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“Only when I use them. But those don’t have any use. That is—”

“Of course they have use,” she said, sitting up. “I just don’t have a baby to use them yet.”

“Will you nurse your own children?”

“My mother nursed me,” Isidore said. “Italian gentlewomen nurse their own children. My mother believed that babies are less likely to survive if they’re given to a wet nurse.”

Simeon didn’t want to talk about babies. “I just thought,” he said slowly, “that women’s breasts felt good. For example…” He reached out his hand, realizing with a certain remote part of his brain that his fingers were trembling, and cupped the sweet heaviness of her breast. “What does that feel like?”

“Fine,” she said. “My goodness, it’s strange to think that you can just touch me like that. No one touches me.”

“But I’m your husband now. In truth and in law.” He let his thumb wander in a little caress.

“I suppose.”

“And how does this feel?” He rubbed his thumb over her nipple.

“Oh—”

He did it again. “Isidore?”

She opened her mouth but no words emerged. “I have heard that women find this quite pleasant as well,” Simeon said, feeling more cheerful. He bent his head and put his lips to her breast.

She cleared her throat. “Simeon, you’re not a child and—”

His lips closed around her nipple. Children had nothing to do with the way desire coursed through his legs, through his heart.

Her hand fell from his shoulder onto the bed, boneless. He started suckling her, and her head fell back. Harder, and a muffled little sound hung in the air. His body was rigid, throbbing. But he was in control.

He pulled back. “See?” he said, talking around the tightness in his throat, the groan that wanted to come out. “We’re not there.”

She opened her eyes. They were a little dazed, sweet, unfocused.

“Where?” There was a tremor in her voice.

Simeon forced himself to roll away, sit up casually. “We don’t know anything about each other’s bodies,” he said over his shoulder. If he looked at her any longer, he’d leap on top of her. “We’ll have to practice.”

“Practice?” Isidore’s voice was husky and a little irritated. He loved it.

“Tonight, perhaps.” He pulled on his shirt, still not looking. “If we feel like it.”

There was a sudden motion and she was sitting up. But the next thing she said was a mile from the husky nymph he was imagining.

“Simeon!” A shrew would be proud of that squeal. “What did you do?”

He swung around. “What?”

She was staring down at her legs. “You—you peed on me!” She swallowed. “In me!”

“Any blood?” He bent over and peered interestedly.

“That’s not blood.” She hastily wiped off her leg, and jumped off the bed. A second later she had her chemise over her head. He’d ripped it, so it fell open in the front, but she didn’t seem to notice.

“It’s not pee. Didn’t anyone tell you about bedding?”

“My aunt forgot to mention this charming detail.”

“It’s just a little fluid, carrying my part of a baby.”