“Terms?” she asked vaguely, clasping his head in her hands and urging his mouth back to hers.
“Yes, I—” Marcus broke off to kiss her lips, slanting his mouth over hers with twisting pressure. She explored his neck and face, her fingertips passing over the strong lines of his cheekbones and jaw, the taut sinew of his neck. The smell of his skin intoxicated her with every breath. She wanted to press herself against him until there was not an inch of space left between them. Suddenly she could not kiss him hard enough, long enough.
As he felt her escalating wildness, Marcus forcibly eased her back, ignoring her whimper of protest. His own breath knocked sharply in his throat, and it seemed to require great effort to sort through his disordered thoughts. “Little one…” His hands rubbed gentle circles on her back and shoulders to soothe her. “Softly. Softly. You can have everything you want. You don’t have to fight for it.”
Lillian nodded jerkily. She had never been so aware of the difference in their respective experience, realizing that he was able to restrain his intense passion, whereas she was utterly overwhelmed. His mouth touched her burning forehead and followed the wing of her brow. “It’s better for you…for both of us…to make it last longer,” he murmured. “I don’t want to take you in haste.”
She found herself nudging strongly against his face, his hands, like a cat demanding to be stroked.
One of his palms slipped into the open back of her gown, seeking the skin above the edge of her corset, and a sigh escaped him as he felt her downy softness. “Not yet,” he said in a rough whisper, though whether he was talking to himself or to her was unclear. He clasped the vulnerable curve of her neck in one strong hand, and bent to feast on her parted lips, her chin, the front of her throat. “You’re so sweet,” he said raggedly.
She couldn’t help but grin, even in the flush of desire. “Am I?”
Marcus sought her mouth with another hungering kiss. “Very sweet,” he confirmed huskily. “Though if I were a lesser man, you’d have torn my head off by now.”
The words drew a low laugh from her. “Now I understand the attraction between us. We’re a danger to everyone but each other. Like a pair of ill-tempered hedgehogs.” She paused as a thought occurred to her, and she pulled away from him. “Speaking of attraction…” Her legs were a bit unsteady, and she wandered to the ready support of the bed. Standing against one of the heavy carved posts, she murmured, “I have something to confess.”
Marcus followed her, the light limning the sleek, superbly toned lines of his body. The fashionable looseness of his trousers, which lightly followed the shape of his lean form, did little to conceal the powerful muscles beneath. “That doesn’t surprise me.” He rested one hand on the post just above her head, his posture relaxed. “Am I going to like this confession or not?”
“I don’t know.” She reached into the hidden pocket of her gown, concealed in the deep folds of her skirts, and found the vial of perfume. “Here.”
“What is it?” Receiving the vial, Marcus opened it and inhaled the scent. “Perfume,” he said, his gaze questioning as it returned to her face.
“Not just any perfume,” Lillian replied apprehensively. “It’s the reason you were first attracted to me.”
He sniffed it again. “Oh?”
“I purchased it from an old perfumer in London. It’s an aphrodisiac.”
Sudden laughter flickered in his eyes. “Where did you learn that word?”
“From Annabelle. And it’s true,” Lillian told him earnestly, “it really is one. It has a special ingredient that the perfumer told me would attract a suitor.”
“What special ingredient?”
“He wouldn’t tell me what it was. But it worked. Don’t laugh, it did! I noticed its effect on you the day that we played rounders, when you kissed me behind the hedgerow. Don’t you remember?”
Marcus seemed entertained by the notion, but it was clear that he did not believe that he had been seduced by a perfume. He passed it beneath his nose again, and murmured, “I remember having noticed the scent. But I was attracted to you for many other reasons long before that day.”
“Liar,” she accused. “You hated me.”
He shook his head. “I never hated you. I was bothered, plagued, and tormented by you, but that’s not at all the same thing.”
“The perfume works,” she insisted. “Not only did you respond to it, but Annabelle tried it on her husband—and she swears that he kept her up all night as a result.”
“Sweetheart,” Marcus said wryly, “Hunt has behaved like a boar in rut around Annabelle since the first day they met. It’s typical behavior for him, where she is concerned.”
“But it wasn’t typical behavior for you! You had absolutely no interest in me until I wore this scent, and the first time you got a whiff of it—”
“Are you claiming,” he interrupted, his eyes like black velvet, “that I would have a similar reaction to any woman who wears it?”
Lillian opened her mouth to reply, then closed it abruptly as she recalled that he hadn’t displayed any interest when the other wallflowers had tried it. “No,” she admitted. “But it does seem to make quite a bit of difference with me.”
A slow smile curved his lips. “Lillian, I’ve wanted you every moment since I first held you in my arms. And it has nothing to do with your damned perfume. However”—he inhaled the scent one last time before replacing the tiny stopper—“I do know what the secret ingredient is.”
Lillian stared at him with wide eyes. “You do not!”
“I do,” he said smugly.
“What a know-all,” Lillian exclaimed with laughing annoyance. “Perhaps you’re guessing at it, but I assure you that if I can’t figure out what it is, you certainly couldn’t—”
“I know conclusively what it is,” he informed her.
“Tell me, then.”
“No. I think I’ll let you discover it on your own.”
“Tell me!” She pounced on him eagerly, thumping him hard on the chest with her fists. Most men would have been driven back by the solid blows, but he only laughed and held his ground. “Westcliff, if you don’t tell me this instant, I’ll—”
“Torture me? Sorry, that won’t work. I’m too accustomed to it by now.” Lifting her with shocking ease, he tossed her onto the bed like a sack of potatoes. Before she could move an inch, he was on top of her, purring and laughing as she wrestled him with all her might.
“I’ll make you give in!” She hooked a leg around his and shoved hard at his left shoulder. The childhood years of fighting with her boisterous brothers had taught her a few tricks. However, Marcus countered every move easily, his body a mass of steely, flexing muscles. He was very agile, and surprisingly heavy. “You’re no challenge at all,” he teased, allowing her to roll atop him briefly. As she sought to pin him, he twisted and levered himself over her once more. “Don’t say that’s your best effort?”
“Cocky bastard,” Lillian muttered, renewing her efforts. “I could win… if I didn’t have a gown on…”
“Your wish may yet be granted,” he replied, smiling down at her. After another few moments, he held her down on the mattress, taking care not to hurt her in their love play. “That’s enough,” he said. “You’re tiring. We’ll call it an even match.”
“Not yet,” she panted, still determined to best him.
“For God’s sake, you little savage,” he said in amusement, “it’s time to give up.”
“Never!” She strained wildly against him, her weary arms trembling.
“Relax,” came his caressing murmur, and her eyes widened as she felt the hardness of his body between her thighs. She gasped, her struggles fading. “Softly, now…” He pulled the front of her gown down, momentarily trapping her arms. “Easy,” he whispered.
Lillian went still, her blood pumping violently as she stared up at him. The light was uncertain in this part of the room, the bed swathed in shadow. Marcus’s dark form moved over hers, his hand
s turning her this way and that as he eased the gown from her body, and unhooked her corset. And then suddenly she was breathing, breathing, too loudly, too fast, and the soothing stroke of his palm down the front of her body only agitated her further.
Her skin had become so sensitive that the feel of the open air seemed to chafe her, her entire body tingling and prickling. She began to shiver as he peeled away her chemise, her stockings and drawers, the occasional soft graze of his knuckles or fingertips causing her to start.
Marcus stood by the bed, staring at her intently as he removed his own clothes with leisurely slowness. His elegantly sculpted body was becoming familiar to her now, as was the aching excitement that penetrated every inch of her tender flesh. She moaned a little as he joined her on the mattress, gathering her against the warm fleece of his chest. Feeling the continuous tremors that ran through her, he drew his hand over the pale length of her back and cupped the taut shape of her bottom. Everywhere he touched her, she felt waves of intense relief followed by a deeper, more pleasurable ache.
He kissed her slowly, deeply, licking into the silky recesses of her mouth until she groaned with pleasure. Moving down to her breasts, he covered them with light, half-open kisses, touching her nipples with fleeting strokes of his tongue. He coaxed and courted her as if she weren’t already flushed and trembling with desire, as if she weren’t breathing in pleading sobs for him to ease the pangs of need. When her breasts were swollen and her nipples had contracted to hard tips, he took one peak into his mouth and began to tug firmly, while his hand settled on her stomach.
She felt a tightening coil inside, a gathering urgency that drove her mad. Her own hand shook violently as she grasped his, and brought it to the damp tangle of curls between her thighs. He smiled against her breast, and moved to the other nipple, pulling it into the moist velvet of his mouth. Time seemed to stop as she felt his fingers searching delicately, parting the springy locks, then grazing over the wet, intricately couched peak of her sex. Ahhh …his caresses were gossamer-light as he stroked her with delicate insistence, first teasing, then assuaging, then teasing again, until she cried out in helpless release, her hips jerking hard against his hand.
Cuddling her protectively, Marcus caressed her quivering limbs. He whispered endearments against her half-open mouth, words of adoration and lust, while his hands moved over her body in reverent forays. Lillian wasn’t a ware of the exact moment when his touch became more arousing than soothing, but gradually she felt him layering sensation upon sensation. Her heartbeat launched into a new urgent pattern, and she shifted uneasily beneath him. He parted her legs and pushed her knees up a little, and entered her slowly. She flinched at the intimate soreness of the invasion. He was so hard, above her, inside her, that her flesh tightened instinctively, but nothing could stop the thick, heavy slide. He kept his thrusts easy and deep, nudging into the tight clasp of her sex with utter tenderness. Every movement seemed to draw a thrill of pleasure from the depths of her body, and soon she relaxed until the pain had tapered to a barely discernible twinge. She felt hot all over, feverish and desperate as she sensed the approach of another climax. Suddenly he astonished her by withdrawing.
“Marcus,” she whimpered, “oh God, don’t stop, please—”
Hushing her with his mouth, he lifted and turned her carefully until she was lying on her stomach. Dazed and shaking, she felt him push a pillow beneath her hips, and then another, until she was propped up high and open as he knelt between her thighs. His fingers stroked and spread the folds of her sex, and then he was pushing inside her again, and her moans became uncontrollable. Helplessly she turned her head to the side, her cheek pressed against the mattress, while her twisting hips were steadied in the firm grasp of his hands. He thrust even deeper than before, probing and stroking and pleasuring her with a measured rhythm …deliberately pushing her over the edge of sanity. She begged, sobbed, groaned, even cursed, and she heard him laugh softly as he drove her into a shattering burst of rapture. Her body clenched around his sex in throbbing contractions, milking a climax from him until a deep growl was torn from his throat.
Panting, Marcus lowered his body over hers, his mouth at the nape of her neck, his sex still buried inside her.
Resting passively beneath him, licking her swollen lips, Lillian mumbled, “And you called me a savage.” She caught her breath as he chuckled, the hair on his chest rubbing like rough-napped velvet against her back.
Although Lillian was pleasantly tired from their love-making, the last thing she wanted to do was sleep. She was filled with wonder at the discoveries she was making about the man she had once disdained as stodgy and boring, who had turned out to be neither. She was beginning to recognize that Marcus possessed a softer side that few people were ever allowed to see. And she sensed that he cared about her, though she was afraid to speculate on that, as the feelings that seemed to be pouring from her own heart had become alarmingly intense.
After Marcus had wiped her perspiring body with a cool, damp cloth, he dressed her in his discarded shirt, which held the scent of his skin. He brought her a plate containing a poached pear, and a glass of sweet wine, and even allowed her to feed him a few bites of the silky-soft fruit. When her appetite was sated, Lillian set aside the empty plate and spoon, and turned to snuggle against him. He rose on one elbow and looked down at her, his fingers playing idly in her hair.
“Are you sorry that I wouldn’t let St. Vincent have you?”
She gave him a puzzled smile. “Why would you ask such a thing? Surely you’re not having pangs of conscience.”
Marcus shook his head. “I am merely wondering if you had any regrets.”
Surprised and touched by his need for reassurance, Lillian toyed with the dark curls on his chest. “No,” she said frankly. “He is attractive, and I do like him …but I didn’t want him.”
“You did consider marrying him, however.”
“Well,” she admitted, “it did cross my mind that I would like to be a duchess—but only to spite you.”
A smile flashed across his face. He retaliated with a punishing nip at her breast, causing her to yelp. “I couldn’t have borne it,” he admitted, “seeing you married to anyone but me.”
“I don’t think Lord St. Vincent will have any difficulty finding another heiress to suit his purposes.”
“Perhaps. But there aren’t many women with fortunes comparable to yours…and none with your beauty.”
Smiling at the compliment, Lillian crawled halfway over him and hitched one leg over his. “Tell me more. I want to hear you wax lyrical about my charms.”
Levering himself to a sitting position, Marcus lifted her with an ease that made her gasp, and settled her until she straddled his hips. He stroked a fingertip along the pale skin that was exposed at the open vee of the shirt. “I never wax lyrical,” he said. “Marsdens are not a poetic sort. However…” He paused to admire the sight of the long-limbed young woman who sat astride him while her hair trailed to her waist in tangled streamers. “I could at least tell you that you look like a pagan princess, with your tangled black hair and your bright, dark eyes.”
“And?” Lillian encouraged, linking her arms loosely around his neck.
He set his hands at her slender waist and moved them down to grasp her strong, sleek thighs. “And that every erotic dream I’ve ever had about your magnificent legs pales in comparison to the reality.”
“You’ve dreamed about my legs?” Lillian wriggled as she felt his palms slide up her inner thighs in a lazy, teasing path.
“Oh yes.” His hands disappeared beneath the drooping hem of the shirt. “Wrapped around me,” he murmured, his tone deepening. “Gripping tightly as you rode me…”
Lillian’s eyes widened as she felt his thumbs stroking the fragile outer folds of her sex. “What?” she asked faintly, and drew a ragged breath as she felt him open her with gentle massaging strokes. His fingers were doing something wicked, their artful movements concealed by the shirt. She shi
vered and watched his intent face as he used both hands to toy with her, some fingers filling her, others flirting skillfully with the sensitive little crest that seemed to burn at his touch. “But women don’t…” she said in breathless confusion. “Not that way. At least… oh … ah… I’ve never heard…”
“Some do,” he murmured, teasing her in a way that caused her to moan. “My reckless angel …I think I’ll have to show you.”
In her innocence, she didn’t comprehend until he lifted her again, and positioned her, and helped her to slide along the rigid, engorged length of his arousal until she was fully impaled on him. Shocked beyond words, Lillian made a few tentative movements, obeying the low murmur of his voice and the patient guidance of his hands on her hips. After a while she found a rhythm. “That’s it,” Marcus said, now sounding breathless. “That’s the way…” Reaching beneath the shirt once more, he found the aching nub beneath the hood of her sex. He circled it with his thumb in an electrifying counterpoint to her downward thrusts, with a soft pressure that sent new heat dancing across her nerves. His steady gaze held hers, drinking in the sight of her pleasure, and the realization of how utterly focused he was on her caused the ecstasy to ripen until she shuddered in hard, deep-seated spasms, her body and heart and mind filled with him. Gripping her waist, Marcus held her firmly as he ground upward, letting his own pleasure pump and surge through her.
Feeling witless and utterly drained, Lillian let herself collapse over him, her head coming to rest on the center of his chest. His heart pounded and thundered beneath her ear for long minutes before it eased into something approaching a normal rhythm. “My God,” he muttered, his arms sliding around her, then falling away as if even that required too much effort. “Lillian. Lillian.”
“Mmm?” She blinked drowsily, experiencing an overwhelming need to sleep.
“I’ve changed my mind about negotiating. You can have whatever you want. Any conditions, anything that’s in my power to accomplish. Just put my mind at ease and say you’ll be my wife.”