Virginia Henley (10 page)

She sprang up quickly, confused. “Do … do you have a key of your own?” she stammered.

“Of course.”

“Good. Then you can let yourself out when you’re ready to leave. I know you’ll excuse me, but I’m just dying to take a bath in that beautiful tub. Oh, Patrick, I can never thank you enough for what you’ve done. Good night!” she said quickly and ran from the room.

Patrick chuckled to himself and rang for Mrs. Harris. “Milady has decided to take a bath. She’s used to doing everything for herself, so you will have to insist on helping her if she tries to dismiss you. Oh, and, Mrs. Harris, try and hurry her along to bed, won’t you?” he said with a wink. He removed his jacket and waistcoat, stretched out his legs and lit a long, thin cheroot.

“I’ll draw your bath, ma’am,” said Mrs. Harris.

“Oh, please call me Kitty, won’t you? Fill the tub right up and pour in some of those lovely lavender bath salts. I feel very extravagant tonight.” Kitty tied up her curls with a satin ribbon and sank into the perfumed water up to her chin. The hot water gave her a sensuous feeling. Although Kitty did not
know what it was exactly, she knew it was an extremely pleasant sensation.

After ten minutes Mrs. Harris came in and picked up Kitty’s clothes and laid a white gossamer nightgown out for her.

“Where did you find that?” asked Kitty, surprised.

“It was in one of the boxes that were delivered. Mr. O’Reilly picked it for you.”

“I can’t wear that. It’s indecent! Bring my petticoat back, please.”

“Nonsense. Put the nightgown on before he comes up. I think he’s been patient long enough.”

“Hasn’t Patrick left yet?” asked Kitty, surprised.

“Of course he hasn’t left—he’s spending the night.”

“But where will he sleep?” puzzled Kitty.

“With you, of course,” Mrs. Harris answered firmly.

“But men and women don’t sleep in the same bed,” said Kitty, shocked.

“I don’t know what game you’re playing, miss, but you’d better slip into that nightgown and pop into bed or we’re going to have one angry young man on our hands.”

Kitty was furious. “I will not put that thing on. Bring my clothes.”

“Then you’ll have to get into bed naked. He’ll soon have you in that state anyway.”

“Mrs. Harris, you are an evil woman and I don’t want you here.”

“Listen to me, dearie. You an’ me have a good thing going here if you’ll just be sensible. All you have to do is open your legs for him and he’ll give you anything you ask for. On the other hand, if you cross him, he looks like he could be a very nasty customer.”

“Oh, I won’t listen to such wicked talk,” Kitty said, close
to tears. She stepped from the water and dried herself on the big white towel.

“Where are my clothes?” she demanded.

“You’ll never find them,” asserted Mrs. Harris.

Wildly, Kitty opened drawers and pulled out their contents, but she could only find nightgowns and undergarments. Tears of frustration filled her eyes. Realizing how undignified she must look, scrambling about for clothes, she ran back to the bathroom and swept up the white nightgown. It was slit down the sides and fastened with delicate ribbons. She put it on furiously and Mrs. Harris approved. “That’s better. It was designed to give a man pleasure.”

Kitty caught a sob in her throat and ran downstairs to the sitting room.

Patrick’s cheroot glowed in the darkened room and Kitty ran to him. “Patrick, thank God you are still here!”

“My darling, what’s wrong?” he gathered her close and she hid her face against his chest.

“It’s Mrs. Harris. She’s an evil woman. She’s been saying such wicked things to me. Oh, you wouldn’t believe the things she said.”

Mrs. Harris appeared in the doorway and said, “I’m sorry, sir, but she wouldn’t go to bed. I can’t understand what’s upset her so much.”

“You may leave us, Mrs. Harris. She’ll be all right with me,” he told her coldly. She bobbed a curtsy and disappeared.

“My darling, what’s the damned woman been saying to you” he asked soothingly.

“I … I can’t tell you,” she whispered.

He reached over and turned up the lamp. Kitty gasped as the light flooded over her dishabille.

He raised her face and demanded, “Tell me instantly what she said to you.”

“She said … she said that men and women sleep in the same bed. I’ve never heard of such a thing,” and she began to cry again.

He kissed her forehead and smoothed her hair. “Kitty, when people love each other, they do sleep in the same bed.” He stroked her back gently until her tears subsided. He had her gentled now and he didn’t want her to see the naked desire in his eyes.

“I love you, Kitty. Do you care for me a little?”

“Patrick, you know I love you.” She looked up at him and the tears spiked her eyelashes. He bent forward and took her mouth possessively. When she pulled her lips away from him she saw the tip of his tongue. Would he dare to put his wicked tongue in her mouth?

“You go to my head, kitten.” His voice was husky and his hands slipped inside the folds of her gown and caressed her body. My God, wasn’t it just like a man to want to touch a woman on her most shameful parts!

With an air of ownership, he leaned forward to kiss her again, but she brought up her hand and slapped his face. His teeth glittered in a wicked grin and he laughed deep in his throat. “I denied you nothing all day. Now you seek to deny me everything, selfish little wench.”

His hands moved upon her body possessively, knowingly, as he tried to remove her nightgown.

Her deep modesty was so outraged she escaped his embrace and fled toward the stairs. He was after her in a flash and she could hear his laughter and knew he was enjoying himself more every moment.

“A female runs away just so that the male will chase her.” He grasped her ankle with strong fingers and she could go no farther up the stairs. “You were quick enough to display your ankles at the dress shop. I think you enjoy teasing me, Kitten.” He sat down on a step and pulled her down into his lap.
Slowly, tentatively, his hands slid up her legs, inching the nightgown higher and higher, until her limbs were exposed to his avid gaze. “You have beautiful legs, sweetheart. And what are these pretty curls between them?”

“You are going to ravish me!” she gasped as the full realization of her plight dawned on her. “My God, Grandada warned me about ravishers!”

He was startled for a moment and lifted his hands from her body. She fled up the steps into the bedroom and quickly put the width of the bed between them.

“Is that all they’ve told you about what happens between a man and a woman?” he asked incredulously.

She saw a softening in his eyes and begged, “I had such a beautiful day. How can you spoil it for me like this? Oh, Patrick, please tell me it’s just a game you are playing with me.” She looked at him imploringly.

“Sweetheart, of course it’s a game. It’s a love game. It’s a grown-up game. Let me teach you how to play. You can’t be a little girl forever. It’s time for you to become a woman.”

“I’m afraid,” Kitty protested.

“My little love, there’s nothing to be afraid of. I promise I won’t hurt you. I just want to kiss you and hold you,” he coaxed.

She shook her head. “It’s wicked.”

“Kitty, there’s nothing wicked about love. Kisses are beautiful things. Every one different, just like snowflakes. Let me show you.” He noted her slight hesitation. “You are shy because you’ve never been alone with a man before, and that thrills me more than words could ever tell you. I thank God that you come to me pure and innocent. That’s the way it should be. Trust me to cherish you, Kitty.”

She wanted to believe him. Wanted it with all her heart. She loved Patrick and had wanted him to love her since she’d seen him in Ireland, years ago. She cursed her own ignorance.
He was so educated, so worldly, how could she ever hope to become his wife unless she let him teach her every thing she should know? She let him come around the bed to her and take her in his arms. Slowly her arms lifted about his neck and Patrick dipped his head to take her lips. She did like to be kissed, she admitted. Other things about him were powerfully attractive and exceedingly pleasant. She liked his smell. She liked his strength. It would keep her safe against the whole world. Her hand touched his face. He was so masculine, her fingertips felt the roughness of his beard in spite of the fact that he shaved every day.

She heard him groan and suddenly his hands pulled off her nightdress, leaving her completely nude. Immediately she ran around to the opposite side of the bed. She stared in disbelief as he unbuttoned his shirt and tossed it aside.

“If you come to my arms willingly, I promise to make love to you in a way that will not hurt you.”

When she saw that no appeal would turn him from having his way, a searing anger spread along her veins. “No one has ever said ‘no’ to you in your whole life! You are so accustomed to having your own way, you think it’s the natural order of the universe. I will fight you to the death, you arrogant bastard!” she spat.

His teeth gleamed against his dark face as he stripped off his “inexpressibles,” and her eyes widened as she saw the column of his hard phallus stand up rigidly from his groin to his navel. In her fury, she had forgotten her nakedness and Patrick knew she was the most exquisite, exotic creature outside of paradise.

“You are flaunting your beauty for me like an angry pagan goddess. Your body was made for love!”

They posed for a moment, facing each other. With a swift movement he reached across the bed and grabbed her, then she was clawing, biting and scratching him savagely. He held
her down on the bed with both wrists clamped securely above her head and brought his lips down to touch hers. He breathed, “My wild Irish Gypsy.” He knew this seduction was going to be the most exciting thing he’d ever done. He’d gentle her with sweet kisses until she clung to him. Then he’d awaken a flicker of desire, which would burst into flames and consume them both. He took her mouth exultantly because he could smell victory.

The taste of her lips had the tang of wild honey. He slid his mouth across hers, molding the curve of her lips with his. The desire he felt for her was white-hot. Naked, beneath him, her effect stunned him. The passion she aroused in him was blinding, dizzying. He meant to be gentle, meant to awaken her sensuality slowly, meant to seduce her with tender kisses and caresses, but his hunger for her blazed out of control like wildfire.

Kitty lay still while Patrick kissed her. The shock of being naked on a bed with a man above her was almost staggering. The things he was doing to her, coupled with the breath-stopping nearness of the man felt delicious. In fact, the pleasure he was bringing to her body felt so wonderful she knew it must be sinful and wicked beyond belief. In her distress at her own carnality, she began to pant.

Patrick felt a thrill when he saw her breathless with desire. She was no longer fighting him, she was yielding to him sweetly.

His hot breath teased her silken skin as his mouth slid down her throat and across one very round breast. It was as firm as an apple and he knew he must taste it.

Kitty’s thoughts ran about like quicksilver, writhing with the conflict of opposing desires. At all costs she knew she must not take the very thing she desired. She wanted Patrick. She wanted his love and protection, but the raw lust she saw in his dark face frightened her. It frightened her because she
knew with the age-old knowledge of Eve that he created a matching lust in her, and once that devil inside her was released, there would be no controlling it.

Kitty felt her very senses being drugged by the dark whisper of skin against naked skin. He was all hard muscle, scalding heat and surging male hunger. He aroused sensations in every inch of her silken skin as her young body responded to his virile sexuality. He was bad and wicked and sinful and he was on the verge of making her bad and wicked and sinful.

Suddenly, even his mouth became hard and he crushed hers savagely. Kitty took his bottom lip between white pointed teeth and bit down hard. He cried out in pain, then kissed her so brutally, her whole mouth was bruised. Her eyes flashed fire as she sought a vulnerable place to wound him. She saw the scar on his shoulder, pink and tender, barely healed over where the knife had been plunged in. She arched her body up to him and sank her teeth in his wound deeply.

He screamed with the raw agony of it, then as if pushed beyond endurance, he wedged her thighs apart and impaled her with one plunge. He increased the depth and speed of his thrusts. She was so hot and tight inside, he had never experienced such ecstasy. Each time she moved, her muscles gripped the shaft and sent quivers to the tip.

The mating was elemental, like a great force of nature. Patrick was beyond thought. When she writhed and cried out it excited him to madness. He would have sold his soul to sustain and prolong this cataclysmic intercourse but some instinct told him she had endured enough, so he did not delay his climax. It came like an explosion that rent his body with great shudders and left him totally satisfied and sated. He rolled his weight from her and quickly gathered her to him with gentle, protective arms.

Kitty was in a state of shock. All the fight had gone out of her. It was too late now. They had both committed a terrible sin. She was as much to blame as he. She lay numb, knowing she should have somehow stopped him. How ironic that now when she needed to be comforted and enfolded in warm, loving arms, they were
his
arms that were offering her succor.

Patrick murmured endearments against her hair. “Kitten, I’m sorry. You received no pleasure from it at all, did you? If only you hadn’t fought me, it would have been so much easier for you. Next time I promise to be gentle and tender and bring you exquisite pleasure.”

His words threaded through her brain. She knew he was entirely capable of bringing her exquisite pleasure. He would have done so tonight if she had not fought like a tigress against it. She flinched at his talk of next time. She knew that if there ever was a next time, she would be lost. She would offer herself for his taking. Her virtue was gone and she felt covered with shame because of her own secret longings.