Her Only Desire (24 page)

He captured her face between his warm, wondrously skilled hands, and as he kissed her slowly, deeply, he tugged the tortoiseshell combs out of her hair and brought her tresses tumbling down. This was a man who knew exactly what he was about.

When he ended the kiss, she wove a little on her feet in blissful unsteadiness. Ian, meanwhile, gathered her skirts in his knowing hands and slipped her dress off over her head with a practiced skill that would have impressed her lady's maid.

Across the tall ceiling, the fire cast huge shadows of the two of them stealing more kisses and continuing to undress each other. Her senses were so sharply heightened she noticed the subtlest current of air moving against her bare arms as Ian gently unlaced her light stays. Discarding them behind him, his glazed stare fixed upon her now freed breasts.

He seemed to forget what he was doing as he stood there admiring the shameless jut of her swollen nipples against the paper-thin cotton of her chemise. He brought his hand up slowly from his side, ran one knuckle up her stomach through her chemise, and then diverted the center line of his caress, rubbing his knuckle across the hardened peak of her left breast.

Georgie sighed, but she wanted to see more of him, too. Reaching up to unfasten the single button that closed the front V of his shirt, she parted the smooth lawn fabric, revealing an expanse of his sculpted male chest so enticing that it made her moan a little. “Your turn,” she whispered, trailing her fingertips hungrily down the expanse of smooth skin that had been revealed.

Ian shook himself out of his daze and obeyed her, loosening his silver cuff links and then lifting his shirt off over his head. Tossing it aside at once, he moved toward her again to rid her of her petticoat, but Georgie stopped him in sheer awe, planting her hand on his splendid chest to keep him at arm's length, just so she could admire.

“Oh, Ian,” she breathed in stunned awe. “You are magnificent.”

He smiled at her and dropped his gaze with almost boyish modesty, but it was true.

He was breathtaking, tall and powerful and beautifully proportioned from head to toe. His chest was at her eye level, so Georgie could not help but gape at the flowing swells of his pectoral muscles, the adorable flat circles of the masculine nipples, the slight dip in the center, running up to the beguiling notch at the base of his throat. His collarbones spanned outward like flying buttresses to reinforce the might of his wide, iron shoulders. Meanwhile, just below his lovely chest, all the compact rippling muscles of his abdomen and trim waist invited her exploration. She could see by the firelight that his skin there was velvety smooth, but she was almost too much in awe to dare touch him.

Looking lower, she admired his lean hips and strong, sweeping thighs. The size of the bulge between them, however, chased her frank scrutiny away in sudden recollection of what lay ahead.

How would it be possible for him to lie on her? she wondered. The man had to be more than two hundred pounds of pure muscle. Surely he would crush her.

She lifted her chin to ask him about it, but forgot the question as her stare traveled up over his wonderful torso. The beauty of his powerful arms lured her gaze now, and her touch.

Lifting her hands to his shoulders, she slowly traced her fingertips down his thick biceps, over his lightly furred forearms, to his warm, strong, gentlemanly hands. Her touch ended at the signet ring that he wore on his pinky finger, when Ian suddenly captured her venturesome hands. When she looked up in surprise, she found him watching her with rising fire in his eyes.

“Looked your fill?” he asked in a husky murmur, but Georgie couldn't find her voice to answer, still caught up in staring.

She gazed at the strong, enticing column of his neck, the forthright angle of his Adam's apple. She understood now why men kept their necks covered under restrictive cravats—to keep ladies from daydreaming all day about kissing those beguiling lines, tasting that sensitive skin. She admired his steely jaw, the narrow planes of his smoothly shaved cheeks, his generous, sensual mouth.

She had barely noticed the subtle gold streaks in his dark brown hair before, but now the gold in it sparkled in the firelight. His forelock had fallen forward over his brow, and beneath its tumbled shadow, his eyes smoldered with bright jade intensity. She reached up and tenderly brushed his hair out of his eyes, revealing the thick, feathery lines of his eyebrows once more.

Impossibly handsome, and there was an end to it.

Somehow finding her wits again, she wondered if she should apologize for staring, but then, all of a sudden, she noticed the cheval mirror in the corner and caught a glimpse of his broad, bare back in the reflection.
God.
She shuddered violently in a fresh wave of fiery yearning.

What struck her most about that strong, beautiful back, however, was his proud, erect carriage. Posture that fine couldn't be taught. A man was either born to stand like a leader or simply couldn't do it. In the solidity, the sheer predatory grace of his posture, she could see his Norman warlord ancestors in him. It made her smile. Oh, yes, every line of this princely man proclaimed his innate nobility.

She met his gaze again and couldn't speak, a lump in her throat to think that he would truly be hers, always. She may have looked her fill, but if he was really hers and this wasn't a dream, then she wanted to touch him.

She wanted to claim him for her own.

Every inch.

         

Georgiana reached out and touched his stomach; then she began caressing him, and Ian melted against her hands. He closed his eyes and dropped his head back slightly as an eager sigh escaped him.

The way she touched him made him tremble. She stroked him with reverent delight, like some fair archeological lady who had unearthed a precious find that she alone knew how to decipher, she alone could understand.

It didn't matter at all in that moment that she was a member of the grand Knight clan. If she had been the lowliest dairymaid and yet touched him with so much love, he would have married the chit. The value to him of being touched like this was greater than she could ever understand. What he mostly remembered of marriage, after all, was being pushed away.

But Georgiana's heartfelt caresses traveled up his chest and over his shoulders, making him feel almost as though it were the first time for him, too. Maybe in some strange way, it was. For behind all his practical reasons for marrying Georgiana, so logically thought out, and quite apart from their crazed physical desire for each other, an indescribable something
else
had sparked itself into existence between them, a promise and a possibility, like some magical seed that with proper tending might flower into something beautiful.

She gave him hope that a closeness he had long given up on might still be possible for him. That maybe he could be truly known by a woman, and maybe even…truly loved. Not until finding her had he realized how much he needed this. She made him aware, too, of how much he had to give. Perhaps her native daring inspired him, for, at last, despite the nightmare of his first marriage, she made him willing to try again. To give again. To risk opening himself anew. Then her touch curled around his nape, pulling him down to kiss her.

He obliged, still frankly amazed at how easily she had agreed to the match after all her brave words at the maharajah's feast, flaunting her independence. He hadn't forgotten her silly quote from her aunt's ridiculous book: “Wedlock is a padlock.”

Well, there was a time not very long ago that he would have agreed, but the events at Janpur and their brush with death had forced them both to consider life a bit more seriously. For his part, Ian had realized during all those long months at sea spent wrestling with Derek's request that he didn't really want to spend the rest of his life alone.

The truth was, it hurt every time he went to Knight House. All his friends were paired, and all his friends were happy. It wasn't as though he hadn't had plenty of chances to remarry. After the official year of mourning for Catherine had passed, his secretary had shown him a list of the ton's top thirty debutantes whose parents had already begun making discreet inquiries about his future plans.

He had never had any illusions about their motives. It all boiled down to his title, his obscene fortune, and his worldly position. Having had his fill of being used, he had shied away from all their simpering daughters. But with Georgiana, everything was totally different. She had become his second chance at the one, secret thing he had always wanted most, the one thing that fate, despite all the gifts that it had showered on him, had not seen fit to give: a family.

A real family of his own, and a home filled with happiness and love.

He had expected to have it years ago, but the whole thing had turned into a cruel joke.

Fearless Georgiana made him brave enough to try again. If there was one thing he was sure of, it was that this passionate beauty would never betray him.

Thrusting the past out of his mind in favor of his much rosier future, he continued kissing her, reaching down to untie the tapes of her single petticoat. All he wanted this night was to make her feel as treasured and beloved as she did him. When her loosened petticoat crumpled to her feet, he glanced down to help her step out of it and noticed that she was still wearing her shoes. For that matter, so was he.

Realizing it simultaneously, they exchanged a smile, then both of them kicked off their shoes. Ian gazed at his soon-to-be bride for a long moment, relishing the sight of her stripped down to her chemise.

Helen of Troy was no match for Georgiana. She truly was the most ravishing woman in all of the world, he thought, admiring her midnight tresses, her creamy skin, her rosy lips with a blush to match. Her cobalt eyes.

“Excuse me, you're staring,” she said sardonically, the pot calling the kettle black.

But he only smiled. “Can't help it. I feel like a king.”

“You look like a god,” she whispered fervently.

He lowered her head, abashed by her too-lavish praise. “And you look like an angel.”

“But I'm not,” she reminded him with a saucy little smile, drawing him closer.

“No, you're not,” he agreed with gusto, and when he tugged the charming vixen into his arms, she laughed aloud. “It's your best quality.” He kissed her soundly, then released her from his snug embrace and offered her his hand, casting a nod of discreet invitation toward the bed. “My lady?” he murmured.

Cautiously, Georgiana placed her fingers atop his offered palm and let him lead her there, to her seduction.

As she climbed up onto his bed, he stole a peek under her chemise at her bare bottom. She gave a small shriek at his roguery and laughed, coming up onto her knees to hook her arm around his neck, and pulling him down with her as they kissed each other madly.

“You taste so good, Ian,” she whimpered when he finally let her up for air. “Are you going to do what you did to me before?”

“Oh, that, and much more besides,” he purred.

“There's
more
?”

He lifted an eyebrow and gave her a slightly sinister smile.

“Ah, of course there is,” she whispered in a knowing tone. “How silly of me! I've seen those carvings on the temple walls.”

“Mmm,” he agreed, nodding.

“What will it be like for me?” she asked him almost shyly.

He tucked a lock of her dark hair behind her ear with a tender motion. “Would you like a little precursor, my darling? An introduction, as it were?”

“Yes.”

“Lie back,” he whispered, and the trust with which she obeyed him shook Ian to the core. “Now spread your legs,” he instructed in a husky murmur as he eased into position atop her.

Still safely trousered as he settled between her slim thighs, his senses reeled with bliss at the feel of her soft, warm body beneath him.

“Ian, you're heavy!”

“Sorry.” Roused from his daze by her protest, he immediately shifted more of his weight onto his elbows, then paused to glance down at her, making sure that she was comfortable. “Better?”

“Yes—much.” She gazed at him with such sincerity, such sweet wonder, that Ian couldn't break the spell of her wide, violet-blue eyes. He could not look away.

He had never made love to a virgin before.

He was supposed to have done so on his wedding night, but things were never what they seemed.

On some level, in fact, being a man of the world, he had prepared himself for the possibility that Georgiana wasn't a virgin.

She was, after all, an extremely sensual young woman with an avid interest in the erotic. He had braced himself already not to be shocked if he learned in taking her that she had given way before at some point in her past, to some other man.

He wouldn't be happy about it, God knew, but at least this time he wouldn't be taken off guard. If he did still choose to go ahead with the marriage, then at least this time he would know what he was getting into. Last time, he hadn't been granted that courtesy, and he had lived to regret it ever since.

But now, as Georgiana lay in his arms, he knew with every fiber of his being that she was pure, niece of the Hawkscliffe Harlot or no. It was written all over her lovely face. For her, this night was an earth-shattering event, and to be the man she had chosen to gift with her virginity made it just as profound for him.

No, indeed, he thought as he traced the line of her cheek and petted the delicate curve of her eyebrow with his fingertip, this was a new experience for him, too. To be sure, this was not how it usually went when he brought a woman to his bed.

The acts he performed with his carefully selected lovers were mere empty performances of cold virtuosity beside this. A necessity for a healthy grown male, like water or food.

But this, she, nourished him so much more deeply. Her sweetness pierced into the very soul of him and loosed a floodgate of emotion. He leaned down and kissed her softly. She cupped his face and returned his kiss with all the nubile eagerness that he had come to know from her. Her responsiveness made him want to protect her all the more from other males who might think they could take advantage. They wouldn't dare touch her once they knew that she was his. And she wouldn't dare let them once he had schooled her lush young body in the arts of ecstasy. When she wanted pleasure, she must always come to him.