“I lived in the grip of laudanum. I know what it is to crave. To tremble with wanting, be ruled by need. It nearly destroyed me. This is worse. There’s no respite. As soon as I leave your bed, I’m counting the hours until the next night.”
He pulled her hips higher, forcing her to balance on her toes.
“Sometimes,” he panted, “even in the middle of the day, I have to lock the library door and stroke my own cock, spending into a handkerchief like a randy youth. And it’s still not enough. It’s never enough.”
There was an angry edge to his words, and a brutish quality to his rhythm—as though he wanted her to be sorry for driving him mad with lust. Well, Emma had no intention of apologizing. His growled confessions were the best things she’d ever heard. She only hoped she could remember them long enough to write them all down in her diary tomorrow.
She felt his forehead rest against her shoulder, feverish and damp with sweat. He put one hand over hers on the bedpost, bracing his weight, and then reached with the other to touch her between her thighs. Circling his fingertips just where she needed it, just where he knew it would break her apart.
All the while, he took her in forceful thrusts. It was animal and uncivilized and she was wild with arousal. Her body quivered as he drove her toward the most devastating orgasm of her life. She couldn’t hide from it, couldn’t hold back. When the pleasure caught her, she came in racking, tearless sobs. She forgot where she was, who she was.
But he hadn’t kept his promise to tup her senseless. Not quite. Her awareness of him only heightened. She sensed the heat of his body, heard the harsh rasps of his breath, breathed the earthy musk of his skin, felt the iron length of his cock at the center of her.
“God,” he choked out. “God. Emma.”
A thrill shot through her as he called her name. Even in the mindless fury of joining, he hadn’t forgotten her, either.
A ragged groan signaled his crisis. Then it was only stillness and quiet and dark and labored breath.
After several moments, he kissed the top of her head. His arm tightened around her middle, drawing her close. “Tell me you’re not too scandalized.”
She smiled to herself. “I’m scandalized the perfect amount, thank you. But my thighs are jelly.”
He helped her onto the bed, and they collapsed in a tangle of sweaty limbs.
“Well,” he said, “that was a delightful first course.”
“First course? Of how many?”
“Depends on how hungry I am.”
She buffeted him with a nearby pillow. He took it from her, and tucked it under his head.
As he drew her close, he jolted in surprise.
“What is it?” she asked, alarmed.
“By God, woman. Your feet are ice.”
“I told you, I seem to be one of those people who’s always cold.”
He rose to a sitting position and caught one of her ankles, drawing it into his lap. He rubbed briskly with both hands, warming her chilled foot. When he was done with the first, he reached for the other.
Emma resisted. “Truly, you don’t need to do that.”
“I need to do it if you’re going to stay in my bed. And you are going to stay in my bed. I’m nowhere near finished with you tonight.” He reached for her ankle. “Give it here.”
She didn’t know how to refuse. She let him take her foot in his hands. “Don’t mock me, please. I know it’s unsightly.”
“Unsightly?” He stroked her bare leg from her ankle to her knee. “Nothing about you could be unsightly.”
“It’s my toe. Or rather, my lack of one.”
He finally dragged his gaze down to the end of her foot, to the empty space where she was missing the small toe. “Were you born without it?”
“No, I . . . It froze in the snow.”
He ran his thumb over the stub of flesh.
“I tried to warn you.” She tugged her leg from his grip. “Lord, it’s so embarrassing.”
He broke into laughter. “You are the most ridiculous woman. Of all people, you’d worry that I would give a damn that you’re missing a tiny scrap of a toe?” He waved at the scarred side of his face. “Have you looked at me?”
“As much as you’ll allow me to, yes. But that’s different. You have war injuries. They’re marks of valor. I have a mark of foolishness.”
“The only foolishness here is the fact that you’d hide it.”
She tilted her head. “Hm. Shall I point out the hypocrisy in that statement?”
“No.”
“You did walk right into it.”
“In point of fact, it crashed into me.” He reclined onto his side, his head propped on one elbow. “A Congreve rocket at Waterloo. Powerful impact, nearly impossible to aim. One happened to turn back on our ranks, and I was its lucky target.”
Emma lay on her side, facing him. She didn’t dare say anything, for fear he would shutter himself again.
“After my injury, when I woke up in blinding pain and missing parts of myself, I looked down to see if my cock was still there. When I saw that it was, I said—fine, I suppose I want to live.”
She smiled. “I’m glad you did. Tonight was . . . I’ve never felt anything like it.”
“I’m tempted to take that as a compliment, but considering your limited experience I’m not certain I can.”
“My experience might not be as limited as you’re assuming. I . . .” Emma gathered her courage. “I’m not a virgin. Or, I mean, I wasn’t when we wed.”
Silence fell over the room, heavy as an anvil. She found it difficult to breathe under the weight.
“You’re very quiet,” she finally ventured. “Won’t you say something?”
“Let me guess. The boy back home?”
“Yes. I knew it was imprudent, but that was what made it exciting. My father was uncompromising, and I have a rebellious streak.”
“So I’ve noted.”
Emma had never been a good vicar’s daughter, no matter how she’d tried to be. Her father’s expectations were too elusive. If she made the slightest progress toward his approval, the line only moved further away. At some point, she gave up on trying and went looking for approval and affection in other places.
That, of course, was what had landed her in trouble.
“He was the local squire’s son,” she said. “Three years older than I. Sometimes we would meet by chance during walks, and I was flattered by his interest. A kiss became two, and so forth. I fancied myself to be wildly in love with him. There was a ball at his sister’s house, and he asked her to invite me. Said it would be a special evening for us both.”
“I can guess the sort of ‘special evening’ he had in mind.”
She looked over his shoulder, her gaze unfocused. “I made myself a new gown for the occasion. Rose-red silk with gold ribbon at the sleeves and waist. I spent hours fussing with curling papers and tongs to make my ringlets just right. Fool that I was, I thought he meant to propose. And even when he tugged at my bodice and reached up my skirt, I still thought he meant to propose—afterward. I thought he was carried away with passion, that was all. It felt dizzyingly romantic.”
She skipped over the details of the encounter. “We were caught together, which was humiliating enough. Then he refused to marry me—which was devastating. Apparently there’d been some family understanding that he would wed a distant cousin.”
“To the Devil with any cousin. Someone should have brought the knave up to scratch.”
“There was no one to try it. I hadn’t any brothers to defend my honor, and my father . . . My father didn’t even attempt to force his hand. He blamed me for everything. What treatment did I expect, he asked, going about in a harlot-red dress. He called me a strumpet, a jezebel, said he didn’t blame the young man for refusing. He told me no decent man would ever want me, and that I was to leave his house at once and not bother coming back.”
Even six years later, the pain felt as fresh as if it were yesterday. She’d known society would judge her harshly for her mistake, but her own father . . . ? Giles had disappointed and misused her, but Father was the man who’d broken her heart.