Page 30 of The Wayward Duke
Liquid heat pooled between her thighs. God, she wanted those elegant hands on her body again. Stroking her. Taking her hard against the tiles as her world fractured apart. This man’s calm, stoic demeanour had always aroused her so effortlessly – that unwavering focus on her alone.
Before she could think better of it, Caroline let her eyes slip shut and surrendered to the sensation of Julian’s fingers moving down the line of tiny buttons on the back of her tattered gown. She focused on the delicate rasp of fastenings slipping free, each baring another sliver of her bruised skin. The tender drag of his knuckles down her neck, her spine.
To be undressed this way after so many years apart felt too intimate. Exposing. As if he slowly peeled back the layers of pretence and performance that comprised her armour, stripping her down to the most vulnerable parts of herself. When he eased the ruined gown from her frame, she heard his sharp inhale ghosting against her bared nape.
Julian efficiently divested Caroline of her chemise, leaving her clad only in tattered stockings gartered high on her thighs. She watched in the mirror as he sank to his knees. His fingers scorched trails of fire along her legs as he removed those last wisps of fabric. She saw it in his eyes – the hunger. Felt it simmer in the heavy air between them. For a suspended heartbeat, she thought he might grip her hips and drag his mouth up her inner thighs, licking over sensitive flesh until she shattered with his name on her lips.
Put your lips on me,she wanted to say.
But Julian only rose and pulled her back against him. “Get in the bath before I forget to be a gentleman.”
Caroline angled a look at him over her shoulder. “And if I don’t want you to be one?”
He froze. Hunger blazed in his eyes, silver-bright. But then Julian took a slow, deliberate step back from her. Cold air raised the fine hairs on her bare arms.
“Forgive me,” she said. “That was too forward.”
“Don’t ever apologise for telling me what you want.”
Want.That word ricocheted between them. What did she want? Not just tonight, but for the endless nights and days after?
Julian looked away when she said nothing. “In you go, Linnie.”
Caroline sank into the tub, limbs heavy. She let her eyes drift shut as warmth seeped into her muscles, loosening knots. The hot water lapped at tender places and turned her skin pink. Steam curled around her, blurring the sharp edges of recent memory into something softer.
Silence enveloped her, broken only by the soft sound of Julian’s clothes hitting the floor, followed by the gentle displacement of water as he joined her. When she forced her eyes open, it was to find her husband sitting across from her, close but not touching. Julian’s stern features appeared softer through the film of steam wreathing his face, blurred at the edges. Younger somehow, like a half-remembered dream.
“You’re injured,” she realised, jolted back by visible proof marring smooth skin. She reached out, unthinking, to skim her fingers over the angry welts slashing his face. “You’re bleeding.”
Julian caught her hand. “Just scratches. Nothing to fuss over.”
Lie.
She read it in every bruised line of him, tension wound tight beneath the skin. Julian was very much not fine. Then again, neither was she.
“Tonight is for you,” he insisted when she opened her mouth to argue.
She traced her fingertips over the fresh cuts marring his knuckles. “Says who? I don’t recall signing that decree.”
The barest ghost of a smile touched Julian’s mouth. “Always so stubborn.”
“Resolute is the word, I think. And you’re clearly not fine, so stop pretending.”
“Determined,” he allowed. “But I want to take care of you right now.” His voice gentled, turned reverent. “All right, Linnie?”
The old nickname speared her heart. Swallowing around the ache, she nodded. Let him shift closer until his thigh pressed to hers beneath the water. Let him ease her back until she floated, supported and safe.
Julian took up a sea sponge and began to wash her. As he worked, Caroline studied his face – taking in faint lines etched at the corners of those pale eyes that had not existed between them before. She had loved learning the landscape of him once. Had traced every part of him with curious fingertips, greedy lips – memorising the geography of this man who was hers. Now he seemed some half-remembered country glimpsed through morning mist. So achingly familiar, yet unknown.
She wondered if her own face betrayed similar stories, mapped by the trauma and loneliness he had not been there to witness.
“You do that well,” she murmured.
“You used to tell me I was good with my hands,” he said, brushing the sponge over her shoulders.
“You still are. I love your hands. I used to watch them for hours – while you wrote, while I drew you. While you played the piano. Especially then.”
Julian went very still. “Did you?”
