Chapter 19 #2
Unwrapping Louisa’s dressing gown, Benedict cupped one of her perfect breasts and kissed her again, even more deeply. When he pulled back to look into her eyes, she was panting wildly, aroused and unnerved, her hardening nipple pressing into his palm.
“I shall give you such pleasure as you have never dreamed, Louisa,” he whispered into her ear, his other hand dipping lower to caress her hip and the curve of her bottom. “I promise you will scream my name before I am done…”
Her passionate response to the kiss that followed was all that Benedict could have hoped.
Louisa might know little of the pleasures of the flesh yet but all the signs were that she would prove an adept pupil to his teaching.
She whimpered and quivered as his hand lingered at her bottom, pressing lightly at the backs of her thighs, toward the damp crevice between them.
“Oh!” Louisa moaned again, jerking slightly, although pressing into Benedict’s touch rather than away from him.
Her golden-haired face was a picture of desire, confusion and awe, beautifully overwhelmed by only these partial and preliminary caresses.
“Yes,” breathed Benedict, intruding his hand just a little further between her thighs so that the thin fabric pressed inward and his fingertips could just detect the texture of her womanly hair and the wet heat he was drawing from her. “Just like that.”
Louisa’s hands clung to his shirt as Benedict held her so, communicating a sensual restlessness in the kisses of her panting lips and in the involuntary movement of her hips.
Soon enough those hands would press equally tightly on his back, and her thighs would grip Benedict’s waist as he mounted and worked her to ecstasy.
Louisa was already hot and wet and his to take.
When he lifted her, the shape and weight of her body in Benedict’s arms felt utterly natural, as if she belonged there.
Again, he told himself that Louisa would truly belong to him in the eyes of the church, the law and society soon enough.
Did it really matter if he claimed her tonight, only a few weeks before the wedding ceremony?
In the moment, he could think of no good reason why he should not.
Given their betrothal and mutual lust, all else now felt irrelevant to Benedict.
No one had any right to stop this now, except the breathless and excited woman in his arms. As his lips and tongue trailed Louisa’s throat, he tasted the faint salt of her skin and wanted more.
Then, as he bore her towards that inviting rug, she stiffened, something changed in her face and when she said his name this time, the tone of her voice was different.
“Benedict, we can’t…”
“I want you, Louisa, and you want me. What is to stop us?” he murmured, his voice thick with desire, kissing her again and again between his words.
“No, Benedict, we mustn’t,” she said very clearly and turned away her face, still panting but apparently determined in her resolution. “Even if I do want you, I cannot, not like this…”
“Louisa,” he breathed heavily, inhaling that woodland violet scent in her hair and struggling against his basest instincts. “Do not be afraid. You are ready for me and I promise it will be good, I promise…”
“Put me down, Benedict,” she said softly but firmly and he obeyed, biting back a groan of thwarted longing. “I must go.”
Louisa fled the room without another word or look, tying her dressing gown again as she went. Benedict forced himself to let her go and make no attempt at following. He felt like an utter beast.
What in hell’s name had he almost done tonight?
It was bad enough that Benedict had ever kissed Lady Louisa Ascot in the first place and compromised her into a marriage neither of them had wanted.
Now he had almost deflowered her hastily on the rug in the library, where anyone might have heard or seen them.
Why do I keep losing all my self-control around her?
Louisa deserved better than him, although that much could not be helped.
At the least, however, Benedict should not make her induction to physical pleasure a hurried tussle on the library floor.
Louisa should be taken slowly and gently in a private bedroom, with a wedding ring on her finger, and her husband’s vows fresh in her mind.
Well, at least those vows to comfort, honor, and keep her in sickness and in health. Benedict had already made it clear that the vows concerning love and forsaking all others could hardly apply in their case.
His heartbeat slowing again now, Benedict turned and saw the book lying still on the ground where it had fallen from his hand as he kissed Louisa. The sight of it made him smile, despite his self-recrimination.
What is so important in that silly little book that Louisa was prepared to wrestle it from me…?
As Benedict took the volume from the floor, an ancient dried flower fell from the center pages to the ground and he bent to pick that up too.
Had Louisa once pressed it there, he wondered?
Likely it was his imagination, but when he raised the flower to his nose, he thought he still detected some scent, and then determined that it was woodland violet, not rose.
Going to the sheepskin rug with the flower in his hand, Benedict lay down and began to read, feeling some part of Louisa close to him as he did so.
This is the tale of the brave knight Sir Benedict Palmer, the Shining Shield of Wanderham, the purest and most honorable of the king’s warriors in the long-ago days when fearsome beasts, powerful wizards and evil villains roamed the land…