Page 109 of The Reckless Love of an Heir
He laughed. She was still an anomaly, but now she was his wife and he could take as long as he liked discovering all the facets of her nature.
Desire and affection clasped in his stomach, tightening the muscles. He let go of her breast and then lifted off her spectacles and put them on the dressing table beside her.
‘Will you take off your shirt? It feels strange to stand here like this when you are clothed.’
A low sound of amusement rumbled in his chest. Her nightdress was gaping open, it was only fair that he stripped too. He gripped his shirt above the waist of his trousers and pulled it up over his head, then discarded it in on the chair where he had left his other clothes.
Her fingers touched him, spreading out over his pectoral muscles. ‘I wanted to touch you in the spring,’ she said.
When she had come up here to his rooms…
‘When you lay on the sofa in the library. You were so bruised, and so beautiful.’
‘And so reckless and self-centred.’ His hands pressed over hers.
She looked up. ‘No, I was trying to convince myself I had every cause to dislike you, but I did not dislike you that day. You fascinated me.’
‘Like one of those flowers in that book.’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, you now have a lifetime to explore your fascination, both for me and for that book of orchids.’
He kissed her and her soft lips pressed gently back against his. Every time he kissed her he was reminded of her inexperience. He treasured it.
His hand slid inside her open nightdress as hers lifted to his shoulders.
He kissed her for a moment more, then bent and kissed the exquisite skin of her upper breast. Her nightdress fell off her shoulder, hanging down her arm. He bent lower. As her hands explored the contours of his body, his tongue played with her nipple.
He lifted his head. ‘Let us be rid of this nightdress.’ Heslipped it off her other shoulder and pulled the cuffs over her hands, so it slid to the floor, leaving her naked in front of him. She showed no self-consciousness.
Looking into his eyes with a gentleness he had never seen in a woman’s eyes until he started looking more closely into Susan’s, ‘I love you,’ she said.
To hear those words… They did very strange things to his stomach. ‘I love you also, Susan. Now run and get into the warm bed, while I finish undressing.’
She smiled widely, before turning away.
As she turned, he smacked her bottom with a satisfying crack.
She squealed and ran for the bed as the orange light of sunset shone through the window onto her skin, highlighting her curves.
He unbuttoned his trousers then bent and pushed both his trousers and underwear down, stripping his stockings from his feet too. He put his clothes in the pile on the chair, and picked up her nightdress, and put that there too.
‘Are you not going to close the shutters?’ she asked as he walked towards the bed.
‘No. I want to see you in the last of the daylight, and then I will wish to look at you in the moonlight. Now make some space for me.’
She moved over, lifting the sheet and blanket.
He climbed in beside her.
‘I am used to sleeping with Alethea, we often share a bed…’
Her innocence made him laugh. ‘I hope sleeping with me will not be at all comparable.’
She giggled with a lightness he had only heard when she had been in a ballroom. If he could make her as happy in their marriage as she was in a ballroom, then he would be happy too.
He leaned over her, his hand embracing the back of her neckand kissed her again. Then he threw the covers back and kissed a path down her neck and across her shoulder. This is how he had wanted to make love to her in the rose garden. To have been able to kiss her skin everywhere.
