She lifted her shoulders, even though he could not possibly see her shrug in the dark. “I don’t know. I don’t even reallyunderstand what you mean by performance. Isn’t it something we’re meant to do together?”
He coughed. “You are experienced.”
It wasn’t a question.
“What?” she choked out.
“Last night, when you asked for a child, you said women can have pleasure during the act. And I thought?—”
“You thought I had . . . ?”
“Haven’t you?”
She fought against her tears with a rare burst of temper. “I have had one experience with a man. One. My husband kissed me in my father’s study. Of course, he wasn’t my husband then. I suppose that makes me a wanton.”
Then she did cry. Oh, no. She had been on the brink of having physical intimacy with Oliver, and she had ruined it.
Or maybe not.
He gathered her to him. At first, she didn’t notice he was wearing a shirt as he put those heavenly forearms around her, pressed her into his chest, and said, “Forgive me. I’m a fool.”
But after several sobs, she didn’t like the scratch of the linen against her face, the fact her bare breasts were not against his skin. His clothing was as offensive to her as his presumption she was not a virgin.
“You’re wearing a shirt,” she said through her tears.
“I . . . I didn’t know what you would want.”
“I’m naked.”
He didn’t speak for a while. “I know. That. Now.” His voice was as strangled and raspy as it had been after he had spent by his own hand.
She snuffled. “Can you be naked, too?”
“As you wish.”
He released her and there was a whiffle through the air and when he put his arms around her again, her cheek settled against hot skin covered with hair. Hair on his chest. Mmmmm.
“That’s so much better, Oliver.”
He said nothing, so she nuzzled her face into his chest and dared to kiss him there. Under her lips, she could feel his heart beating almost as rapidly as hers was.
“There’s something you should know,” he said.
Mmmmm. His skin tasted as good as it smelled. She kissed his chest again.
“I . . . neither of my . . . I am not . . . don’t worry, I should be able to impregnate you, it should be no problem whatsoever, but I am almost certain you will not enjoy it.”
She stopped kissing his chest. “I’m enjoying this. You holding me. Kissing your skin.”
“About that . . .”
“Yes?”
“I think I had better perform my duty now.”
That must be his way of saying he didn’t enjoy the holding and the kissing. She’d have to learn what he liked in this, just as she had with other parts of their life together.
She rolled onto her back.
