She should not be here. Given her meeting yesterday morning with Miles' mother and her observation of him with the woman who would, no doubt, one day be his wife, they had no place being alone as they were now.
For even as she wished to be with him, cared for him, desired him, she could not be one of those wanton women who would ever come between him and his eventual wife. Philippa studied the tips of her slippers. "You should not be here, Miles."
"Why?" His husky baritone wrapped around that question and sent heat spiraling inside.
"Your Miss Cunning." A woman, perfectly plump and golden blonde and all things an English lady should be. No doubt, she'd give Miles perfect, flawless babes and they'd be a laughing, joyous family, and … A spasm contorted her chest.
She stiffened, as Miles dusted his knuckles along her cheek. "Is that the manner of man you take me for?" There was a hard, wounded edge to his question that brought her gaze snapping up to meet his. "Do you take me for a gentleman who'd seek out one woman while intending to betroth myself to another?"
"No," she said on a rush. "Of course not." The oddity of it all was that, even knowing him just these few days, she could say beyond a doubt that Miles Brookfield was a man of honor. The woman fortunate to have him as her husband would have a devoted, loving man at her side. And God, how she despised that eventual lady.
He continued stroking her cheek. "And yet, you believe I would be here if my intentions were to marry another?"
… My intentions to marry another … Words that suggested his intentions to wed her. Philippa's throat worked spasmodically. She would never have anything more to do with him. And that truth was not borne of his mother's meddling, but rather a truth of who she was. In a Society where dutiful wives gave their husbands many babes, boys with which to carry on that distinguished title, she could never give him those things. Nor would she ask him to abandon those gifts that all men wanted.
But she would know his kiss once more.
Miles peered at her through thick, hooded lashes. "What are you thinking?"
She trailed the tip of her tongue along her lower lip and his gaze went to that slight movement. Desire flared in the endless green depths of his eyes and a heady sense of feminine power gripped her. "I want you to kiss me," she whispered.
His body jerked as though he'd been struck and then with a long, agonized groan, he took her in his arms. With his mouth, he devoured hers in a meeting that was fierce and hard. He slanted his lips over hers again and again, a primitive male wishing to forever mark his mate, and a low moan slipped from her throat as her lips parted to allow the sound to escape. He took advantage of that slight movement and thrust his tongue into her mouth, where she tangled her tongue with his; sparring in a forbidden dance. With raspy breath filling the quiet of the room, Miles cupped his hands about her buttocks and dragged her close. The thick length of his desire prodded her belly, liquefying her with a white, hot heat.
In this moment, Philippa forgot all the reasons there could never be anything more with him and, instead, took this gift of passion he offered. He drew his mouth back and she cried out softly at the loss of him, but he merely ran his lips down her neck, sucking and nipping, and finding her pulse pounding away at a maddening rhythm. With a ragged moan, she clasped her fingers reflexively in the silken tresses of his unfashionably long, ginger hair.
"I want you, Philippa," he breathed raggedly against her skin as he dragged his mouth on a scorching path from her neck to her décolletage. Her knees buckled and he guided her against the sideboard.
"Miles," she whimpered, as he freed her breasts from her gown. The cool night air slapped her heated skin in a delicious mix of hot and cold. He cupped the white mounds in his hands, pushing them together, and weighing them. Moisture pooled at her center and she reflexively arched her hips, needing this gift he held out-pleasure, desire, hunger-all those wickedly wonderful sensations she'd believed herself incapable of. Then he raised a breast to his mouth. His hot breath fanned the skin and the tip puckered under his mastery. She slid her eyes closed as he drew the bud between his lips and suckled. That skillfully seductive act pulled her into a sea of sensation where she was reduced to a bundle of thrumming nerves. Never, ever in any of the times Calvin had visited her bed and fumbled through their couplings had she burned with the need for his touch.
She bit her lip to keep from crying out and tangled her fingers in his hair, anchoring him close, never wanting him to cease his delicious torment. "Please," she managed to pant out.
Miles showed no mercy. He dropped to his knees and slowly drew her skirts up, so that the air caressed her skin. "Let me love you," he whispered, trailing kisses along her calf, up the sensitive flesh of her inner thigh. His hot breath stirred her core and she whimpered, burning in ways she'd never felt. Knowing only Miles could teach her.
"Wh-what … ?" she whispered as he put his mouth to her mound. His breath stirred the curls shielding her femininity and her entire body jerked. "Miles," she rasped.
He parted the curls and, with his lips, found her swollen nubbin. A low, tortured moan bubbled past her lips. She arched her hips toward him, aching for more of his wickedly wonderful ministrations. In the whole of her marriage, lovemaking had been mostly painful, always awkward, quick couplings she'd silently suffered through. With Miles, he'd awakened her to the truth that she was very much a woman; a woman capable of passion. And she wished to know all of his touch. Philippa let her legs fall open and she tangled her hands in his luxuriant hair as he thrust his tongue inside her.
He swirled his expert tongue around, playing with the pleasure nub. Then the way he'd done with her nipples moments ago, he sucked that flesh between his teeth. Her breath coming hard and fast, Philippa thrust herself against him. Tension spiraled inside her and she gritted her teeth, her body climbing toward an unknown precipice. Then, he reached between them and his fingers found her sodden center. She flared her eyes and on a sharp cry, exploded in a wave of color and feeling. Waves of ecstasy went rippling through her with such force and she wept from the force of her climax, arching and twisting, wanting the moment to go on into forever. Miles continued suckling her nub, until he'd wrung every last bit of utter bliss from her. She slumped on the sideboard, faintly panting.
Philippa slid her eyes closed, breathless from her exertions. As a wife, she'd been schooled by her miserable husband to believe their joining's served only one purpose-to produce his precious heir. There had never been satisfaction. As such, given the lessons handed down by her mother before she'd married on her "dutiful obligations" in the marriage bed and the shamefulness of that act between husband and wife, she should be scandalized. She should be ashamed and mortified and all those proper responses ingrained into her from early on.
Her breath settled into a smooth, even rhythm. And yet, in this, there was no shame. There was just a glorious sense of being alive and knowing the powerful wonder that her body was capable of. Pleasure she'd long believed herself incapable of knowing through a deficit in who she was as a woman. Miles placed a final kiss along the sensitive flesh of her inner thigh and drew back, adjusting her skirts and undergarments.
A tear slid down her cheek. "Thank you," she whispered. "I never knew … I never … " She sucked in another breath. "Thank you."
Miles caressed her cheek. "May I call on you tomorrow?" he asked, his meaning clear.
And just like that, reality intruded. The realness that was her life. She mustered a smile. "O-Of course." He wished to court her. And were she any other woman, a wholly unbroken woman, she'd have reveled in his attentions. But she was not. And, as his mother had coldly reminded her, never would be. With frenzied movements, Philippa set to work righting her gown. She then gathered the strands that had sprung free of her once neat chignon and attempted to stuff them into a semblance of order. "I have to return."
"I know," he whispered, touching his lips to her earlobe.
She moaned and leaned back into his caress. He angled her around and found her mouth with his. Their tongues met in the same fiery explosion they'd shared since their first embrace at the lake. It was Miles who found the fortitude to draw back.