Page 29 of To Marry and to Meddle
“If this is the punishment being visited upon me for a somewhat lackadaisical attendance record at church, I’d like to note that I am appropriately cowed.”
“I believe we have wandered rather far from the point,” she said.
“I’m sorry, do you even recall what the point was?” he asked her, incredulous.
Emily drew herself up straight—difficult to do in a terribly commanding fashion when one was sitting on a bed wearing only a chemise, but she gave it her best effort—and fixed him with a glare. “We are discussing the—the—the consummation of our union.”
His mouth quirked. “I thought you didn’t like that word. ‘Not romantic,’ wasn’t that your complaint?”
“Well, it’s certainly more polite than some of the alternatives,” she admitted.
“Oh?” he asked, and there was a wealth of illicit promise in that single syllable. “I must confess, I’m suddenly desperate for you to tell me some of theimpolitephrases you’ve heard to describe this particular activity.”
“I’d much prefer that youshowedme some of the impolite aspects of this activity instead,” she said, and despite the fact that this was easily the boldest thing she had ever said in her entire life, for once she did not blush. This was her husband, and they had been robbed of their wedding night, and she, for one, did not intend to be distracted again.
Right on schedule, a plaintivemeowcame from the basket before the fireplace.
“Not now,” Emily and Julian commanded in unison, never breaking eye contact with each other, and Cecil subsided with a sleepy, yawnedmeow.
“Emily Turner,” Julian said, a slow, seductive smile curving at his mouth.
“Belfry,” she corrected, and he paused—she thought, for a moment, that he thought she was addressing him, so she added, “Emily Belfry, if you please.”
He gazed at her for a long moment, then reached out and picked up her hand, bringing it to his lips for a soft kiss that caused warmth to rush over her like a wave.
“Emily Belfry,” he repeated, “I can’t think of anything I’d like more than to be very, very impolite with you.”
And without any further ado, he proceeded to do just that.
Emily’s recollections of the evening became less clear from that point forward—her focus seemed to narrow, so that her entire world became their room and the soft firelight and the snowy expanse of the bed, and the spectacular sight of Julian Belfry, in all his naked glory, before her. He dispensed with his trousers and smalls in such a hurry that she didn’t even have the chance to reach out to attempt to assist with their removal, and then he was kissing her again, and he was warm and close and she could do nothing but close her eyes and wrapher arms around his neck and not worry even the slightest bit about any noises she might be making.
He pressed her down into the mattress, and she never would have imagined that the feeling of his body, the weight of him bearing down on her, could be so strangely comforting. Soon enough, however, he was sliding a hand beneath her chemise, up the bare skin of her leg and thigh, reaching the juncture between her legs, and she could not manage more than a moment’s embarrassment about the slickness he encountered there, becauseoh Godwas it normal for every single nerve ending in her entire body to take up temporary residence in that particular location? This was her last coherent thought for quite a while, because his fingers quite quickly got to work, and she could feel herself climbing some sort of unknown peak, moving higher and higher, but before she could reach the top his fingers were gone and she came quite close to uttering some frightfully unladylike words, but all at once fingers were replaced with lips and tongue and—
Oh.
Andoh.
And then she didn’t think anything else for quite a while.
When next she became aware of herself and her surroundings, she was lying in the cradle of his arms, blinking in confusion, and saying the first words that came to mind: “I don’t understand why you were worried about hurting me.”
He laughed at that, but she was too blissfully dazed to be much bothered by this, and instead leaned her head back on the comforting firmness of his shoulder, turning her face to the side so that she could press a kiss to his skin.
“This wasn’t the part that I was worried about,” he said, sliding a lazy hand up her arm. “There’s more to it, you see.”
“I know that,” she said, still too rapturous to take issue with his knowing tone. “I do have two married friends, you know.”
His hand stilled. “I still can’t believe ladies talk about such things.”
Emily snorted—she was not certain such a sound had ever passed her lips before, buthonestly.“I don’t know that ladies in general do, but I assure you that Violet and Diana, specifically, do.”
“I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, knowing the ladies in question,” he said with a resigned sigh.
“They’re very useful friends,” she said, a shiver coursing through her as his hand resumed its lazy path up and down her arm. “If I had to rely on what my mother had told me—well, I’d not even understand that clothing had to be removed.”
“Technically, not much clothingdoeshave to be removed,” he said, casting a significant look down at the rumpled chemise that Emily still wore, though it was, at the moment, bunched up near her waist.
“Speaking of which,” he added, and Emily let out a giggle as he sat up slightly—resulting in a very impressive display of abdominal muscles in the process; good heavens, did all men look like that under their waistcoats? Surely not—and reached down to tug at the hem of her chemise. Emily obligingly wriggled out of it, resisting the temptation to cross her arms over her chest as he cast the chemise aside and gazed down at her appreciatively. She was glad, in that moment, that she overcame her modesty—it was undeniably gratifying to have a man like Julian, with a reputation like his, gazing down at her naked body with such undisguised admiration. His blue eyes, which she normally considered icy, were full of heat as he regarded her with frank appreciation, and even as she felt a blush crawl across her chest, up her throat and into her cheeks, she felt another warmth, too, deep in her belly and between her legs.
