could alter that inescapable fact.
She was like a sorceress, and he was helplessly, happily in her thrall.
She broke the kiss first, tearing her mouth from his, her breathing every bit as ragged. Her eyes were wide, glazed, her lips parted and swollen from the savagery of their kisses. Her cheeks were flushed from pleasure, her damp hair clinging to her face in golden wisps.
“This cannot be repeated,” she said.
No four words, strung together in the Queen’s English, could have infuriated him more. Nor ended the stupor of lust and love infecting his mind more efficiently.
“Yes it can,” he returned. “And it will.”
She shook her head, her expression turning stricken. “No, it cannot.”
Nell scrambled off his lap, settling her skirts back into place, tugging furiously at her corset and chemise. He remained where he was, the echo of his release still throbbing in his ballocks.
“You are ignoring the obvious, my love.” Grimly, he watched as she struggled to right the wet fabric and cover herself.
Her breasts jiggled quite temptingly. Difficult to imagine his mouth and hands had just been adoring that satin-soft, creamy skin and now she was attempting to hide it from his view.
“I am stating the obvious, rather than ignoring it,” she corrected him coolly. “Will you not at least make yourself decent?”
His cock was already half-hard again. Curse the woman. He gripped himself just to spite her, stroking slowly. He was still coated in her dew and the remnants of his seed. If she wanted to challenge him, she had chosen the wrong time to make a stand. This would not wash. There was no way she had not felt the intensity of their joining.
“If you do not like what you see, then look away,” he told her curtly. “There is nothing more natural than a husband and wife being intimate. What we just shared was long overdue.”
Her gaze settled upon his cock, and the effect was instant.
His erection jutted forward.
“Jack!” Her tone was scandalized, but she did not remove her stare.
Because she was not nearly as unmoved as she would like him to believe. He did not fool himself—Nell wanted to be unaffected by him. She did not want to long for him. She did not want to ache for him. But she did. She did, and he knew it, because he felt the same way about her.
“I could say the same for you, darling. You are hardly decent yourself, with your pretty bubbies still on display,” he pointed out, wanting to find his way beneath her defenses once more.
“You are a scoundrel.” She spun about, presenting him with her back as she continued to struggle with the gown and undergarments he had obliterated in his frenzy to have her.
She regretted what had just happened.
And he hated that regret.
Jack tucked himself back into his trousers and smalls, then buttoned up the fall. He rose from the chair with grim intent.
“You did not seem to think me a scoundrel a few minutes ago,” he could not resist observing.
If she thought she could blithely act as if they had not just made love, she was wrong. If she thought he was done fighting for her, she was also wrong. He would fight for her forever. He had been waging war in all the wrong ways. But he knew the difference now.
He was back, and he was not going anywhere.
“It was a mistake,” she said coldly, still struggling to work her corset back into place. “I feared something had happened to you, and in my emotional state, I lost my wits. As I said, it shall not happen again.”
Oh yes it shall, he promised her back silently.
Aloud, he said, “Allow me to aid you.”
The violence of their passion had left her corset’s strings gaping. If she had a hope or a prayer of getting the buttons on that indecently form-fitting habit to close, she needed to be tight-laced once more. She would have to set aside her pride.
“I do not want your help, Jack.” She cast him a frown over her shoulder. “You have done enough damage.”
He inclined his head. “So I have, and so I will be the one to fix it. Unless you do not trust yourself, that is?”
Her pride won out. Her lips pursed. “Go on, then. Lace my corset back up if you please. It is devilishly difficult to get wet garments back into place. Do not mistake my request, however. Just because I allowed my baser nature to overcome my judgment does not mean I