A Desperate Wager (22 page)

Nate opened Sarah’s bedchamber door slowly, afraid to wake her if she had already fallen asleep. A candle still burned on the bedside table and his wife lay on her side, her hair braided, one hand under her cheek as she gazed at the flickering flame. Her eyes were puffy from crying and her nose was still red from her illness, but she gave him a wan smile as he walked over and perched himself on the bed beside her.

“
I feel as if I should have some wonderful words of comfort that will make everything all right. But I am afraid I have none. I can only say that I shall be here for you if you want to talk. It does get better, but then you know that too.”

The large clock in the hall struck two o’clock. The earl had died about four hours earlier. It had taken rather a long time to organise things and leave Sarah’s family home. She had been terribly brave, only crying when it became obvious that her father really had passed on and that the old man had indeed breathed his last.

“Nate, will you sleep with me tonight?”

“
If you wish.”

“
I do. Will you… Will you make love to me?”

“
Oh!” Nate stood and pulled his robe around himself tighter as if afraid of her. “I do not think… Sarah, you have been ill, you father died a few hours ago. You are in no state to…”

“
Please, Nate.” Her eyes were wide and glistening with unshed tears.

“
My darling. I feel as if I would be taking advantage. You are in a delicate state.”

“
I want to feel alive. It may be inappropriate and perhaps you think me a terrible person, but you are all I have left. I… I want to be close to you and I… want the lie you told my father to be true.”

“
You want me to get you with child? Tonight?”

Sarah nodded and Nate blew out a slow breath. He wanted her—badly. But he did not wish her to wake in the morning and feel as if he had pushed his attentions upon her. His manhood had sprung to attention as soon as she had mentioned making love. Now he felt like a cad for even considering the idea.

“Let us lie for a while, you in my arms. Let us cuddle. You will be tired and probably only need to feel close to me.”

He moved around the bed, shrugged off his robe and slipped underneath the covers, pulling her slight body against him. He breathed in the scent of vanilla and rose and gloried at the heat of her body.

She laid her head on his chest and stroked her fingers up and down the skin, circling one of his nipples with her fingertips. Eventually she spoke.

“
I am sorry that you had to lie to my father.”

“
It was a small lie and it was worth it to make his passing more peaceful. He was very concerned about your welfare. I think we convinced him.”

“
Yes. But you also lied about loving me and I thank you for that too.”

“
No.” Nate felt his heart pound in his chest. He wanted to stop himself from saying what he was about to blurt out, but somehow he could not. Making himself so vulnerable was anathema to him, but still his mouth would not obey him. “No, Sarah. I did not lie about loving you. I do love you.”

Sarah’s fingers stilled on his chest
, and it seemed for a moment that his wife had stopped breathing entirely. Then she pushed herself up onto her elbows and arrested him with an intense green gaze. He stared back as if this was a duel. As if the first person to blink lost the battle. “I love you, Sarah, Duchess of Kirkbourne, Marchioness of Westgate, Countess of Gunstable, and let us not forget Baroness of Dunrigh.”

“
You do?” Her voice was an awe-filled whisper.

“
I do. I told your father only one lie this afternoon, and we both know that you are not with child.”

“
I love you too.” Her gaze had not left his, and her body was soft and pliant in his hold. She also told the truth and it sent a warmth through him that had nothing to do with the sexual desire he also felt.

He rolled her slowly onto her back and pressed his lips gently to hers. She responded in the same manner
, and that night they made love—quietly and tenderly.

As he withdrew from her body afterwards, drawing his weeping wife against his body, Nate knew it had been the right thing to do. He had not taken advantage of her. It had been a meeting of two broken souls finding comfort in one another. Two hearts melding into one.

Four weeks later

Nate groaned and thrust into his wife’s hand which was working up and down his hard shaft. He bit gently into her shoulder and moved his hand between her legs.

“
Do you need turned over, my love?”

“
Something like that,” she giggled. His front lay alongside her back and had her hand not been stroking him, his erection would be nestled comfortably in the crease of her arse.

He flipped her onto her back and she squealed in delight, Nate batted her hand away and fe
igned sleep. It must be around four o’clock in the morning. It was the time Sarah usually awoke and needed turned. Most nights he would turn her and make love to her, then wash her and settle down for the rest of the night. Occasionally, she fell asleep as soon as he had turned her. Tonight, however she was in a playful mood and his body reacted accordingly. His hard length pulsed as she sighed sorrowfully.

“
Clearly I am no longer attractive to you, Your Grace. Therefore I shall not push my attentions on you. I must insist you do not touch me again in such a manner, and I promise not to awaken you by stroking your cock in future.”

He rubbed a hand over her flat belly, his eyes still closed but a smile tugging on his lips. Six weeks since she had last had her courses. Did she think he was unable to count? He suspected she did not want to say anything too soon, but he knew his seed had taken the night her father had died. Instinct told him.

“Did I not explain before our wedding that duchesses do not say the word ‘cock’? Honestly I do wonder if it is too late to send you to finishing school, Your Grace.”

“
Would this be a finishing school that taught me how to suck your cock? Or how to run my tongue up the length of it. How to make you curse as I bring you to completion after tea in the library?” she asked, giggling again.

God, the memory of her, sucking and licking at him as he perched on his desk and she sat on her wheeled chair nearly made him release there and then. Her breasts had been practically popping out of her stays as he had fondled one in his hand while the fingers of his other hand curled into her elegant coiffure, encouraging and guiding. Luckily it had been evening and the drapes had been drawn or else half of Mayfair would have seen his beautiful wife giving him the ultimate pleasure without any reservations.

“My darling, Freckles, the last thing you need is lessons on how to bring me pleasure.”

Nate moved half over her and pressed a wet kiss to the tip of her nose. She squawked quietly and wrinkled her nose. He ran his tongue over her bottom lip and she sighed, opening her mouth. Then he captured her lips, massaging them with his own, pressing his tongue into the dark, wet cavern of her mouth and groaning as her own tongue responded, exploring his mouth. She kissed back, murmuring and moaning as his hands blazed a slow sensuous trail over every inch of her flesh that his fingers could reach.

Sarah arched into his touch as he pinched her nipple before rubbing his thumb tenderly across it. Then his fingers moved over her belly, over her silky hip, moving her thigh so he could access her most intimate parts. Then he ran the tips of her fingers up her inner thigh. He knew he had reached the place where feeling began when she sighed against his kiss and clasped his buttock. Her own hands had not been lazy. They had explored his chest, his belly, his back and muscular shoulder, and now his backside. And at this moment she stroked him deftly with her free hand as he thrust once more into her touch, knowing he was not ready yet, and neither was she.

He lifted his mouth from hers, their gazes fixed despite the dark as he rocked into her clasped hand, trailing his fingers leisurely through her damp folds.

The intimacy of their lovemaking had increased a hundred-fold since their wedding night. They may be equally naked and equally a part of one another, but their love seemed to add more. He knew he would die for this woman. Emotion welled up and he could bear the space between them no longer. He gathered her into his arms and rolled onto his back, clamping her to him.

Her legs fell on either side of his hips, and Sarah held on to his shoulders. She held still, having become used to these sudden displays of intense emotions when they were together. It was as if he was overcome by his feelings and was still unsure what to do with them. He had been brought up to hide emotion and to always appear to be in control.

“Nate, I love you too,” she murmured into his chest.

“
I am sorry, I still fear something happening to you and then I cannot believe my luck. And I feel so undeserving and all these emotions… I do not know what to do with them or how to deal with them…” And these episodes had started to happen since the attacks on them. He knew it was driven by fear of something happening to her. Still there was no answer as to who had shot her or tampered with the carriage, and it was killing him inside.

“
I know, my love. I understand.”

He felt like a damned fool. And one whose cock was nudging his beautiful, pliant wife’s entrance. But she could not go on top. Could she? The sudden rush of emotion had left him and he was back to himself, his body crying out for its release. Needing to be inside her. He flexed his hips and he considered the positions they were in. He grabbed the pillow from behind his head and launched it across the bed before shuffling them both up the bed.

“Nate?” She raised her head and gave him a quizzical look.

“
Can you pull yourself up using the headboard so I can enter you?”

“
I…yes.” As she lifted herself, he pushed on her backside to increase her leverage. With his free hand he positioned his hardness.

“
Lower gently.” She did as he asked and they groaned in unison as their bodies joined. When she was seated astride him, impaled on his rigid flesh, her arms raised to the headboard, he nearly came undone. He had never seen those perfect freckled breasts from this angle. He lifted himself up and quickly suckled on one breast as Sarah gasped in pleasure. Then he lowered himself and ran his hand over the taut peaks and down her sides to her hips. “Choose your own tempo, my love. I can help you. You will not be doing all the work, but you are in control.”

She bit her bottom lip, charmingly, and pulled on the headboard. Her hot, wet internal flesh sliding along him made him groan. In the past he had known courtesans and widows who would eagerly go on top but this was special—perhaps because it was Sarah—perhaps because Sarah taking control was one of the fantasies that haunted his dreams.

When she pulled too far and he fell out, she looked perturbed but he simply guided her back onto him. “I am not that big, my darling,” he chuckled.

“
I was attempting to flatter you, my love.” He chuckled again and moved under her, urging her to set a rhythm.

She did and soon one hand was on the mattress, improving her leverage. His hands, clamped around her hips, did some of the work. Her tempo was sending him insane. Slow enough to make him grit his teeth in the effort not to turn boorish and take control but fast enough to ramp up his pleasure by tiny increments.

Her features were set in concentration, which surprised him as his own mind seemed to have ceased functioning. Her muscles gripping him, the slap of her arse on his thighs. The little whimpers of unreleased tension.

“
Oh Nate. I need… Oh please.” He moved slightly, increasing the friction, hopefully increasing her pleasure. Sending himself out of his mind. He could not hold back. He clamped her to him and thrust hard… once… twice… Her moan was low and almost feral as she released the headboard and dropped against his chest, her entire body shuddering. He cursed as his own body reacted to her muscles pulsing around his member. He filled her with his seed in short sharp bursts—pain and pleasure coursing through his veins.

He grazed his fingertips slowly up and down her spine as her gasps
returned to regular breaths.

“
Nate?”

“
Mm hmm?”

“
I think we are going to have a baby.”

“
I think so too.”

She lifted her head and stared at him.
“You do? How…”

“
I can count past four, and it has been six weeks since you unceremoniously threw me out of our bedchamber because you had your courses.”

“
Even if I hadn’t been enduring my courses, I would have thrown you out. You were being an idiot.”

He ran a hand through her loose red tresses. He would need to brush it and braid it before Tilly arrived in the morning.

“Perhaps if you had not been indisposed, I would have insisted on my conjugal rights,” he teased. She frowned and moved, reminding him that he was still inside her.

“
You would never do that.”

“
I do not need to. Do you remember last Tuesday?”

Sarah’s cheeks darkened. Even in the slowly growing dawn, he could see her high colour.

“I do not need reminded of my wantonness.” Her voice was half -indignant, half-purr.

“
Seven times, Sarah. On the seat of the harpsichord, against a wall in the garden, on the chaise in the drawing room, across the dining room table, twice on the bed and across my desk. And that was just during the day.”

“
You are clearly a bad influence on me, Your Grace. Especially considering I am in mourning.”

“
If I recall, Your Grace, you were the one who suggested I tumble you on the dining room table and that you were the one to dismiss the servants before you did so. I do also have fond memories of you opening the placket of my breeches just after you had played some Handel. And the fingers that had just completed a wonderful fugue then showed their talents in other areas.”

“
Are you complaining?”

“
Not at all.” He pressed his lips to hers and swept his tongue around her welcoming mouth. She lifted slightly giving him room to cup and fondle her breast, teasing the peak back into a hard nub. She curled her fingers tightly into his curls and pressed her mouth harder to his.