Wish List Part 24

He sounded insulted, yet why should he be? Why should he not be flattered and pleased that the legacy she had married into was grand? She was expected to marry well. Should she be derided because she had? Obviously not. Her only recourse was to ignore him, since he was being so contrary.

But he was very difficult to ignore.

He knew that well enough.

Beau was perfectly aware that Clarissa was doing all in her power to ignore him, as if he were an unnecessary accessory to "her" Irish lands. She had been clear in her purpose from the start and equally vocal. What cause had he to complain now?

What cause? Because he had believed her to have some kindred feeling for him. Because he had wanted her with the first look. Because her odd honesty had beguiled him as surely as her beauty.

Beguiled but not blinded. He was no fool; he would not have pursued her if he had not felt some s.h.i.+mmer of attraction in her. She wanted him, and for more than his t.i.tle and lands. She had to want him. No woman could be so cold anda practical. It was only left for him to prove it to her. He was not a pair of gloves purchased for her convenience. He was her husband. If she did not understand the difference, she soon would.

The house was entered through the marble hall, and he could hear her intake of breath; it was breathtaking. Corinthian columns of pink Nottinghams.h.i.+re alabaster made up the colonnade. The ceiling was frescoed and lit by circular skylights. The floor was buff marble inlaid with curls and circles of white marble. It was most impressive entry.

"A most beautiful hall, Lord Montwyn," Jane offered.

Beau nodded at the compliment, graciously accepting it from her.

"Shall we have a tour?" Clarissa said, her priorities clear, as always.

"Not tonight," Beau answered. "Moresby has prepared a light supper for us. We shall dine and then retire for the evening. It has been a long and tiring day; I am certain a good night's rest must head our list of priorities."

Clarissa swallowed her argument and smiled her acquiescence. Most reasonable of her, especially as he had not given her any choice but compliance. Moresby, the head butler, was introduced to them, and he led the way to the dining room, where they ate sparingly. It had been a long day, and Jane, if not Clarissa, was most fatigued.

"I do think I could look at the ground floor," Clarissa said as the plates were being cleared. "What was beyond the marble hall?"

"The salon," Beau answered, rising from his chair, "and you shall see it tomorrow. Good night, Lady Jane," he said. "Moresby will conduct you to your chamber. Have a most restful night."

Jane left without a murmur of protest or even any hesitancy of step.

"That was most rude of you," Clarissa said as they proceeded up the stairs. "Jane would have enjoyed a tour of Montwyn Hall very much. You gave not a thought to her pleasure."

"I do believe that Jane is more attuned to my pleasure than my own wife," he said. "Should we not hasten to the bedchamber and conclude our transaction?"

"I believe I quote your sentiments when I remark that you are delving into the vulgar in your attempts at truth telling," she said.

"Perhaps the fault, if there is one, is that I lack your practice at speaking a civil truth. Perhaps I can phrase it better." He pondered, leading her on down a wide hallway ornately littered with oil paintings and mahogany chairs. "Ah, let's try this." He smiled. "I want to sample the goods I have paid for. Better?"

"I should have paid more attention to your outburst in the garden. You are intemperate," she said stiffly. Her stomach dropped into the cradle of her hips to wiggle there in a most distracting manner.

Beau merely smiled and opened the door for her. The chamber beyond was sumptuous, large, and well lit by fire and candle. The room was done in green, buff, and gold, the furniture Chippendale, the hangings silk. The bedcover had been turned down. All was ready for his "sampling."

"Perhaps," he said, closing the door behind them. "I would have said eager, but the best word may be curious."

"Curious?"

"To see if your boldness was a ploy. I often wondered if you were as bold as you seemed. It appears I am soon to have my answer."

"I understand the transactions of the marketplace as well as you," she said coldly. "Let a servant attend me. I will present myself to you shortly, and then the bargain we have struck will be well and truly sealed."

"No servants," he said. "Just us. And this bargain, this union, is already sealed, Clarissa. All has been signed, our words have been spoken, our families have borne witness; we are wed, and not intemperately. We knew what we were about, did we not? Did you not know that when you shopped for an Irish estate, a husband came with it? Surely a great bargain for such an astute shopper as you."

She stood speechless as he began to disrobe. He moved quickly. He showed no embarra.s.sment at the revelation of his skin. She dared show none, though it was not embarra.s.sment she felt but fear. Now came the moment when the bill must be paid. An heir must be conceived. She would have to couple with this man, this husband of hers, until her duty had been accomplished.

If he had looked powerful in cravat and coat, he was a hundred times more so bared to the waist. Muscle gleamed in the firelight, rippling with each movement of his body, proclaiming his raw masculinity loudly to her eyes. Her heart jumped into her throat to almost suffocate her. He stared at her; his eyes were intense and discerning, reading in her what she most wanted to hide.

She wanted him.

Yet wanting to touch and be touched by the man before her could have no part in a rational mind; it was all blind desire and need. Such a response shamed her. She wanted him anda she thought she might love him.

She could not love him. She could not want him. She could not need him. Because she would leave him when she went home to Ireland. She would leave and he would stay; his duty would require it. Her heart would call her to Ireland; she would not leave it again.

"Come, Clarissa," he said, clad only in his tight buckskin breeches. "I will not hurt you and I will not provoke you further."

Not provoke? He truly had no skill at speaking honestly. He was broad and hard, his muscles sculpted by flawless skin. His chest was lightly furred with black hair, and his eyes shone green as spring growth.

"Thank you," she said, turning her back on him. "Is there no one to a.s.sist me? No screena""

"I will a.s.sist you, if you have need, and there is no need for a screen. Delay is not to your advantage, my dear. With a bold stroke, the matter is behind us."

"I wish you had used a different expression," she said with an uncomfortable laugh.

"I apologize," he said, grinning. "Do not rebuke me for my lack of skill in truthful communication; I will learn.

Now, if you had been a different sort of woman, I would have resorted to my old ways of sparkling civility and polished pretense."

"Really?" she asked, sitting to remove her shoes. "And what would you have said?"

He knelt at her feet and removed her shoes for her, his hands on her feet and ankles, his position submissive, his manner valorous. "I would have told you that since I first beheld you, with your vibrant hair curling around your face, I was captivated. I needed no brothers to commend you to me; my own eyes would have borne the task lightly."

Her shoes were removed. With a gentle and subtle hand, he inched his way up to the top of her stocking. Her limbs shook and she could not stop her trembling. His eyes held hers, green as the darkest yew branches. She could not look away and could not find a reason to want to.

"I would have told you that, having seen you, I was halfway to offering for you. Hair as red as embers, eyes as deep and l.u.s.trous as a doe's, skin as flawless as satin; what man would not want such a woman for his own?"

His fingertips touched her thigh, his skin cool next to her heat, and very gently he slipped her stocking down to her ankle. Over her foot he slipped it, his fingers caressing her arch and the delicate back of her ankle. She s.h.i.+vered and looked down into her lap.

"But what you speak is pretense, is it not? We have agreed upon that," she said, not looking at him.

With bolder hands, he reached up and carefully slid down the other stocking. She felt strangely nude, yet she was fully covered.

He touched her face with the tips of his fingers, tracing her. "You taught me that truth need not be uncivil. I teach you now that civility need not be pretense."

He raised her to her feet and stepped behind her, loosening her gown. He did it without an overt air of seduction, yet it was seductive simply because it was Beau. Just knowing he was in the room made her heart pound erratically. To know that he was disrobing hera she felt light-headed, and her vision blurred.

"And when I spoke to you," he continued, slipping her dress down to her feet, leaving her in her tissue-thin undergarments, "when I first understood that you had a tongue in your heada""

"Of course I have a tongue," she interrupted, crossing her arms over her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and moving away from him. "What did you expect?"

"I can see that you have not been shopping for a bride, lady, or you would not ask," he said with a chuckle.

"Not lately," she said, turning to him again, her smile soft. He had not taunted her for her retreat from him, and for that she was grateful. He had every right to see her, to touch her; the deal had been struck. "I have been rather busy shopping for a husband. Tell me, what is the market in brides like this season?"

"Grim, lady," he said, sitting on a chair by the fire to pull off his Hessians. "Silent and still when it is known you are looking for a bride. The women are demure and submissive, showing their best qualities first, I suppose, and then, when the dance has been shared and the turn in the garden has been taken, the truth comes out."

"Truth is always good," she said, kneeling before him to help with his boots. She would be logical and not fearful. The marriage must be consummated.

"Not in my experience," he said. "For the truth isa they have nothing to say. Demure silence is their only recourse when nothing intelligible comes forth."

"Perhaps they are overawed by you," she said, succeeding with one boot.

"Undereducated and lacking spirit, rather," he argued, succeeding with his second boot.

He should have looked rather harmless sitting in a chair in his stockinged feet. He did not. Beau Wakefield was not the least bit harmless, sitting or standing, naked or clothed. Nakeda they were almost naked.

Clarissa shot to her feet and stood by the fire, logic deserting her.

"You, my wife," he said, rising to stand near her, "never lacked for spirit."

"I may disappoint you," she said on a whisper. His mouth was just above hers, his body ma.s.sive and pulsing with heat. He would kiss her, she knew, and it would be a kiss nothing like their winter garden kiss. There was no anger in Beau now, only desire.

She was more comfortable with his anger.

"You will never disappoint me," he said softly as his mouth took hers.

He was gentle when she had expected raw pa.s.sion. She was grateful, for bold he might call her, but she was afraid. His arms wrapped around her and held her tenderly, warmly, welcoming her into his embrace. She sighed away her tension and her fear as his kiss lifted her up to meet his desire.

With ease, he held her in his arms, kissing her face, her throat, her mouth, murmuring words she could not understand beyond his intent; he wished to soothe her, to arouse her. He was succeeding.

And with that thought, she realized that she wanted him to succeed. His success would be hers. She wanted his arousal; had she not realized that before? She wanted him to want her, and he did, and in wanting her, he fed her own desire for him. For she did desire him.

Bold as she was, she let him know it.

"I want you," she said against his throat, her arms wrapping themselves around him, her mouth hot against his skin.

He could feel her nipples pus.h.i.+ng against the thin lawn of her undergarment, feel the tension of fear leave her to be replaced by the tense demands of pa.s.sion. She wanted him. The words settled upon him like golden netting. She wanted him for more than his Irish lands, and her decision to wed him had been grounded in more than hard practicality. In his heart he had known it. But how sweet the words.

"Good," he said to her, laying her upon the bed and lying atop her. She was soft and firm and willing; praise G.o.d for a willing virgin on the bridal bed. But he had not expected less from Clarissa. Fear and timidity would never rule her.

He cupped her through her gown and she spread her legs wide for him, moaning her willingness. She was already wet, but he would not rush her. Her skin was white as cream and as smooth, her eyes dark and full in the flickering light, her mouth open and panting.

"Bare yourself to me, Clarissa," he commanded, sitting back from her.

For a moment she paused, and then she smiled. "If you'll do me the same courtesy, my lord."

With quick hands they slid off their remaining clothing. Naked on the bed, they studied each other. He was darkness to her fire and light, and they wished only to combine and consume each other.

"Beautiful," he said softly. His eyes scoured her and she s.h.i.+vered in response. He reached for her, pulling her to him by the back of her exposed and slender neck, and then urged her down at the foot of the bed.

"Do it quickly," she whispered.

"I don't want to hurt you," he said, looking into her eyes.

"Don't hurt me," she said, "but do it now. I cannot bear the waiting."

No, that would little suit her. Bold action was her way.

Hands on her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, he touched her, arousing her, pleasuring her, thinking only of bringing her to such need that his taking of her would be a release and not a fear-filled memory to cloud their future together. His mouth moved everywhere upon her. Her skin was hot and soft, her limbs twitching with flares of pa.s.sion as they surged through her. She was a most willing bride, trusting him to protect her and please her. He would. He would do nothing less.

He spread her and she sighed. When he touched her, she groaned and pulled him to her breast. His mouth found her nipple and he teased her to the next level of desire.

"Please. Hurry," she said in a moan, thras.h.i.+ng beneath him.

"A truth I was most anxious to hear," he murmured against her skin. "It will be uncomfortable at first," he said. "I will do all I can to keep you from pain."

"Yes. Do it," she said breathlessly.

She was wet and ready, and he slid just the bare tip of himself into her.

"Oh." She grunted, her limbs tightening against him.

He kissed her mouth, his tongue gliding over hers, learning the inside of her. With his finger he pressed into her, widening her slightly. She was very tight. He did not know how to keep her from the pain of lost virginity.

She pulled her mouth from his. "It's going to hurt, isn't it?"

Her brown eyes were full of fear and trust. He did not know what to tell her that would ease her.

"Tell me the truth," she said.

"Yes," he said.

"Then do not hesitate," she begged. "Let me get beyond it. Help me to be past it."

Yes, he understood her. And he marveled. She was a remarkable woman, as bold and astute as she had appeared. He could only do as she asked, though it pained him more than it would her; he did not want to hurt her, yet delaying the pain she knew was to come was a torture of its own.

Staring down into her eyes, he thrust. She cried out and closed her eyes, thinking it accomplished. He was only halfway there. Waiting for her to soften around him, he thrust again. Home. She choked out a smothered scream and then instantly was still. He looked down at her, at her tense and expectant face, at her eyes pressed shut, and felt her soften around him still more.

Home at last.

"'Tis done, Clarissa. The worst is done," he said, kissing her mouth softly.

"Good," she said. "Is it over now?"

Beau smiled. "No, not yet."

"Oh." She frowned slightly.

"It gets better," he said, poised above her, holding himself still.

"Oh," she said, trying to look hopeful.