Page 70 of The Subtle Craft of Courting Kate

“Not soon enough,” he grated out, the words tinged with misery. “A proper wedding takes time to arrange. I’ve got to get a license and a ring. You’ve got to have a gown. There’s announcements to be made, a wedding breakfast to be arranged—”

“What about a wedding that isn’t quite so proper as all that?”

His breath shuddered out on a fretful sigh. “Don’t tempt me,” he said. “It would be a scandal.”

“You like a bit of scandal,” she accused. Another button undone, and he seemed to shed a bit more of his composure with each she eased free. “And I think I could do with being a little scandalous.”

Another button, and she slid her fingers through the sparse golden curls that peeked through the opened sliver of his shirtfront, provoking a shiver. He said, “It would be more than a little scandalous. People will think—” His hands slid around to the small of her back, grabbing fistfuls of her nightgown as she loosed yet another button. “People will think we had to marry.”

“What does it matter what they think, if we are going to marry anyway?” And there, the last button. Her fingers touched smooth skin, warm and lightly dusted with that gold fleece, felt the frantic race of his heart beneath them. “What would we need? To marry scandalously?”

A rough sound deep in his throat, as if he were gritting his teeth against an answer. “Witnesses,” he said at last. “A ring. A few hours free to appeal to the Archbishop for a special license, and to find a clergyman willing to perform the ceremony on scant notice.”

“Hmm.” Kate scraped her nails lightly over Elliot’s bared flesh and enjoyed the indrawn breath that seared the air. “A ring could probably be had quite easily, no?”

“Bond Street,” Elliot gasped. “The best jewelers are on Bond Street.”

“And the witnesses…there’s Mama, of course, providing the weather turns fairer and she has managed to rid herself of her headache. There’s Hodges and Mrs. Norris—and there’s Richard and Rebecca. Would they—”

“Yes. Without question.”

Kate smiled at the tortured tenor of his voice and rocked up onto her toes to brush her lips against his. “Then will you marry me tomorrow?”

“Kate,” Elliot pleaded, the dip of his brows conveying the depths of his struggle. “A proper wedding…”

Wrong answer. Kate shimmied free of his hold, and the wet linen of her nightgown slipped right between his gloved fingers as he fought to keep her close. “Do you know,” she said as she gathered bunches of the fabric in her hands and dragged the drenched garment off over her head, “If we were married, Hodges would not likely eject you from the house. Particularly if he had witnessed it himself. You could stay here…with me.” The nightgown dropped to the ground near his coat.

“Christ.” There was a wet plop as his waistcoat fell to the grass. With jerky, uncoordinated movements, Elliot yanked off his gloves and stripped his shirt off over his head, where it landed with unerring accuracy beside the nightgown she’d tossed down. A makeshift bed formed of damp, discarded garments. Undone, he reached for her with hands that trembled with longing, stifling a groan as his bare fingers touched her bare flesh.

“Katie,” he said, in a grim, fatalistic voice against her ear. “I am going to violate your mother’s trust in me.”

A laugh tripped off of her tongue, and she sank alongside him onto the damp bed of clothing. A few drops of rain loosed from a cluster of wisteria blossoms overhead sprinkled down upon them.

“But tomorrow,” he said, as he cupped the nape of her neck and drew her up for a kiss, “we are going to be married.”

Yes. Kate sighed in satisfaction as his mouth opened over hers, as the breadth of his bare chest pressed her down to the earth, infusing her with a lovely, luxurious heat. As she swept her hands down the flat plane of his back, she learned swiftly enough that she could play him just as skillfully as he could play the pianoforte, teasing passionate little sounds from him with just the lightest application of her fingers and the gentle rake of her nails.

She explored the texture of his skin, enjoyed the smooth slide of her palms across his rain-slicked shoulders. Craned her neck to the glide of his lips as he traced the path of a raindrop that slid down her throat. Somewhere far in the distance, a low ripple of thunder rumbled as the storm began a slow ebb, traveling away from the heart of London.

His warm breath followed the strokes of his fingertips, shimmering across her damp skin with a silky flourish. The wool of his trousers abraded her tender skin as his hips settled in the lee of her thighs. The hard ridge of his arousal pressed against her belly, and mad, inane thought traipsed across her mind and slipped out of her mouth. “Oh. This is…not like sheep.”

The puff of Elliot’s laughter teased her nipple to an aching point. “No. Not like sheep.”

“But you do know how—”

“I have read quite a lot of books.” His tongue flicked across her nipple, and Kate let her head drop back upon the grass as the dizzying sensation left her breathless.

A restless tension stole through her limbs, and a cascade of shivers slipped down her spine. Her fingertips slid beneath the waistband of his trousers, skating over the muscled flesh of his arse. She felt the groan that vibrated against her breast, the pulse of his arousal against the soft skin of her belly.

“God, I love you,” he whispered as his lips closed around her nipple. The delicate suction of his mouth stoked that fire that had kindled low in her belly, made her tip her head back and pant a few frenzied breaths to the clouds roiling above. Purple wisteria danced across her field of vision, glittering with rain in the soft glow of moonlight through the haze of clouds, and her fingers clutched his backside as his hand slid down the quivering flesh of her stomach. His fingers petted the fleece at the apex of her thighs.

She made some soft, embarrassing sort of sound as he explored the melting-wet flesh of her core, and her hips arched into the tender strokes, welcoming the slow thrust of his fingers inside her. It wasn’t enough; she ached to be filled by more than only his fingers, ached for the blanket of his body over hers, ached to cradle him in her arms, to feel him inside her.

A plaintive cry wrenched itself from her lungs as he withdrew his fingers at last, her inner muscles striving to hold him, searching for that fulfillment that dangled just out of reach. Cool air coasted over her skin as he pulled away altogether, and Kate wilted with a sigh as she heard the thump of boots onto the grass, the wet rustle of fabric as he shed his trousers.

Reverent hands smoothed down her body once more. Elliot’s lips touched her temple, her cheek, her chin. The warm weight of him settled over her, blanketed her in a comfortable heat, soothed her with the velvety slide of his bare flesh on hers.

His hand cradled hers, drew it down the corded muscle of his belly to the jut of his arousal. Her fingers shaped him uncertainly at first, then with increasing confidence as his breath whistled through his teeth, as she felt the escalating beat of his heart against her breasts, heard the soft, impassioned sounds he made near her ear. This gave him the same sort of pleasure, she realized, as he had given her.