My Last Duchess (The Wildes of Lindow Castle #0.5) - Eloisa James Page 0,59

Hugo laughed and said, “I never would have imagined you were so vocal. And so obscene.”

She blinked at him, hurt burning down her spine as fiercely as desire had, and so she saw the moment that he realized what he’d just said and added, “No. Oh, shite, no. I didn’t mean it that way.”

“Um,” Ophelia said, suddenly incredibly aware of the fact that her legs were bound around him as if she—

She unwound herself and put her feet back on the bed. “I’m not usually . . .”

“Oh, God, Phee.” There was a rasp in his voice that she liked. “Please don’t take offense. I’m an idiot.”

He had stopped moving, and she had stopped moving, so now they lay together awkwardly, and Ophelia, for one, felt frozen.

She cleared her throat. “I apologize for the profanity.”

“Fuck that,” he said, breaking the obscene still life they’d created by thrusting again.

Desperate herself, Ophelia responded with a squeak and a swallowed word.

“Give me your hands.”

Bemused, she brought her arms down to the bed and bent her elbows so that their fingers could entwine. Then Hugo started kissing her so deeply that even if she had thought of words, there was no air to speak them. His body took on a rhythm that made passion quake down her legs and press tighter against him.

“Here,” he said, when she’d almost lost control of herself, but not quite. He uncurled his right hand, reached back, and pulled her knee up. Her pelvis tilted and she helplessly let out a broken sound.

“Put your legs around me,” he growled into her mouth.

She did, and it changed the angle so that she was breathless, suddenly mad, shaking all over. She managed to keep her mouth shut, though, until he suddenly stopped and put his lips on hers.

“Please, Phee.”

“Please, what?”

Their hands had fallen apart and she was clinging to him again.

“Talk to me,” he growled. “Please talk to me.”

She was sweaty and shaking. She wanted to come more than she had . . . well, forever. Instead of talking she kissed him and let her hips talk, but then he began moving faster, and her head fell back.

Tension was building and building and she wasn’t sure when she started talking again, but she registered the joyous glint in his eyes. Then they were both gasping for air, trembling violently, and she was pushing against him with all the strength in her body.

And then the world exploded around them with a fiery intensity that she, for one, had never experienced.

“Bloody hell,” she whispered a while later.

“There’s my duchess,” he whispered back. “My last, wonderful, beloved, profane duchess.”

“Duchesses probably don’t curse.”

“Mine does.” He licked her cheekbone. “Sweats too. I’m so lucky, so damned lucky.”

Ophelia believed him, because the look in Hugo’s eyes wasn’t one she’d seen before, but her soul instantly welcomed it. “I’ve never felt . . . said anything like that before,” she said, stumbling into an explanation that she suspected he didn’t need.

“Lucky me,” he whispered. “I suspect you know this, but I’m in love with you, Phee. And I’ve never used that sentence before either. Dukes don’t swear.”

“In love?” she said, wonderingly. “I didn’t . . .”

“I am.”

“Me too,” she offered. “I love you too. I’m in love with you too. I will, I do.”

“I do, I will.”

Chapter Eighteen

At five in the morning, Lady Astley’s snug little house was silent. Hugo had the idea that he woke up simply due to the lack of noise. His townhouse was rarely silent; it was too full of children for that.

The castle was too old: It groaned and talked to itself; wind scoured across Lindow Moss, the bog that lay to the east of the castle, and then whistled through its turrets.

A moment later he realized that it wasn’t silence that had woken him but the patter of small feet. The door silently pushed open and a small creature dressed in a white nightie ran directly to the bedside.

He glanced over at Ophelia. Thankfully, after the third time they made love, he had donned the nightshirt provided by the butler, and Ophelia had pulled her nightgown back on, after which they had made the short journey from the guest bedchamber to Ophelia’s bedchamber next door.

For good reason, it seemed.

Viola stopped at the side of the bed and looked up at him. Soft brown curls made a halo for a sweet face, with hazel eyes and luxurious eyelashes.

You, his soul said.

You too.

It was the same feeling he had had after each newborn child