Chapter 22
22
J ulia paced the floor of her boarding house bedchamber and wrung her hands, trying to decide where she ought to sleep. Of course, as an exclusive residence, this room was as opulent as any she’d seen in Dunscaby’s residences. The furniture was in the latest Grecian style with burgundy velvet upholstery and gold-trimmed damask draperies on the four-poster bed as well as the windows. Even the ewer and bowl on the washstand were gilt-edged and hewn of the finest porcelain china. But then, this boarding house was quite dear and catered only to the elite—a class which she definitely did not feel a part, despite her birthright. Julia may have been born to an earl, but she had become one of the working class. Even when she resided in her father’s house, she had taken on duties at which most well-born women would thumb their noses.
Fortunately, the arrangement at Lady Blanche’s was only for a short time. The problem was whether or not Julia should don Mr. Smallwood’s clothing and spirit into her rooms at the town house or sleep here and return in the morning. Because her bedroom window was hidden by thick foliage, there had been no difficulty slipping into the chamber as Jules and come morn, she could easily tell anyone who might happen to see her that she’d arisen early and had been out for a brisque walk.
That decided, she took a deep breath and reached back to untie the laces on her gown. Her fingers brushed the neckline but didn’t touch the laces. Twisting her other hand up her back, she wrenched her arm, forcing her pointer finger as high up as possible, then traced down between the eyelets.
Where is the blasted end or the bow or a knot for the love of Moses?
Charity had played lady’s maid and obviously had taken the role to heart. Her Ladyship certainly had done so when she’d cinched Julia’s stays. It had been a long time since she was laced this tightly. As Aphrodite, Sophie had insisted the costume needed no stays—very scandalous of the Marchioness.
Just as Julia’s fingertip found the bow tucked away in the middle of the bodice, a rap sounded on the window. Nearly jumping out of the gown including the breath-inhibiting laces, Julia gasped. There was no possible way Mr. Skinner would know where she was at the moment. The room hadn’t even been let in her name. Furthermore, though the papers might mention she’d been present in the Dunscaby box at the Theater Royal, the news wouldn’t be available until the morrow at the earliest.
As soon as the duke’s name popped into her mind, Julia’s gaze shot to her man clothes neatly folded and sitting on a chair. Was her clandestine visitor Martin? She hadn’t told him about the garden window. But then again, Charity seemed most determined to see her brother in a courtship. Julia’s stomach not only squeezed, an eruption of fluttering butterflies set to flight.
She quickly scooped the clothing into her arms and stuffed the bundle into Charity’s trunk—the one containing all the lovely things the lass had managed to have Tearlach remove from the attic and shift to the boarding house for Julia to use during this charade.
The tap sounded again.
“A moment,” she said as sweetly as possible, spotting her father’s boots and hiding them away before she shut the trunk’s lid and fastened the buckles, which proved more difficult than usual considering the stiffness in her wrist.
“Who is it?” she called, pattering to the window and kicking herself for not asking such an obvious question in the first place.
“’Tis me…ah…Martin. I hope I haven’t frightened you,” Dunscaby’s hushed voice came through the heavy damask drapes.
Julia’s heart took to flight as she reached for the curtain then stayed her hand.
I mustn’t appear too eager. After all, it is very knavish to knock on a woman’s window at this hour.
In fact, such a thing wasn’t done during respectable hours, either. Except she was ever so happy to know he’d come, and even happier that she’d decided not to return to the town house this night.
Affecting an aghast expression, she pushed back the curtain and slid the window up. “What are you doing here?” she whispered rather hotly.
He grinned—not just a smile, but a turning up of the lips revealing his boyish crossed incisors that made any resolve she might have had melt into a mass of molten honey. Then the duke held up a red rose. “This was blooming in my garden and as soon as I spotted it, I absolutely had to bring it to you directly.”
He wasn’t lying. There was a hedge of roses alongside the mews. “But how did you know this is my window?” Julia asked as if she hadn’t a clue who might have told him. “Anyone could have been staying in this chamber.”
“Perhaps my dear sister mentioned that your view is a wee bit like a forest within the midst of a bustling city.” He held out the rose and she took it. “Please forgive my cavalier appearance, but as soon as I bid you farewell on the stoop, I felt empty as if I had not savored nearly enough of Lady Julia to satisfy my curiosity for the evening.”
Unable to move, she stood dumbly while her heart hammered out of rhythm. He, Martin MacGalloway, the Duke of Dunscaby—the man Julia had pined for ever since watching him climb down from the library ladder with those hairy legs scandalously tempting her from beneath his kilt—had just said that he’d wanted to savor more of her.
She drew the rose to her nose and inhaled the heady, floral scent, which provided a dizzying effect. “I am not dreaming, am I?”
“No, lass. At least, you don’t look as if you’re sleepwalking. You’re not even dressed for bed.” He placed a hand on the ledge. “If I promise to keep my voice very low and behave like a gentleman will you allow me to come in?”
Julia, patted her thundering heart, doing her best to appear aghast. “And break Lady Blanche’s cardinal rule of no men allowed?”
“I promise I won’t tell her…” He winked—oh dear, how wonderfully delicious he was at winking. “Will you…please?”
Julia stepped aside and held the curtain. “I cannot very well deny the bearer of such a lovely bloom. But only for a moment, mind you.”
Martin climbed inside, looking far more like a scoundrel than a duke, though once he straightened and brushed off his lapels, he once again transformed into the entirely irresistible man she’d come to admire. His blond hair was mussed as if blown by the wind. His neckcloth was no longer crisp and pristine but loosened and a tad askew.
Turning toward the table, Julia set the rose down, wishing she could wrap him in her arms and shower him with kisses, but terrified that he’d reject her if she appeared too forward. But then, hadn’t she kissed him when they were alone in the Rose Bedchamber? Hadn’t he just said he wanted to see more of her? Hadn’t he said he wanted to kiss her at the opera? Hadn’t he brazenly kissed her on the portico steps at the masquerade?
Why not take a chance?
This very well might be the only time in her life where she might enjoy a bit of passion. This was her fortnight. Once it was over, Julia would disappear and Jules Smallwood would return to his ordinary life, contentedly managing the Dunscaby estate.
Her mind decided, she faced him, fists clenched at her sides. “I want to kiss you.”
Martin’s eyes grew dark as he took a step toward her, one corner of his mouth ticking up. “Och, lass, I’m all too happy to oblige, if you promise not to run away.”
She scraped her teeth over her lower lip. “Since I didn’t run from the Rose Bedchamber, I’m assuming you’re referring to the incident on the portico steps, are you not?”
“Yes, well, must apologize for that. I shouldna have been so forward. Mark Antony lost his head, so enraptured was he with the beauty of Aphrodite?—”
Unable to wait a moment longer, Julia clasped his cheeks between her palms and kissed him. His guttural sigh rumbled through her as his body seemed to shed a mountain of tension. He cocked his head to the side and stroked her lips with his tongue. As before, Julia opened for him, allowing Dunscaby to take the lead and show her the nuances of kissing.
But this time, she didn’t think of all the reasons she shouldn’t be kissing the man for whom she worked. This time, she swirled her fingers across the prickly stubble on his face. She sighed when his hands grasped her shoulders and drew her closer before they slipped around her back.
Melting into his kiss, she explored further, sinking her fingers into the curls at the back of his nape, far softer than she would have imagined a man’s hair to be.
She dropped her head back as Martin trailed his lips to her neck, making tingles thrum across her skin. Julia’s mind swam with the ecstasy of his mouth plying her skin. Letting herself feel like a woman who was wanted by a man, she arched toward him, her hips shifting forward and connecting with his body.
Oh. Holy. God.
His manhood pressed into her stomach—far higher than she needed to feel him yet far more rigid than she’d ever imagined a man’s tool would become in order to accomplish the act of copulation. Julia might be a virgin, but after once coming across a rather lewd book in her father’s library, she had a fair idea of how the act was accomplished.
As his lips grazed the tops of her breasts, she gripped his shoulders for dear life. If she died in this moment, she would pass thoroughly sated and content. “I cannot believe how heavenly you make me feel.”
“You need no costume, you are a goddess, I swear to it,” he growled, his hand slipping over her breast and kneading gently.
“I mustn’t…”
“Hmm?”
“I cannot…”
His hand slid lower and rested on her hip. “I desire you, lass.”
“But I—you—” Yes, she desired to lay with him more than life itself, but Julia knew full well the act of copulation planted a seed in a woman’s womb. How could she explain to him what she wanted and the step she positively must not take?
Martin’s hand paused on her hip while he straightened and looked into her eyes with the intensity of sunlit crystal. “Tell me what’s troubling ye, lass.”
Ever so bashfully, she allowed her gaze to flicker downward to the outline of his member, now straining against the falls of his trousers. Her mere glimpse making her mouth grow dry and the longing inside her ignite into an insatiable flame. “Earlier this evening I admitted to being risk-averse, and I cannot…ah…I absolutely must not…um…”
With the crook of his finger, he urged her chin upward, encouraging her to shift her gaze to his face, still so beautiful it arrested her breath. “Are you worried about what might happen nine months hence?”
Julia nodded, doing her best to stare into his eyes and not again brazenly glance down to the prominent outline of his tool.
He cupped her cheek in the palm of his hand. “I would never expect you to?—”
“Even if you wanted to?”
“Och, lass, I most definitely want to,” he said, moving his hand to her back. “But there are many things we can do without risking…well, you ken.”
“Such as?”
“Kissing,” he said, his voice but a low growl.
“I like kissing.”
Julia shivered at the sensation of his finger sliding between the eyelets of her gown—the very spot where she’d been searching for the bow.
“Everywhere,” he said in a deeper tone, his lips almost touching her ear.
“Forgive me?” she breathlessly asked. “Were we not just kissing everywhere ?”
He easily tugged the ribbon as if he were most adept at blindly removing women’s garments. “I want to kiss every inch of your body.” The silk of her bodice eased as he nuzzled into her neck. “Will you allow me to worship you, oh, goddess of mine?”
Martin MacGalloway wanted to worship her ? Could this night become more fantastical? The first time she’d set eyes on him, she’d nearly swooned. And then at the hunting lodge when she’d had to remove his wet clothing, it was all she could do not to stare. He’d trusted her, he’d befriended her, he’d become such an enormous part of her life, Julia could scarcely remember her life before they met. “I beg to differ. You, sir, are to be worshipped. Everything about you makes my blood thrum with molten desire.”
His lips wickedly danced across her flesh as those deft fingers released her stays. In a blink, Julia’s clothes dropped to the floor, leaving her wearing nothing but a shift and her stockings. “It seems we are of like minds.”
Drawing in her first deep breath of the evening, her head cleared. She had admired this man from afar for so long, it was surreal to have his hands on her, his lips on her. “You have rendered me powerless to resist you.”
“Then do not,” he purred, as he tugged open the bow on her shift and bared her breasts. Heaven help her, she ought to be mortified, but from the hunger in his eyes, she felt not a thread of embarrassment. “You are nothing short of divine.”
He backed her to the bed, his mouth trailing to a taut nipple. Julia whimpered as he eased her to the mattress and climbed beside her. “I cannot believe this is happening.”
“Trust me,” he whispered, focusing those light blue eyes upon her face.
She stared back, wishing she could tell him everything, but knowing she must not. “Yes. I trust you more than you know.”
He chuckled, swirling a finger around the peak of her nipple. “You speak as if you’ve known me for years though you must ken my reputation has not been stellar.”
“That is because the shallow people who spread gossip have never taken the time to come to understand you.”
“But we’ve only just met, have we not?”
“True, but my heart knows you. My heart has a very good sense about these things.”
“Does it now?” he asked, his mouth on her, kissing with wildly wicked strokes of his tongue.
Needing to see more of him, Julia tugged his neckcloth away and let it fall. Her trembling fingers moved to his waistcoat and released the buttons. Frantically, she tugged open his shirt and slipped her hand inside, savoring the downy soft hair on his chest and finding an erect nipple. “I want to kiss you here.”
“Later,” he said, moving lower, allowing her to push the shirt from his shoulders. “I will see to your pleasure first.”
Rendered speechless, she nodded her consent. Martin placed his palm on her thigh and slid it downward until he grasped the hem of her shift. “When you were dressed as Aphrodite, I caught a glimpse of the most alluring ankles in all of Britain.”
“Scandalous,” she tittered while his fingers encircled an offending ankle.
“But I want to see so much more,” he purred, inching her shift up to her knees. “May I?”
Dare she allow more? What was it he’d said about the things they could do while avoiding pregnancy? “Yes,” she uttered, her body responding, her mind elsewhere. “I trust you.”
Moving higher, he toyed with the ribbon of her garter.
Julia gasped. “Oh my.”
“Och aye, lassie.” His fingers slid in between her thighs, sending a new wave of insatiable desire shooting through her. “You are exquisite.”
Trembling, Julia gripped his shoulder, dappled with freckles and sculpted by the muscle beneath.
“But this is where I want to be,” he said, brushing the tips of his fingers along her, parting the place where she quivered for him.
Oh merciful mercy!
He stroked again. “Does this feel good?”
Unable to utter a word, she nodded.
“You are so ready, so very lovely, so ripe.” He seemed to know exactly what she needed as his fingers worked magic in the most intimate place on her body. “Imagine me here…sliding inside you.”
Julia gasped when he slipped a finger inside her core.
“I want to be here. My cock sliding in and out just like this,” he said as he stroked back and forth, in and out.
“Yes,” she whispered, closing her eyes, overcome with the image of his manhood replacing his finger, craving it, yet fearing it. Heaven help her she’d never felt like this before, never even imagined she could feel like this…then he licked her.
“Ah,” she cried out. Stars crossed her vision. “Oh my.”
“I said I wanted to kiss you everywhere,” he whispered, sealing his mouth over her while his finger performed wickedly wonderful things inside.
“I-I don’t know how much more I can withstand.”
He paused and glanced to her eyes, his face devilish and cocksure. “I intend to take you to the stars. Ease back and allow me to worship you.”
Julia dropped her head onto the pillow while Martin turned into a magician, his tongue licking and sucking, gradually increasing the tempo in tandem with the overwhelming increase of her need. Incomprehensible pleasure wracked her mind, body, and soul as she clutched his hair and rocked her hips, falling further and further under his spell.
“You are the duke of sin, the duke of temptation, the duke of… Oh Goodness !”
The rumble from his roguish chuckle vibrated through her. She was going to die on this bed, succumb to an overabundance of gripping, driving passion…until every sinew in her body tightened as if she were on the precipice of bursting. A gasp caught in the back of her throat as she shattered into a pulsating maelstrom of euphoria.
Martin eased his torture while Julia gradually regained her senses. “Wicked,” she mumbled. “I must add duke of wickedness to the litany of your qualities.”
He grinned—enchanting teeth, hypnotic eyes. Indeed, this man was no stranger to sin. “Mayhap every name is true but I will only own to them if my lady is utterly and completely satisfied.”
“I say, my satisfaction is well underway, but is this interlude not yet complete?” As his smile faded, she urged him up beside her. “You said there are many things we can do. Surely, such satisfaction as that which you just delivered can also be imparted from a woman to a man? Please show me how to pleasure you, sir.”