and though I had ravished and ruined her, she returned to the ball without anyone aware of what had happened between us. Yet another secret, dear reader, I share only with you, that you might protect your wives and daughters and sisters from wicked men like me…
~from Confessions of a Sinful Earl
Sin reminded himself he needed to proceed slowly for what seemed at least the hundredth time since he had walked into his new wife’s chamber to find her in delicious dishabille. If he had been a gentleman, he would have walked away and allowed her the additional time she requested. But, as his actions had just proved, he was anything but.
Head tipped back, she stared at him now with wide, dazed eyes, her lips swollen from the kisses they had just traded and slack from the aftereffects of the orgasm he had given her.
“Now?” she asked, sounding hesitant for the first time.
Ordinarily, she was bold and brash. She fought him at every step.
What a pleasant surprise—in the aftermath of her crisis, she was docile as a kitten.
Perhaps he would have to keep her tied to his bed after all.
Fucking hell. Wrong time to entertain that thought. The image of her naked, her glorious, ripe breasts on display, her slender wrists secured to his bed, sent another bolt of lust straight to his straining cockstand.
“Now,” he ground out. “But not here. I want you in my chamber.”
He had to pace himself, he knew. He could not merely have at her like a ravening beast. After all, there remained the possibility that she was a virgin. He must not forget.
“Await me in your chamber, and I will join you in a few minutes.” The prim tone in her voice, after she had just made such throaty, wicked requests of him, was an unexpected delight.
If he did not take care, he would enjoy himself too much with his bride. He must endeavor not to do so. She was a means to an end, not a mistress to savor. Not even a woman he liked.
Or was she?
Blast.
“No,” he denied, still holding her against him. He could not shake the notion she would flee if he allowed her. “Come with me now.”
“At least allow me to fasten my dressing gown,” she protested, her fingers already flying over the buttons he had undone.
“I am going to see you naked when I bed you anyway,” he told her, amused in spite of himself. “What is the difference if I see you now?”
She nibbled at her lip, and he fought the urge to groan and feast upon her mouth again himself. “There will be no gaslights then.”
“Of course there will be lights,” he countered. “I want to see you. All of you.”
In truth, he could see rather a lot of her now, thanks to his height and the manner in which the twain ends of her dressing gown had fallen apart. But he did not bother to point that out. He may have married her for her dowry, but she was his wife now, and he was enjoying his vantage point immensely.
“Aunt Fanchette said there would be no light,” she protested.
Gone was his docile kitten. As the pleasure ebbed from her, the stubbornness returned. Very well. Challenge accepted. He would just have to make her spend as often as possible.
“What does Mademoiselle Beaulieu know of the marriage bed when she has never occupied it?” he demanded calmly, as if his prick were not harder than a block of marble, grinding against his wife’s delectable rump.
“Please, my lord. I must insist you give me a few moments to compose and prepare myself.”
She was not being unreasonable, he supposed. Except that he could see through her ploy. She was attempting to resurrect the walls he had just so summarily torn down when he had pleasured her.
“You do not require composure for what I have in mind,” he told her, meaning it. “And the only preparation you need is the sort I have already done for you. But that is merely the beginning. There is more, much more.”
His fingers still burned with the remembered feeling of her lush folds and the deliciously responsive bud of her sex. Of her tongue lashing his. Damnation. This was not helping matters.
“More?” Her fingers were still frantically working over those bloody buttons, stealing his view from him.
“More,” he repeated.
At long last, she sighed, and then accepted it. “Very well. We may as well get the bedding over with. I am tired.”
He stepped away from