Chapter 32 #3
“You’re so close, aren’t you?” He almost purred in his satisfaction at her need. He slid his fingers in slowly and pressed his thumb over the hard nub. And he flicked his thumb softly. Rhythmically. Relentlessly.
The pleasure built fast, and she was crying out within moments, utterly under his spell.
“Watch me, Ellie,” he ordered as her eyes fluttered closed.
She opened her eyes and found him staring at her, his gaze locked on her face as he worked her body to a peak that left her shaking and limp, her nerves singing, her muscles clenching around his fingers as she flew apart.
But he still ordered her to keep her eyes open and focused as he withdrew his fingers, raised them to his mouth, and licked her juices off.
“Now watch me take you, Ellie.”
He was standing at the edge of the bed. He gripped her hips and pulled her down so he could position himself between her thighs, angling until he was pressed against her still-throbbing core. He licked his lips, relishing the moment.
Then, with a slowness that was both tender and torturous, he slid into her, inch by exquisite inch.
“Eyes on me, Ellie,” he said, his voice low, commanding but somehow comforting.
She kept her attention on him, skimming over his face and body. All the skin, all the scars, everything that made him who he was.
He moved one hand from her hip and slid it across her belly, not even rounding yet. “You’re so beautiful, Ellie,” he said with a raw note emerging. “Inside and out.”
“So are you,” she gasped, meaning it. She loved every inch of him. “Struan. I’m…getting close again.”
“Are you? Even if I go slowly?” He grazed her most sensitive spot with every languid, lazy thrust. He was bending half over now, his head closer to hers as he tested new angles. Still he watched her, and made her watch him. She’d never felt so vulnerable.
“Yes. It feels so good.” She saw the sweat on his temples, heard his breath tighten. He was on the edge. The knowledge made her own breathing speed up. How could this feel so painfully sweet, like it was the first time?
“Ellie,” he said, his heart in his eyes.
She reached up and put her hands on his shoulders, pulling him down so his chest was inches over hers. “Together now. No more holding back.” And then she deliberately took him in deep and held herself tight around him, keeping her eyes on his face.
He inhaled once, then let out a low, almost soundless moan as he stiffened and released his seed inside her. She felt it even as another orgasm rippled through her core, spreading out to her limbs in a slow wave. She relaxed under him, sighing as all the tension drifted away.
Struan waited a moment before withdrawing, and then rolled onto his back beside her, his chest still rising and falling heavily.
She wasn’t sure how this exchange altered anything—though she couldn’t pretend it was meaningless—when Struan spoke.
“How long will it take a maid to pack your things?”
“Pack for what?”
“You’re moving here, to the townhouse.”
“I don’t know if I’m ready for that.”
He rolled his head to the side to look at her. “I thought we just confirmed that you’re very ready for that.”
“Oh, Struan. What you make me feel when we’re…”
“Fucking.”
“Yes…that’s not life. How I feel in a bed…or wherever…doesn’t solve all the problems outside of the bed.”
“But if we’re in the same house, we have a much better chance at working those problems out.”
“And you can more conveniently get me into bed?”
“Well, there’s that.”
“I won’t be seduced into being…”
“Safe? Happy? Cared for? Christ, Ellie, what sort of seducer could I ever be? I’m not trying to lead you into sin. We’re already legally married.”
“Through deceit.”
He sighed. “I should have been honest from the start, but I never knew how to begin telling you the truth. At first it seemed like it would be an unnecessarily cruel shock. And then, as you settled into your new life, I told myself that maybe it didn’t matter how the marriage was arranged, if you were content with the results.
I was afraid that I would hurt you, and then I hurt you anyway.
Everything that happened was my fault. I told you that, or I tried to. ”
“Did you?”
“Not well, I admit.” The backs of their hands brushed, and he took her hand in his.
“It was stupid of me to think that I could maintain the secret, but I hoped that I would somehow be able to. Because telling you wouldn’t just hurt you, it would hurt me too.
I was already falling for you, even before we got off the ship.
Before that, actually. When I first saw you, doing the laundry. ”
“No man has ever fallen in love looking at a woman doing the washing.”
“I did. It was your laugh. It was so pure and full of joy, and I wanted it. I wanted you.”
She was silent, hearing the truth in his words, knowing he was holding nothing back now.
“I had this idea that we could have a real marriage,” he said quietly.
“That you saw me as a real person. That I wasn’t just a collection of old wounds and a way out of your previous life.
I thought that if I could just make it through a few more months or a year before telling you, it would soften the blow.
I hoped that I could prove to you that my love for you was real and that was all that mattered. ”
“I should’ve asked more questions.” Elspeth shook her head. “My father knew that I wouldn’t. Mairi would have worn him down with questions and arguments and proclamations. I just nodded and asked when I should pack. Agreeing to the marriage was my fault as much as yours.”
“I never would have let it happen if I hadn’t seen you and wanted you.
And now I don’t know how to let you go.” Struan looked devastated as he spoke.
“I don’t think divorce is possible at this point.
Especially if you’re with child. But I know that you can’t maintain the fiction of our marriage, so tell me how you wish to live, and I will make it possible. ”
Elspeth wanted to protest. It was on the tip of her tongue to say No I don’t want to leave you.
But that was precisely what she had done, wasn’t it?
And despite what just happened, that momentary madness they shared, Struan seemed resigned to the idea of her leaving him, if not relieved.
And Elspeth wondered how he could know what she wanted when she didn’t know herself.
“I suppose it all comes down to the child,” she said.
“What do you mean?” he asked, anxiety sparking in his voice.
“I mean that until our child is born, it will be impossible for me to make any decision about the rest of my life. I’d like to nurse the child, at least. But I know you don’t want me around any longer, and—”
“I didn’t say that,” he countered. “Christ, of course I want you. I only said that we can’t live a lie. There’s no point in forcing you to pretend to be happy when you’re miserable. And you would be miserable with me.”
She’d be miserable without him too.
Struan looked so defeated that Elspeth wanted to put her arms around him, and tell him that he was being foolish, and that there was no need to assume the worst. But weren’t they already at the worst?
Their marriage was in rags almost as soon as it had begun.
And while, yes, Struan could expect an heir soon enough, it seemed the only person who actually derived any satisfaction from the arrangement was Elspeth’s father.
And now he had gone and gotten himself into exactly the same situation that the marriage was meant to get him out of.
“I suppose I might die giving birth,” Elspeth said, indulging in a moment of morbidity. “In that case, at least I won’t have to decide where to live afterward.”
“I won’t let that happen!” Struan rolled to cover her, displaying that massive figure that she almost didn’t think about anymore.
But he was intimidating, and he was un-ignorable.
He looked as though he would personally fight off Death if it came to her bedside, and she half believed he could do it.
“How could you stop it?” asked Elspeth, gently pushing him off as she sat up, clad only in his heirloom necklace. “If it’s my fate to die while giving birth, that’s simply how it is.”