“Are we to make use ofthat?” She asked as he pulled her along behind him. “Améridienne, I’ve heard, is solely for feminine?—”
He’d swung around and crushed her to him, abruptly interrupting her sentence. With a rough meeting of their mouths, he literally stole the word from her lips.
Presently, however, the kiss transformed into one tenderly long, deep, and thorough. When he finally lifted his head, she’d forgotten that she’d been mocking him.
“You were saying?” he asked.
“WasI?” she responded, dazed.
“I’ll have to remember that trick.” He grinned. “Not that I’m likely to forget. You were about to say, “Why, yes, Godric, Iyearnto join you in the bed you’ve so beautifully and cleverly made.”
She hadn’t been certain that he approved of her using his given name, but Godric had slipped out of him quite naturally. She was content.
When she called him Godric, he was her very own.
“Iyearnto join you in the bed you’ve made?” She smiled up at him. “Why yes, I believe you’re right. How obliging of me. I’ve been obliging quite frequently of late. Don’t you think?Didyou make up the bed?”
“Indeed, I did,” he said, not without pride. “Procuring clean, fresh bed linens without arousing the curiosity of one’s staff is a thorny problem. You’ve no notion!”
No, she supposed she hadn’t. She was touched by his consideration. “How did you?—”
He kissed her again. “Never you mind.” He stepped backwards, pulling her along. “Your office, at present, is to be impressed.”
“I am positively dazzled, I promise. Your audience appreciates your talent.”
“While yours”—the back of his legs hit the edge of the bed—“feels it’s time for a change of costume.”
Without waiting for a response, he yanked the string of her dressing gown. She raised her brows inquiringly, almost in challenge, as she lifted the garment from her shoulder and then let the fabric pool in a heap on the floor.
She whooped as he swept her off her feet—oh, yes, he’d reliably respond to any challenge—but she hadn’t a moment to enjoy being held as if she were of trivial weight before he deposited her in the center of the mattress.
“There.” He climbed abed on his knees.
She could think of no appropriate response. Nor, apparently, did he require one, as he was busy divesting himself of his own clothes. She tucked an elbow behind her head. With half-closed lids, she observed.
Where Karl had been wiry, he was broad. But she refused any further comparison and focused only on the man that mattered—the duke in the bed.
His hips were rather a work of art, and the rounded curve of his ass simply begged caressing. A smattering of short, soft curls made a sort of expanded hourglass shape—covering his upper chest and then reducing to a thin trickle, a pathway down toward his already stiffened shaft.
Yes.There were advantages to not dousing the lights.
He rested a fist on one hip “Am I to do all the work?”
“Poor duke...” She pouted sympathetically.
“Off with the shift, wench.”
She laughed as she lifted herself onto one elbow. “I prefer to watchyourexertions.”
She made minimum effort to assist him as he worked her shift beneath her bum, allowing him to manipulate her limbs as if she was one of Felicia’s dolls. Finally, he lifted the garment over her head and tossed it aside with a triumphant grunt.
“Exhausted?” she queried with pity.
“Mmm.” His gaze fixed to her breasts. “I have my reward.”
She regarded him, bemused.
Sometimes, Karl’s lascivious stare had caused her discomfort, making her feel as if she and her body were separate objects, the latter good only for his use. But Godric tilted his head, and touched her gently, reverently, as his eyes soaked in—absorbing her with desire, but also with something akin to amazement, as if she were a gift.
