Valor Under Siege (The Honorables) (17 page)

His brows drew together in a sharp
V
. “Arrogance?” His eyes hardened. “You would call it
arrogance
to move past a painful moment in your life? Elsa ...” Norman pressed a hand to his mouth. Then he stood, rolled his shoulders back, and cracked his neck. He paced to the other side of the room, pivoted on the ball of his foot. His gaze found hers and held. And held. Firming his lips, he nodded, as if reaching a decision.

“At first, I did come here because of what happened, because of the screening. I was angry; I shan’t deny it.”

“Of course you were.”

His lips carved a humorless smile at her reassurance. Then he resumed his seat and scrubbed a hand through his hair, resulting in a rumple of brown waves. “I denied it to myself. Believed my primary interest was in the seat itself, not in thwarting you.”

A pang flashed behind her sternum. She rubbed the spot. “If I could take it all back, Norman ... You must believe I would.”

Soft green eyes followed the press of her fingers above her breasts. Slowly, he extended one of his own large hands and traced the almond shape of her fingernail with his blunt forefinger. “I know you would, Elsa,” he whispered, lightly dragging his finger down the back of her hand before enveloping it with his palm. Their entwined hands rested on her chest, heavy against the fullness of her breast. There was no way he did not feel her heart’s wild tempo.

His thumb described small circles on her skin, gentling her distress while stirring those desires she had struggled to hold at bay.

“But then I saw how well you were loved here,” he went on, “and I heard you speak. Do you know, Elsa Fay, you’re the sharpest politician I’ve ever met? No, it’s true!” he insisted at her sound of protest. “I’m glad it’s your cousin standing against me and not you, else I’d have no chance at all.”

She chuckled nervously, squeezed his hand. He returned the pressure, solid and comforting. “Do you forgive me?” she asked in a small voice.

Lifting his brow, he gave her an exasperated look. “Come here.” With a tug, he pulled her into his lap.
Finally.
Elsa went willingly, gladly, knowing she was forgiven as he enveloped her in the shelter of his arms that felt like home and smelled so manly and good. His embrace was a physical relief, as if the sensation of his touch was the vital component her life had been lacking.

“You’re forgiven, minx.” One hand slid to the small of her back, holding her firm. The other cupped the side of her neck.

Elsa’s arms slipped around his shoulders. She swung one foot idly, enjoying the novelty of being in the arms of a man who made her feel positively pocket-sized. Lifting her face, she grazed the underside of his jaw with her nose. Norman sighed his approval. “Will you continue, then? In the election, I mean. Since you aren’t angry any longer ...”

Norman drew back, a small frown puckering his brow. “I mean to win that seat, Elsa.”

“But you said—”

He brought a finger to her lips. Caught her eyes in a piercing gaze. Elsa’s throat tightened painfully with the effort of not drawing his finger into her mouth. Vexing man. Infuriating man. Enormous, handsome, desirable man.

“I said my anger was part of the reason I chose to stand for election, yes, but that’s not the whole of it. I cannot be called to the bar for at least two years, and it remains to be seen whether this little brouhaha will cast a pall over my future as an advocate. I need an alternative, and this is one I’m suited for.”

A flurry of anxiety, like snowflakes, settled on her shoulders. It wasn’t that she didn’t understand Norman’s reasons, it wasn’t that she didn’t sympathize, but him winning would mean her losing her chance at regaining the life in which she’d flourished. If she could not be Oscar’s political hostess, what
would
she be? She’d be left floundering for an occupation that could help her keep her drinking habit in check.
Please, don’t make me quill and knit and tat and spend an hour every Wednesday night with the Fleck Christian Ladies’ Auxiliary.
The very thought of such a fate had her longing for a drink to numb the pain.

“Let’s not talk about the election any longer,” she pleaded, shying away from the unwelcome thoughts and burrowing into the strength of him. “Please.” She couldn’t bear to think about the ramifications of failure. Not tonight, when she wanted nothing more than to relish the sweetness of knowing she was forgiven and the simple joy of being a woman in the arms of a man. Clinging to his neck, she kissed his cheek. He shifted beneath her, restless.

“Last week,” he said, his baritone voice the slightest bit strained, “last week when you said ‘100 days,’ you meant 100 days since your last drink of alcohol, didn’t you?”

She nodded against his temple. Kissed his cheekbone. Her fingers burrowed into the silk of his hair.

His breath came faster; his fingers clutched her waist. “It took me a couple hours, but I finally figured it out. At first, I thought you meant the days since we were in bed together, but the count was wrong. On the 100th day since your last drink, it had been ninety-eight days since I had you in my arms.”

And with that, her joints went to jelly. Had he really been keeping a count of his own? Norman lifted his head, met her eyes with a melting half smile. As if in answer to her unspoken question, he said, “Ninety-eight days of wanting and missing you. Ninety-eight endless nights.”

A cry escaped her. Elsa bought her hands to his cheeks and pulled his mouth to hers, poured months of longing and loneliness into her kiss. Norman slanted his mouth and parted his lips; Elsa opened hers in response, suckled his warm tongue into her hot mouth. She slid her tongue alongside his, back and forth, imagining it was her foot gliding up and down the length of his bare thigh while he lay atop her.

Norman’s hands bracketed her hips, lifted and turned her so she straddled his lap. Elsa rocked against him, and he thrust upward, bumping his erection against her swollen mound through their clothes. She whimpered into his mouth; her nails nipped his shoulders. Allowing her head to drop back, she relished the sensation of his mouth working the column of her throat while one of his enormous hands enveloped her breast, massaging and claiming.

“Where’s Foster?”

“Gone,” she answered, kissing his cheekbone and brow and nose. “I sent all the servants away for the night.” She clutched his cheeks and brought her forehead to rest on his. “Make love to me?”

“Yes,” he growled. “God, yes.”

He stood, easily supporting her weight with one arm, the other hand tweaking her nipple, driving her wild. There was something to be said for taking a giant for one’s lover. She directed him to her bedchamber, where he deposited her gently onto the leaf-green counterpane. On her knees, Elsa loosened his cravat and then worked the buttons of his waistcoat.

“Wait ...” he breathed a laugh and shrugged out of his coat before shedding the waistcoat and cravat. His hands dived into her hair, and he kissed her deep, working loose the pins that had restrained her coif all day. He combed his fingers through her hair, untangling her locks and arranging them over her shoulders. Then he hung his head over her shoulder to see her back as he unfastened the line of buttons running down her dress.

When the muslin gaped, Elsa pulled it down her arms, pushed it to her hips, then flopped back onto her bum and held her legs out for Norman to finish the job. There was smiling and laughter as they undressed one another, playful tweaks and tickles as they revealed themselves to one another.

Finally, Norman shucked his breeches, and Elsa glimpsed his cock for the first time. It was commensurate with his height and then some, thick and heavily veined. The head, bulbous and ripe as a plum, oozed liquid from the slit at the tip; her mouth watered, her innards ached. It had been a long time since she’d lain with a man. She felt like she’d been waiting her whole life for this one. That he was hers and hers alone—

But was he? He was much bolder than he’d been the last time, more self-assured. “Have you been with someone? Since we were together?” She strove for a casual tone, but did not succeed in entirely suppressing the spurt of jealousy she felt at the notion that another woman may have claimed him.

He shook his head and stroked a hand down her breast. “No one, Elsa. There’s no one but you.”

Purring her approval, she wrapped a hand about his shaft and commenced stroking, base to tip.

Norman let out a guttural sound; his eyes rolled back in his head. “Sweet Jesus, Elsa.” He bucked against her. She swiped a tongue over his tip, lapping up the glassy pearl and moaning at the salty-sweet flavor.

Beneath her fingers, she felt his blood fizzling in his cock, sensed his bollocks drawing up tight. She pulled the head into her mouth, laved her tongue around its spongy circumference.

Norman’s hips jerked. When she glanced up, Elsa saw a sheen of perspiration on his brow. It wouldn’t be long now. With a happy moan, she slid her eyes closed and she lowered her head to take more of him into her mouth.

“No, wait, please.” His hand came to her shoulder, and he gently guided her back onto the pillows. “That’s so good, what you were doing. Too good. I don’t want to end that way.”

“Come here.” Elsa parted her knees wide and wider until he was comfortably nestled in the cradle of her hips. Norman’s fingers parted her, sank into her silken heat. Elsa’s head tipped back on a low moan. He found her clitoris with his thumb and rubbed little circles around the taut bud.

Elsa arched against him, her legs writhing.

“May I ...?” he panted.

“Yes, yes, go on.”

Norman reared up over her and fitted himself at her entrance. As he notched the head into her welcoming heat, he leaned forward and grasped one of her hands with his, tangling their fingers together above her head, while the other fed his considerable length into her body. Elsa felt herself stretched to the limit to accommodate his width, a pleasurable burn that singed her nerves from head to toe.

When he stopped, her eyes fluttered open to find him staring at their joining, a look of consternation on his face. “I don’t want to hurt you. You’ll have to tell me if what I’m doing is ...” His voice faltered. “I want to be good for you,” he confessed, his face a miracle of raw emotion.

Inside her heart, something golden and new began to grow. “More,” she urged. “Give me your all. I can take it. I can take you.”

With a groan of surrender, he sank his weight onto her and drove his cock home. Elsa bowed upward. Never had she experienced such a sensation. She was so full, she wasn’t certain where Norman stopped and she began.

Then he started moving, and any semblance of two separate entities was utterly obliterated. Norman’s body was Elsa’s pleasure, his withdrawal and thrust were her own nerves coming to life, the slide of his sweat-slick belly against her sensitized nipples was her climax building and building.

Elsa brought her legs to his hips, urging him to ride her harder, to thrust ever deeper. It was beautiful madness, this absolute possession. Her fingers grappled at his back as she slipped into the abyss. “Norman,” she cried, lost, but then he was there, his mouth on hers as she broke and fell to pieces around him in convulsions and tremors of pleasure.

And just as she drifted downward, Norman found his own release, calling her name as he came, the pulse of his heavy cock inside her triggering another orgasm. She came and came until her vision went black at the edges.

When she was sensible again, she was cradled in his arms, nestled against his chest. “Did I smother you?” he asked, fretful. “You were so dazed.”

“I was dazed because of the back-to-back orgasms you gave me, you great lummox, not because you smothered me.”

“Oh,” he said. And then, cheerfully, “Oh.”

His fingers combed her hair again, and Elsa hummed in satisfaction. When she felt sufficiently recovered, she rose and went to the washbasin, her hips swinging loose as she crossed the room to clean herself. She brought the flannel back and tenderly cleansed Norman’s softened member, laying heavy against his thigh like a slumbering dragon.

“I hope your first time did not disappoint,” she said, unaccountably nervous. It was a first time of sorts for her, too. Never had she shared her bed in Fleck with any man. Norman’s opinion mattered a great deal—more than any other lover’s ever had.

“That was beyond wonderful.” His brown hair flopped onto his forehead, and he swiped it back with a large hand. “I would do that with you incessantly if you let me.” He gave her an impish grin. “Will you?”

Laughing, she fell into his arms. She rode him that time, her thighs jouncing as she worked his cock, her breasts bouncing in time with the pace she set. Norman’s hands enveloped her buttocks as he held fast to her as if clinging for his life, letting Elsa take him where she would, until they careened over the edge together.

Later, she stirred against his side. “What time is it?” she asked, her voice thick with sleep.

Norman sat up and found the clock on her mantel. “Almost midnight.”

Elsa fished her journal and pen from the drawer of her bedside table and opened the book to the double pages that recorded her sobriety. With Norman looking on, she made the day’s tick.

“One hundred and six full days of sobriety,” she said.

Norman rested his chin on her shoulder as he ran a finger over her marks from the beginning to the most recent.

“I’m so proud of you, Elsa. Look at you. You’re so strong. Look at what you’ve achieved.”

That golden warmth in her chest unfurled a little more, and she leaned her head against his. “I’m no hero. It hasn’t been easy.”

“That’s what makes you a hero,” he countered. “If it was easy to stop, there would be no drunkards. But it isn’t easy; it’s bloody difficult. And you did it. You’re doing it, every day.” He was quiet for a time, then said haltingly, “I’m sorry I left you when I did, when we arrived here. You asked me to stay, and I should have.”

Elsa shook her head. “No, you did exactly the right thing. It had to be that way. I did have to stand on my own.” She turned to face him, brought a hand to his cheek. “But I’m so glad you’re here now.”