He worked his way lower, nibbling along the satin of her throat and the ticklish ridge of her collarbone. Cupping the perfect fullness of her breasts nearly undid him. With his face buried in the sweetness of the valley between them, he slowly lowered himself to his knees. She knotted her fingers in his hair, then tugged and pulled in time with her groans as he worked hismouth down her torso, forcing himselfnotto lift her shirt but nibbling her through it. As he nuzzled more and breathed her in, he ran his hand lower and rubbed her most intimately through her buckskins. The warmth between her legs pulled a yearning growl free of him.
“Oh my.” Once again, she filled her hands with his hair, yanking and groaning as she stumbled and almost lost her balance.
Another growl escaped him as he caught her and lowered her to the ground. His senses raged into a blinding haze of need. But he would not take her. Not today. He was determined to reserve that ultimate pleasure for after they saidI do.“When we join, it will be the perfect sealing of our vows,” he rasped as he nuzzled her breasts through her clothing.
Hovering over her, he opened her legs with his knee and jutted his hips forward, nudging and rubbing his hard length against her warmth that would soon be his. Both of them remained infuriatingly clothed. Keeping their garments in place was the only way he knew of to set himself a boundary that would make him stop and think rather than reel out of control and bury himself in her, as he so badly needed to do.
“I swear I will not take you until Saturday.” He rhythmically ground himself against her. “I will not take you until you are my wife.”
“I will surely die by then.” She groaned, arching to meet his rubbing thrusts, clutching at him and wrapping her legs around his waist. “This aching…this wonderful aching will kill me.”
He understood completely. The feel of her, the smell of her need, was driving him past the point of reason. He plundered her mouth with his tongue as he slid his hand down between them and massaged her between her legs harder and faster, tickling her sex through her clothing with an insistent steadiness he knew would soon send her into oblivion. Oh, what hewouldn’t give to rip off every thread she wore and join with her. But not yet—not today.
She shrieked and shuddered beneath him, moaning and thrusting hard against the pressure of his fingers. Then it was as though she melted, relaxing and letting her legs slowly slide from around him and come to rest on the ground. She barely shifted beneath him with slow, deep breaths, but her heart pounded against his chest.
“How in the world did you do that?” she asked in a lazy whisper without opening her eyes.
“I am a very gifted man.”
“You have no idea.”
“It will be even better after we are wed.” He rose and kissed the tip of her nose.
“I fail to see how that could be remotely possible,” she said, her eyes still closed.
“Trust me, my love. It is very possible.”
She barely cracked open an eye and smiled. “On this, I will always trust you, my very gifted man.”
“I rather like the sound of that.” He nibbled a slow, leisurely kiss along her jawline, noticing with some pride and a great deal of satisfaction that her lips had gone a delightful shade of cherry red with his attentions. Even though he still painfully ached for relief, her nearly boneless state of relaxed bliss made his suffering well worth it. He could tend to himself later.
“I suppose we just proved we do, in fact, require a chaperone.” Her lighthearted tone revealed no remorse or regret whatsoever.
“I think we did quite well.” He locked eyes with her, losing himself in the twin pools of blue that had grown so much darker with her passion. “You remain a virgin, and we have yet to see each other unclothed.”
She didn’t respond, just held his gaze and caught her bottom lip between her teeth. The faintest puckering between her brows worried him.
“Grace?”
“What?”
“You look as though you dread what I am about to ask.”
“That is because I do.”
He remained on top of her, propping himself on his forearms to keep from crushing her. “I am not moving until you tell me what is wrong.”
She struggled to look anywhere but in his eyes. “You know I often ride astride? The only time I ever ride sidesaddle is in the park in London.”
“I fail to understand how that is a problem.” He twitched the slightest shrug, then pecked another kiss to the tip of her nose. “You may still ride astride after we marry. Here in the country. On our land or the Broadmere estate. I feel you should still ride sidesaddle in front of others, of course, and absolutely no riding once you get with child.” He gave her a stern look that he prayed she took to heart. “I will not have you or our children endangered in any way.”
“You obviously have no idea of what I am attempting to tell you in as delicate a way as possible.”
Her expression became so terse that he wondered what he had missed. He wasn’t normally thick when it came to understanding hints and innuendo. “Just tell me, Grace, since you are quite right. I have no idea what you are trying to tell me.”
She shifted beneath him with a deep breath then released it as a heavy sigh. “Mama warned that if I insisted on riding astride that my husband might be taken aback on my wedding night if I did not inform him and make it quite clear that I had never lowered my guard and allowed a man any liberties.” Tears welled in her eyes. “And yet here I am, unmarried and lying beneathyou after allowing you a great many liberties. I’m afraid you won’t believe me when I tell you that no man has everknownme—as in the biblical sense of the word.”
It finally dawned on him that in her roundabout way, Grace was attempting to tell him that her maidenhead might not be intact due to her habit of riding astride and usually at a hard gallop. He had heard of that happening. Never had he come across it, but he knew it to be a possibility.
