Page 26 of How to Tempt An Earl
He lifted her then, her legs wrapping around his hips, her core meeting his. His blood ran hot and hard and his phallus throbbed and strained, a stallion waiting to be let loose of his reins. Good God, this woman drove him to the brink of madness…and pushed him over with a single, simple gesture. She raised a hand to her hair and with one pull of a pin sent it falling over her shoulders in a chestnut cascade while her eyes locked on his until he was an inferno of want.
She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, her body moving against his in invitation, a reminder to his fevered self that water slaked fire, that wetness solved heat.Shewould be wet…shewould assuage his fire. He went into the wet channel of her, deep, hard and thirsty, the way a man on fire might jump into a lake. She arched against the wall, moaning in appreciation, the joining bringing initial relief. ‘More…again,’ she coached, moving her hips against him.
Yes, more. The simple command resonated with the instinct of his body. Once more, twice more, thrice more he drove into the welcoming wetness of her, fire banked, while desire roared until his body shuddered with it. He felt her nails dig into his shoulders and felt her body gather, preparing to claim her release even as he did the same. He felt her legs tighten as if she could hold him within her for ever—something he absolutely must not let her do.
In the recesses of his mind, caution awoke. Appealing as the thought was to spend deep inside her, he could not. The Horseman in him roused at the last moment:protect, protect, protect…What he could not do for himself, he could do for her. He felt climax claim her, felt her body gather and release, and then he was gone from her, groaning and shuddering with the power of his own completion as she held him to her and he spent.
They came back to earth very slowly after that, her legs eventually letting go of his waist, their bodies able to function at last without the support of the other, although they clung together long beyond what was necessary. He could feel the rise and fall of her breathing against his chest and could feel her breath slow. He could smell the scent of hyacinth on her skin mixed with sweat and the musk of sex—details to file away; details by which to remember this night when, for a while, he’d held perfection in his arms.
Kieran took a half-step back from her and kicked his breeches off the rest of the way before returning to her and gently removing her gown and the halves of her chemise. ‘We are naked now,’ he murmured against her cheek, his eyes half-closed as he breathed her in.
‘Yes, we are. Wholly, completely, naked,’ she replied with soft seriousness. She understood what he’d meant: this nakedness was more than the physical; they also stood before one another emotionally stripped to the skin and vulnerable. She wrapped her arms around his neck. He lifted her once more and at last carried her to the bed.
They were good at this, lying together in the dark. They’d had a few nights’ practice, perhaps intuitively knowing they would lead to these moments, these revelations. A smart man could tell a lot about a woman by the way she made love. He’d not been wrong that she’d been looking for partnership, not possession. But now, he better understood why. The obvious answer was because she controlled her passion and she valued her freedom.
One might leave it there and feel satisfied. He’d known other women who’d valued their right to choose and to control their lives in and out of the bedroom. But it was the reasons behind valuing her freedom that gave her away and set her apart. He was coming to learn that, for Celeste, freedom was a defence: she used it for control but also as a means to protect herself. Freedom was her shield.
‘May I ask you a question?’ he ventured in the dark.
Her hand lingered at his hip. ‘If I can ask you one.’ Her fingers idly traced the scar and he could guess the trajectory of her thoughts. ‘How did you get this?’
‘By being young and careless.’ It had happened twelve years ago, and it was still hard to talk about, but it would be the price for the question he would ask her. If he did not share confidences with her, he could not expect her to share any with him.
She snuggled closer. ‘It is hard to imagine you being reckless. What happened?’
‘I was in Leipzig on an errand for my grandfather, delivering dispatches to the Allies. It was during the War of the Sixth Coalition that ultimately led to the liberation of Paris, so I suppose my sacrifice was not in vain.’ He tried to make light of it. ‘Caine was with me or I might not have made it out alive. It was just the two of us back then. Stepan and Luce had not yet joined us.’
She stopped her idle stroking of his hip and raised herself up on an arm. ‘You’re deflecting. Do you even realise you do it? Whenever something personal comes up, you immediately turn the conversation to your brothers.’
‘I do not!’ Kieran protested.
‘Yes, you do. For instance, when I ask about summers at Willow Park, you talk about things you all did together. When we were gazing at the stars, you talked about camping.’
‘Well, yes. Is there something wrong with that?’ Kieran was intrigued now. Apparently, the insights tonight were not all going to be his.
‘No, I liked those stories. But I also want to know about you too—just you, whatyouthink, whatyoufeel,yourexperiences. Yes, you are a Horseman, a member of a group. But you are also Kieran Parkhurst, a single individual.’
Her finger went back to tracing his scar in a long, deliberate stroke. ‘Perhaps it’s been a long time since you’ve thought of yourself that way. Perhaps this scar is the reason for that,’ she prompted gently. ‘Tell me what happened and don’t gloss over the part that really matters—the part that changed you, the part that still haunts you.’
Good God, he’d never felt more naked than he did now, or more seen. When had someone actually looked that deeply into him? How he felt about that was rather confusing, awkward, perhaps because it happened so rarely. The tables had been completely turned on him.Sheshould be a Horseman. With those insights, she’d be lethal at interrogation. A man’s secrets wouldn’t stand a chance. He had no excuse to put her off other than his pride. He settled back against the pillows and drew her close. ‘It was on account of a woman.’
* * *
‘Of course it was.’ Celeste smiled up at him, hoping to ease his apparent lingering embarrassment. ‘Go on.’ If she didn’t encourage him, she suspected he’d find a way to make the story disappear into a different conversation.
‘I met her at an officers’ reception in Leipzig. She was charming, cultivated and intelligent—a lot like you,’ he teased, and she sensed he joked to make light of something that was not light at all. This vulnerability was an intriguing side to the all-confident Kieran Parkhurst and she rather liked it.
‘We danced a few times and went out on the veranda for a stroll. She made sure I was aware of her interest in me—a touch here, a provocative remark there. I was twenty-four and perhaps too easily impressed with a slightly older woman’s experienced attentions. We went back to my rooms, which was my first mistake. I’d nowhere to go after…well…afterwards. That made me careless. A Horseman never stays the night or never falls asleep. I usually left my lovers’ chambers after we had our fun.
‘But that night I dozed off. I awoke to find her rifling through my messenger bag. She found the dispatches I was to deliver the next day. I was groggy and I thought she was just looking for money. When I confronted her, she drew a blade on me and I was too far from my own knife. That was when I realised she’d known all along who I was and that she was not merely a guest at the party. I was her mark. She’d been sent by the French to intercept the dispatches.
‘I charged her even though she was armed and I was not. I knew my duty and I knew those dispatches contained information about troops and munitions—information that, in the wrong hands, would lead to the deaths of Englishmen. I was betting that she was bluffing and that she wouldn’t use the knife.’
‘And you bet wrong,’ Celeste whispered softly. ‘What happened to the dispatches?’
‘I saved them, at great expense to myself.’ He was becoming tight-lipped again. But she didn’t need the details when she had the scar. She could imagine all too well the blood and the pain.
‘And the woman—what happened to her?’ Celeste asked quietly. It was perhaps a question that could only be asked in the dark and only discussed once.
