lara rested her hands on the scrolled wooden railing of the balcony off her bedchamber, tilted her head back to feel sun warming her skin, and leaned into the solid presence of the man she loved at her back. Birds chirped, the air was redolent with freshly mown grass and the pink roses blooming in the gardens below.
She inhaled deeply, eyes closed. “Is there anything sweeter than a Virginia summer?” she asked Julian on a pleased sigh.
He pressed his wicked mouth to her throat just below her ear and gently nibbled at her skin. “You are sweeter than a Virginia summer, my love. Far sweeter.” He nipped her ear lobe and then traced his tongue over the shell.
An answering heat slid straight to the pulsing ache at her core. They’d just made love not an hour ago, and even though she’d restored her gown and hair to a semblance of order, she was already contemplating luring him back to bed. It was their honeymoon, after all.
A sigh of approval hummed from her as she inclined her head to grant him better access. “Perhaps you ought to keep tasting me to see where I’m sweetest,” she suggested with cheeky intent.
“With pleasure, Clara mine.” He kissed her jaw, her cheek, nuzzled into her throat, his tongue playing over her with delicious, insistent little strokes. “Tell me where I shall taste you. Here?” He found the sensitive dip where her neck and shoulder met, tasting it as well. “Or perhaps here?”
Anticipation sparked through her, making her nipples tighten into hard points against her corset. How she loved their easy familiarity with each other. Julian had proven himself a tender and attentive husband as well as lover. He listened to her, was patient and kind even to her bear of a father, he made her laugh with his wit, and simply put, he made her melt. Everywhere.
She found the small buttons hidden on the front of her bodice and slipped the first few from their moorings. “I had somewhere else in mind. Somewhere…lower.”
“Ah, I know just the spot.” His low drawl sounded simultaneously proper and debauched.
A thrill went down her spine. The moment he came into a room, looked at her, touched her, existed, she wanted him. She couldn’t touch him, smell his divine masculine scent, or look upon him without feeling an ache deep inside her. A need to be filled and claimed. And it seemed that the feelings only grew stronger with each passing day. Each day she loved and wanted him more than the last. She’d never imagined it possible, but it was true.
“What spot is that?” she asked, feeling like a wanton and not knowing even a trace of shame for it.
She expected to feel her skirts rising. Instead, he took her hand in his and brought it to his lips. Her head swiveled to the side to drink in the sight of him, bronzed and dark and beautiful. Virginia agreed with him. She was so very happy that she’d allowed him to persuade her to spend a month here for a belated honeymoon. He’d rented a grand old home in the countryside that was only half a day’s drive from Richmond. His sisters were thriving in London under the clever tutelage of Lady Bella in preparation for Alexandra’s comeout. It was nothing but the two of them and a handful of staff, and Clara reveled in the chance to be unfettered and free and simply enjoy married life.
After their honeymoon was at an end, they would travel by train to New York, where they’d meet with Levi Storm and his wife Lady Helen Storm. Julian had been keen on creating his own source of wealth so that his estates would never again fall into ruin. He was partnering with Levi in a company that would manufacture steam turbines, set up with the help of Clara’s father. It seemed that everything—all the pieces of their puzzle—had fallen together.
Staring at her now in that rakish way he had that never failed to undo her, Julian ran his tongue over one of her knuckles. “Here.” He licked again.
Moisture pooled between her thighs. Her husband could make even the most innocent part of her body into a seduction. And she loved him all the more for it. “That wasn’t the spot either.”
He sucked the tip of her finger into his mouth before releasing it. His gaze was like electricity sparking straight through her. “Here?”
“Anywhere,” she confessed. “Surely you know by now. I’m helpless to resist you.”
He pressed a passionate kiss to the top of her hand. “That’s what I like to hear, little dove.”
With her free hand, she tunneled her fingers through his thick, dark hair. How she loved this man. “You already knew that, my lord.”
He kissed her inner wrist, his grasp curling lightly over her. His touch sent a fresh wave of longing through her. “You could tell me every hour of every bloody day and I’d never grow tired of it.”
She smiled, realizing in that moment that she was the happiest she’d ever been, at ease on a summer day with her husband in her arms and the sun shining down upon them. All was right in the world. “What if I told you every minute? Perhaps you’d grow weary of it then,” she teased.
With a growl, he spun her to face him, trapping her between the balcony’s railing and his body. He cupped her cheek and fitted his mouth over hers, taking her lips in a possessive kiss. He tasted of tea and sin and of their earlier lovemaking.
When he tore his mouth from hers, they were both breathless. “You could tell me every minute, love. I still wouldn’t mind as long as you’re mine and as long as you love me.”
Her gaze traveled over his handsome, beloved face. “You know the answer to both.”
“Tell me,” he commanded.
Her smile softened. “I love you, and I’m helpless to resist you.”
He gave her a roguish grin. “You didn’t seem helpless to resist me earlier when I found you at your correspondence. Tell me, what letter had you frowning so ferociously until I eventually convinced you to join me in bed? You never did say.”
“Nor did you ask.” She swatted his chest playfully. “You were far too busy tempting me away from my letters. But if you must know, the letter was from my dear friend Bo.”
Julian groaned. “Not the troublesome one.”
“She’s not troublesome,” Clara defended her best friend. “She has a good heart. We’ll always be bonded by terrorizing our enemies at finishing school. She’s an original. True, sometimes she gets herself into scrapes, but it isn’t as if I couldn’t say the same for myself. Bo is bold and unique and…”
“Troublesome,” her husband finished for her. “I’ll be forever in her debt for sending you to me, but my gratitude aside, I can see her for the hoyden that she is.”
“She isn’t a hoyden.” Clara frowned at him. “She wrote me with news of the inroads she’s been making on behalf of our Lady’s Suffrage Society.”
Clara and Bo had decided to create a group of ladies who could advocate for women receiving their rightful vote. It went against the grain of the ton elite, but Clara didn’t give a damn and neither did Bo. They both believed firmly that women should be treated as man’s equal, in law and deed, and they meant to do something about it.
Thus far, they hadn’t accomplished much. Their membership was thin at best. But when Clara returned to London, they would begin recruiting. If enough women banded together, they could accomplish something. She just knew it.
“Inroads?” Julian arched a brow, his interest piqued. He had encouraged her to take action about her beliefs. Creating a group with influence that could potentially sway parliament had been his idea.
“Yes,” she said on a satisfied sigh as he kissed her neck again and his fingers found the buttons she’d already undone on her bodice. “An MP is sweet on her, and she hopes to influence him. He’s the younger brother of the Duke of Bainbridge.”
“Bainbridge is an arrogant, pompous, unyielding stone wall of a man,” Julian said against her skin, his tone suggesting he found the notion humorous. “I doubt very much he’d allow someone as free-spirited as Lady Bo to bend his brother’s ear.”
Clara thought of what her friend had said about the duke. Frigid as Wenham Lake ice. Disapproving of everyone save his superior self. “She’s been invited to the family home, so it couldn’t be as bad as all that. It’s some sort of country house event, or so I gather.”
“Good luck to her. Or perhaps I ought to say good luck to Bainbridge.” Julian made short work of the remainder of the buttons on her bodice, peeling it open. In another breath, he’d loosened her corset and tugged it and her chemise down, allowing her breasts to spill free into the humid summer air. “Either way, I’ve more pressing concerns at the moment.”
She moaned and arched into him as he sucked a nipple. “More pressing concerns? What could they possibly be?” As she asked him the question, she slid her hand down his taut belly to the rigid protrusion of his cock beneath his trousers. She cupped him, feeling an answering ache between her thighs.
He caught her nipple in his teeth before releasing it with a lusty sound. “I have a feeling you already know, Lady Ravenscroft.”
“Do I, Lord Ravenscroft?” She attempted a look of innocence. “Perhaps you ought to show me, just to be certain.”
In one swift motion, he scooped her up in his arms. “With pleasure.”
She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him soundly, her heart bursting with happiness. “I love you, Julian,” she said again, for she couldn’t speak the words enough, it seemed. She never wanted him to forget. He was a man so very much in need of love and so very worthy of it too.
“I love you too, little dove,” he said against her lips. “More than you know. Now, if I could only find the spot where you taste the sweetest.”
“It may require some research, my love,” she told him with mock seriousness.
He grinned down at her as he carried her back inside. “Never let it be said I’m not an excellent student.”
And he proceeded to show her just how excellent he was.