Chapter 23

Julian guided Tessa out of the supper box on silent feet, and they slipped into the night, his hand fast around hers. Muted steps crunched on Vauxhall's winding gravel paths, each more dimly lit than the last the farther they moved from the stage and orchestra, lilting drifts of music following in their wake.

While the impulse was simply explained—it was a fine night, and the dark walks lent the desirous couple a bit of privacy to…court—the intention was more complex.

He wanted to have her to himself—simple.

But to what end?

Complex.

To keep holding her hand?

Certainly.

To talk?

Possibly.

They should talk.

They had much to discuss.

But the feel of her hand in his only made his arms want more—to feel her within their embrace.

They rounded a bend on the darkest path, and he pulled her into an indent in the shrubbery that could serve as a makeshift alcove in a pinch, one that would protect them from view. Her head tipped back to meet his gaze. Though they'd come as far from the entertainments as the perimeter of the garden allowed, the music wafted around them, imbuing the air with the feeling that it was only they two in the wide world.

He lifted her hand to his mouth, pressing his lips to her knuckles. An innocent kiss—simple—but made more complex when he turned it over and pressed his mouth to her warm palm. A fire lit within her eyes as he followed inclination to the delicate skin of her inner wrist, her pulse beating a skipping rhythm beneath.

No more exposed skin available due to her blue wool spencer—hardy wool…for a night at Vauxhall Gardens where the ladies wore gossamer silk to impress…The woman was practical to the marrow of her bones—he lifted his mouth and shifted forward, the one hand refusing to relinquish hers, while the other found the small of her back, bringing her body against his. He angled his head so their mouths were only inches apart, so close her breath skittered across his lips.

And he kissed her.

It felt novel and wondrous, this kiss witnessed by only the moon and stars glittering in the inky sky above.

Yes, they'd kissed before.

But this time was different.

It was the first time he'd initiated a kiss.

And it felt like another wobbly step forward.

Intimate, this kiss.

It wasn't only its physicality—her lush body pressed against him, her curves molding themselves to his hard length, curves that all but begged to fill his hands, to offer pleasure and be pleasured in turn…his cock, hard and full, painfully straining against his trousers, demanding he hike up her skirts and bury himself deep inside her.

Oh, those physical demands were nothing new, though no less precious to him.

Yet this kiss tapped into a different side of him, too.

But his wasn't the only hand on the move. Hers caressed his bruised jaw, before trailing down his neck and chest, giving the solid muscle of his chest beneath a testing squeeze. She liked his heft. Then she was pushing his overcoat back from his waist, his cock straining with anticipation as to where her hand would next venture.

A curious, little sound erupted from her throat, and she went still. She pulled away enough to break the kiss, and now it was a sound erupting from his throat, one that resembled nothing so much as a dissatisfied grumble.

"What is it?" he asked, the question gruffer than intended.

She glanced down, and he saw that she still clutched his coat. Even before she reached into the pocket, he knew what her hand would emerge holding.

Blast.

Tonight, he'd worn the same overcoat he'd been wearing at Blanton Co on the day she'd followed him.

And that day's purchase had lain forgotten in the pocket all these weeks.

The jade phallus.

He watched her slide it from his pocket and go stone still. Eyes wide with recognition flew up to meet his. "This…"

He remained silent, even as his every muscle tensed. She would have questions, and he would answer every one of them. For he understood why he'd allowed her to remove the phallus from his pocket.

He wanted to be known by this woman—fully.

And this jade phallus was part of that composition within him.

"This…" She held it up, its seven-inch length glowing a mellow otherworldly green. "This is the item I saw you purchase at Blanton and Company."

He nodded.

Improbably, she brought the phallus closer to her face and gave it a thorough inspection from varying angles. A host of sensations beset Julian—bewilderment…amusement…lust—but mostly a jittery assortment of nerves that might have him crawling out of his skin.

"It's rather long," she said, at last, having arrived at a few observations. "And thick and, erm, hard." Her gaze lifted to meet his. "But, perhaps, not quite as long and thick and hard as you."

Oh, lord.

He would combust.

There would be nothing left of him but a spent pile of ash.

"And you use this…" She hesitated. "On women?"

Of course, Tessa would ask.

"I've never used that one on a woman." And he didn't hesitate. "There has been no other woman since you, Tessa."

And there will be no other woman if there is an after-you, he didn't say.

He didn't know how to speak such words.

Skittish thoughts flashed behind her eyes, but alongside them slid others he recognized—desire…curiosity.

"Would you like a demonstration of its capabilities?"

A blazingripple of lust shuddered through Tessa.

Her mouth gone suddenly dry, all she could do was nod.

A wicked glint flickered in Julian's eyes. But that wasn't what had her thighs squeezing together with utter ache and need.

It was the dark intention within.

Here was a man about to take control of her body.

He eased the jade phallus from her hand. "Let's put that aside for the moment." It disappeared into a pocket.

"But I thought?—"

The slow shake of his head, and the knowing smile curling his lips had the rest of her words fading in her mouth.

"You have permission not to think, Tessa," he said, both the words and the way he spoke them, oh, so seductive. "All that is required of you is that you feel."

Again, his mouth claimed hers, firm and demanding, his tongue skating across her bottom lip before sliding suggestively into her mouth, tangling with hers, all her senses filled with this man—his cedarwood scent…the ragged in and out of his breath…the taste of coffee on his tongue…the feel of his hard, demanding length against her.

She wasn't the sort of woman who went through life being a vessel for a man's needs. She was a woman with drive and agency—a woman who took control of the path she followed.

But here she was, nothing more than an empty vessel, desperately aching to be filled by him.

To cede all control of self.

Large, masculine hands took hold of her skirts, hiking them over knees, up thighs, exposing them to the night air.

A hoyden…a wanton…That was her in this moment.

Instinctively, she lifted a long leg and wrapped it around his waist, drawing him nearer.

She felt his smile against her mouth. "Now," he muttered, "let's get you ready."

Anticipation shimmered through her as rough, calloused fingers trailed across the sensitive skin of her inner thigh, grazed over the slick slit of her sex, lighting fire through her. A quick inhalation suspended in her lungs as his fingertips grazed across her sex. It felt so…good. Her back arched, and her legs trembled as she pushed forward and opened herself more fully, greedy for the pressure of his touch.

Then a long finger slipped inside her and a long moan poured from parted lips. Oh, this need…It would consume her. His finger slid, deeper with each stroke, playing her body like a well-tuned instrument. "You're so wet and ready," he muttered, and somehow, improbably, the anticipation within her spiked to a higher level.

He took the jade phallus from his pocket. "It's going to feel cool. But you might like that."

Inch by inch, jade entered her, so smooth and slick—an altogether different sensation from him.

His eyes remained concentrated upon her face as he pushed the phallus deeper inside her, watching her as he carefully controlled the movement, which was different from how he moved when he was inside her. Here, this way, he was in total command of her pleasure. The phallus pushed to the end of her, and she closed her eyes, imagining his hand squeezed around the base, thrusting the jade deep and her desire spiked higher, and a familiar feeling began picking up momentum inside her. "Oh," she exhaled. "Oh."

He increased the rhythm, moving the phallus in smaller increments, but faster. It was hitting a specific place inside her—one created for pleasure.

Then the build became suddenly and impossibly too much and impending climax beckoned and teased, her cries lifting to the heavens, he moved the jade relentlessly, her arms tight around his neck, clinging on for dear life as the hand pressed at the small of her back tightened, holding her steady as release burst through her and dissolved into starry glitter almost as quickly. His head bent, and he caught her mouth with his in a slow, languorous kiss as he slid the phallus from her.

Then he eased back, and her lashes lifted. She met his gaze so steady and knowing upon her. "That was…" Oh, there weren't words to describe what that was. "And you're so…" However, there was a word for him. "Skilled."

How the smile perched upon his lips—a smile that acknowledged precisely how skilled he was—made her want to kiss him again.

Until this very moment she hadn't the faintest idea how attractive a man's arrogance could be.

A shiver traced across her skin, tightened her nipples. She lifted onto the tips of her toes with one foot, and dug her other heel into the indent of his taut buttock, and did exactly as she pleased and pressed her mouth to his.

Oh, how she loved his kiss—its surrender to intimacy.

One of her hands unhooked from around his neck and trailed down his torso, reveling in the solid, bulked muscle of his chest and stomach. He could've done the nation a service and posed as the model for Hyde Park's Achilles statue himself.

Lower, her hand explored until it reached his shaft, her fingers gone trembly with the desire to wrap around him.

"I want you inside me."

How attractive was the smile curled about his mouth, the serious intent within his eyes. "Haven't you received enough pleasure for one night?"

She gave her head a slow shake. "That"—there was no mistaking the meaning of that—"is no substitute for you."

On a low growl, his hand slid to her bottom and pulled her against his length, unyielding beneath the thin superfine that barely contained him, he angled his head, and his mouth met her neck, as if he'd only needed her permission to devour her.

Her swift fingers worked the falls of his trousers. After the havoc and pleasure he'd just wrought upon her body, how could she want more?

You have permission not to think, Tessa.

The falls released, and his cock fell forward, a turgid, heavy weight in her hand. She couldn't resist wrapping her fingers around that hard length she so badly needed to have inside her. "Julian," fell from her lips and into his ear, a breathless whisper devoid of sound. "Please."

His fingers replaced hers around his shaft, guiding it to her sex, her arms tight around his neck as he slightly bent his legs, a better angle for when he, at last, pushed inside her on a sure, slick stroke. The breath caught in her lungs, her heart in her throat. He lifted his mouth from her neck and caught her gaze, refusing to release it as he began moving in and out of her.

Oh, that length of jade had been capable of delivering great pleasure—there was no doubting its effect on her body—but this…this was the genuine thing.

So hot…visceral…urgent…real.

This mingling of sweat and breath and tangling of tongues and limbs and intentions held an immediacy that nothing else in life came close to achieving.

This was intimacy.

Their bodies found a rhythm, sinking into it, and as frenzied as it was, their urges were in sync.

As if she had a choice to think her way out of this.

As if she would want to.

Him in her arms…him inside her…

Feel.

To feel…him…was all she ever wanted.

Another feeling that he'd made so familiar to her began to pool and coil within her. "Oh, Julian," she gasped, her leg wrapping tighter around his waist, imploring…more.

"Tessa, wrap your other leg around me."

His feet planted wide, both hands clamped tightly around her bottom, he began driving into her with focused intention. Her mouth found his neck, so her cries of pleasure would be muffled and not carry on the night air.

Her quim, at last, could take no more and, for the second time tonight, broke in release, pulsing around him, and this time a cry did break free as lightning bolted through her veins and tingled through nerve endings to the farthest reaches of fingers and toes, at once utterly alive and deliciously enervated.

His mouth found hers again as he continued his relentless drive inside her, his climax following hers, her mouth closing on his and muffling his shout of release.

Slowly, his hips stilled, their chests heaving, the sharp in and out their only movement.

"That was…"

She couldn't seem to finish a descriptive sentence tonight.

"Aye, it was," he rumbled into her neck, punctuating his agreement with a kiss.

His head lifted, and their eyes met. Neither seemed able to look away, each understanding that when they did, reality would begin to assert itself.

But…

What if this could be reality?

Not illicit trysts in Vauxhall Gardens, as such.

Though she wasn't in the least opposed to it.

But…

This.

Them…together.

She unwound one leg from around his waist, then the other. Her feet on firm earth, her dress fell into place down her legs. He buttoned the falls of his trousers.

And that was them—respectable again.

It was only when he didn't immediately run that she realized she'd half expected him to.

Instead, he stood before her wearing a bemused smile.

When he'd said he didn't know how to do this, he hadn't been lying.

He didn't.

But neither did she.

And the fact that he remained, opened the possibility that, perhaps, they could learn together.

But even as the comforting thought drifted through her mind, it cut across her at the wrong angle.

What came next for them wasn't that straightforward.

"We have a matter of some importance to discuss," she somehow forced herself to say.

Uncertainty flickered within his eyes. "Oh?"

"I might have some news." Only by sheer dint of will did she not touch her stomach.

His gaze narrowed. "Is this about Jagger?" Before she could reply, he continued, "Jagger can wait."

"I'm not sure he can, but that wasn't?—"

He twined his fingers through hers, their solid strength pushing all matters of some importance from her mind.

All matters lost the urgency of importance when he was touching her.

So, she didn't tell him what she knew with near certainty.

That she was with child—his child.

It was a fact that could wait one more night, for it was going nowhere. If she told him now, it might be too much, too soon. What they'd done, after what he'd confessed to her—he didn't court ladies…he abstained from intimate relations…

The fact that he was doing both, with her, meant something important.

But it was new and fragile.

So new and fragile it could collapse beneath the weight of what she had to tell him.

So, it would keep for one more night, but it wasn't something that could wait forever.

Soon, there wouldn't be a choice.

Soon, there would be a child.

A child she knew to the core of her being that she wanted very much.

A child whose blood she knew to be pure as the driven snow.

But Julian…He'd harbored the idea for so long that his blood was intrinsically bad, it felt elemental to him—like a foundational part of his being.

But it wasn't.

He hadn't been born with bad blood.

Life had taught him to believe that—and he'd taken the lesson to heart.

The problem was he couldn't see that his belief was fundamentally flawed. It happened with mathematical equations—and it happened in life.

But a seedling of hope had sprouted that this belief could be changing within him.

And if it did, with a little more time, there could be hope for them.