Love, Remember Me (26 page)

For a moment he couldn't breathe. His chest felt tight. His eyes hungrily ravaged her form. Wet, it glistened with the oily bathwater. He watched fascinated as a drop of moisture rolled between her pretty little breasts and slid down her long torso. She was all pink-gold in the firelight. Reaching out, he yanked her from the tub and pressed her wet body against him, kissing her deeply. He had never in his life wanted a woman quite so much as he wanted this one.

Nyssa's head swam dizzily with the sensation of his mouth against hers, with the heat emanating from his hard body. She knew so little of him. She certainly did not know him well enough to love him, but the feeling his actions engendered inside of her certainly was not fear. Raising her arms, she let her palms slide up his smooth chest. His very skin seemed to leap beneath her touch. It was then with wonder she realized that whatever it was he felt for her, she felt it also for him.

He slid his hand up to her head, pulling out the pins that had held her hair up from the water. Her dark mane tumbled free, caressing her shoulders. He kneaded her scalp, with his fingers turning her head this way and that, his mouth never leaving hers. His heart almost stopped as he felt her fingers unfastening his breeches, pushing them down along with his linen drawers. He stepped out of them, kicking them away, his arms still wrapped tightly about the girl.

Nyssa pulled her head away from his, gasping for air. Her eyes met his and she said tightly, "What is this I feel, Varian? What is it that makes me play the wanton with you? I do not understand. It cannot be love."

"It is lust you feel, sweeting," he said low. His big hand slid smoothly down the arch of her back to fondle her buttocks.

"The Church says lust is a sin," she whispered, unable to restrain her own body, which seemed to want to press itself into his palm. "Coupling between a man and his spouse is for the purpose of procreating children," she recited primly. "I have not heard it said that coupling should be an enjoyable thing, and yet I liked it last night when the pain was finally gone. Is it wrong for me to like coupling?"

"Nay, sweeting," he murmured against her lips, his finger rubbing sensuously against the very tip of her backbone. "And lust between a man and his wife is permitted, I swear it! The Church may not publicly say it, but they know it is so, and it is a good thing." With his palm in the small of her back, he pressed her closer to him.

Daringly she ran the tip of her tongue across his lips. She did not know why she had done it, but she had suddenly wanted to.

His nostrils flared, and then he was pressing his lips against hers again, his tongue wild in her mouth. To his surprise, she did not flinch, but met him kiss for kiss until his head was spinning. Slowly he turned her about so that her back was to him and they could see their reflections, dusky gold and nebulous, in the narrow pier glass she used to inspect her costume. He heard her sharp intake of breath as his hands slipped up to cup her young breasts. He felt her struggle to control the motion of her body.

Nyssa stared, fascinated by what she saw. She had never really gazed at herself naked in a mirror. Was it the firelight that made her body seem ripely lush? His hands were so big. Yet her small breasts seemed to fit nicely within the cups of his palms. She watched as he gently rubbed her nipples with the balls of his thumbs. Then bending, he kissed her shoulder softly, nuzzling the spot where it flowed into her neck.

"You are beautiful, Nyssa," he said low, "and you don't even know how beautiful, do you, sweeting?" While one hand remained clasped about her left breast, his other hand began to caress her belly.

She viewed him through half-closed eyes, tense yet relaxed. A single finger slid between her nether lips and burrowed itself deeply until it found her most vulnerable spot. She ground her bottom into his groin, and he groaned.

"You make me feel so naughty," Nyssa whispered to him.

She saw him smile in the glass. "I like you naughty," he told her, nibbling on her earlobe with sharp teeth. "I am going to teach you to be very, very naughty, sweeting, and you will like it, I promise you." His tongue swept up the side of her neck wetly while his finger began to tease at her insistently.

She wanted to close her eyes for this was too personal, but he would not allow it, and forbade her. She saw the subtle changes in her expression as he aroused her. Her face seemed to grow more wanton with each passing moment. Her body was afire with new and very powerful longings. She ached, but pleasantly so. She could see from his look that he did too.

"Let us couple now," she begged him.

"Not yet," he told her. He picked her up in his arms and walked to the bed. Instead of laying her lengthwise upon it, however, he placed her so that she lay sideways across the bed, her legs hanging over its edge. Shocked, but unable to move, she watched as he knelt between her outspread legs, his head pushing between her milky white thighs. She felt his fingers opening her, and then to her great surprise, his tongue began to play with her sensitive flesh.

"
Ohhh, no!
No! No! You must not," she protested feebly, but for the life of her she could not stop him. It was so delicious, but dear heaven,
this
had to be wrong! For a moment she struggled against him, but then the sweetness began to possess her and she couldn't fight him.
She just could not
. It was too wonderful. And then when she thought her honeyed flesh could bear no more of his torture, he rose before her, his great manhood rampant with his desire for her.

He stood, his legs pressing against the bed, and then leaning forward just slightly, he drew her forward, his fingers digging into the soft flesh of her thighs and buttocks until she was fully impaled upon him. His hands reached out to fondle her breasts; then, steadying himself, he began to slowly pump her with great majestic strokes of his manhood. He suddenly felt incredibly strong.

Her breasts ached and felt hard, yet his fingers dug easily into them, almost hurting her. She felt him filling her, and it seemed that now he was bigger and stronger than he had been last night. Without knowing why, she wrapped her arms and legs tightly about him, gasping as she felt him plunge even deeper within her body. A sound something like a moan came from somewhere in the back of her throat. It did not even sound human. Surely she had never made such a noise before? There was no pain this time, only an incredible tension very deep within her that seemed to be building and rising within her until she was certain that she could not bear it another moment, yet she did.

"
Nyssa! Nyssa!
" he half sobbed her name into her perfumed hair. "Dear God, sweeting, I have never desired any woman as I do you!" His thrusts became more and more frantic within her.

She heard his words, and then suddenly she was lost, caught up in a rainbow-hued vortex that was spinning out of control, taking her with it. She was a butterfly, soaring, trapped in a maelstrom of passion so great that she had no control at all. "
Varian!
" She cried his name even as the feeling of pressure building within her exploded in a starburst of incredible pleasure at the very moment of his own release.

He could feel his love juices gushing forth in a great discharge of sweetness that overflowed her womb. He fell forward atop her body, exhausted, yet filled with a contentment he had never before known. He struggled to raise his head, looking down into her beautiful face. She was pale and seemed to be scarcely breathing, but then she opened her lovely violet-blue eyes slowly, focusing upon him.

"
I love you, sweeting!
" he declared passionately, and his look was one of great tenderness toward her.

Nyssa burst into tears. "Do not say it!" she begged him. "I do not love you. I do not even know you! It is not fair! Fate has made us man and wife, but I do not know what love is. How can you love me, Varian? How can you love a woman you do not even know? Such things only happen in children's tales of old. It cannot,
does not
, happen in our time."

"I love you, sweeting. I told you so last night. The moment I first saw you at Hampton Court I knew you were the only woman for me, Nyssa. I do not understand it myself, but when my grandfather so coldly suggested giving you to another man, I knew I could not let that happen. I could not allow anyone else to have you, to kiss your sweet lips, to plow a furrow in your love fields, my darling. You are mine, Nyssa. In time I will teach you to love me, I swear it!"

He lay his head upon her breasts with a sigh, and Nyssa gently stroked his dark head. Can love be taught? she wondered. Her mother had certainly learned to love her father. Blaze had not even known Edmund Wyndham when she became his wife. And had not her stepfather Anthony secretly loved Blaze, even when she purported to despise him and held him responsible for Edmund Wyndham's death? Yet eventually her mother had come to love her stepfather deeply. This was the way of her world. Still, it seemed so strange that Varian should love her when she had not even considered him as a husband.

Suddenly she realized that she was hungry. She had not eaten since early that morning, and then she had had nothing but some bread and wine. "I am starving, my lord," she told him. "Have you eaten?"

He raised himself off of her and then drew her up onto her feet. "Has my love for you not satisfied your hunger?" He teased her with a smile. "Thou art a greedy wench, I find."

"My stomach is hollow, sir," she told him. "My aunt keeps a good table wherever she may reside. She has been here for months now, and the cooks are well-trained by her at last."

"Let us call Tillie and have her bring us a full repast," he suggested. "I find making love to you ravenous work, madame."

"Cover your nakedness, my lord," she told him, climbing back into bed and pulling the coverlet well up. "My Tillie is a good girl. You must not shock her."

He pulled his breeches back on before calling for their two servants. Then he instructed Tillie, who wide-eyed went to fetch them a good meal. Toby was instructed to empty the tub and refill it for the earl.

Tillie returned, two kitchen maids in her wake. The girls could not help but giggle at the sight of Lord de Winter in naught but his breeches, bare feet, and bare chest. Tillie rapped them both sharply on the back of their heads, admonishing them, "Mind yer manners!" She directed them to lay the food out on a long, narrow oak table which was set along the window wall. Then she placed a decanter of red wine and a pitcher of foaming ale upon the table, slipping the goblets from her apron pocket. With a curtsey to her mistress and new master, she quickly shepherded the kitchen maids from the bedchamber. Toby, having finished his task of emptying and refilling the bath, was already gone.

"Will you bathe first, or eat?" Nyssa asked her husband.

"The water is too hot," he said, perusing the contents of the table, and then he observed, "Your aunt does keep a good table. I hope you will do so as well, madame."

"You will not find me lacking in housewifely skills, my lord," Nyssa told him. "Is your home very grand?"

"Nay, 'tis but a modest house. I have scarcely ever lived in it. You may find it old-fashioned, but it is yours to decorate as you will, Nyssa. I want to spend the rest of my life at Winterhaven with you, and with our children. I often think how lonely my father must have been there. He waited until he was practically an old man to marry, and then he lost my mother in childbirth. From the time I went to live with my grandfather, I spent only Midsummer's Day until Mid-Lammas with my father. After his death I only came in September to hunt." The earl took his plate and heaped it high with beef, capon, raw oysters, bread, and cheese. Seating himself upon the bed, he asked her, "What was it like to grow up at
RiversEdge
? Your father's hospitality was famous. My father often remarked on what a fine gentleman he was."

"I do not remember Edmund Wyndham," Nyssa said quietly. "I was not quite two when he was killed. My stepfather, Anthony Wyndham, is the father I have known. Growing up at
RiversEdge
was wonderful. I wonder now why I ever left it. I have five brothers, and twin sisters born six months ago. I will hardly recognize them when we go home. They were but a few weeks old when I left for court. I had ponies, and later on horses, and of course dogs, to play with as a child. My cousin, Mary Rose, was my best friend. We ran barefooted in the summer months, and rode our horses upon the frozen river in the wintertime. There is nothing special about my growing up."

"You had a family about you, Nyssa," he told her. "A mother, a father, and a houseful of siblings. Your aunts and cousins live nearby, I know, for they are my neighbors too, and your grandparents also. You are very fortunate, my darling, in all your relations."

"Were you very lonely, Varian?" she asked him, suddenly aware of how hard it must have been for him, a small, motherless boy given over to his power-hungry grandfather to raise. There would have been no abiding love in the Duke of Norfolk's house, or even time for it. Even the duchess had separated from Duke Thomas, and did not speak kindly of him.

"Lonely
?" Varian thought a moment, and then said, "Aye, I was lonely, Nyssa. People never thought of me as the Earl of March's son and heir. I was always the son of Duke Thomas's bastard daughter. Nonetheless, being brought up in my grandfather's shadow was an education in itself. I had no time to feel sorry for myself, sweeting. He is a hard man, but he is also an admirable one in many ways. Still, I am of no real value to him, I realize. I do not like the games he plays, and he knows it. Now that I have a wife, it is time I returned to Winterhaven and took up my own responsibilities. The estate is large, and has not been properly managed in years. I will have much to do." He looked at her. "You are not eating," he said. "You will need your strength, sweeting. I do not intend to let you off so easily as I did last night."

"Is that why you swallow oysters so greedily?" she demanded. "I have been at court long enough to have heard of their restorative powers. Is it true, my lord?"