His mouth held a sardonic twist as he replied. “My dear, Iama secret. My whole life, my very existence, is a shameful secret.”
“Not for Harold, I don’t think. He kept the secret because he thought it was the best for you. But I know he is proud of you, as he should be.”
Gabriel shook his head, as if to deny the oblique compliment. “Tell me about him. What ails him?”
She let the subject go. “It’s his heart. He has chest pains, the doctor calls themangina pectoris. He’s been having them for years, but they are more frequent of late. And he suffered an apoplexy a few months ago. He hasn’t completely recovered.”
Gabriel nodded somberly. “How much time do doctors think he has left?”
“They say it’s difficult to predict. He could have another apoplexy and die tomorrow. Or he could linger on for a few years in a slow decline. But Harold thinks he doesn’t have much time.”
“I wish I had known he was my father sooner. Years ago, when we first met. I wish I’d had more time with him. Without this between us.”
“Bythisyou mean our relationship?” She heard the defensiveness in her tone.
He noticed as well. He didn’t miss much. His hand extended towards her face, caressing her cheek, his thumb brushing lightly over her lips.
“I don’t regret our relationship. I never will, no matter what happens. How can I, when having this time with you, however long or short it might be, is the best thing that’s ever happened to me?” There was naked vulnerability in his eyes. He was letting her in. Showing her some emotion he dared not give name to. Neither did she.
“But I do regret the nature of it. I regret this strange situation that puts each of us in a separate corner of a triangle. I don’t wish for the duke’s death. I...care about him. And yet, he’s standing between me and what I want most in the world. It is so deucedly difficult.”
She lowered her gaze. She couldn’t bear to witness his pain. The desperate yearning warring with guilt that also found an echo in her heart.
“I’m sorry, Gabriel.”
He tugged her against him, held her close to his chest. “Don’t be. You have nothing to apologize for. I suspect you are as much a victim of the circumstances as I am. And are just as torn.”
CHAPTER 33
GABRIEL AWOKE TO HUMIDheat, pleasure, and darkness encasing his turgid flesh. He grappled with consciousness for a few moments before realizing what was going on. They were in their room. At the inn. Only the fire illuminated the chamber. The bedsheets lay discarded, exposing their naked bodies to the night and the overheated room. Or maybe that was just him? Judging by the dim light, the sun had not risen yet. But a part of him obviously had.
Light sucking, followed by a gentle lick, almost had him jumping out of the bed as unadulterated ecstasy spread through him like a tidal wave. His body responded without thinking, groaning, grabbing her hair, his hips pumping into her mouth, before reason asserted itself. What was she doing? He had never asked her to do this for him. Oh, but it felt so good. Her sweet mouth, inexpert and tentative as it was, produced more pleasure than the practiced seductions of the most experienced lovers.
“Hannah, wait. What are you doing?” he rasped, leaning up on his elbow, pulling her head up. Striving for some semblance of control.
She looked up to meet his eyes, and the sight of his swollen cock inside her mouth was almost enough to make him come on the spot. With an iron will, he held himself in check. She pulled back with a delicious, torturously slow motion. The head of his cock popped out of her pursed lips with a wet sound. She licked those lips.
Fuck.
“The book described the act,” she replied a little bashfully. “There was even an illustration. It was intriguing. I woke up, and you were hard.” A small shrug. “It seemed like the perfect opportunity. You don’t enjoy it?”
The uncertainty in her voice tore at his heart. “Enjoy it?” He snorted. “You were a moment away from having my enjoyment spilled in your mouth.”
Her eyes grew wide with what he thought was horror, but the words that came from her were, “Yes, please.”
He fell back with a groan. How could he resist that plea? Why would he, when his cock was throbbing, angry at having its pleasure interrupted? Because he wanted to come inside her, not in her mouth, that’s why.
She took his gesture as surrender. The next moment, her hand fisted around his cock and her hot mouth descended upon him again, drawing an excruciating curse from his throat.
“Fuuuuck, Hannah. I can’t resist you. That feels so damned good. That’s it, darling, take a bit more. Cup my sack, roll them gently in your palm...yes!”
She took instructions like the apt pupil she was. Her tongue pillowing his shaft, curving around it, then licking a place on the underside of his cock that had him seeing stars. He would lay odds she had never done this before, and yet, God help him if she ever became more adept. What she lacked in experience she more than made up for in enthusiasm. Her clever hands and mouth played him with innate skill, drawing embarrassing, incoherent sounds from his throat.
His body strained, leaning into her heat, his hips pumping with a rhythm of their own, his legs widening, tensing, lifting him off the bed. He was afraid to reach for her. Afraid that his ecstasy would turn him careless, that he would grab her too hard, handle her too roughly. So he fisted his hands on the bed’s iron headboard, holding on for dear life like a man in agony.
But such intense pleasure couldn’t last for long. His body could not bear it. He felt his release climbing down his spine, creeping up his legs, converging at his bollocks.
“Hannah, let go,” he panted.
