Loving Sarah (20 page)

One hour later, with her trunk now tied securely to the foot of Ian’s bed, Sarah began to undress. She didn’t know how he would react to finding her in his cabin, especially after he’d abandoned her on Lucky’s boat minutes after marrying her, but she knew one thing about her new husband. Ian enjoyed sex with her. When he arrived back to his cabin, he’d find her waiting for him in his bed.

He could either tell her to leave or allow her to stay.

Granted this wasn’t the way she’d wanted things to happen. She should never have read that book. Even though she found it titillating and bold, luring Ian into a sexual liaison merely to satisfy her curiosity was likely the biggest mistake she’d ever made. But there was no crying over it now because it was done. She simply had to make the best of the circumstances now.

But Sarah didn’t think their future was entirely dim. She had funds, so he didn’t have to feel as driven as he had to turn a profit to support a family. Her fortune, and the estate in Surrey, would take care of them for the entirety of their lives. That should certainly be a relief to him.

She just hoped he could get over the notion that she’d planned this from the onset because for him to think she’d trapped him into a marriage was what upset her most. Sometimes when she thought about that night, she remembered him asking her repeatedly if she wanted to halt their lovemaking. In hindsight, she probably should have said yes.

After checking her appearance one more time, Sarah noted the absence of any discoloration from the bruising on her leg and side. Smiling to herself, she then climbed into the bed and pulled the sheet and blanket over her and settled in for a nap while she waited for her husband.

I
an returned to
Revenge
after escorting the two men to their respective homes in the city. He felt responsible for their safe return to their families, seeing as he and Lucky had taken the men from their evening meals.

Rowing back out to his boat with three of his crew who’d been in a nearby tavern waiting for his return and celebrating, Ian sat quietly and relived the brief marriage ceremony that took place in Lucky’s cabin. Sarah wasn’t as mad with them as he’d thought she’d be. Oh, she was upset at having her hand forced, yes. But Ian read more fear and sadness in her eyes than anger.

He’d told her there was nothing to fear, promised her he’d be with her to face her family, and what did he do? He abandoned her. It was the single-most cowardly thing he’d ever done. He wanted to go to the other boat and fetch her, then thought of the hour and decided he’d get her at first sun.

If she refused to come with him, he’d throw her over his shoulder and take her by force. She was his wife now. Her place was by his side.

So why couldn’t he tell her the things he wanted to? Why did he always push her away or anger her so she left him?

When the minister told him to kiss his bride, he saw a glimmer of hope in her eyes that he would, then the window shut, and he turned away without making a move toward her. Why did he hesitate?

He desired her. He was, in fact, glad to be married to her.

She was attractive and of proper background as to be a good match for him. So why then was he feeling as though she’d cornered him? Was it because she’d taken the initiative and started the affair, taking the control of the relationship from the onset? Is that what bothered him? That she’d taken the courtship and seduction out of his hands?

Did he feel less of a man because of that? He wasn’t sure.

As she fought against the marriage in the confines of the cabin, with five men surrounding her, overwhelming her with force, he realized it was pain, not fear, he saw in her eyes. His Sarah didn’t fear him. She didn’t fear anyone. She was hurting. And now he had to figure out what it was he’d done and make up for it. Only he couldn’t get her until morning.

Knowing he could do nothing until then, he grunted to the crew as they tied the gig to the side of the boat, then he climbed the ladder to make for his own bed. When Ian reached his cabin, he slid the latch and found the door bolted from within. He jiggled the handle in case it was stuck, and it wouldn’t give. He muttered an oath, and wondered who among his crew was skinny enough to go through a porthole, because he could think of no other way he was going to get into his room. Right as he was about to find someone small, he heard her voice.

“One minute,” Sarah’s voice called out through the door.

He felt a jolt of excitement stir his cock. “Sarah? What are you doing here? I thought….”

When the door opened, his tongue nearly dropped from his mouth and his eyes from their sockets. His new wife wore one of his shirts and nothing else. Her loose curls cascaded over her shoulders and past the peaks of her breasts, hiding them from his view. His gaze lowered along her white-linen-clad form to where the shirt ended just above her bare knees and calves and farther, to her dainty, bare feet.

She had to know what wearing something like that would do to a man.

The cat skittered out of the room, and he entered quickly, before any of his crew might happen by. He slid the bolt home, then turned to face her.

“Sarah.” The word came out on a sigh, and even to his own ears it sounded weak and vulnerable to her presence.

“I want to return with you Ian. And….” She paused, as though considering her words carefully, then took a fortifying breath, pushing her breasts against the linen shirt. He swallowed past the dry knot in his throat and forced his cock to settle down. “And I want more than anything to make this marriage work.”

“Oh, Sarah-mine, I have been a fool,” he whispered as he claimed her lips in the kiss he longed to give her a few hours earlier—the one that made her his.

“
Y
ou’ll have to explain. I…don’t understand,” Sarah said early the next morning as they lay under a mound of covers on the bed, Ian facing her and their legs entwined. Fresh from her morning toilette, she climbed back into bed unwilling to be parted from him for a moment now that they’d reached this comfortable intimacy. “Where would…it…go?” she asked sheepishly as she looked up at him as he rested on his elbow gazing down at her.

Ian offered her another sip from his glass of wine he’d poured just moments before returning to her side under the covers. She shook her head too interested in what he said. Her new husband dipped two of his fingers in the glass, then finished the contents with two gulps and set the glass on the floor next to the bed. “My dear, naive seductress, there are other ways for a woman to be with men without her losing her virginity.”

“How so?” She was curious now that her husband intimated of ways other than those they’d done and from those she’d seen in the book.

He tipped her chin up to face him, and he slid the two fingers into her mouth. “Imagine this was my shaft,” he whispered.

She’d read about this act, fellatio, in his book, and swirled her tongue around his fingers, before taking them in deep, suckling as she did. He groaned and took his fingers from between her lips and closed his eyes. She could tell he tried to control his breathing and wondered if that were something he desired. When she lifted her gaze back to his, she gave him a shy smile and asked, “Did I do it right?”

He nodded, the barely restrained passion in his hazel eyes telling her where this was heading. “You did it right, wife.” His green-brown gaze told her how right she had performed that little trick. “But there is also one other place….” His voice trailed off because he knew it would rouse her curiosity.

She gave him what she hoped was a seductive look as she quirked a brow in curiosity. “What is that?”

He motioned for her to roll onto her side, away from him, and he slid closer to her, spooning her, and warming her chilly body with his massive warm one as he snuggled close behind her. Sarah felt his rigid shaft rest between her upper thighs. She sighed as his hand came around her waist to cover her mons. He worked his fingers between her lips and began to tease her nub again.

“Some men also enjoy this other hole,” he said fingering her moistness and moving it up to her rear entrance, where she clenched instinctively.

“Really?” she squeaked.

He chuckled softly into her ear. “Really.”

Pressing his erection against the groove of her buttocks, he continued to play with her nub, driving her even more insane with need. He spread her wetness up and down the split, then ran the tip of a finger around the slick, tightened entrance.

She tried to pull away from him, but he held her fast with his arm around her waist. “Surely you don’t mean….”

With the hand in front, he continued to rub her very sensitive nub, driving her insane with desire to have him fill her again, but with his other hand on her behind, he dipped into her slick wetness and drew forth more of her natural lubrication and laved her other, tighter entrance with her own juices. “Some men find this a pleasurable diversion from the norm. And from what I’ve heard, there are some women who enjoy it as well.”

“I don’t think I am one of them,” she stated, trying unsuccessfully to scoot out of his reach. “It sounds rather perverse, and I would rather do it the way we have been. It feels so much better.”

“Trust me, Sarah-mine,” he whispered into her ear as he held her. “Now, lift your leg for me.” He then took her leg and moved it over his, making his access easier.

His palms caressed her nakedness, stirring heat within her traitorous body. “Ian, even with my great desire to learn and experience all that I can in order to please you, I assure you I do not want to try that.”

“Shhh, Sarah,” he whispered. “Trust me.” He placed the tip of his engorged rod at her entrance, thankfully not
that
entrance, and slid in easily.

“I do, Ian,” she said as she surrendered to him, and more importantly, wanting him to remain in the orifice he’d entered. “I trust you.”

Then he plunged into her from behind, spooning her as he thrust deeply and thoroughly, filling her until she felt him touching her soul. “I’m glad you trust me, Sarah-mine,” he took a deep breath and began to move slowly, steadily. “Because I don’t particularly enjoy
that
manner of lovemaking either.”

“Thank goodness,” she said as she heaved a sigh of relief and began to relax and enjoy his slow thrusts.

Soon they began to move as one, and he carried her back to the pinnacle of all sensation and desire. To that special place where only release would ease the torturous need building within her. And after he gave her what she sought so desperately, he found his own completion.

A t one-seventeen p.m., exactly twenty-four hours after their arrival in New York harbor, Ian skillfully maneuvered his three-masted Baltimore clipper through the buoys set as the start line for the start of the second leg of their race.

“Which boat comes out of the box next?” Sarah asked. Because she’d gone into the town to shop, she didn’t see which boats came in behind them. When she’d returned after her expedition to the hotel for a bath, she’d noticed two other competitors dropping anchor and another sailing into the harbor, but didn’t catch the names.

“
Evangeline
comes out next, then the
Mirage
and
Solent
. In that order.
Ann McKim
came in overnight, but she’s not one to discount yet. She’s set records crossing the Pacific and Atlantic each year since she was launched.”

Sarah saw the look of sadness or longing cross his face for a brief moment and wanted to delve into his life and upbringing, but knew she had to wait for the right time. She’d tried once before, and he closed up like a box, keeping his secrets inside, unwilling to share yet what she thought to be his pain.

“When I look at her, I see the mark of my father’s influence in her design, though he’s long been dead. The architect on record is M. Michael Watkins, and I believe he may be the son of my father’s partner, though I don’t remember the man having a wife, much less children.”

They sat in silence a few minutes as he pointed his bowsprit in the center of the two buoys. “How far ahead is Lucky?”

Ian nodded. “His departure is eleven minutes ahead of us.”

“Hang all the sail you can on those yardarms, Captain,” she said to her husband. “We have a race to win.”

“Competitive, wife?”

“I’ve been losing to Lucky in most competitive endeavors my whole life. Just once, I’d love to beat him at
something
!”

“It doesn’t matter which of us wins, we’re applying the purse to the purchase of the new ships.” Ian looked at her and smiled, warming her all over, yet sending shivers of delight through her. “Besides,” he leaned toward her and said just loudly enough for her to hear, “I’ve already won.”

The entire crew stood on deck to watch as they crossed the start line. When they did, the men cheered, their voices echoing through the harbor as they began the second leg of their journey.

“
W
hat drives you?” Sarah asked Ian several days later, as she sat behind him on the steering deck as he held his course through the warm, summer day. Sailing conditions had been optimal for them thus far, and the assisting currents he’d once mentioned were doing exactly as he’d said and pushing them home. Sarah had long ago taken the hat off and turned her face to the sun to feel its kiss on her cheeks.