17. A Christmas Eve of Reconciliation

CHAPTER 17

A CHRISTMAS EVE OF RECONCILIATION

E arlier, on the main stairs

Once he and Ivy were up a flight of stairs and out of earshot of the servants, Robert took Ivy’s hand in his. “You will come with me to my bedchamber?” he asked.

The query made it sound as if he feared she would deny him, but Ivy had no intention of turning him down. With her skirts gathered into her free hand, she was practically racing him up the stairs. “Of course, I will. Will you undo my buttons?” she countered, before she burst through the master bedchamber door.

“I’ve a mind to simply tear your gown off of you,” Robert countered, following her into the room as if he were being chased. Before she could put voice to a protest, he added, “But I won’t since I rather like seeing you in it.”

Ivy reached for his top coat and quickly undid the buttons. “That’s a relief. I shouldn’t want my new lady’s maid to have to do a repair so soon.” She pushed the coat from his shoulders and went to work on his waistcoat buttons.

“Even if I tore it off you, there are no doubt layers of underthings I still have to remove,” he complained, attempting to undo the buttons at her back while she was facing him.

“What underthings?”

His eyes widened as his fingers stilled. “The sorts you wear under your gowns?” he ventured.

A slight look of disappointment appeared at the corner of her lips. “Oh, for a moment, I was thinking of what I wore last night,” she whispered. “Or rather, didn’t. I suppose there are some stays and petticoats that must come off from under this one,” she added on a sigh.

Robert blinked before his gaze fell to her bosom. The telltale signs of hardened nipples were evident in the muslin. “Do you mean to tell me you were naked under your gown throughout our entire dinner last night?” he asked in amazement, his breathing still coming in pants from their quick trip up the stairs. He let go of a fastening at her back when she forced the waistcoat from his torso.

“Of course. Petticoats ruin the line of a satin gown, and my regular stays tend to show at the edges of the neckline,” she explained, reaching down to undo the closures on his breeches. “So I had to wear the smaller stays.”

He placed a hand over hers. “Had I known that, you would have been last night’s dessert,” he stated.

“Robert,” she murmured, pulling her hands from beneath his to resume her work.

“I need to remove my shoes first, my sweet,” he said in a whisper. He backed up to the bed and shed the footwear before seeing to his stockings.

Meanwhile, Ivy rushed to the bed to turn down the counterpane and linens, her actions creating a wind and sending the flames in the fireplace into a frenzy. Embers danced about on the hearth.

“Careful, or you’ll start another fire,” he teased, pushing the breeches from his legs .

She stepped in front of him and went to work on untying his cravat. “I suppose I should remind you it’s been years since you’ve seen me... unclothed,” she whispered. “The last few times we did this, it was dark. I expect you’ll be a bit disappointed.”

“I rather doubt that,” he said, helping her to unwind the length of silk from around his neck. As she lifted up the hem of his shirt, he was attempting to push the sleeves of her gown down her arms. When neither could continue what they were trying to do, they stopped and chuckled softly.

“You first,” he said, giving up his hold on her gown to raise his arms over his head.

Ivy had the shirt removed from his torso a moment later, and when her gown was free of her arms, it slid down her body into a puddle of fabric on the carpet below. The petticoats, stays, and chemise soon followed.

When she caught him staring at her mostly naked body—she still wore a pair of stockings—she lifted her arms in front of her chest in an attempt to hide her breasts from his view.

He was too quick.

“Oh, no you don’t,” he said, gathering her into his arms so she was pressed hard against the front of his body.

“Oh,” she managed, before his lips took hers in a scorching kiss. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she stood on tiptoes and was rewarded when one of his hands skimmed down the side of her body and over one of the globes of her bottom.

“Your hand is so warm,” she whispered once he had ended the kiss to take a much-needed breath.

“That’s not the only thing that’s warm,” he murmured.

Ivy was well aware of his manhood, its hardened length pressed into her soft belly. “I do believe you’re the one who is in danger of starting another fire,” she accused.

He chuckled softly before lifting her into his arms. “God, but I’ve missed you,” he said, before dumping her onto the bed.

She gasped when her bare back hit the cold linens and gasped again when he crawled atop her. “I’ve missed you,” she whispered, spreading her legs in anticipation of him impaling her. Instead, he was kissing his way down the front of her body. “Where are you going?” she asked, giving up her hold on his shoulders.

He chuckled and mumbled something incoherent, and a moment later, Ivy inhaled sharply when his whiskers scraped the insides of her thighs. “Robert!”

The sensation of his thumbs and tongue on her most private place had her attempting to pull her knees together. She stopped when the first frissons skittered through her thighs and belly. “Oh!” When his tongue circled her womanhood, she mewled first in protest and then in pleasure until whatever he was doing had her insides tumbling about in a maelstrom of welcome sensations. When the frissons coalesced into a single wave of pleasure, she cried out, her hands reaching down to cup the sides of his head. “You have to stop,” she whimpered, her breaths sounding labored.

She felt more than heard his chuckle and inhaled sharply when he was once again atop her. She inhaled again at the sensation of the tip of his manhood at her entrance. “Hurry,” she whispered.

“We have all night,” he countered, although his entry into her was quick. Both of them gasped when he was suddenly buried to the hilt. “Oh, Ivy,” he breathed. He pulled nearly all the way out of her before thrusting into her again.

Her hips met his on his next thrust, and he groaned. “I was going to make this last,” he murmured, as if in protest.

“Next time,” she managed between gasps for breath.

He growled in response, and from the way his body seized and his face lifted, she knew he was in the throes of his orgasm. Deep within, she felt his last desperate thrust as the wash of warmth filled her, and she sighed happily.

B reathing heavily, Robert rolled off of Ivy and landed on his back, groaning as he did so.

Tittering, Ivy turned her head and regarded him with a grin. “How is it we can be so good together when we’re in a bed and so... distant with one another when we’re out of one?”

He regarded her with an expression of hurt. “I don’t think that’s an entirely fair assessment of us at all,” he replied, sliding his arm beneath her shoulders in an effort to pull her closer. “Our first few years of marriage were rather pleasant, as I recall.” He grunted. “Our first twenty years, even.”

“That’s because we spent most of them in bed,” she countered, grinning with the memory.

Robert rubbed a hand over his face, felt the evening stubble of his beard. “How could we not? When you were expecting Charity, you were insatiable,” he accused. “You were the same with Grace and Michael, too.”

She giggled softly. “You were so accommodating.”

“I had to be your cock on demand,” he said on an exaggerated sigh. “I was afraid you might decide a footman was good enough.”

Gasping, Ivy turned her head to regard him with disbelief. “Never,” she responded. “Eww.”

He guffawed. “I’ll never forget the time you sent a footman to Parliament with a note saying my presence was required post-haste. I don’t think I ever had Walker drive the town coach as fast as he did that day. I was sure I was going to arrive to find the house on fire, and instead, I discovered you, bare naked, round with child...” He motioned the shape of a ball with a hand over his own midsection. “In the middle of my bed, demanding my cock.”

She grinned at the reminder of what had occurred when she was pregnant with their first son, Michael. “I was so in need of you,” she insisted. “Right up until the end. And as I recall, you didn’t seem to mind one bit.”

Once again sounding a guffaw, he said, “That’s because I was able to leave an especially boring session of Parliament. Some ancient earl was droning on about corn or wheat or some such.” He turned to look at her. “You were far more fun to plow.”

She reached out and slapped a hand on his thigh. “Don’t be crass,” she scolded.

They both sighed, and Robert reached for her hand with one of his. He brought it to his lips and kissed the palm. “I spent so many nights wondering...”

She stared at him, her auburn brows crinkling. “Wondering what?”

He displayed a grimace. “More of a whom,” he murmured. “I was sure you had taken a lover in London. I feared I even knew his identity?—”

“ What ?” she interrupted, pulling back her hand so she could lift herself up on her elbows. As a result, the bed linens shifted so her breasts were exposed. She stared down at him. “I don’t have a lover,” she claimed. “That’s what you thought? All this time?”

Robert swallowed, his gaze going briefly to her nipples. He rolled onto his side, pressed an elbow into the mattress, and held his head on his hand. “Did you ever think about taking one?” he asked, before leaning forward to kiss the side of the breast closest to him. He closed his eyes and buried his nose in the soft flesh, his eyelids barely touching her skin.

She inhaled sharply at the tickling sensation. “No. Never,” she insisted, lowering herself back onto the bed and pulling up the linens so she was once again covered.

Emitting a sound of disappointment, Robert furrowed a brow even as he felt profound relief at hearing her declaration. “All these years... and you haven’t made love to anyone?”

She blinked and swallowed. “Robert, you have a terrible memory,” she accused.

“What are you saying?”

“Every Season when you’re in London...” She paused, her eyes narrowing. “Don’t tell me you actually slept through all those times I sneaked into your bedchamber when I was in need of you.”

Robert furrowed his brows. “That was you ?” he asked in a whisper.

She made a sound of disgust and once again sat up. “Well, who else would it be?”

He shook his head. “That was you,” he said again. “I always thought I was... I was dreaming ,” he said softly. “Now you’re telling me you were... it was you who was seducing me in the middle of the night?”

She scoffed in disbelief. “You thought it was someone else?”

He shrugged. “I didn’t know. It was dark, and I thought I was dreaming,” he murmured. “You were quite the seductress,” he accused, a grin lifting the corner of his mouth.

“I didn’t exactly have to seduce you,” she claimed with a huff. She crossed her arms over her chest. “You were always quite welcoming as I recall.”

“Oh, no doubt,” he murmured.

“Hard as a rock.”

“In my sleep?”

She lifted a shoulder. “Well, I didn’t know you were sleeping through it,” she countered defensively.

“Was... was I atop you?” There was only a hint of a tease in his voice, but Ivy caught it. She let out another sound of disbelief and stared at him before saying, “Sometimes, and sometimes I was.” She waggled her eyebrows.

“Riding St. George,” he whispered. “I always loved it when you did that. Your gorgeous breasts bouncing up and down. Your hair all loose and long, the ends of it brushing over my chest.” He sighed as he settled back onto the mattress.

She angled her head to one side. “So you do remember?”

Robert inhaled and shook his head. “I wish I’d been wide awake instead of half asleep. No wonder there were days when I woke up so happy,” he said, arching his brow. “The bed linens were all mussed as if I’d been fighting off the ghosts.”

Inhaling sharply, Ivy stared at him. “What did you say?”

He cleared his throat and reached out an arm in an attempt to bring her closer to him. When she finally relaxed and snuggled against his side, her head in the small of his shoulder, he said, “Nothing.”

She lifted her head to stare at him. “Were those the same ghosts you spoke of with Graves?” she asked. “What we talked about earlier?”

He narrowed his eyes. “Did... did he tell you that?”

“I heard it from my new lady’s maid,” she said. “I might have... encouraged her to share what she had heard about your unexpected arrival. ‘The ghosts of the past have driven me from York’,” she added. “Are there other ghosts, Robert?” she asked. “Ones you haven’t told me about?”

He inhaled deeply and let the breath out in a whoosh . “Aren’t they enough?” he asked on a sigh. “I admit, I have been feeling my age these days. Spending too much time wondering if I’ve done right by you. By our children. By my title?—”

“Of course you have,” she insisted. “Robert,” she added in a gentle scold .

“Those first few years after I inherited were so hard,” he murmured.

Ivy lifted her head. “Because?” she prompted.

He winced. “Father’s debts. I felt as if we were mired in a giant gaping morass.”

Although Ivy hadn’t been with him back then—she hadn’t even had her come-out when he inherited—she knew a bit about his early struggles with the earldom. He’d had to sell off a number of unentailed properties to come up with enough blunt to pay off creditors and the vowels left behind. Although he was essentially debt-free at the time of their marriage, there were still a few years when he ran the earldom as if he was still in debt. “And yet you paid them all off,” she said brightly.

“I didn’t think it fair you had to economize as a result, though,” he murmured. “Those first few years.”

She shrugged. “I didn’t mind. As I recall, I didn’t know I was economizing,” she said. “It wasn’t as if it was going to be like that forever.”

“I don’t think I ever told you how much I appreciated your efforts to help when it came to your wardrobe and to buying things for the children and the house.”

“I didn’t mind wearing the same gowns two years in a row,” she said. “But I do wish you had told me before we returned from our wedding trip. So I wouldn’t have had the salon and dining room redone at Gladstone. The cost of the tassels for the drapes and sofa alone was enough to put us back into debt,” she claimed, remembering how stunned she had been when she peeked at the invoice. “The renovations could have waited.”

A grunt sounded from him. “I didn’t want to take that from you. It made you happy to have such a project, and it did improve Gladstone greatly, even if I didn’t actually notice the improvements at first. ”

She gave him a quelling glance. “I gave you an entire week to say something before I scolded you,” she reminded him.

“I noticed the changes in the dining room right away,” he countered.

“I should hope so. The walls were covered in a completely different colored fabric, and I had the colorman redo the paint for the mouldings. You would have had to be blind not to notice.”

“The Turkish rug in there is still my favorite,” he murmured.

She grinned and hummed contentedly. “You haven’t had it changed?”

He chuckled. “Nothing has changed since your last visit,” he replied. “Except for a few servants.”

“As I recall, it didn’t take long for you to pay off your father’s accounts.”

He shook his head in the pillow. “Cold winters helped. The coal mines... well, they were more profitable than I expected,” he admitted.

“Probably because you didn’t trust them to an unscrupulous man of business as your father did,” she reasoned. “Nor have you ever been much of a gambler. At least, if you were, you never mentioned it.”

“True. Besides, owning mines is enough of a gamble.” He ran a hand down the side of her arm until he could grip her hand in his. “But it did mean I had to spend an awful lot of time on the business. Away from you and the children.”

“You were never gone longer than a fortnight, and you always came back. The children still recognized you, so it wasn’t as if you were gone too long,” she teased.

He chuckled. “I suppose that was something, although there were times I didn’t recognize the children.”

“You did better than some of your fellow peers,” she whispered .

“How so?”

She tittered. “I heard Lord Pettigrew didn’t even meet his heir until the boy returned from Eton.”

Robert let out a guffaw. “I was a bit more involved with my children than most,” he agreed. “I didn’t want them growing up to be cold-hearted bastards like so many of my fellow peers. Like my father. Forgive the curse.”

She sighed. “You’re forgiven.”

“Truth be told, I didn’t want to be away from you at all,” he murmured. “I feared I would come home to discover you had some young buck... bucking you,” he stammered. “Don’t think I didn’t overhear my peers remarking on your generous bosom or your gorgeous hair and how much they wanted a chance to plow you.”

“Robert Michael John Lucius Strathford?—”

“Ah. I’m in trouble now,” he said, rolling his eyes before he scoffed softly. “You remembered all my names,” he added, as if he was impressed.

“Of course I remember all your names,” she replied. “How else am I to ensure you know when I’m annoyed with you?”

He displayed another grimace. “As I recall, you didn’t used to say anything. For sometimes an entire day,” he murmured.

She inhaled to respond but bit her lip. It was another moment before she said, “That’s because I feared I would say too much, and you would leave, go to your mistress, and never come back.”

Robert suddenly sat up in the bed, which once again had the bed linens coming off of her. He turned to stare at her in disbelief. “What mistress?”

Blinking, Ivy gripped the bed linens tighter to her chest. “Whichever one you happened to employ at the time, I suppose,” she said meekly.

He growled and rolled his eyes again. “Ivy Anne Charity Strathford, I most certainly did not employ a mistress,” he claimed. “At least, not after we were married. How... how could you think such a thing?”

Ivy inhaled at his mention of all her names. “Well, a... a prostitute then,” she countered in a hoarse whisper, not about to give up her argument.

“Eww,” he responded, his face displaying disgust. “Never. Besides, why the... why the fuck would I want to bed another woman when I had you as a wife?”

She recoiled at the vehemence in his query. “Well, why indeed?” she countered, sitting up to challenge him. Having used her hands to help in the process, the bed linens fell from her chest and once again left her front on display.

His gaze dropped to her breasts, the orbs still rather pert despite her age. “Why ever would I want any other woman?” he asked in a whisper.

Ivy inhaled softly. “Did you... did you want me because of my bosom? Or... or because of my hair?”

Blinking, he allowed a soft chuckle. “Neither.”

“What?” she asked in disbelief.

He grinned at seeing her expression. “The first time I saw you?—”

“Was where?” she challenged.

“At your presentation before the queen,” he said without a pause. “All the other debutantes your age came out looking like they were being led to the lions, but not you,” he said on a soft chuckle. “You came out with a smile on your face, as if you thought it was the best day of your life, your gorgeous eyes lit up like green fire.”

Ivy gasped at hearing his recollection. “You noticed... my eyes ?” she asked in wonder.

His expression suggested he was still recalling that day, thirty years ago. “Yes,” he affirmed. He suddenly sobered and turned to stare at her. “What did you think I noticed? ”

She gave him a quelling glance and straightened so the bed linens once again exposed her bosom.

He raised his brows in appreciation. “I do adore them. And your hair. More than you can know,” he admitted.

They sat together on the bed in companionable silence for a time before Ivy said, “I can’t believe you thought I took a lover.”

His expression turning sheepish, Robert winced. “I’m terribly jealous,” he admitted, leaning over to kiss her on the corner of her mouth. “It’s hard not to think the worst when you have the most beautiful woman as a wife?—”

She scoffed softly.

“—and you’re not a particularly handsome bloke.”

Her mouth dropping open in surprise, Ivy stared at him a moment. “You don’t think you’re handsome?” she asked softly.

“You don’t,” he accused with a shrug.

About to counter his claim, she instead dipped her head. “Looks are not all that important in a husband,” she murmured. When he grunted in response, she added, “Besides, you never had to be.” She moved a finger to where the dark whorls at the base of his torso disappeared beneath the edge of the bed linens.

He inhaled sharply at her touch, his manhood already hardening in readiness. “What are you saying?”

“I remember seeing you that day. The day of my presentation to the queen,” she said, lifting her chin. “From the first moment I saw you, I wanted you, and I didn’t know why,” she admitted.

He grunted. “As I recall, I was standing with a half-dozen other peers, several younger and far more handsome than me,” he said, doubting her claim.

“It was your eyes, Robert.”

Giving a start, Robert narrowed them. “My eyes? ”

“They’re terribly wicked,” she said in a whisper. “Sometimes they’re silver and sometimes they’re blue-gray,” she said. “Rather startling, if you’ve never seen them before. You were staring at me that day, like you could see through me,” she whispered, her body shivering. “Or mayhap just through my gown. It was... unsettling, but exciting, too, the way my body reacted. I think I experienced my first orgasm at that moment.” She took a breath and let it out. “Just part of your charisma I suppose.”

He stared at her for several seconds, as if he was seeing her in an entirely different light. “I wasn’t aware,” he whispered.

She lifted her gaze to meet his as her hand wrapped around his manhood and squeezed. “I... I didn’t understand attraction. Desire. Lust.”

He feathered his lips over her forehead. “I remember later that night,” he whispered softly. “At the queen’s ball. I was all set to ravish you in the gardens?—”

“And I was going to let you, even though I had no idea what that meant.”

“—kiss you senseless?—”

“Oh, you’re very good at that. You always have been.”

“—claim your maidenhead for myself?—”

“I’m rather glad our first time was in a bed.”

“—and do it all over again and again and again.”

Mewling softly, Ivy allowed her head to drop back on her shoulders as his kisses tickled her neck. She was forced to let go of his member when he pushed her down to the bed so he could take one of her breasts with his mouth.

“I remember the first time you did this, you said more than a mouthful was a waste when it came to breasts,” she whispered.

Robert lifted his mouth from her skin to murmur, “I was a fool. A stupid fool.” He recaptured her nipple and nibbled it before moving his attentions to her other breast. “I am so much wiser now.”

She giggled and raised her knees in invitation. “Ah, yes, but right now I need the foolish you,” she begged.

He chuckled and did her bidding, burying his manhood into her wet and willing channel. Before he began the movements that would send them both to the edge of oblivion, he kissed her softly. “Ivy Anne Charity, I don’t know what sort of spell you’ve cast over me,” he growled as she lifted her knees to grip his thighs. “I think I am falling in love with you all over again.”

“Well, it’s about damned time,” she whispered with a grin. “We’ve been married nearly thirty—” She inhaled sharply when he did something with a strategically placed thumb.

“Still works,” he whispered, feathering his fingertips over her mound.

She visibly shivered beneath him, and for the first time in a decade, he once again felt true happiness.

Ecstasy was to follow a few minutes later.