Chapter2
Newlyweds Awaken
Meanwhile, on a dhahabîyeh out in the river
The sound of footsteps overhead had Randy Forster, heir to the Gisborn earldom, emerging from a deep sleep.He reached out to ensure his new wife, Diana, was still next to him, grinning when she rolled to face him.
“Good morning, sleepyhead,” she whispered, her lips upturned at their corners.
“Good morning, gorgeous.”He leaned toward her and kissed her forehead.“What are you doing awake so early?”
She tittered, a sound he found as welcoming as he did amusing.As a woman determined to remain a spinster when he had met her atop the Acropolis in Athens, Diana rarely smiled, nor was she easily humored.For some reason he hadn’t yet sorted, Randy had been immediately attracted to the young woman.
“Trying to determine if it’s your brother or David walking about up on the top deck,” she replied.“I believe it’s Tom, but as to why he’s up there, I have to admit I am rather curious.”
“It’s Tom,” he affirmed, recognizing his younger brother’s cadence.He lifted his pocket watch from the nightstand, his eyes widening.“Iama sleepyhead,” he added.“It’s nearly nine o’clock.”He lifted himself onto an elbow and listened for a moment.“And it feels like we’re moving rather fast.”
“The wind is in our favor,” Diana remarked.“Our captain said this is the best time of the year to sail up the Nile.”
He scoffed softly.“Are we in a hurry?”
Diana once again tittered and stepped off the small bed.Given the size of their compact cabin, she had to shimmy sideways to reach her trunk.
Randy suppressed the urge to groan when she bent over to open it and retrieve some clothes.His very first view of her had been of her bum, the perfect upside-down heart-shaped derriere encased in a pair of men’s breeches.
She wasn’t wearing anything at the moment, due to the fact that he had stripped her of her nightrail the night before, prior to them ever climbing onto the small bed.She also seemed oblivious to the discomfort she was causing him and his manhood.
“Are you staring at my bum?”she asked, her attention still on the clothes in the trunk.
So...not oblivious.
“I am and you know it, you minx,” he accused, managing to inflect some humor into his otherwise serious response.Despite what he wanted to be doing with his new wife—engage in the sort of bed sport in which they had enjoyed once he had her completely naked—he pulled on a pair of pantaloons.“But if my brother is up on the roof...”He paused to listen and grunted when the sound resumed.“He must have seen something.”
“Agreed,” she replied.She held up a day gown next to a pair of breeches.“I can’t decide,” she added.
The daughter of Viscount Jasper Henley, Diana regularly engaged in her father’s avocation of archaeology.She was clever, too, and gifted—or cursed—with the ability to remember everything she had ever heard, read, or seen.
She also possessed a body Randy found irresistible.Given all her traits, he supposed he’d had no choice when it came to convincing her to marry him.Although he had offered to be her lover for life if she remained a spinster, he knew he would always regret it if she couldn’t one day be his countess.
As for if she was regretting marrying him, he reveled in the reminder of the words she said to him every night before they slept.
“I love you, Randolph Forster.”
For the first week after their civil wedding ceremony in Athens, she had added, “Please don’t make me regret it.”
Ever since, he had done his very best to improve upon his lovemaking skills—in seeing to her pleasure before taking his own.Other than having studied illustrations or read about lovemaking in books, neither one of them had any experience prior to their wedding night.
They had certainly learned much from one another since that night late in September.
“Mayhap neither,” he whispered, referring to the clothes she held out.He swallowed, his eyes darkening with desire.
Diana dropped the folded items onto the bed and turned around as if she intended to look for something else.Bending over, she glanced back at him.“Perhaps you should come help me choose,” she whispered.Instead of rummaging through the trunk, she braced her hands against the cabin wall.
The sight of her upturned quim had Randy gulping.He quickly divested himself of his pantaloons before moving to stand behind her.Gripping her hips with his hands, he gasped when one of her hands reached between her thighs to cradle his ball sac before guiding the tip of his manhood to her entrance.
“You’re already wet,” he whispered in surprise, inhaling sharply when he realized he was already half-buried inside her.
“I’ve been awake longer than you,” she whispered.
