CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“FRANCESCA…” Her name shimmered with hunger and hope on his tongue, and he wrapped his arms around her, lifting her up.
He kissed her hungrily, desperately, and Francesca clung to him with equal fervor, returning kiss for kiss, her hands digging into his jacket. He was her anchor in a maelstrom of emotions and sensations. The creator of her hunger and, at the same time, the only one who could ease it.
Untutored and clumsy with need, she moved her hands over his shoulders and up into his hair, desire increasing with every touch, driven by the awareness that it was not enough. She knew that it was his flesh she wanted to explore, his bare skin that her fingers trembled to touch. With a brazenness heretofore unknown to her, she slipped her hand beneath the edge of his jacket. The silk of his waistcoat was slick and cool beneath her fingers, and the texture of it sent tendrils of desire twisting down through her, but that was not enough, either.
She wanted to touch him, feel him. Most of all, she wanted to have his hands on her.
Sinclair set her down and reached back to pull off his jacket, flinging it carelessly to the floor. Francesca undid the buttons of his waistcoat, fumbling a little in her haste and hunger. He ripped at his carefully arranged neckcloth and tossed it in the general direction of his jacket, following it an instant afterward with his waistcoat.
He pulled her to him then as if he could wait no longer and pressed his mouth into hers. Francesca, no longer restricted by his outer garments, ran her hands over his back and chest. She could feel the heat of his skin through the thin lawn of his shirt, but still she wanted more. Bunching his shirt up in her hands, she tugged until it came free of his breeches, and she slid her hands up under the cloth onto his bare skin.
She felt his flesh twitch beneath her touch, felt the heat that flooded through him. She rubbed her hands over his back, then trailed them across it lightly, her fingernails barely scraping over his skin, testing and exploring, now digging in, now tracing the faintest of swirling patterns upon it.
His breath hissed in sharply, and Francesca felt a tremor run through him. He dug his hands into her hair, sending pins popping loose and curls tumbling, and he kissed his way down her throat, lingering on the tender white flesh. His fingers went to the back of her dress, and he let out a low curse as the row of tiny pearl-like buttons impeded him.
Francesca could not hold back a chuckle, and he raised his head, eyes glinting with a mixture of amusement, frustration and hunger.
“You find that funny, eh?” he mock-growled.
“I find it very familiar,” she returned, and then reached out to unfasten the ties of his shirt. “Much better to have these, I think.”
His only reply was a murmur as he returned to kissing her neck, moving up this time to lay kisses in a line along her jaw up to her ear. His lips grazed her earring as they moved along the curve of her ear.
He paused, then once again lifted his head, narrowing his eyes as he looked at the earring. He traced his thumb across the jewel. “You are wearing the earrings I gave you.”
Francesca blushed, feeling suddenly embarrassed. “Yes.”
Rochford looked into her eyes, his gaze searching. She could not read his expression, and a prickle of unease crept up her back. What if the earrings reminded him of the rift between them, the anger and resentment he must have felt when she broke off their engagement? What if he thought she was presuming too much?
But he only smiled and said, “They are lovely on you.”
He turned his head to look at her wrist, where the bracelet lay, then lifted her arm and placed a soft kiss upon her skin just above the jewels. Francesca felt her pulse jump beneath his mouth, betraying her.
Rochford traced his finger across the bottom of her throat. “You need something there to match them, don’t you think?”
Before she could protest, he bent and kissed the vulnerable hollow of her throat. Francesca’s eyes fluttered closed, and she hoped her knees would not give way. Funny, how one tender little gesture like that could turn her insides to wax.
“Sinclair…” She smoothed her hand over his hair. “Oh, Sin.”
His mouth left a hot trail up the side of her neck, and he nuzzled her ear, sending shivers through her. He murmured her name, his voice husky with desire.
He had never been like this with her before, she thought—never so bold, so tempting…so hungry. Desire fountained in her in response, hot and swift. She slipped her hands beneath the edges of his open shirt and slid them outwards, exploring the ridged muscles and the smooth skin with its roughening of hair. Her fingertips found the small, hard masculine nipples and circled them.
He made a noise low in his throat, and his mouth came back to claim hers. His fingers worked at the fastenings of her dress, making short work of the rest of her buttons—Francesca was rather sure that she heard a snap as a button or two popped off, as well as a rip here and there, but she did not care. All that mattered was that now his hands were on her skin, gliding across her back, bringing every inch of her flesh tinglingly alive.
Sinclair pulled her dress down over her arms, and it fell to her feet. He bent to kiss her shoulder, then moved along the hard line of her collarbone, and finally down to the softly swelling mounds of her breasts. Francesca’s breath caught in her throat. Gently he edged down the lace of her chemise, and the movement of the fabric across her delicate skin was a caress. The top ruffle skimmed over her nipple, making it tighten.
His eyes, heavy and dark with desire, were fixed on her breast, watching his fingers follow the path of the cloth. Francesca trembled at the touch of his skin on her nipple, and the bud hardened even more. He traced his fingertip around the rosy button, teasing it, and moisture pooled between her legs in response. The blossoming warmth there startled her, but then he bent and took the fleshy bud into his mouth, and all thought was lost to her.
Francesca moaned, catching her lower lip between her teeth, and the noise seemed to excite him further. He wrapped his arms around her, lifting her up, as he pulled her nipple deeper into his mouth. He sucked at it gently, his tongue circling and caressing, driving the hunger in her ever higher. With each movement of his mouth, the heat deep in her abdomen grew, moist and pulsing, aching for fulfillment. She wanted to wrap her legs around him, to move against him in a way that would have made her blush if she had thought of it at any other time.
Roughly, he dragged down the other side of her chemise and turned his attention to that breast. Francesca had to suppress a whimper, and her fingers dug into his arms.
Finally he let her slide back down his body to the floor, and his hands swept over her buttocks in a parting caress, his fingers digging into the fleshy mounds and pressing her flush against the hard ridge of his desire. With a wantonness that would have shocked her a few weeks ago, Francesca moved her hips, rubbing herself against him, and she smiled with satisfaction at the swift and unmistakable response of his body.
He tugged at the ribbon that fastened her chemise. Stretched as it had been, the bow had tightened, turning into a knot, but after a few seconds struggle, the narrow ribbon ripped, releasing her. Impatiently, he shoved the garment back from her shoulders and down. Stepping out of her slippers, Francesca reached back to untie the ribbons of her petticoat and pantaloons, circumventing the destruction of any further ties at his hand.
Her underclothes slid down to pool at her feet. Sinclair’s eyes moved slowly downward, taking in every inch of her body. Francesca remembered her embarrassment the first time her husband had looked upon her naked body in bed, the urge she had felt to cover herself before him and the impatience with which he had shoved her hands away.
It made the heat rise in her face to stand like this beneath Sinclair’s gaze, but she knew that only a small part of it came from any embarrassment, for her body flamed with desire at the touch of his eyes as surely as if his hands had swept over her.
He shrugged off his opened shirt, and Francesca found herself exploring the naked expanse of his chest with her eyes just as eagerly as he had looked at her. She wanted, she realized with a twinge of surprise, to see even more of him. More than that, she was filled with a yearning to touch him, to kiss and caress him. Something deep within her longed to know him in every possible way, to possess and be possessed by him, to become a part of him.
She watched as he quickly divested himself of his boots, then the rest of his clothes, the throb of her pulse quickening with every garment that slid down his skin. He came to her then, taking her by the hands, and knelt on the floor, pulling her with him. Francesca lay back upon the tangle of her petticoats, her hair spreading out around her like a shimmering golden fan.
She tightened a little, thinking, Now is when it will come—the cold, the indifference, even disgust. This would be the moment when she learned that nothing had changed inside, nothing was different with Sinclair. She would grow stiff, and the warm pleasure in her loins would melt away, and she would know that she had been mad to think that it could end any other way.
Rochford lay on his side next to her, propped up on his forearm, and he gazed down at her, his eyes searching her face. “I always dreamed of making love to you in my bed, of seeing your hair spread out over my pillows.”
He ran his hand across her hair, then brought it back to caress her cheek and throat, saying, “But I want you too much to wait.”
Lowering his head, he kissed her slowly and tenderly, his mouth moving with a gentle lack of haste that was at odds with the words he had spoken. But Francesca sensed the barely leashed passion that lay beneath his actions. It was there in his thrumming pulse, the quick intake of his breath, the searing heat of his skin. She knew that he was restraining himself by force of will, like a dam holding back the floodwaters, tamping down his desire in order to savor the pleasure of each moment.
And all she felt was that same delight. Her body warmed, and the tightness relaxed. There was no trepidation, no anxiety. She was floating on pleasure, reveling in emotions she had never expected to feel.
Francesca trailed her hand up his arm, learning the texture of his skin—the tender skin on the inner side of his elbow, the firmness of muscle beneath his upper arm, the faint coarseness of hair. Her fingertips tingled from touching him, sending tendrils of desire wriggling down through her abdomen. She let her hand stray up onto his shoulder and over his back as far as she could reach.
How could she ever have feared that this would not be wonderful? Yet even as she thought it, she reminded herself that things might change at any moment, that Sinclair would leave off kissing and stroking her and would shove himself between her legs, eager for his fulfillment.
When he lifted his head, she thought it would change then, but he left her mouth only to explore her neck and chest, his lips and tongue tasting and teasing her skin, arousing her more with each kiss. As his mouth moved over her, his hand slid down her body, caressing her in slow, lingering strokes.
Her legs moved restlessly at the touch of his hand, and the ache between her legs grew and pulsed, flooding with passion. His mouth crept over her breast, moving slowly, inexorably toward the nipple, and anticipation grew in her. She waited for him to take the hard bud into his mouth once more, and with each touch of his tongue, his lips, his teeth, the eagerness heightened and swelled until she was taut as a bowstring, her skin damp and her breath rasping in her throat. She dug her fingertips into his shoulders, aware of a primitive urge to rake her fingernails down his back and sink them into the soft flesh of his buttocks.
Then, at last, his mouth closed around her nipple, velvety soft and damp, and he began to suckle, pulling at the sensitive button of flesh with long, hot strokes. Francesca could not hold back a moan of satisfaction, so intense it was almost painful, and her hips moved on the bed of her petticoats.
Answering her unspoken urging, Sinclair’s hand slid up her thigh and over onto the flat plain of her abdomen, circling and inching closer to the thatch of hair between her legs. His fingertips edged into the silky triangle, tangling in the hair, and gliding to the center and down into the slick, heated folds of flesh. Francesca jerked and tried to move away, embarrassed that he should feel the unusual flood of moisture there.
But his searching fingers followed her, gliding insistently over her, pressing into her in a way that made her gasp and dig her heels into the floor. Then his clever fingers were parting and exploring her in the most intimate way, stroking over the supremely sensitive nub of flesh until she was almost wild with hunger, her hips circling and pressing up against his hand. Soft whimpers of passion escaped her lips, and she turned her head to muffle the sounds against his arm.
Something was building inside her, a hard, aching knot of yearning, until she felt, desperately, as if she were going to scream. Then it burst within her, and she did cry out, sinking her teeth in his arm. A tidal wave of pleasure washed through her, and she trembled under the force of it, lost in the pure physical sensation.
She heard him groan, and he rested his head against her chest for a moment, as though fighting for control. And when, at last, she lay limp and languid beneath him, rendered utterly nerveless, he moved over her, parting her legs. She opened her legs to him eagerly, for despite the mind-numbing satisfaction of what she had just experienced, there was still an ache, a hunger that would not be filled until she took him inside her.
But he did not move into her just yet. Instead, propping himself on his elbows, he began a leisurely pleasuring of her other breast, kissing and teasing it, taking the nipple into his mouth and repeating the slow, hard suction. To her amazement, the tension began to rise in her again—if anything, she was more eager this time, knowing what waited at the end.
He pulled back, blowing a soft breath of air upon the damp berry-colored nipple and causing it to prickle and lengthen, and he teased the other nipple between his forefinger and thumb, rolling and gently tugging. The hunger built in her until she was almost sobbing with need.
She moaned his name, and her hands drifted down his back to his buttocks, caressing the fleshy mounds. “Please,” she murmured. “Please…”
He moved into her then, lifting her hips and pressing slowly, steadily into her. She gasped at the sensation as he filled her, shocked by the sense of completion, the wonderful rightness of the joining. Sinclair began to stroke within her, pulling almost out, then thrusting back in, creating an intense, delightful friction that pushed the tension inside her ever higher. Then, once more, she convulsed, and this time she did indulge her primitive desire, raking his back with her nails and digging her fingers into his buttocks.
Sinclair let out a hoarse cry, jerking against her, and they met in a cataclysm of passion. Francesca wrapped her arms and legs around him, clinging to him as the storm engulfed them.
HE WAS A HEAVY WEIGHT upon her, his face pressed into the crook of her shoulder, but Francesca did not mind the pressure. She was so buoyant with joy that she was not sure she would not simply float away otherwise.
She held on to him tightly, reveling in the feel of his body upon hers, his skin hot and damp, his breath tickling her neck.
Tears gathered in her eyes and spilled over, trickling down her face, and she reached up to wipe them away.
“Francesca?” He rolled away from her then, gazing down into her face, a frown forming on his brow. “What is it? Are you crying?”
She nodded, embarrassed, and gulped back her tears.
“I’m sorry.”
“Are you all right? Did I hurt you?”
“No! Oh, no,” she hastened to assure him. “I don’t know why I’m crying—it was just so beautiful.” She began to tear up again, and she dashed the moisture away impatiently with her hand. “Oh, bother…”
He chuckled, his voice rich with satisfaction, and gathered her up in his arms, pulling her back against his chest so that they lay curled together like spoons in a drawer. He nuzzled into her hair and pressed a brief kiss on the back of her neck. “It was beautiful.”
“I have never felt anything like that before. I thought—” She stopped, suddenly realizing that per haps she was giving away too much.
“Never?” There was astonishment in his voice. “You mean…” He paused, then went on thoughtfully, “You mean you never felt—Oh, blast, I cannot think of any genteel way to put it—you never reached satisfaction before?”
She shook her head. Her voice was small as she replied, “No. I know you must find me very odd. And, really, there is no point in talking about it.”
Why had she ever brought this subject up? she wondered, cursing her own thoughtlessness. There was no reason for Sinclair to know about her former coldness. It was bound to make him wonder about her.
“I don’t find you odd at all,” he replied, kissing her hair again. “I find you—” he trailed his hand down her side, following the curves of her waist and hips “—delectable.” He laid another kiss on the point of her shoulder. “What I don’t understand is your late husband.”
“It was so different with him. I—I hated it!” Her vehemence shocked her a little. “I am sorry—I know you must think I’m terrible.” She pressed her lips together, trying to stem the flow of words.
“Of course I don’t think that.” He pulled her even closer into his body, surrounding her with his warmth and strength. “I think Lord Haughston must have been an even greater ass than I realized.”
The words poured out of her now, and she seemed helpless to stop them. “Andrew said that I was cold, an ice princess. I tried not to be, but I could not help it. It was…it wasn’t at all like tonight. I hated for him to touch me. I know I was a terrible wife. I should not have married him. I did not love him. I tried to make myself think I did, but as soon as we were wed, I knew what a dreadful mistake I had made. It was so awkward and—and painful. I cried half my wedding night.” She swallowed, then added lightly, “’Tis no wonder, I suppose, that he found me unappealing. Or that he turned to other women. I made a horrible mess of it all.”
“Stop it,” Sinclair told her crisply. He went up on his elbow, pulling her over onto her back, so that he could look down into her face. “Listen to me. You are a lovely, extremely passionate woman. I detected not the slightest sign of coldness in you. You are utterly desirable, and whatever that fool Haughston told you, there was no fault in you.” He bent and kissed her, hard and fast. “Understand?”
She nodded, a blush creeping along her cheekbones.
He stroked his knuckles along her cheek, his face softening. “I am sorry for your unhappiness. For the pleasure you didn’t know. But I am a base enough fellow that I cannot help but be glad that he never…had this with you.” He smiled, his dark eyes lighting wickedly. “And I am…well, I am quite detestably smug and self-satisfied to know that you found satisfaction with me and not him.”
Sinclair bent to kiss her again. “Furthermore,” he went on, punctuating his words with kisses across her face and down her neck, “I intend to devote a good deal of my time to showing you exactly how lacking you are in coldness.”
A little gurgle of laughter escaped her. “Do you now?”
“Indeed. I shall make it my solemn mission. We shall discover exactly all the things that excite you.” He trailed a finger down her body, skimming over her breasts, smiling a little at the tightening response of her nipples. “It will take some time and effort, I fear, but I think it is my duty to discover each one.”
He bent and brushed a kiss on each hardened point.
“You are a very dedicated man,” Francesca told him.
“I am,” he agreed, his hand drifting lower.
She drew her breath in a little gasp, arching up at the sudden sizzle through her body. Her eyes clouded over in desire as she murmured, “Already?”
“Mmm. I believe so.” His voice turned husky. “I think it is imperative that I begin my research immediately. I would not have it said that I shirked my duty.”
“No…” She sighed on a new wave of pleasure as his fingers sought out the very center of her passion. “We cannot have that.”
He kissed her, and everything else faded from her mind.