"Piers," she gasped.
He didn't pause for even a moment to reply, only settled in to his task with renewed dedication.
He felt the quiver of her thigh against his cheek, and it encouraged him to work his fingers deeper, faster. Her body tensed.
Yes. That's it. Surrender to it. Let it happen.
He would have licked and kissed her all day if she'd needed him to do so, but she broke apart beneath him in stunning fashion, gasping and arching off the ground.
He pulled her down to the earth with gentle nuzzling and caresses until her breathing slowed.
He kissed his way back up her belly, crawling on hands and knees as he moved atop her. He guarded her body between his arms, offering himself as a shelter. But what she gave him in return was so much more. Comfort. Succor. A soft place to lay his heavy heart.
Her thighs parted, making a cradle for his legs. The hard, eager curve of his cock wedged tight between their bellies, straining toward her navel.
He raised himself up on straightened arms. Then he rocked his hips, so that the head of his cock parted her and fitted just where it wanted to be.
She looked up at him with clear eyes and absolutely no misgivings. She was so damn trusting it made his chest ache. He fought the impulse to claim her fast and hard. Make her his own before she could change her mind.
"If we do this," he said, "you must marry me. You do understand that?"
She nodded, but it wasn't enough. He needed words.
"Once we're joined, you'll be bound to me. Irrevocably. Always. Tell me you understand that. Tell me you want it. I need to hear it from your lips, Charlotte. Say you . . ." The breath rushed out of him. "Say you'll be my wife."
Charlotte gazed up at him, her heart wrenching with emotion. It seemed she had finally heard a true proposal. Or as close to it as she was likely to get.
"Yes, Piers. I'll marry you."
I will marry you, and I will love you. And somehow, some way I will make you love me back.
She was resolved on one thing. She was not going to be one of those virgins who whimpered and cried upon her deflowering. She could take a bit of pain. Anyway, his fingers had already been inside her. How much bigger could this part of him be?
Much bigger, she discovered, as the tip of him nudged at her entrance. Bigger, thicker, harder, hotter.
Just . . . more. In every way.
Nevertheless, she thought she was dealing with it all rather admirably.
And then he pushed inside.
Oh Lord oh Lord oh Lord.
She couldn't help it. All her resolutions were abandoned. She cried out and tensed, digging her fingernails into his shoulders like claws.
He cursed. "Sorry."
It's all right, she wanted to tell him. It's fine, truly. Plow on ahead. No need to worry about me.
But it wasn't all right, and she wasn't fine, and if he plowed on ahead just now, she would likely serve him an involuntary punch in the eye.
"I'll go as slow as you need me to. I won't move again until you tell me you're ready. I swear it."
Charlotte nodded. She breathed in and out, willing her body to relax.
When the pain finally began to ebb, she released her tight grip on his shoulders. He slid in a bit farther, and a bit farther still, and--miracle of miracles--it didn't make her want to scream.
"Better now?" he asked.
"Yes."
He cared about her comfort. He was working so hard to make this not only bearable, but wonderful. And that made everything better.
His every careful, inching thrust went easier than the last. Her body stretched and ached, but in a tolerable way. Perhaps even a pleasant way.
When he was finally fully seated inside her, he gave a low moan. The last bit of tension in her arms and neck melted.
And then she did the most ridiculous thing:
She lay back and thought of England.
It came to her all at once: house parties and foxhunts, partridge shooting and prizefighting. Lovers meeting in libraries and carriages and autumn dales.
All those strange, silly, so very English quirks of manners and mystery that had formed their characters and forced them together.
He noticed her smile. "What's so amusing?"
"Only everything."
He bent to kiss her. "I rather adore that about you."
I rather adore that about you.
Her heart gave a bittersweet twinge.
Don't be greedy, she told herself. With a bit of strategic memory, the redaction of a word or two, she could remember that as I adore you--or close enough to it.
He took her in slow, gentle strokes at first. Then his thrusts became rougher, more urgent. It hurt, but this was what she'd been waiting for. She wanted to watch him, see his face contorted with raw pleasure and unfettered need. But at the last moment, he withdrew and turned aside, spending himself into the folds of his discarded shirt.
Preventing conception was a considerate gesture, she told herself--even if she was left feeling hollow and a bit disappointed. Even in that last moment of abandon, he'd managed to keep his restraint.
Afterward, he stroked her naked body in the sunlight, touching and exploring and looking where he pleased.
"You are like a boy with a new plaything," she said.
"I'm not a boy, Charlotte. I'm a man. A man who's been trusted with royal secrets, battle plans, and international treaties. And now . . . I'm seized by the notion that you're the most precious thing I've ever held." His eyes burned into hers. "You're mine now."
Part of her wanted to rebel at his possessive tone, but part of her found it thrilling, too. There seemed no point in denying it, anyhow. He had her heart. He had her body.
She was his.
The sooner she accepted that, the sooner the true challenge would begin.
Making him hers.
Chapter Fifteen
Charlotte dreamed of being on a boat, rocking to and fro. Then the sea grew violent, tossing her this way and that. Where was Piers? He would make this stop. The waves themselves would not dare disobey him.
"Charlotte. Charlotte."
Her eyes fluttered open. "Piers?"
She looked at his hand curled tight on her arm. He wasn't her safe port in the storm. He was the one shaking her.
"What is it?" she asked. The words came out in a sleepy slur: Whaeesit.
Cool grass tangled with her toes. The hunt. The stream. The meadow. Their joining.
She struggled up on her elbow, pushing away a lock of hair crusted to her cheek.
Oh, Lord--had she been drooling? Had he seen?
As her vision came into to focus, she could see that his expression was grave.
Now she snapped awake.
She clutched his shoulder. "Is something wrong?"
He shook his head. "No."
"Then what's the matter?"
"Nothing." He turned to pull on his breeches.
"Are you certain?" She hugged his waist and propped her chin on his shoulder. Beads of cold sweat had risen on his hairline, and his heart was pounding in his chest. She could feel it through his ribs and hers. "Piers. What is it?"
"It was difficult to wake you, that's all."
She pressed her forehead to his back. "So sorry. I sleep like the dead. Everyone in my family knows it--and the servants, besides. But I hadn't thought to warn you."
The sun was sinking lower, and shadow cloaked the meadow.
"Goodness." Charlotte sat up and began reaching for her chemise, jerking it over her head and pushing her arms through the sleeves. "They'll be wondering about us by now. I don't suppose it will have escaped notice that the two of us disappeared together." She reached for one of her stockings and jammed her toe into it, then paused, remembering something worse. "Oh, no. That demon horse. She's probably halfway to Scotland by now."
"She knows where she's fed and watered. She'll have returned to the stables."
"I hope you're right. Otherwise, I don't know h
ow I'll explain it to--"
"Charlotte," he interrupted. "If there are any explanations required, I'll make them." He tilted her face to his, then gave her cheek a light caress. "I will take care of everything. From this moment forward. Do you understand that?"
"I . . . Yes, I suppose I do."
I'll take care of everything.
It was a promise she'd been waiting to hear since she was a girl, but she wasn't a girl anymore. Especially not now, after what had just happened in this meadow.
All the questions she'd submerged an hour or two ago . . . they bubbled to the surface of her conscience now.
How was this going to work? Not only now, but for the rest of their lives? He'd sworn to look after her. Would he ever allow her to look after him? Trust her with his fears and secrets? Would he ever let her come anywhere near that fiercely guarded heart?
Desire and pleasure were all well and good, but they wouldn't be enough to sustain a lifetime.
Only one thing was clear to Charlotte as they left the meadow. From this point forward, there was no going back. Never mind the lovers in the library. Now she had an even greater mystery to solve--and it was Piers.
"I can't wait any longer. We must do it now." Delia inched closer to Charlotte on the drawing room divan.
Charlotte looked up from her book. "Do what?"
"Ask them," Delia whispered. "The Continent? The Grand Tour? Our escape from stifling parents and English society . . . ? Is any of this sounding familiar?"
"Oh, of course."
Charlotte felt a stab of guilt. She hadn't been thinking of Delia and their plans when she made love to Piers.
She hadn't been thinking of anything. Just feeling.
Feeling glorious and adored and impetuous and in love.
But apparently, she ought to add selfish and heedless to the list. All the while, Delia had been counting on her as a friend.
"Of course it does, all of it. But we can't ask them now."
"There won't be a better time. Papa is pleased with the stag he shot this afternoon, and he's had at least two glasses of port. Mama was proud of that dinner, and she has Lord Granville's farewell ball to plan. They're in a charitable mood. We won't have a more advantageous moment than this."
"But . . ."
"But what?"
But your father still believes me to be a shameless, fortune-hunting hussy, your brother believes I'm a murder target, and your sister has threatened to ruin my life.
"Is it your mother?"
"Yes," Charlotte said hastily. "Yes, the problem is my mother."
That was one good thing she could say for Mama. She made such a convenient excuse for everything. At the moment, she had her feet propped up on a footstool as she leafed through the pages of a ladies' magazine.
"She'd never agree," Charlotte said. "Not now."
"You don't think she's still trying to match you with Lord Granville?" Delia asked.
"It's likely."
Highly, definitely, certainly likely.
"But you've made it clear how much you dislike the man," Delia murmured to her sketchbook. "And for the past few days, he's taken no notice of you whatsoever."
"I know he hasn't," Charlotte said, more dispiritedly than she ought to have allowed herself to sound.
Somehow she and Piers had managed to avoid notice after returning from their tryst in the meadow. Everyone had been resting or preparing for dinner, and they'd all assumed Charlotte was already upstairs in her room. Piers hadn't needed to offer any explanations.
And now, for two days, he'd scarcely spoken at all.
He was avoiding her, belatedly--just as she'd begged him to do when they first met. Now, however, she wanted nothing more than to see him, speak with him. Be held by him and breathe in the scent of his skin.
At the very least, take a stroll around the garden one afternoon.
She couldn't understand why he'd become so suddenly aloof. Unless . . .
Unless everything she was feeling had simply left him cold.
"You do still want to go, don't you?" Delia's voice grew small, hesitant. "I wouldn't blame you if you'd changed your mind. I know I won't make the most convenient traveling partner. I walk slowly, and I--"
"Never think it. I couldn't imagine a better companion."
"Oh, good." Her friend looked relieved. "Because if I have to spend another season sitting in the corners of ballrooms--"
"We're going to break free, the two of us." She reached out and squeezed Delia's hand. "This time next year, you'll be painting views of the Mediterranean. I promise."
Somehow, Charlotte would make it happen.
She looked across the room, at Piers. He could make it happen. They needn't marry straightaway. He would likely even pay for the journey, arrange for them to stay with his diplomatic acquaintances overseas. A chance for their daughters to socialize with princesses and archdukes? Sir Vernon and Lady Parkhurst--and Mama--couldn't refuse that, no matter how protective they were.
Charlotte dared to believe she could convince him. He was a man who understood loyalty. He knew the importance of keeping a promise.
But she would need to speak with him first, and for the past half hour he'd stubbornly kept his nose in a newspaper.
Look up, she willed. Look at me.
He turned a page of The Times instead. It must have been a particularly riveting issue.
Delia set aside her sketchbook. "Do let's ask them now. If they refuse, so be it. I just can't bear any further suspense."
Charlotte put out her hand. "No, wait."
"Vegetables." Lady Parkhurst laid aside her pince-nez and looked up from her lists of recipes. "I can't decide on vegetables for our supper at the ball."
Hallelujah. Saved by vegetables. All lessons on nourishment aside, Charlotte had never expected to think those words.
"I was hoping for something in the French style," Lady Parkhurst went on, "and my egg-plant in the conservatory has produced some lovely aubergines."
"Aubergines?" Sir Vernon asked. "What the deuce are those?"
Charlotte gripped Delia's arm, hard. She couldn't dare look at her. If she did, they would both burst out laughing.
"If you ever took an interest in my plants, you would know. It's the latest variety from the Continent. Produces a long, purplish fruit like so." She drew the shape with her hands. "Why, some of them must be seven or eight inches long."
Charlotte stared hard at the carpet and breathed through her nose. Beside her, Delia began to quietly wheeze.
"A purple vegetable?" Sir Vernon snorted. "What do you do with the things?"
"Well, that's the question, isn't it? I haven't any recipes. Though I hear the French do wondrous things with their aubergines."
Piers looked up from his paper, casting a worried glance in Charlotte's direction. Evidently he'd been paying some attention to her after all. He was probably wondering if he needed to call a doctor to diagnose her convulsions.
"Lord Granville, you've spent time on the Continent," Lady Parkhurst said earnestly. "How do you like your aubergine?"
There was no holding it back then. A shriek of laughter escaped Delia, and Charlotte tried--with only modest success--to covers hers with a coughing fit.
Mama closed her magazine. "Girls, really. Whatever is so amusing?"
"Nothing, Mama. I was just showing Delia a humorous passage in my novel."
"What sort of novel?" Frances asked, setting aside her needlework.
Delia tried her best to help with the subterfuge, pointing at the book. "You see, there's a girl, and she meets with a . . . a . . ."
"A pigeon," Charlotte supplied.
"A pigeon?" Frances asked.
A pigeon? Delia mouthed.
Charlotte gave her friend a yes-I-know-but-I-panicked look. "It wasn't an ordinary pigeon. It was a malicious, bloodthirsty pigeon," she went on. "A whole flock of them."
Frances blinked. "I've never heard anything so absurd."
"Precisely!" Delia de
clared. "So you can see why we found it so hilarious."
Charlotte had finally managed to contain her laughter. Then she made the mistake of looking at Delia, and they giggled all over again.
"I sometimes wonder if the two of you aren't spending too much time together." Sir Vernon studied them over his glass of port. "I won't have it said that I raised a foolish daughter."
Once everyone had settled back into reading or needlework, Delia whispered, "I suppose this isn't the time to ask about our Grand Tour after all."
"No," Charlotte agreed, and though she would never say it aloud, she mentally added: Thank heaven. "We may as well go up to our beds."
There was one other confession from this evening that she would not only keep to herself, but take to her grave:
Mama's "marital duties" lesson had come in useful after all.
Chapter Sixteen
When Piers opened the door of his bedchamber later that evening, he'd scarcely shaken his arms free of his topcoat before he noticed a small, folded paper had been pushed under the door.
He hung his coat on a peg with one hand, unfolded the paper with the other, and read the single line of script:
I need to speak with you.
It wasn't signed, but he knew it could only be Charlotte. And if she'd risked this method of communication, the matter must be urgent.
Seeing that the corridor was empty, he wasted no time. He knocked lightly on the door of her chamber.
No answer.
He rapped again. "Charlotte."
Nothing.
He tried the door latch.
Locked.
He freed his stickpin from his cravat and inserted the sharp end in the lock. He was typically able to keep impatience and frustration at bay, but this time they slipped past his defenses. His fingers fumbled with the stickpin, and the damn thing clattered to the floor, rolling into a darkened crack between the floorboards. Curse it.
Piers stood back from the door. He wasn't about to get down on hands and knees to search for the pin, and he wasn't going to head off in search of another one, either. She ought to have heard him and opened the door by now, unless . . .
Unless there was something wrong.
He shifted his weight to his left leg and delivered a swift kick with his right, breaking the door latch and sending the door swinging inward on its hinges. Not the most surreptitious way of breaking into a room, but undeniably effective.