There was no light, but he could see the outline of a trunk in the dark. He turned her around and pushed her toward it, and bent her over it, hauling up her skirts from the back. He held them out of the way and nudged open her legs with his knees. She gripped the edge of the trunk for balance; he could see the pale outline of her gloves against the wood as he positioned himself behind her.
Like Jack in the meadow, he was taking what he wanted, whether offered or not. He could not seem to stop taking from her. He pushed her legs wider and stroked her quim, and found her copiously wet. He slid two fingers inside her, pumping them in and out. “Naughty little duchess. How hot you are. Stop squirming about, and let me have you.”
“It’s so dark,” she said. “I’m afraid.”
“You’re not afraid. You want this.”
“Please don’t hurt me.”
She meant Please hurt me. He heard it in her tone, and felt it in her arching spine as she wriggled back against him. He shoved inside her, driving through her tight, hot slickness all the way to the hilt. “Oh,” she gasped. “Oh!”
Oh, indeed. He thrust into her again, not caring for the dark or the hard floor beneath his knees. He set up a steady rhythm, capturing her arms and pinning them behind her. She struggled with a low moan. By God, she stripped his control with her responsive reactions. He couldn’t resist her, and he couldn’t restrain his animalistic urge to possess her.
He reached beneath her to yank down her bodice and expose her breasts. He grasped one of them, worrying the nipple between his fingers before treating her to a hard pinch. She gasped and threw her head back.
“Does it hurt, darling? Yes?” He chuckled at her distracted nodding. “It hurts in the best way, doesn’t it?”
He released her arms and squeezed her breasts until she wailed and shuddered. Her pussy’s clenching sent waves of need through his cock and balls, an intense building of energy. He pumped inside her, losing his mind, losing control.
“You should always be like this,” he growled, twisting his fingers in her hair. “You should always be beneath me, moaning like this, taking my cock.”
“No,” she cried.
“Yes. You’re mine.”
Her hips moved wildly to meet his pounding thrusts. She was so beautiful, so powerful, even in her surrender. He pulled her hair harder, yanked her head back so he could kiss and suck the smooth column of her neck. Her pussy pulsed and her breath hissed through her teeth.
“Please,” she begged. “Please.”
“Please what?”
“Please don’t stop. Don’t stop. I’m so close…”
“Come for me,” he ordered. “Come for me now.”
She obeyed with a ragged cry, arching back as he grasped her breasts. He climaxed deep within her, his own pleasure heightened by the intensity of her release. For long moments they remained still, gasping for air.
“Are you all right?” he asked when he could manage it. He tried to turn her in his arms, but she resisted. He realized she was in tears.
“What’s the matter?” he asked. “Did I hurt you?”
She pulled away, readjusting her clothing and wiping at her cheeks. “You always hurt me,” she said. “You make me ashamed of myself.”
He squinted to see her in the dark room. She wouldn’t let him hold her. She got to her feet and moved toward the door, searching for the handle in the dark.
“You’ve done nothing to be ashamed of,” he said, following after her. “There’s no need to cry.” He did up his breeches as she stumbled into the moonlight. He could see her well now, her tears and her agonized expression. He caught her before she reached the horses.
“Do not,” he said, taking her face between his fingers. “Do not be ashamed of what just happened. Do not dare.”
“You can’t control me in everything. You can’t tell me how to feel!”
She tried to turn away, but he forced her face back and looked into her eyes. “I can tell you how I feel. I don’t want you to cry when we’ve just shared such pleasure.” He frowned at her tears. “You ought to be happy. In this, you please me.”
“In this.” She gave a bitter laugh. “What a laudable duchess I am, to be able to meet your basest carnal desires.”
“Your carnal desires too. You enjoyed yourself well enough, for all your tears.”
She pulled away from him when he would have comforted her. Why were they back to anger, after the closeness they’d just shared? He took her arms and made her look at him. “If this is the only thing that works for us as husband and wife, so be it. It’s the only necessary thing to perpetuate my family line.”
“Of course your family line is the only matter of importance in this marriage.”
“It’s the most important thing, yes.”
“What about love? What about caring?”
He scowled at her. “Why are you harping at me in that shrill tone? You’re never angrier than after you’ve just been fucked. If I could contrive a way to keep my cock in you all the time, you’d be a lot more biddable, I think.”
“You are crass.”
“And you are peevish. Again. No matter.” He lifted her and put her on her horse. “I’ll be ready to take you again by the time we return to the house.”
“I don’t want you again.”
“Is that so?” He put on his gloves and mounted his own horse. “In the end, one has little to do with the other. Especially when I am so much more powerful than you will ever be.”
* * * * *
Gwen rose the next day feeling mentally and physically exhausted. Arlington had seen fit to lay with her twice more after they returned from the temple. He had proved his point—that she enjoyed his caresses—but it had come at a cost to her peace of mind, and her pride.
The last thing she wanted was to spend more time with her husband, but the portrait artist was there for the final sitting, so she put on her silver dress and her jewels and reported to the grand hall to pose primly with her hands in her lap. She wondered if the painter could see the strain on her face, or intuit somehow the stresses of the previous night. Arlington stood proud and pompous behind her, having shown yet again that he ruled supreme.
Only fitting, that he should stand tall in their painting, while she sat below him, his dog at heel. She didn’t smile. She refused to smile in this portrait so that generations to come might imagine she had been happy as his wife.
At last the artist declared himself finished, with the preliminaries at least. To Gwen, the painting looked half done, with white spaces and shaded areas, but the artist would finish the rest from his sketches, and promised delivery within a couple of weeks. The duke, at least, seemed handsomely outlined. The artist had captured his attitude perfectly, his regal aura and bearing. Gwen seemed an afterthought. Her face was only partially sketched in. That was how she felt these days, only partially sketched in.
Once the artist was gone, Arlington told her to dress for riding. His commanding tone reminded her of the night before, of firm touches and carnal manipulations. She didn’t want to be aroused by the memories, but she was.
“I would rather not go out today,” she said.
“You’d rather not go out? Or you’d rather not go out with me?”
When she clamped her lips shut and refused to answer, he took her arm and led her into the breakfast room.
“Do you know that we are famous this morning?” he asked.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“I’ll show you what I mean.” He snatched up a paper from the sideboard, the newspaper he scanned every morning at breakfast, and read from the third page with great dramatic flair.
“It appears the Duke of A---- is not as lion-hearted as he is lion-haired. The admirable duke took his wife, recently acquired from W----, to meet with the Crown, whereby the Duchess of A---- alluded to a less than satisfying marriage. Look, darling, there’s even a likeness of me frowning at you.”
She swallowed hard, and forced herself t
o glance at the drawing when he shoved the paper under her nose. “Horrid gossip,” she whispered.
“I don’t know if one can call it gossip,” he said, taking it back to scowl at the picture. “The paper’s only saying exactly what you did.”
“That drawing is ridiculous,” she said to placate him. “You don’t have lion hair. And I don’t know why they bother to use initials when everyone knows who they mean.”
“It doesn’t matter if I have lion hair or not,” he said, throwing the paper back down on the table. “What matters is that, thanks to you, everyone in London is talking about our failed union and laughing behind their hands. We’re going out riding, Guinevere, like the happiest married couple ever. Go get dressed.”
Gwen hurried upstairs to change, to obey him, yes, but also to get away from him. He was in a very prickly mood.
“You must make me look happy,” she told Pascale. “The duke commands it.”
“Are you going to ride in Hyde Park?”
“I think so.”