Heartless (33 page)

“From the enormous amount of food on their plates, I doubt the vicar or his wife will even know we are gone. And Clay will certainly understand.” Taking the sweeping marble stairs two at a time, he strode down the sconce-lined hall to his suite of rooms. He turned the silver knob, shouldered open the door, and carried her into the sitting room. A firm kick closed the door behind them.

“Besides,” he finished, striding past the ornate marble-topped tables into his bedchamber, “I don't give a damn what they think. I care about making love to you. And since it is your wish as well, that is exactly what I intend to do.”

His words sent a frisson of heat sliding through her. A wave of uncertainty followed, worry that she was making another mistake. Ariel determinedly ignored it. Closing her eyes against her fears, she clung tightly to his neck.

The storm heightened. The wind howled, rattling the windows and making the candles flicker. Justin let go of her, and she slowly slid the length of his body. She could feel his arousal pulsing against her, and an answering pulse started low in her belly. The air in the room seemed to crackle around them, as if they stood on some ancient precipice out in the wind and the rain.

Ariel stared up at him, unable to tear her eyes from his face. She was his wife and she wanted him. Needed him. Yet fear of the future lurked like a shadow in the corners of her mind. With every gentle touch, every whispered word, she belonged to him more, loved him more. She knew the danger, knew how grave a chance she was taking. Knew that in giving herself to him so completely she risked her very soul.

Justin gently touched her cheek, brushed a finger back and forth along her jaw. “Ariel,” he whispered, his voice a soft caress. Looking into her eyes, he bent his head and kissed her, his lips clinging, then pressing deeper. It was a fierce, saturating, penetrating kiss that sent heat flooding into her stomach. Ariel opened to him and his tongue swept in, silky wet, hot as fire. The kiss she gave him in return was even hotter, bolder, more seeking, driving out the fear, locking it away. Today he was her husband, her lover. He belonged to her and she to him. Tomorrow the fear would return, but not now, not tonight.

Sliding her hands inside the vee of his dark blue tailcoat, she urged it off his shoulders. She fumbled with the beautiful diamond stickpin, finally got it free, pulled the knot on his white cravat, and slid the long length of fabric from around his neck. She worked the buttons on the front of his shirt and it fell open, exposing taut muscle and dark skin covered by curly black chest hair.

Justin kissed her again, softly, deeply, pulled the pins, one by one, from her hair. Pale silver-gold waves slid in a long fall around her shoulders. Turning her back to him, he pulled the heavy mass away and kissed the side of her neck, began to remove her blue velvet gown. In minutes he had stripped her naked. Then he started kissing her again.

His hands skimmed over her shoulders, her breasts. He pressed small butterfly kisses into the corners of her mouth, kissed her deeply again. She thought that he would hurry, that his fierce need would drive him to take her swiftly. Instead he paused, circled her waist with his hands, lifted her up, and set her on the side of the bed. Another deep kiss and he eased her back on the bed, settling himself between her parted thighs.

She thought that he would hurry, that he would open his breeches and drive himself inside her, as she so desperately wanted him to do. But when she reached for him, he only shook his head.

“I won't be rushed. Not on my wedding night. You belong to me now and I mean to cherish you, as I should have done before.”

It was such a beautiful sentiment that when he kissed her again, so softly, so fiercely, she didn't question what he meant. Not until he began a slow assault on her body, kissing the pulse in the hollow of her throat, trailing his mouth across her shoulders, using his tongue to circle the peaks of her breasts, making them tighten and throb. He took the roundness into his mouth and suckled gently, deeply, making her ache in her most tender places.

Ariel arched her back as his lips moved lower, trailing kisses over her rib cage, circling her navel with his tongue, tasting the flat spot between her hipbones, moving lower, kissing the soft, pale hair at the juncture of her legs.

She gasped when he found the hot, wet dampness at her core, parted the folds with his tongue, and settled his mouth over the tiny swollen bud of her desire.

“Justin!” she cried out, her teeth sinking into her bottom lip, her hands shaking as she reached out to him, her fingers curling into his thick black hair. “Oh, dear God!” She thought to make him stop, for surely this was a sin, but the pleasure was so sweet, the fires so hot, she couldn't bring herself to say the words.

Her hand gripped his shoulder. She felt the softness of his fine lawn shirt, remembered that he was still dressed while she lay naked and exposed. The image was so sensuous, so utterly erotic, a fresh rush of dampness swept into her core. Justin slid his palms beneath her buttocks to hold her in place, exposing her to the wicked assault of his tongue. Her body shook with fierce sensation, and Ariel heard herself moan. His shoulders wedged her thighs even farther apart, and he stroked her deeply, skillfully.

Determinedly.

The pleasure built, became almost unbearable. Slivers of fire slid into her stomach, melted over her skin. Her flesh burned. The breath rushing out of her lungs seemed to scald the inside of her mouth. She was writhing on the bed, arching upward, pleading for the release he was so determined to give.

It came with astonishing force, a wave of pleasure so deliciously sweet, so totally consuming, she sobbed out his name. She was crying, the tears cascading down her cheeks, when he leaned over and softly kissed her lips.

He left her only long enough to remove the rest of his clothes; then he joined her on the bed. For several long moments, he simply held her, wrapping her tightly in his arms, cradling her against his chest. His arousal pressed between them, hard as steel, hot as fire, and she knew what it cost to hold himself in check.

The heat of his body seeped into her skin. His hard, masculine strength made her need for him surface once more. Ariel cupped his cheek, leaned over, and kissed him, sliding her tongue inside his mouth, making the muscles across his chest go iron hard. With a low male groan, Justin took control of the kiss, turning it hot and fierce, sweeping her up in sensation.

Lightning flashed, illuminating the room and the hunger in his eyes. A crack of thunder shook the windows. Then she was beneath him, his long, lean body rising above her. He parted her legs with his knee and took her with a single deep thrust, filling her completely, making the fires burn out of control.

She thought that he would hurry, that his need would be too strong for him to wait. Instead, he set up a slow, driving rhythm that had her arching upward, wrapping her legs around him, opening herself more fully to each of his powerful strokes. Heat and need built to crescendo. Ariel cried out as she reached a shattering release, and Justin followed a few seconds later, his body shuddering, tightening, pulsing deep inside her.

Afterward they lay entwined, hearts pounding, bodies damp with perspiration.
I love you,
she thought, but didn't say it. The fear had returned more quickly than she had imagined, and it kept the words locked away. Instead, she lay beside him in silence, listening to the echo of thunder and the whistle of the wind, wondering about the future.

She had felt this way before, had believed in him as she wanted to now. She had wound up out in the street with no money and nowhere to go, with a heart that was shattered into a thousand pieces. How easily he had made her forget that. How badly she wished she could pretend it never happened. Instead, she lay in the darkness remembering the pain, the agony of betrayal. Wondering how big a fool she had been to trust him with her heart again.

She felt him stir beside her, come up on an elbow. Eyes as dark as the night outside moved slowly over her face. She knew he read the fear. Had felt it even as they were making love. She could see it in his expression, hear it in the long, pain-filled sigh that escaped his lips.

“We should have waited,” he said, drawing a little away, the muscles tense across his shoulders. “You wanted me, but you're afraid to trust me. I can see it in your face.”

Ariel moistened her lips, shook her head, tried to keep the tears from collecting in her eyes. “I'm sorry. In time—”

Justin moved suddenly, rising like a panther off the bed, moving to stare out the window. A flash of lightning illuminated his naked body, the long, sleek muscles in his legs, the ridges across his flat stomach. “Time … yes. We're married now. We'll have all the time we need.”

He stood there for moments that seemed like hours, then turned and padded softly back to the bed. Gathering her close, he gently kissed her, but he didn't try to touch her, and he didn't make love to her again.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY-ONE

The weather remained inclement, the roads too muddy for travel, though the vicar and his wife made a miserable sojourn back to the parsonage in the village.

Weary and troubled by the events of his wedding night, Justin headed downstairs. In the Oriental Salon, he stumbled upon Clay, who looked far more rested than he.

“Well, I see you survived the night,” Clay said with a grin, lounging in a wing-backed chair in front of the fire, a newspaper cast carelessly over the armrest. “How does it feel to be a married man?”

Justin tossed a dark look in his direction. “To tell you the truth, I'm not certain.”

Clay arched a coffee brown eyebrow. “Trouble in paradise already?”

“I shouldn't have made love to her. After all that's happened, it was simply too soon.”

Clay got up from the chair and strolled toward him, paused beside a carved cinnabar vase. “Perhaps you're right. With everything happening so quickly, Ariel is bound to be a little confused. She's a smart girl. It won't take her long to sort things out.” Clay picked up the vase, examined the intricate carvings. “By the way,” he said casually, yet Justin thought there was a faint note of tension in his shoulders, “a friend of your wife's arrived at the house this morning. Kassandra Wentworth. Apparently, she is just returned from the Continent. I believe you know her father.”

“Lady Kassandra is here?”

Clay nodded. “Arrived just a short while ago.”

“I know Lord Stockton. We've had business dealings together.” He did indeed know the viscount, Kassandra Wentworth's father. On one occasion, the viscount had voiced his irritation at his wayward daughter while at the same time extolling her beauty and telling Justin she would soon be of an age to wed.

Justin hadn't been certain whether the man had been seeking advice or hoped to spark interest in a match between them.

“I've never met the girl,” he said, “but Ariel speaks of her often. How did she know we were here?”

“According to what she told your sister, she read a notice in the paper that the Earl of Greville was to wed. I gather she and Ariel had previously discussed your relationship. Miss Wentworth put the pieces together, went to your house in Brook Street, bullied your butler into divulging where you'd gone, and traveled here forthwith.”

Justin was faintly intrigued. Knowles wasn't a man who was easily intimidated and certainly not by some chit of a girl. “Where is she now?”

“Upstairs in the room your sister grudgingly assigned her. Barbara wasn't any too pleased to have another house-guest, but Kassandra left her no choice.” A smile of what might have been amusement touched his lips. “She is quite a determined little baggage.”

Justin almost smiled. “In that case, I had better summon my wife. Ariel is extremely fond of the girl. She'll be pleased to know she is here.” But they hadn't always been friends, he remembered, thinking of a paragraph Ariel had written in one of her letters:

A new girl arrived at school today. Her name is Kassandra Wentworth. She is the youngest daughter of a viscount, rich and terribly spoiled. I swear her nose sticks so high in the air it is amazing she doesn't catch flies in it. I don't like her overmuch and she doesn't like me.

Those feelings had changed over the years. Ariel had once told him that Kitt Wentworth was the only true friend she had in the world, the only person she could trust completely.

The thought bothered him. Ariel might be his wife, but she had lost whatever small amount of faith she had ever had in him. She didn't trust him. He wasn't sure she ever would again.

“I suppose you've already eaten,” he said to Clay, thinking he should probably put something in his stomach, though he didn't have much of an appetite.

“I did, but that was hours ago.”

Thinking he could use at least a cup of strong black coffee, he slid open the door, and a red-haired whirlwind rushed past him into the room. Kitt Wentworth, he saw, was petite and lovely, with bright green eyes, a fair complexion, and what appeared to be quite a voluptuous figure. She stared at Clay—or rather past him—surveying the room for Ariel. Disappointed at not finding her, she turned her attention to Justin.

“Lord Greville, I presume.”

“That's correct, and you are Lady Kassandra Wentworth, I imagine.”

“I am.” She glared up at him. “Where is she? What have you done with her?”

Justin could have told her he had done the most intimate things imaginable and he ached to do them again. With profound self-control he refrained. “My wife is still abed.” He couldn't resist adding, “Last night was, after all, her wedding night.”

Spots of color appeared in Kitt's cheeks, but she didn't look away. “I should like to see her. I should like to discover for myself if she is all right.”

A thread of irritation filtered through him. “I assure you, my wife is in perfectly good health. Now, if you will rein in that temper of yours, I'll see that she is awakened and you may ascertain the state of her well-being for yourself.”