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“Mama!” Henry was waiting for her at the top of the stairs, but Octavius’s words thrashed about in her head, begging to be heard again.
“Mama?”
Eleanor shook her head and held out her hand. “Come along, sweet pea. I want to hear about your day.”
Her son beamed up at her and let her lead the way to her bedchamber.
Eleanor settled into the chair by the empty fireplace and pulled him onto her lap. He was getting so big, she could barely hold him anymore. He was tall, if not as broad as his father. At least not yet. She could imagine how much alike the two of them would look once Henry was grown. By then would this relationship they were forging be a solid one they could both rely on...?
She gave Henry a light squeeze. “What did you do at the park?”
He began to describe a game of cricket, and she let her head fall back against her chair. His voice ran high with excitement, but the recitation was hypnotic nonetheless. He moved on to the describe his first foray at fishing, and she smiled against his head tucked up against her shoulder. Every sentence he uttered about his father was a positive one. He didn’t complain about anything Octavius had done or said, and as Henry finished, babbling some nonsense about spinning and falling, she was hard-pressed to keep her smile at a non-foolish level. Whatever else their stay in London accomplished, at least her husband had acknowledged their son and taken an interest in him.
She cupped her hand around Henry’s. “Did you have a good time?”
“Yes.” He sat up straighter, nodding vigorously. “Perhaps you could come next time. Though you wouldn’t like the spinning. Or the cricket.”
“I might very well like cricket, young man.”
He screwed up his features in a way that indicated he didn’t think so, but the look was so comical that Eleanor had to bite her lip to keep from laughing.
His reply was as solemn as a sermon. “You can try it, then, if you wish. Though it won’t be easy to run in that dress.”
“Probably not,” she said, just as seriously.
“Oh! I need to find the earl’s bat.” Henry leapt off her lap. “Mr. Carter made him a bat just like he did for me. Isn’t that odd? I thought the earl never came to Mayne Castle.”
“Hmm.” Eleanor kissed her boy on the cheek. “He hasn’t lately, but it sounds like he used to.”
“He should really come again. I have to find that bat.”
Henry executed a perfect bow and then ran out the door. Eleanor sat and smiled for an unhealthy amount of time; then she remembered her son’s father and everything that had passed between them just a short while ago. She slumped in her chair. She wasn’t being fair to Octavius. He wanted to apologize for how misled he’d been in his past behavior, and he’d even shown in these last two days that he was sincere. That he could step outside the harsh, bitter shadow he’d been cast in. Had wallowed in. But she hadn’t let him.
She rose and paced the room. Though the late afternoon sun brightened the walls and furnishings, everything blurred before her. The fear that niggled at the back of her brain—at the back of her heart—hadn’t disappeared. Octavius could overpower her. Not physically but emotionally. She was in a considerable amount of danger.
And yet... He seemed changed. He wanted her there for the confrontation with Drummond. He’d overcome his fears and taken Henry to the park. He had defended her to her mother. He’d wanted to marry her and had said as much. So Eleanor stopped pacing, closed her eyes and exhaled, knowing what she must do—what she wanted to do, despite the hazardous possibilities of the outcome.
When she opened her eyes, a flash of color atop the counterpane caught her attention. She tilted her head then went over to investigate. A small bouquet of flowers reclined on the bed, propped up by the pillow.
Upon closer inspection, they were a rather wilted bunch of pansies, daisies, and violets. Still, she picked them up and admired their cheerful color. Henry must have left them as a gift for her. She was only surprised he hadn’t mentioned them. Then she noticed the folded sheet of paper lying atop the pillow that the flowers had partially covered.
She lifted the paper and unfolded it, trying not to drop the flowers in the process. Most of them fell to the carpet anyway when she gripped the paper in amazement, staring at the strikingly accurate and oh-so-beautiful sketch. Henry smiled back at her, his dimple perfectly placed and his cowlick twisting just so. She’d never had a portrait of her son painted, but while these lines and shading might not be called fine art, she already cherished this as better than all others.
On the back of the sketch, having used a pencil, Octavius’s script appeared less harsh:
Eleanor,
You have not let me say so, but I apologize for the cruel assumptions I made about your character and Henry’s paternity. I cannot blame you for thinking me a beast. Though I’ve not given you much reason to believe it, I am not so lost to humanity as to be incapable of admitting when I’ve wronged someone. I am truly sorry.
She turned the paper over again and smiled at the image of Henry. Then her gaze strayed to the bottom right corner where the artist had signed it:
Octavius.
The sketch trembled in her fingers. Octavius, not Lex. Henry’s image blurred just the slightest bit; she brushed the back of her wrist across her eyelids. She should have known Octavius wouldn’t obey her, would apologize one way or the other. Just this once, she’d let him have his way.
She drew in a breath. An apology had been offered. She would accept it. She only hoped she could bear the consequences.
Gathering the flowers from the floor, Eleanor clutched them to her chest along with the sketch. Now, to find her husband.
––––––––
LEX WAS LEFT IN THE drawing room, alone and confused, by Eleanor’s abrupt departure. He’d thought things were going well. His explanation of why he’d married her had been a tad severe, but he’d warned her he wasn’t going to paint the truth in a gilded light. He would have thought Eleanor wanted nothing less.
Under other circumstances, he probably would not have admitted how rash and sentimental he’d been in marrying Eleanor. After the way her mother treated her, he’d been compelled to offer his wife the one thing he could: honesty. In her astonishment, Eleanor hadn’t the wherewithal to further question his irrational behavior all those years, for which he was very grateful.
He stood there for some minutes, but when it was apparent she would not return he retreated to his study and closed the curtains, shutting out the obnoxious sunlight. He reminded himself—for the hundredth time in the last two hours—that he hadn’t wanted a wife, even if he’d wanted Eleanor desperately.
As strange as it was to admit, the high point of his day had been the trip to the park with Henry. Everything else had been grim. His in-laws’ visit was uncomfortable, more for Eleanor than him. And while his conversation with his wife had opened up new territory for them, at least in his view, it too had ended badly. Now he had to look forward to Drummond’s call after dinner.
He wasn’t given to excessive drinking, more’s the pity, so to drown his sorrows he ordered a plate loaded with every wafer, biscuit, bun, and cake Cook had available. Once it was delivered, he tucked himself into the chair by the fireplace, settled the plate on his lap and began his overindulgence with a cinnamon biscuit.
He tried being angry with Eleanor for not accepting his apology—it was a habitual emotion he’d never had trouble expressing before—but he couldn’t do it. She was under no obligation, even if he’d indulged in sentimentality. Licking the sugar from his fingers Lex admitted that, even before Drummond whispered so insidiously in his ear, he had turned his abiding regret on his wife in the form of coldness and neglect. To think now how deeply those actions must have cut Eleanor... Her mother had paid her scant attention, and her husband treated her even worse. Guilt soured his belly.
A footman tapped at the door and entered when commanded. “A note for you, my lord.”
Lex took it and dismissed the servant. He nearly tossed it in the fire when he saw the seal with the imprinted script D.
Lexden,
While I can think of nothing more entertaining than spending an evening with you and my lo—beg pardon, your wife, I am afraid something of more importance has arisen. I trust we can find another time to our mutual pleasure.
With warmest regards to you and to Lady Lexden,
W. Drummond
Lex crushed the note in his fist and then consigned it to the fire. This was nothing more than Drummond trying to wrest back the upper hand. The ignorant cur had no idea what Lex was about, but he’d made it clear he wasn’t going to be led around like a pony on a rope.
Good. Drummond was worried. Let him stew for a day.
Mindlessly, Lex plucked another bun from the plate balanced on his lap and devoured it in two bites. The evening now stretched before him. Whatever goodwill he’d cultivated with Eleanor had apparently evaporated, so...perhaps Henry needed help reconstructing the Battle of Talavera.
Another rap sounded on the door, quieter and more hesitant than the footman’s. Lex paused, throttling the hope that rose in his chest; Eleanor didn’t want to talk to him right now. This was most likely a timid maid.
“Come.”
The door opened, casting a triangle of light upon the carpet, but Lex was on the wrong side to see who stood there. That damned hope sprang up once more.
Eleanor.
She slipped into the room and closed the door, moving no farther, her hand still upon the latch as if ready to bolt at any second. Her other hand clutched the ragged bouquet he’d bought and the sketch he’d left her. Lex grabbed the plate off his lap and moved to stand.
“No, please don’t,” she said. Her voice cracked. “Just stay there.”
A distance between them was a good idea. Wasn’t it? “You left in a rush. Are you well?”
“No, not completely.” She held up the picture. “Aside from Henry in the flesh, this is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. It’s lovely, as are your words. Thank you.”
When she’d ordered him to remain seated, he’d frozen on the edge of the chair, still balancing the plate on his leg. The position was uncomfortable, as was the idea of sitting while speaking to a lady. But he didn’t want the conversation or the pleasantness to end so he must say something.
“You’re welcome. I drew it while he was fishing. Obviously, he didn’t look nearly that cheerful after he caught the blasted fish. He was devastated to think he might have killed the poor thing.”
To his surprise, Eleanor chuckled and pushed away from the door. “He is insisting that fish be taken off the nursery menu.”
Ingrained politeness and the fact there was only one chair had Lex rising again.
“Please, sit,” she commanded. She neared him, bent, and pushed the unused upholstered footstool over in front of his chair. With a sweep of her gown, she perched on it and reached across to pluck a biscuit from his plate. “The ginger ones are my favorite. Which do you prefer?”
“The...the cinnamon, actually.” His heart thumped at an unhealthy pace, as if they were discussing his wretched family history and not the flavor of confectionary.
She tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear and nibbled on her biscuit. He saw her mouth move but had no idea what she said. The firelight played along one side of her face, making her skin glow and her hair a burnished gold. Her eyes sparkled green and lively, but still he saw the wariness there, as if she were playing with a lion and wasn’t certain when it would attack.
He wouldn’t turn on her. Not this time.
“Octavius, you are not attending me.” She tilted her head to catch his gaze, and when she did, she raised her eyebrows mockingly in imitation of her mother.
“I’m sorry,” he said simply. “I love to look at you.”
She blushed an even more distracting shade of pink. “I asked if you were the artist whose sketch hangs in the sitting room.” Shifting, she narrowed her eyes. “And in here. Is that Mayne Castle?”
He glanced over his shoulder, though he knew exactly what she admired. “Yes.”
“You are very talented.”
“They are just sketches,” he said with a shrug, placing his nearly empty plate on the chair-side table. “I don’t paint or do watercolors.”
“I like your sketches.” Her lips formed a circle. “Oh! Will you draw me?”
Eleanor, in the nude, stretched out provocatively by the fire while he put pencil to paper? He could do that.
He shouldn’t do that. Even as the image formed in his mind, her breasts and hips all tantalizingly curved and shaded, he knew it was a mistake. This tête-à-tête was about more than just carnal lusting. His brain knew that even if other parts didn’t. He wasn’t quite certain however, what that “more” was.
“The light isn’t very good in here,” he said in a pathetic attempt to turn her off the idea.
“Of course,” she replied. “I should really go and tidy up before Drummond’s visit.” But the look of disappointment on her face so clearly read, Oh yes, how silly, no one ever pays me any mind.
Lex jumped up and yanked open a drawer in his desk. “Don’t move. Drummond isn’t coming. You actually make a perfect subject there in the firelight.” He sounded like an idiot, but he wanted that look gone from her face. Banished forever.
He slipped a new sketchbook out of the drawer and grabbed a pencil, returning to his seat before she could even think about leaving.
“You don’t have to—”
“I insist.” He flipped the book open. “Turn your head to the left just a fraction.”
Her brow furrowed. “Drummond isn’t coming?”
Lex sighed. “You cannot talk while I’m sketching, Eleanor. It ruins the lines of your face. Hmph. Maybe I should do this more often.”
She looked down her nose at him, and he smiled—which wasn’t as painful as it used to be, especially around her and Henry. What in the hell were they doing to him?
“Drummond?” she prompted.
“Right. He sent a note saying he cannot come this evening. He’s playing games, as usual. I think he’s frightened, actually. After my display of temper the other night, he’s likely not sure why I would want him in my home.”
“We can’t postpone speaking with him, Octavius. We don’t know what either he or Portia will do next.”
“I’ll write him back and insist he come tomorrow.” Lex lifted his pencil in the air. “Now hush so I can work. Look down, at the portrait of Henry. Yes, perfect.”
She wore that smile again, the soft one that only came over her face when she looked at her son. Henry was so fortunate; Lex’s mother had never smiled at him in such a way. She hadn’t ever been cruel or unkind to him while she lived at Lexden House, but neither had she been loving or caring. Lady Lexden had had her interests, and they hadn’t involved her children or her husband. No, he admitted, she hadn’t abused him, but she had helped destroy the person he’d loved most.
Shaking his head, Lex concentrating on getting his pencil strokes just right. Eleanor was nothing like his mother—or her own. She loved Henry, she did her best by Portia, she’d been faithful, and she always knew just how to help.
His chest constricted so tightly he could barely breathe, and his pencil fell slack in his fingers. He’d let her in. She’d battered her way past his strongest defenses, and he hadn’t stopped her.
A great roaring assaulted his ears from within as he looked up at Eleanor. “What are we doing?”
The rasp in his voice must have caught her attention, for she lifted her lashes, revealing enormous pupils. “I don’t know.” She slipped forward and rested a hand on his cheek. He tried, God, how he tried not to move, but still his head turned just a fraction and his cheek nestled within that warm palm. Then she sucked in a small breath and leaned closer. “I have no idea. You’ve offered an apology and I’m accepting it. I think we should let the wind carry us where it will.”
Her breath was against his lips as the gap between them disappeared. Her mouth touched his, and he closed his eyes and gave in.
Her kiss was soft but not tentative. Eleanor had never been shy in such matters. She slid her hand past his ear and threaded her fingers through his hair, tendering her acceptance of his apology just as he’d first offered it. But as he savored the hint of ginger on her lips, she broke contact.
“I’m very scared.”
Lex hadn’t opened his eyes. However, he heard the quaver in her voice and still felt the whisper of her breath upon his mouth. That forced him to admit, “Me too.”
He’d regret that; he knew he would. At the moment, though, he couldn’t hold anything back. Not from Eleanor, the wife he didn’t want. He pressed forward, capturing her mouth once again, uniting their fears and joining their passion, and despite their qualms, their kiss was deliberate: slow and provocative. Lex touched his tongue to her lips, and her fingers curled into his hair. Then she was gone.
He opened his eyes to find her sitting fully upright on the footstool, biting her lower lip. Coherent thoughts, and the power to express them, were still a few moments away, so Lex simply stared.
“I suppose I should have known the wind would carry us that way,” she said softly. “I don’t think we should... I just think we should focus on our weaknesses, not our strengths.”
Our strengths? He’d made love to his wife exactly once in the last six years, but yes, of a certainty they should ignore these strong feelings and...talk. Again.
Lex sighed. He shouldn’t be frustrated. He’d told himself the very same thing. At least he could put the pressure on her this way. “Tell me why your mother is the way she is.”
Eleanor lifted a shoulder, surprised. After a moment she said, “I don’t know.”
Lex shook his head. He wasn’t fooled by her feigned nonchalance; wariness had turned her eyes from green to a dull brown. “I’ll fetch you some sherry if it will loosen your tongue, but you aren’t going to avoid my question. You’re the one who wanted to talk.”
“You are willfully intrusive.”
“A quality you clearly admire as you possess an abundance of it yourself,” Lex replied with cheerful satisfaction. “Now, would you like that sherry?”
She nodded.
He rose, bumping his shin into her knee then saying, “Take the chair. You’ll be more comfortable.”
Stepping into the hall, he found and instructed the footman to bring sherry—and more wafers, which he would need if he wasn’t allowed to touch Eleanor. Returning to the study, he found her curled up in the chair, her legs tucked beneath her bottom. Her slippers lay in a jumble on the carpet, as if she had kicked them off without a care.
He’d wanted her to be comfortable, not relaxed and alluring.
As he crossed to the dying fire, she reached for the sketchbook he’d left on the table. Veering over to snatch it away, he snapped, “I’m not finished with that.”
She was too quick. He leaned over the back of the chair, intending to take the book back, but then he saw the look on her face. She held the sketch in front of her, lips parted, eyes bright, and he pushed away and stalked to the fireplace to stir up the flames.
“Now do you see why I was distracted?” he asked.
“I don’t look like this.”
“You do to me.” Vivacious and bold, with a strong hint of compassion.
The footman tapped on the door. Lex retrieved the proffered tray and set it on the desk. Eleanor flipped the sketchbook closed and placed it back upon the table. Lex noted she hadn’t said if she liked the sketch.
Pouring some sherry, he carried it over and straddled the footstool. “Drink up, and speak up.”
The sherry disappeared before he could blink twice.
“You’re enjoying this too much,” his wife accused as she wiped her lips.
Not as much as Lex would enjoy kissing her again.
“Your mother,” he prompted.
Eleanor leaned her head against the chair and stared at the ceiling. “To say that she was exceedingly disappointed I was born a girl is an understatement. A great uncle of hers had bequeathed her a very handsome annuity if she gave birth to a son.” She lowered her head and leveled her gaze upon him. “I was not that son, and, in addition, my birth was so difficult that the possibility of any future children was out of the question.”
His wife’s dispassion was admirable. Lex would have been proud to speak of his mother in the same tone. And yet, what had a lack of feeling, what had keeping things buried ever done for the two of them but created more hurtful secrets?
“Do you hate her?” he asked.
She started. Then her eyelids rose and fell in a flurry as dark emotion shoved out the dispassion. “I used to.”
Surprised—he’d expected a swift and vehement “yes” that was perhaps more reflective of his feelings for his own mother—Lex slipped his hand beneath Eleanor’s and stroked his thumb over her knuckles. “What changed?”
“It was nothing so abrupt.” Her eyes focused on his arm, but Lex doubted she could see anything but her past. “I first saw a crack in her when my father was threatened with debtor’s prison. She had no one to rely on but me. That’s when I noticed the fear. She lives in constant terror of poverty and degradation. Her own family’s finances were unstable, and my father’s spendthrift ways, well... She wanted—and I can’t really fault her for this—the son that would have provided her with security, a financial security a daughter might or might not have given her through marriage.”
“You’re far more understanding than I,” Lex muttered. Then he realized just how hard he was squeezing her hand and let go.
She recaptured his fingers. “Because of Henry.”
“Henry? What’s he to do with your mother? As it is, I’m amazed at how you’ve mothered the boy considering your example.”
“My reasoning is ridiculous.”
When she said nothing further, Lex raised his free hand in the air. “Your reasoning is your reasoning. It just is. So tell me how Henry changed your understanding of your mother.” He cut his gaze back to her. “Never tell me you’ve pinned all your hopes and dreams on Henry.”
“Absolutely not.” She picked at the sprigs on her gown. “I...love him so much. You can’t imagine how deeply it would wound me if he hated me. I couldn’t bear that. A child shouldn’t hate their mother. I don’t want Henry to see that. So...I can’t. I just can’t.”
Interesting, but not ridiculous, logic. Were feelings ever logical anyway? Lex had never felt there was any rhyme or reason to his own, which was why it was best not to examine them. They simply were.
“Very well,” he said, “you’re not obligated to hate her, but I cannot understand why she hasn’t changed her mind about you. You’re a countess, for St. Bartholomew’s sake! You’re worth more than ten sons.” He paused, raising his eyes to her face. “And I don’t just mean financially.”
Eleanor’s cheeks glowed rosily in the firelight. The urge to kiss her—and more—hadn’t disappeared. She leaned forward a fraction, and his hopes, not to mention his cock, sprang to life. Then she flopped back against the chair.
“Oh, she was ecstatic when I first married you, but then I ruined everything by getting sent away to Mayne Castle.”
“Eleanor...”
She shook her head, smiling wanly. “I know I wasn’t to blame for that, but my mother wasn’t going to blame you, the man with the money.” She paused. “At least she’s nothing like your mother was. You win that battle.”
Lex shuddered. This conversation wasn’t going to devolve into one about his mother, nor was he going to spend another minute looking at a dejected Eleanor. “I was thinking...perhaps you and Henry would like to visit Astley’s Amphitheatre the day after tomorrow.”
Eleanor straightened and raised her eyebrows, saying nothing.
“With me.”
Her smile could have blazed a hole through his heart. “We would love to! Though we daren’t mention this to Henry before tomorrow. He would never sleep.”
“He seems to do very well for himself in my bed.”
A knock sounded at the door—the footman, blast him! The servant opened it a crack at Lex’s command and said, “Dinner is served, my lord.”
“Thank you,” Lex replied, probably sounding most ungrateful. He had no desire to interrupt what he and Eleanor had going.
She rose as the door closed, and due to his close proximity she was trapped between his knees. Celibacy was one thing when she lived seventy-five miles away but quite another when her lavender scent swirled around him and he had only to tip his head up an inch to bury his face in her breasts. What was so wrong about exploiting a strength, again?
With much reluctance, he pushed back the footstool upon which he sat to give Eleanor room to pass. Even after moving, though, her muslin-clad belly hovered right in front of him, as if she’d moved closer instead of away. Then, suddenly, her hand was on his shoulder, sweeping up the back of his neck as she dropped to her knees between his thighs.
Her mouth met his, capturing it in a ferocious kiss. One flick of her tongue on his lips gained her entrance, and Lex gripped her hips and pulled her against the instant evidence of his arousal; he was more than wise enough not to mention her earlier wish to forego this kind of pleasurable congress.
She withdrew the pressure of her hand on his neck, but he wasn’t going anywhere. He kissed her, possessively, ardently, trying to make up for all the years he’d stupidly believed Drummond. Intent on getting her out of her dress, he slid his hands up her back, lamenting the number of fasteners standing between him and a naked Eleanor. He stopped in shock when her hands found the buttons on the fall of his breeches and worked them loose, then yanked his shirt from the breeches and lowered the flap to release his cock into her hands.
Sweet heaven, he nearly lost control. Might have, just a bit. Her circled fingers stroked him from head to base.
“Eleanor, don’t—”
“I’m sorry!” She withdrew her hands as if his cock were suddenly a hot, burning coal. “I know you hate it when I’m forward.”
He could barely see her through the lust clouding his vision, but he found her chin with his hand and raised her face to look at him. “Never,” he croaked. “Why would you think that? I like nothing better than when you follow your instincts.”
“It isn’t seemly,” she mumbled, lowering her eyes, shading her thoughts.
Never would he have guessed she was this insecure about her passion. It devastated him to think she didn’t realize how much he loved her boldness, so he stroked his thumb across her cheek. “What happens between us is neither seemly nor unseemly. It’s private. We can do whatever we wish, though I would hope you’d tell me if I did something you didn’t like.” He pressed his lips to hers briefly. “Ha, as if you wouldn’t tell me.”
Confusion muddled the color of her eyes. “You weren’t going to tell me to stop? You don’t mind that I’m brazen?”
“You are unabashed and impudent every other minute of the day. Why would I expect you to be less so now?”
“That isn’t the same as liking it.”
She sat back on her heels, releasing herself from his gentle grip, and Lex suddenly realized he was sitting there with his breeches hanging open. He pulled the flap back over his now shrunken yard, fighting hard not to show his disappointment. “I like it, Eleanor. I was trying to tell you ‘Don’t stop.’” He attempted a half-hearted smile at the irony that they had, indeed, stopped.
“Oh.” She stared at his knee, apparently deep in thought.
“Shall we go to dinner?” he proposed, though it was the last thing he wanted. Then he realized how he’d just asked Eleanor for honesty and here he was being anything but truthful. “No, actually, I’d like to start again. Would you?”
Rising up on her knees, she smiled tentatively, then a bit more saucily, then ran her hands along his thighs. “Absolutely.”
His cock responded as swiftly as before, but her hands took a different path and slid up inside his coat. She helped him shrug out of the garment and tossed it over onto the desk. Next, she set to work on the buttons of his waistcoat.
Lex leaned over and scattered kisses along her neck, pausing to whisper in her ear, “How am I to get you out of that dress if you won’t take your hands off me?”
Her lips skittered up to his ear. She nibbled on the lobe before replying, “You will just have to wait your turn. I started this, after all.”
“And I am humbly appreciative.”
Together they removed the waistcoat and his shirt. No sooner were they were tossed aside than she ran her hands up his bare chest, across his shoulders, and down his back, finally sealing herself against him. As she nipped little kisses along his shoulder, he reached around and began undoing her dress, but the distraction of her hot lips on his skin and her belly pressed up against his cock meant his fingers were quite inept at the task. He’d only unfastened two hooks when her wicked hands moved to his waist and captured the stiff length of him once more.
He was useless after that, and he had a sneaking suspicion Eleanor knew it—even reveled in it. She stroked him, experimenting with different methods, and all of them made his mind go numb. He could do no more than sit there, chin on her shoulder, as desire scorched through his veins.
“I love the way you feel,” she said, as Lex groaned shamelessly. She leaned back to look at him and smiled, no doubt because he looked like a slavering idiot. “If I keep doing this, you will...spend your seed, won’t you?”
His cock pulsed in her hands. Somehow, he got his brain to issue a command and he grabbed her, stilling them. “Yes, but not now.” He’d spent six years finding release with his own hand. He wanted to be inside her. More than that, he wanted their pleasure to be mutual. “I want you. With fewer clothes on. You, me, together.”
Barely functional words, hardly poetic, but they achieved the goal he wanted. Eleanor backed away and turned around so he could finish unhooking her gown. He did a slapdash job of it, may have even ripped one or two hooks, but that’s what lady’s maids were for. His fingers shook as he lowered the dress around her shoulders. She stood and stepped out of it, shedding her petticoat soon after. Only her stays and chemise remained.
She made to kneel in front of him again, but he stopped her. “That can’t be comfortable. We can lie by the fire.”
“No.” She sank to her knees again and said nothing more.
Too eager to contemplate her refusal, Lex got her stays off and she pulled her chemise over her head. Before she had it all the way off, he had his hands on her hips, smoothing them down to caress her firm cheeks. As soon as the white linen hit the carpet, though, Eleanor turned, disengaging his hands.
He moved to stand and remove his boots and breeches, but she took steps toward him, set her hands on his shoulders and held him in place. He looked up but had no time to speak as she braced herself on his shoulders and climbed onto his lap, straddling him. His blood roared.
She bit her lip in obvious worry, so he had to say something. “You have the best ideas, Eleanor.”
In thanks, she kissed him and rubbed herself against his overly enthusiastic cock. He had no inclination to think after that. While he plunged his tongue into her mouth, she lifted herself onto him, sinking slowly and seductively farther down until he thought he might explode with just that one stroke.
He didn’t, and thank God, for she threw her head back and began to pump up and down in a raw rhythm that sent his head spinning. He was so close, but even through the blurry haze of arousal he could tell Eleanor wasn’t there yet. He slipped his hands up to her breasts, momentarily regretting he hadn’t spent more time there already, and rubbed his thumbs across their sensitive peaks.
Her moans began as a low hum. They grew louder as she thrust her lithe body up and down until at last she erupted, and he gripped her ribs to keep her from falling as wave after wave of pleasure rippled through her.
“Eleanor,” he groaned, “my wanton Eleanor.”
On her final plunge, as she clenched around him, he gave himself up to his own release. She collapsed against him, and he gripped her bottom as he continued to pulse inside her.
At length, his senses returned. They were both breathing hard, Eleanor more so. He planted a kiss on her salty neck. “I still have my boots on.”
“That’s more sensual than it sounds,” she whispered, lifting her head.
“Oh, really?”
“Except that I don’t think I’ll be able to walk tomorrow if I stay in this position much longer.”
“Thank goodness there are other positions,” he ventured.
She rewarded him with a smile. “What about dinner?”
“Are you hungry?” Please say no.
She shook her head, which was enough for him. Lex stood and carried her over to the fireplace, easing her down to the carpet where he stretched out beside her and pulled her close.
“Do you realize all your hairpins are still in place?” he asked, leaning in and pulling the first one out.
She closed her eyes. As he continued removing the pins, her body became soft and pliant against his. Her breathing evened out. He plucked free the last, thinking she had dozed off, then her lips curved into a smile that was satiated with a hint of wistfulness. “This is perfect.”
This. So innocuous-sounding, and yet her words unleashed a tremor of fear up his spine. “This” was more than just physical gratification, and the full implications eluded him. So he had to ask again.
“Eleanor, what are we doing?”
She sucked in a muted breath, as if she knew the answer despite her earlier protestation of ignorance. Her eyes were big and soft, a greenish gold that called to him and chilled his blood at the same time. He looked away.
Standing, she tugged at his hand. “Let’s retire for the evening. We can have dinner sent to my chamber. Then I think we could both benefit from a sound night’s sleep.”
He might benefit from a few hours’ brooding in his study, too, accompanied by more buns and cake. But even without acknowledging the sly shadow in Eleanor’s eye that suggested one other activity that might be included in that agenda, Lex knew which choice he would make.
Fool to the last.
“As you wish, my lady.”
They made themselves somewhat presentable and then dashed out the door and up the stairs. Eleanor was giggling breathlessly by the time they reached her bedroom. Lex chuckled along with her as she toppled onto the bed, but that frisson of panic still lingered and so instead of joining her he said, “I’ll ring for a tray.”
She popped back up. “I’m going to change and then see how Henry is faring.”
The boy was fine, obviously, and much later, after they had dined on turbot in lobster sauce, with a few teasing references to Henry’s new aversion to fish, they prepared to retire.
As he extinguished the candles one by one, Lex knew what he had to do. He had to give Eleanor a chance to question him. Not only because he’d done the same to her, but because he still owed her a penance for his outburst. So, as he snuffed the last candle between his thumb and forefinger and slipped between the bed linens, he said, “It is your turn.”
“Oh, for what?”
Why did she sound so animated? He managed to unclench his teeth. “To ask me a question.”
Clad now in a lawn nightdress, with her hair flowing freely, she leaned into him. Her gaze intent, her eyes turned from green to light brown—a change that sent a spear of anxiety through his chest. Things went much better for him when Eleanor’s eyes were green.
“Are you certain? I think I’m rather ahead in the questioning game.”
He spit the words out before he could change his mind. “I’m certain.” Then he closed his eyes, knowing what she would ask.
The point of her chin dug into his chest as she propped her chin there. She reached out and smoothed the hair off his forehead. “Tell me about the day your father died.”
The memories cut even though he’d had time to gird himself. He might have even flinched once or twice.
“I’m sorry for pressing you. I understand. You needn’t answer.” Eleanor stroked her thumbs beneath his eyes, brushing away tears that weren’t there. They hadn’t been there since he was twelve.
“I can do it,” he croaked, the words contrary to every thought running through his brain. Thank God his eyes were still closed. “That day—”
“No!” Her fingers slid down his cheeks, pressed on his mouth, trapped the words in his throat. “I was wrong to ask. I meant it when I said I understood. Don’t do this for me.”
Who else would I do it for?
“I can do it,” he insisted again, through her fingers. And as with telling Henry they would have a grand time, Lex began to think he might.
“Why don’t I ask you two questions a day?” she suggested, sliding her fingers down his chin until they dropped onto his chest. “Then I won’t feel like an Inquisitor pushing for too much at one time.”
How kind yet unfair, for her to take the blame of discomfort. He nodded anyway. “Two questions a day: one in the morning, one in the evening.”
“Will you make one other concession? For me.”
The soothing aroma of her lavender hair soap drifted up to his nose. “Yes...?”
“Will you open your eyes when you answer?”
Confused, he kept his eyes shut. “I beg your pardon?”
“You seem more willing to talk when you don’t have to look at me.” There was a distinct tinge of bitterness in her voice. “At night, behind the dark of the bed curtains. Even this afternoon, in the drawing room, you wouldn’t look at me when you explained why you married me. But for this... Please, Octavius, will you look at me?”
Opening his eyes, he pushed upright, crowding her, and she lay back on the mattress. Lex loomed over her, his face inches from hers, and he said, “Is this what you wanted?”
She smiled, her mutable eyes shading back to a beguiling green. His heart thumped a little louder, and cradling his cheeks in her hands she said, “I like this very much.”
The harshness from a moment before seeped out. She was right; he did find it harder to talk—at least about important matters—when he had to look her in the eye. Feeling her breath upon his face, seeing every emotion she felt in the differing hues shading her eyes: the intensity of it all nearly compelled him to roll away, look away.
Nearly.
He locked his muscles against the compulsion and stared into her eyes. “I accept your terms. Proceed with your question.”
She reached her hand across her chest, slipped it into his and squeezed. Armed not just with inquisitiveness, she’d break him down with affection as well.
“Were you there when your father died?”
He took a deep breath and fought the urge to close his eyes. “I was in the house that day, yes.”
She leaned close and kissed him on the cheek, then wrapped her arms around him in a soft embrace.
When she pulled back, he asked, “Why did you do that?”
“That was for your twelve-year-old self.”
Lex said nothing. He buried his face in the pillow of hair bunched up around her shoulder, and steadily inhaling the heavenly lavender, he soon drifted off to sleep.