Chapter 23
Nat groaned as Kit… no, Kate… kissed him.
He had wanted this so desperately, and for so many weeks, and he had honestly believed it would never happen. The happiness he was experiencing now felt almost excessive, as if his heart might burst from it.
He would have liked to say that he kissed Kate gently. Reverently. Like the precious treasure she was. The way she deserved to be kissed.
But he had awoken painfully hard for this woman every day for the last month, and now, she was in his arms, naked to the waist and willing. What chance did a man stand against such delectable temptations?
And so, he did not kiss her so much as devour her. He claimed her with an open-mouthed kiss as his hands scoured every inch of her soft, intimate skin.
“I’m sorry,” he gasped, even as he cupped her breasts, stroking his thumbs over her nipples. They were small. Delicate. They felt so good in his hands. But he forced himself to release her. “I’m probably going too fast.”
She seized his hands and put them right back where they’d been. “Please, touch me there! Touch me everywhere. I’ve needed you so badly!”
Nathaniel didn’t need to be told twice. He pressed a trail of kisses down Kate’s neck, eager to taste her everywhere.
To his infinite delight, she began undoing the buttons of his waistcoat with trembling fingers.
As his lips reached Kate’s collarbone, he felt her pushing the garment off his shoulders.
She grabbed a handful of his shirt just above his waistband and pulled it free of his trousers. With a feral sound, she peeled his shirt up over his head.
Kate lifted a hand as if to touch his chest, then hesitated, abruptly turning shy. “You look like the statues at the British Museum. Like a work of art.”
His breath was coming fast. “That’s high praise, coming from you.”
That earned him a tiny smile. “I can hardly describe how I felt when we first arrived at the inn, and you took off your shirt and started splashing yourself with water. It was agony and ecstasy in equal measures.”
He laughed, remembering. “I finally understand your stilted reaction.”
A becoming blush stained her cheeks. “I’d never felt such potent attraction toward a man before.”
He lay down on the bedroll beside her, tremendously pleased. “Is that when it started for you?”
Astonishment swept over her face. “Oh, no! It started for me the first moment I laid eyes on you.”
He smiled. “Did it truly?”
A faraway look came into her eyes. “You walked into your office, looking so bookish and tweedy, with patches on the elbows of your jacket and a satchel full of books you’d actually read.
It was as if you’d found the diary I kept when I was thirteen, the entry where I described the man of my dreams.” She shook her head.
“By the time you put your spectacles on, I was lost.”
He caressed her cheek. “I had no idea. I remember thinking you seemed nervous about the interview.”
She sighed. “Then, you opened your mouth and revealed yourself to be kind, clever, erudite, and interested in precisely the same things I was. Oh, and you praised my art to the heavens and back. Don’t forget that part.”
He ran a hand up her side. He couldn’t decide which he was more eager to do—make love to Kate or hear her call him the man of my dreams again. “I even took you to sketch a wild puma—the pinnacle of wooing.”
She laughed. “Yes! Is it any wonder I was head-over-heels in love with you by the time I left your office?”
His heart stuttered in his chest to hear those words on her lips. “Kate,” he whispered urgently. “I… I need you.”
Tentatively, she brought a hand to his chest, touching him with quivering fingers. “I need you, too.”
“If you don’t want me to take your maidenhead, tell me at once. I can go outside and… jump in the loch.”
“I do want that,” she said quietly, but with conviction.
“I don’t want to wait. Every morning, I’ve woken up with this throbbing between my…
” She trailed off, blushing. “I don’t understand what’s happening to me.
Not precisely, anyway. But I’m fairly certain that I need you, too.
And we’re getting married.” She looked up at him, a trace of hesitation coming into her blue eyes. “Aren’t we?”
“Yes,” he said with absolute conviction. “We are getting married the second we get back to Edinburgh.”
“In that case…” She reached down and began unbuttoning the placket of the trousers she wore. Watching her arch her back and slide them over her hips was the most erotic sight Nathaniel had ever beheld. She peeled off her stockings, then lay back on the bedroll, naked to his hungry gaze.
“My God, Kate,” he breathed, reaching out a hand to cup her breast. She was the most beautiful sight he’d ever beheld.
Her form was slight. Delicate. Yet with an unmistakable underlying strength.
Which made perfect sense—had he not watched her trudge up and down the mountain every day for the last two weeks?
His hands traced downward, and he groaned when he reached the firm swell of her bottom.
Unable to resist, he drew her against him, chest to chest. It was like being struck by lightning, in the most pleasurable way, the moment her skin came into contact with his.
She must have felt it, too, because she cried out and began writhing against him, like a cat.
He stroked a hand across her back. “Relax, my darling. It will be all right.”
She was panting. “Please, Nathaniel. I’m in agony! Please, make it better!”
Nat bit the inside of his cheek. He hoped he could. He wasn’t some wild buck who slept with a different woman each night. He was a square academic and a rule follower by nature, which was to say, he had been saving himself for his future wife.
But he had once been a medical student, which meant he had some knowledge of anatomy.
There had been a lecture on the use of pelvic massage to treat female “hysteria.” Based on the ribald comments made by some of his fellow students, he was given to understand that this was also an act a husband ought to perform for his wife, at least, if he wanted to have a happy marriage.
One of his more experienced friends had even mentioned that the woman would like it even better if he performed the massage with his tongue…
Kate had said something about a throbbing between her legs, which sounded promising. He knew what he needed to do, at least in theory.
He kissed her again and touched her all over. Then, he bent down and kissed a delicate breast, both because he wanted to and because he had heard this was also something she would enjoy.
She gasped his name, arching her back as she threaded her fingers into his hair. Interpreting this as a good sign, he continued his ministrations for another minute before lavishing her other breast with the same treatment.
After a few minutes, she was making desperate sounds and squirming on the bedroll.
He thought perhaps it was time. He trailed a hand down her abdomen to the soft, curling hair at the juncture of her thighs.
Something inside of him purred with masculine satisfaction when she parted her thighs for him eagerly.
He swept his hand slowly down her folds, hoping he could find the correct spot. His anatomy instructor had described it as a “nodule” or “bud.” He hadn’t made it very far when Kate’s eyes widened, and her body jerked on the bedroll.
He paused. The place he was touching was longer and skinnier than he had expected.
But perhaps it could be described as a “nodule.” He brought his fingers, which were now slick with moisture from her opening, back to that spot and began to gently rub her there.
Her body jerked again, and she began squirming on the blanket.
“Does that feel good?” he asked hesitantly.
She opened her eyes, and they were suffused with pleasure. “So good! Oh, please, Nathaniel, don’t stop! This is… this is what I’ve been needing!”
He felt his chest relax and expand. “Good. Good!” Her breath was growing desperate, and he wondered if she was getting close.
He slid down, withdrawing his hand, and his sweet, taciturn Kate actually snarled at him.
“Don’t worry! I’m not stopping.” He pressed a kiss against the inside of her thigh.
“Let me do this. Let me make this beautiful for you.”
She seemed to be beyond words. Nathaniel carefully parted her folds.
His cock leaped beneath his falls at the sight of her most intimate parts.
God, but she was beautiful. He wanted this woman desperately, but he was determined to give her pleasure first, as he was given to understand that what lay ahead might bring her pain.
He brought his mouth to the spot he had been rubbing just moments before.
Tentatively, he caressed her with his tongue.
Her reaction was instantaneous. “Oh, Nathaniel! That feels so good!” Her fingers tightened their grip on his head, her nails digging into his scalp, holding him where she wanted him.
Encouraged, he quickened his pace. She began bucking her hips, showing him just what kind of strokes she preferred, and how fast.
Suddenly, her thighs tensed beneath his hands. “S-something’s happening!” she gasped. “I… I’m going to… Oh, my God! Nathaniel!”
Her thighs began shaking uncontrollably, and she spasmed beneath his tongue. Nathaniel kept licking her, loving the sounds she made as she took her pleasure.
After a moment, her thighs cramped around his head. “That’s enough,” she gasped, laughing.
“Are you overly sensitive?” he asked, coming up to take her in his arms.
“How did you know?”
He shrugged a shoulder as he ran a hand down her back. “That’s the way it is for me afterward.”
“Ah. I didn’t know. That was the first time I…” She trailed off, her cheeks flushing.
He smoothed her hair back from her face. “This will be my first time, too. With another person,” he clarified. “Not just my own hand.”