He lowered his head to tease her breast with his lips again, feeling the nipple tighten as his hand caressed her other breast until she cried out, kittenish and needful as she arched across his lap. The subtle press of her rounded hips over his hardening body nearly drove him mad.Careful,he told himself.Slow.It took all he had.
Capturing her around the ribcage with both hands, he rolled his thumbs over her nipples while he sought her mouth again with his own. When she sucked delicately and quite deliberately on the tip of his tongue, he knew that she wanted and needed what he had to have, knew she felt all the desperate intensity he himself felt. The enticing thought that she might allow it to happen made him as hard as rock, as hot as fire.
He shifted, holding her, kissing her, driving her mad, for she bucked gently in his embrace. He pushed at her skirts and slipped his hand up her leg, found her knee, poised there.
She did not stop him; indeed, she pressed against him with a little whimper, so that he lowered his head again to her breast and kissed her there, slipped his tongue into the hotcrevice between her deliciously full breasts. He breathed in her fragrance, closed his eyes, trembled for control.
Though she wore long cotton knickers over her stockings and garters, he knew from previous experience with ladies and their undergarments that the long garment might open quite easily, and he let his hand slide slowly over the soft fabric that covered her lean leg. Amid the folds, he found the opening he sought, a slitted gap in the cloth, and felt the warm female nest hidden there. He traced his fingertip delicately over the tender crevice, taking his time, giving her every chance to protest.
She cried out, gasped, and took his head between her hands, drawing him upward to meet her mouth. But she did not kiss him, only hovered, her lips close to his, as if waiting.
He waited, too, ready to withdraw his hand. She made no sound, did not move, but her breaths came fast and her heart pounded through her back, where he supported her with one hand.
His own heart thundered, and somewhere outside—far beyond, in the world he had forgotten even existed—he heard the crack of lightning, and the increased sheeting of the rain on the tarpaulin overhead.
“Someone might—” she whispered.
“No one will find us here,” he murmured. “We are safely hidden…. No one… But if you do not—please, my darling lass, tell me now, before I—”
“Oh p-please,” she murmured, her voice shaking, and she pushed gently downward, so that his finger, still resting motionless upon her intimate entrance, slipped inside, into exquisite heat, and she whimpered from what he knew was splendid, unmatchable joy.
He groaned, a low rumble, as he touched her there, where she was hot and honeyed and ardent, already swollen for him. She trembled as he moved his fingers slowly, easing her towardher release. He did not know how long he could endure it, but he was determined to give her this pleasure, though he strained against the searing demand in his own body, felt passion burn a path through him, but he held back, denied himself release.
He found her nipple again—she offered it, asked for the touch of his mouth there with the arch of her body—and he tasted there while he touched and teased her elsewhere with his fingertips. She turned in his arms as the thrill finally shuddered through her, and she whimpered a little in his ear.
Closing his eyes, he felt the delicious undulations of her body, heard her soft cries. He could scarcely bear it, nearly groaned aloud, nearly spilled himself out without fulfillment, just for the intense excitement of touching her, wrapping himself in her embrace.
Somewhere in the midst of heat and passion, even while she rocked with the final easing of the thrill that she had felt, she shifted in his arms and he felt her fingers eagerly upon him. He was surprised, for he had not expected or anticipated her help, her boldness. Her palm fitted to the hard bulge he could not conceal, and she worked the buttons and the drawstring of his trousers. Silently, swiftly, he opened his belt, nearly losing his control entirely when her fingers, slim and heaven soft, captured him, velvet over hot iron.
Her caresses turned up his passion like the wick of a lamp, bright, hot, flaming fast through him. Closing his eyes, he let the storm engulf him, and it slammed through him like thunder.
He came shuddering and vulnerable and needful in the generous fire of her touch, and he gasped out, drawing her tightly to him. For one moment, he let go of every lock he had ever had upon himself, just this once, just for her, only for her.
Chapter Nineteen
“Ihave finishedredoing this bedroom, Aedan. Come look!” Amy opened a door along an upper hall. “Now it is nice enough even for the queen to use, I think!”
Aedan followed her into the room. “Dark green, a nice choice,” he commented, looking at the newly painted walls. “Stylish and economical.”
“Paint costs less than wallpaper, as you pointed out in other rooms,” she said.
He nodded. In his boyhood, the bedroom had been his mother’s, and Amy had kept the maple furniture, while redecorating with paint and fabrics. The adjoining door that separated the two bedrooms used by his parents had always stood open. Now it was closed.
“The Prince Consort could use the other room,” Amy said. “I left it as it is, because it belonged to Sir Hugh, who was one of the queen’s favorite poets. I added tartan pillows.”
“I see.” Truly, it seemed a good deal of fuss and expense for just a day or two of a royal visit; the rooms had been excellent on their own. But his father had desired changes throughout the house, and Amy was helping in that. He gestured toward the plaid coverlet on the bed and the fabric of roses and vines on the bed canopy and in the drapes. “Plaids and flowery stuff everywhere is becoming your signature mark, cousin,” he said with a smile. “If a room is awash in tartan and chintz, MissStewart has been here with enthusiasm.” He chuckled to see her wide smile.
Aedan walked around the room, noting bowls of fresh flowers, a lemony polish on the furniture, gilt-framed landscapes on the dark-green walls, and poufy cushions on the chairs. The lovely touches did make the room cozy, he had to admit.
“And more tartan carpet underfoot,” he said, looking down. “There must be acres of it in the house by now.”
“It is very in vogue now, considering the queen’s love of Scottish things,” Amy said.
“What is this?” Aedan walked toward the marble fireplace. “You had Blackburn’s painting of Robert the Bruce with Isabella moved here. Interesting.”
“It looks very handsome in this room. I hope the dining-room mural proves half so nice as this one.”
“From what I’ve seen, the mural will be a splendid thing. Very special,” he added.
