The Duchess Hunt (34 page)

She narrowed her eyes and shook her head
slowly from side to side. “This is hardly fair.”

“Oh?”

“I am completely naked.”

“Oh yes, you are,” he said, his voice
saturated with pure male satisfaction.

“And you are fully clothed.”

He looked down at himself. “So I am.”

“I insist you join me in nakedness. At
once.”

He grinned up at her. “Demanding now, are
you, little wife?”

“Not demanding,” she said, “just willing
to make a stand for justice.”

“Then we shall have to remedy this
atrocious wrong,” he said.

He rose from his crouch, but he took his
time, kissing the insides of her thighs, her mound, her hips, and her stomach
where their child grew. He lingered there, thinking of her with his baby in her
arms. He knew she’d be no Georgina Stanley – he’d had the distinct sensation
that Georgina had intended to stow away their children in the nursery like most
aristocratic mothers tended to do. Sarah would be as loving and attentive as
his own mother had been. More so, because Simon would make damn sure she
wouldn’t have to bear any of the pain his mother had suffered from her and his
father’s infidelities.

“There is no one in the world more suited
to be the mother of my child,” he murmured.

He rose to his full height and discarded
his clothes in short order. She watched him, her eyes dark with desire… and
with love.

He went into the hot water first and
pulled her in after him, settling her on his lap facing away from him, where he
used one of the soft cloths covered with lavender-scented soap to bathe her,
knowing that even lavender couldn’t cover her innate fresh, sweet scent. Or
taste.

He paid special attention to bathing the
area between her legs, touching the tiny peak above her entrance with soft but
sure strokes, knowing how wild it made her when he touched her there. She
writhed, making ripples in the water as she gasped, “Simon!”

With his arms wrapped around her hips, he
worked her with two hands. With one, he continued to stroke her with the cloth.
Using the other, he parted her folds and slid two fingers inside her, feeling
the slickness of her arousal despite the water that washed around her.

He was still learning her body – would be
learning it forever, he knew. His own arousal, nestled between the cheeks of
her bottom, was tight and throbbing, aching to fill her, to take her again.

He stroked the outer nub as he slid his
fingers into her, through her folds, back inside again, moving his fingertips
against her inner walls. He played her like a violin, until she was thrumming
with pleasure, gasping with it, flushed with it. And then she came, her back
arching, her body convulsing around him. He kept her still in the water with
his arms tight around her body and felt every shudder, every contraction, as
she moaned her release.

She came down from it, slumping back
against him, her hands stroking the outsides of his thighs as the remnants of
her orgasm shuddered through her. When she was finished, relaxing completely
against his chest, he murmured into her hair, “We’re not finished yet.”

“Mmm,” she said.

With a low laugh, he turned her around,
lifting her and adjusting her until she straddled his body over his thighs. She
looked down at him, at his arousal, and gave him the wickedest erotic smile
he’d ever seen. Somewhere in the water she found the cloth he’d used to
pleasure her, and she took her time to cover every inch of it with copious
suds.

He looked askance at her. “What are you
planning to do with that, love?”

She didn’t answer but laid the cloth out
so it covered her hand and then plunged both her hands into the water to take
his cock into her grip.

He was already so hard, so hot. She felt
it, too, her eyes widening at the hardness, at the seeming impossible length of
it.

And then, she began to stroke him.

With a low groan, he leaned his head back
against the edge of the tub. Heat rushed through him, starting from her hands
and licking up through his torso and out through his limbs. He thrust into her
grip, a purely instinctual move his body couldn’t control. And then his
ballocks tightened, and he felt the bloom of pressure at the base of his spine
that told him he was close to exploding.

With a swift movement, he thrust her hands
away from him. Her eyes widened, but before she had a chance to say anything,
he hauled her forward with one arm, lifting her so he could position his cock
beneath her entrance. He found the notch of her sex and wedged his cockhead
into it, grunting a little at the exquisite pleasure of that most sensitive
part of him stroking her hot folds.

He grasped her hips and pressed her down
over him.

Both their breaths released in a harsh
rush. She froze. He froze. They stared at each other.

Then, she began to ride him. Leaning
forward, she placed her hands on his shoulders for leverage, and with long,
slow drags, she raised and lowered herself over him again and again. He kept
his hands on her hips, guiding her, his fingertips kneading the tops of her
buttock cheeks.

Now the water did splash over the edge of
the tub, but Simon couldn’t bring himself to care as Sarah bent forward to take
his mouth. Her lips met his in a kiss that took his breath, and his awareness
of his surroundings. There was only Sarah now. The sweetness of her enveloping
him, covering him, bringing every part of him to levels of pleasure he hadn’t
known existed before she’d come into his life.

The pressure at the base of his back
returned, this time a thousand percent more powerful than the last. It grew and
tightened, a ball of roiling lust and love that centered around the woman in
his arms, who loved Simon just as intensely as he loved her.

When he came, it poured from every
physical part of him, and also from his heart and soul, his body wrenching in
pleasure and release.

She collapsed over him, wrapping her arms tight
around him, her cheek pressed to the side of his head. He gathered her tight
against him, both of them trembling.

“I love you, Simon,” she said, her breath
a tickle against his earlobe. “I love you so much.”

He buried his face in her hair and held her
close, never wanting to let go.

It was two hours later when they came
downstairs, Simon shaved and dressed in perfect, unwrinkled fashion by Burton,
and Sarah dressed in one of her London dinner gowns, her hair done elegantly by
one of the maids, who’d gushed to her the whole time about how wonderful and
romantic it was that she’d captured His Grace’s heart.

She glanced over at him and felt the warm
wash of his love. It was unavoidable – just from looking at him one could tell
that he loved her. He made it clear to everyone that she had been charged with
the care and keeping of his heart. He either couldn’t hide it or didn’t care
to. Either way, it strengthened her, made her feel confident and… complete.
She’d always wanted Simon, but she’d pushed that love for him into a corner of
her heart, never even allowing herself to dream of one day being his wife.

“Come with me into the library for a
moment,” he told her, and she followed him into the dim room.

He went to the desk and unlocked it,
pulling something from the drawer before straightening. “Give me your left
hand.”

She reached her hand out to him and
watched as he slid the ring they found in the dower house onto her finger.

“But it’s your mother’s —” His fingers
pressed over her lips, stopping her protest.

“This ring belongs to the Duchess of
Trent. First my grandmother, then my mother. It was meant to be my bride’s
next. I know that wherever she is, she would want you to have this.”

He brought her hand up to his lips and
pressed a soft kiss to the ring on her finger. Then he let her go, and she felt
the weight of the diamond-encrusted gold.

“I’ll wear it until we find her,” she
said, “and if she wants it back —”

“She won’t.” Smiling, Simon enfolded her
hand in his. “Let’s go to dinner.”

They walked into the parlor, and Sarah’s
heart brimmed as she looked at her family. She’d always secretly considered the
Hawkins family hers, but now it was no secret. They were
legally
hers. And she adored each and every one of them.

Simon fetched them plates and went to the
sideboard, where she pointed at various dishes and he filled their plates. And
then they joined the family, sitting on the silk sofa – the same sofa the
duchess had asked Sarah to sit upon so many years ago, when she was dirty and
bleeding from the blackberry bush. This was the very room where she’d met all
of them that day so long ago. This was the room where she’d discovered the
identity of the boy who’d saved her.

She smiled at Simon as he handed her a
plate, and they ate in silence for a few minutes.

It was Sam who spoke first. “The Stanleys
are gone.”

Simon nodded. “I expected they’d go.”

“Ah, but I’d wager you didn’t expect the
manner in which they departed,” Luke said with a chuckle. He raised his glass
of wine and took a healthy swallow.

“What do you mean?” Simon asked.

The brothers exchanged looks, and Sarah’s
heart began to pound. Slowly, she lowered her fork to her plate.

“Well, who wants to be the one to break
the news to him?” Luke asked, glancing around. When no one answered him, he
said, “Me? Oh, very well.” Shrugging, he turned back to Simon. “The day after
you ran off to Scotland,” he said, “so did Miss Georgina Stanley. With the Duke
of Dunsberg.”

“What?” Sarah gasped.

“That’s right. Seems she was so intent on
becoming a duchess, it didn’t matter which duke she attached herself to. So she
grabbed the first one that came along. Dunsberg called the afternoon you left,
Trent, when all in the house was still in quite the uproar, and I expect she
poured her poor broken heart out to him.”

“What did her parents do when they found
out?” Simon asked.

“Absolutely nothing,” Mark said
cheerfully.

“They wanted their daughter to be a
duchess, and when she succeeded, they had no complaints,” Luke said.

“But she didn’t succeed in the way they’d
planned!” Sarah exclaimed.

“And they’re not going to like the
scandal, surely,” Simon said.

“If anything,” Esme said, and they all
turned to her, because it wasn’t like her to speak up when they were in a
group, “Georgina will be thrilled by this particular scandal. Imagine… jilted
by the Duke of Trent only to fall into the arms of the Duke of Dunsberg. She’ll
simply thrive off all the attention she’s bound to receive.”

“I hope Dunsberg knows what he’s got
himself into,” Simon said, shaking his head.

Luke waved his hand in dismissal. “Oh, I
know Dunsberg. He can manage women. Even one as obnoxiously spoiled as Miss
Stanley.”

“I saw them together the night they
disappeared,” Mark said. “He seemed, well, quite
taken
with her.”

Simon gave his brother a contemplative
look. “He seemed taken with her even when she was engaged to me. But I don’t
think they know each other well.”

Luke shrugged. “Does it matter? He is a
duke. She wanted to be a duchess.”

“And for Dunsberg’s part,” Sam said, “how
could a forty-nine-year-old man resist the wiles of a twenty-year-old beauty
proclaiming her undying love?”

Mark gave Sarah a blinding grin. “Well,
let Dunsberg have her, I say. I’m much more pleased to have Sarah as my
sister-in-law.”

“Always thought of you as my sister when I
was a boy,” Theo said. “And I have to say, I always found it a little odd to
think of you as a housemaid. Even Esme’s companion. Now…” He shrugged and said
simply, “it feels right.”

She gave him a warm smile. “Thank you, my
lord.”

“Theo. Call me Theo.”

Her smile widened. “Theo. I admit to being
apprehensive about your reactions, but I am…” She took a deep breath and tried
to control her roiling feelings. “I am so glad you have accepted me.”

“As far as I’m concerned,” Luke said,
“this is the first time my brother has shown sense in a long while.”

“Do you think so?” Simon asked.

“Of course.”

Simon’s thumbs moved in small circles over
the edge of his wine glass. “It’s just that Stanley still intends to reveal
your parentage, Luke.” He looked at Esme, realizing that she might not know
about any of this. “Did they tell you?”

She gave him a solemn nod. “Yes. The night
you left.”

“Good. The fact is, we all need to come to
a decision about how we’re going to manage the repercussions of Stanley
spreading his bile to the world.”

Sam, who’d been leaning against the
mantel, pushed off and stepped forward, holding out what looked like two sheets
of parchment in his hand. “You have received a few letters, Trent.”