“I was ruined at birth.” She slid her hands up his chest and touched his face with such tenderness that he bit back a groan. “I am so very weary of being alone,” she whispered, her sultry voice echoing with despair and aching hopelessness. “Show me, Elias. Show me what it is like tonotbe so lonely. At least for a moment so I can cherish it and remember the feeling.”
“Celia.” He wanted her with a fury that raged but feared how she would feel afterward. “You do not realize what you ask.” It took every ounce of control he possessed to keep from lowering her to the thick carpet of soft grass and indulging in their passions. “I want you, dear one. More than words can describe.”
He squeezed her shoulders, aching to join with her, but she had to understand, once he claimed her for his own, she would be his forever. There would be no going back. She was not a woman meant for a casual dalliance, and he was not a man who would use her and toss her aside. They would marry. He would have her as his wife.
“I long for you,” he repeated more softly, “but I do not want you unhappy.”
“Give me happiness, Elias.” She rested a hand on his chest, then slowly tightened her fingers and clutched the front of his shirt. “I ache, but I do not know what I ache for. I yearn but have no idea what I need.” She sadly shook her head. “I am so alone in this world, and sick of this dark, desperate feeling. Bring me into the light, Elias. Make the darkness go away—at least for a little while.”
He lifted her chin and leveled her gaze with his. “If I do this thing you ask of me, there is no going back. I will possess you completely and never leave.” He leaned so close that the tip of his nose nearly touched hers. “You will be mine, Celia. Forever. Do you understand? I will always be in your life. At your side. And you will take my name. Be my wife and I will be your husband.”
She locked eyes with him, staring deeply into his soul. So sad. So lovely. “Are you capable of unconditional love?” she finally whispered.
“With you, my precious one, I am capable of anything.”
She tilted her head and barely trailed the tip of her finger across his bottom lip. “Then I give myself to you, Elias Raines. Forever. May God have mercy on your soul.”
*
The shadowy gardenmade Elias’s eyes dark and unreadable, but Celia stared into them anyway. Her complicated world was closing in on her, and he was the only one who could save her.
What they were about to do was immoral, scandalous, and every other judgmental adjective that described the act she had only read about in forbidden books. But she so badly needed to be held, to fully connect with another soul, another heart. She longed to know something besides loneliness, hopelessness, and despair. She would worry about Elias finding out the truth about her at another time. Perhaps what they were about to do would restore her, invigorate her, and reveal the miraculous answer to the stark prospect of spending the rest of her life alone.
Feeling as though in a trance, she watched him remove his coat and spread it across the ground, belatedly realizing he did so to protect her muslin dress from grass stains. She wet her lips and swallowed hard. Soon, she would lie atop that coat—beneath him.
His neckcloth fluttered to the ground. His waistcoat landed on the bench beside her. With the throat of his shirt open enough to reveal a tempting expanse of muscle that made her palms itch to touch him, he held out his hand. She took it and allowed him to guide her to the coat and gently lower her upon it.
He smiled down at her as she lay beneath him. “You are certain?” he asked softly.
“I am.”
He bent his head and nibbled slow kisses along her jaw line. An excited shiver stole through her as he continued the tantalizing trail down to her collarbone and across her shoulder that he had somehow bared so easily.
The bodice of her dress suddenly loosened, and she realized he had artfully undone her buttons and slid his hand inside the back to undo the laces of her stays. A gasping breathlessness plagued her as he kissed a wonderfully tingling trail down her front while fondling her breasts in a most pleasing way. “Elias?”
He lifted his head and smiled down at her. “Yes, my lioness?”
She wet her lips, struggling to speak through the pounding of her heart. “This is very nice so far.”
“It is indeed.” He waited, watching her as if offering yet another chance to stop things before they went any farther.
“I want this,” she whispered. “I want you.”
“I am glad, Celia. More glad than you will ever know.” His whisper was deep and rasping, sweeping across her as tantalizing as a caress. With a tenderness that made her hitch in another quick breath, he brushed her curls back from her face. “I have wanted you from the first day we met when you scolded me for being impertinent.”
“Kiss me,” she whispered, fearing if he didn’t, she might say more than she should. His warm weight gently pressed her deeper into the cushion of grass, making her arch against him, needing him to do more. She wasn’t quite sure what thatmorewas. Most of the forbidden books had been slightly confusing about that part, and her mother had refused to speak of it.
She closed her eyes and breathed in his scent, an enticing blend of citrus, bergamot, and amber. The solid hardness of his muscular shoulders rippled under her hands, making her greedy to touch him even more. She couldn’t get enough of him as he kissed her long and deep, filling her with an unbearable aching that kept growing stronger.
As his hand roamed lower and slipped under her dress, she hugged his head to her chest, reveling in the way his mouth made her tingle and tense with the tightness of an overwound clock. She struggled to breathe as his fingers trailed up her thighs, then found the place no man had ever touched before.
“Oh my.” She wrapped a leg around him and arched into his hand. A squeaking sound escaped her as he slid his fingers inside and treated her to the most delicious sensations she had ever experienced.
He lifted his head from her breast and kissed her tenderly as his fingers worked their incredible magic. She ran her hands into his hair and held on tight as the lovely sensations intensified, finding herself unable to stop moaning into his mouth while bucking and writhing into his touch. Then a shocking wave of ecstasy spilled through her with the force of a relentless storm. His arm tightened around her as she jerked and cried out. As the bliss ebbed, a burning rip from deep within made her stiffen.
Elias broke the kiss and stared down at her. “All right, my lioness?”
With the sting already gone, she nodded. “I am better than all right.” His gentle preparation of her made her heart soar. Such a caring man. Yes. This had been the right thing to do. She caressed his cheek and whispered, “Now I wantyou.”
