The Duke's Night of Sin (17 page)

Sebastian leaned up just enough to look at his partner’s face.
Hell’s blazes!
His eyes widened as he realized the identity of the naked woman beneath him. He rolled to his side and from the blankets and staggered to his feet. “Miss Bonnet!”

She brushed her long ebony locks from her face and lazily peered up him, but within an instant her eyes were wide. “Och, thank heaven you remember me and are well. I was so worried about you last night after the accident.”

Sebastian blinked again. He raised his fingers to his pounding temples. Dark images flashed in his mind. Being dragged up a hill. A voice in the darkness, soothing him. His clothes being removed. At the thought, he glanced down at his naked body and shivered uncontrollably. He was standing before Miss Bonnet without a stitch of clothing.

“Unless you prefer to freeze, I think it best you come back under the blankets while we discuss all that happened.”

“But Miss Bonnet, I am naked. We cannot—”

Siusan laughed. “Dear sir, I am naked as well, as we were all through the night—sharing our warmth. Our clothes were wet and covered with ice. We would have died if I had not acted logically and removed them.” She gestured to their clothing piled in a heap a few feet away.

Sebastian turned and snatched up his trousers, but they were stiff as the plank walls. Casting them aside, he paced, fiercely shaking with cold. He had to think. What the hell had happened?

“We were too cold. Warmth was necessary for our survival. You were injured. I will think no less of you if you return to the warmth of the blankets … I will not look upon your body, and you need not gaze upon mine. But if you continue to pace, I shall be forced to stand against you, for my own warmth is quickly waning.”

He started for the blankets but stopped abruptly, recalling the position of his body when he awoke. “Forgive, Miss Bonnet, but I must know. Did we … that is to say did I—” He covered his penis with his hands.

“Make love?” Miss Bonnet’s face betrayed nothing. She sat fully upright, and the edge of the blankets fell to her lap revealing a pale, full breast. She nonchalantly covered herself. “Nay.” She reached a hand to him. “Come, let us stay warm while we think of a solution to our very grave problem.”

Still he resisted.

“Come now, Lord Wentworth, I would not have imagined you to be so concerned with propriety that you would rather lose your … extremities to the frost than to share my warmth.”

“Propriety is not my concern.” Not quite. His concern was more of humiliating himself the moment his body touched hers with a hard, bouncing cock. Standing there, the cold would prevent embarrassment.

Fine granules of snow seeped in between gaps in the lowest two feet of the planks. The air was so cold he could not draw enough of it into his lungs. No one would be coming for them in so much snow, in such freezing weather. Miss Bonnet was right. They would have to come up with their own solution, and quickly.

He started toward her. Miss Bonnet lifted the blankets, exposing her own porcelain body to him, as he climbed underneath. Without delay,
she rolled against him, and, instinctively, his body pressed tightly against hers.

After several minutes, his shivering had subsided. His teeth no longer chattered. But without the cold, he was now forced to fight with everything he was not to react to the soft, warm body pressed so intimately against him. He had to ignore the feel of her nipples hardening the second his cold chest pressed against her breasts. Pretend that the curls between her legs were not tickling his cock.

How long, though, would the remnant cold mask his desire? How long could he rein in his body’s fierce arousal when all he could think about was sinking deep into her ultimate warmth?

“Who would have ever imagined this?” Miss Bonnet said softly, moving her arm tighter around Sebastian’s body, pressing her full breasts against his side.

“What? Do not tell me you never imagined this.” His mouth twitched in want of a smile. “I know I have.”

“Och, well to be truthful, I have to admit, during the drive from Bath, I considered it many times,” she admitted.

Sebastian tensed. He had been only teasing her with his question. And yet, she admitted it without reserve. “Not until we left Bath, did you have … this thought?”

“Och, good heavens, nay,” she replied as if the notion was distasteful. “Why would I?” She raised her thigh higher over his legs.

He squeezed his eyes shut. How could he endure this sweet torture any longer?

“I confess,” she added, “we were hardly three miles from Bath when I first imagined the risk of freezing to death.”

Sebastian opened his eyes and could not restrain the chuckle welling up inside of him.

Miss Bonnet leaned up and peered at his face. “You were speaking of freezing, were you not?”

Sebastian schooled his features. “Of course, I was.”

Miss Bonnet turned to lie down again, pausing briefly as she did so. “I only wondered because of your … tent.” She glanced down, and he followed her gaze.

Gorblimey.
His engorged cock was standing straight out from his body beneath the blankets … exactly like a tent pole. “I beg your pardon, Miss Bonnet.” He swallowed. “It is morning.”

“Oh, is that it?” He glimpsed a smile on her
mouth as she lay down on her side, this time with her back against him. “I thought you fancied me.”

“Well, I … um … I—” Yes, he did, but she was his ward’s teacher. He could hardly admit that he would like nothing more than to bury himself inside of her that very moment.

“It is still very early. I think it advisable if we sleep for a while and store our strength. The sun will surely warm the air, and perhaps we can venture from our blankets then and figure out some means for rescue.”

“Very good, Miss Bonnet.” Sebastian closed his eyes, but his wicked mind imagined her full breasts bouncing as he thrust into her.

That image made him harder still, the skin of his shaft stretched painfully taut. He could not lie there, beside her like that. He needed to stop this throbbing ache, and yet he could not seek relief.

Withdrawing his hand from the warmth, he angrily palmed his erection down through the blankets. A pained gasp hissed through his clenched teeth.

Miss Bonnet rolled over, facing him again. He hurriedly slid his hand from his erection and held his breath, willing it to relent. “I beg your pardon.”

Suddenly, he felt her soft hand move beneath the
blankets and grip his member. His eyes flashed open, and he saw that she was looking intently into his eyes.

“Miss Bonnet—”

“Siusan.” Her hand slid down to his base, then back up, palming then ringing his crown. “The morning had nothing to do with this. But I did.” Her hand tightened around his shaft and mercifully pumped him twice, three times.

Damn it all, this is worse.
It only made him want to have her more.

She looked up at him, moistening her lips with her tongue as she continued to move her hand.

“Siusan, I want to—oh, Christ.” He cupped her face in both hands and angled her mouth to his, kissing her harder than he meant to.

When he lifted his mouth from hers, she pressed her lips down upon his, resuming their kiss. Ringing his crown with her fingers, she concentrated her touch, her movements,
there.
Bloody hell, he could not take it any longer.

He turned and rolled on top of her, making her release him. Sebastian wedged his knees between her thighs as he pinned her with his gaze. “I need you, Siusan. I have to be with you.
Now.”

She stared back into his eyes, then cupped his cheeks and kissed his lips with a stirring passion
that matched his own. Her thighs opened wider, and she wriggled lower, until his marble-hard erection touched her moistness.

He thrust into her, burying himself to the hilt. Gasping with pleasure, she spasmed and jerked, her body tightened with passionate force around him. He pumped into her, lost in the pleasure of her softness, of her scorching heat.

Slipping his hand between them, his circled her core, sending her into a fierce, bucking climax. He circled again, quieting her moan with his mouth.

She nipped at his lips as she clutched him to her, urging him forward.

Semen welled at his base. He tried to pull back, but Siusan wrapped her legs around his back and held tight. “No!”

But it was too late.

He pounded deep into her sheath. He pumped forcefully into her, then collapsed atop her, panting.

His head was throbbing again from the exertion, but as his heart slowed, somewhere in the recesses of his mind he recalled the one other time in his life when he hadn’t been able to stop. Hadn’t wanted to.

Soft, silken thighs wrapping around his back, holding him inside of her.

Devil take me.
The library. The night of the gala.

Could she be the woman he’d been searching for these weeks?

He lifted his head and gazed down into Miss Bonnet’s drowsy eyes. “Siusan,” he whispered. “Who are you—really?”

S
iusan shuddered inwardly. Somehow, Lord Wentworth had realized she was not the person she claimed to be. Thankfully, though, he hadn’t yet discovered that she was Lady Siusan Sinclair … hiding in Bath to avoid crossing paths with another man, the Duke of Exeter.

How long could she conceal this? Word of her world in London had already come creeping into Bath in the guise of an
on-dit
columnist. Already her untrustworthy employer knew too much,
enough to force Siusan into leaving Bath the instant she returned from Clover Hall.

That is, if they ever arrived at all.

“I am Siusan, your ward’s teacher.” She reached out and caressed his forehead, carefully avoiding the red-and-blue bump at his hairline. “I fear your injury is looking worse. Does your head ache? Are you feeling light-headed or nauseous? How do you feel, Lord Wentworth?”

He caught her wrist and drew it from his head. “Call me Sebastian. After all we have been through together, rattling titles seems wholly unnatural.”

She blinked at him, worried that he would assail her with another string of questions.

He lowered his head. “I am sorry, Miss Bonnet … Siusan. I know this cannot make sense to you. Memories, like flashes of lightning, keep appearing in my head, and I cannot ignore them.”

Siusan shifted against him, gulping back the ball of nerves rising in her throat. “W-what sort of memories? And, are you sure that is what they are? Perhaps they are glimpses of dreams. You were struck in the head with such force that you lost your senses for a long while.”

“They are not dreams. The flashes are real. I do not know how I know, but I do.” He gazed upon her. “You and I were making love.”

“Aye.” She turned her gaze away, feeling somewhat embarrassed. “Well, we … did.”

“I do not mean now—
before.”
He turned her face toward him, forcing her to meet his gaze. “Shards of memories keep coming back. Not always visions. Physical sensations. Emotions. I know you cannot understand this.”

“Sebastian.” Siusan’s cheeks heated. “When you awoke this morning, lying with me as you were, you asked me if we made love.”

“And you told me we had not.” His eyes began to squint with growing confusion.

“I was not being entirely truthful.” She bit into her lower lip. “During the night, we touched, kissed, caressed each other most intimately. And, we very nearly made love. I do not know why. It was as though we were driven to do it. Aye, we were unclothed, but what compelled us went far deeper than that.”

“You are right. Though I cannot explain why we were so driven.”

“We were nearly frozen to death.” Siusan angled her face to look at Sebastian. “I believe it was because we both feared death … and were grasping for life. Does that make sense to you?”

“Indeed, it does.” Sebastian pondered her theory for a moment more. “Several members
of my family died unexpectedly, tragically.” He stared upward, instead of at her, his eyes blank as though lost in memories of the past. “Their deaths … well, they changed my life in ways you cannot imagine.”

Siusan’s head lolled back, and she peered upward too. “My mother died when I was but a wee lass. And in a blink, nothing was ever the same again. So, aye, I do understand what you mean.” She turned her head to the side to look at him. “As the reality of death loomed over us, we had to fight it. What is more life-affirming than making love?”

He turned his head to look at her, caressing her cheek with the tips of his fingers. “Siusan, when we made love moments ago, it had nothing to do with fear of death.” A trace of a smile touched his lips. “It was undeniable attraction. Passion. Emotion.
Need.”
Suddenly, the smile fell away, and his eyes widened as if something occurred to him. “Before, when we were about to make love, why did we stop? You didn’t mention why.”

Shame forced Siusan to bow her head against his chest. “I stopped you … the moment I realized you did not know who I was. I knew then that you had not recovered from the blow even though you were conscious and lively.”

He turned her face to his. It was different when he stared into her eyes then. Almost as though he was seeing her in a new shaft of light.

“I will tell you the truth.” She swallowed deeply before making her admission. “I wanted to be with you, Sebastian, wanton as this may sound to you.”

Still he said nothing, but only peered intently at her.

Siusan knew there was no need to lie any longer. She had shamed herself freely and should admit it in the same manner. “Though we constantly argue, and can agree on nothing at all, I have felt a great esteem for you since the moment we met at the Upper Rooms. I daren’t attempt to explain an attraction of such strength.”

“Siusan … there is something more. Something that greatly confuses me.” Sebastian set his large hand on her shoulder and drew her tight against him. He didn’t say anything more for a long while. “When I said we had made love before … I … damn it all … this cannot be and will sound totally daft to you, but I must say it.”