Chapter 17
In all her life, Eleanor had never felt anything like the incredible intensity she felt now in her husband’s embrace. Everything was well. . . More. The feel of his hands on her body was not just a touch. It was a fire brand. The scent of him was an intoxicating potion. His lips? His lips were temptation itself.
His eyes upon her scorched her very being.
His voice caused her stomach to coil in the most delicious and shocking of ways, racing to a place between her legs she’d never contemplated much before.
And his kiss, that light touch, it was heaven. But instinctually, she knew there was more to be had, and now she was giving herself permission to take it. This was different than what she’d done before. There was nothing perfunctory about it. There was no one-sidedness either. He clearly expected her to kiss him in turn.
So, as she angled her head and held on to him, her mouth opened.
When his own mouth came down upon hers, it was still soft. But now, it gave and took, teasing her, until she, too, was kissing him back. Kissing with a desire she’d never known she even truly possessed. It was both upsetting and revelatory. How could she not have known this existed between a man and a woman?
Without Margaret’s convincing, she never would have considered it possible.
Now, it was Tony who had persuaded her that she’d been mistaken. Marriage could be for pleasure, if not love.
Without even having to think about it, she met the rhythm of his mouth. And when his tongue teased along her lips, she shook. Not with fear, but need.
Need for him. Need for the beautiful man who had tied her tongue on their first meeting, shocking her to her very core. Now, she knew what that feeling had been when she’d laid eyes on him crossing the room. Desire. It had been intense, unrepentant desire. A desire she could not give in to.
But now she could and she would.
Her breasts tingled as they brushed his hard chest and she shoved any misgivings aside. She had to make him hers. She would not lose this new life or new safety, no matter what it required of her. She could dance this strange dance of intimacy with him without putting her heart at risk again. Without risking pain. The pleasure of their bodies would be enough. It had to be.
When his tongue slipped into her mouth, she opened to him, letting her body lead. Each kiss drove her further and further away from the prison of her thoughts.
Until her eyes were closed and a moan tore from her throat.
Tony was a maker of magic and his mouth was seducing her as nothing ever had before. No, not just his mouth. Him. The way he had looked at her. The way he was concerned about her. The way he sought out small ways to please her.
He slid his hands along her back, firm and possessive.
She arched into him and he groaned.
He tore away from the kiss.
“Did I do something wrong?” she asked, alarmed, having no guidance or knowledge in what to do to create his goodwill.
Passion stared back at her and his chest was rising and falling as if he’d been running. “Not at all, but I want to touch you.”
“You are touching me,” she pointed out, laughing at the silliness of his statement.
He groaned, dropping his forehead to rest against the top of her head. “So I am. But I should like to touch you all over.”
He lifted his chin then, gazing down at her. “May I?”
Her eyes flared. “All over?”
“Indeed.”
“I assume you will enjoy doing so,” she replied, feeling a wave of uncertainty. No one had ever touched her thusly before. It was difficult to let go of the control she had always known.
“Enjoy is not powerful enough,” he countered, his voice rough. “But I think you will enjoy it, too.”
This was what she had brought him to her room for. To know him as a wife ought, no matter how strange it felt. Margaret had told her, if she’d but trust Tony then all would be well in this. And Margaret had never set her wrong in the past.
“Touch me, then,” she whispered.
That passion in his eyes burned brighter and he kissed her again. Then, much to her shock, he kissed her temple and slowly moved to her throat.
Instead of the male ravishment that she’d expected, he was slow, so very slow and tender.
The feelings that these particular kisses induced caused her to grab tightly to his arms. It was. . . It was indescribable, the hot feel of his breath, the touch of his lips, upon her neck.
She tilted her head back, allowing him to pursue his purpose. He kissed along the column of her throat until he was playing homage to her clavicles.
“You are so very beautiful,” he whispered, his breath teasing her skin until she felt she might not be able to bear it.
“Silly mon,” she scoffed.
He looked up from his ministrations. “Eleanor, you are beautiful.”
She bit down on her lower lip. She knew she was passing fair. But beautiful?
He swept his hand up her back then over her ribs until he cupped her breast.
She jolted at this, but then her entire body melted into him, ready from his kisses.
Gently, he massaged her curves then he said, “I’d like to remove your gown.”
Swallowing, she nodded.
His deft fingers worked the ties of the garment. He slid it down her shoulders exposing her simple, nearly transparent chemise.
Bending his head, he kissed her breast through the fabric, a soft, exquisite torture.
He let out a rough groan. “We must cease.”
“Why?” she asked, feeling pleasantly drunk and completely alive.
“Because, I want to bed you, Eleanor,” he growled temptingly. “You asked for a kiss and I want to make you mine. But it is too soon. You don’t want this.”
“I want you to do it,” she whispered, almost to her own astonishment. For before, this was out of necessity. Now? Now it was, indeed, what she longed for. “I think we should. I want to be yours, you see.”
And she did. She wanted to be secure in her relationship with him. With a man like Tony, this was what that meant.
His eyes widened, half with hope, half with doubt. “You cannot mean that. We barely know each other and this must be. . . Very new.”
“How many young brides go to bed barely knowing their husbands?” she challenged. “Most. I willna mind. And I think I know you far better now than I did before. I’ve seen what kind of mon you truly are.”
He gazed down at her, weighing his words, but then he shook his head. “I want your first time to mean something. Do you?”
She frowned. “Can it? Aside from assuring my purity?”
“It can,” he affirmed. “I want you to trust me when you let me bed you.”
“You’re not going to stay?” she asked, distressed. How could she have failed already?
He arched a brow. “Oh no, dear wife. We are going to do as you requested. We are going to become better acquainted, even if it kills me. Now, come to bed.”
Confusion pooled inside her. “I thought you said—”
He lifted a finger to her lips. “I just want to hold you,” he said before cupping her cheek.
“H-hold me?”
“May I?”
She nodded, but a force deep within her caused her to be bold.
“You asked me what I want,” she stated, amazed at her own boldness. “You’ve asked time and time again, insisting you’ll listen.”
He gazed at her, stunned. “I have.”
Purposefully, she stood. Her gown and its thin straps tumbled from her waist, swooshing to the floor. She stood in the pool of fabric, nothing but her thin chemise shielding her body before the fire. Her fingers shook as she raised them to the tie at her breasts.
His rapt gaze followed her every move and she noticed the way his hands tightened on the armrests of the chair.
She tugged and the string loosened the neck until the thin fabric slid over her shoulders then dropped in a pool at her feet beside the gown.
Lifting her chin, she said with as much determination as she could muster, “This is what I want.”
Then, feeling more powerful and more full of nerves than she’d ever felt, certainly more than the previous night, she walked to the bed, climbed atop the counterpane and waited, praying for a very different outcome than her previous attempt.
Her heart hammered in her chest as she prayed, prayed he would join her this time. That she had not behaved the fool.
His boots thudded over the floor and he stood before her beside the bed. Only the glow of the fire illuminated them.
Silently, he slipped his evening jacket from his hard body. Deliberately, he tugged his cravat free, dropping it to the floor.
His long, strong fingers undid the tie at his own throat.
She watched transfixed, unable to believe that this sculpted, god of a man was her husband. A man like Tony was not the sort of man she’d ever thought to know intimately. A man who was synonymous with pleasure.
He worked his shirt up and out of his tight breeches. Then in one solid tug, he whipped it over his head and let it whisk to the floor.
Making short work of his boots, something that would have seemed awkward with any other man, his gaze never left her. His hungry stare seemed to be speaking to her without words.
She shivered under its intensity.
Quietly, he sat, his weight denting the feather mattress.
She dug her fingers into the soft counterpane. It felt as if every inch of her skin ached for his touch. Such a thing seemed impossible but there it was.
As if he’d heard the call of her body, his fingertips touched her forearm. Slowly, he trailed them up to her shoulder and then oh so terribly slowly he dragged them down between her breasts, along her rib cage then down her stomach.
“Do you trust me to please you?” he asked.
She nodded, unable to speak now. Afraid she would sound a complete ninny in her innocence.
Those fingers of his burned with hot fire along her body, awakening it, teasing it to life. Taking his time, he touched her hips, then her belly then lower.
She tensed and he paused. “Eleanor?”
“Dunna stop,” she instructed, though it took all her will to say such words given what he was doing.
Tony swung himself up onto the bed and lay down beside her. The heat and breadth of his body was powerful and deeply appealing.
Tenderly, he dipped his head and kissed her again.
As he took her mouth in a slow dance, his hand slid between her thighs skimming her most intimate place.
For one moment, her thighs tensed and then she forced herself to relax. This was what she wanted. And much to her amazement, she discovered her body wished it even more than her mind.
When he circled his fingers, her hips lifted off the bed, quite unbidden and a strange sound of longing passed her lips.
His fingers circled and teased, slipping into her wet heat.
She gasped, half-horrified, half-awed that her body was capable of so much sensation.
A foreign sensation began to build deep within her and she grabbed hold of him. The wildness of it began to overtake her, but he did not relent in his kiss or his touch.
Her thoughts flew from her mind then and she gave herself over to his mastery. When he slipped one finger inside her, she bucked against him and her entire world exploded into wave after wave of pleasure.
Shaking, she could barely fathom the power of it. As her body relaxed, he slid his own frame over her, his hips between her thighs. He eased his breeches down and off his legs.
The slight pressure of his sex pressed against her ready folds and she stared up at him with wonder.
“It will hurt,” he advised, his voice rough.
“I know,” she whispered, yet she clasped her arms around him, desperate to hold him close, to make all this real. To hold on to him physically, even if she could not emotionally.
Then he was thrusting inside her.
It stretched and a searing pain shot through her as he rocked forward.
He held her gently, even as he thrust into her body. Much to her relief, the pain began to ease as he slipped a hand between their bodies and touched that spot that he’d found.
Once again, as he rocked his body against hers, she felt herself being tossed upward, higher and higher. The sound of his wild need only drove her further until, at last, he shuddered against her and cried out her name.
Just as he did, her body arched against his. And out of sheer instinct, she lifted her legs, wrapping them about his waist, letting herself be possessed once again by pleasure.
As he rested his forehead to hers, she held on to him, amazed. She was in a new country now and, much to her shock, she could not wait to discover it.