adversity and adversaries—even when the adversary was him. Without it she’d have been lost to him long ago; she’d have done what most of her sex did, which was to find the first available male they could stomach and let him deal with life’s unpleasantness. His Elizabeth hadn’t done that; instead she’d tried to cope, not only with him, but with the terrible financial burdens she’d carried. That reminded him of how thrifty she was, and he promptly decided—at least for the moment—that her thriftiness was one of her most endearingly amusing qualities.
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