Betina Krahn (53 page)

“What was it, Toni?” He refused to release her, sensing from her agitation that he was close to the truth. “Did he make you do things you found repugnant?”

“No, he didn’t,” she said irritably, trying again to lever him to the side and slide from beneath him. It was no use. The more she tried to escape, the more determined he became. She halted and finally gave him what he demanded.

“He wanted me to
not
do things!”

“To
not
do … what things?” It took him a moment to realize what her adamant silence meant. “You mean
that
thing?” he said, eyes widening as he recalled her reaction to her first taste of pleasure with him, and her shamed confession that she had reached a climax before. “You reached a climax and he didn’t want you to?”

Again her silence confirmed his supposition. It shouldn’t have astonished him, but it did. He knew that many men believed it was detrimental for their wives to respond during sex … said it ruined their character, made them loose and unruly and untrustworthy. Such men saved their caresses and lubricious attentions for the already “ruined” Hillarys and Carlottas of the world, while their wives got only dry, miserable duty in their beds.

“The old fool,” he said, looking at her with disbelief that slid quickly into anger. “He left your bed because of that?” Her nod was barely perceptible.

“I didn’t agree with his decision, and one night I went to him and I …” She blushed from the tips of her breasts upward as she recalled that night in her husband’s room. Sir Geoffrey had stood watching her as she … “unbuttoned my nightdress and showed myself to him, hoping to … to …” She couldn’t say it and so he did.

“Seduce him.” He nodded. “And?”

“And I managed to humiliate both him and myself. I had never seen him angry before that night. He buttoned me up, from neck to toe, and sent me straight back to my room like a … a …”

“Naughty child,” he supplied. “And you stayed ‘buttoned up’ ever since.” He began to smile. No wonder she had reacted so strongly when he cut off her buttons that day in the parlor! “Well, if you hadn’t already guessed, sweetheart, I don’t share his modesty or his restraint. I don’t mind being seduced in the least. And on occasion I have been known to behave like a naughty child myself.” With a grin that was some part relief, some part rebellion, he pushed up onto his elbows. “Come with me, Lady Antonia.”

He rolled from her and from the bed, pulling her up with him. She squirmed and resisted, blushing furiously as he dragged her across the floor and stood her in front of the pier glass. Shocked, she twisted and shoved at his arms, but he tightened them forbiddingly around her waist and ordered her to look at herself. She clamped her eyes shut and he chuckled and began in sultry tones to describe her to herself.

“God—you are a piece of work, Antonia Paxton. Look at those, long, silky legs … ummm … trim little ankles … strong, sleek thighs.” His hand joined the exploration as he reached her hip. “Extraordinary curves … a soft little belly … sweet curls …” He brushed them with his fingers, and she groaned. “Very nice waist, Antonia … and then some of my favorite parts … your lovely breasts.” He held her against his body with his elbows, freeing his hands to cup her breasts. “Round and soft … just made to fill my hands … and those long, pouty nipples … tight little swatches of velvet. Ummm, how they make you squirm. I do like the way you squirm, sweetheart.”

She went still and caught her breath as he rolled her nipples back and forth between fingers and thumbs. Her knees gradually weakened and the fight drained from her as she surrendered to his hot words and tactile persuasions. On impulse she opened her eyes, filtering the sight of her naked body through her lashes.

Then with his seductive words flowing into her ear and his supple hands flowing over her body, she opened her eyes wider, and still wider. She looked at herself, then at the tantalizing outline of his body behind hers. His strong arms wrapped her, his agile hands cupped and caressed and skimmed her body with sensuous assurance. And the sight of him claiming her nakedness both unnerved and reassured her.

She dragged her gaze up the legs in the mirror, then over the hips, up the small waist and to the full, rose-tipped breasts. She met his eyes in the mirror. They were glowing with pride and desire and not a little mischief.

“What do you think? Isn’t she the most beautiful naked woman you’ve ever seen?”

She blushed and laughed with an edge of embarrassment. “She’s the only naked woman I’ve ever seen.”

“Well, she’s not the first I’ve seen … though I admit some have been on French postcards—ow!” She had jabbed his ribs with her elbow, and he straightened and grinned. “Well, I told you I was naughty sometimes.”

He turned her around and pulled her hard against him, with their sides to the mirror. “Look at us.” Thigh to thigh, breast to breast, they stood looking at the softly merged lines of their bodies in the glass. They were like a statue or a painting, one of Winterhalter’s sylvan romps.

“Any time you want to ‘unbutton’ in my presence, sweetheart, feel free.”

Feel free
. That was exactly what she was doing and she liked it—the sound, the feel of it, the way it resonated
through her body, bringing her to life. She stepped out of his arms and swayed across the room to the bed, sensing his eyes on her as she stretched her arms wide, rolled her shoulders, then arched her back and wiggled her hips, trying out her new freedom.

“I think I like this,” she said, turning to him, drawing him toward her with a sultry look. Nakedness was not all she was trying out, he realized. “What if I come to like it too much?”

“I believe that was precisely what old Sir Geoffrey was afraid of,” he said huskily, watching her hands gliding down her sides and then up her ribs, brushing the tips of her breasts. He saw the flicker of pleasure in her eyes and felt his temperature rise. “I’ll try to see that you get loose and libidinous only in my presence.”

“And how will you manage that?” she said, squirming seductively, and watching the effect it had on him.

“By keeping you … busy,” he said, feeling his throat tightening at the way she was twitching her hips, moving to some internal rhythm.

“Ummm … I like being busy.” Her eyes darkened to an alluring midnight-blue. “But what if I’m not busy enough? What if I get unruly and loose and wicked? What if I get … out of control?”

“Every husband’s nightmare,” he breathed softly, unable to pull his eyes from the erotic movements of her hands over her body. He felt a sudden pang of sympathy for knotty old Sir Geoffrey. The old boy hadn’t had a prayer of keeping up with her, and obviously knew it. “Believe me, sweetheart, I have never suffered the illusion that I have ever been in control of you.”

“Ummm.” She halted, her eyes half-closed, her arms wrapped around her just beneath her breasts so that she looked like the veriest temptress he had ever seen, French postcards or otherwise. “What if I decide to take up a
placard and demand the vote?” As she swayed across the room, he watched her legs flex and her hips swing provocatively. Then she stood in the middle of the clothes they had shed and demanded, “Or what if I decide to take up wearing trousers?”

He felt the bedpost at his back and leaned heavily against it, watching in heated fascination as she reached for his trousers and, with an eye on him, held them open. First one pale leg, then the other, sank inside the black legs of his trousers as she raised them to her waist. With her lip caught between her teeth, she worked the buttons, then released the trousers, letting them sink so that they caught on her hips. She laughed softly and bent to roll up the bottoms so she could walk. Catching sight of his starched collar and tie on the floor, she wrapped them around her throat and swayed to the mirror to tie his tie. With the collar in place beneath a creditable knot, she turned this way and that, watching his reaction in the mirror.

“Well, what do you think?” She strolled seductively toward him, his trousers hanging just below her navel, her throat bound in his proper collar and tie, and her breasts and body bare between the two. His eyes went black as he watched her hips wriggling inside his trousers, watched her breasts jiggle with each step, and saw the way his hard collar circled her neck and forced her chin up to a provocative angle. She was rebelling against years of sexual constraint, and he knew it.

“I believe you said something about making me wear trousers and a stiff collar. How would I look?”

She turned slowly, letting him look her over, tempting him. She had no idea just how tantalizing she looked or just how close he was to ripping those trousers off her body. He snagged her arm as she swayed into reach. Pulling her against him, he let her see the desire she ignited in
him, then pressed her trouser-clad hips hard against his swollen desire, making her feel his arousal.

“When you dance, sweetheart, you have to pay the piper.”

She laughed softly, letting her desire show in her eyes, too. “Take whatever payment you want, piper.” As his hands slid feverishly over that collar, down her bare breasts and waist, to squeeze her buttocks through his trousers, she groaned softly and thrust her pelvis against his in a slow, grinding motion. “I’m not through dancing.”

He crushed her lips beneath his and felt her explode slowly in his arms.

Together they toppled onto the bed, kissing, straining close, arching hungrily into each other. He fumbled with his fly buttons and finally laughed, admitting he had never had to undo pants on somebody else before. She laughed and helped, peeling open the placket to reveal a slice of silky abdomen. The contrast of his half-open trousers and her pale skin was the most erotic thing he’d ever seen. He leaned down to trace that seductive V with his tongue.

Shortly, his trousers lay in a heap by the bed, and his body was sliding onto and into hers with the same liquid motion. They moved together in wild, changing rhythms: frantic and lustful one minute, light and playful the next. They rolled and writhed and teased and laughed, exploring and celebrating their closeness even as they did their passions. And this time, as sensation and response built, they held each other tightly and went tumbling one after another into wild, churning waves of pleasure that carried them onto the broad shores of release.

It was dusky in the room when they awakened. Antonia gave an involuntary moan as she sat up. Every muscle in her body was aching; it felt as if she’d been pounded.
When she extracted her legs from his and tried to slide across the bed, she halted and turned a look of distress back over her shoulder.

“What is it, Toni?” he said, rising onto his elbow, his voice concerned.

“I feel like I’ve been pummeled … all over,” she said with an agonized look.

He laughed and pulled her back onto the bed. “I know just the thing to help that. Lie down … facedown.”

Frowning uncertainly, she obeyed, and he began to rub and knead her aching muscles, turning them to butter under his strong hands. After a while he had her sit up, and she found most of the soreness gone. “That’s wonderful,” she murmured, giving him a gentle kiss.

“You see?” he said, holding her with only a smile. “You trust me.”

She stared into his eyes, hoping she wasn’t making a huge mistake.

“Heaven help me, I do trust you, Remington Carr.”

His smile widened and took on a triumphant curl, then he glanced at the window. “Would you look at that? The sun is going down. You’ve slept the day away, lazybones.” When he turned back, she caught his eye with a wicked look.

“I haven’t exactly
slept
the day away,” she said flirtatiously.

She led him into the bathroom that adjoined her bedchamber. Between kisses and playful caresses, they managed to wash and brush hair and don clothes. She was loath to let him take his trousers back, until he promised to bring her a pair of her own the next time he came.

The next time.

The idea lay suspended on the air, between and around them, as they finished dressing. She sat down at her dressing table and picked up her brush, looking at her glowing
face in the mirror and feeling a chill stealing into her limbs. He must have seen her response, for he came up behind the bench and went down on one knee.

“There will be a next time, and a time after that,” he said quietly. He felt her stiffen as he said, “We will have a lifetime of ‘next times’ … when we’re married.”

“Married?” she whispered. A chill swirled through her like the draft from an open door, starting with her feet and rising. For a time she had thought only of here and now, keeping thoughts of the future and the cost of her pleasure at bay. “I didn’t say anything about marriage.…”

Disbelief mingled with irritation in his words. “Come, Antonia, don’t be stubborn. What have we been doing all morning—all day?” When she just sat, gripping her brush and looking paler by the moment, he turned her to face him on the bench. “I don’t know about you, but I’ve been making love to the woman I want to marry.”

She wanted to say that she’d been making love to the man she loved, but somehow couldn’t. To say it would be to give him rights with her, would give him power over her and her future. He wanted that power—he had already begun to claim it … assuming she would marry him because he wanted it to be so, absorbing her into his expectations and his desires. She felt herself sliding, being pulled toward something in which she would have little say, and that feeling of powerlessness frightened her the way nothing else could. Something deep in the pit of her stomach began to quiver, and dread collected in her throat to keep her from speaking.

She was terrified of being caught up in a disastrous marriage, but just as frantic at the possibility of losing him. All her life she had dreamed of feeling this way … of loving someone with all her heart … of having someone to share her time and her ideas and her passions. The
conflict in her was almost unbearable. She took a deep breath and made herself say it.

“I don’t want to get married, Remington.”

With an aching heart she watched the frustration turning to anger in his face.