Page 68 of The Danger of Desire
“Not so much the former.” She climbed the rest of the way to the top, with him dogging her heels. “I mean, I trust you to make it as easy for me as you can, given my inexperience. But after all the seductive women you’ve bedded—”
“That was a different thing entirely, and not nearly as exciting as you apparently imagine.” As soon as they emerged onto the rooftop, with its lovely views and large wooden table at the center for picnics, he tugged her into his arms. “In the brothels, it was an even exchange of money for services, and neither I nor the women ever forgot that.”
She wouldn’t look at him. “What about all those fine married ladies and widows you... you had affairs with?”
“Damn Clarissa for telling you so much about my habits,” he muttered, annoyed that all his pigeons were coming home to roost. Literally.
Her gaze shot to him. “I didn’t find out all of it from her. I read the gossip rags the same as anyone else.”
“Well, don’t believe everything you read,” he said irritably. “Yes, I did indulge myself a few times with... certain ladies of theton, but that hardly bears mention. We coupled merely to assuage our mutual loneliness.”
Good God, that was true. He’d never thought about it that way before, but his illicit affairs had always included more than a hint of desperation. For him as well as the bored wives.
“It won’t be that way with us.” At least he prayed it wouldn’t. “You and I are trying to build a life together.”
“That doesn’t mean I know what I’m doing in the bedchamber,” she said in a small voice.
“I wouldn’t expect you to. What matters most to a man is not a woman’s expertise but her enthusiasm.” He bent to whisper in her ear, “Luckily for me, you’ve always had ample amounts of the latter.”
“Still, when it comes to the point, I may disappoint you.”
“I doubt that.” He caught her by the chin. “Will it help if I tell you that I, too, am terrified?”
Her eyes flashed with scorn. “Don’t be ridiculous. You’ve been with so many women—”
“Yes, but I’ve never deflowered one. So I’m just as worried about disappointing you as you are about disappointing me. After all, introducing a woman to the pleasures of the marital bed is tricky. I might cause you to hate it.”
“I highly doubt that,” she said dryly.
He smiled. She was always so bloody honest about her feelings, one of the many reasons he felt comfortable with her. “Aren’t you the least bit worried about your own enjoyment?”
Her cheeks turned a bright pink. “You’ve always made our intimate encounters... very pleasurable. So I can’t see how doing... the deed itself... would be otherwise.” Her tone turned glum. “Unless I mess it up somehow.”
“Trust me, it’s notthattricky.” He smoothed back a lock of her hair. “How long have you been fretting over this?”
She darted a nervous glance at him. “Since you left for London.”
“So I daresay by the time we consummate our marriage, you’ll be in a fever pitch of worry over it. I won’t have that.” Cupping her head in his hands, he kissed her until she softened against him and returned the kiss with equal eagerness.
“What are you doing?” she whispered against his mouth.
He tossed his top hat onto a bench at the nearby table, then scattered openmouthed kisses down her jawline to her neck. “Having the wedding night before the wedding.”
Her pulse quickened against his lips. “Here? Now?”
“Why not?” Shrugging off his coat, he threw it onto the table, then backed her toward it even as he continued caressing her throat with his mouth. “We have a penchant for being intimate in the most inappropriate places. Might as well go on as we have.”
“But... but...”
He lifted her to set her atop his coat on the table. “Tell me, dearling. Do you like it up here on the rooftop?”
She gazed about, her eyes brightening as she drank in the beautiful views. “Of course, but...”
“Then it’s here I mean to take you.”
Here, she might regain her usual reckless self and feel less compelled to behave as his “dutiful wife.” That would go a longer way toward easing her fears than all his reassurances.
So he took her mouth again with all the pent-up lust he’d felt since that night he’d fondled her so boldly. And to his delight, she rose to the kiss.
