Outside the windows, the winter wind raced over the close-grazed downs, causing tree limbs and branches to sway like unbolted gates. Creaks and settling noises came from the house’s bones as the night deepened.
Rhys cradled her comfortably while they listened to the crackling of the seasoned oak on the hearth and watched sparks dance and rise. No one had ever held Helen so close, for so long.
“Why do old houses creak so much?” he asked idly, playing with her braid and drawing the silky end across his cheek.
“When all the warmth fades at night, it makes the old boards contract and slip against each other.”
“A bloody massive house, it is. And you were left to your own devices in this place for too long. I didn’t understand before, how alone you were.”
“I had the twins for company. I watched over them.”
“But there was no one to watch over you.”
A sense of uneasiness came over her, as it always did whenever she reflected on her childhood. It had seemed as if her very survival had depended on never complaining or drawing attention to herself. “Oh I—I didn’t need that.”
“All little girls need to feel safe and wanted.” He stroked back the fine loose locks around her face, his fingertips gently following the changing patterns of firelight against her hair. “When you grow up without something, the lack of it is always with you. Even when you finally have it.”
Helen looked up at him in wonder. “Do you ever feel that way?”
His smile turned self-mocking. “My fortune is so large, cariad, that the numbers would frighten any reasonable man. But something inside me always insists that every last shilling could disappear tomorrow.” His hand charted the shape of her hip and followed the line of her thigh. Clasping her knee, he stared into her wide eyes. “When we were in London, you told me that your world was very small. Well, my world is very large. And you’re the most important person in it. You’re safe and wanted now, Helen. In time, you’ll become used to that, and you won’t worry.” As she turned her face against his chest, he lowered his mouth to her ear. “We’re bound to each other,” he whispered, “for as long as the world exists. Remember?”
Helen rubbed her cheek against his velvet robe. “We haven’t made our vows yet.”
“We did that afternoon, when you came to my bed. That’s what it meant.” His fingers slid beneath her chin, coaxing her to look at him. Amusement deepened the faint whisks at the outer corners of his eyes. “I’m sorry, sweetheart, but there’s no getting rid of me.”
Desperately she stared at the face above hers, all strong, stark angles and shadows, a striking framework for those compelling sable eyes. Rhys hid nothing, letting her see the tenderness that was reserved for her alone. She felt the overwhelming pull between them, like the force of gravity between twin stars.
Rhys adjusted her higher on his chest, his powerful body flexing beneath her. Her breasts felt hot and full, and she turned to press them against him. Dizzy with guilt and longing, she linked her arms around his neck. She wanted more of him, his skin, his taste, his body inside hers.
Tell him, her tortured conscience screamed. Tell him!
Instead, she heard herself whisper, “I want to go to bed now.”
Beneath her weight, where she rested on him intimately, she felt a thickening pressure.
His brows lifted in subtle teasing. “Alone?”
“With you.”
Chapter 18
RHYS DIDN’T UNDERSTAND WHY Helen seemed especially vulnerable tonight, at the mercy of some private anxiety she wouldn’t explain. She always held something in reserve, an edge or two of her soul turned inward. The mystery of her, the hint of elusiveness, fascinated him. God help him, he had never wanted to be inside another human being the way he did her.
He carried her to the bed and deposited her on the mattress.
With a decisiveness that caught him off guard, Helen reached for the belt of his robe and untied it. The garment listed open, revealing his aroused body . . . and then her cool fingers settled on him. His mouth went dry, and his flesh throbbed viciously as she explored the shape and texture of his aroused flesh.
Shrugging out of his robe, he stood with his hands suspended in midair, not quite sure where to put them. Never in his wildest dreams would he have imagined that Helen would do such a thing of her own accord. It inflamed him further to see how ladylike she was about it, her pretty hands touching him with the same lightness she used on her piano keys or to hold a porcelain teacup.
Noticing the way he jumped and caught his breath as she reached the head of his erection, Helen asked in an abashed voice, “It’s more sensitive here?”
Unable to muster a coherent word, Rhys nodded with a gruff sound.
Slowly she caressed the shaft with the flat of her palm. He saw the luminous blue glow of the moonstone ring, the symbol of his claim on her, as her fingers glided to the swaying weight of him below. She cupped him so gently, as if she were handling something dangerously volatile. Which she was. His body was nothing but a container brimming with lust, ready to explode. The primitive part of his brain took obscene satisfaction in the lurid sight of her, a fair-haired nymph, sweetly caressing his cock. The contrast of grace and crudeness appealed to him on the most primitive level.
Taking hold of him at the base, she made a delicate cuff of her fingers and slid them upward. Her thumb touched the exposed tip and made a mild circling stroke, and for a few seconds he couldn’t see past the shower of sparks over his vision. A heavy pulse began deep in his pelvis, warning that he was only seconds from climax. With a groan, he tried to push her hands away. “No more . . . no . . . sweetheart . . .”