Her fine russet brows drew together. “Aren’t you going to…sleep with me?”
There was no point telling his dick that she really did mean sleep. He ground his teeth and prayed for patience. Surely by now, Jane knew that teasing him like this verged on cruelty. How his debauched friends would fall around laughing, if they found out Hugh Rutherford’s bride was still a virgin five days after his wedding.
“No, I’m damn well not.”
His tetchy answer made her jerk back. “Don’t you want to?”
“You know I bloody want to.” Garson lurched to his feet, the evening’s peace shattering as if it had never existed. “I might have held you in my arms pure as an angel last night, but nothing this side of heaven can make me do that again.”
The somber gray gaze settled on him, as he struggled to control his temper. She was too inexperienced to understand what she put him through. When she licked her lips, Garson swallowed a groan. This was agony.
“I’m not asking you to do that again, Hugh,” she said calmly. She raised her chin. “I’m asking you to make me your wife.”
*
For what felt like an age, Hugh stared at her as if he didn’t understand. Once she spoke the words, she’d expected him to sweep her into his arms and through to the bedroom. Preferably kissing her, so she didn’t have to think too hard about what was about to happen.
“Are you sure?” His growl wasn’t reassuring, and he still didn’t touch her.
“I was.” Irritation fought its way up through an ocean of bewilderment. “You’ve been trying to bed me for days. I can’t believe you’re dithering like an old woman deciding on green tea or black.”
To her relief, a spark of humor lit his dark eyes. “Green tea or black?”
“Yes,” she said steadily. To her vast relief, he no longer looked like she’d struck him with an ax. “Fussing and fretting and asking for something, then deciding you don’t want it after all.”
The spark in his eyes flared into a blaze. As that glittering gaze focused on her, she gave a long, sensuous shiver, and her heart performed acrobatics.
“I want it.” He took a pace toward her. “By God, I want it.”
She licked her lips again, and for the first time said the words that had been true since their wedding night. Powerful words, expressing a powerful feeling. That very power had once turned her to ice. But no longer. “And I want you.”
At last, he seized her in his arms. “My beautiful wife, you make me so happy.”
By now, she should be used to his kisses, but perhaps because this kiss wasn’t an end unto itself, but the beginning of a passionate journey, it felt different. Hungrily she kissed him back, twining her arms about him and pressing as close as she could.
He turned around, almost waltzing her into the bedroom where last night, she’d slept in his arms. Tonight she’d lie in his arms again, but she suspected there wouldn’t be much sleep involved. He set her on her feet near the bed.
With greedy hands, she ripped at his neck cloth and cast it away. “I wanted to tell you first thing this morning.”
He shrugged his coat off his shoulders and tore at the buttons on his cream brocade waistcoat. “I wasn’t fit for you then.”
She knocked his hands out of the way and pushed the waistcoat off, letting it drop to the floor with his coat. “What about now?”
He kissed her as if he starved. When he raised his head, the light in his eyes made her shiver again. What a long way she’d come in these few days. This unabashed passion would have sent the girl who married him fleeing for the hills.
“I’m burning up with wanting you.” He kicked off his shoes and grasped her shoulders to turn her round so fast, her
head swam. “Why are you wearing so many damned clothes?”
“Because I like to make your life difficult,” she said, wondering who this smart-mouthed wench was. It certainly wasn’t prim Jane Norris.
“Then congratulations, it’s working,” he grunted, tearing at her laces so roughly that her body jerked. “That bloody maid should be shot for trussing you up like a Christmas goose.”
Jane was panting, and her hands opened and closed at her sides as she fought the urge to tell him to forget about undressing her and just throw her on her back. “Tear it,” she said in a strained voice.
He didn’t query the command. She heard rending fabric, and air brushed across the bare skin of her back and shoulders. She wriggled to pull the long sleeves down and twisted her hips until the ruined gray gown puddled at her feet.
“Shall I tear the corset too?”