Competing emotions warred in the lines around his mouth and the creases at the corners of his eyes before he sighed and took her hand. The thrill of the contact sang through her veins. “You know I have nothing to offer you.”
She threaded her fingers through his and looked him up and down with unabashed interest. “I beg to differ.”
His eyes darkened at her frank appraisal, but he frowned unhappily. “You deserve more than—"
Oh, no! She knew where that was going and cut him off before he could finish the thought. "More than the ardent attentions of a man I desire and who, unless I am mistaken, desires me as much in return?"
Langston lowered his head and pressed a kiss to the back of her hand. A shiver ran up her arm, raising gooseflesh. “You are not mistaken,” he said gruffly, “but I do not want to take advantage of your feelings. Not when I know I cannot fully return them. Not when I know the day will come when I have to leave.”
“And what if I told you that I would rather enjoy whatever time we may have than worry about when or how it will end? I thought I would grow old with my husband, and instead, I have been alone longer than I was married. And I’m very tired of being alone.” She extricated her hand from his and cupped the strong curve of his jaw. The half-day’s growth of stubble caressed her palm like the stroke of a cat’s tongue. “I know what I’m missing, you see.”
With a groan, he covered her hand with his own and settled onto the bed beside her. “This is a very bad idea,” he muttered. “We will have to keep it a secret. If anyone found out, it would ruin you.”
“‘Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof,’” she quoted piously.
He let out a low bark of laughter. “I am sure Matthew never imagined that verse being used in quite this context.” His gaze was amused, but also equal parts uncertain and hopeful. “I cannot deny that I want you. But only if you are certain.”
She brushed her fingers over his lips. “I am as certain as I have ever been.”
“Thank God,” he growled and then, in one swift motion, he grasped her wrist and leaned down, pressing her hand to the mattress and capturing her mouth with his own.
Yes, oh yes. Heat and light and wild excitement blossomed in her chest and lower, in her belly and between her thighs. How had she survived a decade without this? She had been living half a life, a twilight life, the life of a butterfly trapped inside its chrysalis—safe from all the world’s dangers but unable to fly, incapable of experiencing its delights.
The kiss was rough and urgent and over almost as soon as it began. He lifted his head and peered down at her, his eyes dark and heavy-lidded. “When—?”
Breathless and unspeakably aroused, Laura said, ““Tomorrow morning.” She pointed at her foot. “I am not going to be able to walk to church tomorrow, and hitching up the wagon would be breaking the Sabbath.”
His chuckle was uneven. “Another curious application of scripture. Speaking of which,” he said, rising to his feet again, “I believe it is time I applied those bandages.”
Matching action to his words, he removed the now nearly dry cloth from her foot, draped it over the bedpost, and picked up one of the strips of linen. Once he had straightened the cloth, he began wrapping it, quite snugly, around her foot and ankle. His hands were gentle and sure, demonstrating his easy familiarity with the technique. The brush of his fingers against her skin sent shivers of pleasure up her leg, and she found the constriction of the swollen joint did seem to lessen the pain, though she was at a loss to imagine why that would be so.
When he had finished with the first length of cloth, he asked her to sit up and hold the free end in place so it would not come loose before he could start the next one. Laura complied, the motion bringing them nose to nose, faces scant inches apart. His pupils dilated, and his nostrils flared. Reflexively—or possibly intentionally, she wasn’t quite sure—she moistened her lips with her tongue.
“Laura.” It was the first time he had ever used her given name, and he pronounced it like an invocation. His gaze locked on her mouth for several heartbeats, and intention flickered in his autumn-colored irises.
“Yes, Geoffrey,” she answered, testing the intimate syllables on her tongue. They felt right. Good.
He tilted his head, and she closed her eyes, leaning in. Her pulse raced with anticipation.
“Yoo-hoo, Mrs. Farnsworth!” Abigail’s voice, a trifle shrill with concern, reverberated through the otherwise empty rooms of the house.
Startled, Laura’s eyes flew open just in time to see Geoffrey jerk away so abruptly from the imminent kiss that he came within a scant few inches of banging his head against the bedpost. He gave her a look that communicated, quite clearly, a very profane swear word and snatched up the forgotten length of fabric.
“Is everything all right?” Abigail’s voice was closer now. She was headed toward the bedroom.
Laura fought to get her respiration—now accelerated as much by consternation as by thwarted desire—under control before responding. She should have realized Daniel would have begun to worry by now that something was amiss.
“Yes, everything is fine,” she called back, pleased to find her voice steady.
The other woman appeared in the doorway seconds later to the perfectly respectable sight of Geoffrey wrapping the second layer of bandaging around Laura’s foot and ankle.
“Oh,” Abigail said, her face registering confusion. “Why’s he doing that, then?”
Geoffrey glanced over his shoulder at her. “It helps to keep the joint steady and reduces the swelling,” he explained, as calmly as if they hadn’t nearly been caught in an exceedingly compromising situation. “She may even be able to put a bit of weight on it today if we’re lucky.”
Abigail nodded at this explanation. “It’s only we were concerned that it was taking so long for you to come back. Daniel was afraid the injury was worse than we thought.”
Laura shook her head emphatically. “No, ‘tis just a sprain. Go tell my son I am fine and Mr. Langston will be back to picking soon.”
Once Abigail had departed to deliver the message, Geoffrey completed the rest of the bandage in silence, tucking the end of the last strip of cloth to ensure the dressing would hold tight. When he was finished, he rose to his feet. “Are you still sure? After…that?”
She knew what he meant. If Abigail had come straight to the bedroom door rather than calling from the open doorway… But there was even less sense in crying over milk that hadn’t yet been spilled. “Yes.”
“Tomorrow morning, then.”
Her nod was firm.
Tomorrow could not arrive quickly enough.
Chapter Thirteen
Geoffrey consigned his soul to the devil as he walked the twenty yards from the barracks to the main house that Sunday morning.
In one sense, he knew his self-recriminations were hypocritical. He was not a virgin, and he had never married. This meant he had engaged in liaisons with women who were not his wife. His conscience had never been bothered by this fact. Nor had he ever held to the opinion that women should be held to a higher standard of chastity than men. That was just utter nonsense.
But Laura Farnsworth was different, and for the life of him, he could not put his finger on why. It was not that she was a respectable widow. Two of his past lovers had been widowed ladies of impeccable reputation. Nor was it that he feared she had hopes he could not fulfill. She had made it quite clear she did not.
So why did he feel as though taking her to his bed—or, more accurately, going to hers—was an unforgivable sin? An unforgivable sin he was nonetheless going to commit because he could not have stayed away from her if his life had depended on it.
Reaching the front door, he took a deep breath and turned the knob. Somewhat to his surprise, the parlor and dining room were both empty. Thanks to the bandage he had wrapped around her injured ankle, she had been mobile enough the night before to make four loaves of bread, as well as join the rest of them for dinner as
usual. He had expected her to be waiting at the table for his arrival.
Had she changed her mind? He felt a pang of regret, then smirked to himself at the irony. It seemed he was more disappointed at the prospect of being prevented from sinning than he was at the prospect of being damned for it.
“I’m in here,” she called.
Her voice was somewhat muffled, from which he deduced that “here” meant her bedroom, since the door between that room and the sitting room was closed. What he saw when he opened that door rendered him speechless.
And almost instantly hard.
She reclined on the bed, her head and shoulders propped up by several pillows. Her dark hair fell in a loose curtain around her neck and over her shoulders. The ends of the curling locks reached the tops of her breasts.
Her very naked breasts.
Along with the rest of her.
He couldn’t stifle his gasp of astonishment. And admiration.
By heaven, she was beautiful. Her skin glowed rosy-gold in the silvery morning light that seeped in through the sheer curtains, its hue a sharp contrast to the very white sheets upon which she lay. She possessed all the lush, lovely curves of a mature woman—full breasts, generous hips, the gentle swell of a belly—and the shapely, well-muscled limbs that ladies of leisure seldom developed. The only slightly discordant note in the erotic picture she presented was the bandaged ankle, but that only made him more aware of the desire swelling—quite literally—in his trousers. And yet, the principal ache was not in his groin, but in his chest, as if his heart had grown several sizes too large to fit behind his rib cage.
Geoffrey realized he’d been standing in the open doorway and staring a few beats too long when Laura delicately cleared her throat and asked, “Are you coming in? Because there’s a bit of a draft, and I’m…” she gestured at herself, her cheeks pinkening just a trifle, “…not dressed for it.”
Christ, he was an arse. Shutting the door behind him, he tried to think of something witty to say, but his wits seemed to be in short supply. He settled for the truth. “You’re so beautiful, I forgot how to do anything but look at you. To be honest, I’m still not sure I know how to do anything else.”
“Oh,” she said with a frown that was belied by the mischievous sparkle in her translucent blue eyes, “I certainly hope that isn’t true.”
Relief flooded him. He hadn’t made a total of hash of this. Yet. “Well,” he began, deciding to follow her lead, “perhaps you could suggest how I might proceed.”
She looked him up and down, one dark eyebrow slanting upward as if she were considering a very complex dilemma. As soon as it was possible, he was going to kiss that eyebrow, because it—like the rest of her—was delectable. “I am somewhat out of practice myself,” she said at last, the corners of her lips twitching ever so slightly, “but I believe the next step would be for you to disrobe.”
Geoffrey could not remove his clothing quickly enough. So much so that he fumbled the laces of the work boots he was wearing—a pair of Daniel’s cast-offs—and wished he’d worn his Hessians instead. Not that they wouldn’t have looked ridiculous with the baggy work trousers and cambric shirt he wore, but they certainly would have been a great deal easier to remove. Once he had surmounted that initial obstacle, however, his remaining garments offered less resistance, and he was soon down to his linen drawers, an unmistakable bulge tenting the fabric.
Laura watched him undress with undisguised and unabashed admiration. This was a woman who knew her own mind, and when she determined on a course of action, she pursued it as aggressively and competently as any field marshal. Geoffrey was halfway convinced he’d survived his injury not because she’d nursed him competently, but because she had resolved that he would, and the possibility that he would not had thereby been foreclosed. And now that she had decided to take him to her bed, her wish was his command.
Not that he had any desire to do anything but whatever she wanted.
He shucked that final, meager article of clothing and met Laura’s gaze as his erection sprang free. Her irises were no more than a sliver of molten silver ringing huge, dark pupils and flickered with heat. He’d believed he was already harder than he’d ever been in his life, but he felt his cock stiffen in response to the unconcealed hunger in her eyes.
She patted the empty space on the bed beside her. “Lie with me.”
With a nod, he stretched out alongside her, propping his head on an elbow so he could look down into her lovely face. The sheets were almost cold compared to the feverish temperature of his skin. Her skin was undoubtedly just as overheated as his, but he deliberately avoided allowing their bodies to touch. Not until he received an invitation. “And now?” he asked.
Her lower lip jutted out, and her eyebrows drew together. “Are you going to make me ask for everything?”
Geoffrey gave her a minuscule shake of his head and his most earnest expression. “Not ask; tell. Tell me how to please you. Because there is nothing more important to me right now than that.”
Comprehension suffused her cheeks with color. “Oh,” she breathed. Her chest rose and fell distractingly, but he kept his gaze on her wide, luminous eyes. Waiting for the words that would free him from his leash. "In that case,” she said at last, snaking one arm around his shoulder and resting her slightly calloused palm against the nape of his neck, “it would please me very much if you would kiss me.” Her warm fingers threaded into the overlong hair at the base of his skull, and she pulled his head down toward hers.
Not that he needed the encouragement. Even before she finished speaking, he was on the downward slide that would end with their lips locked and their naked bodies pressed together.
The first contact was perfect. She tasted sweet and tangy and bright as the sunny autumn day. Kissing her was like kissing comfort and happiness and hope. Like immersing himself in all the good and right things he had almost forgotten could even exist. And yet, there was nothing gentle about the way they devoured one another or about the wild, incandescent fever that built beneath his skin. He needed her as much as he needed to breathe; more, perhaps, for he would gladly forgo respiration if it meant he could kiss her, could touch her, could fuck her.
Before he was aware of his own movements, he had levered himself over her until the head of his cock nestled in the hollow near her navel. The hardened peaks of her breasts brushed his chest as she arched into him, and her fingers traced an exploratory path over the muscles of his back, as if she were mapping a newly discovered country by touch and then claiming each landmark as her own. Triumph surged through his veins at the thought. He was the conquest, a territory to be won; defeat was victory, and submission was success.
Supporting his weight on one arm, he slid a questing hand over one breast and brushed his thumb across the nipple. Laura gasped in response, digging her nails into the muscles of his back. With a groan, he broke the kiss and followed the path his fingers had taken with his mouth, closing his lips around the swollen bud and flicking it with his tongue. She squirmed beneath him, and he shifted his position so he could apply the same attention to the other breast while his hand slipped lower still, over the thatch of dark curls that crowned her mons and to the soft flesh of her pussy.
He found her slick with arousal. When he brushed her clitoris, she made a frustrated sound and canted her hips upwards, chasing the contact. If that wasn’t telling him what she wanted, Geoffrey didn’t know what was. He released her nipple and moved so he could capture her mouth again. As her lips parted and her tongue met his, he stroked the crest of her sex until he found the rhythm and pressure that made her muscles tighten and her breath come in short, uneven pants.
God, but she was as warm and golden as a sunrise, and her responses were so unguarded that he felt humbled and glorified. What had he ever done in his long, dark life to deserve the affection and trust of such a shining, beautiful person? He felt certain the answer was not only that he hadn’t done anything worthy of her, but also that he did not,
in fact, deserve her. But he would be a damned fool not to accept and treasure the gift the universe had given him.
Just as he sensed she was on the verge of reaching the peak, she tore away from the kiss and panted, “Now. Please.”
He paused in his efforts and stared down at her in confusion. His chest heaved like a bellows directed at a particularly recalcitrant hearth fire, and he realized with some surprise that he was exerting a good deal of control to lock down his own desire. Was he preventing her from achieving her release somehow? What more could she…?
Oh.
“Are you sure?” he grated out, even as his body encouraged him, vigorously, to take what she was offering without delay. “It might be fast. I haven’t… That is, it’s been a long time.”
She emitted a snort of wry amusement. “Pot, meet kettle.”
Right. Even so… “I don’t want to disappoint you,” he muttered.
Her hand cupped his cheek, and she met his gaze with steady but molten eyes. “I want to climax with you inside me. I’ve managed it alone for quite a while.”
An incredibly vivid and carnal image of Laura, naked on the bed as he’d found her but with her fingers between her thighs, flashed through his brain and lust roared in his ears. He would give a great deal to watch that.
But not now.
Now, he would do as she commanded.
As he adjusted the position of their bodies, he forced himself to get his respiration and his arousal under control. He had his orders, and he would do his damnedest to fulfill them.
Kneeling between her open thighs, he took himself in hand and dragged the head of his cock through her wet folds and down to her entrance. The musky perfume of her sex filled his nostrils. If there was a more potent aphrodisiac than that, he could not at the moment imagine what it might be. She made a humming noise low in her throat and spread her legs wider, the better to accommodate him.
With that clear invitation, he sank into her tight yet welcoming heat, inch by delicious inch, and fuck, it felt good. Better than he’d imagined. Sweeter than he’d dreamed. Bloody hell, he would be lucky to last five strokes. Closing his eyes, he held himself very still and tried to inure himself to the incredible sensation of being inside her.
Sleeping with the Enemy: Lords of Lancashire, Book 4 Page 10