Four Nights With the Duke(43)

At least she hadn't been alone. She risked a look at Vander's face and  saw he was stunned as she was. He withdrew slowly and lowered her to the  ground; her skirts fell over legs so weak that she clung to him for  fear she'd crumple.

Last night, he had been tender and desirous, soothing her when it stung, whispering reassurances in her ear.

Today, he had uttered only one word, a word she had scarcely registered in the instant. What was it he'd said?

Then it came to her: greedy.

That's what he'd said.

That was the word.

She glanced down, feeling as if she were in some sort of odd dream, and watched as he buttoned up his breeches.

Greedy. The word grew and grew until it occupied all the space in her head.

The tingling she felt now wasn't the pleasurable kind. "What did you  mean by that?" she whispered, and then cleared her throat and  elaborated, "By that word?"

His eyes moved slowly to hers. The good thing was that he looked as  stupefied as she felt. Her hair had fallen down her back. His beard had  scraped her face and her neck, and her legs ached because she had clung  to him with all her strength. And other parts of her . . .

Ached too.

"What word?" Vander asked.

He was staring down at his wife, trying to work out what had just taken  place between them. He had been with many women before; he'd sampled  women as if he were at a banquet.

He regarded women the way he regarded food: necessary and sometimes delectable, but ultimately a distraction.

He had spent hours upon hours training a single horse. He would never  spend hours on a woman. Hell, he'd never even had a mistress who lasted  more than a few months. Either they wanted more, or he became  bored-whichever came first.

But he had never had an experience like this one. A moment ago  everything in him had turned inside out and poured into Mia. And he  wasn't done, either. Even though he was still shaking, all he wanted was  to scoop her up and head back to the house to start all over again.

A man could lose himself in a woman like this. He could find himself  tied to her, so tightly that he would go mad if she strayed.

If she left him.

The way his father had broken.

"You said ‘greedy.'" Mia's voice was hoarse.

Bloody hell, she was beautiful. All that bright hair had fallen around  her shoulders, and her skin had turned rose where his stubble had  scraped it. She had that perfect nose, and pointed chin, and her eyes  were exquisite.

How had he ever thought he preferred blue eyes? He liked green eyes,  dark green eyes like water tumbling in a Highland stream, reflecting  pine trees.

There was nothing sunny and sweet about Mia. She was all hidden depths  and passion. Her lips were plump and red, and looking at them made him  start to harden, even though he'd just poured himself into her.

This was unacceptable.

The feeling lent itself to what he said, sharpened his voice though he didn't mean it that way.

"You're greedy for me," he said bluntly. "I had you pinned against the wall and you wanted more. Hell, if-"

He stopped. What was he doing, talking to a lady like that? Not just a lady, but his wife?

Mia's cheeks first turned red, and then pale. She swallowed so hard that  he saw her throat ripple. She bent her head and hair fell across her  face; when she looked back up a second later, her eyes were calm and her  face empty.

She didn't look angry. Or hurt.

But she was.

Vander felt another stab of irritation about that, because he didn't  like that he could read her face. He didn't care to wonder whether a  woman was angry.

If she was angry, she was welcome to leave. If he disappointed her, she could leave. If he asked for too much, she could leave.

Or he could leave.

But he was married to Mia.

Neither of them could leave.

And even worse, he didn't want to go anywhere. It was as if her wedding  ring strung a chain between them, because even now, after insulting her,  he was hard and he wanted more than anything to take her back into his  bed and fill her up.                       
       
           



       

That feeling sent a spasm of panic through him, and he didn't care that  her face was no longer flushed and pretty and open to him, her eyes  soft.

He didn't want a woman with an open face. Or softness in all the right places, including her eyes.

"Some women are greedy for a cock, and men love that," he said, stepping  back and rearranging his breeches because commanding his tool to go  down wasn't working. "It was a compliment."

"‘A compliment,'" Mia repeated.

She gave her skirts a shake and pulled at her bodice, which stretched the fabric against her breasts.

He had to force his eyes away, because another streak of madness went  through him. He had never made love to a woman-gone mad with  lust-without even touching her breasts.

It had to be the novelty of marriage.

No ring would tie him to a woman, not even a woman who looked at him as  if he could give her bliss. As if he had the only thing in the world she  wanted-without meaning his title or money.

She looked at him as if he were a king.

"So, Duchess," he said. "Let's count that as part of last night, shall  we? It needn't be the second of our four nights. It's morning, after  all."

Her eyes weren't blank now; they were growing enraged. He welcomed it,  because he could not resist her if she looked at him with aching hunger.  If she looked at him that way again, as if she were greedy for him, he  would follow her anywhere. Probably on his knees.

Shit.

"My treat," he added, and tapped her chin with his finger.

Her hand came up so quickly that he saw only a blur. She caught him hard  across the cheek with her open hand. His head jerked back, but he  welcomed the sting.

He deserved it, taking a lady against the stable wall with no more finesse than a man takes a cheap whore.

Gentlemen didn't treat their wives that way. They didn't behave like  sailors on shore after a nine-month-long voyage. She had driven him mad.  If she would allow it, he would have her against the wall again, her  lush body cradled in his.

He'd never seen anything more erotic than the way Mia threw her head  back, lips open, when she came. There was nothing feigned about it.  She'd responded with her whole body.

Vander caught a hint of something . . . a delicious, heated hint of Mia,  sweat and desire and honeysuckle. All of a sudden he was caught up in  an erotic haze and took a step closer to her. Yet his words came out  haltingly. "I apologize for my remarks. They were deeply inappropriate."

"Stop looking at me like that," she hissed.

He couldn't.

"I am not a jam tart!" The words came out in a scream.

What?

She was gone. Vander fell back against the stable wall, his knees weak, staring after his wife. His duchess.

A jam tart? Where in the hell had that come from? He'd no idea, though  now he thought on it, she was like a jam tart. She was like sweet  treacle and he'd like to eat her up.

Slowly his mind cleared. A memory came to him: Rotter calling Mia a jam tart years ago.

He had been appallingly rude, far more so than Rotter. He would likely have to grovel.

Of course he would grovel. He would make their excuses to Charlie and Chuffy, and follow her to the house.

Now Mia wasn't in front of him, he remembered that there were things he  hadn't done with her . . . to her. Even though he'd just come, he was  throbbing, damn it. Throbbing the way he had as a boy, on the verge of  an unacceptable loss of control.

He wanted the jam tart. He wanted to eat his wife over and over, make  her throw back her head like that until she was dizzy with it. Until he  could rear up and pull her small body under his and pound into it.

He leaned against the stable wall, trying to force his mind elsewhere.  The sky was pale blue and far away, and a hawk circled far above, below a  single cloud. He rearranged his breeches again, trying to make room for  a body part that no longer fit in his smalls.

He ached all over, his body telling him that there was only one thing he wanted.

Mia.

Thanks to his being an ass, he had exactly three nights in the rest of the year to enjoy her.

One would have to be tonight. Tonight . . . the promise of it sang in his blood. She was angry, but she would get over it.

He would tell her the truth: if she was greedy, he was as starving as a  man who not only had been at sea for months on end, but at sea without  food.

Surely she would understand. And they did have three nights left.

A slow smile curled his lips. That would be enough to take the edge off  this frantic lust. He'd never slept with a woman for more than two  nights in a row. He got bored.

Tonight should do it.

The second night would break the spell.




                       
       
           



       
Chapter Twenty-four




NOTES ON CASTLE PLUM





~ After Frederic continues on his fruitless quest, the Evil Lord Plum  discovers Flora unconscious amongst the poppies and takes her to his  castle.