Chapter Nine

July 20, 1815

A sound that wasn't what Marjorie had been accustomed to hearing came to her ears in the middle of the night, and it didn't belong there. She closed her eyes and tried to return to slumber, but a few seconds later, the soft snick of the door adjoining her dressing room closing echoed in the dark and silent space.

She lifted her head off the pillow. "Who's there?"

"Don't trouble yourself. It is only I." The rumble of Benedict's voice in the shadows sent awareness sailing over her skin. Then the mattress depressed and the bedclothes rustled. Seconds later, he eased his body close to her, and what was more, the marquess was completely nude. "If you don't wish for company, I shall return to my room."

The soothing sound of rain outside the open windows tried to lull her back into sleep, but this new development prevented that. "Please don't. I like having you near." His presence coupled with the rain and the scents from the wet nighttime world outside was quite cozy and lovely. In fact, it made her think about highly inappropriate things such as a future when there wasn't anything there before.

"Good."

"Did you walk here without a stitch of clothing on?" She snuggled back into her pillow, and even though she lay on her belly, the thought of having him next to her sans clothing was more than thrilling.

"I had a banyan on but shed it once inside the room." He said nothing more, and her eyes drifted closed.

Yet she smiled in the darkness. "Ever the surprise, Your Lordship," she murmured as she settled in for sleep.

Almost into slumber, tingles of need shuddered down her spine as he pressed his lips to her shoulder while dancing the fingertips of one hand along her back. "What are you doing?" Not that she minded. They hadn't been together in a carnal capacity for a couple of days.

"Hopefully getting into wicked trouble." He moved his form so that he could easily access her nape, which he then kissed and licked until she shivered with need. "I didn't wish to pass the night alone, especially after talking to my wife."

Now that was odd. "Do you do that often?" No wonder he clung to the past.

"At times when she comes to me in ghostly form during the times my mind in conflicted." As he spoke, Benedict caressed his fingertips over her skin, swiping them along her sides, down her back, around her buttocks through the thin fabric of her night dress. Every touch was gentle and different in tone than their usual encounters.

"Are you conflicted now?"

"No." Once more, he changed position, and this time he encouraged her onto her back. The night dress twisted hopelessly beneath her. "This is where I need to be tonight."

"Why is that?" While it was fun to tease him, there was a certain truth to the questioning, for they had known each other for nearly two weeks and there had to be more between them than this immediate and consuming heat.

"I merely needed you." The marquess followed the statement by pressing his lips lightly to hers, and he lingered there for a time, apparently content in kissing her with a tenderness that hadn't been present in any of their couplings thus far. In fact, it was reminiscent of the kiss he gave her in the portrait gallery.

A tiny piece of her heart flew into his keeping. Not knowing what to say, Marjorie ran a hand up and down his arm. The solid feel of this man's form was always so satisfying, and the marquess was so deliciously muscled that her mind fell to fantasies.

And still he kissed her as if he didn't have anything else to do. The sensation of falling assailed her, but she held onto him and returned his kisses. It was beyond intimate and drew them closer together emotionally as well as spiritually if that were possible. Nothing like that had ever happened with her husband, and the fact that it was happening with Benedict both stunned and pleased her.

Could he feel that too? Is that what had brought him to her tonight?

A faint rumble of thunder far in the distance rolled through the air, and it only enhanced the coziness enveloping her.

When he closed his lips around an erect nipple through the thin fabric of her night dress, a gasp escaped her throat and her back arched. The marquess said nothing as he teased and tormented her other nipple with his fingers. All too soon, heightened sensations flooded her body. Heat licked through her veins. She clutched at his biceps and writhed from his erotic attentions. At some point, she surged upward and bit his shoulder with no idea of why, but he didn't seem to mind. He merely chuckled and pinched one of her nipples. Pleasure tingled between her thighs, and when she assumed she might break merely from his play at her breasts, the marquess moved again.

"You are an addiction, Marjorie," he whispered, and the sound of his voice was nearly overwhelmed by the rain. As he spoke, he flipped her over onto her stomach and then slowly shoved up the hem of her night dress. "You have infected my blood, inflamed my body, seeped into my brain, and I am naught but a slave to your siren song."

"That is much how I feel about you; it is insanity yet marvelous." Never had she known such a connection with a man after so little time. Trembles careened down her spine as she encouraged her legs apart and then settled himself on his knees between them. "To think we wouldn't have this if it weren't for that dratted horse bolting."

"Which makes this all the more confusing. A chance meeting has turned my existence upside down and has mucked about in my thoughts." The whisper of his lips on her back, tracing her spine all the way down to her rear had the ability to steal her breath.

"Perhaps we should puzzle through together." A sigh followed the words, for his hands on her body were simply magic.

"It is definitely that." The marquess licked the divot at the small of her back. Seconds later, his lips were on a buttock, and when he lightly bit her skin, she squealed in surprise. His chuckle blended with the rain. "Tit for tat, fair Marjorie."

There wasn't time for her to reply, for he put a hand between her thighs, slipped his fingers along her folds, leisurely caressing and exploring. She shook from anticipation and shivery need while fisting the bedclothes in one hand. This was different than anything she'd experienced yet, and she burned to know what he had planned.

"Benedict…"

"Hush. Let me send you flying."

She snorted, but it was a breathless affair. "Haven't you already done that too many times to count?"

"Indeed, but never like this." He leaned his body over hers. The heavy length of his aroused member prodded against her back. Clearly, he wanted this too. "And do remember to keep your voice down. Traverston's room is nearby." His lips brushed her skin. "I don't want him listening and thereby taking himself in hand with his imaginings."

"Would he really…?" The rest of the thoughts in her head fled along with her words when he coaxed that swollen button at her center from hiding. Intense pleasure streaked through her insides, pulsed through every nerve ending.

"If it were me, and my bedchamber was anywhere near yours and I knew I couldn't have you because my best friend had already showed possession?" As he talked, Benedict licked and nibbled a path down her back to linger over the swell of her bottom. "Yes, I would certainly get my rocks off thinking of you."

Did that mean the two men had talked about who she belonged to? The thought made her reel, for she was one year shy of the age of forty, and she'd never been fought over even when she'd been a young woman. That knowledge made her grin into the pillow. "How interesting."

He grunted but didn't comment, and when he gripped her hips, encouraged her onto her knees, Marjorie shivered with anticipation. Then he smoothed his palms over her buttocks, spread them while widening her stance slightly, and once more he put a hand between her thighs to bedevil that all-important button at her center with varying degrees of friction.

Oh, it was glorious, this feeling of floating just before flying, and the marquess did it so well. His wife must have been a very lucky woman indeed to have been partnered with him for as long as their marriage had lasted. With a breathy moan, Marjorie rocked backward as bands of pressure stacked and built low in her belly.

"I'm going to break soon."

"Then do it spectacularly, Mrs. Stowe. You deserve at least that."

Desire became her only guide, for the marquess was quite unrelenting in his quest to send her over that edge. When she still didn't fall, he changed his approach, and the moment he changed his position and put his mouth to that part of her he'd been pleasuring with his fingers, she buried her face into the pillow and yelped with surprise.

The act was so different than anything else he'd previously treated her to, she didn't know what to do, but he employed his talented tongue in ways she could only imagine. It took less than no time to be ushered to that brink and then pushed over when he added the brush of his fingers to the symphony already being conducted.

She couldn't hold back her scream. Luckily, the pillow muffled much of the sound, and the distant growl of thunder covered the rest of it. As wave upon wave of exquisite pleasure rolled through her, Marjorie didn't offer protest as the marquess propped her back upon her knees. While her body still shook with contractions from that release, he moved into position behind her, gripped her hips in his large hands, and barely did she feel the tip of his shaft sliding through her already sensitive folds when he entered her passage from behind, and with one powerful stroke, seated himself to the hilt.

"Dear heavens," she managed to breathe, and another host of pleasure raced through her being. The angle of penetration was deeper and fantastic, so beyond anything she'd yet experienced that she feared she might go over again with very little provocation. Sweat trickled down her back and between her breasts. "My husband never was adventurous during bed sport. I'll wager he'd rather die than do something like this."

"Quite frankly, your husband was an idiot." He withdrew only to thrust back into her body, and at that angle, the sensations were intense and all-consuming. "Sex is always more exciting when willing to be adventurous."

Already, contractions were beginning from deep within her core. She gasped, and on the heels of a swallow asked, "Did you and your wife enjoy unorthodox joinings?" Goodness, but she would break apart merely from his connection with her.

"We did not." As he began to move, Marjorie's eyes crossed at the wealth of sensations that threatened to draw her in them. "Phoebe was a traditionalist. She adored intercourse in the one way, but that didn't mean she cared for the act itself…"

"Yet your soul thirsted for more." The way he filled her from this angle was amazing. Every part of her body felt as if it would be transformed from this act; every nerve ending tingled with exquisite feeling.

"Perhaps." And he moved, bent to his task as if he were only put on this earth to pleasure her and usher her into bliss as many times as he could.

Each stroke had her shaking from head to toe; every thrust made her cry out from the sheer pleasure of the coupling. The marquess went so impossibly deep, she wondered how she would survive. With each powerful push, her eyes crossed, and her sensitive nipples scraped against the fabric of her night dress, which only enhanced the madness brewing within. In this position, there was no doubt in her mind that they were forever joined and soul bound. The different angle meant she was thrown over the edge far too soon and before she even realized it. Her heart pounded as if she'd run here from America. A scream ripped from her throat, but she buried her face into the pillow, and still the marquess wasn't done with his work.

Again and again and again he thrust into her body while contractions carried her away and bliss surrounded her like a warm cocoon. The sound of their ragged breathing blended with the background of the rain until finally, he bit back a shout and with one final deeper than deep stroke, Benedict fell into his own release. His shaft pulsed and jerked within her, and she fell into that void with him all over again.

Never had she felt as wrung out or exhausted as she did now. When she collapsed into the bed, he did the same, and for a few seconds, she rejoiced in the solid weight of him against her back. Then he rolled onto his side, hooked an arm about her waist, and hauled her to his chest so that she nestled into his body, and it was the most natural thing in the world to relax with him.

There was something about being held in strong arms as a storm drew closer after being completely and entirely sated by said man. She rested both hands on his broad chest and when a sigh escaped her, Marjorie smiled and closed her eyes. By far, this was her most favorite night of her stay here.

Silence reigned in the room while her breathing returned to normal, and her body ceased to shiver with residual contractions. Then Benedict broke the spell by speaking.

"What will happen when the new novelty of this wears off?" He nuzzled the crook of her shoulder. "When we aren't consumed with desire or mindless lust any longer?" A hint of vulnerability in his voice. "When I'm alone again…"

"Oh, Syn…" Her heart squeezed, and she lost another piece of it to him. He was merely a man who needed permission to live, to move forward, and he was as frightened about it as everyone else. "Fears are always compounded more at night." Marjorie held him closer, pressed her lips to the side of his neck. "For the moment what we have is amazing and surprising and lovely. But that doesn't mean it needs to end."

Did it?

He slipped a hand up and down her back. "You can't stay here indefinitely."

"Perhaps not. There is always Cousin Dorcas, and being a companion to her. It would mean we could still see each other on a regular basis." She snickered. "Indulge in scandal right under her nose."

"I think that will not be possible."

"Why not?" Had he tired of her already?

"Your cousin means to travel back to London… without you, and there is no companion position available, for she doesn't want the expense of having you underfoot. It is what she told me the other day." He pressed his lips to her temple. "I'm sorry."

"Well, that is disheartening." A frown tugged at the corners of her mouth while tendrils of panic branched through her chest. Her fingers stilled. "I suppose there is no excuse for me to remain here then." It was her turn to be vulnerable. Tears crowded her throat. "I don't know what that means for my immediate future. No doubt I'll need to return to America. My son could probably benefit from my guidance."

Except, she didn't want to be anywhere but here, and she couldn't leave the marquess when he hadn't been brought fully into the light and away from the dangers of depression.

For long moments they clung to each other as thunder echoed in the distance and the rain continued to come down. The cooling breeze pouring through the window was most welcome, though. Then, Benedict stirred.

"Stay as my guest… and my mistress?" There was such hopefulness in his tone that her heart trembled all over again.

It was possible, she supposed. "What of feelings, or even love? Perhaps marriage? Will any of that be ours eventually?" Already, she had much affection for him. What would happen after they'd spent more time together?

A sigh left his throat that ruffled the curls at her forehead. "I don't know if I'm strong enough for marriage or even love again. Losing another person…" He bit off his words lest he say too much, no doubt. She couldn't begin to imagine what was going through his mind. "Why can this not be enough? What we already have?"

"I…"

"Ah." When he made a move to leave the bed, she put a hand on his arm, keeping him with her. "Hush, Syn." Gently, she encouraged him back amidst the pillows, made soothing sounds to calm him. "For the time being, it is. There is no need for it to be anything else, and I've never been a mistress before, so that's an adventure."

"I adore the way your mind works." And he briefly kissed her. Did he realize such a thing was a sign of affection, that he might enjoy being with her for far more than a coupling partner?

"Being free of a horrible husband does wonders for the spirit." Daring much, she cupped his cheek, ran the pad of her thumb along his lower lip as she peered into his eyes. "Sleep now. I'll be here waiting for you in the morning. Our worries won't seem as great in the light of day."

For long moments, he stared back, his eyes glinting in the darkness, and then finally, he relaxed and once more tugged her against him. "I am grateful for that. Thank you."

She nodded and said nothing, couldn't for the unshed tears gathering in her throat. Despite the magical two weeks she'd spent here, they were living on borrowed time. It might be the height of scandal, but in many ways, she didn't care.

This string of trysts, of taking a temporary lover, was better than what she'd had before, but how could she ever manage to forget him?