Cheryl Holt (13 page)

Anne hovered over Stephen, knowing she should leave his room, but unable to force herself to go.

She yearned to confide that she’d never been with a man before, that she’d just had her first experience with desire, but by claiming to be a widow, she’d painted herself into a corner. Over the years, she’d told so many lies that she almost believed them herself, sometimes forgetting that there’d never been a
Mister
Smythe.

Stephen thought she was an accomplished matron, when in reality, she was a sheltered virgin. Passion had been a nebulous concept, pondered during those infrequent moments when she’d wondered what it would be like to have a husband.

He’d shown her such fantastic pleasure that he had her questioning the choices she’d made in her life. Her mother had often counseled as to the wages of sin, how a girl could be led astray by a handsome fellow, and Anne had embraced the admonitions.

As a result, she’d forgone marriage, telling herself that she was happy with her feminine surroundings, but now, she wasn’t so sure. He’d scratched an itch that she hadn’t realized
was plaguing her, and she pined to swim naked with him again. As soon as he was up to it, she wanted him to unveil more of the secrets of the flesh.

Stephen Chamberlin was a sorcerer who had transformed her into an unrestrained slattern. How could she slow this rush to recklessness that had her greedy to try any nefarious conduct he might suggest?

At that very second, if he asked her to fornicate with him, she’d eagerly agree, when she wasn’t even positive as to what the deed involved. Twenty-four hours earlier, the notion would never have occurred to her, but suddenly, she couldn’t wait to discover the joys of carnality.

She sighed, debating how to make a gracious exit. From the instant they’d stepped out of the water, she hadn’t opened her mouth, for fear that she’d begin to babble like a ninny.

“Are you feeling better?” she inquired, deeming it an innocuous query that could nudge them to the firm ground of healer and patient.

“Yes. How about you?”

Though he was depleted and drained, maimed and mangled, he had the energy to smirk in a thoroughly masculine fashion. He was preening! Devil take him! He was half dead, but had only sex on his mind!

“You are an unrepentant libertine, Captain Chamberlin.”

“I am at that.” His laugh was a low, enticing rumble that rattled her.

“You’d likely seduce the Blessed Virgin if you had the chance.”

“She wouldn’t be nearly as fun as you.”

Rolling her eyes, she attempted to appear irritated, but she didn’t succeed.

Oh, it was hopeless! With his wry humor, and cocky manner that charmed and enthralled, he was so different from how she’d imagined he would be. He was smart, clever, and she was falling head over heels, so much so that she’d shed
her outfit and romped with him in the nude, and pathetically, she felt no guilt or shame over what they’d done.

She was her mother’s daughter, all right! The poor woman was probably spinning in her grave!

He started to speak, and she silenced him. “You should rest. Let’s get you out of this wet shirt and lay you down.”

It was tricky business, undressing him, while striving not to see anything that ought to be concealed, but after their rollicking, she had no desire to be cautious. Their lusty interplay created the impression that he belonged to her, that his body was hers.

She untied the laces at the front of his nightshirt and drew it off. Goose bumps prickled on his arms, and she reached for a blanket and draped it over him.

In a huff, he shrugged it off. “Don’t treat me like I’m a decrepit grandfather.”

“I don’t want you catching a chill.”

“I’m fine.”

Continuing, she moved the shirt downward, assessing every inch of his torso as she went. Previously, her evaluations had been analytical, like a scientist carrying out an experiment, but after their frolic, her interest had changed.

He was too skinny, but she intended to fix that, and was already building him to a more robust condition. Despite his lack of bulk, she could picture what a dashing figure he’d been before he’d been wounded.

Brawny and broad-shouldered, his chest was coated with a matting of hair. It was thick across the top, then it thinned as it descended, narrowing into a line that pointed to his loins, guiding her to iniquity—in case she couldn’t locate it herself!

Normally, this was the juncture where she’d have placed a towel across his lap, but on this occasion, she didn’t bother. They’d leapt far beyond the spot where privacy mattered.

Kneeling before him, she lowered the nightshirt farther,
revealing his belly, his abdomen, his phallus. Limp, harmless, it dangled between his legs, with no apparent purpose, and the fact that it hadn’t stirred since his arrival—not even when they’d been naked in the pool—underscored her suspicion that he had no sensation in the extremity.

She had no capacity for conferring over male sexual organs, had scant comprehension of how the rod functioned, or what she could do to fix his problem. For once, she was at a loss, and she shifted him around, lifting one hip, then the other, to work the garment free so that he was unclothed.

If he suffered any discomfort from his nudity, she couldn’t detect it, so she feigned nonchalance, too, acting as though she stripped men all the time.

He smiled the crooked smile she cherished. “I’m not much to look at anymore.”

“No, you’re not.”

“I wish you’d known me before. I was such a gallant rogue.”

“I’m sure you were impossibly handsome, and impossibly vain about it.”

“I was.”

Chuckling, he pulled her close, snuggling her to him. While he was mostly dried off, she still wore her wet bathing costume, and her hair was soaked, but he didn’t seem to mind.

“Stay with me,” he whispered. “I want to hold you till dawn.”

Hadn’t she just been thinking the very same? That it would be marvelous to tarry? Yet, she could contemplate no more dangerous proposition. She ignored his tempting words, refusing to let them sink in and take root.

“I can’t,” she forced out, endeavoring to sound cheery.

“Don’t say no.”

There was a peculiar gleam in his eye, of tenderness and regard, but something more, as well, something she couldn’t
interpret, and she was crazy enough to presume that it was affection. Was he growing attached, as was she?

How thrilling! How terrifying!

“You need your beauty sleep,” she teased.

“I
am
more tired than I realized,” he conceded, “and I need to regain my strength so I have the stamina to flirt with you tomorrow.”

“Bounder.”

“Always.”

He kissed her, a sweet brush of his lips to hers, then she balanced him against the pillows, hoisting his legs onto the mattress. She perched on the edge, studying him.

An intimacy had been forged between them, and there would never be a better opportunity to broach the delicate topic of his impotency. She wanted to hash it out, to delve into the dilemma, so that she could ruminate over a remedy.

“I must ask you a question.”

“Go ahead.”

“Don’t be angry.”

He scoffed. “As if I could be
angry
with you.”

“It’s personal.”

“As I’m lying here, buff bare, I don’t believe it could become more so.”

How to phrase it? She had limited terminology, and she blushed. “I’ve noticed that . . . that you’re . . .”

“I’m what?”

Her fingers slithered down, to his navel, to his tummy, and she wrapped them around his phallus. He displayed no reaction, not so much as a twitch.

“Can you feel me?”

For an eternity, he glared at her, and he was so tense that she worried he might snap in half. He shimmered with fury, and it was his turn to blush.

“Yes.”

“But nothing happens?”

“No.”

With blatant curiosity, she scooted down, inspecting and caressing the pliant appendage. She hadn’t seen one since the days Phillip had been a boy, before he’d gotten too old and too modest to have his sister helping him wash. Though Stephen’s was much bigger than Phillip’s had been, she couldn’t envision it being rigid enough to penetrate a woman.

She explored, cradling the two dangling sacs, while she persisted with stroking his droopy member. It wasn’t so much a stroking, as an examination of the yielding skin, the more firm crown. Her attention was focused on his lap, so she was surprised when he pushed her away.

“Stop it!” he commanded.

“Stop what?”

“You’re touching me as if you’re some kind of coquette. As if you can make it hard. You can’t.”

“I didn’t mean to upset you.”

His rage was scarcely controlled, his shame disturbing to witness, but at least the forbidden subject was out in the open. They could talk about the situation and decide what to do—if anything.

“Is this another of your injuries?”

“Would you shut up?”

“It isn’t an impairment from before the war, is it? I assume you could develop an erection prior, and I need to find out if—”

“I will not discuss this with you!”

He stared out the window, not meeting her gaze, and she leaned nearer so that he couldn’t avoid her. “Look at me.”

“No.”

“I understand this is difficult for you.”

“No, you don’t. You couldn’t.”

“Is this why you haven’t wanted to improve?”

Incensed, he scowled at her. “How did you know that?”

“I told you before: I’m aware of things about you that I
oughn’t be.” She rested her palm on his cheek. “Your functioning may come back.”

“Like hell it will.”

“It might. As the remainder of your body heals, this might, too.”

“Have mercy! Please be silent!”

“And if it doesn’t, you can have a full life.”

“Spoken like an idiotic female who has no bloody idea what she’s saying.”

“It’s true. You will—”

“I can never marry!” he shouted. “I can never have a family. I can’t pledge myself to a woman. What type of existence is that?”

“Maybe there’s someone out there who would figure having
you
was enough, that she could forgo children, if she had you. Many would consider it a fair exchange.”

“Name a single person.”

“Me,” she asserted, and she kissed him on the mouth. “You’re worth having, my dear Captain Chamberlin. You’re worth fighting for.”

“You’re mad.”

“I want to attempt a physic that I’ve been—”

“No! None of your broths, or your alchemist concoctions. I forbid it.”

“You can’t
forbid
me. It’s my own damned house!”

Clutching her wrists, he squeezed harshly enough to leave bruises, and he gave her a firm shake. “What will it take for you to listen? You’ll raise my hopes so high, but when you can’t deliver, I’ll be crushed. If you prepare me for a miracle, and then, you can’t bring one about, I won’t be able to bear it.”

He shoved her away, and she frowned at him with a significant amount of consternation. “I’ve never claimed to work miracles.”

“You certainly pretend quite well.”

“I just want to rub some lotion on you. We won’t declare that it has a defined restorative purpose. I simply think it will feel good.”

“What sort of
lotion
?”

“It’s a balm I devised for Widow Brown. Her joints used to swell, and she’d be in such agony. I made a salve, out of ground mint and other herbs. It relieves many aches and pains, and I want to massage you with it every night.”

He gulped, flaming a brighter red. “On my . . . my privates?”

“Yes.”

“Do you . . . you . . .” He had to swallow twice before he could continue. “Do you believe it could help?”

“It’s soothing. That’s all I contend.” The yearning in his voice was distressing, so she flashed a wicked smile. “If you’re searching for a magic solution, you should concentrate on my hot springs.”

“Why?”

“My clients insist that the water has erotic tendencies.”

“Utter nonsense!”

“I swear it! They maintain that a quick swim has them racing home to their husbands, and demanding the men exercise their marital rights.”

“You’re joking.”

“I’ve always ignored their gibberish, but after my antics outside, I’m not so sure I doubt them anymore.” She placed her hand over his heart. “Let me.”

For a long while, he assessed her, his anger having faded into resignation. He shrugged. “What the hell? How can I refuse? I may be impotent, but I’m not dead.”

“I’ll go fetch the ointment.”

She rushed to her room, and shed her damp clothes, opting for a robe and nothing else. A week prior, she wouldn’t
have dared such brazenness, but Stephen Chamberlin had bewitched her, had effortlessly goaded her to conduct she’d never have risked before she’d met him.

On her way down, she detoured to the pantry and retrieved her arthritic cream. When she returned, he appeared calm, but there was an intensity about him that was scrupulously banked. She seated herself on the bed, and dissolute fellow that he was, he loosed the belt on her robe, and tugged at the lapels, so that her center was revealed to her navel.

He dipped into the jar and held a glob to his nose. “It smells delicious. Is it edible?”

“I don’t see why not.”

He dabbed it on his tongue. “Not bad.”

“Roll over.”

“I thought you were going to rub it onto my genitals.”

“Your back, too.”

Probing for an ulterior motive, he scrutinized her, then he rotated as she’d requested. She crawled on top of him, her thighs spread, her loins over his buttocks. The positioning was decadent, scandalous, but she didn’t care. Jolted by the impropriety, she lowered herself, but she declined to reflect on what was transpiring.

Cupping the liniment, she smoothed it across his scarred, healing torso.

“This will tingle.”

“It already is.”

“Just relax.”

Commencing at his shoulders, she dug into his muscles, circling down and down to his waist, and she scooted off, her crotch on his thighs, so that she could knead his buttocks. Clasping and molding the curved mounds was so naughty, and so thrilling, that she could barely breathe.