The Very Daring Duchess Part 21

Francesca flushed, not from shame or embarra.s.sment, but from confusion. Many foolish young English gentlemen on their tour had professed great love and desire for her, none of which she'd listened to with any seriousness. But Edward was different, a grown man of the world, and uneasily she wondered if there were something about herself-something she'd inherited from her own rather dissolute father, along with his straight nose, his laugh, and his talent for painting-that made men think of her this way.

"You must not claim all the fault for yourself, Edward," she suggested hesitantly. "You are a wickedly handsome man, and you-you tempt me as well."

"Not the same way," he countered moodily. "You're a pa.s.sionate woman, aye, but women are different. You do not have the same base instincts that can haunt a man."

"But is that so very wrong? Surely most gentlemen must feel the same intense pa.s.sions toward a woman at least once in their lives."

"No." He turned abruptly, resting his palms flat on the long table with his back toward her. "I should have told you earlier, Francesca, before we were wed. My fine, n.o.ble family is as rotten as a barrel of last year's apples. I pray you'll never be cursed to meet my brothers, drunkards and gamblers who cannot keep count of the number of wh.o.r.es they've paraded through their beds, same as our father was before them."

"You don't have to-"

"No, Francesca, you must hear this," he said, and took a deep breath, clearly warring with himself. "You must. As long as I can remember, I have striven to be different from them, to set myself apart by being more honorable, and yet here when I am truly tested, I find I'm not one d.a.m.ned bit better-not one!"

"Oh, Edward, don't," she cried softly. She'd listened as he'd asked, and heard far more than he'd said, and when she looked at the broad back that still wasn't strong enough to carry all his guilt and sorrows alone, her heart wept with the suffering he felt. "Santo cialo, you are the best, most honorable gentleman I have ever met!"

Before he could answer or rebuff her again, she came behind him and circled her arms around his waist, pressing her cheek to his back. She knew how much solace a touch could bring because they'd been so rare in her own motherless life. His back in the kerseymere dressing gown was warm beneath her cheek, which didn't surprise her, but holding him this way was as comforting to her as she wished it to be to him, which surprised her very much.

"You were right to keep apart from me in the beginning, la.s.s," he said with a groan. "Haven't you been listening to anything I've said?"

"I have, caro mio," she said, her fingers spreading on their own to feel the sleek, hard muscles at his waist beneath the kerseymere, feel the way he'd sucked in his breath so sharply at her touch. That surprised her, too; he was vastly different to embrace than her father had been. "And you are still the best and bravest gentleman I know."

He covered her hands with his own, lifting them from his body. "You don't know what you're doing, Francesca."

"Oh, yes, I do, Edward," she said, twisting around to face him as if taking steps in an elaborate dance, sliding between his body and the edge of the table. "I am trying to convince you that you are not nearly so bad a man as you believe."

She was tempting fate by tempting him like this. She wasn't so great a fool as to ignore the danger, but for now she cared more about easing his unhappiness than holding exactly to their agreement. Slowly she brought his hand to her lips and kissed it, teasing his wrist with the edge of her teeth the same way as he'd kissed hers that first night, and looked up through her lashes to see his reaction.

It was an admirable reaction, too, well worth watching. His captain's reserve dissolved and the hard, stubbled planes of his jaw-unshaven since the storm had begun-relaxed. His eyes filled with wonder and pleasure, and something darker, rougher, more excitingly male.

"Ah, la.s.s, you've a warm nature," he said gruffly, his breath quickening as he turned his hand to cup her cheek, caressing the side of her throat with his thumb.

"Warm, and pa.s.sionate, too," she said, turning her head to rub against his thumb like a little cat. "You said so yourself."

"That I did," he growled. "But I won't be burned by you, la.s.s, even on this cold December day."

"Not burned, leone mio, no, no," she said, again echoing his gesture by touching her palm to his rough cheek, cradling his jaw as she threaded her fingers into his hair. "But you do need warming, caro. You need the merry sun of my Napoli to chase away that English chill from your soul."

She wasn't sure if she kissed him then, or if he was the one who kissed her first, but when their lips did meet it seemed the most natural, the most perfect thing in the world. This time, she wasn't startled; this time she knew what to expect, what to antic.i.p.ate, what to do.

Eagerly she answered his kiss, slanting her lips to accommodate his. Letting him coax hers apart, she relished the exciting sensation of having his tongue play against hers, the feel and the taste of him. She'd teased him about needing to warm his proper English reserve, but there was nothing cold about how he kissed her, or the desire she felt simmering between them, the same as it had the first time he'd kissed her at their wedding.

But while she'd thought she known what to expect, she soon learned that, however pa.s.sionate, that wedding kiss had been only the beginning. He had more to offer her, and much, much more for them to claim together. Emotions and weariness and denial, too, had worn away at their promise to wait to a degree that she hadn't realized until she felt his hand upon her hip, his fingers spread to caress her as he lifted her easily onto the edge of the table. She felt him tugging the front of her bodice down and his hand slipping inside her shift to the bare skin beneath. She wriggled, weakly trying to protest more because she knew she should than from any real wish for him to stop.

How could she, when what he was doing was building such a delicious tension in her body? With surprising gentleness, he'd begun by tracing little circles around her nipple with his fingertips, just enough to make her flesh tighten and ache, and when-at last, at last!-he found the rosy nub itself, squeezing and teasing and tormenting it between his callused thumb and forefinger until all she could do was arch beneath him and whisper sweet, urgent nonsense in Italian into his ear, words and promises she'd never dare venture in English.

"Sweet, sweet," he murmured, feathering hot kisses along her jaw and throat, his unshaven jaw teasing rough against her skin. "Do you know how much I want you, la.s.s? Do you know?"

"Oh, yes, caro mio," she whispered, her fingers pressing into the hard muscles of his shoulders beneath the soft red kerseymere. "I know because I want you more, my brave English lion, coraggioso, coraggioso!"

The rumbling sound he made deep in his chest could indeed have been a great cat's muted roar, or simply a sound of purely male possession, marking her as his. She wasn't sure and she didn't care, not after he shifted lower to find her breast with his mouth, his tongue flicking lightly over and around her nipple until she gasped and twisted with the unexpected sensations rippling through her. His mouth closed over her then, tugging and suckling hard enough to make her dizzy with pleasure, a pleasure great enough that she freely let him unlace the back of her gown so he could slip it over her shoulders. With an impatient twitch and a shrug, she freed her arms from the sleeves so the gown crumpled down around her waist, unabashedly bare for him and his marvelous, seductive hands and lips and tongue.

"You are good, Edward," she whispered fiercely, her words fragmenting into little broken moans as he caressed both her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. "You-are-good."

"And you're mine, Francesca," he rasped, pressing her gently back against the polished wood. "All, all mine."

He leaned into her, between her legs, and his dressing gown fell open, a scarlet tent around them, and eagerly she reached inside like a child greedy to unwrap a present. His skin was warm, sleek, over hard bands of muscle that were a delight to touch. Whorls of golden hair patterned across his chest, springy beneath her fingers, and with a purr of satisfaction she breathed deeply of his heady masculine scent, so different from her own. She kissed him again, drawing him closer against her, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s tight and heavy as they brushed across the hair on his chest.

She felt the chilly air on her bare legs as he pushed her skirts higher, followed by the warmth of his hands on her knee, on her thigh, high above her garters. Instinctively she shifted to accommodate him. Her body wished the same as his, completion, connection, release from all this aching, teasing torment, and some distant part of her realized she was curving her legs over his hips exactly like the disporting nymph in the fourth panel of the Oculus and she wanted the rest, she wanted him and everything that came with him, and then with a creak and a thump the cabin was filled with light. With a confused gasp she looked toward the brightness, to the now-unshuttered stern windows with two sailors gaping in at them from the stern galley, the wooden deadlights they'd just removed forgotten in their hands.

"What in blazes is that racket?" demanded Edward furiously as he stood and glared at the sailors, who in turn instantly clambered out of sight and back to the deck. He shielded Francesca as best he could, but still she scrambled backward, yanking her clothes back over her body. "What the devil do those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds think they're doing?"

"Most likely they're following your orders, Edward," said Francesca, blushing furiously with shame. It was one thing to bare her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and much of the rest of her to Edward, but quite another to find herself on such flagrant display before his crew. What was it about Edward that made her so instantly, thoroughly wanton like this? How could desire make her forget all her most reliable common sense?

"My orders, h.e.l.l," he said, but he didn't disagree. He still stood before the window with his back-a most rigid, frustrated, and unyielding back-to her, his shoulders heaving with frustration.

She could only guess how he felt. Her own heart was racing and her entire body felt jangled and on edge, putting her perilously close to tears. What was wrong with her, anyway? Those sailors had been the only thing that had saved her from committing a folly that would have ended her independence forever, yet here she was turning weepy over the interuption of her own ruin.

"You know, Edward," she began, wishing her voice weren't wavering. "You know we should be thanking those men for taking down the deadlights when they did, and saving us from ourselves. That's twice now, Edward, twice we've nearly-nearly-"

"You're hardly to blame, Francesca." He turned around, his face set and haggard. Instead of easing his burdens, clearly all she'd done was compound them. "Clearly I cannot be trusted to be alone with you like this."

She tried to smile, pressing her hands over her still-flushed cheeks. "Well, yes, caro mio, I rather am. If I'm a woman grown enough to kiss you, then I'm fully capable of accepting the responsibility for doing so."

He raked his fingers back through his hair, heedless of how mussed it had become. "You take entirely too much responsibility for a woman."

"If I didn't," she said sadly, "then I'd never have survived as long as I have on my own."

And before her waited London, she reminded herself fiercely. In London she'd draw and paint and make a grand, lasting name for herself, and forget the pa.s.sing pleasure of a wanton kiss.

He grumbled wordlessly, deep in his throat. "Will you at least let me say I'm sorry?"

"I'm sorry, too, Edward," she said wistfully. "But for now, for us, it is better this way. If we'd gone on as we'd started-"

"d.a.m.nation, I'd never have forgiven myself!"

"Oh, yes, and how flattering is that to me?" She held her hand out to him, her ring-his ring-glinting in the pale light. "No regrets, mio leone, no sadness for us, yes?"

For an endless moment, he held back. "Do you know," he asked slowly, "that this wouldn't hurt so d.a.m.ned much if I didn't care for you?"

Oh, please, please, Edward, my fine, brave English lion, don't say such things!

"I do know," she said, and to her sorrow, she did. "Because I care for you, too."

"Then why the devil are we fighting this, Francesca?" he demanded. "Why plague us both this way?"

"Because I'm not-not ready," she whispered, tears of misery and longing once again blurring her eyes.

He sighed, and reached out to take her hand, pulling her gently toward him. "I wish to G.o.d I'd a compa.s.s or star to guide us through this, la.s.s, for I'm feeling powerfully lost without one."