Читать книгу Regency Affairs Part 1: Books 1-6 Of 12 - Кэрол Мортимер, Кэрол Мортимер - Страница 38

Genevieve clutched the bedcovers beneath her chin, watching Benedict as he slowly sat down on the end of the bed to remove his boots before standing up again to face her, the darkness of his gaze holding hers as he slowly removed the rest of clothes. Hose. Pantaloons. Drawers …

Her breath caught in her throat as he straightened after removing the latter, the darkness of his hair rakishly tousled, his naked flesh that same golden hue all over as he was bathed in the warmth of the sunlight shining in through the windows of her bedchamber. The width of his shoulders. His muscled chest covered with its light dusting of dark hair. The flatness of his abdomen. Down the long length of his legs, and even his long and elegant feet.

Her gaze moved up slowly from those feet to his ankles, his calves, his knees, thighs, and finally to his—

Genevieve stopped breathing altogether as she finally looked at the long length of Benedict’s arousal, long and proud as it jutted upwards from the thick thatch of silky dark curls, and so wide she doubted she would be able to span it with her fingers.

She was allowing herself to think too much! Benedict had been kind and considerate during their lovemaking to date. There was no reason to suppose that would ever change.

‘Genevieve …?’

‘Yes …?’ She looked at Benedict now with wide and startled eyes, swallowing hard as she saw the questioning look on his harshly handsome face.

Benedict gave a frown. ‘You seem … nervous. As if you were unsure of me? Of this?’

The lightness of her laugh was supposed to sound dismissive, but even to her own ears it sounded strained. ‘You are being fanciful, Benedict. Come. Join me …’ She threw back the bedcovers beside her enticingly, at the same time as she kept the ones on her side of the bed pulled tightly over her own nakedness, watching now as Benedict strolled slowly round to the other side of the bed, the darkness of his gaze never leaving hers.

As Genevieve’s gaze remained firmly fixed on his; she could not, dared not, look at the evidence of his arousal for a second time, knew that her control over her nerves was now stretched to such a point of breaking that it might snap altogether if she did so.

She could do this. She must do this, if she were ever to find any shred of normality in her personal life.

Normality …

What did she know of normality between a man and a woman? Married at eighteen, to a monster of a man who had raped her on their wedding night, and allowed—no, encouraged!—his own son to beat her during the miserable six years that had followed, whenever Josiah considered she had committed the merest infringement of his rules in regard to what he expected of her behaviour.

Just being in Benedict’s company this past two weeks had shown Genevieve that was not the normal behaviour of a gentleman towards a lady, even one newly met, let alone the woman to whom you were married. As for their lovemaking! Benedict had thought only of Genevieve, of her pleasure, during their times of intimacy together.

As, she hoped, he would do so again today.

‘Are you going to release your death grip on the bedsheets and allow me to look at you, pet?’

She smiled tentatively as Benedict lay down on the bed beside her before turning on his side to look at her teasingly, having made no effort to pull the bedcovers up over his own nakedness, that nakedness so much more—more immediate, now that she could feel the actual heat of his body only inches away from her own. ‘It is only that it is the middle of the afternoon, and that I am feeling … a little shy.’

‘You have no reason to be.’ One of Benedict’s hands moved to cup the side of her face. ‘You are very beautiful, Genevieve,’ he assured gruffly, his breath a warm caress against her throat as he lowered his head to kiss her there, his lips a silky caress against her flesh. ‘Every part of you that I have been privileged to see is deliciously feminine and desirable.’

She thankfully felt some of her icy fear melt under the warmth of Benedict’s approval. ‘Perhaps we should not talk further but just—just—’

‘Just …?’ Benedict prompted lightly as his lips now travelled the length of her creamy throat down to the hollows beneath.

‘Cease teasing and kiss me, Benedict!’

Benedict enjoyed teasing this beautiful and unexpectedly shy woman, found that shyness entirely adorable after the years of bedding women who were usually as experienced and cynical as he in regard to their own physical gratification. Genevieve, in contrast, held an air of mystery for him, the feeling of caressing and making love to and with a woman who held hidden depths of passion not yet explored.

Which was indeed fanciful of him when Genevieve had been married for six years …

Nevertheless, Benedict could feel the tension in her as he took Genevieve fully into his arms to claim her lips with his own, deepening, lengthening that kiss as his own desire for her soared higher at the first touch of those full and sensuous lips beneath his own.

As usually happened when Benedict kissed her, Genevieve’s misgivings began to dissipate. The dark hair on his head feeling soft and silky to the touch as her fingers became entangled in its long length, her breasts crushed against the hardness of his chest, the softness of hair there a pleasurable abrasion against her sensitised breasts. The heat and overwhelming feelings of desire and trust she had for this man once again taking precedence over everything else as she parted her lips to allow for the thrusting possession of his tongue into the heat of her mouth.

One of his hands, those warm and sensual hands, roamed freely across her naked curves—her back, the arch of her spine, the globes of her bottom—before moving up to cup her breast, squeezing, kneading that soft orb before rolling the nipple between finger and thumb. Genevieve was at once engulfed in that now-familiar heated pleasure that coursed through her hotly, warming and dampening between her restlessly parted thighs and causing the tiny nubbin there to throb and ache.

An ache Benedict immediately satisfied as his hand travelled down the curve of her waist and hips before moving surely between her thighs, caressing, stroking that heat to a fire that blazed out of control almost at his first touch. That did blaze out of control as he continued to caress her whilst at the same time one long finger penetrated her sheath and began to thrust into that moist heat.

The pleasure that ripped through Genevieve was almost painful in its intensity, Benedict continuing to thrust and caress her as her inner muscles convulsed in a lengthy and pleasurable climax.

‘You are beautiful, Genevieve!’ Benedict wrenched his mouth from hers to move down her body and suckle deeply, strongly, on her engorged nipple, prolonging her pleasure, her eyes squeezed tightly shut as her hips bucked and surged instinctively. ‘So very beautiful …!’ Benedict lifted his lips from her breast, moving down the bed as he kissed his way slowly over the dip of her abdomen, the curve of her hip, before settling between her parted thighs, lowering his head and gently claiming that most sensitive spot with the slow rasp of his tongue.

‘Benedict …!’

‘Shh, love,’ he soothed as he looked up to see that Genevieve had shot up into a sitting position and now looked down at him with alarm.

‘But—but—That is—I have never—Is it quite correct for you to—to—?’

‘Nothing is forbidden between lovers, Genevieve,’ he assured soothingly even as he felt a surge of satisfaction in hearing that no other man had ever kissed Genevieve with such intimacy.

What an old stick in the mud old Josiah Forster must have been not to have introduced Genevieve, his young and beautiful wife, to this particular sensual delight. As for her other lovers …! Genevieve had obviously not chosen well there, either, if they had never loved her in this highly satisfying fashion.

‘Nothing, love.’ He held her gaze with his as he once again rasped his tongue across her sensitive and swollen nubbin and heard her gasp even as her cheeks flushed a becoming pink. ‘No part of you is forbidden to me, as no part of me is forbidden to you. You may touch and caress any part of me that you choose. As I will touch you …’ He allowed the tips of his fingers to graze her swollen folds before moving lower still, caressing, stroking, and able to feel Genevieve’s response to those caresses as she shuddered and trembled with renewed arousal. ‘You are beautiful here too, Genevieve. Utterly. Erotically. Beautiful.’ He lowered his head again.

Genevieve’s head felt back against the pillows as she relaxed into the ecstasy of those caresses. She had never known such intimacy as this existed. That such pleasure as this existed. She felt both cherished and completely claimed at the same time, as that pleasure once again spiralled and rose out of all control.

She moved restlessly into those exploring lips and fingers, wanting, needing—oh God, hungering for more of the pleasure Benedict had already given her. That he gave her again as Genevieve once again became lost to those waves of heat and fire, and her body convulsed and shook in a long and tortuous release that left her breathless.

‘Will you touch me now, pet?’

She finally lifted heavy lids to find Benedict gazing down at her with a look of indulgence and satisfaction as he lay beside her. ‘If you wish me to …?’

He arched a teasing brow. ‘As desperately as I need to draw my next breath.’

Her earlier embarrassment at her own nakedness was forgotten as she moved up on to her knees beside him. ‘That seems only fair, when you—you have twice made love to me now and I have as yet had no opportunity to—to touch you.’

Benedict’s smile widened even as he lay back against the pillows, arms behind his head as Genevieve moved to kneel between his splayed legs, her breasts firm and uptilting, and tipped by those rosy nipples. ‘You may touch wherever the fancy takes you, love,’ he invited again gruffly.

She moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue. ‘And you will like it?’

‘Anywhere and everywhere,’ he repeated softly.

Benedict very quickly had reason to regret that largesse as, after her initial hesitation, Genevieve took him completely at his word, with one of her hands immediately cupped beneath his sac as her tiny fingers encircled and caressed the heaviness of his erection before he felt the soft and moist rasp of her tongue along its length before encircling and stroking against the swollen and bulbous ridge above.

Benedict drew his breath in sharply even as his fingers clenched into the pillows beneath his head, able to feel the heated surge of moisture that escaped his control as it pulsed down the length of his shaft before instantly being lapped up by the rasping heat of Genevieve’s tongue as her hand continued to cup the tightness of his sac. Her fingers were a light caress along the length of his pulsing shaft as she repeated that caress with her tongue again and again, emitting a low and satisfied purr deep in her throat.

‘You have to stop now, love!’ Benedict reached down to grasp her wrists, unable to stand a moment more of this pleasurable torture, knowing that if Genevieve did not stop now that he would release himself into the heated cavern of her mouth.

‘You did not like it, after all …?’ She frowned her uncertainty.

His smile was self-derisive. ‘I just need to be inside you now, Genevieve.’ He sat up to lower her on to the bed beside him. ‘I want to feel you around me, taking me, when I find my own pleasure.’ His voice had lowered gruffly just thinking about finally being inside Genevieve. ‘Open up for me, love,’ he encouraged teasingly as she kept her knees firmly together despite his gentleness.

Genevieve could not move!

Those earlier fears, those feelings of panic, had now returned with a vengeance, totally erasing the wondrous pleasure she had so recently found in being caressed by and caressing Benedict. Only that panic and fear now remained, stiffening her limbs to ice, numbing her brain, just at the thought of the painful invasion she knew was about to come.

It did no good telling herself that Benedict was not Josiah. That Benedict had never hurt her, but only given her pleasure. The memory—the pain and humiliation of her wedding night—was too predominant still in her mind. Too raw, too much a part of her, for Genevieve to be able to accept what was about to happen.

Benedict stilled as he looked down and saw the fear in the darkness of Genevieve’s eyes as she gazed up at him with wide-eyed apprehension, her cheeks sudden pale. Fear? Was it possible that Genevieve did fear him after all? But why? What had he done that could have so alarmed her about their lovemaking just now, that she should look at him in this way?

He gave a puzzled shake of his head. ‘Genevieve …?’

She moistened the stiffness of her lips before speaking. ‘I—Do not be concerned about me, Benedict. I know—I accept that you must now do what needs to be done.’

Benedict barely breathed. ‘And what is that exactly …?’

She gave a slight shake of her head. ‘I realise—understand, that you need to—that you must now put your—your hardness inside me to achieve your own pleasure—’

‘I neither need nor must do anything, Genevieve,’ he cut in softly. ‘I ache to make love to you, yes, but it is not something I would ever wish to do without your full consent, without knowing of your own enjoyment of whatever we choose to do together.’ He gave a pained frown. ‘In truth, I believe I am somewhat insulted that you might imagine I would ever do such a thing.’

Something was not right here. Benedict had no idea what that something was as yet, but he would be a fool if he did not realise that Genevieve was not that woman seeking ‘fun and excitement’ in her life, or that teasing woman of earlier today, nor the responsive lover of just a few short minutes ago; she was now a woman with fear, terror, in her eyes!

She blinked. ‘It was not my intention to ever insult you.’

He gave a pained frown. ‘And yet I find I am insulted.’

Her throat moved convulsively. ‘And angry.’

Yes, Benedict was angry. But at whom he was as yet unsure …

One thing was for certain, it was not Genevieve.

Nor, he found, could he even think of making love to a woman who looked as terrified as she now did. A fact his rapidly softening cock appeared to have recognised well before he had!

Benedict fell down on to the bed beside Genevieve, his arm thrown across his eyes as he lay there drawing deep and steadying breaths into his lungs, trying to make sense of what had just occurred. Genevieve had seemed happy just now, even eager, to enjoy their lovemaking. Admittedly neither her husband, nor any of her previous lovers, appeared to have shared any of the more intimate delights of lovemaking with her, but Benedict had found a certain satisfaction in being the first man to experience Genevieve’s responses to having his mouth upon her.

Where had it all gone wrong? One minute he had been talking of the anticipated delight of being inside her, and the next she had been talking of ‘accepting what he must do’ to her. As if—

Benedict removed his arm from over his eyes to slowly turn and look at her. ‘Genevieve …?’

She had pulled the covers back up to her chin, her face appearing all tear-wet blue eyes as she continued to watch him apprehensively. ‘I am sorry if I have d-disappointed you.’ Her bottom lip trembled precariously. ‘I kn-knew from the f-first that I am n-not what you are—

are used to. I had h-hoped—I—I so much w-wanted not to d-disappoint you—’

‘Why do you keep using that word, “disappoint”?’ The hand Benedict had raised to cup her cheek stilled in mid-air as she flinched away from him instinctively. ‘I was not going to strike you, Genevieve.’ He moved up on to his elbow to look down at her searchingly. ‘Did your husband beat you?’

‘Not after that first night. He was not able—’ She gave a fierce shake of her head as the tears began to fall down her cheeks. ‘I do not wish to talk about that, Benedict.’

‘But—’

‘I will not talk about this any more, Benedict,’ she insisted fiercely as she scrabbled to the side of the bed, taking the sheet to cover her as she stood up to reach for her robe where it lay draped across the chair. ‘I would ask that you leave now.’ She kept her back towards him as she dropped the sheet to pull on the robe and tie it tightly about the slenderness of her waist before releasing the fiery cascade of her curls from beneath the collar and then thrusting her hands into the pockets.

Leave? Now? When Genevieve had not answered a single one of Benedict’s questions to his satisfaction? ‘I do not think so,’ he told her firmly even as he swung his own legs to the side of the bed to pull on his shirt and pantaloons before standing up.

Genevieve turned just in time to see Benedict fastening his pantaloons before he straightened and looking so—so fiercely male, so intensely beautiful, that her heart skipped a beat just looking at him. She had wanted this so much, had wanted Benedict so much, and instead she had only discovered that she was irrevocably damaged by the past. By her past. A past which had nothing to do with Benedict.

Her hands bunched into fists in the pockets of her robe. ‘You should go now, Benedict,’ she repeated softly. ‘And never come back.’

‘Explain to me what just happened, Genevieve. Talk to me, damn it!’ He ran a hand through the already tousled darkness of his hair, his eyes as black and as unfathomable as a night sky.

She gave a sharp shake of her head. ‘I cannot.’

‘You must!’ he groaned as he crossed the room in long strides to stand only inches in front of her, not touching her, but overwhelming her by his close proximity none the less. ‘What did Woollerton do to you?’ he demanded harshly.

Her face became even paler. ‘William …?’

Benedict had meant the father, Josiah Forster, the previous Duke of Woollerton and Genevieve’s husband. But … ‘Father or son. What did they do to you?’

Once again her tongue moved nervously across her lips. ‘Josiah was my husband.’

‘I am well aware of what he was.’

‘Then you must also know that the law provides little protection for a wife in any marriage!’ Her eyes flashed in anger at his persistence. ‘That she is nothing more than another piece of property, a possession, and subject to her husband’s whims and fancies.’

A pulse beat rapidly in Benedict’s tightly clenched jaw. ‘Which in Josiah Forster’s case were …?’

Genevieve gave a firm and determined shake of her head. ‘I swore I would never talk of it to anyone.’

‘Swore to whom?’

‘Myself!’ She glared defensively up at Benedict now.

Benedict stared down at her with an equal amount of frustration, knowing by the almost desperate look in Genevieve’s eyes that she was not being difficult or unnecessarily stubborn, but that the details of her marriage to Josiah Forster really were too painful for her to remember, let alone talk about.

His eyes narrowed. ‘You said that your husband did not hurt you “after that first night” … You are referring to your wedding night?’

Her gaze skittered away from meeting his as she worried her top lip between her tiny white teeth. ‘I doubt any woman recalls losing their virginity with any degree of pleasure.’

‘I do not believe it should ever be so painful that a woman cannot bear to talk about it—’

‘And what would you know about it, Benedict?’ Genevieve rounded on him fiercely. ‘What does any man care to know about it as long as he may take his own pleasure?’

‘I would care!’

Her breasts quickly rose and fell as she breathed her agitation. ‘Women are nothing but a receptacle for a man’s pleasure. A convenient and warm hole for him to—’

‘That is enough, Genevieve!’ Benedict rasped harshly at her deliberate crudeness. ‘Did I behave towards you like that today? At Vauxhall Gardens? Have I ever, in any way, treated you with less than the care and gentleness you deserve?’

Her cheeks flushed hotly. ‘You—’

‘Did I take my pleasure just now?’ he continued softly. ‘When you showed hesitation, spoke of your uncertainty, did I continue to make love to you as if you had not voiced those concerns? As if what you wanted was of no matter to me?’

Genevieve could no longer meet the fierceness of his dark gaze. ‘You know you did not.’

‘And so?’

‘Can you not see that it does not make any difference?’ The heat of her tears began to fall unchecked down her cheeks now. ‘I believed, after our time together at Vauxhall Gardens, that it would be different with you. That, because I have come to trust you, I would be different with you. That I would be able to—able to—’ She broke off as the tears fell so heavily she could no longer speak coherently. ‘Please go, Benedict,’ she pleaded. ‘Please!’

Instead of hearing his footsteps departing, she felt the warmth of his arms engulf her as he drew her tenderly against his chest and held her to him gently. ‘I cannot, Genevieve. Not until you have told me what the bastard did to you!’

If anything she sobbed harder, deeper, the slenderness of her body trembling as she glared up at him. ‘My husband raped me on our wedding night! But first he beat me. Then he threw me on to the bed, ripped my nightgown from my body before he ripped into me. There. Is that what you wished to know, Benedict? What you wished to hear?’