Page 45 of A Bride for the Icy Duke
“Not precisely… this.” His voice was dry, and when she shivered, he took her arm. “You should never have followed me out here.”
“I can’t say I’m sorry I did.”
“No,” he replied. “Neither can I.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Alexander led Lydia back to the house, his heart still thumping and his breeches a mess. What a humbling way of reminding him that it had been such a long time since he had last pleasured a woman! At least her innocence prevented her from thinking less of him for it.
Once they reached the house, he handed her to Mrs. Jones and retired upstairs. A good bath would most certainly set his mind to rights.
But the second the door closed behind him, he thought back to Lydia. Not just of the things they had done—anddamn him, he had not meant to take any of her innocencethere—but of the fact she had come after him.
Since Helena, he had done such an excellent job of icing out the world; he had effectively cut everyone off. Everyone except for Samuel Godwin.
And now, apparently, his wife.
He half wanted to laugh, the craving in his bones deepening, though now he didn’t know if it was for laudanum or Lydia.
Hell, perhaps it was both.
As the hot water heated, he tugged at his clothes and threw them against the floor. The chill had infiltrated his bones. And on the other side of the wall, he knew Lydia was changing, probably preparing for her own bath. He should never have allowed her to stay out there for so long; if she caught a chill now, it would be entirely his fault.
He ought to have been more controlled!
Yet he couldn’t bring himself to regret it.
A knock came on the door, and he opened it to allow the maids in with their buckets of steaming water. The fire raged in the hearth, and he glanced once more at the closed door separating his bedchamber from hers.
“Do you know if Her Grace is well?” he asked. “She was very cold.”
“I believe so, Your Grace.”
“Is she having a bath of her own made up?”
“She is, Your Grace.”
He nodded, making a decision. “Bring my water to her bath instead.”
The maid paused, looking at him inquiringly. But it was not her place to argue with him or question his will, so she merely nodded. “As you say, Your Grace.”
It was not long before his room emptied, and not long after that that the adjoining door between their bedchambers opened.
Lydia stood there, clothed in a robe and nothing else, her damp hair loose and falling sultrily over her shoulders. She fixed him with a glare that only made his desire for her stir higher. She had no idea what she was doing to him in this state of undress. He almost wanted to shut the door in her face to prevent the servants from seeing them together, as though there was something illicit about a husband seeing his wife.
But there was so much about her he didn’t yet know. He had felt the creamy softness of her thighs, but he had yet to see them spread without the sodden skirts of her dress getting in the way. Her stomach, her breasts; the robe did an imperfect job of keeping them hidden from him, although he caught a tantalizing glimpse of skin at her navel that made his mouth go dry.
He was a man, and women’s bodies were not habitually a mystery to him—but Lydia felt as though she had come to him just so he could unwrap him. His cock, previously sated, stirred at the thought.
“Well?” he asked, doing his best to ignore his body’s insistence that he push her back into her bedchamber and take her then and there.
Instead of answering, she brushed past him into his bedchamber. “Sothisis what it looks like?”
“To what are you referring?”
“Your bedchamber.” She glanced back at him. “And you in a state of undress. Your robe becomes you.”
He glanced down at the finely printed burgundy robe. It had been a present from Godwin, of all people. Apparently, all gentlemen needed to have one for the morning after indulgence.
