Chapter Eighteen
They were in bed before nightfall.
Bram was not certain how that happened, because they were responsible adults who still had much to discuss, and this was no first experience of intimacy for either of them.
But they shed their clothes the moment they were locked inside Miranda’s bedchamber and began to devour each other like hungry wolves.
Somehow Bram wound up flat on his back, cupping and gently kneading one of Miranda’s soft, lovely breasts while she sat astride him, leaning forward, their mouths grinding and hot against each other.
There was something to be said for pent-up passion.
Miranda had not been touched in fifteen years and, frankly, it showed in the way those flames of desire were bursting out of her with little effort required on his part.
Och, she was clutching his shoulders and pressing her mouth to his with ravaging ardor.
But she was also crying. He felt the moisture on her cheek as he caressed her.
He ended the kiss because her tears concerned him. “Miranda?”
She scrambled off him when he shifted in order to sit up and take her in his arms. She brushed her tears aside with the back of her hand, obviously dismayed by her behavior. “I don’t know why this is happening.”
He drew her into his arms and then straightened the bedsheets around them, for they had done a fine job of messing them up. “Yer tears? Or yer ardor?” he remarked, raising the sheet to cover her bosom and provide modesty while she was about to confide her feelings to him.
Aye, this was Miranda feeling everything she had suppressed since that cruel betrayal all those years ago, and her, barely a lass of eighteen when she’d married, was humiliated, becoming a widow at the tender age of twenty.
She nodded. “Both. Oh, Bram. Why are my feelings such a mess?”
“Ye’ve lived with yer past pain for so long, ye forgot what it means to be happy.
Let the past go, my love. Yer life is with me now.
We will walk it together. I’m no’ here just for tonight,” he said, knowing her late husband had abandoned her shortly after their wedding night.
This had to be what she was fearing would happen with them next.
“Ye’ll no’ be rid of me so easily,” he gently teased.
She laughed.
“Och, sweetheart,” he said, giving her cheek a gentle caress. “Ye’re mine to love and protect from this day forward. I’ll no’ be shirking my duty to ye. Nor is it a duty when being with ye gives me so much pleasure. We have strong feelings for each other, so dinna be afraid to acknowledge them.”
“I thought it would be easy for me to move forward because I love you so much, Bram.”
“Aye, lass. I know ye do. Perhaps this is all too much for ye at once.”
“It is,” she admitted.
He wrapped his arms more securely around her. “Let’s take it slow. Ye’ve nothing to prove to me or to yerself. Do ye wish to talk for a while? Rest yer head on my shoulder and ye can tell me what is running through yer mind.”
She nodded, then nestled against him and closed her eyes while he gently stroked her silky cinnamon curls. Her hair was such a beautiful color, a burnished copper by candlelight, and felt so soft to the touch as he skimmed his fingers through her lush mane.
She said nothing, just curled her body against his for a while. He wasn’t certain what had brought forth her tears as they were about to couple. Perhaps they had gone about it too fast and she’d got the feeling it would be over and done within a trice, and then he would leave her.
Well, he would take it slow with her. They had all night.
He knew that he could pleasure her because she was not averse to his body, nor was she shy about having him look at hers, so beautifully shaped and quite exquisite. Neither of them had on a stitch of clothing, and she did not seem to mind.
Nor did he mind that her ample breasts were resting against his chest, soft and round, and would be as sweet as cream when he finally got to tasting them. One of her legs was brushing up against his own, bent slightly and quite close to his private parts, which he was trying to keep from stirring.
But Miranda excited him and his body could not help but respond.
“Bram…”
“Aye, sweetheart?”
“Let’s try this again.”
He did not need coaxing. His body was already hot and he was feeling an animal urge to mate with his wife.
Want her. Claim her. Protect what’s mine.
“Aye. I’m ready if ye are.”
He shifted their positions so that she was on her back. He settled himself over her, and then propped himself on his elbows so as not to squash her. He considered getting straight down to business, then held back. He wanted her to experience the throes of passion first.
He did not think she had ever known that.
Och, all of this was new to her.
He realized the extent of her inexperience when she gasped and regarded him in confusion the moment his mouth closed over one of her creamy breasts and he began to tease the bud with his tongue.
Blessed saints. Had that craven man never properly touched her? Had he never been tender with her?
No wonder she had burst into tears just before.
Bram was no rake or practiced seducer, had never worked on his prowess or bothered with books on the art of seduction, just did whatever came naturally to him. Women had not complained. Of course, they wouldn’t, because he was a duke and they hoped to get something out of him.
But all Miranda wanted was his love.
He put all of his heart into each kiss and caress, into each lick upon her soft skin, and watched her responses.
She obviously liked what he was doing, for Miranda was honest in her feelings and would only react truthfully to his touch.
He closed his mouth over her breast, pleased when she purred and plunged her hands in his hair, which was too long by ton standards, in order to draw his head closer.
He ought to have had his hair trimmed before the start of Parliament, but this is what set him apart from an English gentleman.
He wasn’t elegant and had no plans to be.
He moved to her other breast, equally soft and sweet on his tongue, and got his ears pulled forward this time.
He heard her soft moans, and was pleased she enjoyed his touch.
He moved lower.
“Bram!”
“Hush, love. Ye must trust me,” he said, hoping he was not moving too fast with this intimacy, but he wanted her aroused when he claimed her…and he wanted to taste her there, too.
“I do. You must know I do.”
“Aye, love,” he said, and placed his mouth on her, knowing she was either going to purr like a kitten or kick him in the jaw, believing good girls did not do such things in the bedchamber.
He was fairly certain that Miranda had a lot of passion in her and was not going to be prudish in bed.
He meant to draw out a little of her wild side.
He was soon rewarded, for he felt her quivers against her warm skin and heard her soft purrs, those cries sounding so sweet from her lips. “Oh…ooh…Bram.”
She was almost there.
“Bram.”
Och, she had the sweetest voice.
“I love ye something fierce, Miranda.”
He felt all the pride in the world when she soared to the stars, moaning and calling his name and clinging to his shoulders as she found her release.
He moved back upward and took her in his arms. “Ye’re so lovely, lass.”
“Oh, goodness,” she said, laughing softly between panting breaths. “I did not know it could be like this.”
“It will always be good between us, sweetheart.”
She laid her hand upon his cheek. “But we are only half done. You’ve neglected your own needs.”
“We’ll get to the coupling next,” he said in all seriousness, for this was important. “But I wanted ye to know ye will always be first in my heart. Pleasing ye and taking care of ye will always be what matters most to me.”
“You impossible man,” she said, hugging him fiercely. “You’ve stolen my heart. How will I ever be able to get angry with you after this? I love you so much. Everyone will laugh at us as we trip over ourselves to make each other happy. We will be the most ridiculous duke and duchess ever to exist.”
“I’ll no’ complain. How can I ask for anyone better?
Ye care for me and love me. I’d call it paradise.
” He’d meant for her to experience her release first, and not rush her for the rest of what was to come.
But he found himself too aroused by her softness and her achingly sweet smiles, so he knew he was not going to hold out much longer.
Miranda was aware and did not leave him to suffer. “I’m ready, Bram. Make me yours.”
He gave a feral growl and wasted no time in claiming her.
Their joining wasn’t artful or practiced, just hot and real, and exquisitely pleasurable. There was much grunting and moaning, much touching and exploration, and always joy in their union, for they both appreciated the chance they had been given to make a good marriage.
As their bodies soared to the stars together, Bram felt the rightness of their bond and knew he was the luckiest man in the world to have found Miranda.
She had won his heart the moment she’d hurled that first vase at him at Lanark Castle. It was a losing battle for him from then on.
He was hers.
She had conquered him, heart, body, and soul.
Perhaps Miranda’s residing on Duchess Square was an omen.
She was now his duchess.
And while their lives and home life would be mostly at Lanark Castle, he did not mind being a Scot on Duchess Square whenever he was in London.