Sally MacKenzie Bundle (212 page)

She would rather he loved her, of course, but she was not going to wait for love or marriage. She could have been killed today. If she’d gone headfirst into a stone wall instead of a bush, or gone flying out of his curricle and under the horse hooves and carriage wheels on Oxford Street…“I was…I wanted to, ah…” She could have died.

She started to shake.

“Are you stuck?”

“N—no.” She bit her lip. She couldn’t cry. Edmund would never take a weeping woman to bed. And she would look terrible, as well, with red eyes and a dripping nose. Not seductive at all.

He was down on his hands and knees now, sword shoved aside, squinting, obviously trying to see her in the dim light under the bed. “Are you crying?”

Thank God she was hidden in the shadows. She swiped at her nose with the back of her hand. “W—Why would I be crying?”

She took a deep breath. Better to concentrate on clothing removal. He was already perfectly dressed—undressed—but she…she would just have to slip the nightgown off when she got the opportunity. There was no way she could manage the feat underneath a bed.

“I don’t know.” He frowned—he was in the light; she could see him perfectly well. Oh, not perfectly. He was too scrunched down to be viewed in all his glory. “
Will
you come out of there? Carrying on a conversation like this is completely ridiculous. I’ve got my naked arse in the—damn.”

He stood up. She watched his feet move away. Damn, indeed. He’d finally remembered he was naked.

She scooted out from under the bed. Yes, he’d gone back to the bathtub and was reaching for a towel. This was her opportunity. If she pulled off her nightgown now, when he wasn’t looking, he couldn’t deter her. It would be a fait accompli.

She grabbed her hem and pulled it up and over her head in one motion. Then she dropped the nightgown on the floor and kicked it under the bed.

She wouldn’t have thought the thin cloth provided any warmth, but the sudden touch of cool air on her bare skin turned it to gooseflesh—and caused other things to pebble as well.

Should she try to cover her womanly bits with her fingers? That felt overly coy. But where
did
a naked woman put her hands? She had no skirts to hide them in, and placing them on her hips felt too bold.

She should not have removed her nightgown, but it was too late to rectify that. Edmund had picked up the towel now and was turning.

She clasped her hands together at her waist and smiled.

Chapter 15

Good God.
The towel he’d just picked up slipped to the floor from his nerveless fingers. Miss Parker-Roth was standing by his bed stark naked.

Had he died in the curricle crash this afternoon? He must have, since he was now in heaven.

She was exquisite. Her lovely warm brown hair tumbled over her delicate shoulders, begging his fingers to comb through its silky length; her perfect small breasts made his palms itch to feel their soft weight. He wanted to run his hands over her graceful waist and flaring hips and part her beautiful milky thighs to find the treasure he knew was nestled in the thatch of curls there.

All the blood left his head and rushed to his cock. Damn. He grabbed the towel back off the floor and held it in front of him.

“Oh, don’t be shy,” Jane said. She giggled and held out her arms. “I’m not.”

He heard the nerves in her voice, the mix of excitement, defiance, and fear, and his heart turned over.

She’d had a hard day, full of shocks and upheavals. She’d seen that damn painting of her father, hidden from her mother on the floor of a closet, and been thrown out of a runaway curricle. Finally, to add insult to injury, she’d had to endure Mrs. Hornsley, her mother, and his aunts. She must be worn to a thread. “You should go back to your own room, Jane.”

“No.” He watched the candlelight shimmer over her hair as she shook her head. “I don’t want to.”

He should insist. He should take her arm and escort her to her door.

If he took her arm at this moment, he would escort her to his bed.

At least he should put on a dressing gown or nightshirt or breeches or something to bring a little sanity back to his overheated brain, but all he could do was hold the damn towel in front of his cock and stare at Jane like a lust-crazed noddy.

“I don’t want to go to my room, Edmund.”

He knew it was mad, but he couldn’t stop himself from asking. “Then what do you want, Jane?”

She wet her lips. “Y—you.” Her voice shivered.

God. The word when straight to his cock. It jumped with eagerness to present itself to her.

He grasped the towel more tightly and tried to grasp his suddenly elusive self-control. She was tired. She was upset. She was not in any state to make life-altering decisions. He should put her in bed—her
own
bed. She was a virgin, for God’s sake. She had no idea what she was asking for.

But he was not a virgin. He had a painfully detailed picture of exactly what she was requesting, and he would so like to give it to her, again and again, slow and gentle, soft and teasing, hard and fast, any and every way she’d like it.

She had—they both had—narrowly escaped death this afternoon. They should celebrate life in the most elemental way possible. Skin to skin, breath mingled with breath, his body deep in hers.

She was compromised past saving; they would have to marry. Did it matter so much if they anticipated their vows?

She was coming toward him. He could see fear and uncertainty in her eyes, but under that, determination.

“I could have died today, Edmund, and, if you are correct about Satan, I might die tomorrow.”

He had not meant to give her that much fear. “I’ll keep you safe, Jane. Satan won’t hurt you.”

She shook her head, ignoring his words. “I always thought I had the future, but this afternoon, when I was thrown from your curricle and had that sick, helpless moment of being tossed through the air, I realized I don’t. The future is just a dream. Nothing but this very moment—this
now
—is real.”

She was close enough to touch, but he kept his hands on the towel. He knew if he touched her, the faint voice of propriety, the whisper of his conscience, would be shouted down by far more urgent exhortations.

“I don’t want my life to end before I’ve lived it. I don’t want to die a virgin, Edmund.” She put her hands on his shoulders; her fingers burned like a brand. Her breasts taunted him. They were so close.

“We’ll have to marry.” He waited for the heavy knot of dread to twist his gut. It didn’t. The hot tide of lust washing through him must have drowned it, and his already weakened notions of propriety were sinking fast.

And it wasn’t just lust he was feeling. There were other currents in the flood—protectiveness, tenderness, admiration. He’d never felt this way before.

Of course, he’d never felt as though his cock were literally going to explode, either.

“That’s the future,” Jane said. “I can’t think about the future.” She started moving her hands from his shoulders down his arms.

He was having a damn hard time thinking about the future as well, or anything besides the soft slide of her touch over the muscles of his upper arms and her lovely naked breasts just inches in front of him. He drew in a deep breath, and the musky scent of her need wafted up from the hot place between her thighs…

Hell, his cock
was
going to explode. Her hands had slipped down his forearms, over his wrists to his fingers, which still clutched the towel.

“Please, Edmund? Will you please show me what I’ve been missing?”

“Ah.” God! Her fingers bypassed the towel and wrapped around his cock, just like she’d wrapped them around Pan’s prodigious member. He thought his eyes would roll back in his head and he’d pass out with pleasure. He dropped the towel and put his hands on her shoulders to steady himself.

Normally he took the lead in the bedroom. Hell, normally he paid for what he was getting, so his partner did what he wished when he wished as he wished. He had one specific goal; once that was achieved, he took his leave, forgetting the woman as soon as the door shut behind him—if not sooner. It was a physical and a financial transaction, nothing more. He’d never had a long-term mistress; he’d never wanted one. He didn’t want to live a life anything like his father’s.

But this was different, so different that he felt almost the virgin Jane was.

“You are hard like Pan,” she murmured, “but soft, too, and warm.”

Warm? Hot, more like. His temperature must have just shot up a hundred degrees with her words. Her hand moved, sliding up and down his length. Her touch was soft, tentative—teasing. He sucked in his breath.

“Do you like that?” He’d leaked a drop of fluid; she found it and spread it over his tip, slipping her finger around his sensitive skin.

“Y—yes.” He couldn’t manage more words—he could barely manage that one.

She stepped closer, cradling his aching cock against her belly. Her nipples teased his chest. He slid his hands from her shoulders to her back, but didn’t pull her against him. Soon, but not yet. He’d let her keep the lead for a little while longer—she was going in so many interesting directions.

Her hands moved down to his arse while her mouth moved up his chest. She laved a nipple, then trailed her lips over his skin to his collarbone, his neck, his jaw. As she stretched, her body rubbed against his.

Sweat trickled down his back. Letting Jane do what she wished was torture—wonderful torture. Rational thought fled—lust clouded his poor brain.

He needed her as he needed food and water and air.

And then her lips reached his mouth and he couldn’t hold back any longer. He pulled her tight against him, leaving no breath of a gap between them.

She was his now. They might not have spoken vows before a minister; they hadn’t even made promises to each other—in words. But their bodies were promising everything.

This was not just the need to erase their brush with death; it was the need to affirm life. To begin a life together…

And a new life? A child?

Good God.

He expected a flood of dread, but felt only anticipation. He
wanted
a child. A son—or a daughter—with Jane. He wanted a family, a future, with her.

That cleared the lust from his brain. He needed to slow down. Jane was a virgin, after all.

Damn. He’d never taken a virgin to bed.

He ended the kiss and lifted his head so he could see Jane’s eyes. “Are you sure you want this?”

“Huh?” She looked so beautiful, her mouth soft and open, her gaze unfocused. Her tongue touched her lips; she blinked. “Y—yes.”

His heart sank. “You don’t sound sure.” He relaxed his hold, and stepped back. The air on his damp body chilled him—or was it the disappointment? He couldn’t take her to bed if she was uncertain.

Jane swallowed. Damn it, why did Edmund suddenly have to have an attack of scruples? She didn’t want to think or talk—she just wanted to
do
. Yes, she was nervous; of course she was nervous—she’d never done this before—but that didn’t mean she didn’t want to do it. “I
am
sure. Very sure.”

“No, you’re not.”

Oh, dear God, he was going to prose on and on and then convince himself to do the right—the noble—thing and return her to her room. She would never get to sleep if he did—she was
aching
for him. Desperate for whatever he would do to her. And she would never find the courage to do this again. How could she persuade him?

There had been that very odd part of Clarence’s sketch. It had looked rather disgusting, but Clarence had drawn an extremely happy expression on the man’s face. Perhaps Edmund would like it, too, and be moved to stop talking and proceed to his bed with all due haste.

She dropped to her knees and fastened her lips around his male member. The poor organ had shriveled to a limp shadow of its former self, but it perked up nicely the moment her lips touched it.

“Jane!”

Was he appalled? He sounded…she couldn’t decide how he sounded. His fingers buried themselves in her hair, but he didn’t pull her away.

If his morals were horrified, his body was not. She smiled and ran her tongue over the bit of him between her lips. She heard him suck in his breath. His hands clenched in her hair, and his hips flexed toward her. His penis grew even thicker. She leaned back slightly to admire its sturdy length. Another drop of moisture glistened on its tip. She licked it.

Edmund made an odd sound, a combination of sigh and moan and laugh. He tugged gently on her hair. He clearly wanted her to stop playing and stand up. She wasn’t about to do so. “I’m not done.” She licked him again and watched his organ almost jump in response. “I think you like it.”

“Of course I like it. I like it so much my knees are about to give out.”

“Really?” She could bring this strong man to his knees? She rather liked that thought. She licked him once more. What would happen if she took him in her mouth again and sucked? She would see…

He wasn’t letting her. He held her head immobile and moved his hips back, taking her prize beyond her reach. “Enough,” he said. “It’s my turn.”

She’d thought he
was
having his turn. Well, at least he wasn’t trying to send her back to her room. This time when he tugged on her, she stood up. He pulled her against him, hugging her so tightly she could barely breathe. Then he stooped slightly, put an arm behind her legs, and scooped her up.

“Ack!” She threw her arms around his neck. She wasn’t certain she cared for this new position. The floor looked much too far away. What if he dropped her? She wasn’t large, but she wasn’t light, either. Stephen had tried to pick her up once, and had made a great show of groaning and complaining before giving up. Of course, they had been children then…

Edmund’s arms felt very strong, but she was used to standing on her own two feet. Giving her body into his complete control was distinctly unsettling…though that would be what happened anyway when he laid her in his bed.

No, she would have some control there. She’d just demonstrated that.