Chapter 6
CHAPTER SIX
For a moment, time seemed to stay still, which was absolutely the opposite of what Betsy wanted.
How could she have said that? How did those words emerge from her mouth?
“I was going to say that I did not believe in love at first sight. And I don’t. but I have always believed in love at first kiss.”
Betsy swallowed but that did not slow her heart, or take back the words she had uttered…not that she wanted to take them back.
Well, she was in a scandal with a sovereign no matter what she did, wasn’t she? They had spent hours here now in conversation, surely there was going to be an assumption in the whole of Society that they had…at the very least, kissed.
So why not experience it? why not gain from that sensation, this strange situation they found themselves in?
Why not kiss a prince?
Betsy could feel a flush tinging her cheeks at the very thoughts that were moving through her mind. It was outrageous, yes, but surely she could not be the only woman who had ever thought of it?
There must be many ladies who wished to gain Prince Rupert’s affections. She shifted in her seat, trying not to think about his chiselled jaw, the way he smiled when he realised he had said something foolish.
Well, he was charming!
“Like…well, like that! Why, you were almost speaking like—as though you…you…”
“As though I had fallen in love?”
Was she not due a little excitement?
“You…did you…I think I may have lost all sense of hearing just then,” said Rupert weakly. “Can you repeat…what did you say?”
Betsy hesitated. Well, if she wished for a chance to take back her words, it was now. She could merely pretend to have said something else, to be jesting with him.
But at the same time…
Her gaze drifted, against her better nature, to his lips. What would it be like to kiss those lips? To feel them on her own, to be swept away by the heady emotions she had been attempting to keep at bay since she had found herself locked in the library with Rupert?
A kiss with him would surely be…
“I said,” Betsy whispered, not taking her eyes from his own. “I have always believed in love at first kiss.”
She watched him swallow, watched him take in her words, and she was just as startled as he was.
But then, her reputation was ruined already, was it not?
There was no going back from this, she was a ruined woman.
It was fortunate indeed that her inheritance would see her through the rest of her life, for she would never marry now, unless a gentleman was willing to take what the ton would consider to be spoiled goods.
And there was something inside her, something yearning for his touch. For Rupert’s hands on hers, on her skin, caressing her—
“I—Betsy, I—”
“Kiss me, Rupert,” she said with a smile.
Her heart skipped a beat in the silence that followed her words, but she did not have much time to consider.
Rupert moved forward swiftly, as though he had merely been waiting for permission to do such a thing, and Betsy gasped as he pulled her into his arms.
Oh, this was heaven—this was glorious, to feel the strength of his arms around her, to feel safe and enclosed, yet desired, oh, so desired—
But she had no time to really think about what she was experiencing, as Rupert’s lips grazed hers.
It was just a brushing kiss, nothing more, but a jolt of desire rushed through Betsy at the faintest connection. How did he make her feel like that, with the slightest of kisses—and more importantly, why did he hold back?
“I told you to kiss me, Rupert,” Betsy breathed, pulling him closer, her fingers gripping the lapels of his coat. “So kiss me.”
He groaned at her words, his hands moving to her waist to pull her even closer, and then his lips were on hers and there was none of the reticence she had felt with his first kiss.
Oh no. this was quite different.
Bold, and passionate, and eager, absolutely knowing what she wanted. Betsy sighed with delight at the way he took possession of her mouth, gently tilting back her head to give him greater access, his tongue teasing along her lips and she did the only thing she could do; she let him in.
As his tongue teased her own, Betsy gave herself up entirely to the kiss.
This was nothing that she could ever have imagined, and as she melted into his arms, clinging to him, giving him everything he wanted and almost hoping he asked for more, Betsy knew she would never be able to kiss anyone else like this again.
He had ruined her in more ways than one.
Eventually the kiss ended. Betsy was unsure why, she could have accepted his ardour all night, but Rupert was looking at her with lustful eyes and jagged breathing which matched her own.
“Betsy,” he breathed.
Betsy tried to smile but it was hard to control her body at the moment, everything seemed to be tingling with anticipation of greater pleasure. “R-Rupert.”
He groaned at the mere sound of his name on her lips and she revelled in the strange power she appeared to have over him.
Why, whenever she had thought about such things—and it was far more frequently than she would ever care to admit—it was with the assumption that it would be the gentleman in control.
But it was her, wasn’t it? Betsy glorified in the way his eyes flashed as they took her in, at the way he quivered at her touch.
And it had been her words which had instigated this, hadn’t it?
“I told you to kiss me, Rupert. So kiss me.”
“I-I have never felt this way before,” she blurted out, unable to keep the words within.
Rupert groaned. “You are incredible. You are—what are you doing?”
Betsy hardly knew, only that she had to be closer to him, had to touch more of him, feel the sensation of his skin against hers. She had to know what it was to be possessed by him entirely, this growing hot ache inside her needed to be fulfilled, and—
“Betsy, stop.”
Rupert had captured her hands, her fingers no longer able to unbutton his coat as she had been, and when she met his gaze, there was a mixture of the same emotions in his eyes as in her heart.
Attraction. Lust. Desire. Passion. Eagerness. Confusion.
“Betsy, I—damn, I did not know that you…” Rupert swallowed and Betsy tried not to notice how his Adam’s apple moved. Oh, he was all man. “You need to stop.”
Betsy smiled, trying to pour into it all the charm she possessed. “Do you really want to stop me?”
Rupert blinked. He was dreaming.
Although he was not entirely sure when he had fallen asleep, he must have done. There was no possibility that he could have heard what he thought, or that Betsy—the Lady Elizabeth!—would have said that.
So he must be dreaming.
But it felt real. Betsy was warm under his fingertips, his heart racing, his manhood must definitely standing to attention.
“Do you really want to stop me?”
But this was just her desires pouring forth—if he was the first man to have ever kissed Betsy, then she had never managed to resist all these throbbing desires before.
Rupert swallowed. and that meant he had to resist for the both of them. damn.
“Betsy, you don’t know what you’re saying,” he said gently.
Only then did Rupert notice that he was still holding onto Betsy’s waist as though she was an anchor in a storm. He tried to let go, discovered he had absolutely no wish to, and decided to continue holding onto her.
It could not hurt, after all. could it?
Betsy had affixed him with a firm look. “I know what I'm saying.”
Nonsense. “No, you—”
“You think that the world will not just assume that we already have?” she pointed out. “Look at us, locked in a library for the entire night. Unchaperoned. The two of us. the whole of Society will presume we have m-made love, Rupert.”
There was just a hint of shyness in her voice, but he could not deny her words.
The moment this got out—and it would get out, if London was anything like Austria—then the gossip would not be whether they had made love or not, how but how many times.
Rupert’s stomach lurched. oh, to think that he could—
No. no! he was a prince, he had tempted Betsy into this kiss and now she was completely addled with lust. He would not do that to her.
Betsy was shaking her head with a smile. “I never thought I would have to convince a man to bed me.”
“It is not that I do not wish to—damn, Betsy, you know how I feel about you!” Rupert said with a rueful laugh.
She raised an eyebrow at that. “You love me.”
“I…” Rupert swallowed. how did she manage to do that; speak with such sincerity and yet seem to question everything that he in turn had said, but without saying a word?
It was impressive. Her chest was heaving slightly with the breathlessness of their kissing, her breasts moving in a most—
He was getting distracted.
“Once we do this, if we do this,” Rupert added hastily as he saw the light appear in Betsy’s eyes, “there is no going back. You cannot take back your first experience, you cannot do it over. It would be…well, rather final.”
He held his breath, then forced himself to try to breath naturally again.
Had he ever had to speak like this before? No, Betsy was entirely unique. The women he had bedded in the past knew precisely what they were getting in for; a night with a prince and a fat payment, no questions or rumours.
But this…this was different. She was different; different from any other woman he had ever met.
Rupert swallowed. what on earth was he going to do, locked in a library, if Betsy heeded his words and decided not to—
“Make love to me, Rupert,” Betsy breathed. “I know the risks, I know the cost—but I have paid that already, have I not? My reputation is gone, probably forever, and I would much rather have the benefit of experiencing what I will be shamed for.”
He could not argue with her there—and the trouble was, Rupert did not wish to.
“You are completely sure?”
Betsy smiled, and leaned forward to kiss him most delicately and lightly just in the corner of his mouth. “Having second thoughts yourself?”
Rupert groaned. What this woman did to him! “Never.”
And then he was kissing her again, kissing her as though his life depended on it, and in a way, Rupert rather thought he was.
He was in love with her. He was in love with Lady Elizabeth, and though she did not love him, she certainly desired him, liked him, and that meant only one thing.
He had one chance. One chance to show her just what he could give her, what she meant to him.
Rupert lost himself in their kiss, his hand moving to her breast, groaning as he felt her respond, the shiver down her spine echoed by the whimper she made in his mouth.
“Rupert—”
“Betsy,” he breathed, kissing down her neck and glorifying in the way he made her quiver. There was nothing like her, nothing he had ever known. How would he ever kiss another?
Their kisses grew more passionate, more uncontrolled, until somehow Betsy was lying on the sofa and Rupert was above her, in her arms, her legs wrapped around his own and there was nothing but this irritating gown between them.
When had he removed coat, waistcoat, shirt? Rupert could not tell, his mind hardly paying attention to such mundane things—how could it, when his fingers had pulled Betsy’s gown down her shoulders to reveal—
“God’s teeth, I can’t control myself around you,” Rupert moaned, his lips moving to that sweet décolletage now revealed.
Betsy arched her back under him. “Then don’t.”
He shivered as her hands clung to his shoulders, her nails just scraping his back as she moaned. Oh, to give her pleasure, to feel pleasure in return, nothing else would mean as much to him. Nothing else would matter.
And then Betsy’s hands left him. Rupert almost cried out at the sudden lack of contact, he craved her so utterly now it was painful to be without her.
Only then did he realise why.
She was pulling up her skirts, struggling against the weight of him, entangled between her legs, but still making progress. She was giving him entrance.
Rupert groaned. “You are definitely sure that you—”
“If you do not make love to me right now, Prince Rupert,” Betsy panted, scalding desire in her eyes, “if you do not scratch this itch within me, if you do not bring me to pleasure—”
“Then what?” teased Rupert, heart racing.
Betsy smiled wickedly. “Then I will have to make matters into my hands and get me there myself.”
Oh, he would never survive this woman. If she did not love him after this, he was entirely at a loss, Rupert thought, manhood twitching at her salacious words. Had the world ever seen such a woman?
Pulling a preservative from his waistcoat pocket, Rupert struggled to undo his buttons. Nimbler fingers than his own met them, releasing him.
“Oh!”
Rupert looked up at her hastily. Betsy’s mouth had fallen into a perfect O that he was absolutely not going to think about, and tried hastily to put the preservative on his manhood. He was no cad, he—
“Rupert!”
The damned thing was finally on. He nestled himself within the warmth of her legs and captured her mouth with his, kissing her passionately as Rupert gently slid his manhood into the warm and welcoming depths of Betsy.
She moaned in his mouth—at least, it could have been a moan, it may have been a whimper.
Rupert halted immediately. “I have not hurt you?”
Betsy shook her head, mouth a crimson red with the passion of their kisses. “More.”
“I beg your pard—”
“More, Rupert!”
Her desperate cry would surely be heard throughout the house but Rupert did not care.
She was right, her reputation was gone and he wanted to be the one to claim it.
and she was his, now, and he was hers, and as he gently moved in and out of her, building a rhythm that was growing that exquisite ache within him just as he built it within her, Rupert knew he would never be the same again, this was everything, she was everything, and as she clutched his shoulders and tipped back her head and cried out his name—
Rupert exploded. Ecstasy, pleasure, was raining down on him and his whole body jerked as he thrust himself into her, unbale to stop himself crying out.
And then he fell into her arms. Where he belonged.