“And these …?” His eyes shot up from the silvery lines that decorated her belly. “You’ve had a child.”
Those marks had hurt the worst of all. Reminders of all she’d lost. “I had two. Neither survived their first year. One died of fever. The other croup.”
He kissed the lines. “I’m sorry. There was nothing the doctors could do?”
Colleen huffed. “Those leeches? They didn’t bother to come until after my babies were cold.”
Max wrapped his arms around her waist, his beard tickling her lower abdomen. “And yet you endured your losses to become the incredible, resilient person you are. The take-no-prisoner’s woman of business.” He curved his lips against her belly. “Your scars show that you’re a survivor. There’s nothing more alluring than that.”
Her chest grew tight. Max spoke of a better woman than she. If he knew what she’d done, the respect in his voice would disappear, and that knowledge lashed her heart.
Her mind became crowded with regret, when all she wanted to do was feel. She stretched out her hand, and he filled it with his own. “Come,” she said, pulling him up. “Show me your fire.”
Setting the candle on her bedside table, Max trailed his fingers up and down her back. He skimmed up her sides, along the swell of her breasts, and up her neck.
She shuddered. His touch was so soft. Delicate. Max treated her differently than anyone else in her life had, and it made her stomach twist and her heart pound. She bit her lower lip. He made her feel revered. The emotion didn’t suit her. It was like her new boots. They were luxurious, but she didn’t quite feel at home in them.
He coiled a lock of her hair around his finger. “I love your hair. It reminds me of a fire deep into the evening, as it’s starting to cool. Years from now, when I’m sitting with a glass of whiskey and looking into the flames, I’ll remember your hair and how soft it is between my fingers.”
“I don’t need pretty words,” she whispered. But she couldn’t deny that they did warm her heart. “I’m not one of your Quality ladies that needs to be wooed.”
He just smiled. Leaning past her, he pulled a pillow from the head of the bed, plumped it between his hands, and placed it in the center of the mattress. “Lay face down, with your hips over the pillow.”
“My boots—”
“Can stay on.” His smile started small and built slowly. “You look quite tempting in them and nothing else. Now quit delaying, woman.”
A shiver of anticipation tickled her flesh. She climbed on the bed and crawled over the pillow, embarrassment and excitement dueling over the view she was presenting. Lowering onto the pillow, she rested her head on her forearms and crossed her ankles.
She heard bottles rattling and liquid sloshing. Craning her neck, she saw Max pouring the jug of water she kept on her bureau into her wash bowl and soaking a small towel. Using the flame from the white pillar, Max lit two more candles, one a dark blue, the other made of a deep crimson-colored wax.
He turned to the bed and tossed a thin leather string next to her hip. Running a palm up her calf and thigh, he said, “The sensations will be more intense if you close your eyes.”
“When you’re playing with fire?” she asked tartly. “I think not.”
He smirked. “Suit yourself. For your first experience, that’s probably wise. I’ll pull my blindfold out later.”
She narrowed her eyes at his jest then grew serious. “You will be careful?” she whispered.
He squeezed her shoulder. “There’s absolutely nothing I want to protect more than you.”
Colleen stilled. The sincerity in his voice hooked into her heart and tugged. She knew men said a lot of pretty things to women to get them in their beds, but Max actually believed it, if only for the night. He was a dear man, a better man than she deserved.
She released a long breath. She needed to relax. If she was going to lay aside her morals and her guilt for the night, she’d darn sure best enjoy herself while doing so. What was the point otherwise?
Max began undressing, and any second thoughts she had dissolved.
His coat he hung on the back of her dressing table chair. His top boots were neatly placed beneath. Silk rasped against linen as he drew his cravat from his crisp white shirt, the sound sending a ripple down her spine.
With one hand at the back of his shirt, Max pulled it over his head, and Colleen bit her lip. Good lord, but the man was impressive. As broad across the chest as a blacksmith. The muscles of his shoulders and arms were defined, and they twitched with every button he opened on his falls. He shoved the trousers an inch down his lean hips, exposing a thatch of dark curls.
Colleen’s breath caught in her throat. She fixed her gaze on that crop of coarse hair, eager to see what lay below. She’d seen her husband’s, of course. But she had a feeling that the differences between the two men would extend further than the color of their hair and the size of their chests.
She wasn’t disappointed. Max pushed his trousers and smallclothes down his legs, his long length rising free. He bent over, obscuring her view, as he pulled off the remainder of his clothes. When he stood, every delicious inch of him was exposed.
She shifted her thighs together, moisture pooling between her lower lips. Every bit of the man before her spoke of power. From the determined set of his full lips, to the bulging muscles of his arms, to the ruddy head of his cock straining against his flat stomach. Maximillian Atwood, Baron of Sutton, was a formidable man.
He crawled on the bed beside her, the mattress dipping, and gathered her hair in a mass at the nape of her neck. She rested her head back on her forearms. Separating the locks into three sections, he braided it down her back, his thick fingers nimbler than she would have expected.
