Page 89 of Heiress Gone Wild

She shrugged, so nonchalant, she might have known about condoms all her life. “I saw something about them in a magazine. I didn’t know what they were, not then, but—”

“Where did you get it? You can’t buy them since you’re not married.”

“The baroness, of course. I went to her after the ball, and she gave it to me.”

He groaned. “The baroness. Of course. I should have known.”

“She explained everything. How babies are made, what happens, and... and... all of that.” Her cheeks flushed rosy pink. “It was quite a revelation, I must say.”

He could not talk about this with her. Not now, not when she was standing in front of him—again—in nothing but a nightgown. “I’m so glad you’ve been made aware of the facts of life,” he said tightly, pulling the envelope from her fingers and tossing it aside.

She seemed not to notice the sarcasm. “That night in the library makes so much more sense now. I’m so glad I understand what to expect.”

“I had a plan, damn it,” he muttered, appreciating—not for the first time in the past two months—that when a man was in love with a madcap ginger, chaos was the order of the day. “Why is it that every time I have a plan, you manage to wreck it?”

“Sorry.” She bit her lip, trying to look contrite, but to his eyes, she just looked deliciously naughty. “But when you realize how you truly feel about someone, waiting even a few hours to tell them seems intolerable. That’s why I’m here.”

He stared, hope and disbelief warring for control, his jaded side telling him not to go making assumptions.

“I seem to have rendered you speechless,” she murmured.

“Let’s get this clear.” He grabbed her arms, held her fast, not certain he could ever let her go again. “I’m in love with you. Are you saying you’re in love with me?”

“Yes.” She smiled, so radiant and beautiful, he couldn’t breathe. “Yes, I’m in love with you. I realized it when we were dancing, because when you were talking about standing by and letting other men have a chance, I couldn’t imagine it. In fact, I can’t imagine letting any other man ever touch me the way you did.”

He was too thunderstruck to reply. What could a man say when he was handed heaven on a plate?

“So,” she said in the wake of his silence, “are you going to let me have my way with you? Or do I have to be even more shameless,” she continued as she freed another button of her robe, “and take off all my clothes before you capitulate?”

He tried to hold back, his instincts, his reason, and all his superior experience telling him that despite her declaration of love and all her newfound worldly wisdom about the physical side of things, she didn’t truly understand what she was doing.

And what about their future? Yes, he’d bought a house, he would be giving her the home she wanted, but the plans he’d made would mean other compromises, big ones, ones he knew she wouldn’t want to make. He ought to resist, wait, at least until after tomorrow.

But then, she slipped another button free, his throat went dry, his resistance crumbled, and any notions of waiting or resisting went straight out of his head.

“Only if you’re sure,” he said. “Because once it’s done, there’s no undoing it.”

“I understand, and I’m sure.” She tugged at her sash, her robe came apart, and he could take no more. He grabbed her, hauled her into his arms, and kissed her.

When his lips parted, hers did, too, and he took her mouth in a long, slow kiss as he slid his hands between them. As he unbuttoned her nightgown, his knuckles brushed her breasts, threatening to flare his lust out of control. But he strove to keep it in check, knowing he had a long way to go tonight if he was to win more than her body.

To slow things down, he slid his hands away from her breasts and took a step back, earning a cry of dismay from her that caused him to press a finger to his lips.

“If we’re going to do this,” he said softly, “we have to be quiet about it. There’s chaps on both sides of me, and if we make any noise, they’ll wake up and know I’ve got a woman in my room. And since you’re the only one I’ve danced with, they’ll guess that it’s you. We can’t have that, so mum’s the word. All right?”

She nodded. “As long as you’re not stopping,” she whispered.

“No. I don’t think I could resist you now if my life depended on it.”

But he didn’t move to touch her, and when she stirred as if to move even closer, he held up one hand to stop her. “I want this to be right for you, and despite your recently acquired knowledge, I know a bit more about this than you do. So, we go at my pace, not yours. I’m in charge. Agreed?”

“Agreed.” She smiled back at him, then bit her lip, slanting him a wicked look from beneath her lashes. “For now.”

Jonathan drew back, raking a hand through his hair and working to get his bearings. Virtually all his sexual knowledge had been gained with women who were anything but innocent. It had been a decade since he’d been at risk of deflowering a virgin, and during that episode, he’d been a fumbling eighteen-year-old of woefully limited experience, a formal engagement had already been announced to both families, and he and the girl in question had been fully dressed and standing in a coat cupboard under a staircase—hardly the place for slow and tender lovemaking. Nonetheless, he knew that was precisely what would be required of him tonight, and having already spent weeks in a very precarious condition, he paused a moment to draw a profound, shaky breath.

“All right, then,” he said at last and reached up to slide her robe off her shoulders. As it fell to the floor, he could see the faint circle of her nipples beneath the thin batiste nightgown, a sight that threatened to snap the tight leash on his control before they’d even begun, but he paused for another slow, deep breath, then lifted his hands and cupped her breasts through the fabric.

Her arms came up around his neck. Her breathing quickened, warm against his throat, as he shaped her breasts in his hands. They were every bit as full and lush as he remembered—not surprising, since that night in the library at Upper Brook Street had been haunting him for days.

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