Chapter 14

Chapter Fourteen

L iam barely felt his bloody knuckles as Cora poured the whisky into matching tumblers. She set them and the decanter on the small tray the maid had used to carry up a poultice and clean linen strips, and she carried everything over to the wingback armchair he sat in near the fire. Setting the tray on the small table to his left, she uncorked the decanter once more, poured a bit of the whisky on the linen, and knelt before him.

She settled her hand, palm up, on his thigh and curled her fingers a bit, bounced them back out straight. "Your hand, please."

He gave her the unbruised one.

"The other." She lifted a brow, waited.

With a sigh, he gave in, placing his palm against hers.

She hissed, her fingertips hovering over his knuckles, busted and flecked with blood.

And then he hissed because she pressed the whisky-soaked linen into his wounds.

"I must clean it," she said softly.

"Of course. You have no injuries, do you? I can send for a doctor."

"None whatsoever."

"Good." He cleared his throat, unsure what to say next. Her tender touch brought him to life and rocked him into a hazy, sleepy state at the same time. She'd never taken such consideration over him before, never seemed to care enough about him to tend to any wound he might have. She'd appeared… too distant, too sure of their independence from one another to take any interest.

Now she knelt before him, rubbing salve into his wounds and binding them tightly with clean linen.

"Liam," she said, watching her hands twist the bandage round and round, "you were magnificent today."

"I was terrified. Fights are like that." He rubbed his weary eyes. They'd returned later than expected, dawdling on the path back home and stopping to watch the last dying moments of the day bleed color across the sky. He'd been content to have her happy and safe on the bumpy bench beside him, anxious to extend that moment of quietude as long as possible after the fracas of the boxing match. "They break out at any moment. Unpredictable. Men's blood already boiled by the violence. And when money switches hands, or fails to, things turn nasty. Dangerous. God, Cora, when you were ripped out of my hold, I panicked. It's my job to keep you safe." He leaned forward and cupped her cheek, his hand all but swallowing the side of her face as he urged her to lift it and look at him.

She did, tilting her head the smallest bit into his palm. "I am safe."

"Should you like to learn to throw a punch? I admit that, knowing you could, would give me great comfort." Particularly since she did not seem inclined to remain by his side indefinitely. If he could not convince her to stay, he could at least have the satisfaction of knowing she knew how to lay a man out flat.

"I would like that very much. Then I shall know how to protect myself with knee and fist." Cora tied the ends of the bandage in a tight bow. "There. Now, were you hit? Need I inspect any other bit of you?"

"You can inspect every single bit of me." He slunk in the chair, stretching his legs out long, one of them sliding with a quiet hush against her skirts.

Her breath caught, and the corner of her mouth twitched up. "I was hoping you'd say that." But she dropped her hands away from him and looked across the room.

They were alone. Finally.

She was not hiding from him. Finally.

And he was going to bring her body to the trembling edge of pleasure until she shivered over it and fell into his arms.

Finally.

He picked the tumbler of whisky she'd poured him and took a bracing sip. This, his first real test of his recently acquired education. The brothel had been impulse. So, too, had their fumbling in the portrait gallery. This would be quite, quite meditated. The whisky burned going down.

He would make her burn.

He leaned forward and slipped his hand around her neck, fingers sinking soft into the hair at her nape. He nudged her nose with his, intending to kiss her. Instead, he told the truth. "I want to please you, Kitten, make you purr."

"I want you to as well."

"But I am"—he swallowed, wishing for more whisky—"doubtful."

"Of?"

He licked his lips. "My ability to do so."

The touch of her fingers on his neck, a sudden caress, made him shiver. She smiled, like they shared a secret, naughty and joyful and just between them two. "I do not doubt you at all. There is heat between us. We have proven that. And when I remember how tenderly you touch me at times… and how quickly I made you come… when I think how much you want me." She shivered. "I cannot wait for more."

How had she known exactly what to say to give him courage? How had she known exactly what to say to make him feel invincible?

He nudged her nose with his once more, and with his lips brushing soft and light against hers, he said, "I am going to kiss you now."

Then he did, a lingering, slow, sparking sort of thing, hotter than the fire. He pulled away, a mere breath, her already heavy breaths fogging the air between them. He tugged her to her feet and kissed her again, walking her backward toward the bed. One foot and then the other, legs and skirts and lips parted, tongues seeking until she bumped up against the bed and gave a slight gasp. He wrapped an arm around her waist and lowered her to the mattress. Her hair spread like spilt ink across the quilt. Her chest rose and fell with little pants. He brushed away a lock of hair caught on her lips, pushing it behind her ear and kissing her temple. Every move gentle. Every move, slow, savoring.

No panicked rush now. She'd given him the courage to move at a more prowling pace, and he set a knee on the bed beside her, lowered his body over her soft curves, and licked her lips, tasted her tongue, thanked God for Cora Fletcher, Lady Norton.

She'd found courage, too, and her graceful fingers flitted about his body—neck and shoulders, hair and chest. When she fisted the linen of his shirt and tugged, he captured her wrist and held it tight against the mattress. She regarded him with a brow crooked in curiosity.

"All for you tonight," he said. "Lie there, Wife, and let me please you." A quick nip at her lips led to a line of kisses over her chin and down the long line of her neck. Pulling down her bodice, he released each breast and kissed them, nipping and licking. Before leaving them, too. His hands spanning her waist, he placed a single, singeing kiss near her navel. Too much material between them, fully dressed as she was, but he lingered there, holding her, promising to give her everything.

Then he slid off the bed, hit his knees, and dragged her hips to the mattress's edge. He hooked her legs over his shoulders and grasped the hem of her gown. She bit her lip, and her hands fisted in the quilt. Beautiful. He lifted her skirts above her shins, above her knees, and resting them across her hips so her legs opened wide the very center of her body to his perusal. He ran his hand up on a stocking-clad calf, then down again. Up and down, up and down, first palm, then the backs of his fingers, watching how each stroke and caress tensed her face, then relaxed it. Every touch flexed a new expression over her features.

He kissed the inside of her thigh and raked his fingers down the exposed length of them from hip to knee and back up, flirting with that little button at her center he hoped would drive her wild. Then he kissed a line up the inside of her thigh to her very core. When she moaned, he tightened, feeling impossibly hard already. But somehow, he put the demanding need of his body away.

To focus on her.

"I have wanted to do this for so long," he whispered against her skin. "I have imagined it and dreamed of it. What will you taste like? How will you sound? I'm going to find out." He wasn't asking permission. He wasn't waiting for her to give it. He simply licked the seam of her sex, and she shivered. "Cold? I'll warm you."

She reached for him, sinking her hands deep into his hair, taking the fever of his need a pitch higher.

Not now.

Now her . He kissed her cunny softly, and her hands made fists in his hair, pulling him closer to her center. He licked, and she moaned, and his hands clenched gently around her thighs. Better that than losing control. She did not seem to mind, though. She made the cutest little moans and squeaks.

"You like that?" he asked.

"Yes," she breathed.

No more gentleness from his hands, then. His fingernails dug into the meat of her thigh, and then he smoothed his palms around to cup her bottom. He kissed and kissed and licked and sucked until she writhed beneath his touch, until she called his name, pleaded.

"Liam… do something. God, just do something."

"Not yet." He nipped at her inner thigh. His entire body had gone hard with a need that felt fatal. But still he focused on her. Only on Cora.

She growled and thrashed, but still she did not come. And Liam needed it. Needed it for her .

Flattening a palm against her belly, he smoothed it up until he found a breast, and as he kissed her cunny once more, he rolled her pebbled nipple between thumb and finger. He kneaded her arse, and holy hell, the woman felt like perfection everywhere he touched and tasted—breast, backside, and sweet, sweet center. Wine and honey and heaven.

"Liam," she moaned, "Oh, oh. Oh, I'm so close to… to something ."

His hands tightened, and he exhaled a rough breath across her cunny. She shivered and moaned but still did not come. What did she need? What did she like? How could he give it to her?

She liked to feel wanted. Hadn't she told him that? Yes, now time to show her he'd listened.

He slid back up her body, keeping one hand at her center and the other kneading her breast. He found her lips and kissed her hard, then said hot and near her ear, "Touch me."

"W-what?" A barely there and stuttered word as her body stilled beneath his.

He did not still. He worked his thumb in slow circles around that most sensitive bit of her. "Touch me to see how much I want you, how much I need you right now." When she did, no doubt, he'd lose control, embarrass himself again, but it did not matter. What mattered was that she knew , she believed .

Her fingertips trailed down the length of his body, sparking like matches against his skin, their heat leaving the marks of her progress on his chest, his abdomen, his hip. And then she palmed his cock, and he almost damn well exploded. He threw his head back and growled a curse or perhaps a prayer to help him keep control.

"Yes," she breathed. "You do want me." There should not be a single note of surprise in her voice, but there was.

And it enraged him. He kissed her again, needing to show her, needing it more than breath, and they connected everywhere—lips to lips and hands to the places on their bodies that screamed for release.

"I do want you," he said between hard kisses, his hand working quickly and methodically between her legs. Continuing to circle with his thumb, he slipped first one finger and then another into her. She bucked against him, and he met her movement. "I do. Now come for me, Cora. C—"

She broke to pieces with a cry, her back arching off the bed, her hands pulling at his hair, lighting up delicious pin pricks of pain across his scalp. She shivered, her hand shaking and pulsing against his cock where still she held it. He would come, too. He bit the side of his tongue to somehow control it, but she said his name in the softest, breathiest way as she floated back to the bed.

She lay like a velvet gown puddled on the floor with the smallest sated smile upon her lips. He'd put that there. He knew how she felt now, when she'd caused him to lose control—elated.

And powerful. And like, for the moment at least, he was impervious to mistake making.

He gathered her body into his arms, scattering kisses across her face. He was hard and ready, but he could wait, could let her have this moment. She turned into his embrace, touching him lightly, half asleep. Together their hearts pounded, and together their breathing ripped ragged through the air. And together their bones melted heavy into the bed as he stroked his fingertips through her hair.

"Next time, you too," she said, nuzzling into his chest.

"As you wish." He kissed the top of her head, and when he moved to leave, she wrapped arms strong as chains around him.

"Stay. I want to stay here."

Not a chance in hell he'd let her go anywhere but his bed tonight. He placed another kiss to the top of her head where she smelled of something warm and floral—a flower in a summer garden. "I'll return shortly." He needed to clean up, and he needed to coax her out of her stays. And she might need cleaning, too, and what an excellent opportunity for exploration that would prove.

He found the washbasin and submersed one of the linen bandages into it. Then he exchanged his clothes for a dressing gown and fished out the linen, wrung it out, and returned to the bed. Nudging her leg aside with his knee, he cleaned her slowly. She made little, sleepy, mewling noises that shot straight to his still-throbbing cock. To his heart, too.

"So very pretty everywhere, Cora," he whispered.

She chuckled, the smallest sound when her mirth should be loud and echoing.

"Sit up."

With his help, she obeyed, but sleep swayed her from side to side. "I've always wondered. About that. Did you"—she yawned—"enjoy it?" His wife, it seemed, reacted peculiarly to finding release—she seemed to drift on the pleasure into sleepiness.

"Yes. More than I can say." The tapes at the back of her gown fell easily beneath his touch, and the gown slid off her shoulders. The stays proved just as simple to remove, and when he pulled her to her feet so everything but her shift might slide down her body and to the floor, she leaned into him, her head nestled in the crook of his shoulder. Still, she trusted. He hoped he was worth it.

By the time he'd laid her back down, he knew they would go no further for now. She'd fallen into a deep sleep, satiated and sweet. He held her close and nuzzled her temple with his nose. Any man who thought of his naked wife as often as he did should want more than this. Any man who walked around as hard and as often as he did, because one roll of his wife's pretty eyes made him want to strip her bare, should find no satisfaction in quiet moments.

But this quiet moment felt more like forever than any he'd ever shared with her. So, he held her, and he let his heart feel full with her, and soon, he slept, too.