Tangled (15 page)

Let my courage hold.

It was almost a relief to feel his hand grasping her nightgown and easing it up her body. Soon now. Soon. And then the minute or two of discomfort. Then the end.

But he did not move onto her immediately when her nightgown was to her waist. He spread his hand over her abdomen and held it lightly there while she waited, tense.

"Relax, Rebecca," he said against her ear.

She was deeply shamed. To have to be told such a thing. To have to be told that she was not pleasing him, that she was resisting him.

She relaxed instantly. And had to fight not to tense again when his hand moved upward beneath her nightgown, up through the valley between her breasts and around to cup one of them. Julian had never

. . . She pushed the thought away. David was David. He was her husband.

"Relax," he murmured against her lips. It was not an admonition this time.

She could feel his thumb brushing against the tip of one breast and could feel the nipple growing taut. And there was that rush of sensation again. She fought the need to squirm, to push his hand away. It was wrong. He should not . . . She should not . . .

Please, oh, please let it be over with.

And then his hand was moving down once more, down over her stomach, over her abdomen, down between her legs. She bit down on her lower lip. This was worse . . . This was far worse . . . But she had known it would be. She had loved the first time. She did not love this time.

His fingers were parting her and stroking her. And then something he did with his thumb, something she did not consciously feel at first, sent that sensation stabbing

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through her again, upward inside her from the place he touched through her womb and her breasts, past her throat and up behind her nose. A totally raw pain that was not pain. She turned blindly into him, seeking escape.

And finally—oh, thank God, finally—he was going to do what was familiar to her. Only the brief discomfort now and then it would be finished for tonight. She went gratefully over onto her back again, his hands beneath her, and spread her legs obediently astride the pressure of his. She drew a slow breath and set her hands flat on the bed on either side of her.

There was no pain, no discomfort. That was her first relieved thought. But it was only momentary. He was sliding into wetness.

She could both feel and hear it. The embarrassment and humiliation had her losing control, panting for breath, pushing at his chest, before she could take herself in hand.

"Easy," he murmured. He was up on his elbows, looking down at her. She wanted to die of humiliation. There was nowhere to hide her face. "Easy, Rebecca."

He was deep. Much deeper . . . Much larger . . . But she would make no comparisons. She spread damp palms against the mattress, pressed them down hard against it.

His mouth came to hers. "Easy," he said into it. "I'll not hurt you."

It did not hurt. She was too wet for discomfort or pain. She listened to the wetness as he began to move and waited for the swift pounding that would bring the humiliation to its familiar end. Only a minute now.

He moved slowly, withdrawing almost completely before sliding deep inside again. The movements, the sounds, became gradually rhythmic. And she found after all that she was able to relax, to hold herself open to him, to give him what he wanted and needed without resistance. She tried not to listen to the sounds. She wondered how disgusted he was with her.

She forgot time. This was what it felt like to be David's wife, she thought after the rhythm of his loving had relaxed her and there was leisure in which to think and feel. He was making prolonged, deeply intimate use of her body. Their marriage was being very thoroughly consummated. She knew that she would feel sore and throb-

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bing when he had finally finished with her. That she would feel very much his wife.

Was that what he intended? Did he mean to banish any lingering ghosts once and for all? Put the strong stamp of his possession on her from their wedding night on? Dare her ever to feel that she was still another man's wife? She did not feel it. She was David's. She had made herself his by her will and her words in church that morning.

He was making her his tonight by the deep rhythmic pumping of his body into hers.

But even if she had not already put the past determinedly behind her in order to make herself undividedly this man's wife, she would have been his wife now. She felt thoroughly possessed, thoroughly known. Her body, opened and in use, held no secrets from him. Her soul felt as if it were pinned open to his gaze and his possession.

But after all it was not so difficult. It was not even entirely unpleasant—despite the fact that it had continued for much longer than she had expected it could.

And then his hands were gripping her shoulders and he stilled inside her, thrust deeply once, twice, three times more, and sighed against the side of her face. She felt with a stab of surprise the hot release of his seed.

She felt damp and cool when he lifted himself away from her and lay at her side again. He drew her nightgown down with one hand and the bedclothes up over her, keeping his arm across her when he was finished. She turned her head and looked into his eyes. One lock of his dark hair was down over his forehead. His hair looked thoroughly rumpled. He was David, she thought in some wonder.

David, of course. He was her husband, the man she had married just that day. But even so— David! Her mind felt dazed with the knowledge that what had just happened, the consummation that had been so far different, so much more—
carnal
than she had expected, had happened with David.

She wondered if it had been proper. Were husbands allowed to use their wives so? An absurd thought, of course. Anything was proper within marriage—anything that the husband initiated. Husbands were allowed to take their pleasure of their wives in any way they pleased. A
wife must submit herself—but not enjoy it. It would be unseemly for a wife to enjoy anything that was of the body. She had been taught that as a girl.

She had not enjoyed it. She had only found it—well, not unpleasant. Less unpleasant than she had ever found it before though it had been far more carnal and had lasted a great deal longer.

She closed her eyes at the betrayal of that final thought. Julian had loved her. He had treated her as a lady. David did not love her. That was why he had treated her . . . But he had a right to treat her as he would.

Julian. She could not after all put him from her mind. It was so final now. So very final. She was another man's wife in every sense of the word. David's. And she had promised David that she would not even think of Julian any longer. She would not think of him, then. It would be disloyal to do so. She would not. .

She was David's wife.

She felt him lean over her and then his lips were brushing hers.

"Thank you, Rebecca," he said softly. "Sleep now. It had been a long and tiring day for you."

Yes. Ages and ages long. And bone-wearying. Soul-wearying. She did not open her eyes or reply. Some time later she slept.

David did not sleep for long. It felt strange to be sharing his bed.

He had slept all night with women before, but it had been different.

The main purpose of such nights had been sexual. Sleep had been taken in snatched intervals between bouts. The main purpose now was to sleep, to make love first and then to sleep. To set a pattern for the rest of their married life.

It felt strange. And to be lying with Rebecca. He could hear her breathing quietly and deeply. She was lying on her back, her head turned toward him. Her hair spilled over her pillow and over the covers. She looked different—not the quiet, disciplined, always proper Rebecca he had known for much of his life, the unattainable Rebecca of his dreams, but a woman, voluptuous and relaxed after sex.

She was his wife. In every sense of the word she was now his wife.

He would be content with only what she was able to give, he had told her. He would be content with her help and companionship and perhaps her affection. Never her love. He closed his eyes and tried to will sleep to come back. It seemed years since he had had a good night's sleep. A lifetime.

He had planned his wedding night with care. She had known love and a lover. She had been married to Julian for almost three years.

She knew all about passion and sexual fulfillment with a man she loved with all her heart. He could not hope to compete. He could not hope to arouse passion or joy in her. And yet he had known that he could not be satisfied with mere brief, dispassionate exercises of his rights at night. Their marriage would stand little chance if there was not at least some physical tenderness between them.

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He would love her with his body, he had decided, and take whatever she could give in return. But he was very aware that she was a lady, that he must love her with some restraint. It would have been different for her with Julian—she had loved him. She did not love her new husband. He must love her with restraint.

He was not sure now that she had been able to give him anything except her acquiescence. Rebecca would always give that. It was her duty as a wife, and duty would always come above everything with Rebecca. She had been repelled by his touch. He had touched her only enough to prepare her body, to ready it for penetration. He knew from an early manhood experience with an outspoken prostitute that it was uncomfortable, even painful, for women to be mounted when quite unaroused and dry. He had learned on that occasion—and practiced it ever since—how to make the passage wet and comfortable for his woman. And pleasurable for himself.

Rebecca's body had responded. She had not. Duty had had to fight with repulsion. Duty had won—of course. She had relaxed completely after he had mounted her and established a rhythm in her.

But she had been utterly passive. Her hands had not even touched him.

She must have been making comparisons, he thought. It must have been dreadful for her. It must have seemed to her that she was being violated. A war must have been raging in her mind—all the time he had worked in her— between duty and protest. And he knew that she would have fought not to remember, not to make comparisons.

She had made him the promise that she would not even think about Julian after her new marriage.

And yet David had stubbornly kept to his planned course. He could have finished swiftly in her. Heaven knew that touching her had aroused him enough. But he had wanted the consummation of their marriage to be something quite decisive, something that would establish beyond question the new physical bond between them.

In the process he had probably given her a lasting disgust of him and of what her duty to him was going to involve.

He wondered it he would have the courage to go on. Not that there was any going back now. She was his wife.
And she was awake, staring at him with rather vacant eyes. Looking for Julian?

Soon there would be the awareness in her eyes that it was he, David, not Julian.

"Comfortable?" he asked.

She was more than half asleep still. "Mm," she said, and her eyes fluttered closed again.

She was going to have a stiff neck in the morning. He moved a little closer to her, slid one arm beneath her neck, and turned her onto her side against him. She was all soft, relaxed heat. Her hair smelled of soap, but there was a more enticing smell about her—the smell of woman. It was a smell he had encountered before but had never associated with Rebecca. But then he had always been careful during those four years to keep his mind out of Julian's marriage bed.

Her eyes were open again, he saw when he looked down at her. But she had still not stiffened into full wakefulness. He kissed her. Her mouth was relaxed and yielding.

"Your head was at an awkward angle," he explained. "Your neck would have been stiff in the morning."

"Oh," she said. She lay still in his arms, but it was the stillness of acquiescence now. She knew that something was to come between this moment and a return to sleep. He could feel the awareness in her, though no part of her body tensed.

That had not been his intention. One might take a whore for one's pleasure as many times in the course of a night as one had energy for.

One did not demand as much of a wife. He had had Rebecca once and had taken his time over it. He had intended to allow her to sleep after that. She had had a busy and emotionally exhausting day. And what had come at the end of it had not been a pleasure for her.

He ran one hand lightly down her back, feeling the curve of her spine. He could feel her breasts resting against his chest, her thighs brushing his. And she was right, of course. Her body had picked up the message even before his brain was aware of it. He kissed her again, tasting her lips with his tongue. He could feel the silki-ness of her hair over his arm.

He eased her nightgown and his night shirt up between

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them and touched her lightly, his hand flat against her. She was still warm and moist. He ran two fingers downward, parting her, and reached them up a little way inside her. Her body was ready for him.

The sounds of wetness enflamed him, sending his temperature suddenly soaring.

And then she was pressing her head against his shoulder and going rigid with tension. "I'm sorry," she said, her voice high with distress.

"I'm so sorry."

"Sorry for what?" His hand stilled against her. Sorry that she just could not do it? Could not be his wife?

"I'm so sorry," she said again. "I feel so humiliated."

He understood suddenly. It was because her woman's body was responding to his man's touch although her heart could feel nothing for the man himself. God, he thought. Unbidden, he remembered his father warning him that she had not even begun to recover from the loss of Julian.

"Because of the wetness?" he said. "I deliberately induced it, Rebecca, so that you would not feel pain with my possession. Would you have preferred it otherwise? Did I hurt you? Are you sore?''