The Widow's Auction (6 page)

Though Justin knew
he'd made the right decision, it cost him a great deal to hold to it. Especially when she stood there looking so lost.

But what she'd told him explained so much. It was no wonder she'd reacted violently to his proposal at the governing board. If he'd been in her place, he'd have done the same.

Unfortunately, it also explained why she worshiped Henry Lamberton. She would never accept another man in Lamberton's place. And who could blame her? What man could replace a real saint?

That must be why she'd participated in the auction instead of just looking for a husband–she didn't
want
a man to replace Lamberton. Except for one night. And Justin couldn't be only that to her, not now that he'd seen how truly rare a woman she was.

“I should take you home,” he said.

He regretted the words when he saw tears leak out from beneath her mask. Bloody hell, he hadn't wanted to make her cry! Not after all she'd endured.

“I-I see,” she stammered. “Now that you realize how very far beneath you I am–”

“Don't be absurd.” It hurt that she could even think that of him. “Your origins have nothing to do with it. If anything, they make me respect you more. Indeed, I respect you too much to take advantage of you when you still have only room for your husband in your heart.”

She blinked at him. “What? You think. . . ” She laughed harshly. “Dear heaven, so that's what this reluctance is all about.” She stepped nearer, her face full of supplication. “Oh, Justin, didn't you understand what I was saying? My marriage wasn't like that at all.”

“Like what?”

“A love match. Yes, I was grateful to my husband for what he did, but–” With a sigh, she glanced away. “Have you ever heard the myth of Galatea and Pygmalion?”

He sifted through the years of his Eton education. “Pygmalion was the one who created a statue of a woman so perfect that he fell in love with it, right?”

She nodded. “He suffered for his love, but Venus took pity on him and turned Galatea into a real woman. Then Pygmalion and Galatea married.”

His eyes narrowed. “You're saying that your husband was Pygmalion, and you were Galatea.”

A bitter smile touched her lips. “Exactly. Except that my Pygmalion hardly ventured beyond adoration of his statue. He had no idea how to be Galatea's husband. All those lovely things you just did. . . the way you touched me and kissed me? Hen–my husband would never have done any of them.”

He couldn't fathom such madness. “Why not?”

She strode up to him, her eyes glittering beneath the mask. “My husband considered that sort of behavior too wicked for his precious creation. Despite all his talk about peasant blood, once he made me into the image of a perfect wife, he didn't want to defile that image in any way.”

Justin stared at her, wanting but hardly daring to believe what she was saying.

She went on relentlessly. “He couldn't avoid committing the actual act of love–not if he wanted to sire a son–but he made it. . . ” She halted, no doubt reluctant to speak of the intimacies of her marriage. Then she went on. “He made it as short and perfunctory as possible. There was no enjoyment, no pleasure, none of those heavenly feelings you gave me. Just a few painful thrusts while he apologized for inconveniencing me.”

“Bloody hell,” he whispered, the truth slamming into him. There were men with such proper ideas, but he'd never guessed Lamberton would be that sort. How could the man have wasted his hours with her in such a stupid fashion?

Though Justin hadn't been much better. When he could have been showing her how wonderful lovemaking between two people could be, he'd been acting like a pompous idiot, ignoring her protests, sure that he knew better.

What a fool he was. “I'm sorry, Bella, I didn't realize–”

“And I thought that was all there was,” she went on as if she hadn't heard him. “I thought that was all I could expect of a husband. Until my friend told me it didn't have to be like that. I was sure she was wrong–that perhaps I was flawed–”

“You're not flawed.” He grabbed her by the shoulders, needing to reassure her, to touch her, now that he knew he could. “You're not flawed in any way.”

“It might be better if I was! Then perhaps you men would stop putting me on a pedestal where I don't belong! I don't
want
to be Galatea anymore, blast it!”

She twisted out of his grip, but he caught her about the waist and tugged her back against his body. When she froze, he pressed his mouth to her ear. “You can't stop being Galatea. It's who you are, whom he made you into. You couldn't return to being that orphan millworker even if you wished to.”

A strangled sob erupted from her, and he went on hastily before she could misunderstand. “But it might not be so bad on that pedestal if you have the right man there with you.”

“Th-the right man?” she echoed.

“Yes.” It was time he showed her what Lamberton had not. She might only want him for tonight, but he'd give her that, no matter what it cost him. It was the least she deserved after risking so much for one wanton night. He lowered his voice to whisper. “If you ask
my
opinion, what Galatea needs is a lover.”

She turned her head to gaze up at him, and the look of hope in her face nearly shattered him. “Where do you suggest I find this lover?”

“Right here.” He cupped her cheek in his hand. “I'd be honored to fill the position.”

“But what if I really am flawed–”

“The only flaw you possess, my darling Bella,” he murmured as he turned her fully to face him, “is a deplorable inability to appreciate how wonderful you truly are.”

A sudden smile broke over her face. “Oh, Justin, you say the sweetest things. Tell me, have you a method for ridding me of my ‘deplorable' flaw?”

“Indeed I do.” Feeling his hunger well up inside him, fierce, undeniable, he pushed the sleeves of her chemise off her shoulders. “What you need is to see yourself through the eyes of a man who
does
appreciate how wonderful you are. Like me, for example.”

She sucked in a shaky breath as he dragged her chemise lower.

“First, there are your breasts.” His voice thickened with need as he exposed them fully. “So beautiful and soft to the touch. I love having them in my mouth.”

Dropping to his knees, he kissed them in turn. “I love tasting them and teasing them and. . . ” He trailed off as he seized one in his mouth, giving free rein to the urges that had plagued him endlessly all night.

But only for a moment. There was more of her he wanted to “appreciate.” Sliding the chemise down farther, he smiled to see her slender waist. Lamberton must have been blind to ignore this angel's delights, to treat her body as something shameful when he should have been worshiping it.

Well, Lamberton's loss was his gain, and he'd make up for the man's stupidity if it took him all night. “Then there's your smooth belly,” he rasped through a throat gone raw with desire. “One day, if you'll give me the chance, I intend to spread this belly with jam and spend an afternoon licking it all off.”

Her skin quivered at his words, but her hands reached to caress his hair, and that was all the encouragement he needed. He kissed her navel, then pressed open-mouthed kisses in widening circles around it, inching lower and closer with every one.

Only after she swayed into him with a moan did he draw back to tug her chemise free of her hips. It dropped to the floor, baring her completely to his gaze.

With a little embarrassed cry, she covered the thatch of hair with her hand.

“Don't,” he commanded. He looked up at her. “I want to see you, darling Bella.”

Though her face grew pink, she nodded and pulled her hand away. “My husband never saw me without clothing,” she said softly. “He told me that nakedness was indecent and. . . and shameful for a lady.”

He felt a surge of anger toward Lamberton, anger mingled with pity. “What about when you made love?”

“He came into the bedchamber in his nightshirt, gave me a kiss, then got into bed. Only after he was under the sheets did he lift my nightshirt and. . . and. . . well. . . you know. . . ”

Without sucking those pretty breasts? Or touching her lovely belly or–“Your husband was insane,” he growled. He unfastened both her garters, then slid her hose down her legs. “Not to take advantage of his right to see these perfect thighs of yours? Bloody insane.”

Stroking up the insides of her legs, he said hoarsely, “You don't know what they do to me–your elegant thighs. I can't help imagining them wrapped about my waist as I drive into your sweetness.”

Her face flamed, especially when he sat back on his haunches and parted her curls with his fingers to expose the pink flesh beneath. “And as for
this
sweetness here. . . ” he began.

“Justin, you shouldn't–”

He ignored her protest. “
This
is the holy altar at which I long to worship. It's so tender and dainty and eager for me.”

Then he leaned forward and planted a kiss right on it. She jerked back with a little gasp of surprise, but he caught her hips to hold her still. “Oh, no, Galatea,” he said, smiling up at her, “how can I be your lover if I can't worship every part of you?”

She looked uncertain, but he could already feel her relaxing in his hands. “Justin, are you sure–”

“Shhh,” he murmured, then kissed her there again. But this time he used his tongue and his lips to caress her sweet petals, delighting in how the swollen flesh grew warm and fluid beneath his mouth.

Good God, her scent inflamed him–ripe with musk and hinting at lemon oil. It made him devour her, thrusting his tongue deep inside in his urgency to know more of her.

She shivered and shook, yet made no move to prevent him or chide him for his scandalous behavior. Her hands left his hair to knead his shoulders, and the mewling sounds she made in her throat turned his cock to iron. His mouth was ravenous on her now, and he could feel the heat build in her body, between her legs, beneath his hungry lips.

When at last she convulsed and cried out his name, he thought he'd come off in his breeches right there.

He needed to be inside her. He couldn't wait another moment. So while her knees were still buckling, he rose to sweep her up in his arms and head for the bed.

Isobel reveled in Justin's fierce, eager hunger. Like her very own Roman conqueror, he carried her off, his eyes dark with the intent to plunder and vanquish and mold her to his will.

She was quite eager to be molded after the way he'd sent her soaring just now. Why, her tender parts still thrummed from the excitement, and he hadn't even put himself inside her yet.

As he set her down on the bed, she stretched out to her full length, feeling languid and soft and all woman. He stepped back, and she propped herself up on one elbow to watch him drag his shirt off.

How odd that it didn't bother her in the least to recline here entirely naked. But he'd banished any shame in her body that Henry had tried to drum into her. He'd certainly banished any reluctance to see him scandalously bare his chest.

Such a fine chest it was, too! She hadn't seen a shirtless male since her girlhood in the mill, where the proprieties were rarely observed. Back then she'd been too young and tired to care what the boys looked like, but she did remember that their bony and grimy chests bore no resemblance to this wide expanse of male muscle, all sculpted and lean.

“Are you sure about this, Bella?” he asked, his hands pausing on his breeches buttons.

Her gaze flicked down to his bulging breeches, and curiosity overcame any lingering apprehension. “Oh, Lord, yes,” she whispered.

A faint smile graced the firm mouth that had just sent her into ecstasies. “Like what you see, do you?”

She blushed, and turned her head. “I-I'm sorry. I didn't mean to–”

“There's nothing to apologize for.” Catching her by the chin, he turned her back around. “I like having you look at me.” Her gaze met his to find it smoldering with heat. He added in a ragged whisper, “I'd like it even better if you'd touch me, too.”

Her heart knocked madly against her ribs. Sitting up, she ran her hands over his chest, over the muscles flexing beneath rough, hairy skin, over the taut belly that trembled beneath her questing fingers.

“My husband never let me touch him,” she murmured. “I was supposed to lie still. He said if I touched him, he might do something awful.”

“Like make love to you as you deserve?” he bit out. “Forget your husband. Forget every stupid thing he ever told you.” He shoved his breeches off to bare drawers that strained with the fullness of his arousal. “Granted, there are men with such absurd notions about lovemaking, but I'm not one of them.”

Opening his drawers, he slid quickly out of them, and her heart stopped. His shaft sprang free, long and rigid and arrogant–a conqueror's lance, to be sure. And she'd wager it was larger than Henry's had been, though she couldn't be sure since she'd only felt Henry's. She didn't know whether to be frightened or intrigued by Justin's size. If Phoebe were right, then her discomfort during lovemaking hadn't been related to the size of the blasted thing.

But if Phoebe were wrong. . . 

“If you belonged to me, darling Bella,” Justin rasped, “I'd take every opportunity to have your hands on my bare flesh.”

“Like now?” she whispered a little nervously.

“God, yes,
now
. I'd like nothing better.”

Reaching out, she stroked his silky thickness tentatively with her fingers. “Y-you'll have to show me how to give you pleasure. I don't know anything.”

“You know plenty, almost too much for a man's sanity. But I'd love it if you'd grip it in your hand.” Closing her fingers around him, he said, “Here, like this.”