Page 12 of The Duke of Cups (The Highwaymen #3)

HYACINTH’S HEART WAS beating very fast. “What? Now?” This conversation was horrible, very horrible, and she shouldn’t have said that, she should have simply told him no and put an end to his saying anything else like that.

“There are beds upstairs,” he said, looking very serious.

She simply gaped at him.

“You’re worried about my getting you with child, but that’s no worry.” He reached into his front pocket and took out a little tin. He opened it and pulled out a long, cylindrical thing, and she blinked at it. “It’s a French letter. It catches all the spend. It’ll be fine.”

“The what?”

“Right, you don’t know how any of it works,” he said with a little smile, tucking the French letter back into its tin. He raised his eyebrows at her, conspiratorial. “Do you want to?”

Well, the truth was, yes, she did. She really hated being kept in utter ignorance of this entire process, only able to glean little bits of information here and there.

What she knew about the act of marital congress amounted to the following: One had to take off their clothes to do it.

It was something to do with the bits between men’s and women’s legs.

Men had pricks, which she’d seen before, not real ones, but in paintings and sculptures and the like.

She didn’t quite know what they did with them, but she had the notion that the man was doing most of the whatever-it-was and the woman was mostly receiving.

“It would really be advantageous to you, actually,” he said. “You’re looking for a husband, but you have no idea what you’re consenting to do with him. So, you could let me show you, and then you’ll be better able to decide which man you really want to submit to in that way.”

That actually made sense. She licked her lips. “But they’ll know, won’t they? There’s something about, erm, maidenheads or something, and if you tear past mine—”

“No, I hear it’s very common for women’s maidenheads to be torn riding horses,” he said, furrowing his brow. “If your husband says anything, you simply say that. Say you ride horses a lot.”

“You think he would accept that?”

“Oh, certainly,” he said, nodding.

“You’d say anything to convince me, though,” she said. “And I know, quite well, that one thing a woman is never supposed to do is to allow a man this sort of liberty.”

“True,” he said. “But no one ever needs to know besides us, and if no one knows, it’s like it never happened.”

Well, that was nonsense. It would absolutely not be as if it had never happened. It would have happened .

He was horrible in every way, Dunrose was.

No, not true, there was one way in which he was not horrible, not even a little bit horrible, and that was the way he looked.

He was beautiful, an Adonis of a man, with his curly dark hair and his elfin features and his long, graceful fingers, and she thought about seeing all of his slender body uncovered and something unfurled, low in her belly, something so strange and pleasant that she actually gasped out loud.

“Seraphine likes it,” she whispered.

Dunrose nodded at this. “Of course she does.” He looked away, making a face.

“What?” she said.

“Nothing,” he said. “Let’s just leave her out of this, shall we? ”

What was that about? She was thrown for a moment.

He cleared his throat. “You were saying that because you’re worried you won’t like it, because you’ve probably heard awful stories about how women don’t like it, and I assure you, I know what I’m doing.”

“Yes,” she said with a nod. “You’re very experienced. Which might be good for my first experience, really.”

“Exactly my thought,” he said.

“Seraphine gets to choose,” Hyacinth said.

“She gets to decide which men she wants to take into her bed, but I shall never really have that choice. I can’t choose a man because of whether or not he appeals to me in that way.

” And you appeal to me in that way. “I have to choose a good husband, which doesn’t mean I’ll want him in that way. ”

“Also true,” he said.

“And once I’m married, I can’t go around sleeping with other men.”

“Well…” He cleared his throat.

“Seraphine does, but her husband is so… French.”

He laughed.

“So, this could be one chance I have to choose,” she said breathlessly. “I might be foolish to throw this chance away, really.”

“Yes, you’d be a fool not to surrender your virtue to me,” he said with a rakish grin. “I do like the way your mind works, madam.”

“Oh, Christ, what am I saying? ” She put her fingers to her lips.

“Let’s try this,” he said, coming for her.

“What?” she said, startled.

“Just a kiss.” His voice had lowered in register to something silky and sinful. “Just that. It will help you think more clearly.”

She did not think it would. But she had never been kissed, if it came to that, and this man, this beautiful, regal man was advancing on her, and she felt that strange, pleasant feeling in her jump deliciously, and she nodded. “Just that,” she whispered .

He was right on top of her now, only inches between them. He was very tall, and she craned her neck back to look up at his face. He studied her expression carefully, his own visage very serious. He reached up and brushed his knuckles over her cheek, his touch soft and reverent.

A shiver went through her.

“You’re very beautiful, Miss Thomas,” he murmured, and then he put his lips on her lips.

It was like the press of pink, fluffy clouds just before the sunrise. It went through her, making her feel light and airy. She liked it.

He deepened the kiss, careful but somehow urgent, and when his tongue touched hers, she liked the sweet slipperiness of the sensation.

She felt drowsy but wide awake. She felt small but luminous. Shyly, she moved her tongue against his and he made a noise in his throat of affirmation.

She let out a sigh.

He pulled back, still close, still touching her face, gazing into her eyes. “Upstairs?” he whispered.

She nodded.

He kissed her again, harder this time, a kiss of some dark promise, and something jolted inside her, a feeling of bright excitement

He twined their fingers together and he led her out of the room, down the hallway, into the kitchen, and then up a set of narrow steps, the servants’ steps, she supposed, though there weren’t any servants here, if what he said before was true.

Upstairs, there were open doors, and she could see beds inside them. It was afternoon, and that seemed like a strange time to do this, in the light, sunlight streaming in the windows.

You could stop him, she thought idly.

She didn’t wish to.

He pulled her into one of the rooms and shut the door behind them. He backed up against it, lazily leaning there, regarding her with a casual, pleased smile. God, why was he so beautiful?

“We have to take our clothes off,” he said.

“I-I know that part,” she whispered.

“Me first or you first?”

She didn’t know what to say. She felt embarrassed and shy and out of her depth.

“Me first?” He gave her a wicked smile.

She nodded, and she found herself smiling back. Yes, please, Your Grace, undress for me, she thought. Let me watch you undress.

He kept his gaze on her, still smiling that wicked smile, and he untied his cravat. He tossed that on the floor and then unbuttoned the buttons of his purple velvet jacket.

She bit down on her lip.

He shrugged out of that and tossed it aside, too, never breaking his gaze with hers.

Oh, my, his shirtsleeves. She was in a room alone with a man in just his shirtsleeves. This was abundantly scandalous. She let out a little giggle.

“Laughing at me?” He was amused.

“No, no, I…” She hunched up her shoulders, but she could not stop looking at him.

“Nervous?” he breathed.

“No,” she said, but her voice trembled a bit, betraying her.

He’d somehow unbuttoned his purple velvet waistcoat already and he took that off, dangling it in front of himself and letting it drop. He started in on unbuttoning his shirt as he spoke. “I told you, I’m the safe one. You don’t need to be frightened of me.”

“I’m not,” she gasped, and she wasn’t, but she wasn’t sure what she felt.

He bared his throat to her, then his collarbone, then the top of his chest. He had dark curls there, and there were more and more of them revealed as he parted his shirt, showing her a sliver of his chest, a line of those dark curls traveling all the way down to the top of his trousers.

He pulled his shirt off easily, and her breath caught in her throat as she watched the ropes of his wiry muscle moving under his skin.

He was slender, but every bit of him looked hard and angled.

Her jaw worked. He was fascinating to look upon.

“Like what you see, then?”

She giggled again. “Perhaps.”

He chuckled. His hands went to his trousers.

She sucked in a breath of anticipation.

“Yes, yes, this is what you want to see, isn’t it?”

She felt herself flush, but it was true, so she didn’t contradict him. She gave a little nod, her gaze narrowing in on his crotch.

He unbuttoned only the two top buttons of his trousers and then he shoved them down, shoved everything down, in one quick movement, and there he was.

His prick was sticking straight out, swollen and thick, and it seemed as haughty as the rest of him.

She gaped at it, and she could swear it sort of winked at her, a knowing wink.

She thought a word that she’d heard before, but one that she didn’t think she’d quite understood the meaning of, not until this very moment. Lascivious. His prick was lascivious. It was a temptation to all manner of wickedness, the most intriguing thing she’d ever seen in her life.

She wanted it.

She hadn’t the faintest notion what to do with it, however.

“Miss Thomas,” came his velvet voice. “Look at me.”