Page 17 of Wedded to the Beastly Duke
Now, though, the drugging intensity of his mouth against hers was forcing her to consider something she had not yet given thought to: she wanted the Duke.
Her body—that was to say, the traitorous compulsion from which she now suffered—wanted to know what his hands would feel like on her skin. The force of her desire shocked her, brought forth from barely anything. Skin against skin.
His teeth sank into her bottom lip, and she groaned. He made a noise, too, something that sounded almost like a noise of pain, and he pressed his hips more firmly against hers. Something long and hard rubbed at her most sensitive place, but before she could think too much about what it was, he had taken her waist in both hands and was positioning her so that the tumescent bulge was precisely where she needed it.
Forgetting herself, she caught his face in her hands, pulling his face closer to hers as she returned his kiss. It felt as though she was on fire. She burned for him, and he had been the one to turn embers to flame.
He broke away, and for a heartbeat she followed, seeking his mouth before reality set in. The pleasure seeped away and the full force of what she had done intruded.
This man was not some nameless prince. He was her husband. She had kissed herhusband.
“You see?” he murmured, his eyes dark and hot on her. “I can do whatever I please with you.”
In a fit of rage, Emmeline brought her hand back and struck him across the face. Her lips tingled from the memory of his mouth on hers, and her body felt needy, urgently craving something she could not have.
He rocked back, one hand on her cheek, and for a moment, she thought he would retaliate. Instead, he watched her with mingled amusement and desire.
“Be warned, Emmeline,” he said in that low, rough voice. “I will give you some time to accustom yourself to the idea, but I will come for you. That is my right as your husband.”
Before she could think of anything to say, he strode away.
* * *
Adam stared at the wall of his study, his vision supplying the image he wanted to see there: Emmeline, her hair mussed and her lips bee-stung, watching him with as much heat in her gaze as he ever could have desired to see.
Kissing her had been a mistake.
No woman had ever made him lose control, but he had been tempted to take her against the wall as though she was some common courtesan. For a moment, he had wondered if there was any purpose in waiting at all. She had engulfed him with her unexpected passion, the way she had returned his kisses twofold. The sound he had made when he had ground himself against her?—
He shook off that thought before he could think too deeply about it. His erection throbbed, and he forced himself not to take it in hand and relieve the ache. If he did so, thinking of her would only make his preoccupation with her worse.
No. He would wait a few days for the strength of his desire to die, and then he would visit her at night when it was dark and he would be unable to see her body. There, he would do his duty as a husband, and he would leave immediately after. No sentiment, no undue longing. Merely a body’s natural act.
She seemed to think there was affection in the act of sex, but he knew far better. It was about pleasure, nothing more. There would be no affection in their union. In truth, he could hardly stand her, even if her constant resistance to his commands intrigued him.
That intrigue would be his downfall if he was not careful.
He groaned as he poured himself a tumbler of whisky and swirled the amber liquid in his glass. She was clever—more so than he had initially anticipated. And she was defiant. Beautiful in a subtle, unobtrusive way that he only truly noticed after they had first met. Their second meeting, the wedding, had been his undoing.
He only noticed the soft line of her jaw, the way her eyes changed color according to her emotions, the subtle arch of her eyebrows, and the fullness of her lips. Admittedly, she was not a classic beauty, but he found her all the more appealing for that.
So he would keep his distance from her. Stop noticing all the things that made him want to lose his mind and sink into her, and pursue her only as long as was required to conceive an heir. And a spare, because as he proved beyond all doubt, the heir could not necessarily be counted on to survive as long as was required.
After the successful birth of his two heirs, he and his wife could take as much distance as they pleased from one another.
No matter what, he would not allow himself to become consumed with her the way his body wanted to be.
ChapterSix
Emmeline spent the next day fuming. Then, the day after that, she began to plot.
Every time she thought about the kiss, she burned a little inside, hating herself for the flood of desire that still raced through her, and hating him for making her feel that way. It was only natural, she decided, that her body would react like that when he kissed her. After all, he had probably kissed plenty of women. He was no doubt an expert, using that experience against her.
She had been caught off guard, but that would not happen again.
To begin with, she made inquiries about the Duke’s likes and dislikes. Ostensibly, so she claimed, so she could better learn how to please him, but in reality, so she could discover how best to make him call off this wedding.
When the stable cat had kittens, the timing could not have been more perfect.
