Page 56 of Never a Duke
Ned bowed up to hug her. “Truly, you were bent on seduction. I have never been seduced before. I suspect I’ll succumb without much struggle. No struggle at all, in fact.”
“Good.” Rosalind undid the bow holding the décolletage of her dress closed. “That gives us more time to be wicked.”
“Not wicked.” Ned eased back to the blanket, taking Rosalind with him. “Loving. With you, only loving will do.”
Rosalind’s last pretensions to cool reason deserted her, for she wanted and needed Ned Wentworth’s loving so very, very much. She had waited years in the hopes that such a man would come her way, and having found him, she would never, ever let him go.
***
Ned gazed past the lady’s shoulder to the cloud of blossoms above and rejoiced.
Rosalind Kinwood wantedhimfor her own—Ned the banker, Ned the orphan, Ned the man who talked business with widows, and argued with his tiger. Ned who had no real family, but many familial obligations. She wanted all of those Neds, and—how this gratified him—she alsodesiredthe Ned who could be seduced on a picnic blanket.
That fellow was a new acquaintance to Ned himself. He was lusty. He had moved beyond the shadows of his youth, and delighted in being a healthy male in dear and willing female company.
He was a bit devious, that Ned, sliding a hand beneath Rosalind’s skirts to shape her hip and cup her delectable bum. Her skin was marvelously soft and warm, and she sank her weight against Ned’s falls in a manner that conveyed enthusiasm approaching insistence.
“Patience,” Ned said. “Savor this celebration.”
“I want to be naked. I want to be naked now. I want you naked.”
The images she conjured…“We’ll start with a little nakedness,” Ned said, undoing the bows of her jumps and the first of her two chemises. No fancy embroidery for his Rosalind, just plain soft linen worn almost translucent with age. “Near nakedness to allow me a touch of restraint.”
He shaped her breasts, and she arched into his touch. When he used his mouth on her nipples, shewiggledand Ned had to pause and count backward from one hundred by visualizing Roman numerals.
“Your falls,” she said, sitting back. “Time for you to be a little naked too, Ned Wentworth.”
She had him half-unbuttoned before he assembled enough wits to realize what she was about. Even as part of him wanted her to slow down, to cherish rather than plunder, another part of him marveled that he had inspired her passion.
No dithering, no false hesitance, no practiced airs and posturing.
“Ned Wentworth.” She rearranged his linen and took him in her hand. “You do want me after all.”
“Had you any doubt?”
She stroked her thumb over the crown of his cock, and Ned had to close his eyes, which only made the sensations more immediate.
“You have depths of reserve,” Rosalind said, repeating the caress. “I want to plumb them all, until you feel as desperate and determined as I am.”
“My objective,” Ned said, fisting his hands on the blanket, “is to visit upon you an experience of unbearable pleasure. If I’m to attain that—merry hell, Rosalind.”
She’d wrapped her fingers around his shaft and stroked him. “Did I hurt you?”
He had to get control of the situation before Rosalind’s enthusiasm doomed him to humiliation, and he had to manage it without hurting her feelings.
“If you persist for another fifteen seconds, I will spend,” he said, “and then I will wilt, and you will be disappointed. The first twenty years of our marriage will be taken up with me trying to compensate for a very poor first impression, though believe me, I’m tempted to worry about that later.”
And what a wonderful twenty years they would be.
“Oh.” She let him go, a relief and a sorrow. “Twenty years?”
“At least.” Ned sat up, which left him a trifle dizzy. “On your back, please.”
Rosalind lay down, and ye cavorting cherubs, what a picture she made, hair a little untidy, lips rosy, clothing in disarray.
“You are a feast of temptations,” Ned said, unknotting his cravat and startingto unbuttonhis waistcoat and shirt. “An embarrassment of inspiration for the male imagination.”
“Less talk, and more undressing, Ned.”
