by Robert Thier
‘Don’t flatter me too much, Miss Linton.’
‘-but you’re a good man. Well, to me, anyway. Sometimes. Mostly.’
‘Are you quite sure that you are in love with me?’
‘Yes!’
‘Just checking.’
Instead of answering, I kissed him again. Long and hard and with all my heart. Then, slowly, I let my lips wander. First over his cheek, then across his stone-hard jaw, and further down to where, usually, his ten-year-old mint-condition tailcoat was to be found. Now there was no tailcoat. No nothing. There was only him.
And he…
He was really truly mine?
I got my answer when strong arms slid around my shoulders, pulling me closer until my cheek was cradled against his rock-hard chest.
Safety.
Warmth.
Love.
Never in my life before had anyone made me feel like this - like a small child, and at the same time like the strongest most beautiful woman alive. I couldn’t keep the smile from tugging at the corners of my mouth. Was this real? Was Mr Ambrose, Mr Rikkard Stone Face Ambrose actually making me smile?
He was. And it felt wonderful in more ways than I could have dreamed of. I had expected the intoxicating rush of this encounter, had expected to feel heat and need and passion - but never in a million years would I have expected how close it would make me feel. Close to him. Close to his heart.
Let’s not forget his body, shall we?
Good point.
Tentatively, I reached out. Feeling almost like a naughty child touching an invaluable artwork, my fingers brushed against his chest. He was so hard, so smooth, I might really have thought he was a sculpture hewn from stone if I hadn’t felt him tremble beneath me.
‘I’m sure,’ I repeated, my words a whispered breath against his skin. ‘I love you.’
His arms tightened around me. ‘Adequate.’
I couldn’t help grinning like a fool. My greedy fingers continued to explore. I couldn’t see a thing, couldn’t catch a single glimpse of his perfection - but that didn’t matter. Because no matter how perfect he might look, how chiselled his muscles might appear in bright daylight, it was nothing compared to how they felt, bare to the touch. Heat rose inside me to meet his ice and stone. I wanted more. Touch more. Feel more. It wasn’t enough. It would never be.
‘Corset!’
My breathless demand was hardly audible, but he caught it. A second later, his fingers were at the back of my corset, tearing open lacings as if they were no more substantial than cobwebs. The bloody cumbersome thing fell away, and I was free! Free to move, free to feel, free to do terrifying and wonderful things.
‘Come!’
I didn’t have the best track record when it came to obeying commands coming from Mr Rikkard Ambrose - but that one I obeyed without hesitation. Gripping his broad shoulders as if they were a lifeline, I closed the distance between us, just as he grabbed me to do the same. We clashed like ice and fire, like rock and not-so-solid chocolate. With only a thin chemise between us, his chest dug into me almost painfully hard. Almost. And if there was a bit of pain, it was the kind that only made you want more.
‘Miss Linton…you are…!’
His voice trailed off, and the silence said more than a million words could ever have. His hands slid up under my chemise, worshipping me, tentatively exploring every single inch. In every touch, I could feel the truth: I was his love, and he was mine.
‘I know,’ I whispered to my man in the shadows. ‘I feel the same.’
Safely wrapped in darkness, I let my fingers travel farther and farther, clinging to him while his strong arms held me and his hands continued to worship me. His body was like a beautiful landscape made from bedrock. Hard ridges and shallow dips, smooth plains that I wanted to kiss a thousand times. I revelled in every single inch. Felt them. Claimed them. And as I did, slowly a realisation began to sink in:
He’s real, Lilly. He’s really real, and he’s yours.
Tentatively, I moved both my hands until they were lying lightly on his chest. The strong beats of his heart under my hands fired my blood, making my own heart thump faster with a feeling for which there was only one word.
Love.
It was love. Both in his heart and mine. And whatever the morning brought, I wanted this night with him.
Bending down, I pressed a gentle kiss on his chest, eliciting a groan from deep inside him.
‘Miss Linton…Lillian-’
‘Shh!’ Quickly, I covered his mouth with a single finger. I didn’t want to hear if by chance he had any more reasonable, well-thought-out objections to our night together. I was not in a very reasonable mood. ‘Remember what they say? Silence is golden.’
‘And you,’ he told me, his sea-coloured eyes finding me even in the pitch-black darkness, ‘are diamond.’
His words nearly made my heart burst. Bending down, I retaliated in kind, pressing a gentle kiss just above his heart.
That did it. Whatever restraint he’d still possessed before was gone. A growl erupted from his chest, and suddenly I was on my back, Mr Rikkard Ambrose was above me, gleaming in a sliver of moonlight. Holy Mammon! If I’d thought he was beautiful before, that was nothing compared to the sight of him hovering above me, the remnants of his shirt hanging in tatters around his waist, muscles shining in the silver moonlight. The storm in his eyes had abruptly turned into a hurricane, ready to devour anything that came into its path.
Me! Me! Take me!
The words were as clear on my face as they were in my head, and Mr Rikkard Ambrose - he was not one for wasting time. Ravenously, he plunged down and claimed my mouth in a searing kiss. Capturing both my wrists with one powerful hand he pinned them to the bed, taking charge, riding the wave of passion rising in us both. I bowed under him, losing my mind and my body. Losing them to him, and never wanting them back.
‘Tell me you’re mine!’ he commanded.
‘I’m yours!’ For tonight. Just tonight.
‘Tell me you want this!’
It felt like a command. It sounded like a command. But from the way his free hand reached out of the shadows to caress my cheek, I knew it wasn’t. He was asking in the only way Rikkard Ambrose could.
Turning my face into his hand, I pressed a soft kiss onto his palm.
‘Yes.’
With a primal noise of satisfaction, he slid his hand around the back of my neck and pulled me up for a kiss that rocked me to my core. I hardly heard the ripping noise, hardly noticed a thing until cool air touched my skin and I realised: It’s done. The last barrier between us is gone.
He released my hands.
Silence fell. Reverent silence. Silence filled with love.
Reaching up, I tenderly caressed his face.
‘This…this is my first time. Will you do something for me?’
Even through the darkness, I could see the storm roiling in his eyes. ‘Anything.’
‘Oh. Good.’ Quickly, I reached over to my bedside table, pulled one of the little items I had in stock for just such an eventuality out of the drawer and pressed it into his hand. ‘Put this on, will you?’
Wrapping Things Up
Silence.
Complete, utter, icy silence.
For quite a long time.
Then…
‘Miss Linton?’
‘Yes?’
‘Is that…is that a-’
‘Yes.’
His hand snapped shut around the little thing and crushed it.
‘Hey!’ I protested. ‘It took me quite a while to make that!’
On the other hand, I had over thirty more, just in case. Hey, I’m an optimist, all right?
Reaching into the drawer again, I pulled out a replacement and dangled it in front of his face. I could tell he didn’t particularly like the view.
‘Miss Linton. Do you mean to tell me that before we engage in amorous congress, you wish me to…to…’
‘…wrap up your belly-tickler?
Yes, that was the idea.’
‘Miss Linton!’
‘What?’ I raised an eyebrow, even though in the dark he probably didn’t see it. ‘You didn’t think that I’d let you get me pregnant and then end up marrying you after all, although I don’t really want to, did you?’
Silence.
Silence which, in this case, spoke volumes.
‘You did! You bloody son of a bachelor! You were banking on me getting pregnant!’
‘Banking has always been one of my favourite occupations.’
I thumped his chest. ‘Be serious!’
‘I always am, Miss Linton.’
And he was. He absolutely was. Getting me pregnant to get me to marry him - that scheme had Rikkard Ambrose written all over it.
‘That’s what you were trying to do?’ I whispered, something tugging at my heart. ‘You were really trying to get me pregnant?’
In the midnight moonlight, he met my eyes without blinking. His gaze was perfectly steady, cool and unashamed.
‘Of course. It was a perfect solution for my problem.’
‘Your problem?’
‘You.’
‘Me?’
Reaching out, he cupped my face with a tenderness that made my heart ache. ‘You’re everything I want. Everything I need. I have to have you. No matter what I have to do, you will be mine.’
A part of me wanted to slap the devious, chauvinistic part of a bachelor - but the problem was, the bigger part of me felt exactly the same about him. I wouldn’t be able to survive without him. Besides - if he weren’t a devious, chauvinistic son of a bachelor, he wouldn’t be Mr Rikkard Ambrose.
Time to take the reins, Lilly!
Through the shadows, I smiled at him. ‘So…you want to marry me?’
‘I think that by now I have made that abundantly clear, Miss Linton.’
‘And there’s no other way you’d be with me tonight? No other way I could convince you?’
His face was as solid as bedrock. ‘No.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Absolutely.’
Reaching out, I cupped him, too - only not his face. I went a little bit lower.
‘Ah!’
‘Are you really, really sure?’
‘Miss Linton…!’
I smiled into the darkness. ‘Yes, Mr Ambrose, Sir?’
‘I am the one in charge here! You cannot manip-aahh! - manipulate…oh…’
He was probably going to say more on the subject of what I could and couldn’t do - but my kiss shut him up mid-sentence. Shuddering, he melted beneath my touch as I whispered words against his lips that no one but the darkness was ever meant to hear.
Well, when I say ‘melted’…
Most of him did.
The most important part didn’t. It remained quite solid and substantial, in fact.
‘Miss Linton! I order you to dispose of that…item immediately! I will not allow - aaa…!’
‘You were saying?’
‘Ohh…’
‘Bloody hell! Hold still, will you? How am I supposed to get it on you if you keep wiggling like that? Let’s try again…’
‘Aaargh! Ouch!’
‘Oops! Um, sorry. I missed.’
‘I noticed!’
‘Well, at least I know what you told me back in South America was true. You do still have your balls.’
‘Miss Linton!’
‘All right, all right. I’ll get a move on.’
‘You do realise that people have been thrown in jail because of these things?’[20]
I grinned into the darkness. ‘Sounds great. I know a comfy police station in London where we could share a cell.’
‘Miss Lin-’
I pushed down.
‘-aaah!’
‘There. That wasn’t so bad, was it?’
‘No comment.’
‘Don’t worry.’ Leaning towards him, I pressed a light kiss on his lips. ‘It’ll get better from here, I promise. I’ll be gentle.’
He groaned. Capturing my face between his hands, he held me fast, unwilling to let me go. ‘I actually believe you. Sometimes what you do to me frightens me.’
‘Likewise,’ I whispered. ‘Likewise, Mr Ambrose, Sir.’
The time for jokes and games was past. Gazing into the shadowy pools of his eyes, I knew that now it was time for just him and me, and what we were about to do. Wordlessly, he gathered me up in his arms, lifted me, and gently laid me in the exact centre of the bed - the same position, I could see in his eyes, that I occupied in his heart. He leaned down. I stretched up, clutching his broad shoulders.
‘I’m going to have to hurt you,’ he whispered.
That was Rikkard Ambrose. Straight to the point. Brutally, beautifully honest.
‘I know.’ I smiled. ‘Don’t worry. You have lots of practice. I’m sure you’ll manage.’
‘Miss Linton, this is no joke! I don’t want to hurt-’
‘I’ll whack you over the head tomorrow if it makes you feel better.’
This time he kissed me to shut me up, and I let him. I let him do much more than that. Strong hands encircled my ankles, parting them as far as they would go. He leaned down until his forehead pressed against mine, and other parts of him pressed against me, too.
‘Ready?’ he demanded.
‘For you?’ My smile widened. ‘Never and always.’
That night, Mr Rikkard Ambrose wasn’t silent. That night, some talented person whose name I won’t mention managed to make him scream.
*~*~**~*~*
When I awoke the next morning and started to blink the sleep out of my eyes, for a moment, I didn’t remember where I was. My bed suddenly felt unusually hard, and during the night, it seemed to have grown two clamps that were tightly wrapped around me. Hard, warm clamps that wrapped around me tightly and felt suspiciously like the bare arms of a-
I jerked upright.
Or at least I tried to. But apparently, Mr Ambrose’s slumbering arms were exactly like the rest of him awake: grabbing anything and giving away nothing for free. His arms tightened around me as if I were the key to the vaults of the Bank of England.
‘Hey! I’m not a big jewel or a bag of money! You can let go.’
He gave a sleepy grunt of protest, and his grip tightened.
Blast! Even asleep that man was stubborn as a slab of rock! Pushing at his iron-hard arms, I tried to slip out of his grasp - but it only tightened farther, nearly squeezing the breath out of me. Wheezing, I used my one free arm to prod his shoulder.
‘Hey! Wake up! You’re strangling me.’
‘I am awake,’ he told me, making me jerk.
‘Good God! Then why are you squeezing me half to death?’
‘Because.’
‘That’s not an answer! Why won’t you let go?’
Pressing close from behind, he placed a searing kiss against my neck that made me shiver.
‘Because this is where you belong. With me. Bound forever.’
I felt heat rising to my ears. Holy Moly! Why, after everything we had done last night, would that make me blush?
Well…
Because what we had done last night had been under cover of darkness. It had been safe - my own little secret, tucked away in the shadows. Now I was wide awake. A new day was dawning. Sunlight was streaming in through the windows and falling on me and Mr Rikkard Ambrose, tangled up together in my own bed, inside his parents’ home.
All right, there probably was reason to blush. But no need to let him see it.
I jabbed him in the ribs.
‘Oof!’
His arms loosened, and I slipped away, throwing him a smile over my shoulder. ‘Thank you.’
Giving me a cool look, he rubbed his ribs. ‘Was that really necessary?’
‘No, but it was fun. I might do it more often in the future.’
Grabbing a sheet and wrapping it around me, I rose from the bed to survey the room. The bed was in chaos. The drawer of the bedside table hung half-op
en, my severely diminished stash inside peeking out for anyone to see. A vase on a nearby table had somehow toppled over. One of the curtains, which I must have grabbed in one of the night’s more energetic moments, was torn in several places. And stretched right across the bed, wearing about as much clothing as Michelangelo’s David and looking a hundred times as tempting, lay Mr Rikkard Ambrose, his sea-coloured eyes gazing up at me from under his lashes.
I glanced at the clock in the corner. Hm… ten thirty am wasn’t really that late, was it? Maybe I could crawl back into bed a little and we could -
‘Good God! It’s ten thirty already!’
Ah. Apparently, Mr Ambrose had noticed the time, too.
Half a second later, an Ambrose-shaped blur shot past me and started gathering up discarded clothes from all over the room. Deducing that the fun times were probably over for now, I started to look for clothes as well. However, my search was far less successful.
‘Come on, move!’ Mr Ambrose’s voice came from inside his shirt as he pulled it over his head. ‘What are you waiting for, Miss Linton?’
I held up a chemise which was torn from top to bottom down the front. ‘For this to mend itself. But I’m afraid I’ll have to wait a long time for that.’
A stone-faced head popped out at the top of the shirt. He regarded my chemise critically. ‘Hm. You should really take better care of your clothing.’
‘I should take better care? You tore it in half!’
‘Exactly. Next time, take it off before I’m forced to resort to extreme measures.’
‘Oh no, Mister! You’re not getting off as easily as that!’ Taking a step towards him, I waved the tattered remnants of my undergarment under his nose. ‘You love me, don’t you? Well, prove it! Pay for a replacement!’
He froze.
His entire body stiffened. His face stayed as stony as ever, but I could see the struggle underneath. A single muscle in jaw twitched, and his teeth were clenched. He was clearly engaged in a titanic battle with himself.
I sincerely sympathised. I really did. On the one hand - the woman he loved. On the other hand - spending money. It really was such a terribly tough decision.