Georgia felt the tremor in his work-roughened hands as Max explored her face with gentle fingers and even kissing wasn’t enough touch after all these years apart. He was her dear friend, her Max, yet he was the lover she had dreamed of as well. She had to stop letting him take all the weight of their marriage on his shoulders and kiss him back.
His mouth became more demanding and she stopped caring about who was kissing who. The heat inside her was fierce as his tongue made little forays at the gap between her lush lips where her breath was coming short and shallow, so she opened it wider and felt his tongue exploring deeper. The fire inside her was so hot and sweet she wanted to moan and whisper a demand for more, but their mouths were too urgent to make words.
She had feared this much intimacy with Edgar, felt so choked and invaded. She stopped breathing altogether for a moment, but sly little darts of temptation seemed to reach down to the very heart of her femininity at the touch of Max’s tongue on hers so she forgot about Edgar altogether.
Stories about heat and passion and delight she had never even heard before spun around in her head and made her heartbeat race. She heard a soft murmur of extreme pleasure and realised it came from her.
Max was raising his mouth to ask her questions about her first real kiss, if she excluded that teasing, butterfly one on their wedding day, and she didn’t know the answers, so she kissed him this time, echoing his moves back at him because they were the only ones she knew. She tried them out and felt Max trembling with need and it felt so powerful that she nearly got carried away.
It felt novel and shocking to make him gasp, to hear and feel his breath coming short because she was kissing him. Then he deepened the kiss with a moan and for a tense moment she felt invaded as his tongue pushed fully between her lips and past her teeth this time and he probed the privacy inside. Edgar threatened to push his horrid possession of her and break this lovely rightness, so she fought against the shoddy past. This was Max and she knew he would never hurt her.
‘Max,’ she murmured as he raised his head at the sound of her gasp of almost protest at the heat raging inside her with nowhere to go.
She went up on her tiptoes to grab their kiss back so Max was too occupied to reply. She heard his groan as she made funny little noises to say kissing him tasted delicious and he needed to know it. Maybe he was right and she could be good at this kind of loving, with him. Then she was disgusted with herself for thinking there would be marks given out for method and performance afterwards.
All that mattered was them as their kiss went deeper and more desperate and she was plastered against his body like a second set of clothes. Siren Georgia from her wild dreams took charge and stretched sinuously against his powerful male body as she let out a soft moan of something deep and yearning that sounded so strange to her.
She heard Max suck in a great breath as if it was the only way he could hold back from kissing a lot more of her than just her throat from ear to collarbone as he left tender little licks of fire all the way down it. His kiss settled on the racing pulse at the base of her throat and his mouth was so hungry and hot and eager she moaned again and would probably have done a lot more if the door hadn’t burst open so Millie and Helen could dash in.
Seeing their mother locked in Max’s arms, they stared at them as if they couldn’t believe their eyes. They were dumbstruck for a few blessed seconds while Georgia tried to reshape herself into being their mother again and not Max’s would-be lover.
‘You’re up at last, Max,’ Helen burst out in her usual headlong fashion when she was excited, or worried.
‘Nobody told us,’ her big sister added suspiciously.
Max let Georgia go with a haste that made her feel cold and alone, but what else could he do with two pairs of accusing eyes on him?
‘You two were kissing each other when we came in, weren’t you?’ Millie accused as if she had caught them playing with fire and Georgia thought she might be right and the trouble with fire was it left only ashes behind it.
‘None of your business, young lady,’ Georgia made herself say briskly and where she found enough brisk from goodness only knew.
‘You were, though, weren’t you? You can’t pretend you weren’t when we saw you hugging and kissing one another and now you’ve both gone red.’
‘What if we were, Minx?’ Max said smoothly. He had got himself under control again a bit too swiftly, hadn’t he?
Georgia didn’t want him to be controlled with her and, considering she was having second thoughts about the more she had practically begged him for only moments ago, that probably made her almost as contrary as her daughter.
‘Yuk! Grown-ups who kiss like that have babies.’
‘Do they?’ Max said as if fascinated by the very idea and Georgia had to smile and forget how serious they had just been together.
Of course her girls loved him, why wouldn’t they? He always took their odd questions and funny little ways seriously and didn’t treat them like idiots just because they were too young to know some things she wasn’t quite sure about herself, like the difference between loving and just wanting.
‘I’m not entirely convinced by your theory, but what’s wrong with babies if we did happen to have one?’ he asked lightly.
Georgia thought he was every bit as serious and every bit as worried about their response to the idea as she was now. He didn’t know she badly wanted to have his child one day, but she didn’t want her daughters to feel left out if she did. She blushed at the very thought of what they still had to do together to make it a possibility and avoided his eyes.
‘People want them more than us,’ Helen chipped in with a nod to say it was true, so there was no point trying to tell her she was just a little girl who didn’t know things.
‘Which people would those be? I don’t see any of them in this room,’ Max said lightly. Georgia could see the anger in his eyes as he guessed who ‘they’ were before Helen confirmed it, but she knew he would hide it in front of them.
‘Grandpapa Duke and Uncle Chert and the servants, except Cook; she liked us.’
‘Are they here, then? I certainly didn’t invite them.’
‘Neither did I,’ Georgia murmured, secretly vowing never to do so.
Max gripped her hand as if he knew what she was thinking and the warm contact of his against hers stopped her falling back into a false world where heirs were all that mattered and girls were barely tolerated by their own kin. She didn’t belong in that world now, she never had, and she squeezed his hand to say how delighted she was to be living in this one.
‘If you two have a baby, he could be a boy and then you wouldn’t want us,’ Helen persisted as if she was telling them facts they ought to know already and no five-year-old child should ever have to think that was how their life was going to be.
‘What do you think, Max?’ Georgia made herself say lightly even as her heart broke for her precious children kept at Mynham for three whole weeks without her to counter the stupid Jascombes’ stupid obsession with their stupid male heirs. ‘Shall we keep them? Obviously they are girls and they can be noisy and naughty and occasionally they get very dirty. Sometimes they smell a bit as well and even I don’t want to hug them then and I’m their mother.’
‘I think we might as well, since nobody else would want to and boys can be even noisier and dirtier and a lot smellier. Maybe they are going to teach any baby brothers and sisters who do happen to come along to be almost as much of a nuisance as they are, but I think we might risk it, if you’re game, my dear?’
For a moment Millie looked deeply offended, then she saw the smile in Max’s eyes as he pretended to be serious so she pulled a hideous face at him instead. ‘You don’t deserve us,’ she told him. ‘Not me, anyway; Helen loves her doll more than anything else in the whole wide world so she won’t care what you think of us for very long.’
‘I don’t, I really and truly love Max,’ Helen argued and they were in mid-quarrel about who loved him the most when Leonora came to fetch them back to the schoolroom. She had a stern look for their parents as well as her reluctant pupils this time to say why weren’t they doing it for her, since these two scamps were their children and they were supposed to be responsible adults.
‘Thank you,’ Georgia said shakily as they heard her daughters arguing all the way back upstairs and Leonora’s quiet rebuke they should not have run away from their lessons, even if Max was up and about and they wanted to see him standing on his own two feet again.
‘For kissing you almost in public in the middle of the day?’ he asked her with a wry smile she didn’t quite know what to make of.
‘No, for making light of the Jascombes’ stupidity and showing their ridiculous obsession with male heirs doesn’t matter and our girls are wonderful. I want to spit roast my former father-in-law and brother-in-law over a slow fire. They made my girls think they are of no account while my back was turned.’
‘Their loss and you had better let me tie the knots because you were never any good at them and we wouldn’t want them to get away,’ he said. And there he was—her man, her real history, the crucial part of her family she never wanted to live without again.
‘No, we would not,’ she said and laughed as he meant her to. ‘Oh, Max, whatever would I do without you?’ she asked and tried not to be disappointed when he just grinned and went off to discuss something urgent with the estate foreman instead of taking up where they had left off before the girls interrupted.
Max kept Georgia on the edge of something wonderful for days after their first real kiss with a sensual touch here, a fleeting kiss, or an unsatisfying caress when nobody saw him touch her, but she felt it long afterwards as if he had branded her. Her inner sensualist was so frustrated and the rest of her so impatient with this feeling of being slightly off balance all the time.
She would lie in bed at night, wishing she had enough courage to use the key he had given her on their supposed wedding night so she could tumble straight into something new and slightly dangerous with her lawfully wedded husband. At least then she could join him in his grand bed every night instead of being lonely and restless in her own grand one.
So many times she had got up, wrapped herself in a fine woollen shawl, since it was now early autumn and this was Northumberland, and stood on her side of the sturdy ancient oak planks, trying to work up enough courage to open it and step through into them being Mr and Mrs Chilton and truly husband and wife at long last.
She usually got as far as touching the cool old metal handle before her doubts set in and stopped her turning the key she now kept in the lock, waiting for her to find enough bravery to turn it and breach the promise he had made her that first day here: that he would never open it first and demand what she didn’t want to give freely.
That sensual kiss with Max the first day he was downstairs again had taught her to want him so much. Then he had confused her day after day by trailing barely there kisses along her bare arms, or there would be a swift brush of his lips on her bared shoulder when she was wearing evening dress. Maybe even one on her cheek in passing as he placed her evening cloak around her shoulders, if she was lucky. Then he would walk away; leave her shivering with, well, something warm and mysterious she didn’t fully understand yet.
He also left small presents in unexpected places to remind her that she was very much a woman nowadays and maybe she could dare to be a sensual one with him again very soon? She would, if she could only let herself believe she was truly that woman deep down.
First, Max gave her a delicate silk shawl so finely made she was sure it would pass through her wedding ring if she ever took it off to find out. The feel of the light-as-air stuff against her bare skin on nights when they had ventured out to meet local society made her shiver with such delicious consciousness of her own body. It was almost as if Max was touching her instead of the luxurious fabric.
She was almost sure he had picked it to remind her how much he wanted to slide his fingers wherever the silk lay and maybe kiss her there as his touch went sensuous and never mind what local society thought of them if they stayed home to play instead of going out that night.
His eyes had been so hot with desire when he adjusted it against her skin as they walked up the steps tonight she had shivered with hot longings she still didn’t fully understand. She hadn’t dared to wear the perfume in public that he had left in a finely made glass phial inside her sewing table, since she didn’t want to be considered fast.
But on nights when she wanted to open that door between their bedchambers so badly she shook with it and turned coward yet again, she would sniff its heady promise of sensuality and dab a little on the pulse point where he had kissed her so hotly that day, just to remind herself she would be his lover one day and it was going to be worth fighting her inner demons for.
The sweet heat at the heart of her felt dearly, tortuously familiar now. She knew he was doing his best to stoke it into a blaze high enough to sear away her old terror of being intimate with a man and she smiled secretively at the thought of the tempting, clever, sensual lover her oldest and dearest friend had grown up to be and never mind if he did think he still wasn’t very good with words.
She knew he was wooing her without them, teaching her things about herself even her wanton inner dreamer never thought about feeling until now. Why had she never dreamt Max would be such a cunning lover? It made her blush to even think of what he might do in real life when her dreams had grown wilder every time she turned away from that dratted door and headed back to her bed to dream of what she didn’t dare do with him quite yet.
The next morning she frowned down at the delicate pendant Max must have persuaded Huggins to place on the tray with her morning chocolate. It wasn’t that she didn’t like it, she loved it. The elegantly made and satin-lined leather box was like a present in itself. Of course she was too weary to get out of bed early and breakfast with everyone else after she had spent so long with her hand on that wretched key last night it was nearly dawn by the time she finally gave up and now she felt... Hmm, how did she feel? Utterly bewildered, yet so enchanted at the same time she was breathless and shivery.
She stared down at her lazy-feeling body as Huggins fastened the clasp of her beautiful new necklace at the back of her neck so the lovely thing slid into place exactly where Max must have meant it to. She had already been breathless with anticipation when she finally opened the box after looking for a note and not finding one and she certainly hadn’t been disappointed.
The necklace inside it was so beautiful it took her breath away. She knew Max had ordered it to be made for her so it wasn’t some random purchase he had seen and thought she might like. This was clearly the work of a master jeweller with a clever and exquisitely set trail of gems the same colour as her eyes that had been fashioned into a heart shape made of twined lavender flowers.
When she had finally took her eyes off it and let Huggins put it on for her, the chain turned out to be exactly the right length to slip smoothly into the cleft between her breasts and remind her how much she wanted him to kiss her there until she grew breathless with heady anticipation.
She wore it under her modestly high-cut morning gown and felt the weight of it all the time Huggins fussed with her hair and made sure she was perfectly groomed when she left her maid’s expert hands. Max’s latest present lay against Georgia’s skin in secret, warmed by her body and constantly reminding her of her dream of Max kissing her in so many of her secret places.
She squirmed with frustration as she imagined what could happen, if she was finally brave enough to open that wretched oak door tonight and ask him to kiss her there and there and lower and even lower and truly make love to her for the first time.
‘You’re up at last, Mama. You do know that it’s almost noon, don’t you?’ Helen said reproachfully when Georgia finally managed to get downstairs with all sorts of distracting fantasies about her husband making love to her in her head. Her senses felt hazy as well as her thoughts and it took far too long for her to snap back into a properly motherly frame of mind and demand to know why her daughters were not in the schoolroom at this time of day.
‘Miss Haverstock said we could wait for you down here as long as we were good and didn’t make too much mess,’ Millie said, although her dubious glance at the scattered papers and books said she wasn’t too sure about the last bit either.
‘Ah, there you are at last, my dear. Are you ready?’ Max said from the doorway with a grin at her bemused state of mind and he should know since he had caused it.
‘Uhm, ready for what?’ she asked, searching her memory for a clue. The feel of warm gold against her bare skin meant she couldn’t think straight. His hungry gaze lingered on the giveaway gold chain where it rested at the base of her neck and even the high ties of the chemise under her round gown couldn’t quite hide it. He knew exactly where the pendant was sitting since he must have ordered the pretty gold chain to be this length on purpose.
‘Our family picnic, of course, don’t you remember?’
‘Oh, yes, of course. I forgot that was today,’ she lied as she made herself think harder and realised this was the first she had heard of it.
‘Scatterbrain,’ he teased her and no wonder she glared at him, then tried not to laugh when he winked at her so knowingly it was almost a stage leer.
‘You did say only if it was fine, remember?’ she improvised.
‘So I did and it is. Very fine indeed,’ he told her with his gaze on the giveaway strand of fine gold and she wasn’t fool enough to think he was talking about the weather.
Helen was obviously getting tired of such puzzling adult conversations, though. ‘Max?’ she said and held up her arms to be picked up.
‘You mustn’t,’ Georgia said as he bent to oblige her little girl and even Helen wasn’t very little any more as a sturdy five-year-old. ‘You’ll hurt yourself,’ she added as both of them stared at her reproachfully.
‘No, I’m all healed up and ready, willing and able to hug this beautiful little princess every chance I get. The doctor said so, when he came to look me over for bruises this morning while you were still in bed and even he didn’t manage to find any.’
‘What about me, then?’ Millie demanded with a sulky look at her triumphant little sister perched on Max’s arm pretending to be regal.
‘You told me when we were discussing the best ways to get to the secret wood you were too big to be carried, so I shall just have to admire you from afar, Princess Amelia. I would be very honoured if you would deign to take my hand, though.’
‘Very well,’ her elder princess said graciously, then clung to his side as he waited politely for Georgia to walk on ahead of them. She had to blink back a tear of sheer happiness because her daughters had the kind of father figure in their lives she had always dreamt of for them and Max had made it so easy for them to adjust to their new lives.
‘Mama has to walk in front of us because she’s the queen,’ Helen said from her perch and Georgia shook her head sceptically, but kept walking.
She knew Max’s gaze was half on her back view and only half on where he was going and she hoped nothing would happen to trip them up. It did feel a little bit queenly, leading her family outside with her husband’s eyes appreciative and warm as she swayed her hips self-consciously and tried not to think about doing it in the intimacy of their bedchamber once the girls were fast asleep tonight.
It felt powerful and for the first time in many years the feeling of a man watching her with hungry eyes didn’t make her squirm with dread. They had reached the outer courtyard by the time the girls went silent and wide eyed and gazed at the ponies waiting for them in awe.
‘Oh, Max, they are perfect,’ Georgia gasped and if she hadn’t already suspected she was falling in love with him she would have done so when she watched her girls’ dearest wish for ponies of their own come true. Why hadn’t she thought of it now they lived in the country? Of course they were big enough to have their very own ponies as well as dogs.
‘Sam and I had to hunt high and low for exactly the right ones, but at last I think we have found them,’ Max said as he set Helen on the smaller pony and Sam solemnly passed her the reins.
‘Mine,’ she said with absolute contentment and Georgia fought tears again at the sight of her little girl looking so blissfully happy.
‘Help me up, Mama,’ Millie demanded after greeting her newest friend with almost too much love and the carrot the undergroom held out for her to feed her very own pony.
‘Since the mistress is clean, and your shoes ain’t, I’d better do that, Miss Amelia,’ Sam’s deputy said and Millie was too impatient to be on her pony to argue.
‘He’s wonderful,’ Millie said when she was sitting on her own slightly bigger pony. ‘What’s he called?’
‘That’s up to you,’ Max said.
The girls were still arguing about suitable names for such magnificent creatures when he handed Georgia up into the gig and set his horse to trot down the newly mended north avenue. An avenue whose trees might only be three feet tall, but it was the thought that counted, Max told her as she slewed around to see where her girls were going as they took a path even this neat little carriage was too wide for.
‘I’m sure Sam and the lad and Miss Haverstock will be able to keep them safe between them so stop worrying about them for a while and let them enjoy their first ride together through my fledgling woods, Mrs Chilton,’ he said and she turned around and grimaced at her own fussing.
‘I know they will be perfectly all right and they need to have their own adventures just as we did as children, but it’s my job to worry about them.’
‘Mine as well,’ he said shortly and she would hurt him if she insisted on being solely responsible for them.
‘Ah, but you have just provided them with the biggest treat they have ever had so you’re way ahead of me,’ she said and settled back into the padded seat as if she was thinking how to outdo him next time. ‘It’s not fair,’ she added childishly for good measure.
‘I know, but it’s also your job to make sure I don’t spoil them.’
‘Since you’re soft as butter with them I shall have my work cut out,’ she said lightly. She wondered how Millie and Helen would feel if he ever had a daughter of his own to spoil and adore as well, but certainly not instead, because Max just wasn’t like that.
‘I want them to be happy, Georgia, to know for certain they are loved and can feel secure here and are every bit as good as any other child on this planet, not excepting the royal princesses and every male Jascombe ever born. I just wish they were mine instead of his so they would never have had any doubt they are loved and lovable and special to both of us.’
‘Spoilt in other words,’ she said huskily.
‘It’s a father’s job,’ he replied and seemed to be waiting for her to deny him the right to call himself that, but why would she?
‘True,’ she said, with a pretending-to-be-exasperated sigh. ‘Goodness knows what those poor animals will end up being called, though,’ she added, hoping he knew she had accepted him as the father of her girls and another fine layer of happiness was growing over her bitter past. She wanted to love Max so completely that surely she would be able to open the door between them soon?