Teaching the Earl (18 page)

She came without protest, leaned on him and breathed him in. Her stomach clenched. Thank heavens the Hastings lived so close to their London house. He must not have time to change his mind. Not when this urgency drummed through her like a heartbeat, one with life. Crazy to want him like this, when he had hurt her. Crazy to smell the man scent of him, look at his wide hands, press up against his hard body and forget to think. So she was crazy. Let it be so. He had said he would never hurt her again. Let it be true.

The carriage had barely halted when he had the door open and was halfway to the ground, hand extended for hers. She took it and let him pull her out, so fast she fell against his chest and he caught her up and
swept her straight up to the door. He unlocked it one-handed, his other arm tightened around her chest, and she laid her head on his shoulder. Her head whirled as he carried her into the house and up the main stairs. He took them two-at-a-time so she clutched him, half-panicked. She was not such a lightweight.

He breathed heavily at the top, but did not stop, only strode to the master bedroom and thrust open the door. He slammed it behind them and let her slide down the front of his body.

"I have tried. God knows I have tried. But you-You are a more potent lure than I have the will to resist." He seized her, plunged his fingers deep into her hair and held her head still so he could plunder her mouth.

She lifted her arms to twine them around him and pull herself in closer,
her curves sinking into his hard shape. Passion was a thunder in her blood, dark and rolling over her. His tongue in her mouth was urgent and reckless and she sucked on it and moaned, her knees softening so they barely held her up.

He took her weight, his forearms hard bars around her ribs, half-lifted her to the bed and sprawled on it with her on his chest. His hands shifted and shaped her, dragged her close, then he rolled so she was beneath him, arched over her and devoured her, fierce with masculine possession.

She whimpered with the force of it, confused and needing, wanting his skin on hers, wanting more of him, everywhere. Her body twisted beneath his, trying to get nearer, to clutch him and pull him in, to burrow closer to that fervent heat. She fumbled with the buttons at the front of his shirt, mangled his cravat and moaned with frustration.

He reared back and with swift, savage hands tugged at his cravat, then abandoned it for a higher priority
, seized the front of her gown and hauled it down so her breasts sprang free.

"God, yes!" he hissed, and buried his face in them, lavished first one then the other nipple with his hot mouth so they ruched up tight
, so sensitive she flinched with every touch and felt the whipcrack of sensation streak through her body to that secret place between her legs.

She wrested her arms free of her half-sleeves,
heard them rip and did not care; yanked up her skirts so she could wrap her legs around him.

Yes, that was it
. That was where she needed him; at the core of her, where she burned with desire for him.

He knew, for his hands were there, seeking and finding her. She felt them slippery and sensuous on her, in her, so she cried out, mindless and wild. She squeezed him with her thighs, pulled him in with her heels,
urged him nearer until there was barely space between them. Yet still those skillful fingers moved against her, wove magic on her tender flesh until she sobbed and shattered, shaking and calling out, "Chris. Oh. Oh, Chris."

"That's it. That's right. Just like that. Ah, I have to see."

He seized the moment when her relaxed arms fell away and moved, too swift to stop, slid down her body, shoved her skirts even higher then took hold of her undergarments and tore them in half.

"Chris!"

His expression was one of entrancement, and fierce intent, and then he put his mouth on her and she gave a small shriek of shock. What was he doing? What was-Oh.

She shook and fell back on the pillows, head lolling, hands clenched in the coverlet, and lifted her hips mindlessly towards him. Oh yes. More of that, and more and more and let it never stop. She panted, moaned, and tossed her head from side to side, suspended in bliss. Then his hands were on her breasts again, shaping them, plucking at her nipples, and it was too much, between those fingers and his mouth, with all her body aflame, to hold together and be sane.

So she flew apart, lost in pleasure, drowned and submerged.

He groaned, and brought his body to lie against hers. She lifted a limp hand to his shoulder and felt the twitch of muscle beneath her fingers as he unfastened his breeches in haste. Then he rolled towards her and where his mouth had been was now a ruthlessly hard shape, blunt and insistent.

She was prepared for pain. Yet as he dipped and retreated, dipped and retreated in fast pulses, slowly deepening that glide with every thrust, there was no pain, Only tightness and fullness, inexorable and . . . good. Yes, it was good. She flexed up to him, an experiment, took him in further, and a shudder went straight up her spine.

They strove together, a matched rhythm, until he was deep in her and still it was painless. She pulled him close, loving the solid press of his body, the rough friction, the reckless fervor of him. He was not controlled or rational. He muttered husky words of inarticulate praise in her ear, held her hard, as she held him, and plundered her.

Yes, it was
good, to know she could move him, shift him from cool distance to this passion. This was power and pleasure, thrilling and intense.

Then he arched his back, head lifted, eyes closed and jaw clenched so tight he could have been in anguish, still and straining. She gazed up at him, intrigued. When he opened his eyes and looked down at her she smiled brightly, enormously pleased with her own achievement.

His sigh was gusty, and he eased his weight down to one side of her and gathered her in close, hindered by their bunched clothing.

She fingered the trailing end of his cravat. "Did you enjoy that?"

"Did I-There aren't words. The feeling of being inside you-I can't describe it. Far more pertinent though, did you enjoy it? Have I redeemed myself, at least a little?"

"I'd have to say yes. Given due consideration. I thought it very likable."

"That's good. Ah, Elizabeth-"

"Beth."

"Beth, I've no idea what to do now."

"Take off our clothes?"

"I-" His body began to shake, and when she lifted her head she saw he was laughing. "Yes, that would be sensible. A more rational man would have attended to that business first."

"You weren't rational?"

"I was not."

"I like that. I like it when you relax and just do what you want."

"A year ago, I thought I was a self-disciplined man. I thought I had life well in hand. Now I can't keep a vow even for a span of a few months. So I don't know what to do."

"Perhaps you should listen to the truth of that. Some vows should never be made. If you can't keep this one - to deny yourself companionship and comfort and," she waved a hand at the bed, and their bodies on it, "this - if you can't do that
then accept what that tells you about the vow itself. Take it back."

"That is not
honor-"

"You will destroy yourself," she said quietly. "And that would be the greatest tragedy. This man you have been tonight is a stranger. One I like. One I perhaps sensed was within you, when you fascinated me from our first meeting. I don't want that man to go away, to hide behind duty and blame and self-hatred. Please don't do it. If not for yourself, please don't do it
, for me."

"You don't understand-"

"I understand too well." She disentangled herself and sat up, weight propped on one hand as she looked down at him. He was deliciously rumpled and disreputable, like she had laid a stamp of possession on him. She dared to put her free hand on his heart, and when he let it stay there she felt a frisson of delight. "Don't destroy this. I think it is precious to me."

He captured her wrist, lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed it solemnly, then held it. "I'm not free to give it."

"Not even to your own wife?" she said, tried to make her tone light, and saw the answer in his eyes. He believed his words. "Well, then that is your loss, my lord." She shuffled to the edge of the bed, stood, pulled her dress upwards and held it in place. His rejection - gentle as it was - still hurt too much for her to stay. She was going to cry, any moment. Still she strove to be cheerful. "If you change your mind, you know where I'll be. In the next room, unclothed in my bed. We could do that again," she gestured expressively at the space where she had lain in ecstasy only minutes ago, "or lie together, be together, united in hope for the future."

That was it. That was the limit of what she could say, with tears crowding in and her voice close to breaking. So she turned away and glided to the door, head high, ball gown clutched tight at her bosom and sagging around her. The connecting door between their suites opened with a squeal of unused hinges, and she went through and shut it noisily behind her.

Then she undressed, washed herself, put on a nightdress and climbed into her bed, by the light of the single candle her maid had left burning.

Once there she lay for a long time, staring up at the dim ceiling.

He did not come.

She woke to an empty bed.

Of course.
Nothing had changed, for him. He had stumbled on his chosen path, but he would pick himself up and carry on, unflinching.

She could not be so
stoic.

She sighed and got up.
Very well. So be it. There was no point moping about because a man had made a decision. She could make a decision too. There was a conversation that must be had.

She rang the bell hard, and when her lady's maid came to answer she said, "I'd like the cornflower blue walking dress with the navy sash and bonnet. You can do my hair as you did it last Friday for the morning tea with Mrs Edgerton."

"Yes, Madam."

They worked swiftly, and with every ribbon they tied, every button they fastened she bolstered her courage. He might be an earl, but she was a countess; had become a countess only scant months after he gained his title. Really there was little difference in stature between them. Of course she had married into a blue-blooded family, rather than inheriting. Still, she would be a countess for the rest of her life. She must begin as she meant to go on. She had made a poor start of it really, with him; deferring to him, trusting him to choose the right path for them both. If he had done the task well she would have left it to him. However no man got to choose to make her miserable.

That was simply inappropriate. She must teach him to see things clearly. Or rather, to see things as she did, which probably amounted to the same thing.

She caught him just in time. He had been about to leave for a ride in the park.

"Chris! Just a moment. I need to talk to you."

He did not meet her gaze, but kept pulling his gloves on. "I shan't be long.
Perhaps an hour. Then we can talk."

But something about his manner, the way he would not look at her, made her think how easy it was for a gentleman to be diverted while he was about town. To run into friends or acquaintances and be drawn to go and see a prize fight, or watch horse races, or play card games or anything else, really. Anything at all when the last thing you wanted was to go home and talk to your troublesome wife.

"No, I'm afraid it can't wait."

Now he did look at her, and his frown was grim. "I'll be in a bad temper if I don't get out for my ride."

"I'll be in a very bad temper if I don't get these words out that I'm itching to say."

They stared at each other for a long moment, almost a glare, then one side of his mouth
quirked up.

"That sounds ominous.
Very well. Come and tell me. But speak swiftly." He strode away towards the house's small study, a marginalized room furnished by a man who had not cared to keep up with his business. She trotted behind him, and whisked through the door he stood ready to close.

"Madam?" he said.

"I give you due warning, I am a countess now, Countesses do not stand for neglect."

He raised a single eyebrow. "Do they not?"

"No, most certainly not. Neither do they accept rejection"

"No?"

"You'd have to be a fool to reject a countess."

"An amusing idea."

"You have made me a countess. You must treat me like one. That means you will be a proper husband to me. Not merely a fortune hunter who wants to use my money and leave me with nothing-"

"I have given you the title you are so eager to claim
today."

"Eager? It's not eagerness. It's readiness. I can see I must. I will live up to it. And so must you. Your duty to your dependents is not your only duty. You have another to produce an heir."

He looked away. "I cannot."

"Cannot? Or will not? You seemed capable these last two nights, at least temporarily. Or am I wrong? Is it in fact a lack of manhood?"

"Pardon?" he said, vaguely incredulous.

"I understand not every gentleman is able to perform in the bedchamber." That was something Lydia had said once, in a conversation about her new husband. Elizabeth repeated it with compassion but not understanding. "If you are thus afflicted-"

"I am not afflicted, Madam. I think you've had evidence of that. I already explained my reasons to you-"

"But you can't imagine I believe them. They don't make sense. You say you had a
fiancée, you loved her, you jilted her and she killed herself. That is certainly very tragic, but the story is contradictory."

"How so?"
His tone was ominous. She eyed him cautiously, and went on.

"If you truly, really truly loved her, with all passion, you would never have jilted her."

"If she had married me, we would have lived in poverty. I could not offer her more. As an earl I cannot earn the living I had planned on as a gentleman. The duties of the earldom do not permit it. We would have had no money to invest in the grounds, would have scratched a bare existence out of the dirt and lived in a house falling down around our ears, little better than my cottagers."

"Well. Yes, I can see that would be very lowering if one expected more of life. Yet if you really loved her, you would have done it anyway."

"Because I really loved her, I sought to spare her. She was not a woman made for hardship."

"Wasn't she?"

"I-I should not speak of her to you." He turned away and clutched at the roots of his hair with his hands.

"If I truly loved someone, I would be too selfish to give them up," she said softly.

"You have the selfishness of youth."

"Do I? Perhaps you are right. But you are not so much older than I am.
Twenty-six? Twenty-seven?"

"Twenty-five."

"There. You can’t tell me in the next seven years I'll learn to disregard my own passions enough to abandon a person who is life itself to me. This is not a matter of age."

"You overestimate love, as do so many. The poets make it out to be a more potent, vital force than any other. But that is for the sake of dramatic verse. In reality the situation is quite different."

"Really? How is it?" She was intrigued.

"When one has known a person for a great span of years, one is comfortable with them. One knows them inside out, and there is a natural affection for them, and a tolerance of their ways. One goes along very comfortably next to them. That is love."

"Oh." She blinked at him, and for the first time felt pity for him, and true understanding. "So out of care for your fiancée’s wellbeing, you gave up your love for her? You freed her."

"Yes."

"Because it seemed sensible."

"I thought my duty lay with my new dependents. I thought of all the things I could achieve in parliament, with my place in the House of Lords. I could not give up the title, and I could not keep it and marry her. It seems crazy to say these things now, to weigh them up against her life, but I had no idea that she would . . . do as she did."

"That must have been a shock."

"It was . . . indescribable

"And her death changed things for you?"

"Of course it did. It changed everything."

"And now you regret your choice."

"If I had chosen differently, she would still be alive." He shook his head, his face twisted with pain.

"Then I understand, I think. Yet what you plan to do to me is the greatest injustice."

"Not the greatest-"

"The very greatest," she said inexorably. "You take every possibility of love and passion from me. You tell me I will never have children of you, nor companionship. You give me a life empty of meaning, and yet somehow you expect it to be enough for me. You are willfully blind."

"What is it you want, then? Do you want me to say you may take other lovers, have children by them?" His face was like stone, hard and still. "That cannot be."

She had never intended that, and would have blurted out that truth, shocked he would think it of her. But something about his rigid position made her hesitate.

"Why not?" she said slowly.
"It seems a very . . . tidy solution." He stared at her, wild-eyed. "You may retreat to the estate and strive penitently to create all the wealth and prosperity you can there, for yourself and every other dependent. I can . . . ah . . . find love, have children and create the family I want. You will have an heir without ever needing to engage with life or be happy. You can spend your whole life paying for Sophia's choice. Everyone gets what they want."

"All will reject you. Your children will grow up in scandal-"

"It should be easy to conceal. All I need do is visit the estate for a few days each time I discover a pregnancy. That will be quite sufficient." He was going a very interesting shade. Dead pale with tinges of yellowish-green. "And while I'm not very good at hiding things, I don't really need to conceal a lover. It's so normal to have one, it's almost expected. So long as one doesn't make it obvious, of course. I'll have to remember not to kiss him in public."

His fists were clenched, nostrils flared and chest lifted and fell as if he had just run a race. "No!"

"It really is the only solution."

"IT WILL NOT HAPPEN," he thundered.

"Of course it will. Very shortly you'll be back on the estate and I'll set to it. Unless . . ."

There was silence.

"Unless what?" he said curtly, when she did not finish.

"You will service me."

"Service you?" he repeated, and now both brows shot up.

"Certainly.
If you can't bring yourself to make love then you will service me. That is the term, is it not? I've been reading about farming. That is the term used when a bull impregnates a-"

"That is the term. You would subject yourself to this?"

"You leave me remarkably short of options." Though more than that, his powerful emotional response made her hope. If she could break through to him - as she had done before - and keep him by her, perhaps she could teach him something new about life. About love.

If he went away and locked himself back up in that dilapidated manor house, he might spend months or even years there, trapped in his own head. She would not allow
him to ruin her life like that; nor his own, of course. She would save them both.

She hesitated. Was she bold enough for this? Even the thought of what she was about to do made her want to wilt with em
barrassment. But she must do it; must compel him, even. He could not go on thinking she was a malleable, obedient little innocent.

She reached up and untied the ribbons behind her neck, then tugged out the gauze insert that covered the upper slopes of her breasts. It was a strain but she was just able to flick open the top buttons at the back of her dress, and that made it loose enough to push her sleeves off her shoulders and halfway to her elbows. She had instructed Kirkland to leave her stays loose, and they shifted easily. She tugged her whole bodice downward.

Her breasts sprang free, nipples immediately beaded in the cool of the room. Her eyes never left his face, but he had fixated on her bared breasts.

"What are you doing?" His voice was hoarse.

She could not name it. She did not know the word. "Isn't it obvious?" she bluffed. He had seemed particularly entranced by her breasts in the past. Would that be sufficient?

But he did not move. So she stalked him, one slow step at a time, her heart racing madly. Would he reject her? Would he see through this?

She was not a good actor, to pretend a confidence she did not feel.

Perhaps her naked breasts were sufficient distraction, because he was silent as if mesmerized, and when she was close enough to take his hand and lift it to her bare flesh he did not resist.

His hand cupped her, shaped her, and she took a deep breath. Oh, even when she was terrified, still the power of his touch was incredible. She blinked, and recalled her goal. What next? Should she lift her skirt?

But some barrier was broken within him, and suddenly his arms were around her, and he was kissing her, his hands urgent on her body. It was not she who lifted her skirt, but he, and he dragged her to the carpeted floor, holding her mercilessly. She was beneath him, his hips between her thighs, her breasts crushed against his waistcoat, her skirt bunched at her waist, and it was so quick, so hungry and reckless she could barely think. But yes, she wanted him like this, here, uncontrolled and ravenous.

"You will not take other lovers," he demanded.

"Not while you are here."

"Never! Do you hear me? Never."

"If I am happy with you, then of course I will not," she said quietly, and he reared back to look at her.

"Damn you," he said softly.

Then his fingers touched her intimately, confident in their mastery, and her eyes slid closed as she moaned under the onslaught.

"No one but me. Say it."

"Only you . . . for now.
For as long as . . . you are here."

"God damn you, Elizabeth! You are mine!"