Page 4 of Good Duke Gone Hard

“Can you swim?”

She shook her head. Of course she could swim. It’s not like a person could simply forget how to swim. But no matter how loudly her mind would have spoken, it couldn’t, and her body wouldn't have listened anyways, for it had promptly developed an onset of ankyloglossia.

With one arm lashed around her, he used the other to slowly move them toward the nearest bank. As he began swimming, she panicked.

What would happen now? It was nearly impossible anyone had seen, but that wasn’t her concern. She shuddered. Would things go back to normal? Was there a normal that things could return to? What if he were to pretend nothing happened? What if nothing had happened and it was all her imagination? She couldn’t quell the barrage of questions in her mind, but she knew that everything felt different, and she also knew that she didn’t want it to end yet.

This couldn’t be the end. It had hardly begun. How could she live with herself knowing only the foyer to this world of unimaginable and unquenchable heat? And could it be quenched? Could heat be quenched?

These nonsensical thoughts would circle for days if she let them, so instead, she rested her cheek where her honeypot had been moments earlier, and she nuzzled gently into the side of his neck. The corded strength was tempered with the smoothest skin, only to lead into a soft grating nearer to his throat, where day-old stubble must have snuck through his valet’s watch.

She thought she detected a stiffening in his body, but she didn’t care. He wasn’t the only one who could nuzzle. She could nuzzle. She could nuzzle with the best of them. And she would. Whatever that meant.

They reached the bank and he paused before lifting her out of the water and resting her on the grass. Then he pulled himself up beside her, wearing only his smallclothes.

She couldn’t stop herself from looking, even if a nabob bought all the elephants from India and stampeded them past her, she would still look at him and take her time. He was chiseled from marble with strong pectorals and a lean abdomen sprinkled with curling gold hairs. His arousal was jutting upward, to push against his drawers. She thought at any moment he would break free. She wished he would.

She couldn’t stop herself from touching, even if all her relatives had been present two feet away for an outdoor luncheon. Her fingers followed the trail of golden curls, but stopped just before they led down into his drawers.

She couldn’t stop herself from leaning into him, tilting her head up to him, and waiting for his reply.

“Maggie,” he groaned.

With more equanimity than she could credit, she replied in a sultry tone, “Johnny.”

He looked into her eyes and then let his eyes wander down her body. He paused at her neck, and then her bosom. Just before his eyes ambled down further, she felt his gaze pull her nipples taut. Then his continued gaze stalled on her thighs, stroked down to her toes, and met back up at her eyes again.

No, nothing would ever be the same.

***

JONATHAN TOOK TEA IN the drawing room with a chessboard between him and Lyle. This could be the third or fourth game he was playing, and losing, but he wasn’t keeping track. It was merely an activity to keep him occupied for a couple of hours a day to stimulate light mental activity. Lyle was good enough company, though he had refrained from disclosing anything personal and remained something of a mystery. But who was he to judge someone on being a mystery? He had shared nothing either. After all, he had nothing to share

He had found out some news via Gregory that should have elicited a swell of emotions from him. Apparently he had been betrothed, and his fiancee had given up on waiting for him and found a new husband within a year of Jonathan going missing. His mother and father had passed away when he was a boy, and his older brother had passed away while Jonathan was at war, thus making Jonathan the rightful Duke of Somersby. Some paperwork needed to be resolved, now that he had shown up, but Gregory promised to handle that upon returning from his honeymoon. Gregory had only filled in a few gaps about the actual disappearance, telling Jonathan that he had joined the army and after a few months had gone missing. His disappearance had remained a conundrum despite all the inquiries Gregory had made over the years. The War Office disclosed nothing other than approximate dates and times Jonathan had gone missing.

Jonathan should have felt disturbed, desolate, even relieved for at least knowing something of his identity, but no emotions surfaced. Only numbness reigned. And a slight irritation at having no other emotions to manage. His heart was as hard as granite, waiting for something, anything to blast through and thus enable him to be himself again.

As Jonathan waited for Lyle to make his next move, he thought back to the baffling slap, wishing it had at least triggered a crack, or shaken some stones loose.

Fortunately for Jonathan’s pride, no one had witnessed it. Or unfortunately, as he had no one to verify or explain its occurrence. Since Dr. Walker had reiterated the need to be in a calm and familiar environment, he didn’t want to stir up any drama by involving anyone into his affair. And he wasn’t sure he wanted to discuss anything with Margaret yet, especially since he didn’t know her and wasn’t sure how to address it. Sure, he could just go up to her and ask her, but what if she denied it? Or denied answering him? What if she explained it and was unjustified? Worse, what if her explanation was justified? None of the aforementioned scenarios landed him an answer he liked, so for now he chose the path of least dramatics and pondered it for himself.

But when he wasn’t scrutinizing the slap, he was most certainly contemplating the embrace before it. He knew the moment she noticed him because her eyes transformed. The fire that illuminated her eyes took his breath away. Uncertain as to the significance of the fire, he was unprepared for her full body flinging on to him. For that he was most sorry because he couldn’t remember if he put his arms around her, though if he had he was sure he would remember the size and shape of her trim waist in his heavy hands. Yes, for that delayed reaction and therefore inaction, he was most sorry.

Now he might never have a tactile memory impressed into his hands.

But mayhap that was best. This was not the time for him to be thinking about taking a lover, or a wife. And Margaret was definitely wife material. But no, her flowing flaxen locks and perfectly proportioned curves were off limits. He had abstained from taking a lover for the last three years, and he could continue. He could not give himself to someone right now, not knowing exactly who he was giving.

Besides, he was a guest here, and he was choosing the path of the least dramatics. Intimacy leads to drama. Ergo, no intimacy, no drama. The perfect plan. It was foolproof.

Jonathan leaned back in his chair wondering if Lyle had made his move yet. He stared at the board but all he perceived were ebony and ivory pieces randomly positioned on a checkered ebony and ivory board. Nothing had changed.

“Must be hard,” Lyle said.

“What’s that?”

“Thinking of your next move against such a Corinthian at chess.”

“I must say I’m a bit surprised to find you’re not just a tulip.” Lyle’s chuckle burst the melancholy hovering over Jonathan.

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