Page 18 of A Lyon for Luck
“Later,” he said. “You may touch me at your leisure, but not now. This time should be one-sided… it should be all about you.”
Sliding his hand along the silken length of her leg, he coasted his fingertips back up, skating over her inner thigh until he could touch her intimately. When she gasped, he kissed her once more, swallowing the sound so that only the snapping of the fire and their mingledbreath were the lone sounds in the room.
As he explored her tender flesh, she moved against him, seeking her pleasure with a kind of abandon that ratcheted his own need for her. The intensity of it, the need to possess and claim, was unlike anything he’d ever known. And it was something his mind simply shied away from. He was not yet ready to examine the reasons for it beyond the most superficial of them. To do more was to court disaster. So, instead, he focused on her reactions, her sighs of pleasure, the way she arched into his touch. And when she found her pleasure, when she shivered and clung to him as the release shuddered through her, he knew that the why didn’t matter. What he did know was that no one—not her father nor Pozenby nor anyone else—would take her from him.
He lifted her once again, bearing them on to the floor beneath the hearth, his ancient dressing gown cushioning them as he freed the fall of his breeches and fitted himself between her thighs. She didn’t question or protest, but welcomed him with a kind of trust that, given all she’d endured, was humbling.
Easing into her, feeling the slick heat of her surrounding him, he gritted his teeth, fighting every base urge to simply ease his own passions. Instead, he moved slowly, ensuring that she was with him every step. And when he did reach that ultimate end, she was with him, tumbling once more into blissful release.
Hours later, Daphneawakened once more with the weight of his arm draped across her. His thigh was draped over her, as well, his limbs heavy with sleep. It wasn’t comfortable but it wasn’t uncomfortable. It was merely foreign to her, but it did offer her the opportunityto study him.
Dawn was breaking and dim light filtered through the curtains, casting his features in a complex mixture of shadow and silvery illumination. He wasn’t angelic. No angel, she thought, could ever look so sinful. And he did. His well-chiseled features were enhanced by the growth of dark whiskers that highlighted his sculpted lips. The dark sweep of sooty, black lashes formed perfect crescent moons above cheekbones sharper than the most well-tended knife blade.
“You’re staring,” he muttered, his voice sleep roughened and his lips curving in the barest hint of a smile.
“It’s your fault. You’re too pretty. No one should have the audacity to look like you do after days of arduous travel and…”
“Amorous pursuits?” he queried, opening one eye to peer at her.
Daphne blushed. “Just so. If you were a decent sort, you’d look as haggard as I do at the moment.”
“Haggard,” he said with a laugh. “Hardly. Satisfied. You, my darling bride, look like a woman well satisfied… and it suits you. Just fine.”
Daphne blushed. “Well, I suppose that is a fair assessment of our present situation.”
He pulled her closer to him still, easing her beneath him as he rose above her on his elbows. “And if I am not satisfied? If I am never truly satisfied because wanting you is becoming as natural to me as breathing? What then?”
“Then I suppose we should endeavor to find mutual satisfaction. Don’t you think?”
He didn’t respond with words. Instead, he chose actions that were unmistakable in intent.
Chapter Fourteen
It was theirthird day at Avelynd when word reached them in the form of a simple missive delivered bearing a black-and-gold wax seal. There was no mistaking from whom the familiar stationery had come. Fletcher opened the missive even as Daphne, having recently luxuriated in a bath of heated rainwater, dragged a comb through her damp hair before the fireplace.
“What has she said? Are they still searching for us?” she asked.
Fletcher read it once more to be sure. “There is no they. Only he… and your father has returned to London alone. Lord Pozenby has expired from a seizure of the heart. According to reports from the innkeeper in Nottingham who sent his earthly remains to his next of kin, said seizure was brought on by Pozenby’s own foul temper… We are not hunted. At all. I’m not certain how to feel about that.”
“Why on earth not?”
He shrugged. “Because now we have no reason to continue hiding away here in our little sanctuary… we will have to return to London and deal with business matters.”
“You mean my inheritance,” she said.
“I mean your fortune, yes. And it is that… We may have embarked upon this journey—each of us for our own reasons—to marry and escape our problems, but I don’t want you to think that is the only reason. Your inheritance, Daphne, is the thing that brought us to this point, but it isn’t why I wish to stay. I’d live here like this, just the two of us fending for ourselves until the bailiffs cart everything away, but for one thing.”
“And what is that?”
Fletcher passed her the note, paying particular attention to the way her hands trembled.
Lord and Lady Aldwyn,
I write to inform you of the recent demise of Lord Cecil Pozenby. A seizure of the heart induced by his own discontentment led to his death at the Wellbridge Public House and Inn at Nottingham just two days past. Upon his death, Mr. Reginald Acres returned to London alone and promptly petitioned a suit against you for Criminal Conversation. I’d advise an immediate return to London to manage the situation lest scandal become untenable.
Yours,
Mrs. BDL
