Ransomed Jewels (18 page)

Chapter 23

Claire didn’t remember climbing the stairs or walking down the hall, but somehow they’d reached Sam’s room. She couldn’t stop trembling. She was taking the biggest risk of her life. And yet, there was no way she wanted him to stop what they were about to do. She wanted him too much. Trusted him that much. She’d never felt this way before.

Surely this time it would be different. She’d waited seven years and she had to know for sure.

She clung to him and met his fiery kisses with a desperation she was afraid was more than her body could control.

Claire followed his lead, kissing him with an intensity that matched his. His hands moved over her body, touching her, feeling her, setting her flesh on fire. Yes, this was what she’d waited a lifetime to experience. Sam was the man she’d waited a lifetime to find.

She reached up to touch him, cupping his stubbled cheek in her hand. He turned his face to gently kiss her palm. The feel of his mouth on the tender inside of her hand sent a warm heaviness swirling to the pit of her stomach. Then lower. She shivered.

This was how it was supposed to be between a man and a woman. She knew it was. Even though she’d never experienced it before.

She placed her palms against his warm flesh. She couldn’t touch enough of him, couldn’t hold him close enough. Couldn’t kiss him deeply enough. Being in his arms was like being caught up in a violent turmoil she didn’t know how to battle.

She was desperate to feel his flesh beneath her fingertips, his rippling muscles beneath her hands. As if he read her mind, he stripped his shirt over his head and threw it to the floor.

“Touch me, Claire. Like I’m going to touch you.”

Claire ran her hands over his shoulders and his back. She avoided the bandage across his shoulders and moved her hands to his waist, then up again to his shoulders.

She almost didn’t notice his hands at work on the buttons that ran down the back of her dress. One by one they popped loose, freeing her. With his mouth still on hers, he pushed the material from her shoulders and ran his fingers over her exposed flesh. Claire couldn’t suppress the shiver that shook her.

Next he worked on the tabs of her petticoats, pulling them until the yards of material puddled at her feet. His mouth moved to her neck while his hands ran along the side of her body. His warm breath sent shivers racing up and down her spine while his tongue traced fiery circles at the side of her neck just below her ear. Her legs weakened beneath her, and she clung to him with greater fervency.

Claire wasn’t sure what happened next. His hands moved over her, and she couldn’t think. She sighed, and he covered her mouth and kissed her again.

“Please,” a voice whispered when their kiss ended, but it didn’t sound like hers. It couldn’t have been hers. This voice was raw and needy, husky with desire. “Oh, please . . .”

“Please, what, Claire? This?”

She didn’t know what he meant, didn’t know what she wanted, but he did. He must have. Because he loved her like she’d never been loved before.

“Yes. Please, hold me. Please, love me.”

He smiled, then his mouth came down on hers, hot and demanding. He kissed her with greater impatience, taking her with him headlong into the unknown.

Her blood rushed through her veins, pulsing hot and heavy. When she thought she could take no more, his kisses intensified.

“I need you, Sam. Please. Oh, please.”

He kissed her hard on the mouth, then moved over her. She welcomed his weight atop her, his strength against her. She wrapped her arms around his neck and brought his mouth down to hers.

He kissed her hard, then entered her with one swift thrust.

His intrusion was painful, stretching her, then tearing her when he penetrated the proof of her virginity.

He stopped.

“What the hell?”

The look on his face was stark with surprise and something more. Perhaps anger. Perhaps resentment. But mostly shock and disbelief. She read his mind as he realized that what he thought he’d done had to be impossible.

His breathing came in hard, jagged gasps, his muscles tensed in agitation, his nostrils flared wide. His smoldering gray eyes held her captive. She prayed he felt enough passion that he wouldn’t reject her. But she knew he intended to.

He was going to reject her. Abandon her like she’d been abandoned before.

She couldn’t let him. All would be lost if he did.

“No. Please, no. Don’t stop. Please.”

She was begging. She knew it and hated herself for it. But this was important. He didn’t know how important. She needed to be loved just this once. Not that he loved her. She knew he did not. But in that instant, she knew she loved him. And she needed to know what it was like to be loved by the man she loved.

“Please.”

She cupped her palm to his cheeks and smoothed the lines of fury that stretched taut across his face. “Please. Just this once,” she whispered.

She urged his head downward until his mouth was atop hers and waited, praying he’d want her enough to close the distance on his own.

He stared at her, his chest heaving, the muscles across his shoulders and chest as tight as strings on a bow. A heavy sheen of perspiration covered his forehead. Through clenched teeth he asked, “Are you all right?”

She nodded, then raised her head to kiss him. He kissed her back.

His kiss was at first tentative, hesitant, but then he kissed her deeper, harder, with more passion. His tongue entered her mouth, and she met his invasion with all the expertise he’d taught her. Their tongues touched and battled in a fevered frenzy, then mated with a consuming heat that sent her soaring.

“Are you sure?” he gasped, his arms braced on either side of her, his gaze boring into hers.

“Yes. Oh, yes.”

She felt him move inside her and wanted to cry out with joy. She tightened her fingers around his shoulder as they began their journey.

“Relax, Claire. Just relax.”

Claire tried, honestly she did, but he was working her to a mindless state. Carrying her with him on a journey even more incredible than she imagined it would be.

She gripped his muscled arms until she knew she must be leaving marks in his flesh, but she couldn’t ease her hold. He was her lifeline, and she would drown if she let go of him.

Claire didn’t think she could survive soaring this high into the unknown. “Major!”

“Samuel,” he gasped. “Say it!”

“Samuel. Yes. Oh, Sam!”

Claire’s head thrashed from side to side as she lost herself in the wild abandon of their lovemaking. She writhed beneath him, her mind a useless part of her body that no longer functioned. And still he took her higher into the unknown.

His thrusts left her with no control as she cried out his name again. “Sam!”

“Yes, Claire. Claire!”

At the sound of her name, Claire leaped from a precipice high into the Heavens. She tumbled downward toward earth, through billowing clouds, blinding sunshine, and vivid rainbows. And still she tumbled further. Through darkness and blinding light.

If given the choice, she would choose never to fall back to earth. Never allow this miracle to end. Never allow this wondrous sensation to conclude. But it did. And she lay wondrously sated beneath him.

She opened her eyes as he thrust into her a final time. Then, with eyes closed tightly and teeth clenched, he threw back his head and found his release.

When at last he collapsed atop her, she wrapped her arms around him and held him close, pretending for just a moment that he was hers forever. That she’d never be forced to give him up.

His weight was wonderfully heavy atop her, his skin slick with perspiration from their lovemaking. She ran her hands over his shoulders and down his arms. His muscles rippled beneath her fingertips.

She couldn’t stop herself from touching more of him. She memorized the feel of him against her, inside her, atop her. It was a memory she would never forget. A memory she’d cherish her whole life.

His face was nestled against her neck, his breathing harsh and raspy against her throat. His chest heaved while his heart thundered, and she felt every beat against her breast.

The minutes passed in blissful quiet, their bodies replete, their passion sated. And she thought how wonderful it had been.

But that euphoria was quickly replaced by a devastating sadness when his body separated from hers.

He rolled away from her and lay on his back, his eyes open wide as he stared at the ceiling above him. She knew he had a million questions to ask. Just as she knew she owed him an explanation. She just wasn’t ready to give it. Not yet.

“Claire?”

His voice came to her as from a distance. As if he was struggling to invent at least one possible reason that she was still a virgin.

“Don’t,” she answered, curling into him.

He reached out his arm and nestled her to him as if he understood her need for his closeness.

Claire rested her head on his shoulder and wrapped her arm around his waist. And she slept.

A woman.

At last.

Chapter 24

Claire watched the sky turn from a dusty gray to a hazy blue, then brighter yet as streaks of varying shades of pink spiraled through it. She studied the changing colors through half-drawn drapes at the window and knew dawn was not far off.

He slept now. Finally.

He’d been awake when she’d fallen asleep and still awake each time she woke. She’d listened to his labored breathing long after they’d made love and knew it was only a short time ago when it slowed that he’d finally given up his fight to understand. And he slept.

She lifted herself from him and moved to the edge of the bed, then slipped out from beneath the covers he’d thrown over them. She tried to be as quiet as she could, but realized when his breathing changed he was probably awake again. She was glad he let her slip on her gown and leave the room without stopping her.

The night had been wondrous. Even more perfect than she’d imagined it would be. She didn’t want him to change its rightness with the questions she knew she’d eventually have to answer. Questions that would color the major’s opinion of Hunt. So she left him without a word.

She reached her own room without being observed, but wasn’t really concerned. It was too early for even Cook to be up.

How strange that seemed this morning. That life would go on as usual, the same as it did every morning, when it wasn’t at all an ordinary morning. When no morning would ever be the same for her again. All because of what had happened to her last night.

Claire filled the basin with water and dared for the first time to look into the mirror. She didn’t know what she expected to see, but knew she must look different. Knew it must be plain for everyone to see that she’d changed. That the person she’d been yesterday was gone. Had been transformed into a different person. A woman.

She rinsed a cloth and washed. She was sore, she realized, but it was a wondrous soreness. A completeness she’d never thought to feel.

When she finished, she dressed in a fresh black gown. Oh, how she wanted to wear the green-and-white-striped muslin she’d worn before Hunt’s death. Something gay and pretty. Something that would reflect her joy.

She combed her hair, pulling it loosely back from her face and letting it fall down her back. Tilly could fix it in a more severe style later on, but for now, she wanted it loose. Wanted it as free as she felt.

With a smile on her face, she turned from her dressing table and stopped short. Her door stood open and the major filled the entryway.

His feet were planted sternly, his hands locked behind his back, and he wore a severe expression on his face. He’d washed and shaved, his face clean, his thick, dark hair brushed back like she was used to seeing. But this morning his exposed face only emphasized his serious demeanor.

He wore dark pants over his boots and a loose-fitting white cotton shirt tucked into his waist, but open at the collar. She tried not to stare at the wide V at his neck that exposed the bronzed skin and thick hair she’d touched with such abandon last night, but failed to move her gaze from him. She could not keep her eyes from him. Nor could she keep that strange warmth from settling deep inside her.

He stepped into the room and closed the door behind him.

An uncomfortable tension engulfed her, a dark foreboding that entered with him and filled every nook and crevice of the room. She’d studied his formidable presence often, but had never felt its full threatening force more than she did now.

“Good morning,” she said, struggling to stand up to him when what she wanted was to lower her gaze to the floor so she wouldn’t have to look at him. She knew he was seething with questions about last night. Knew he wanted answers to secrets she’d just as soon not reveal.

“Good morning.”

He stepped farther into the room, his gaze riveted on her. An aura of determination surrounded him, and she felt like a prisoner he’d come to interrogate. Like an enemy concealing secret information. She would rather he didn’t stand so close. That he didn’t tower over her.

She rose, then moved to the window and drew back the drapery. It was not yet dawn, but the openness helped. It gave her a feeling of confidence. She needed all the confidence she could gather.

“You didn’t wake me when you left.”

“I didn’t see the need.”

“You didn’t.”

His two words made up such a simple statement, but the hard tone of his voice suggested any reply she gave him would take her to a place she didn’t want to go.

“It’s too early to ring for coffee,” she said, praying he’d take her hint and go downstairs and wait for her there. “If you’d like—”

“What I’d like,” he said, crossing the room in two angry strides, “is for you to tell me what the hell happened last night.”

She stepped away from him. Not out of fear, but because she needed the distance to battle the confusion she saw on his face.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were a virgin? My God, you were married to Hunt for six—”

“Seven.”

“. . . seven years.”

His expression turned harder, the condemning look in his eyes blatant along with the disbelief.

“Bloody hell, woman. Didn’t you once, in all that time, allow him to come to your bed?”

Didn’t she
allow
him?

Claire staggered under the weight of his implication. She gripped the edge of the nearest chair angled in front of the window. She had imagined him coming to many conclusions, the most obvious being that her husband had never
wanted
her as his wife. But never had she expected him to think
she
was the one who would not be a wife to her husband. She swallowed hard. “Is that what you think?”

“What else am I to think? You said yourself the purpose for your marriage was to give Hunt an heir. How could you deliberately deny him that right?”

He thought the worst of her. Thought she was callous and deceiving enough to forbid her husband his right to get her with child. That it was by choice she was still a virgin. She nearly doubled over from the pain.

She didn’t think it was possible to hurt any more than she’d hurt every day during the seven years Hunt had refused to make her his wife. But she’d been wrong. It hurt far more to realize Sam thought she was capable of such deceit.

She pulled deep within herself as she had for seven years. Far inside until she reached that empty place where no hint of emotion or hurt could touch her. Why had she assumed the major would realize that she couldn’t be at fault for the lack of intimacy in her marriage? That it was Hunt’s fault she was still a virgin?

Didn’t he know her well enough to realize that? Or care enough for her? She’d learned years ago that no one had thought for even a minute that Hunt might be the reason she’d never conceived a child. But she thought Sam would be different.

She was a fool. For seven years she’d faced Society’s pitying glances when month after month there was no sign of a child. And for all that time, she’d suffered with her own feelings of inadequacy when her husband refused to come to her. She’d locked away her emotions and convinced herself it did not matter if her husband could not love her.

She’d survived the disgrace of not being a woman her whole married life. What did Major Samuel Bennett’s opinion of her matter? Let him believe she’d refused to be a wife to her husband. If he didn’t know what kind of woman she really was, then let him believe the worst of her. It would solve the impossibility of a commitment between them. It would be the excuse she needed to pretend last night had never happened.

Claire forced a well-rehearsed smile and turned on him.

“Perhaps,” she said, forcing down the lump lodged in her throat, “I wanted Hunt as little as he wanted me. Perhaps our marriage was a one of mutual dissatisfaction.”

“So you refused him for all that time?”

“Do you find it hard to believe that I could remain untouched for so long? Oh, Major. That was not difficult. You knew Hunt. He was hardly the type of man to force himself on a woman.”

The major’s hands clenched at his side. “Do you know what you’ve done? Because of you, the Huntingdon title will cease to exist.”

She wanted to laugh. Oh, how often she’d thrown that same argument up to Hunt in the beginning when she was naïve enough to think she could save her marriage. When she’d tried every tactic and argument she could think of to force him to be a husband to her. Even if it was only to provide him with an heir.

Before Hunt had, in his quiet, forceful way, told her that no child of hers could be his heir. Even though she couldn’t understand his reasoning, she knew his meaning. He hadn’t been able to fight his father’s demand that he take her as his wife, but he refused to have her as the mother of his children.

Even though Claire thought she might be ill when she looked at the disappointment she knew she’d see on the major’s face, she braced herself to face him. “I obviously expected him to live longer.”

She heard the sound of his fury when he sucked in a harsh breath. “How did you do it, Claire? There was never a hint of scandal involving Hunt. No rumors of a mistress or an affair with a widow or bored and unhappy wife. How did you force someone so undeniably male and accustomed to female companionship to lead the life of a monk?”

“Stop it!”

With long, angry strides he took himself to the other side of the room and turned his back on her.

Claire waited, praying he’d realize how wrong he was. Praying he’d say the words that would take away the bitterness she heard in his accusations. She waited for him to realize she wasn’t capable of doing something so horrendous. But he said nothing. He only braced his hands against the fireplace mantel and hung his head between his outstretched arms.

For a long time he stared into the cold, lifeless embers of a fire long gone out. When he spoke, his voice was soft and deadly, his words cutting through the silence like a knife. “Why me?”

Hundreds of painful needle points pierced her heart. A lump formed in her throat, and even though she tried, she couldn’t speak.

“Why did you deny your husband for seven years, then not even six months after his death give yourself to me?”

Claire knew what it felt like to have her heart ripped from her breast. She was still alive, yet she knew a part of her had died.

For seven years she’d thought she’d lived her worst nightmare. Thought nothing could be worse than knowing the man who’d vowed before God to love and cherish her didn’t want her. But that hadn’t been the worst. She knew that now.

Her worst nightmare was watching the man she’d come to care for—no, love—stare at her as if she were the most vile, disgusting creature on earth. It was having the man to whom she’d just given her body accuse her of being such a scheming manipulator that she’d denied her husband his right to an heir. It was having the man to whom she’d given her heart think she could do something so abhorrent. That was the worst.

And a large part of the heart she’d exposed to him crumbled and broke, making it impossible to tell him the truth . . . that her husband had been too repulsed by her to touch her. She could save herself that disgrace, at least.

“Why you?” Claire said, her voice sounding unnatural to her ears. “Who better?”

She took two steps into the center of the room and faced him squarely. “Who better to expose my secret to than Hunt’s best friend? Who better to trust with the knowledge that I’d never let my husband bed me than the one person I knew would never divulge my secret?

“Just imagine the scandal my virginity would have caused once it was discovered the Marquess of Huntingdon had not been man enough to force his wife to fulfill her wifely obligations. Imagine the laughingstock Hunt would have become if I would have let just anyone bed me and my virginity became common knowledge.”

She paced the room, clasping and unclasping her hands. Her breathing was rapid and shallow. She had to keep moving or she would fall apart. “I consider choosing you as my first lover a magnanimous act in protecting Hunt’s memory. Hunt would have been grateful for your participation, Major.”

She saw him stiffen as the impact of her words registered. His jaw clenched, and the narrow glare of his eyes contained more bitterness than she believed could be leveled at any one person.

“Think of bedding me as doing Hunt a favor. Of saving your fellow comrade-in-arms from being posthumously disgraced.” The room spun around her, and she reached out to steady herself against the corner of her small writing desk. “Can you imagine the laugh Society would have had at his expense, knowing the manly Marquess of Huntingdon could have had any woman in England—except his wife?”

Claire managed a laugh even though the blood thundered in her head with such violence she could barely breathe. A painful weight pressed against her heart. And through his hate-filled glare, she tried to pretend the look of horror and disgust she saw on the major’s face wasn’t killing her inch by painful inch. But it was. “Now, get out!” she demanded. “And leave me alone!”

Claire turned away from the look of revulsion on his face. She waited to hear him storm from the room. When he didn’t, she repeated her demand. “Get out! Now!”

She squeezed her eyes shut to keep the tears from running down her cheeks. When he didn’t move, she prayed she’d hear him tell her he knew her words had been lies. That he knew her well enough—cared for her enough—to know she would never have turned Hunt from her bed. That he knew Hunt would never have let her. That there must be another reason.

But if he did, he didn’t get a chance to utter those thoughts. Her door flew open and Barnaby stepped into the room.

“What the hell is going on, Claire? I heard the yelling from my room.”

Claire gave the major a final look, then turned her gaze to the confused look on Barnaby’s face. From the furious look on the major’s.

Barnaby was right. The major wasn’t capable of giving her what she so desperately needed. She’d been a fool to think he could.

“Claire?” When she didn’t answer him, Barnaby turned to Sam. “Bennett?”

Claire knew her brother expected the major to explain what his sister obviously wouldn’t. She knew he wouldn’t. Knew her secret was safe now for eternity.