Andrew Lord of Despair(61)

A sense of burning unworthiness could give a man the most peculiar strengths.

“More, Andrew, please…” she crooned, locking her heels at the small of his back and pulling him into her.

He allowed his tempo to increase enough that Astrid shuddered, her breath catching, her nails digging into his hips. Her sex clutched at the length of him in hot, needy spasms as she groaned quietly into his neck. “Ah, God… yes, Andrew, yes…”

He held back. Somehow, he held back until she was easing down from her pleasure, her legs loosening their grip to rest along his flanks, her eyes again closed in repose and repletion.

And then he drove her up again, more quickly this time. His tongue thrust into her mouth, his fingers found her nipples, and his cock gave her the steady, deep thrusts that had her panting and bucking beneath him in no time. He could sense he’d taken her by surprise, and she would have been content with the softer, gentler wooing, but he kept her off balance, her defenses unorganized.

“Andrew…” she pleaded, but whether it was for relief or reprieve, he could not have said.

“Come for me, sweetheart. Come for me again.”

His self-control frayed as Astrid bowed up to get her mouth over one of his nipples. She vised herself around him everywhere, holding on and not letting go, until pleasure bore down on him with relentless intent.

He did not deserve this, did not deserve her, and yet, she would have him.

Thank God, for however long it took to ensure her safety, she would have him.

Andrew changed the angle of his thrusting, pressing more deeply into Astrid’s body and bringing a hand under her backside to anchor her against him. As satisfaction obliterated all else, he felt her shake with the force of her pleasure as well.

For a long moment, they lay together, warm and spent, breathing in counterpoint. Then the baby fluttered, and Andrew recalled himself enough to roll them, so Astrid straddled him.

“Married life with you has a certain appeal,” Astrid said a few moments later, sliding down to rest on his chest. “If that didn’t wake the baby, nothing will.” She commenced drawing a picture with her index finger on his chest. “May I ask you something, Husband?”

Husband. “Yes, love?” Though he had the right now—the legal right—to call her Wife.

“Have you ever wished this baby was yours?”

He wasn’t quick enough to cover a pause in his breathing or a momentary stillness of his hands on her back. The pain of her question was all the more brutal for being unexpected. Completely, hopelessly unexpected.

“You don’t,” she supplied, disgruntled. Her pointy little chin settled against his sternum. “Do you mind if I wish this were your baby?”

“Sweet lady, it is your wedding day, and you should be free to wish anything your heart desires. The baby is not mine in a biological sense, but the child will be mine to love and protect.”

He kissed her temple, wishing he’d been able to see her face as he made his declaration. His words were a vow to treat this child as his own, and he hoped she understood them as such. He would protect her baby with his life; he would protect her with his life. As she leaned up to kiss him gently on the lips, he offered up a prayer that he would never have to.

***

“Douglas, I do not understand,” Lady Amery said, wringing a damp handkerchief between her fingers. “I simply do not understand why dear Astrid would leave us like this. Did you frighten her? You can be so very stern, you know. Not like dear Herbert, or dear Henry.”

Dear Henry shot Douglas a look of fraternal sympathy. “I think what Douglas is trying to say, Mother, is that Astrid is young, she misses Herbert, and she’s overwrought with the strain of expecting Herbert’s heir. She has run off and married Greymoor as a consequence, and we can do little about it.”

Henry’s ubiquitous grin was singularly not in evidence, which was fortunate for the state of Douglas’s nerves.

“I know she’s young, Henry,” Lady Amery retorted. “But if she’s so young, how could she just up and marry that man without anybody’s permission?”

When he wanted to snap at someone to put some damned coal on the damned miserly fire dying on the damned filthy andirons, Douglas waded back into this most pointless discussion.

“She has achieved her majority, Mother, though barely. Unless I can prove the ceremony was a fraud, or Astrid did not consent to the marriage, our hands are tied.” He’d consulted both solicitors and barristers on the matter, and had been politely prevented from consulting an expert in ecclesiastical law in the See of the Bishop of London. The Marquess of Heathgate’s influence being what it was, that last was disappointing but not surprising.