Page 53 of Tremaine's True Love
Nita considered the translation of Paracelsus sitting in her lap and made another grab for logic, reason, common sense, for anything that would keep her from dragging her visitor to her bed.
“How do you know I’m capable of wantonness?” Nita certainly suffered doubts about that quality in herself.
Mr. St. Michael slid from his chair with the ease of a cat hopping to the carpet. He arranged himself before Nita, his arms loosely about her hips.
“Anybody who defies her family as easily as you do, who takes on the worst of winter’s weather, who challenges death itself, has a capacity for considerable passion. Stop diagnosing a simple case of attraction between healthy adults and kiss me.”
He moved closer, close enough that Nita caught a whiff of mint on his breath. She cupped his cheek, finding it shaved smooth. He’d prepared for his campaign while she’d read medical wisdom written hundreds of years ago.
She was tempted. Tempted by the flesh-and-blood man before her, tempted by his assurance that passion and pleasure could be hers. She set her pamphlet aside, leaned forward, and touched her lips to Mr. St. Michael’s. His shoulders relaxed, but he did not assume control of the kiss, a point in his favor.
Nita would allow no man to assume control ofher, marriage be damned, attraction be double damned.
“More,” he whispered. “Again.”
As she leaned forward and anchored her hands in his hair, Nita shifted, so Mr. St. Michael knelt between her legs. His arms snugged around her waist, and tension seemed to drain from him.
“I’m not saying yes,” she muttered against his mouth. His reply was rendered with more kisses, delicate, entreating, fascinating kisses to which Nita most assuredly assented.
And then she wasn’t saying anything. She was kissing him back like a woman who might never have another kiss, who might die, all of her passion spent on other people’s colicky babies and gouty grandparents.
Mr. St. Michael shifted up so he embraced Nita as she sat before the fire. The contours of his body were more evident than in any of their previous encounters, because Nita wore only her nightgown and robe while he wore only his shirt and waistcoat above his breeches.
Nita knew the names of the muscles—pectoralis, subclavius, serratus—but she was frantic to learn the feel of them, ofhim. Without breaking the kiss, Nita went after the buttons of his waistcoat.
“You will take me to bed,” she said as a button went flying.
“You like giving orders.” He smiled against her mouth and brushed her hands away. “Like being in charge. Maybe this is part of the appeal of the sickroom.”
Nita hated sickrooms. “How can you think of such matters at a time—?”
He rose away from her and she wanted to roar at him to get back to their kissing, except he yanked his shirttails out of his waistband and hauled his shirt over his head, waistcoat and all. Firelight turned his skin golden, and the dratted man must have had some sense of the picture he made, half-naked and all gloriously healthy male, dark hair whorling down the midline of his flat belly.
“I think to please you,” he said, extending a hand to Nita.
She regarded that callused, masculine hand, stretched across the marital equivalent of the Sistine Chapel’s ceiling.
“I would not be a biddable wife. I would be head-strong and difficult. I am not very sociable. I do not hold my opinions lightly.”
“You will not hold your vows lightly either,” he said, his hand steady. “You would protect our children with your life, and you’d manage easily when I’m traveling for extended periods. You’d enjoy your independence, in fact, and be neither impressed with our wealth nor heedless of it.”
Ourwealth.Herindependence. Nita loved the sound of that, though as for Mr. St. Michael’s extended travel… Nita’s brothers had traveled. She’d tolerated their absence with an abundance of prayer and activity. People would still fall ill, suffer injuries, and have babies, regardless of Mr. St. Michael’s traveling. She’d stay busy. Nita put her hand in his and let him draw her to her feet.
“You will give me time to consider your proposal, sir.”
He scooped her up against his chest. “You are magnificently stubborn, which only attracts me more. I will give you something to think about then, besides a few tame kisses.”
Tamekisses?
He settled Nita on the bed, and while she tried to decide if she liked being handled like a sack of flour—albeit a precious sack of flour—Mr. St. Michael toed off his boots and peeled away stockings and breeches.
“We didn’t bank the fire,” Nita said, gaze glued to the middle of his chest.Sternum, rectus abdominis. Do-not-look-down-imus.
Wearing nothing but a smile the likes of which would set every female heart in the shire pounding, Mr. St. Michael crossed the room and took up the poker.
Trapezius, latissimus dorsi, gluteus…
Gluteus God-help-me-us. A giggle threatened, a very pleased giggle as Nita’s suitor returned to the bed.
