His Christmas Pleasure (16 page)

The driver fell into step behind them. Andres learned why when they reached the cottage gate and the woman who greeted them called to the driver by name. “Hey, there now, John Whitacre. Who have you brought to us?”

Whitacre mugged a face at Andres’s raised eyebrows. “A man has to make a living, my lord. Besides, you need more than one witness, don’t you?”

Whitacre said.

“Aye, John’s a good witness,” the woman said. “And he won’t cost you much.”

Andres could have told her he’d already cost him plenty, but he held his tongue in front of Abby.

David Laing turned out to be a former soldier who worked as a blacksmith and performed marriages. Andres thought it an odd combination, but apparently it was the way things were done here.

Laing was happy to marry them for what he assured them was a very good price. “To be honest,” he said in his roguish brogue, “business has been a wee bit slow since the days have been shorter. After Christmas they will start marrying again. You know, once they can smell spring.”

“I’ll ready the chamber,” the woman Andres assumed to be Mrs. Laing said.

Her words brought color to Abby’s cheeks, which was not such a bad thing.

Within the half hour, Andres found himself standing with Abby before Laing in the front room of Laing’s low-ceilinged cottage. Both Andres and Abby had removed their coats and freshened up the best they could. A fire burned in the grate, and lanterns had been lit against the gloom.

Abby placed her gloved hand in Andres’s. Mr. Laing began the ceremony.

He started by asking for their names and addresses and if they were both single.

“Are you here of your own free will, miss?” Laing asked Abby.

“I am.”

“Go ahead now and pay me then,” Laing said. “Have her make the payment,” he instructed Andres. Seeing Andres’s frown at the suggestion, he explained, “If she pays, no one can come back later and claim she was married against her will.”

It embarrassed Andres to have to pour out his meager hoard of coins and pass two guineas to Abby—one for Laing and the other for their witness, Whitacre.

She seemed as dazed about the whole affair as he. She paid and the ceremony continued. It was nothing fancy—certainly not as thorough and inspiring as the clergy would have given.

There was one awkward moment when Laing asked if there was a ring.

Andres felt like a fool. He had no ring. “I don’t have one,” he murmured.

The mood in the room changed. Laing and the witnesses didn’t speak; this was an important detail, one that a man of means like the barón should have anticipated.

And he could feel himself drop in their esteem, sensed himself the bastard again.

“I have one.” Abby let go of his hand and reached for the bag she’d been carrying.

Sitting in a side chair, she pulled off the kid gloves she still wore and reached into its depths, pulling out a velvet pouch. She shook the contents out in her lap. Gold gleamed in the room’s lamplight.

She picked up a simple band and offered it to him. “It was my great-grandmother’s, the mother of the one who left me my inheritance. The pin I’m wearing had been hers as well.”

Andres took the ring while she put her jewelry back in her bag. The band was heavy in his hand.

Abby took her place next to him and gave him a smile. “It is not the quality I would want you to have,” he said quietly.

“This ring is solid. It has lasted one marriage, and God willing it will last another,” she answered.

She humbled him. She was giving. From the moment they’d met, she’d thought the best of him.

He took her hand. He didn’t wait for the blacksmith’s words. He had words of his own. “With this ring, I promise that you shall never regret this day. I shall cherish you with all that I am and all that I own.”

Her eyes grew watery, her smile inviting. Andres leaned down and took that kiss he’d so wanted.

He’d kissed many women. He’d done so gallantly, and frivolously, and without conviction or hope, and sometimes desire.

That was not the way this kiss was.

This kiss was a promise. But the moment their lips touched, the moment he felt her soften and mold to him, in that moment magic happened.

Andres brought his arms around his wife. He held her close as he opened himself to her. Her kiss turned eager, hopeful, trusting, and his grew hard, demanding, needy—

“I pronounce you man and wife,” Laing said, as if attempting to take control of the situation. “What God hath joined, let no man put asunder.”

The kiss broke, but Andres was not going to let her go. Not now. Not ever.

Abby Montross Ramigio knew how to kiss. Her reaction had been instinctive. And he was wondering what other instinctive things she knew how to do, too.

He swung her up in his arms. Looking to Mrs. Laing, he said, “Our room.”

“This way,” she said, her eyes wide and merry with delight. She gave a little giggle as she led him down the hall to where the room had been prepared.

It was not a particularly well-appointed room, but it had a welcoming fire burning in the hearth, not of peat but of wood. A four-poster bed covered in a white counterpane begged them to explore it. There were colorful rag rugs on the floor, and the blue curtains were closed against the approaching night.

“I’ll have the girl bring your dinner to you—” Mrs. Laing said from the doorway, but Andres cut her off.

“Thank you,” he said, his gaze on the lovely woman in his arms.

“She’ll bring the tray in an hour—”

He kicked the door shut.

“That wasn’t nice,” Abby chastised him, but there was no heat in her words.

If anything, she seemed as ready for this moment as he was.

He slowly lowered her feet to the ground. She leaned against his chest. Her nipples were hard.

Andres was hard all over … but he wanted to take his time. He was married.

Yes, it had been a marriage of convenience, but he’d come to respect and admire this woman. In fact, she was far better than he deserved.

“Kiss me,” she whispered. “Kiss me as you did in the other room.”

He was happy to comply. Only this time, he kissed her the way he really wished to do so. This time he showed her his passion.

Her lips opened to his and she let him kiss her deeply and fully. Her hands came up to his shoulders. They hovered there a moment, and then she slid her arms around his neck and pulled him close.

Andres was seduced, his whole body alive with desire.

He began undressing her.

Abby showed no false modesty, and the thought came to him that just as he’d learned to admire her, perhaps she had come to admire him?

And as much as he didn’t want to fall under love’s spell, he certainly was a captive of lust.

His fingers knew how to unlace the back of her dress. He kissed her neck and the line of her jaw, delighting in discovering those special spots that made a woman forget herself.

Abby had many of them.

When his lips brushed her ear, she gasped and her hands began pulling at his coat as if to rip it off of him.

He was happy to help. He shrugged off the coat and began yanking at the knot in his neck cloth, not once letting his lips leave hers.

Her dress fell to the ground at their feet. She’d told him about the layers she’d worn, but he hadn’t believed her until he saw her nightdress serving as a petticoat. It was a heavy cotton that hid all of her curves. He was anxious to see what lay beneath.

Tossing his neck cloth to the floor, he said, “Here, let me.”

She dropped her hands to her sides. Her skin trembled as he slid first one arm and then the other down her shoulders. He pressed his lips against her skin, tasting his way along her shoulder.

Her head fell back with a shiver of pleasure. She was so responsive. So willing.

The nightdress slid down to her waist, exposing a camisole made of the finest lace and lawn. It was spread over firm breasts.

Andres had to touch them. “Beya,” he whispered. “Beya, beya, beya.”

“What is that you said?” she asked, her voice breathless as he circled a tight nipple with the edge of his thumb.

“Beautiful.”

She shook her head, her curls falling around her shoulders. He combed with his fingers, tilting her head up to him. “Yes, you are.”

“You meant your words that night to Lady Dobbins?”

Andres laughed at the impossibility that she couldn’t see the truth. “Yes,” he said. “I’ve thought you lovely from the moment I met you, from when you attacked me in the library—”

“I saved you,” she argued with a smile.

“Yes, you saved me,” he agreed with complete seriousness. “You’ve saved me from so much, Abby. And I’ve wanted you.”

Those serious eyes of hers said she wasn’t sure she could believe him. He took her hand and brought it to the front of his pants, where his hardness was clear for her to feel. “I’ve wanted you.”

She pressed her hand against him, then caressed him, sampling his shape and hardness.

Andres almost went to his knees with desire. She was innocent but a quick learner.

“Unfasten my breeches,” he whispered in her ear as he brushed her wild curls back and kissed her neck. He began undressing her, this time with earnest haste.

Abby did as he asked. Their tasks came to cross purposes when he pulled her skirts down her legs as she tried to stand on tiptoe to kiss him, but they laughed and took turns.

And when they were both naked, he lay her on the bed. She was ready for him, her body tense and moist. He hesitated. “I do not want to hurt you,” he said.

“You won’t,” she promised and reached up and kissed him hard, her tongue finding his—and Andres was undone.

He entered her. She stiffened. He stopped, holding himself tight, letting her adjust to him. He whispered to her in Spanish, telling her she was beautiful, wondrous, magic.

Her legs opened wider. He went deeper. She arched and he wrapped his arms around her.

She felt so good. He’d never known a woman could feel like this. He’d been born to join with her. He’d been unconsciously searching for her all his life, and now this was their moment. Their blessed, precious moment.

Andres began moving. He knew how to make love. He’d done it enough, but he realized he had no control when it came to Abby. What he’d thought of as routine became something beyond his imagination.

She was his wife. And he had become a man of substance because of this wonderful, giving creature in his arms.

Andres went deeper, wanting all of her. He heard her cry his name. She liked this. She gave herself completely to him—and it made him want to please her more.

Abby gasped. Deep muscles tightened. They took hold of Andres, pulled him, claimed him—and his own release was like nothing he’d felt before.

Life flowed between them. For one brilliant, blinding moment, he was lost in her. They became one.

It had never been this way before. He’d not experienced such completion.

And when he was done, he was spent. He collapsed, so stunned by what he’d just experienced that he could barely breathe, let alone think.

They lay together, legs and arms intertwined, until the world intruded in the form of a ticklish chill. He moved, reaching for the bedspread and flipping it over the two of them even as he rolled to his side.

Her eyes were closed. Her hair fanned out behind her.

She was so lovely. So perfect. Her nose, her complexion, her freckles, the stubbornness in her mouth—

A tear escaped from her eye.

Alarmed, Andres brushed it away with the pad of his thumb. “What is it, palomita? Did I hurt you?”

Her eyes opened. She reached for his hand, pulling it across her body. “No, you did not hurt me.”

“Then what is it?”

“That was astonishing,” she responded. “I didn’t know anything could be so completely—” She paused, as if words failed her.

“I understand,” he said.

She snuggled to him, as supple and seductive as a cat, and began to trace the line of his chest with one finger. “Could we do it again?” she purred, moving her body against his.

Pride filled him. Male pride in all its glory. “We can do it all you wish, palomita,” he assured her, and proceeded to show her the truth of his words.

Later, Andres pulled on his breeches and opened the door to find a tray with covered dishes waiting for them. He brought it inside and set it on the bed for Abby to enjoy while he went about finding out if they could have a bath prepared.

Mrs. Laing assured him that the hour was late but one could be prepared.

Andres told her to do so.

The thought struck him that now he really didn’t need to worry about funds so much. What did it matter that his purse was all but empty? He’d married an heiress, one who was quickly fulfilling all his dreams of what a woman could and should be.

He hurried back to the room, where he found his wife sitting naked on the bed nibbling a chicken leg.

Later, it was his pleasure to bathe her. And wherever he washed, he placed a kiss … until it all led to the inevitable conclusion and he climbed into the deep but narrow hip bath with her.

For a bath, it was disastrous.

For lovemaking, it was full of laughter and a very satisfying completion.

What truly bemused Andres was that this laughter wasn’t how he’d pictured marriage. And yet right now, his life was better than he’d ever dreamed.

Abby was embarrassed by the proof of her virginity on the counterpane.

“Don’t worry on it,” he whispered to her as they snuggled in bed together, their naked bodies so close as to be almost on top of each other. “I am certain Mrs. Laing has seen the likes before. Besides, I think it a gift. You are so precious to me.”

She smiled up at him. “You are precious to me,” she murmured. “And just think, we have three more times to make love to reach six.”

“Six?”

Her eyes closing, Abby laughed. “You wouldn’t understand … but I think even at six you were underestimated.” She drifted to sleep.

Even though Andres was beyond tired, he didn’t sleep immediately. Instead, he watched her. He would cherish, protect, and honor her.

He thought he was falling in love with her.