Chapter Twenty-Four
They staggered back from the hotel desk, inelegant and desperate for one another as they clung to each other.
They kissed ferociously with a tender eagerness that hurt.
Their hands scrambled against one another, catching between their bodies as they tried to find a way out of their clothes.
Loosening bits of material, and then casting them aside.
A strangled, desperate laugh at their own wild actions slipped from his lips, although any humor was rapidly fading, compared to the all-consuming need that overrode all.
A yearning for Abigail. Has Robert ever wanted anything more?
He doubted it. This desire, love, passion—a battle between these three emotions, has seeped through into his very skin.
It was ablaze in his very flesh. And would be remembered in his soul.
He hoped to God above, he never felt differently.
The memory of being held inside her clenching, welcoming sex was mounting within him, so that his very limbs were now shaking with the strength of his lust. The single-minded passion of it.
Robert could not think straight, all that mattered was dropping onto his knees and finding a way to be inside Abigail.
The feel of flesh against felt the sheer tension of his cock sliding into her.
Robert’s body, his knees in fact hit hard against the end of the sofa. This action caused him to drop down onto the ground before it. As neatly as he could, in one swift move, he pushed Abigail onto the plush cushioned rump of the divan. Keeping her protected.
“It won’t fit us both.” Her words cut through the haze of his need. The taste of her release was still warm on his mouth.
Abigail sat upright and pushed off and down the cushioned end.
She landed awkwardly in his lap, deliciously so, with part of her back visible to him.
He kissed the gaping part of skin. She arched herself against him, her bottom curving into his stomach and her neck exposed and tipped so he could continue to kiss her back.
“God,” he said, and thought for a moment he might be left in this excruciating state, slowly going mad with this painful erection, until insanity was the only thing left to him.
In haste, he pushed up the ends of her skirt, bunching the plush material around her waist. If only he’d pulled the dress away from her body earlier, but there wasn’t time now.
Her body ground back against his, and Robert had to bite back the oath that suddenly came to mind.
Abigail made a small gasping noise at the stroke of his hands.
“Hush, hush,” Robert said. With shaking hands, he nudged her into the right position—placing her hands out before her, so she could grab hold to the end of the divan, as he entered her from behind.
Abigail turned her head, her smile a twist that made him moan.
Just the angle of her mouth was enough for him to fear he wouldn’t be able to finish inside her.
He might just spill himself now. He took a steadying breath and kissed her deeply, then dropped his hands to lift her a little off his lap.
To get the angle right. Almost immediately the pressure on his erection lessened and he wanted nothing more than to surge into her.
But he had to do what was right. One of his hands slipped between her legs.
Slowly, he started to stroke the damp folds of her sex, testing her warmth and welcome before he removed his fingers.
She was ready. The little cry of need told him that. He loosened the ties of his breeches.
“Shh,” he said. One of his hands moved up to her mouth covering her lips, and in some wanton spirit Abigail smiled at the touch of his fingers caressing her chin.
“I can taste myself on your hand.”
Don’t say that. How he’d like to beg her.
With a nudge of his hips, the tip of his erection brushed against her sex, the temptation overwhelming.
She was ready, eager for him. His hands gripped her hips, resting on the curve of her body, drumming on Abigail’s soft skin.
Then he pushed himself up and inside her.
It was heaven. Pure and rich and the most glorious feeling he could imagine.
Abigail started to rock herself, grinding and moving against him in such a way that Robert was flooded with sensation.
He forced himself to steady his breath or else they would control him.
She gasped and he took over, his body sitting up, adjusting as he started to rock more deeply with it.
Again and again as Abigail’s hands snatched at the divan’s cushioned rump, holding herself present to milk every feeling from this position.
He stroked her back, grabbing the material up so it did not fall down and impede their activities. She was glorious, provocative and clever.
“You are everything to me,” Robert said.
His hips tensed as he continued to pump into her.
Never had intimacy felt more thrilling or erotic, and this was only their second time together, they had so much more to discover.
With one free hand he maneuvered closer, reaching between her legs, finding the pearl of her sex.
Stroking at it, and feeling the reaction writ in her body’s response.
He watched Abigail’s hands clamp and twist on the divan’s cushions. A hearty sound raspy in her throat. Catching. Calling. Finding her release. As her body started to shudder and press back against his.
Robert shifted his fingers through the folds of her skirt, seeking out the pearl of her sex.
Pressing, capturing, torturing her flesh.
Until he felt the slippery slick between his fingers.
He rested his head against her neck, as her sex tightened, and Abigail started to moan.
Stars bright and sharp burst through his head, as his own release coincided with Abigail’s own.
They collapsed down onto the carpeted floor, their breaths mixing as they laughed.
Abigail rolled over and looked into his face. Her fingers reached out and stroked his cheek. They grinned at one another, words unnecessary as it seemed as if they knew how to speak without them.
*
At some point during their time together, over in the intervening hours, Robert had picked Abigail up, and carried her through the hotel.
He had been lucky that no one had seen them.
Down the corridor to his bedroom, he had gone.
Kicking open the door and taking her to his bed.
In the midst of the tousled sheets, doomed beddings and disordered pillows, they had whispered secrets, kissed and made love again.
“We won’t be able to stay here forever,” Robert said.
He wasn’t certain why he needed her to know this, but between the cost of the Fladong’s Hotel, or because it was important that Abigail knew there was going to be a permanent place for her in his home.
Of course he didn’t have a home yet. But he would do.
“I didn’t expect us to stay here,” Abigail said. She stifled a small yawn and leaned up against him. “If nothing else I must fit Mr. Buckhurst and ensure he has rescued our skull.”
“You say the sweetest of things to me, my love,” Robert said, kissing her forehead.
Out of the hotel window, behind the partly pulled curtains there was the faintest of pink light to the sky. Dawn had arrived.
“Where do you want to get married?”
“I must say, I’ve never given it much thought.”
Despite himself, Robert laughed. “You are so damned romantic.”
“I will be happy to bow to my husband’s wishes,” Abigail said, there was a sweetness to her voice to highlight the teasing note of her comment. Rolling onto her elbow she kissed first his cheek and then his lips. “What is wrong?”
“Nothing, not a thing,” Robert told her, stroking her cheek. There was nothing wrong, not when she was lying on top of him. Not when she was talking about the possibility of him being her husband, with that gleam in her eye. He could get used to that brightness shining back at him.
“Perhaps we should elope—” he said, about to launch into the suggestion of travelling up to Gretna Green.
It would not be likely to cause any uproar, but the fact that his real name was not known in Lyme Regis, the ease of marrying without all of the paperwork or the calling of the banns.
However, his suggestion was cut short because someone was at the door.
There was a sharp knock of the kind that was unpleasantly familiar, that broke no refusal.
The door swung wide, giving Robert just enough time to throw the covers over Abigail and launch himself forward, despite knowing who was going to be standing in the doorway, threatening all of their happiness.
Montacute.
The baron.
Somehow in the early morning light, he looked all the more severe and grim faced. Fleetingly Robert wondered if the baron had ever smiled. Certainly, Montacute showed no sign of having done it recently.
The baron’s dark eyes flick hurriedly away from the bed to settle on Robert. “You surprise me, Davenport. This is not your normal style. Does this perhaps explain your behavior over this mission?”
“Indeed, my lord?” Robert said. He tried to inject a question into his reply.
Thankfully, he had managed to snatch up a coverlet from the bed, which Robert had swung around his hips, but had little else to hide his modesty.
“Yes,” came the dry, cutting response, “even your colleagues have even remarked upon in their correspondence to me. In fact, I had to cut my trip to the continent short, in order to return early to see what was afoot.”
So much for the blasted man being in Brighton, that had been a ruse.
And now the game was up. The pretense that he had not inevitably altered by his time in Lyme was an illusion. The impact of Abigail. It was better to be done with the facade, and come clean. Or as clean as he could. Robert might doubt any mercy he could receive from his employer.