Page 91 of Tremaine's True Love
“I’ll get the candles if you’ll bank the fire,” she said, starting with a branch on her mantel. One by one she blew out each flame, the shadows in the room gradually converging into darkness.
Tremaine locked the door, scooped coals into the warmer, banked the fire, and ran the warmer over the sheets. He hoped—a dangerous undertaking, hoping—this was the start of a routine they’d share for the next five decades, but Nita’s mood was off, and he still had no idea why.
Maybe that was also part of married life?
Nita unbelted her robe, then drew her nightgown over her head. For a procession of instants, Tremaine beheld his intended by the flickering light of the fading fire. Long, graceful limbs, pale skin, rosy breasts, full hips gently curving into a feminine waist, a thatch of reddish gold curls at the juncture of her thighs.
“I am marrying a beautiful woman.” Inside and out, beautiful in her heart, in her body, in her restless, vigorous mind.
“While you are handsome,” Nita said, climbing onto the mattress, “and deserving of some cosseting yourself. Have your tups continued to recover?”
Tremaine joined her under the covers and she cuddled up along his side, a quietly perfect moment.
“I heard from my man today, and, yes, every one of them is up and about, swilling water like a sailor at his grog and gobbling up all the grass hay we leave out for them.” This time next year, those lads would all be anticipating their first lambs, and perhaps Tremaine would be too. “Kiss me, Nita Haddonfield. Will you like becoming Nita St. Michael?”
Nita kissed him, a slow, nearly reverent tasting that fueled the desire simmering whenever Tremaine thought of his lady.
“We’ll not get much cuddling done if you keep that up,” he muttered, arranging himself over her and kissing her back. “Though I suppose we can always cuddle later.”
* * *
We cannot always cuddle later.
Nita ran her hands over the elegant musculature of Tremaine’s shoulders and back, smoothed her fingers over his fundament, and tried not to cry.
She refused to marry a man who dismissed her ability to heal others. Tremaine of all people ought to understand that a meaningful life involved doing what needed to be done, not simply what one was pleased to do.
He was protective of others. Nita admired that about him, admired so much about him, but he would not allow her to be protective too.
“Make love with me, Tremaine.”
He’d once granted her a boon, to be redeemed at the time and place of her choosing. Nita seized this moment, knowing Tremaine might despise her for her selfishness come morning. She was being greedy and probably stupid, but she’d have decades to regret this impulse and to treasure the memory of her foolishness.
Tremaine was a gifted kisser, but at Nita’s words, he moved lower, applying his mouth to her breast.
“I can’t think when you do that,” she whispered, cradling him closer. “I can’t—”
He desisted, and she would have yanked him back to his post, but the sensation of his tongue tracing her ribs skittered along paths already illuminated by desire. His next destination exceeded even what Nita had imagined a man could do with his mouth.
“Do you like this?” he asked, nuzzling her low on her belly. “You taste of flowers even here, you know. Meadow flowers”—he took a wet, slow swipe at her sex—“and lavender”—another swipe, while Nita clutched at the pillows with both fists—“and a hint of honeysuckle.”
A hint of madness, as if Tremaine were trying to change Nita’s mind with pleasures dark and dear.
“Tremaine, you needn’t—”
“Hush, love.” His mouth affixed to a part of her person Nita could name only in Italian. God in heaven, no wonder Nicholas and Leah were stupid with desire and affection for each other.
That was Nita’s last coherent thought before Tremaine drove her through ecstasies undreamed of even in her anatomically enlightened imagination. Fireworks of pleasure lit her up from within, sensation upon sensation followed by emotions without names in any language she knew.
When Tremaine had finished working his mischief, he pillowed his cheek on Nita’s breast.
“Have I pleased you, my lady?”
He’d shocked her with the intimacy and generosity of his attentions. “You’ve undone me, in so many ways. I hadn’t known… One overhears one’s brothers being crude, but—”
Tremaine traced a finger over Nita’s lips. “There’s more, you know. You can put your mouth on me, use your hands on me. You can ride me, we can mate like sheep, on our knees. I expect this is the purpose of the wedding journey, to see all the sights and wonders lurking between the sheets while the great capitals and royal courts are thoroughly ignored.”
Oh, Nita would miss him. Miss his dry humor, his lusty male body, his everything.
