He turned his mind instead to her request. She wanted to know more about him, about Westmore Manor, about his past. He could grant her that much of himself. Even if it, too, was incredibly difficult, tangled up in the webs of the past and the painful memories of a life he no longer lived.
He searched his mind, and then he began to speak, locking out the demons at war within him. “My mother and father both, along with my brother, George, are buried in the family plot here. I spent summers here with George. Father largely ignored us. Mother was forbidden by Father to come here. In truth, I harbor few fond memories of visiting. The land and its forbidding, sixteenth-century architecture can go rot for all I care. The precious few memories I do harbor, racing my horse, fishing with George, and throwing darts at the game heads mounted in the great hall until the butler caught us. Father was utterly livid. That is all I can recall, nothing of import, I fear. Only a handful of melancholy memories. Is that what you wanted, Leonie?”
His wife, who was everything he needed and nothing he deserved, watched him. That bright gaze of hers saw far more than he would have preferred, and he damn well knew it.
“I am sorry you do not have many happy memories here,” she said quietly, her full lips compressing. “But if it would please you, I should like to make new memories with you here. Right now. What would make you happy, my lord?”
So many things. So many wrong, wicked things.
He would not begin with any of those.
Instead, he chose something infinitely safer. “My name upon your lips. You have said it before, but I cannot help but to feel I am forever relegated to either ‘Searle’ or ‘my lord’ out of an infinite supply of displeasure. I would have you call me Morgan, at least for today, if not beyond. Hearing my Christian name upon your lips would please me greatly.”
In truth, she had not called him by his given name since the night he had bedded her for the first time. He wanted to return to that tender intimacy, even if the longing was deuced stupid of him.
And itwasdeuced stupid, there was no question of it.
Her smile deepened, her lips so soft and pink and decadent, promising. Tantalizing. “Morgan,” she said.
His name, nothing revolutionary. Nothing special,by God. And yet…
And yet, all the blood in his body diverted to his cock in that instant.
His erection was so fierce, so demanding, he sucked in a breath and hoped his wife did not take note of his sudden, amorous state of discomfort. “Thank you, Leonie.”
A wicked glint entered her eyes. Her hands clenched in the fabric of her prim day gown, dragging the sprigged muslin upward to reveal her trim ankles and shapely calves. “I was hoping we might make a new memory here. A happier one. Together. What do you think, Morgan?”
What did he think? His mouth went dry as she raised her skirts a bit higher to reveal her stockinged knees. Quickly, he calculated the distance of the waiting carriage—quite beyond sight and hearing distance—and servants, who had been given orders not to disturb their picnic luncheon. This dreamy, verdant area of the park was concealed by ancient oaks and the gentle swells of the land, giving the area a sense of intimacy, which had been his reason for choosing it for their picnic.
“Morgan?” she persisted, raising the hems of her gown and petticoats even higher, revealing her garters and the mouthwatering expanse of bare skin where her stockings ended. Pale, milky thighs taunted him.
“I think I may have to finish my dessert in a different fashion,” he told her, a wicked idea taking hold as he thought of the discarded plate of strawberries.
“Oh?” A flirtatious smile tipped up the corners of her lush mouth. Her hem moved farther north. “And what shall your dessert be?”
He closed the distance between them and sealed his lips to hers, kissing her long and hard and deep, unable to resist licking into her mouth, tasting her. She was sweet, so sweet, a heady blend of sugary confections and ripe strawberries andLeonie.
And he was lost. He nipped her lower lip, ravenous for her, wanting to mark her, to eat her whole. “My dessert will be you, darling,” he muttered against her beautiful lips.
*
Leonora swallowed asa frisson of anticipation trilled down her spine and settled deep in her womb where she ached for him most. Her fingers were in his hair, threading through the long dark waves, his hat knocked aside. Need for him roared through her as she kissed him back.
Since they had relocated to the countryside, she had been treated to a gentler version of her husband. He was attentive and charming. He made her laugh with clever sallies. Upon their arrival at Westmore Manor, the full staff of domestics had been assembled. He had introduced her to them himself, and then he had personally shown her each chamber in the astonishingly large home, from its cavernous great hall to the library and the gardens.
They had been in residence for three blissful days, and Searle had been not just attentive but…almost sweet, though the word hardly seemed an appropriate descriptor for the forbidding man she had married. But this moment, this picnic upon the idyllic bank of a stream, where they were surrounded by the abundance of nature at her most munificent, where he fed her strawberries and the tiny faces of Forget-me-nots bobbed around them in the gentle, sweet-smelling breeze and the water cascaded in a relaxing gurgle.
He groaned, then broke the kiss. His gaze burned into hers, seeming to devour her as if he were committing her to memory, or as if he were seeing her for the first time. His intensity poured into her soul, and it remained there. She knew she could not remove it now, not even if she wished to do so. The Marquess of Searle was a part of her, so deep and so true he could never be removed. Not from her heart, not from her memories, and not from her life.
Nor did she want him to be.
“Delicious, my lady,” he said, and then he kissed her again slowly, lingeringly, deliciously. He kissed her as if she was beloved to him, as if she was necessary.
She kissed him back in the same fashion, because hewasto her. In such a short amount of time, he had become essential. He had become a part of her she had not known she so desperately needed. His large body settled between her legs, and he angled himself over her, feeding her kisses until pleasure was once more licking through her like fire.
Her fingers traveled happily over his broad shoulders, investigating his hardness, his strength. How difficult it was to believe anyone had been capable of containing this man. One day, she would ask him. One day, perhaps he would trust her enough to share the parts of himself he kept locked away, the parts he refused to speak about.
But today was not that day, and it did not seem to matter, with his warmth burning into her body, his scent surrounding her, the sun shining upon them, and the pretty gurgle of the stream in the background as he kissed her with such voracious possession a fresh ache blossomed between her legs. They were in an enchanted realm, no one but the two of them, and the rest of their lives could be spent learning each other’s secrets.
