Last Night's Scandal

  He’d been so careful to keep the blanket about her, pulling it away only to rub her arms, her feet. He pulled the blanket over her right arm, then away from the left. He massaged that arm, too. Slowly.

  “The way it feels,” she said in a dazed voice. “I can’t describe. Magical. How do you do this to me?”

  He drew the blanket up, revealing her feet. When his palm slid over her instep, she moaned.

  He dragged the pillows up behind her head and shoulders, then pushed her down onto them. She closed her eyes and sighed. Then she opened them again, to watch him.

  He went back to rubbing her feet. First one, then the other. Then he began to rub her lower legs, pushing the blanket up. His palms shaped to the curve of her calves. Her skin was like velvet under his hands. Warm velvet. Her breathing slowed and deepened. She stopped trembling.

  She lay upon the pillows, looking up at him, her blue eyes lit by the firelight, so that stars seemed to dance there. The light glowed on her skin: the fine bones of her cheeks, the curve of her jaw, the stubborn point of her chin. The blanket had slipped from her shoulders, revealing the white column of her neck and the graceful slope of her shoulders.

  He dropped the towel and let the back of his hand graze her cheek. Her skin was as smooth as the softest silk, the kind the wealthiest Egyptian women wore, so fine that a length of it easily threaded through a ring. It wasn’t silk though, but her skin, warm and alive. Moments ago he’d thought he’d lose her, and the world had stopped, and everything went empty and black.

  He turned his hand to feel the softness and the warmth and the life against his palm.

  She turned her face to touch her mouth to his hand.

  Don’t don’t don’t.

  But that was a lie. That wasn’t what he wanted.

  It was so simple. A nothing of a touch. Merely lips to the palm of his hand. But he’d waited forever, and the touch shivered through him, shock after shock, as though he’d touched an electrical rod. It ricocheted in his heart, setting it thumping erratically. It raced downward, and shot heat into his groin. His body tightened and tensed, and his mind narrowed into a kind of tunnel.

  He was kneeling at her feet, and all he saw was her, glowing in the firelight. The skin he touched was very warm now. She was alive, hotly alive, her bosom rising and falling under the blanket.

  The fire crackled beside them. Otherwise the room was quiet and dark. Shadows danced in the corners.

  She held the blanket closed in front of her with one hand. He reached up and tugged at her hand. Her fingers uncurled and she let go. No protest. No sound. She only looked up at him, watching him, her beautiful face somber and studying, as though he were a mystery she needed to penetrate.

  There was no mystery to him.

  He was merely a man, and he’d merely missed her desperately, and minutes ago he’d glimpsed a world without her.

  He’d lived without her, and he’d stayed away from her. He’d missed her, though. If she wasn’t here to come back to, what would his life be like?

  A moment ago he’d thought he’d lose her. Now she was here, warm and alive in the firelight. A simple fact. She was here and he wanted her: one simple fact that erased willpower and good intentions and conscience and obligations.

  He parted the blanket and drew it down to her waist and simply looked at her, filling his eyes and mind and heart with her.

  “Ye gods,” he breathed, and it was hard to breathe. “Ye gods, Olivia.”

  Her skin was pearly white, like the moon when it rose high in the night. Her firm breasts—the ones the devil had given her—glowed as smooth and white as moons, too, but tipped with rosy buds that begged to be touched. She took his hand and he gave it to her, unresisting. She laid it over one satiny breast. He felt the bud tighten under his hand. His groin tightened, too.

  The tunnel of his mind grew narrower still.

  All he could see was her. All he could think was her. All the world was Olivia, glowing in the firelight. He shaped his hand to the smooth globe and she sighed. He filled his hands with her breasts and squeezed, and she laughed so softly, deep in her throat, and closed her eyes.

  “Yes,” she said. “This is what I wanted.”

  Simple words. He heard everything in them: longing and pleasure and he didn’t know what else, all mingled. Or so it seemed, and that was enough for him, because it was the same he could have said.

  This is what I wanted.

  He eased her legs apart. Still unresisting, she watched him. He crept up and bent over her and touched his tongue to one taut pink bud.

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  Yes. And that said everything. Yes was the taste of her skin and the sound of her voice and the way her belly rose as her body arched under the flick of his tongue. It was the way she reached up and curled her arms about his neck and held him to her. It was the way she moaned while he suckled and while he slid his tongue over her breast and tasted the pearly skin.

  Yes, this is what I wanted.

  Then he was pushing the blanket off her, and she was dragging his face to hers and kissing him, her soft mouth parting in quick invitation, and offering up the cherry-sweet sinfulness. Then it was the kiss that swept him away, the wild, deep kiss that seemed to be a hundred kisses stored up over years, so endless it was and so endless was the sensation of falling, deep, into Olivia and into himself and into a wild world where only they existed.

  The world narrowed to the taste of her and the scent of her and the feel of her skin and the shape of her body under his hands. The world was the way she writhed under his touch and the way her hands slid over him, until she found the edges of his shirt. She tugged it upward until he broke the kiss to pull the shirt over his head and throw it aside. Then he was as naked as she.

  Yes, this is what I wanted.

  She dragged her hands down along his shoulders and arms. She traced the shape of his chest, and shocks flickered over his skin and shot under it as her fingers grazed his nipples.

  “Ah,” she said. And up she came, quick and smooth, and touched her tongue to the hard nubs. She pulled herself up further, and wrapped her legs about his hips and kissed him, her tongue pushing against his and playing with it, thrusting and retreating, while her breasts rubbed against his chest, and while his cock, hard and hot, shuddered against her belly.

  He held her, dragging his hands down her smooth back to the curve of her waist, then down to cup her buttocks.

  The fire crackled beside them, and it seemed to crackle inside him, too. Every touch, every kiss, fed the flames.

  He pressed her down without breaking the kiss, and she went where he silently guided, her legs still wrapped about his hips. He lifted his head and opened his eyes and let his gaze lock with hers while he drew her legs apart and brought her feet down onto the rug.

  He slid his hands along her thighs to her core, where the firelight glowed on soft, coppery threads and made the dewy flesh there glisten. He slid his finger to the narrow cleft and stroked there. She twisted and arched under his hand.

  He knew how to please. He wished more than anything to please—but she fired up so quickly, she burned up thought. Only instinct and need remained. It was elemental: two young bodies, flesh and blood calling to each other, and a driving feeling in the blood, as fierce and unstoppable as the simoom.

  She touched his cock, her smooth fingers sliding down its length and closing over it, and stroking upward and downward, upward and downward.

  He growled and pushed her hand away, and pushed into her. He met tightness and resistance, and she rose up sharply, with a surprised little cry, her body tensing. He covered her mouth, and kissed her deeply, so deeply, stores and stores of wanting saved up for an eternity, it seemed.

  Her hands came up and circled his neck, they slid up to cup his face. The tension eased and sh
e kissed him back with ferocious intensity. And while they kissed, that long, long kiss, he pushed into her again, more deeply. She stiffened but she didn’t pull away or push him away.

  A voice or memory came from far away, warning.

  Stop. Time to stop.

  But the warning was far away and he was past heeding, stripped down to simple need. He was inside her, and she was his, and he could only thrust and thrust again, in some primal language whose only word was Mine. And mine. And mine.

  Somewhere in the surging madness he felt the tension easing, and she began to push back, against his thrusts. Her nails dug into his back. Her body surged up to meet his, again and again, and faster and faster.

  Then it happened, all in a sudden, wild rush: a last frenzied struggle, and a bolt of happiness, of pleasure. Then a feeling of diving into a mad world where stars were falling upward or sinking into the bottom of the sky.

  Then it was quiet, but for the frantic pounding of their hearts.

  She lay, stunned, beneath him.

  The naughty engravings couldn’t begin to convey it.

  She could scarcely understand it. Such profound intimacy. Such soaring feelings.

  Good God.

  She was aware of her heart slowing and the quieting of his breathing. She felt his cock slipping from her, and she felt grieved and madly happy at the same time.

  That awful, awful march in the icy, pounding rain, up that endless road. The worst, darkest hour of her life.

  Even when Papa died, and her heart broke, at least she had Mama.

  This night she’d felt so utterly alone, looking up at the hulking shadow of the castle, offering nothing, not a single lit window to welcome her.

  And this was how it ended. In a sort of heaven, but not the good, boring heaven people prated about. In his arms.

  Lisle moved his weight off her and rolled onto his side, taking her along. He pulled her rump against his groin, tucked his head into the curve of her shoulder. His hand cupped one breast.

  She wanted to die of the pleasure of that intimate, possessive touch. Her heart was turning over on itself. She was afraid to speak, afraid to bring back the world. She clung to this moment, when everything, finally, was right, because at last they’d come together and loved, with their bodies and hearts and minds, freely. For one short, endless time, the rest of the world and the rest of their lives and all the harsh little realities had been set aside.

  His voice, low and hoarse, broke the silence. “Are you all right?”

  Yes, finally, for once. “Yes.”

  “I think,” he began.

  “Don’t think,” she said. “Let’s not think for a moment.” She put her hand over the one holding her breast. “Don’t move. Don’t do anything. Let’s just . . . be.”

  A long silence, but not a peaceful one. She could feel the tension building in him.

  Because he was good and honorable.

  “I thought you were going to die,” he said softly.

  “So did I,” she said.

  “I thought you were going to get colder and colder and never stop shaking until you died in my arms.”

  At the time, she’d been so cold, so bitterly cold and miserable that she’d simply let it happen, whatever it was, whatever he did. She remembered now: the furious movement of his hands over her body, the ache as he forced her blood to move again . . . his hands, his hands.

  “I thought so, too. I thought I’d never be warm again. Or maybe not. I’m not sure I could think.”

  “What were you doing?” he said. “Out there?”

  She told him—all of it, including their imaginary conversation.

  “Why couldn’t you throw something at me instead?” he said. “You couldn’t find a way to torture me without going out into a downpour?”

  “It wasn’t raining when I went out,” she said. “Not a cloud in the sky. Well, except for a wisp here and there.”

  “You were out there for hours,” he said.

  “It felt like years,” she said.

  “What am I going to do with you?” he said.

  “A clandestine affair?” she said.

  “I’m not joking,” he said.

  She turned in his arms. “But it’s what we want. All this business about keeping away from each other. One can’t fight the Inevitable.”

  “We didn’t try very hard,” he said. “We face one trial of self-control and we fail.”

  “Lisle, I fail all trials of self-control.”

  “I don’t. I could have summoned your maid. I could have shouted the house down and had everyone running about, fetching hot this and that and dry this and that, and fussing over you, and sending for a doctor in the dead of night. But no.”

  She stroked his cheek. “Can’t you stuff your conscience into a drawer for a time? Can’t we simply enjoy this moment?”

  He pulled her closer and buried his face in her hair. “You make me insane,” he said, his voice muffled. “But being insane, with you, is exciting, and usually I have a good time. We like each other very well—when we don’t hate each other—and we are friends. And now we’ve made love—and that went well.”

  She laughed. “Oh, Lisle.”

  “It isn’t a bad basis for marriage,” he said.

  Aaargh. She drew back. “I knew it. I knew it.”

  He pulled her back, tight against his hard body. He was so warm and so strong and she only wanted to melt there.

  “Listen to me,” he said. His mouth was warm against her ear. The scent of his skin was in her nostrils and in her mind, making it soft.

  “We’ll ruin each other’s lives,” she said.

  “Not completely,” he said.

  “Oh, Lisle.” She bowed her head, to rest her forehead against his chest. “I adore you. I always have. Part of what I adore is your honor and principles and ethics and duty and—and all those good things. It’s all those good things that are twisting your mind and making you not see things as they are. You are thinking, ‘I ruined her.’ The fact is—listen now, this is a fact: The fact is, I should have been ruined sooner or later. I’m glad it was you. One ought to start one’s love life in a spectacular fashion, and you’ve done that for me.”

  “Start?” he said.

  His entire body stiffened.

  And everything was about to get worse, but it couldn’t be helped. He was determined to be honorable, and he was the most obstinate man in the world.

  “I adore you,” she said. “I always have and always will. But I’m a selfish girl, and romantic, and I must come first in a man’s heart. I won’t settle for what so many other women settle for, ending up bored and lonely.”

  “Settle? Olivia, you know I care for you more than—”

  “More than Egypt?” she said.

  A short but telling pause. Then, “What a ridiculous thing to say,” he said. “Those are two completely different things.”

  “Perhaps they are, but one comes first in your heart, always has and always will. I won’t settle for second place in a man’s heart.”

  She felt him flinch.

  She pulled away and sat up. “I need to get to my room.”

  He sat up, too, and her heart ached. The firelight outlined the hard contours of his chest and traced the rippling muscles of his arms. It made sunlight of his hair. He was the sort of man dreams were made on, and myths, and the dreams and myths inspired great statues of bronze and gold where believers paid tribute, worshipped.

  She’d gladly be his votary. She was romantic enough for that, and both too romantic and too cynical to do the sensible thing and marry him.

  He grabbed one of the cast-off blankets and wrapped it about her. “You’re not thinking clearly,” he said. “You don’t have a choice. You might be pregnant. E
ven if you aren’t, there are rules, Olivia, and I know you don’t want to shame your family.”

  “Then we have to find a way around the rules,” she said. “We should make each other wretched. If you’d gag your curst conscience for a moment, you’d see it. You’re too reasonable a man not to see it.”

  The silence stretched out. The fire snapped. He heard a distant hissing. It must still be raining.

  Rain. Such an ordinary thing. It happened all the time. And it had brought her here, and brought the two of them to this.

  The horrible thing was that she was, for once, reasonable. The horrible thing was that, in this at least, Olivia saw as clearly as he did. He cared for her. He was infatuated with her. Yet he couldn’t be sure that was enough, and the same conscience that urged him to marry her told him she’d be miserable if he did. When he’d let himself think of having her in his life, he’d always thought of what she’d do to his life, the havoc she’d wreak. He hadn’t thought about what he’d do to hers.

  Now he looked, not into the simoom-riddled future he’d imagined, but into his heart. He couldn’t offer what she needed and deserved. She ought to be first in a man’s heart, and it had not occurred to him until now that perhaps he’d left no room in his.

  “We won’t solve this tonight,” he said.

  “Not likely,” she said.

  “We’d better get you to your own bed,” he said.

  “Yes. But we do need to conceal the evidence,” she said. “The easiest thing is to to build up the fire in the drawing room and throw my wet clothes in front of it. That way it will seem as though I did what I was trying to do: make a fire and dry off.”

  Leave it to her. He was used to thinking quickly, but concealing crimes wasn’t his specialty.

  She rose, her blanket slipping to the floor.

  The firelight traced her ripe curves and glittered in the coppery triangle between her legs. He let his gaze travel up and down, up and down, while his heart ached. “Yes, you’re beautiful,” he said, his voice tight.

  She smiled.

  “But I can’t recommended wandering naked about a Scottish castle,” he said. “You’ll undo all my hard work and take a chill.” He was hunting about while he spoke. He found his shirt. He stood up and pulled it over her head and thrust her arms through the sleeves. The cuffs covered her hands. The shirt fell past her knees.