Page 31 of The Duke’s Indecent Scandal (Indecent Dukes #1)

Chapter Thirty

T iffany

She’d fallen asleep suckling on his cock—and why it was called the same thing as a rooster, she did not understand. Strangely, doing so had been rather soothing, and combined with her frazzled nerves from the momentous occasion and her physical exhaustion from having so much pleasure wrung from her, she’d easily drifted into unconsciousness.

And woken with a slow growth of pleasure. It began as a dream, a dream about being with Gregory, about him putting his mouth between her legs… then as the sensations had intensified as she’d come up out of the dark of sleep rather than dissipating, she’d realized it was not a dream. Gregory was between her legs again, feasting.

She gasped, shuddering, reaching for him.

Hands entwined in his hair before she paused, but he did not admonish her.

Instead, he lifted his head, smiling.

“How do you feel, little swan?”

“I… good?” It came out as a question rather than a true answer. She was not entirely sure how she felt. Whatever she had expected from her first day of marriage, it had not gone at all the way she’d thought it would. From leaving their wedding breakfast early, to her mother’s warning, to the revelations within the bedroom, to the utterly indecent pleasures she and Gregory had indulged in…

Tiffany could not imagine trying to describe what they had done without dying of mortification on the spot. No wonder ladies did not discuss such things. No wonder her brother had not wanted to discuss such things with her.

Now, waking up like this… it was good. It was also strange. Part of her was unsure she was not still dreaming a very realistic dream.

But then he moved them around, rolling her over with experienced ease and shifting himself at the same time. Tiffany found herself on her hands and knees above him but with her face above his erect cock. Her knees straddled his head, his hands wrapped around the backs of her thighs.

“Put me in your mouth again,” he ordered.

Tiffany did not obey right away, even as he pulled her down to meet his lips and tongue, swiping them through her swollen folds. She was sore there—she could feel the soreness—yet her growing pleasure almost made her not care. She wanted him inside her again.

Yet… this was also her first close-up look at a man’s appendage. She had been too dazed, too discombobulated, to pay attention earlier. Also, from the brief glimpse she had seen, it looked very different soft than hard. Tiffany wrapped her hand around the shaft, pausing when Gregory shuddered beneath her at the touch. The head was like a blunt mushroom with a split dome, where a drop of pearly liquid had coalesced. She licked up the bit of liquid. It was salty. Familiar. She’d tasted it before when he’d had her clean him with her mouth.

To her fascination, it was also immediately replaced. She licked it again.

Gregory’s hips lifted, pushing toward her, moving her hand along the shaft, and she heard his growl and felt the rumble of his body beneath hers.

“Enough teasing. Put your mouth on me, little swan.” A warning tap against her bottom threatened more substantial swats to punctuate his command. Though the idea of another spanking felt more intriguing than threatening, Tiffany did not want to disappoint him. So, she lowered her head, taking him in her mouth and suckling the same way she had before… except it was not the same at all. Before, he’d been soft in every way; now, the skin was velvety soft, but beneath, it was rock hard, inflexible as her lips traveled down the length of it.

He moaned, the sound muffled by his location, though she felt his hot breath and the vibrations along her slick folds.

There was something incredibly empowering about taking him in her mouth this way. Before, he’d been holding her neck, holding her in place, and she’d felt acutely pliable, helpless against his desires, in a way that had aroused her even when she’d been replete. Now, she was rather enjoying teasing him. Touching him. Finding the ways that made him moan or shift beneath her, the way he already knew how to do so well to her.

Knowing she could make him feel the same was intoxicating.

She moved her head up and down, doing her best to mimic the way he’d thrust into her earlier. It was not easy, especially with him at her backend, his mouth and tongue busily stoking her own passion, giving her an equal measure of pleasure. When she finally reached her pinnacle, she had to pull her mouth off of him entirely, holding the base of him in her hand as she cried out, gasping with ecstasy.

After that, he repositioned them again, so he could grip her hair and use it to move her mouth up and down his cock. Which, for some inexplicable reason, she loved even more than when she’d been able to explore on her own. There was something powerfully compelling about the way he took control of her, using her mouth for his own pleasure. And when he groaned, pushing her head down, making her gag as he hit the back of her throat, she swallowed all the salty fluid that came spurting from him.

They cuddled afterward, Gregory consenting to remove her jewels and assisting her in doing so, leaving her completely bare for the first time. Teasing the tiara out of her hair had required some work, and she did not want to even think about what her coiffure must look like now. She admitted that her mother had warned her about the pain that being bedded would bring, and exactly what her mother had said.

Somehow, being naked, being totally exposed physically, made it easier to tell him things that she had never told anyone else.

“I have no experience in bedding virgins… until now,” Gregory admitted, winking at her, which made her smile even as her stomach twisted at the reminder that he was not inexperienced. Gentlemen were not expected to be, but she still did not like to think about it, so she pushed those thoughts aside. “I do know it can hurt, though, a great deal, in fact, which is always true if the lady in question is not aroused. I suppose it can be more difficult to arouse a virgin, especially if she is nervous or if there is no attraction between her and her husband.”

“I felt a sting, but nothing more.” She rubbed her cheek against his chest, amazed at how comfortable she felt with him, how natural it felt to be skin-to-skin. That he made her feel beautiful was one thing, but he also made her feel safe. Something she now realized she had not felt in years. “It did not pain me unnecessarily. Certainly, nothing like I feared or like my mother told me.”

“It is possible that was how it was for her the first time.”

Despite the reasonableness of his comment, even though she’d used many such explanations to herself in the past, Tiffany felt a surge of defensive anger coiling through her.

“Perhaps, but when I asked her why women take lovers or become mistresses, she had no answer for me. And she has a lover herself.”

Gregory’s fingertips, which had been idly making circles on her shoulder, stilled.

“She does?”

Tiffany nodded, knowing he would feel the movement even if he could not see it.

“Since before my father died. I think he must have had his own as well; they hardly ever lived in the same household.” Tiffany sighed. As always, thinking of her father brought an ache to her heart, though, at least now, she would not be surrounded by the memories of him on a daily basis. She’d never hidden under the table in Gregory’s library, reading, while her father sat in his chair and silently kept her company until she fell asleep. “As far as I know, when they were under the same roof, they lived wholly separate lives.”

“My mother and father as well,” Gregory replied, his fingers starting to draw little patterns on her skin again. “Though we were all relieved whenever he was away from us. Thankfully, he spent most of his time in London, where he could not torment my mother.”

“I cannot imagine anyone tormenting her. She is so kind and thoughtful.” Tiffany shook her head again. Though she missed her own father, she felt even more sad for Gregory, whose father had been more than lacking; he sounded awful. He sounded…

He sounded like her mother.

“She is, and unfortunately, she was saddled with my father. Though I am sorry for the loss of yours and the others, I have to admit, in many ways, my father’s death was a relief.”

Which was a horribly sad legacy to leave behind. His willingness to tell the truth spurred her to whisper her own, despite the fear of what he might say.

“Sometimes, I think the same about my mother.” She whispered the words, barely more than a breath, and his arm tightened around her shoulder. He was silent for a long moment.

“I am sorry,” he said finally, rather than remonstrating her.

Tiffany sagged against him in relief, turning her face toward his chest as tears pricked the corners of her eyes.

It was something she’d never been able to admit to anyone else. Most of the time, she could not even think about it herself because it made her feel so awful. But when they’d first learned of her father’s death, her first thought was that she wished it had been her mother instead. And then she’d wondered how awful she could be to think such a thing.

But sometimes, the thought still popped up in her head.

“I have noticed she does not always seem as supportive of you as she is of Sebastian.” Gregory’s tone was hesitant, as if he was trying to say the truth in a way that did not hurt her feelings.

“He is the first-born son,” Tiffany quipped, though it did not feel very funny. That was the reasoning she’d used over and over again, her entire life, when she could do nothing right, but Sebastian could do no wrong. At least not in their mother’s eyes.

Gregory turned toward her, shifting their positions so he could look at her. Her head was still pillowed on his arm, but he cupped her face with his other hand. Reaching up, she wrapped her hands around his wrist, holding him there, savoring the comforting touch. Their legs moved, entwining together, and the tightness in her chest eased even more.

“You are the first-born daughter.” His thumb stroked across her cheek. “That should mean something as well.”

“Sometimes, I think it means my mother hates me,” she whispered back before pressing her lips together against the sob that was rising in her throat.

Gregory

The pain in Tiffany’s eyes made Gregory want to punch something. Someone. Except, of course, he could not hit a woman. Not in that manner. Neither did he have any urge to spank her mother because that was far too intimate, but dammit, someone should. Whether she’d meant to or not, she’d made Tiffany feel as though her own mother hated her.

He did not want to make Tiffany feel worse, but seeing how she felt, it was impossible not to think back through every interaction he’d witnessed between the two. Even the way her mother tended to focus her attention solely on Sebastian, he could imagine how that would be hurtful.

“My mother loves you,” he said. It was the only thing he could think of to say, though he did not know whether that made things better or worse.

Tiffany sniffled, but she smiled, though her eyes were watery. He was glad he had not made it worse. She ducked her head, snuggling into his chest, and he wrapped his arms tighter around her. If holding her was what she wanted, then holding her was what she would get.

“I love your mother,” she said, her voice only slightly muffled because of how she’d buried her face against his body. “She and Lady Astrid… I do not know what I would have done without them. My mother always dressed me in orange and yellow, and I never questioned why. But seeing how I looked in blue, seeing how I could look today, I do not understand why she kept insisting on anything but.”

“Perhaps she is jealous,” Gregory murmured because it was the only thing he could think of.

Tiffany moved her head back again so she could look at him, frowning in consternation.

“Why would she be jealous of me?”

“Because you are beautiful. Young.” Gregory shrugged. “It happens within the ton when new beauties replace the previous Season’s. Why not between mother and daughter?”

Tiffany worried her lower lip between her teeth for a moment, a furrow in the middle of her brow as she thought.

“I never felt beautiful. Not until I met you,” she admitted.

Which made him want to go punch something again. Remembering the conversations he and Sebastian had had before the Season started, before he’d met her, he almost wanted to punch himself. His only excuse was that he had not known. Then again, it did seem as though Sebastian had been influenced by his mother as much as Tiffany had.

Well.

There was nothing Gregory could do about that, but going forward, he was going to do his best to protect her. From both her mother and her brother if need be. Sebastian might be his closest friend, but Tiffany was his wife, and who would protect her if not her husband?

“Trust me, you are very beautiful, and I am very glad I found you in the library so that I did not have to fight all of my friends for your hand.” He kissed the tip of her nose, making her giggle. “You were always beautiful, little swan… though perhaps what you wore did not show you off to your best advantage. Such as, I had no idea that you had these beauties until today.”

He hefted her breast with his hand, running his thumb over the nipple and teasing it to hardness as her eyes widened, and she let out a gasp. It was too soon to have her again, but he was going to enjoy teasing her, readying for her for a return to his bed tonight.

“My mother always told me they were excessively large,” she admitted, shuddering, her lower body moving closer to his. He felt his cock twitch with interest, despite his satiation.

“Which is proof that your mother has absolutely no idea how a gentleman thinks,” Gregory said, shaking his head. He rolled his wife onto her back, cupping her breasts in each hand and lowering his mouth to shower them with kisses as he spoke. “These. Are. Perfect.”

Tiffany was giggling again, her cheeks flushed with heat as he caressed her, and he might have gone for using his mouth again—or perhaps showing her what lovely things could be done with large breasts and a cock—when there was a knock at his bedroom door.

“Your food, Your Grace.” That was Redding’s voice. Gregory’s lips twitched. Mrs. Bryant must have decided that his valet was the most appropriate choice to interrupt his and Tiffany’s intimate celebrations. “Mrs. Bryant says the household will be ready to greet you in an hour.”

“An hour!” Tiffany exclaimed, her hands automatically reaching up to shove Gregory off of her. He let her, sighing in resignation as he rolled onto his back. “Oh goodness, my hair!”

While he would have been perfectly content to spend the entire day in bed with her and damn the rest of the world, he did not want her to get off on the wrong foot with the household. Wrapping her up in one of his robes, he put on another before letting Redding in with their meal on a cart.

Redding obligingly kept his gaze averted from his new duchess while she was dishabille , which was good for Gregory’s new sense of possessiveness. He thought she looked utterly delicious seated at the small table by his window, hair mussed from lovemaking, cheeks flushed pink, her hand clutching the top of the oversized robe closed at her neck.

He knew what he would rather be eating…

But they needed to keep their strength up and to get through the responsibilities of the day before he could feast again.

So, he behaved himself while they ate, ringing for Poppy, his mother’s ladies’ maid, to come assist her with her hair when he discovered that she did not have her own. He’d assumed… but when it came to what Tiffany should have, what she deserved, and what her mother should have provided her with, he was quickly learning not to assume.

An hour later, she was greeting the household, learning their names as Mrs. Bryant introduced her to them, stunning in a blue twill dress and undergarments that made the most of her ‘excessive bosom’. Gregory could not help but snort and shake his head at the thought—quietly, so no one thought it was directed at Tiffany.

Well, his own mother was going to be happy to make up for the lack that Tiffany’s mother had left, of that he was sure. She’d appeared for the introductions as well, happily beaming her approval as Tiffany was greeted by the household and greeted them. It was a ceremony that would need to be repeated when they retired to Clarence Hall, their country estate, but that would not be for a while.

Not while there was still the mystery of their fathers’ deaths to solve.

Gregory frowned.

He was going to need to have a word with Paulson and his footmen when his wife and mother were not within hearing distance. While there was no real proof of danger from Montblanc or his associates, it would be better to be safe than sorry. Paulson had been in charge of setting one footman to follow Gregory’s mother ever since Gregory had found the threatening notes; he was going to set two on his wife.

Not because he loved his mother any less, but because…

Well, because.

He was not going to examine that impulse too closely because he was not sure he was ready to admit to what he might find.