Pleasurably Undone! (14 page)

L
ady Elise of Nantes watched as her husband and his friend left the rim of the balcony above and walked towards the stairway that led back to the main floor. The castle was appointed with several floors, bright and beautiful tapestries lining the walls around them, and a hall that could seat hundreds without crowding. All Simon’s possessions were grand, as befitted the very wealthy and powerful count of Rennes.

All except her.

Elise smoothed some imagined wrinkle from her gown and considered her good fortune yet again. Even without her mother’s urgings, it was difficult not to do so when faced with Simon’s beneficence. In simple words, she owed him everything.

Her cousin leaned over and handed her a cup of wine and Elise took a small sip. Her mother’s mouth formed a tight line; Elise knew immediately that she disapproved. After seeing Simon’s warm gaze on her, she pulled some remnants of pride and bravery together and emptied the last of the wine into her mouth. If it burned a bit and hit her stomach with a thump, she would never say.

“You will disgrace us, Elise, if you fall asleep or lose your
composure in your marriage bed,” her mother whispered in a furious tone. “Cease drinking this instant.”

Elise nearly dropped the cup at her mother’s order, but she did not. She was married now, married to Simon, Count of Rennes, and answered to no one else. Not her mother and certainly not her foolish father who’d endangered them all. Simon alone ruled her now. A shudder passed through her at the thought of what lay ahead of her this night and of the power one man now held over her.

“My lady, surely a small cup of wine will but soothe her maidenly nerves,” her cousin Petronilla offered. Her mother’s frozen gaze made Petronilla cease her attempt to intercede.

“There is no reason for nerves or hesitation, you silly girl. My daughter knows her place and her duty to the count, in his bed or out of it.” Lady Bertrade then lowered her voice so that only Elise could hear her words. “When you lie beneath him, fight naught that he does and acquiesce in all things. Let him have his way.”

“Come, cousin,” Elise said as she stood. If she had to listen to one more of her mother’s audacious commands about the approaching night in her marriage bed, she was sure she would scream. “I need some cool air to refresh me.”

Elise turned to leave, a brazen move on her part, but her mother grabbed her arm and pulled her close.

“Remember, you will give him leave to do whatever he wishes with you. Refuse him nothing,” she whispered furiously.

“I have heard your words, Mother. I understand,” she whispered back as she tugged her arm free. As bold as she may have sounded, the truth was that she knew not what to expect from her new husband.

Her mother had issued those words of warning for months; as soon as the marriage contracts had been signed, she had
begun her instructions to prepare Elise for marriage. All were the same and excluded details of what she should lie still through or what he would do that she must allow. Elise understood the basic process of marital relations with a man, but her mother’s words clearly hinted at things more dangerous or repulsive.

Standing back, she took Petronilla’s hand, pulling her cousin to escape with her. She nearly ran as she sidestepped couples who were dancing and those just lounging around the hall, drinking and eating and celebrating her marriage to Lord Simon. Finally, they made their way out of the hall, through the corridors to the door that led to the courtyard. The air, fresh and cool as befitted a spring morning, greeted her as she stepped out of the door.

“She means well,” Elise began to explain to her cousin, but the frown on Petronilla’s face stopped her from apologizing for her mother’s behavior again.

“Lord Simon will not allow her to command you so, now that you are married,” Petronilla declared forthrightly.

Elise nodded, not fully convinced that a simple marriage ceremony would bring her mother’s controlling ways to an end. But, if being Simon’s wife meant she would make her own decisions, she welcomed whatever must happen between them as a small price to pay.

Petronilla took her hand and patted it. “Lord Simon will be a kind husband to you, Elise. Alianor said…” Her cousin paused, realizing her error and looked across the courtyard waiting for the awkward moment to end. “I cannot believe I said that to you, and on your wedding day. Pray thee, forgive me?”

At first mortified that her cousin mentioned her husband’s leman, Elise then realized that she, Lady Alianor, was the one person who could answer her questions about what to expect
in her marriage bed. Certainly she could not speak to the woman who, in spite of being the noble-born widow of one of Simon’s vassals, saw to her husband’s private needs. She needed someone else…someone like Petronilla.

“There is no reason to apologize, Petronilla. My lord husband’s attentions to the lady are not a secret here.”

“Still, Elise, ’twas thoughtless of me to bring her to your attention.”

Elise turned and took her cousin’s hand, tugging her closer. Looking around first, to make certain that no one could overhear her words, she said, “To gain my pardon, I seek a small service from you.”

“What service, Elise?” Petronilla asked, her hesitancy obvious.

“I wish you to speak of what Lady Alianor has told you about my husband.”

Petronilla’s otherwise pale face blushed deep red as she sputtered and gasped at the request. So, Lady Alianor had shared many details with her sister-by-marriage about Lord Simon. Good. Mayhap Elise would learn much before being faced with the reality of her husband in their bed?

“Nay, Elise! Alianor has told me nothing, truly, nothing.”

“Petronilla, you are my friend. Would you send me forth to my husband’s bed knowing only what my mother has told me? That I should lie quietly and accept anything he does. That I must refuse him nothing. Not knowing what he will do to me is worse than any suffering I have faced.”

“Still, Elise. You are a maiden. He expects you to know little of bedplay. He is a kind man…”

Elise dropped her cousin’s hand and walked away. Failure to please Simon was not an option for her this night. She must be ready to be his wife, to keep him happy, so that he would
never regret, or question for a moment, his decision to stand by their betrothal and marriage. How could she do that without knowing?

And more than for those reasons, Elise had begun to fall in love with the kind man she met on her arrival. Every preparation for her comfort had been seen to and every request was fulfilled. He greeted her brother and assigned him to duties and training, taking over the responsibilities her father should have accepted. But mostly, although he appeared to be a large, gruff man, he was ever kind to her and solicitous of her feelings when they ate together or conversed. He tried to make her feel as though she was already the lady of his lands and, when he could circumvent her mother’s oversight, he’d even quietly offered his affections to her.

She stopped by a stone wall that separated the main yard from the chapel, and took a breath. Petronilla joined her there and put a hand on her shoulder.

“You are the only one who can help me, Petra,” she said. “I know he cares for Alianor and that he is happy when he is with her. If I know what he likes, what pleases him, I can make certain to keep him happy.” She met her cousin’s gaze. “I must give him no reason to turn from our marriage. Too much and too many are at risk.”

Although the Church sought to gain control over marriages and thereby control more of the wealth and power of the nobles and royalty of the lands, many nobles married as they pleased, some taking concubine wives in addition to the wives the Church recognized. If she was unsuccessful in pleasing Simon or providing him with sons and heirs and if he then sought relief from his vows, her family would not only be in disgrace, but would be destitute and destroyed.

She thought Petra was not going to answer her, then her
cousin began to speak. The words poured out quickly, but never did the two women look at each other.

“Alianor said Lord Simon likes lusty, passionate women who…who…who are neither sheepish nor quiet during their bouts of bedplay.”

Elise lost her breath at such a description. Even trying to sort out the possible meanings made her heart pound and heat rise in her cheeks.

Petra’s words seemed to confirm the things she’d overheard some of the female servants shamelessly discussing after Lady Alianor had walked by them a few days ago. But Elise could not believe such things actually happened between a man and his wife. Yet Petra was not done.

“He likes women who…who…who use their hands…and their…their mouths on him and his…privy parts.” Petra still did not meet her eyes.

“Oh!” Elise whispered as she put her hands on her fiery cheeks to cool them. Did women do such things? She was more confused now than before she’d gained the information about her husband’s preferences from Petronilla.
Hands? Mouth? Privy parts?
Just as the servants had gossiped? Surely not!

Even though such thoughts shocked Elise, a frisson of some unrecognized heat pierced through her. Such scandalous things spoke of passion and lust, something forbidden and yet somehow alluring to her, even in her innocence. An ache began deep within her.

“Do you remember catching your brother with the laundry maid in the stables, Elise?” Petra reached for her hands and tried to tug them free. “Elise? Do you remember what we heard them saying? What he asked her to do? It must be that!”

“Nay!”

She was not completely ignorant in the way in which a man
and a woman joined, for many times coupling occurred in places more public than private within this keep and even at her family’s. But coupling and this…shocking revelation…were simply too different to be considered. Why would a man want such a thing? Did Lord Simon truly expect it of her? Shaking her head at the images that now crept into her thoughts, she dropped her hands away from her face.

Unable to even believe such a thing between a man and his wife, she waved Petra away and walked towards the door. Now, more than at any time since her betrothal had been announced, she needed some wine to calm her nerves. She only hoped she could find some without having to face her mother first.

Or Lord Simon.

Elise heard Petra’s steps close behind her and she continued down the corridor towards the noisy festivities where she could forget what awaited her in the night. Turning the corner, she must have taken a wrong step, for she walked into a wall. Or what felt like a wall. Just as Petra ran into the back of her, Elise looked up into Lord Simon’s smiling face.

S
imon took Elise by the shoulders to steady her after she collided with him. Gazing past her petite figure, he recognized her cousin behind her, who offered a quick curtsy before walking on to the hall. Though tempted to let her go once she steadied on her feet, he remembered his plan and kept her in his grasp, gently drawing her into a nearby alcove.

“Are you well, lady? Your face is flushed and you seem out of breath.”

Her cheeks, usually a lovely cream color, were splotched with red circles and her chest—he dared another quick glance, trying not to notice the voluptuous curves so close to his hands—was heaving as though she’d run a far distance. Simon reached up, touched her cheek with the back of his finger and found it heated. He could not resist sliding his hand along her shoulders and lifting the length of her dark hair away from her face, sending some of the flowers woven into it drifting to the floor.

“I am well, my lord,” she said, without ever meeting his gaze. “’Twas colder outside than I thought and I carried no cloak with me.”

He took her words as a sign to try his gentler method. Stepping closer, he slid his arms the rest of the way around her and held her against his chest.

“Warmer now, my lady?” he asked.

Elise stood still in his embrace, not moving her head or body as he rubbed her back, trying to infuse his heat into her, to warm her from the cold. Simon felt her shiver, so he continued rubbing gently until she stopped. The enticing scent of the flowers, early spring blossoms, woven through her hair wafted up, and he inhaled deeply. He loosened his grasp enough to bring one hand up to her face, tilting it higher so he could see her. Then, he leaned towards her and pressed his lips to hers.

Elise accepted his mouth on hers, standing in perfect acquiescence within his arms—not moving, not seeming to breathe, and neither resisting nor furthering his kiss. Simon moved his mouth over hers, sliding back and forth across her softness, trying to ease her under his touch. But when he lifted his head and met her wide-open eyes, the expression he found there was one not unlike that of a wild animal when caught in the sights of an experienced hunter’s nocked arrow. Fear, for certain, and a full measure of what appeared to be shock filled her gaze.

Simon knew that he was overwhelming her. His body stood nearly a full foot taller than hers, and his bulk matched his height. Wrapping her in his large arms as he had must have scared the breath out of her, indeed, for she still had not taken one in. Releasing her, he tried to come up with soothing words of explanation, but was forestalled by her mother’s call.

“Elise!” Lady Bertrade called down the very corridor where he stood next to his very bemused wife. “Oh, Lord Simon, here you are! I could not find Elise and worried at her whereabouts when she should be seeing to your guests.”

The lady’s briefly bowed head and lowering of tone did nothing to soften her shrill demand, and Simon felt Elise tense next to him.

“I called Elise to my side, Lady Bertrade,” he said, taking Elise’s trembling hand in his. “I sought but a few moments of privacy with her. Surely my guests would forgive a groom’s eagerness to better acquaint himself with his newly wed wife?” For good measure, Simon lifted Elise’s hand to his mouth and kissed along her knuckles.

With a look of extreme satisfaction, Lady Bertrade nodded. “I will leave you to her, then, my lord.”

It was not until her mother was out of hearing distance that Elise spoke, for her mother’s temper might be controlled when Lord Simon was present, but would be unleashed once they were alone. “Pray thee accept my thanks for that, my lord.”

Instead of dropping her hand now that the ruse was not necessary, he held it still and kissed it, this time lingering as he pressed his lips on her knuckles and then on the sensitive skin of her wrist. “You are lady here now, Elise, and you answer to no one save me. Remember that.”

His voice, though always deep, dropped in tone to something more as he spoke—a sound that vibrated through her—and his mouth seemed to grow hotter against her skin. She’d taken precious moments reacting to his embrace and kiss when he’d surprised her in the hall—forgetting everything her mother had warned about—but now realized she must be ready for his nearness and his touch. Still not certain of whether her mother’s instructions or the shocking things she’d heard from Petra were the correct way to go in this situation, Elise watched as he turned back to face her without letting go of her hand.

“Come, ladywife. Let us see to our guests together.”

She risked peeking up at him a time or two as they walked back into the hall and were greeted by various guests, mostly those known or vassals to him. He introduced her to many she did not know, and always he held her hand in his. With her father in disgrace, most of her relatives did not risk traveling here to Lord Simon’s lands or facing those who triumphed over them. Soon, she noticed his hand on her back, guiding her around the hall, then remaining there in a reassuring touch.

Elise had just decided she would use the information that Petra shared rather than her mother’s remonstrations, when Lord Simon began a more personal approach, his attentions growing more blatant and more intimate. When they sat at the high table to eat, his leg pressed against hers under the linen cloth that covered the table’s surface. At first, she thought he had just shifted in his chair, so she moved a bit to give him space. But his leg followed hers, his foot slid between hers, and she felt him rub against her.

On purpose! A flittering began in her belly, and suddenly a nervous anticipation filled her.

Certain now that he meant such a contact between them, Elise allowed him to do so, feeling the strong muscles in his thigh against hers. Any doubt of his intentions was answered by the look in his eyes when he turned to feed her a morsel of roasted beef dripping with juices from their shared plate. Lord Simon slid his right hand down from her shoulders, where it had rested, to her waist, tangling it in her hair. Then he lifted the piece of meat to her mouth, rubbing it first against her lips.

Elise fought a battle within herself while she accepted the food offered by her husband, indeed even as others at the table engaged them in conversation. When Petra caught her eye from one of the lower tables and nodded at her, she knew she must seize her chance to be more like the woman she knew
her husband wanted. Sliding her hand down onto her lap, Elise held her breath, then moved it slowly over onto Lord Simon’s thigh.

If he lived to reach one hundred years, Simon would never have expected such an action from Elise than the one she’d just taken. So light that he nearly missed it at first, her hand slid onto his leg and rested there—only inches from that part of him that reacted immediately. She moved it slightly along his thigh towards his knee and then back upwards again.

His blood pounded through his body, and blistering heat followed from her gentle caress. Torn between the temptation to throw her to the floor and claim her as his own in the way his body now demanded and the need to protect her and to be gentle with so delicate a lady, he tried to swallow the small bite of meat he’d taken just as she’d touched him. It remained stuck there in his throat, and he fought the urge to choke on it, for surely that would force Elise’s hand from his leg and end the sweet torture and all the urges that her touch caused him. Finally, Simon was able to wash the food down with a mouthful of ale. Turning the cup so that her mouth would rest on the same spot his had, he offered Elise a drink.

He would have sworn that she’d placed her lips on him; the reaction to seeing her pink lips touch the same spot where his had been surged through him and he pulled together every iota of self-control he could find within himself to keep from placing her hand on the other part of him that surged as well. Simon attempted to look casual in his posture, trying not to let anyone see that her hand rested on him, trying not to let his raging desire loose on his innocent wife. A glance from Giles told him that his struggles were witnessed—and with a certain amount of sympathy, from the nod his friend made in his direction.

How was he to last until nightfall? How could he sit at her side, touch her, even hold her close, and not simply drag her off to their chambers and make her his? A man only had so much control and his was sorely tested even now, now with her soft hand lying on his hard leg near his harder cock. How? Mayhap if he focused his thoughts on her innocence? Mayhap if he made himself think on the fact that she came to him a sheltered virgin, regardless that the temptress would discover his true nature if she slipped her hand only an inch or two farther? As her hand did move—ever so slightly, but move indeed—he held his breath and tried to remember all of his good resolve. But the wide-eyed expression she gifted him with when he did look at her—a mix of siren and innocent at once—undid him and nearly unmanned him in an instant.

Elise felt Lord Simon’s surprise when she boldly placed her hand on his leg and she thought he would object to so forward a gesture, but he did not. Now, meeting his gaze as he lifted the cup to her mouth, she saw a hunger there that any woman would recognize. The centers of his green eyes darkened, making the lighter ring on the edges of the color appear brighter and revealing that his reaction was much stronger than a simple touch should cause. His breathing sounded shallow and irregular as he gazed into her eyes, and she discovered she had trouble breathing too. As he tilted the cup, she felt his hand move from her waist to the back of her head, steadying her as she drank deeply of the hearty wedding ale.

A tiny drop escaped as she swallowed, and when she would have dabbed at it with her napkin to keep it from dripping, his mouth was there, open and hot, licking up the ale and then kissing her lips as though to share its taste. His hand, still behind her head, entwined itself in the loosened locks of her
hair, something he seemed to like for he’d done it before. Then he pulled her closer and plundered her mouth.

Elise’s body grew warm, her breasts swelled as they rubbed against her gown. First she did as her mother had ordered—opening her mouth wider to let him have his way. Then thinking on Petra’s words, she let out a soft moan, meant only for his ears and then, even more boldly, she moved her hand, the one still hidden by the table’s cloth, along the hard muscles of his leg once more. Not certain what his reaction would be, Elise felt only a moment’s hesitation before he thrust his tongue farther into her mouth and tasted her more deeply.

Heat pierced her body, sending waves of pleasure from the places he touched to every place within her. Even between her legs began to pulse with that heat and she grew damp there and she shifted at the feeling of it. Whether it was moments or minutes, she knew not, but finally the sound of loud, raucous laughter conquered the haze of passion that surrounded them.

Oh, holy saints, they’d kissed so in front of all the wedding guests! She tried to draw back, but his hand held her mouth firmly against his, and Lord Simon showed no sign of allowing the cheering and bawdy calls to interrupt his pleasure. Elise lifted her hand from his leg and withdrew it, laying it against his chest then and trying to break the kiss. Finally, he opened his eyes and released her from both the kiss and his grasp, but not before gazing at her with an inscrutable expression. She could not tell if he was pleased or angered by her reactions to him.

Her heart pounded within her chest; she felt as though she could not draw a breath in deeply enough. Her lips swelled from his attentions, as did her breasts in a similar but different way, and she fought the urge to touch both her mouth and
the tight buds that her nipples had become. Looking about for something to wet her now-dry mouth, she reached for the goblet he’d used before.

“Here, ladywife,” he whispered, as he held the goblet out for a servant to fill and then handed it to her.

When he did not bring it to her mouth and when the fire left his green eyes, she worried that he was not pleased at all with her. Drinking some and then handing it back to him, she glanced around the room at their guests—the ones who had witnessed their public display. Other than her mother, with a grim expression on her face, most of their guests seemed to approve of their public kiss. Her mother, already rising from her chair, clearly did not.