Chapter 25
He opened his mouth to protest. He wasn’t sure why he would do such a thing, but apparently the instinct was there.
She was already hoisting herself up onto the large wood and porcelain washbasin, sliding upward along it as though gravity were no matter and she a lifelong practiced acrobat.
She flipped herself around with her legs dangling off the edge and beckoned to him, now sitting high enough that when he reached her, they were eye-to-eye with one another.
“Hannah,” he said softly, as though he were going to somehow talk her out of expecting nudity as part of bathing.
Again, he supposed it was just instinct. Stupid, ridiculous instinct.
At least it made her giggle, her damp hands already coming up to grip his collar and pull him closer, her pretty face tilted up to watch his face as her fingers found their way to the buttons in question.
He swallowed, the muscles of his throat flexing with more freedom as she released the first of them, right at the top.
“You know,” she said softly, sliding her fingers down to the next one, lingering in the little strip of flesh she’d revealed as a path, “we have never actually seen one another naked.”
“You have seen more of me,” he told her thinly, watching her twist another button loose, “than I have of you.”
“Ah, that is true,” she acknowledged, slipping her fingers down another inch. “That day in your towel. I recall.”
“I thought you might,” he replied with what might have been amusement if she had not then hooked her leg around his waist to pull him closer. Instead, it came out as a rasp.
“You were so cross with me,” she tutted, parting the fabric farther, spreading it apart with the soft planes of her hands as her fingers traveled through the curls on his chest, “so very disappointed to find me there, waiting for you.”
“Disappointed isn’t quite right,” he managed to say, his eyes falling to watch her hands as they freed the final button just at the level of his heart and then traveled lower to pull the tail of the shirt from his trousers. “Cross perhaps is. Frustrated, I would say.”
“Hm,” she repeated, tugging the shirt up over his abdomen and leaning back as he took it from her to pull the remainder of the fabric up and over his head. “Your frustration was self-inflicted, I think. Oh, Thaddeus …”
He paused, the shirt still balled up in his hands as he caught sight of her admiring his bare torso, those blue eyes wandering leisurely over the newly exposed skin.
He felt a flicker of surprise every time she looked at him like that, like something she wanted to devour, though the surprise was often immediately drowned out by the rushing of heat and blood that followed.
“You are so beautiful,” she breathed, returning her hands to his chest, trailing her fingers back down along the skin there. “Just as I remembered.”
He reminded himself to breathe as she skimmed her touch lower, tracing the little scars of his youth that dotted his ribs and abdomen with the soft, stroking touch of her fingers, her eyes drinking in every detail as she went.
“Just one last button,” she whispered, hooking her grip into his waistband. Her eyes flicked up to meet his at the way he drew his breath in, sharp and fast. “Just one.”
He leaned down to catch her lips, his hand sliding into her loose, messy hair as she freed that final button and pushed her soft, pale hands into the gaping fabric to feel his hips.
He tasted her. He might have cursed if he’d been able to, at the way she was working the garment down, exposing him in short measures.
He pulled back to finish the job for her, stepping into the light of the sconce at his back and peeling away the last of his wedding suit.
He was already hard for her. He was bare.
Scarred and ruddy and imperfect, and still she looked at him like a thing of beauty, her fingers working up to her narrow throat as she absorbed the impact of him, nude before her.
She held her arms out toward him, licking her lips and blinking, and he crossed the room without a second thought to help her down from her perch, letting all of that pampered softness slide against his bare body until her toes touched the cool tiles under them.
She left her hands on his forearms, left her face tilted upward into his, and then asked in a soft, low voice, “Do you want to undress me too?”
“God, yes,” he breathed, running his fingers over her hair, down over the lines of her face. “Yes.”
His eyes dropped to her as his hands fell lower, stroking over that rich, creamy satin that was all that remained of her wedding finery.
He touched her through it first, over the straps on her shoulders, over the soft cups of her breasts and the dipping smoothness of her waist. He ran his fingertips over the torturous little swell of her backside as he gathered the fabric up between his fingers, pulling it higher and higher along her pale thighs.
She raised her arms above her head and let him slink the fabric up in one fluid motion, catching up her bounty of hair and letting it spill back into place once the chemise was gone, like Aphrodite emerging from the waves.
All that copper hair, wavy and curling, landing over her narrow shoulders and over the swell of her bare breasts, her body illuminated by the glow of the sconces on either side of her.
This time he did hold his breath.
He held the satin in his hands, running the soft fabric between his calloused fingers in an absent prayer-like motion as he allowed his eyes to travel over the utter perfection of her form.
He let himself see her completely, to look fully upon the parts of her that he had never let himself believe he’d be worthy of.
He must have made a sound, some disbelieving primal thing in his throat, because she crossed the space between them and pulled herself to her tiptoes, wrapping her hands around his cheeks and pulling him down to kiss her again, this time with the full warmth of their bare skin colliding in full as he received her.
He filled his hands with her bare skin, stroking the long, perfect lines of her back. He let his mind ease. He reminded himself that she was his wife. His wife. His.
“You should get in first,” she whispered against his mouth, “and then help me.”
“Oh?” he asked, pulling back and quirking his lips at her. “I thought you had a talent for climbing very large things.”
“Oh, I do,” she said with a breathy sigh, running her hands over his chest and ribs in a way that brokered no question over her meaning, trailing them just short of as low as he’d like them to be until his eyes flickered shut and his breath stuttered. “I just like when you fuss over me.”
He reached for her wrists, clicking his tongue at her in rebuke. “I’m about to do more than fuss,” he warned her, making her flash her teeth at him.
“Good.”
He shook his head, firmly placing her wandering hands at her sides and then gripping her chin to place a firm, stern little kiss on her lips before he turned his back on her to climb into the tub, feeling the graze of her hungry blue eyes on his back as he did.
He sank to his knees in the warm, fragrant water, releasing a breath of pleasure at how easily his frame fit into the thing.
They’d measured him to build it, assuring him it would accommodate his impressive proportions, but he hadn’t really believed it would until just this moment, as the steaming water lapped up at the base of his ribs, carrying with it loose petals in violet and red.
He lifted some of the water and ran it over his hair, turning to see his wife watching, her fingers between her teeth, her naked breasts rising and falling with what appeared to be rapt enthrallment.
He offered her his hand, allowing himself to enjoy the way she startled a little, like she’d been caught staring.
She blushed and hurried forward to accept his offered hand, skittish as a hare at the entry of a fox’s den.
He bit back a chuckle at how charming it was, these little flickers of bashfulness while she remained the most tempting creature ever put on this earth.
He kept his hand steady, urging her closer, and leaned over the rim to catch her fingers and brace her little waist as he helped her step into the marble basin.
She made no effort to find her own space, placing her feet on either side of him and dropping directly into his lap with a little squeak and a sparkle in her eye that betrayed the fabrication of her clumsiness. She slipped forward, catching herself against his shoulders, and whispered, “Oops!”
“Hannah,” he said with a resigned little sigh, pushing her hair off her shoulder and letting it float into the water as he brought her closer, leaning down to taste the dip of her collarbone, running his tongue along the delicate groove in her flesh.
“You do know that when you do things like that now, the rules have changed.”
“There are rules?” she asked sweetly, closing her eyes and leaning her head back, encouraging him to taste her at his leisure. “I wasn’t aware.”
“There were rules for me,” he clarified, nudging her closer so that she was firmly planted against his bare arousal, his kisses trailing lower over the swell of her breasts. “You might have had some, but I don’t think you ever adhered to them.”
“Sounds very tedious,” she murmured between little gasps and sighs, clinging to him and rocking her hips against where he’d put her. “And what will change now?”
He reached behind her to the little tray on the rim of the tub and took up the sponge sitting on it, dragging it through the water with a curl of floral soap without interrupting his sampling of her bosom.
He flicked his tongue over her nipple as he started to lather her back, circling the soft sponge over the base of her spine and working it up the delicate latticework of her back in careful motions.