Sea Fire (3 page)

“This isn’t the first time my wife has incited you to mutiny, old friend. I’m getting rather tired of it.” Jon sounded menacing. Cathy hastily muffled a smile. It was still something of a sore point with him that his pirate crew, of whom Petersham had been one, had been won over to a man by Cathy in the days before she had become their captain’s wife. Before her arrival on board his ship, Jon had been accustomed to his crew’s unquestioning loyalty and total obedience. He still felt slightly disgruntled when he remembered how easily his men had been converted to her cause.

“Sorry, Master Jon,” Petersham said again, looking properly abashed. Then, as the houseboys, having completed their task, scuttled from the room, he added, “I’ll send Martha along in a quarter-hour to help you dress, Miss Cathy, if that suits you.”

“Thank you, Petersham,” Cathy approved before Jon could say anything. Petersham, recognizing from long experience storm signals in his master’s stiff stance, hurriedly took himself off. Jon glowered at the closed door.

“That old reprobate will go too far one day,” he prophesied darkly, then grimaced
with reluctant humor as Cathy, no longer able to control her amusement, laughed.

“Petersham’s right. You’re filthy,” Cathy told him firmly as he made as if to reach for her again. “And I have to get dressed. There’ll be plenty of time later for—for—
that
.”

“Oh,
that,
is it?” Jon grinned, ignoring her attempts to elude him and catching her around the waist. “And what makes you think I want
that?
”

Cathy looked up at him through her lashes, a roguish dimple appearing briefly in one cheek.

“The signs are unmistakable, my love,” she said demurely, twisting away from him with a supple movement. “But you’ll just have to wait.”

“And if I choose not to?” he challenged, but Cathy only laughed as she whisked away into the adjoining dressing-room.

When she came back, a sky-blue silk dinner dress that was part of the new summer wardrobe Jon had insisted on having made for her hanging over her arm, he was already ensconced in the tub. Cathy eyed him with idle interest, taking in the broad bare shoulders and dark-furred chest, the steel muscled arms tanned to a teak brown by days of laboring shirtless under the broiling sun. His knees were drawn up almost to his chest to enable his big body to fit into the small tub. Water glistened on his hair and skin and lapped modestly around his waist, hiding that most essential part of him from her view. He looked slightly ridiculous and wholly adorable. Cathy smiled tenderly at him.

“Wash my back,” he invited throatily, looking up in time to catch her eyes on him. Cathy considered, then shook her head.

“I fear for my virtue, sir,” she teased.

“Coward,” he grunted disappointedly, and, surrendering to the inevitable, proceeded to soap his arms and chest. Cathy watched him for a moment, weakening. At age thirty-six he was still the handsomest
man she had ever seen, taller by far than average and corded with muscle, his black hair curling wetly around his head. His gray eyes were veiled at the moment by long silky eyelashes, the only feminine touch in an otherwise totally masculine face. Just the sight of that long mouth with its twisting smile was enough to make her heart beat faster. Jon looked up again then, and correctly interpreted the look in her eyes. He smiled broadly as he leaned back in the tub.

“Come here, sweetheart,” he directed softly. Cathy flushed, and looked hurriedly away.

“Don’t be silly. We’re having guests to dinner in less than an hour.” She busied herself by laying her dress out on the bed.

“An hour’s plenty of time for what I have in mind. In fact, the way I feel right now, it won’t take a quarter of that.” Jon grinned wickedly at her hot cheeks.

“I have to get dressed,” Cathy told him, but even to herself her voice lacked conviction.

“Not just yet.” Jon drawled the words as he stood up. Water streamed down his body, flattening the fine black pelt which covered him, parting at his swollen manhood to flow down his long legs.

Cathy’s eyes widened to saucers and she backed as he stepped out of the tub onto the highly polished wooden floor. Water formed big pools at his feet as he moved toward her.

“Jon, no!” she protested weakly, still backing around the foot of the bed. “We’re having people to dinner! We don’t have time! I don’t want. . . .”

“Liar,” he chided softly, his hands shooting out to capture her soft upper arms. “You do want, and I want, and, since you’re my wife, I mean to take advantage of the fact. So shut your mouth, woman, and kiss me.”

Cathy was pulled hard against his soaking chest, feeling the wetness and heat of it penetrate her thin gown, and looked up into his face
with a mixture of amusement, irritation, and love.

“You’re impossible,” she accused severely, her hands coming up to rest on the wide expanse of his shoulders. A small girl, she didn’t come much higher than that, and she had to tilt her head way hack to see into his face. The blazing desire in his gray eyes fanned an answering spark in her. Cathy could make no further protest as he bent his head toward her.

“So I’ve been told,” he murmured as their lips met, and then neither of them could speak for a very long while. His kiss was deep and gentle, reminding her of past, shared pleasures and hinting of even more wondrous enjoyment to come. Cathy returned it freely, her inhibitions lost in the wave of longing she felt for him. Seductively she pressed her curved shape against his larger, naked one, quivering as she felt the unmistakable proof of his passion prodding her belly. Eyes closed, oblivious to everything except the pleasure he was giving her and that she wanted to return, her hands stroked down his bare back, molding the strong spine, running teasingly over the hard curve of his buttocks. They tensed beneath her caress, his breathing quickening noticeably. He raised his lips a little away from hers. Cathy opened her eyes to find him looking down at her with a hot intensity that made her heartbeat quicken threefold.

“You’re beautiful,” he told her thickly. Cathy smiled.

“So are you,” she answered with shameless honesty. Jon groaned a laugh before covering her lips with his once again. Cathy felt the tremor in his arms as he swung her up in them and deposited her in the middle of their big bed, following her down. His mouth took hers hungrily, seeking, exploring, while his hands ran over her body, palms flat as they found each soft, feminine curve beneath her dress. His mouth left hers to trail across her cheek, nibble on her ear, then slide down the quivering cord of her neck to feast on the rounded swell of her bosom just visible above the neckline of her dress. Cathy’s arms
were locked around his neck and she pressed small, teasing kisses along the salt-tanged line of his shoulder as his arms went around her, his fingers busy as they tried to undo the numerous hooks that fastened the dress up the back. He succeeded with several without too much difficulty, but one halfway down seemed to defeat him. Silently he struggled with it until Cathy, finally becoming aware of his difficulty and his frustrated passion, giggled. Jon raised himself a little away from her, looking down into her face with something that was not quite a smile in his eyes.

“Laugh at me, will you, minx?” he growled “Well, I’ll soon teach you better manners!”

With that he reached down with mock violence to grasp the hem of her dress and jerk it up around her waist. Then his fingers moved to the drawstring of her lace-trimmed pantalets, untying it and tugging them down.

“Jon, no!” Cathy protested, feeling duty-bound to do so. The way he was planning to take her was not proper, she knew. According to the tenets of the time, married people were supposed to make love with as much dignity as the act allowed, not couple in broad daylight with the woman still half dressed, like a wench being tumbled in a haystack!

“Cathy, yes,” he answered mockingly as he dragged her pantalets off, leaving her naked from the waist down except for the hem of her chemise and her silk stockings, held around her slim thighs by lacy blue garters. A froth of yellow skirts and white petticoats nearly covered the upper portion of her body. Cathy gasped, wriggling, as Jon’s hand slid to the blonde triangle of hair between her legs. Then, as he wouldn’t let her go, his fingers caressing her, she quivered and went still.

“Still no?” he murmured teasingly after a while, watching her flushed face with pleasure. Cathy felt her color deepen, aware of his eyes on her but unable to control the instinctive movement of her hips.

“I love you,” she told him softly, her eyes flickering open to meet his. Jon’s
face changed, his eyes darkening passionately. At his expression Cathy felt a sudden fierce tightening in her belly.

Jon lowered his head to take her mouth in a devouring kiss, his tongue and lips telling her what he still found hard to put into words. Cathy clung to him unashamedly, her body writhing beneath his, eager for his possession. He groaned at the feel of her soft, undulating flesh, covering her body with his, his muscled thighs pressing her legs apart. Cathy opened them willingly, her nails raking lightly across his sweat-
dampened back, returning his kisses with a passion equal to his. With a single hard thrust he took her. The exquisite sensation left them both gasping. Jon began to move, rapidly at first and then more slowly, pausing, teasing, until Cathy strained against him frantically, her eyes closed, her lips parted as she panted for air.

“Jon, Jon, Jon,” she moaned his name over and over, unaware that she was doing so, her hands making beseeching little movements against his back as she urged him to finish. Finally, when she thought she couldn’t stand it any longer, he withdrew almost all the way. Cathy squirmed against him, her eyes opening in protest. He was watching her, his eyes burning as they took in her desire.

“Want me?” he demanded huskily, his breath rasping hoarsely in his throat.

“Yes, oh, yes!” Cathy gasped, mindless with longing, her hands clutching his broad back, her body moving wantonly against his. With a strangled groan he thrust deep inside her. Cathy cried out, clasping him to her, while his arms tightened around her body like a clamp. She felt him shuddering inside her and gave herself up to ecstasy.

It was some little time later before Cathy became fully aware again. Her heart had slowly resumed its normal rhythm, and her breathing was once again regular. Jon still lay sprawled across her, his
big body almost crushing her smaller one. His head was beside hers on the pillow. She turned to look at him, one finger coming up to lovingly trace his hard features. At her touch he opened his eyes, his own warming as they moved over her face.

“Wife,” he said on a note of intense satisfaction, and kissed the slender finger she pressed to his lips.

Cathy smiled at him, opening her mouth to tease him about his reluctance to say the three simple words she wanted to hear. On the rare occasions when he did bring himself to the point of telling her how much he loved her, he was almost sheepish, embarrassed at having to admit to such a thing. Jon belonged to the world of tough, ruggedly masculine men; to confess to feeling an emotion as soft as love was difficult for him. But he had proved his love over and over again with deeds, and Cathy was content.

“Don’t. . . .” she began, meaning to add teasingly, “you have something to tell me,” when a sharp rap sounded on the door. Cathy started, for all the world like someone caught out in a misdemeanor. Jon grinned at her.

“Don’t worry, love, what we just did is perfectly proper.” He mocked her discomposure in an undertone, dropping a hard kiss on her mouth before levering himself off the bed. “We’re married, remember?”

“Oh, hush,” Cathy told him, blushing as his eyes kindled again as they touched on the wanton display she made, skirts raised around her waist, naked limbs sprawled across the flowered silk bedspread.

The knock sounded again, even more peremptorily. Cathy slid off the bed, hastily straightening her skirts and raising her hands to brush ineffectively at her hair, which was tumbling in a golden riot from its pins. Jon watched her efforts, still as naked as the day he was born, hands resting lightly on his hips while a faint smile curved his mouth.

“You look as
if you just got out of bed,” he observed, tongue-in-cheek. Cathy glared at him.

“Miss Cathy?” The voice on the other side of the door was Martha’s, as Cathy had known it would be. “Miss Cathy, it’s almost eight o’clock, and your guests will be arriving soon. Shall I help you dress?”

Jon chuckled softly as Cathy went, still struggling uselessly with her hair, to open the door. Before she reached it he padded away into the dressing room. As she let Martha into the room she heard him bellow loudly for Petersham.

Martha’s eyes were twinkling as they touched on Cathy’s flushed face and obvious deshabille before moving knowingly to the half-empty bath, the puddles standing on the floor, and the rumpled state of the bed. But for once the woman chose to remain tactfully silent. She walked over to the bed without casting more than a single look in Cathy’s direction, straightened the covers, picked up Cathy’s discarded pantalets and put them in the basket reserved for soiled clothing, then with an arrested expression moved down to the foot of the bed. Cathy watched, puzzled, as Martha worked to free something from the space between the mattress and the footboard.

“My dress!” she gasped, horror-stricken, as she recognized the crumpled folds of material that Martha was shaking out.

“You won’t be wearing this one, I fancy. And just as well, if it’s one of them indecent ones that you just had made up.”

“They’re not indecent!” Cathy defended hotly for what must have been the hundredth time. “The low-cut bodice is the latest fashion! And you needn’t look so smug, Martha. I’ll just wear another of my new ones, and they’re all cut the same way!”

“I declare, Miss Cathy, sometimes you are a disgrace!” Martha muttered as she put the crumpled dress aside. Cathy ignored her, sluicing her face and hands with cool water from the pitcher on the stand near the bed.

Martha maintained a disapproving
silence as she helped Cathy to undress, not even lowering her dignity enough to remark on the fact that the job was already half done. When Cathy had washed, Martha assisted her into fresh pantalets. The dropped shoulder, low-necked styling of the new evening dresses Martha objected to would not permit the wearing of a chemise. Martha, grim-faced, laced Cathy into her stays, tightening the strings with some satisfaction until Cathy was gasping and her waist measured no more than the fashionable hand’s span. Then she dropped the required three petticoats over Cathy’s head and rolled gossamer stockings onto her legs, all the while refusing to utter so much as a syllable.