Chapter Twenty-Two #2
He ran a hand over his stubble covered jaw. He would need a shave before this night was through. Before he kissed her—and he did intend to kiss her.
“It seems my father and I do not always see eye to eye.” He wondered how often being in his altitudes was a factor, then huffed out a laugh that held no humor. “More to the point, I don’t think I’ve lived up to his standards for what he imagined his heir ought to achieve.”
She looked dubious. “That is ridiculous.”
“Why? Because I never mentioned anything of his disappointment to you, or because you think the man a saint?”
She shook her head, a soft smile curving her luscious mouth. “Neither. I call your suspicion ridiculous because you’re you. Any father would be proud to call you son. The prince himself would, I wager.”
And there it was.
He’d gone off to war. Left her for years. Arguably worse, for some reason, he had ceased so much as corresponding with her. And who knows what else he’d done. Certainly he’d earned the censure of his closest mate—her brother.
And still she chose to pour out her sweet, seemingly bottomless, intoxicating love on him.
No, not chose.
She’d tried to resist her weakness for him, tried with all her might, throwing up obstacle after obstacle to keep herself from succumbing.
But, in the end, she hadn’t been able to sustain her walls. Because she loved him.
And he’d be damned if he let her love go a second time.
Not knowing what to make of his watchful gaze, Georgina resumed her perusal of his sketches. The sheer number of drawings he’d managed, not to mention the caliber of his skill, was staggering to behold. “Is this what you spent your day doing?”
“Yes. I meant to join you for supper, I just…” He shrugged, looking adorably bemused.
“I understand. When the muse finds you, it’s almost rude to kick her aside.”
He snorted, his evident amusement at her words warming her to her toes.
She reminded herself she did not deserve his charity. Not after what she’d nearly done—and, what she had done—attempting to manipulate him into ingesting poison.
She fanned out a loose stack of sketches piled near the foot of the bed, spying her brother, scenes from what looked to be a military encampment, and… “Hampstead Heath,” she murmured.
Yes, he was remembering. She swallowed, then shot him a searching look, her heart in her throat.
She surmised he did not yet recall the most damning information—namely that they had never married, had never been a couple at all.
She could tell him, now, now that there was no reason to lie. She should…just admit to what she’d done. Would he hate her? At the mere thought, her eyes stung, and she looked away, not wanting to play on his sympathies which she did not deserve.
Then her gaze fell on a picture of Catherine and jealousy, swift and ugly, rose up in her. Where was she when he needed her, she thought? She had left him to rot, and yet still, his soul pined for her.
“She is very pretty, is she not?” Her question sounded stilted to her own ears.
It seemed to take him a moment to discern to whom she referred. “Lady Catherine, your brother’s intended? A classic beauty, to be sure. Popular amongst the ton, no doubt.”
She sniffed and started for the easel, on which sat a sketch pad, several of its sheets folded back. More sketches he’d yet to remove from the booklet.
“No, wait,” he said, one arm lifting as if to stay her.
She sent him a sad smile, anticipating she’d find more drawings of the classically beautiful Lady Catherine.
“It’s all right. You don’t owe me any explanation for the subjects which presented themselves to your subco—” She broke off and stared, her heart lurching with a pleasure so profound it was nearly painful in its intensity.
He’d sketched a detailed picture of her, from today, in the receiving room.
How had he managed to draw a still figure and infuse it with so much life? In Teddy’s depiction, she gazed back at him, eyes soft, body replete, clothing askew. A woman clearly freshly tumbled.
Teddy moved to stand behind her. He rested his hands on her shoulders and propped his chin on her crown of undoubtedly messy curls. “I wasn’t sure I should show you that one. I rather anticipated keeping it as part of my private collection. It’s quite risqué.”
“Why do you say so?” she asked, hearing the smile in her own voice. “Because my undergarments are showing?”
He reached past her to run a fingertip over the swells of her bosom. “Among other things.” Warmth coiled low in her belly.
No. She mustn’t allow herself to become aroused and muddle brained. She must tell him the truth.
She started to turn to face him.
“Flip through the pages, if you like,” he suggested, sounding almost shy.
She could not possibly resist.
“All right.” She folded the pad closed, then opened the cover to view the first of several drawings. Her breath caught. It was her, again, this time, at Hampstead Heath. She sat some distance off from him, under a massive yew, one of her notebooks on her lap, pencil in hand as she wrote.
Hands trembling, she turned the page.
Another drawing of her. She glanced over her shoulder at him, hardly able to take a steady breath.
Teddy gazed down at her, the warmth in his liquid-caramel eyes reaching inside her to squeeze her insides with sheer, unadulterated longing.
Heart thumping, she turned back to the sketch pad, and flipped the next page. Another of her, this time, strolling a walking path at Hyde Park, her eyes glowing with…love. She’d been looking at him. Of that she had no doubt.
“Most of these images are just that. Images that have formed in my mind. But there are a few, like this one, that have actual memories attached.”
“You recall this day?” she asked.
“I recall walking with your brother. He told me to leave you be.” His hands flexed on her shoulders. “Georgina, I know I haven’t been the best…” He broke off and she turned to face him.
“That is, I know I’ve done things, awful things, that should have caused you to take your love away—”
“No,” she interjected, placing two fingers against his warm lips. “No. Don’t say anything else, darling. You haven’t. You didn’t. It’s me who—”
He sent her a blinding smile, his arms sliding around her. “We’re a pair, aren’t we? Each trying to outdo the other for the worst spouse award?”
She choked out a laugh that threatened to turn into a sob.
“I was planning on shaving, sweetheart, but, I don’t think I can wait,” he murmured into her hair.
“For what?” she asked, feeling her resolve crumble beneath her feet. She could no more bring herself to confess all to him at this moment than she could walk on water.
He took one of her hands and pulled her toward the bed. Nearing it, he swiped a hand, sending sketches flying.
“Teddy, no.” She shifted, planning to gather the mistreated artwork, but he grasped her by the waist, lifted her with, seemingly, no effort at all, and deposited her before him onto the mattress.
“They’re not important to me at the moment,” he said in a low voice. “Lie back.”
“They are to me. Teddy, what are you doing?” she demanded, when, with a gentle shove, he toppled her onto her back, though her legs still hung over the side of the bed.
“I need a visual cue for another drawing.”
“Of what?” she demanded.
Then he crouched before her, his hands fisting in her skirts.
In an instant, heat pooled at her apex, despite the air wafting over her stocking-clad legs. Then he gripped her hips, and dragged her so her bottom half hung over the mattress edge.
Her eyes opened, and she grappled with the bedcovers, trying to pull herself back. “Teddy, I hardly think…”
“That’s your problem, darling,” he murmured. “Thinking far too hard, whereas I”—he spread her thighs apart, then feathered kisses from the inside of one knee along her thigh, growing ever nearer her core—“whereas I,” he repeated, turning his attention to her other thigh—“am just hard.”
Then his tongue lathed over her, gently, so gently, where no man’s mouth should be only, Dear Heaven, she could not bring herself to ask him to stop. He flicked the tip of his tongue over her and followed with his lips.
She could no longer speak. Could barely breathe.
“Mmm,” he intoned against her flesh, then pulled back, only to replace his lips with his fingers. He traced her opening and whispered, “Pink and perfect, wet and luscious, and utterly delicious.”
In the next instant, he dipped his tongue inside her, then his fingers.
He licked, he caressed, he suckled. Soon she could not decipher between his fingers, his tongue, his lips as a firestorm of need raged through her.
She reached for him, fingers weaving into his thick hair to grasp handfuls and tug.
He moaned against her and whispered naughty words, that curled through her, tangling her insides into tighter and tighter knots, until she thought she might expire from sheer desire.
So close. That shimmering release hovered just beyond her reach. “Please, Teddy, please,” she begged.
“Yes, sweetheart, yes, come for me. Come apart in my mouth.”
Faced with his relentless torture, she could do nothing less. Shuddering helplessly, pleasure exploded through her.
And love. So much love.
When she thought she could take no more, he reached for her, yanking her from the bed and into his arms. “Wrap your legs around me, sweetheart,” he ordered in a gravelly voice.
She obeyed without hesitation, needing to be close, needing no space to separate them.
In two long strides, he carried her to a blank section of the wall, pressing her back against the cold plaster. Then he fiddled with his clothing and surged into her.
She clung to him, arms and legs trembling with the effort to keep him locked to her as his hips pumped into hers in a steady, pounding rhythm.
He drew his lips to her ear, his harsh breaths curling through her. “Tell me. Tell me, sweetheart. I need to hear you say the words.”
She did not have to ask which words. They were the very words burning her lungs, desperate to come out. “I love you, Teddy, I love you so much,” she half sobbed.
He whimpered in response, the tempo of his thrusts increasing. “Hold onto me, sweetheart. Don’t let me go,” he choked. “Tighter. Tighter,” he ground out in time with his thrusts.
Without warning, another climax erupted through her. She gasped and shuddered with violent, endless pleasure.
As if her release triggered his own, he gave a hoarse shout of pure masculine triumph, then threw his head back as, his hips grinding into hers, his entire body went rigid.
Afterward, he held her aloft against the wall, as, seemingly both of them struggled to come to terms with the magnitude of what they had just experienced in each other’s arms.