Page 17 of The Baron Without Blame
Her heart raced in a thrilling, unstoppable way. Now Lolly moved faster. She fairly raced down the western wing, past family portraits and closed doors and a drafty window encasement. When they had first arrived, Martin had pointed out his suite – flushing behind his ears, Lolly remembered – and now Lolly slipped into it without even knocking.
She entered the sitting room. The drapes had not been drawn, and so moonlight spilled onto dark, oblong shadows that she assumed was furniture. To her left, the orange light of a fire framed another door.
Lolly almost turned back. This was bold – too bold. He had not invited her here. She was a thief, only instead of stealing from him, she was imposing upon him. Thrusting her honor at him. He might not want it.
He might turn her away in horror.
She didn’t know why she kept going. It was like the morning after the balcony all over again, when her mouth had refused to say what she knew she must. Only then, her “no” had surged up from some inner well of stubbornness.
Tonight, her feet moved forward as if pulled by a magnet. As if she knew, even before opening the door, that Martin would be standing at his washstand, waiting for her.
Every grain of her body liquified at the sight of him.
He wore nothing but loose cotton drawers that hung from his hips to just below his knees. He held a washcloth to his shoulder. His chest glowed yellow in the firelight. His hair looked black and curled loosely down his neck. His lips parted in surprise at seeing her, but otherwise he was still, tense, coiled as if ready to pounce.
As she watched, a single droplet of water trailed from the washcloth, down the ridge of his chest, along his rippling stomach, and below the band of his drawers.
“What are you doing in here?”
It took her a moment to find words. “I have not changed my mind yet.”
“This is my bedchamber.”
“I am tempted to marry you only because I want to have relations with you.” The phrasing sounded immature in the air. “Because I want you to swive me.”
Martin’s gaze trailed down her body. He said nothing.
“That would be the worst reason to make such a decision. Don’t you agree?”
“You want me for my body.” Martin’s eyes held Lolly’s now. Dark, smoldering coals that reflected her desire right back at her. “And nothing else.”
Lolly had to swallow to bring moisture back to her mouth. He was close, close enough to smell, close enough to feel the shape of his words against her skin. It drove all reason from her mind.
“I don’t know. I won’t know, until I have…” He cocked an eyebrow. “…swived you.”
“That isn’t how it is done.” Martin’s voice came out huskily. “I wouldn’t be doing right by you.”
Her mouth opened of its own accord. “What is right? What Society dictates, or what is fair and kind and equal?”
Never during her stolen moments of pleasure had Lolly imagined discussing moral philosophy with her lover. But this was Martin. He did nothing without first weighing its moral impact.
It was why she wanted him in the first place.
“You want me to fuck you.” The word flashed between them, hot and daring and right. “And then you might still leave.”
“Don’t I have the right to experience it once, before fixing the course of my life based upon whether I want to pledge my body to you or not?”
Martin reached forward and, one pin at a time, removed her sleeping cap. Her hair tumbled down. She felt a tendril brush her left nipple through the nightgown; she shivered.
The words between them had disappeared. His eyes roved over her. She didn’t feel measured; she felt consumed. And she wanted to replace his gaze with the weight of his fingers. With the curiosity of his tongue. With the heat of his body.
Martin turned away. Silent, he dipped his washcloth in its basin and wrung it out. The excess water dripped loudly against the porcelain. Lolly’s body strained under impatience. She needed him to touch her. But she didn’t dare interrupt, not even as he took long moments to fold the cloth into a perfect square.
Finally, he looked at her again. He closed the distance between them so that they nearly touched. He smelled of a long day; Lolly resisted the urge to inhale it in gulps. She watched his eyes, opaque as they were. Without touching her, he pressed the cloth into her palm.
It was warmer than she expected.
“I was in the middle of washing,” Martin said, his voice nothing more than a scrape now. “Finish for me.”
