Chapter Eight #2
Brinley rocked to his feet and approached her.
He began to circle her extremely slowly.
“No, I was not with another woman.” He leaned in so close that his warm breath tickled the back of her neck.
She bit her lip to stifle a little chill of awareness.
“I must admit that I am flattered by your jealousy, though.”
It was on the tip of Clara’s tongue to vehemently deny his assertion that she was jealous, but she became mute when he brushed a finger across her lower lip. Everything within her froze—her ire, her mind, even her heart.
His voice was so low and intimate when next he spoke.
“In the spirit of confessions, I admit that I, too, was never thrilled with the prospect of all those whelps who attempted to call upon you and had the nerve to believe they were worthy of courting you. I loathed every last one of them. I am only slightly ashamed to say that each time Kempton mentioned he’d been approached for his blessing, I did whatever I could to dissuade the suit.
” He continued speaking over her little gasp of shock.
“All those ‘little Claras’ you despise…they were my attempt to convince myself that you had not grown into a lovely young woman. A desirable young woman.” His drawl was sensuous and sinfully dark.
Clara could hardly credit what she was hearing; her heart leapt so high that it nearly choked her. Her eyes slid shut of their own volition when he began to trail his fingers along her arm as he walked, barely caressing the curve of her shoulder, the downy hair at the arched nape of her neck.
“Have you been drinking again?” she asked, grasping for a reason for his behavior.
Brinley was not a man who waxed poetic; she had never known him to be a man who used words in such a way.
She was desperate to find logic in this interaction, though logic was the furthest thing from her mind when awareness began to buzz through her veins like bees awakening in springtime.
“A little, but it’s long since cleared from my head,” Brinley answered honestly.
“But enough remains to whet my appetite.” His steps halted in front of her, and he tilted her chin up with a crooked finger, so she was forced to meet his eyes.
“I have not stopped thinking about our kiss…” The mercurial pools drew her in, held her helplessly captivated.
“I thought it was a mistake,” Clara breathed.
“It was,” he murmured, standing so close to her that she could feel the heat of his body, as if she stood too close to a roaring fire.
“But now, little Clara, you’re mine to do with as I please.
” With a movement so swift she had not realized what was being done until it was too late, her husband pulled her flush against him, releasing another gasp from her constricted lungs.
“And it would please me greatly to kiss my wife. Properly.” He lowered his head until their mouths were so close, they shared one breath.
Clara’s lips parted, and her head tilted back in silent invitation because, God yes, she hadn’t been able to put that kiss from her mind either.
She’d lain awake too many nights trying to decipher his intention, unwilling to accept his brushing it off as a simple mistake.
There had been no accident in the way his tongue had stroked hers.
And there was no forgetting the way heat pooled at the juncture of her thighs whenever she replayed it.
And so, Clara waited with bated breath until finally, with excruciating slowness, Brinley’s lips whispered over hers, softer than the wings of a butterfly.
Side to side he grazed her mouth. Again.
Again. Again. Just when she thought she might cry from the anticipation, his lips sealed over hers.
Every ounce of sense fled her body as she went pliant in Brinley’s arms. In a desperate attempt to remain upright, Clara flung her arms around his broad shoulders, clutching onto the expanse of taut fabric and hard muscle beneath.
Good lord, what did the man do in his spare time to have earned such a physique?
And how soon until she could view it in all its glory?
Brinley’s talented tongue licked its way into her mouth as she surrendered with a sigh.
He tasted of sweet brandy and the intoxicating musk of desire.
The low groan he emitted when she began to kiss him back in earnest made her dizzy and nearly insensible.
Who knew he could make such a sound? She certainly hadn’t, but she’d give anything to hear it again.
In an attempt to do just that, Clara pressed their bodies together more tightly, fastening her arms more fully around his shoulders until her toes nearly left the thick pile of the rug.
Just when her fingers found the nape of his neck and the short-cropped golden hair there, Brinley wrenched his mouth from hers. Both breathing heavily, their eyes met once more. Clara imagined her cloudy gaze looked much like his—pupils blown wide to nearly swallow all color from the irises.
“And,” he panted, “it would please me greatly to show my wife exactly how much I truly desire her.”
Before she could think, he lifted her into his arms and carried her to the bed. She hung there in his embrace, carried as if she weighed no more than a pile of clothing, hardly believing what was taking place. How had she gone from anger, resentment, and embarrassment to this?
She knew why.
Brinley.
He was the only person who brought out these sudden, extreme changes in her, and he seemed to know exactly how to use them to both their advantage. In that moment, she didn’t think she much minded it.
Gently, he settled her down onto the bed, her lower legs hanging off the side of the plush mattress.
He prowled after her, his right knee pressing into the cushioning beside her hip while his other foot was planted for balance on the floor.
He leaned over her, drinking in the sight of her prone beneath him with intense, dancing eyes.
It should have felt invasive; instead, she experienced an inexplicably pleasant mixture of arousal and nerves.
This was what she’d been prepared for, wasn’t it?
She forced herself to take as deep a calming breath as she could, and she couldn’t help but notice the way his gaze locked onto the rise and fall of her chest. Her aching nipples budded beneath his scrutiny, and that only made his eyes darken further.
He took one of her hands in each of his before drawing them above her head, capturing both of her wrists within the circles of his large fingers.
Though he held her firmly, she instinctively knew he’d release her if she asked it of him.
Still, tasting his strength and power was exciting in an unfamiliar way.
His fingertips grazed the length of the underside of her arm, branding a lazy, painfully slow and gentle trail down her side until she nearly squirmed.
The backs of his fingers grazed her belly and up between her breasts to the underside of her chin.
She was nearly breathless when he pressed the pad of his thumb to the pillow of her lower lip.
“There is nothing childish about you, wife,” he said hoarsely. His eyes held her captive.
He dropped his head and kissed her again, beginning to settle his weight atop her.
While she was swept away by his lips and tongue, his large, warm hand cupped her breast, the pads of his fingers gently toying with her hardened nipple through the fabric of her nightshift.
All the trepidation and anxiety she had been bottling up dissipated beneath his skilled mouth and fingers.
He proceeded to drag up her hem in slow degrees, so gradually that Clara did not notice what he had done until her thighs were bared to the air of the room.
Instinctively, she tried to reach down and cover herself, but he held her arms fast—proving to her that he could, indeed, bend her to his will should he so choose.
Brinley slowly shook his head, his golden hair slightly tousled, and kissed her until she was once more pliant as clay beneath his ministrations.
Her skin danced with sparks when she felt the soft caress of his fingertips along her inner thigh, tickling higher and higher until he finally ever so lightly began to stroke the seam of her sex.
Clara was briefly mortified by the moisture he found there, but his reassuring smile against her lips told her this was a good thing.
It was something pleasing. She found she liked pleasing him, no matter how unintentionally.
It unleashed a tide of boldness within her as she wondered how else her body might welcome him, and how he might react and praise her for it.
He stroked her in slow increments, parting the petals of her sex in torturously unhurried caresses, spreading her blooming slickness, teasing her with delicious sensation until her knees fell open wide and her breath came in deep and desirous heaves.
When the pad of one finger finally swirled around a sensitive bundle of nerves, her hips bucked and she gasped, not expecting the sudden and powerful sensation.
A white-hot flash of something raw and exciting shot through her limbs before pooling low in her belly.
Each stroke unleashed another ripple of that light until she could do nothing but allow herself to float away.
Brinley continued his onslaught, firmly holding onto her wrists when she became desperate to touch him, pinning her left leg between his and using his knee to trap her legs wide when she would have clamped her thighs around the sensations that made her tremble and gasp.
It was becoming too much.
She felt like a bowstring pulled too tight, her every muscle clenching and flexing as it strained for something she could not name. Her body vibrated with new sensations almost terrifying in their intensity.
“Brinley!” she whimpered as her body rocked in time with his caresses.