Nicholas stopped in the middle of the room, the faint glow of the banked fire providing enough light to see him in the dark. He had discarded his outer garments, his shirt halfway tucked out of his britches, like he had been in the middle of undressing for the night when he had felt an impulse to come to her.
She crept toward him. “I have not seen you since…”
“Since Viscount Tate took his leave,” he replied. “I know. I intended my absence to clear my head, not to hurt you. I rode for a time and thought deeply about our circumstances. Though I was furious with you for sending me away.”
Amelia had moved automatically to draw the curtains and emit some moonlight into the room. Her hand found the curtain cord. The rope was coarse against her skin. And suddenly, Nicholas’s hand wrapped around her wrist, eliciting a gasp from her.
His approach had been silent, but his body now cupped hers from behind, a hand coming around her waist and pulling her into him. Herhand fell slack around the cord as he buried his face in her neck, exhaling into her skin.
She swore she could feel his heart beating through the fabric of his shirt.
A fine layer of cotton separated his hand from the skin of her stomach, prickled with goosebumps. His fingers clenched around the fabric as he held her tight against him, his arousal pressed against her back.
She had learned much in the last two days about his body and his desire. And she knew what that transformation of his flesh meant.
“What…” Amelia tried to ask, half convinced she was dreaming.
Her head tilted back, and she moaned as he kissed her neck, his hand roving up her stomach until he found her breasts and kneaded them.
“You sent me away this morning,” he whispered against her skin, rolling a nipple between his thumb and forefinger. “Why?”
“I… I had to.” She could barely think, let alone speak. She tried turning in his arms to face him, but he refused, rubbing himself gently against her. “Someone needed to speak sense into my brother, and it could not be you...”
“Did you think I could not handle him?”
“No,” she sighed, maddened by the feeling of him. In the dark, every sense was heightened. The sound of his labored breaths made her head spin. “You are very… persuasive.”
“And yet, you bid me to leave. I should not have allowed you to defy me. I am your husband. Do you understand?”
Was he looking to punish her? Was this the dark face of Nicholas she had only seen once before, when he struck De Rees?
“Only temporarily,” she murmured defiantly, pressing a hand against the wall to steady herself. “That is what we agreed…”
Amelia cried out softly as his free hand cupped the space between her legs, pressing the palm of his hand into her heat. She almost buckled over in shocked delight, fingers clawing at the wallpaper.
“Do you think thatmattersto me in this moment?” He moved his hand to her hip, bunching the fabric of her chemise and exposing her thigh. “For now, we are man and wife—and not even your brother could hope to tear you from me tonight, for that reason and more.”
Turning her violently, Nicholas grabbed her face and kissed her, leading her back toward her unmade bed. Enraptured, she followed his wordless instructions, allowing herself to be lifted onto the mattress. It sank beneath her. Her heart hammered. She reached for his face, and he took her thumb into his hot, wet mouth.
She ran it along his lower lip, and then he grabbed her wrist.
“All day I have been thinking of you. I wanted to retire. But I have lost all sense. Knowing there are those who seek to rip you from me before it is time has only made me want you more. The carriage, this morning in the woods… Amelia…God, Amelia…Why?”
His voice rumbled with desire. Maneuvering her, he settled her on her back and kneeled before her on the bed. The rain pattered against the windows, a flash of lightning brightening the room for an instant, illuminating his disheveled, impressive silhouette. His broad shoulders. His heavy and hunting gaze.
“What will you do?” she asked, nervous but burning for him.
“What do you expect? I will take what I want.”
Gasping, she arched her back against the bed as he peeled back her chemise to expose her. The night air met her bare skin, and she shivered, though not from the cold.
His hands found her thighs and gripped them, firm and possessive, parting them slowly as he settled between her legs. His breath ghosted against the inside of her knee, and she trembled at the intimacy of it, at the vulnerability of being so completely open to him.
She could not believe what happened next.
His mouth found her heat, and the first press of his lips against that swollen, aching place drew a sound from her throat that would have mortified her in daylight. He kissed her there like he kissed her mouth. Slowly at first, tasting, learning. Then his tongue swept flat against her, and she nearly left the bed entirely.
“It feels...ah!”
