Page 26 of The Etiquette of Love (The Academy of Love #7)
T heir second week at Sweet Clover the days were unusually warm. Even the nights were hot, the air not really cooling until early morning for an hour or two, and then it would gradually heat up again.
“Is it always this warm?” Freddie had asked one afternoon, when the heat had driven her in from the garden and she had actually taken a nap.
“No, this is hotter than any summer that I can recall.”
Plimpton had taken to opening the window in her room when coming to her bed. The breeze not only cooled her heated skin but perfumed the air with the faint scent of honey and the not unpleasant smoke the men used to calm the bees as they harvested their crop.
It had occurred to her, belatedly on the second evening they made love with the windows open that everyone in the vicinity had likely heard her cries of passion. When she had mentioned that fact to Plimpton, he had given one of his rare chuckles and said, “Good.”
“Good?” she had exclaimed. “I will not be able to show my face.”
“You should be proud, not ashamed. These are country folk, Winifred. Fornicating is the chief form of entertainment when one goes to bed with the sunset and rises with the cock crow. They approve of a lusty wench who can satisfy her lord and master.”
“Lusty wench?”
He had laughed when she had gawked at him in disbelief.
And then he had proceeded to make her scream his name more loudly than ever.
That had been four nights ago, and he’d continued to do so every night since.
Tonight, her lord and master had just finished satisfying her twice—he had been prepared to go a third time, but she had pled for mercy—and was now drowsing with her head on his chest, boneless with pleasure as she toyed with the light fleece that grew thickest between his small brown nipples. “I think you like hearing me beg,” she accused in a sulky tone that fooled neither of them.
“I think you are correct,” he replied without hesitation.
“Beast,” Freddie muttered with a smile, amused when his chest shook with silent laughter that turned into a yawn.
She carded her fingers through the damp springy hair, sighing with contentment as his palm stroked languidly from her shoulder, down her spine, to her buttock.
This is a perfect moment.
Freddie’s hand paused and she turned the thought around in her head, viewing it from several angles.
It was perfect. How often did that happen in life? Not more than a handful of times that she could remember. She opened her mouth to share the thought, but hesitated, wondering how to express herself in words. What if he did not feel the same way?
Assaulted by indecision, the moment passed.
There would be more perfect moments and the next time she might know how to share it.
She resumed her caressing, fascinated by the combination of rough hair, hot satin skin, and hard muscles.
“Are you grooming me?” he asked in an amused, sleepy voice.
“I found a gray hair,” she informed him.
He hesitated only a fraction of a second before saying, “I am sure you have mistaken one of my blond hairs for gray.”
She bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing. “Blond like the ones at your temples?”
A low growl vibrated his chest.
Freddie grinned. “No, this hair is definitely gray.” She tugged gently on the pale intruder. “Should I pull it out? It would hardly take any—”
The hand not stroking her back settled over her hand. “I think not.”
Freddie laughed. “Coward.”
He guided her hand away from the offending hair toward his nipple. “If you want to pull on something, pull on this.”
She lifted her head and met his slitted gaze. “You—you would like that?”
“ Mmm-hmm .”
Freddie lightly tweaked the petite brown bud, her curiosity piqued when his body stiffened.
“Harder,” he murmured. He gave a sharp groan of pleasure when she complied. “More.”
“It does not hurt?”
“Just enough to feel good,” he assured her. His eyelids lifted when she hesitated and he frowned at whatever he saw on her face, his hand again covering hers. “Winifred? What is it? You have a—a, well, I don’t know what to call it, but an odd look. Is something the matter?”
She chewed her lower lip as she searched for words that would not be clumsy or insulting.
“You do not have to do this if you do not like it,” he said, guessing the general trend of her thoughts but misattributing the reason. His long fingers curved beneath her chin and lifted her face, until she could not avoid his troubled gaze. “I do not want to let matters fester between us. Particularly when it comes to what we do in the bedchamber. Tell me what you are thinking.”
“It is difficult to say.”
“Take your time,” he said, caressing her cheek and stroking a curl off her temple, tucking it behind her ear.
“Sedgewick liked to be birched,” she blurted.
So much for taking your time.
His hand stilled, but Freddie could not read his expression. Why was he so inscrutable to her when she was an open book to him? Could she really be so unobservant?
“Are you asking me if that is something I enjoy?”
She nodded.
“No. I do not like to be whipped.” After a pause, he added, “Nor do I like to do any whipping. At least not unless my lover wished for that.”
She gave a sigh of relief, and a pleasurable tingling penetrated her embarrassment at the sound of the word lover on his stern lips.
Plimpton’s hand resumed its caressing. “Is that what happened, Winifred? Did Sedgewick force you to birch him?”
She shook her head.
He hesitated, his expression finally one she could read: grim. “Did he birch you ?”
She held her breath, and then nodded.
“Did you give him permission?”
She hesitated and then said, “I did not want to deny him—and—and I was curious,” Freddie’s voice trembled with shame at her admission. “He promised me that if he did it, it would only be lightly.” She swallowed hard. “Not the way he liked it…which was so hard that he was often scarred for weeks, and sometimes there was b-blood.”
“And?” he said, his gaze intense.
“He drew blood.”
His face hardened—not in disgust, but in anger—and he briefly closed his eyes, as if he needed a moment to control his reaction—before opening them and sliding a hand behind her head. “Come up here.”
She glanced at his nipple, which was no longer erect thanks to her introduction of a distasteful subject. “But—”
“We will make time for that later,” he assured her. “Come here,” he repeated, exerting gentle pressure to help bring her up the length of his body, until they were face to face. He rolled onto his side and propped his head on one hand, caressing her with the other. “If Sedgewick were alive, I would beat him to a bloody pulp. And then I would wait until he regained consciousness and beat him again.”
Freddie could not help the smile that took over her face. “Is it wrong for me to enjoy the thought of that?”
“No.” He caressed her cheek, his eyes flickering over her face, as if he were searching for something. After a few seconds, his fingers lightly glossed down her sensitive throat, over the thin skin stretched of her breastbone, and then stopped on the slight swell of her belly. He cupped her with one hand and they both looked down.
His skin appeared dark compared to the fish belly whiteness of her midriff and he gently stroked the slight curve of her stomach, his touch worshipful. “I appreciate you telling me something that was difficult and embarrassing to confide.” He dipped his little finger into the dimple of her navel, his gaze jumping up to hers when she stifled a laugh. “Ticklish?”
“A little.”
“How about here?”
Her breathing quickened as he cupped her mound.
“No. That is not ticklish… yet. Perhaps if you try a little harder.”
He looked amused, the warm pads of his fingers easing into her slick, swollen folds and caressing and exploring, until a familiar tension began to build in her sex.
But then his hand stilled and he cupped her again, his touch soothing rather than arousing. “I want to tell you something.”
She wrenched her eyes from the mesmerizing sight of his fingers toying with her curls and met his gaze. “You do not need to tell me something difficult or embarrassing just to make me feel better.”
“I know. This is neither of those things. Although I assure you that I possess my fair share of embarrassing and difficult memories.” He paused, reflected, and then added, “This is something that probably should embarrass me, but it does not.”
“Now I am intrigued.” Freddie lifted her hand to the nipple she’d been teasing earlier and pinched it.
He shuddered and gave her an approving look. “Wicked girl.” He teased the seam of her lower lips in a way that made her tremble for more.
When his hand again stilled, Freddie knew he was teasing her not by accident, but on purpose.
She lifted her hips slightly in a gentle reminder. But he merely gazed down at her, mildly haughty. Now this was a look she could read; it said he would do what he wanted, when he wanted, and not a moment before. Freddie adored it.
“Are you Wareham’s age?” she asked, returning to her stroking, but not giving his nipple the hard pinches he sought. Two could play at this game, after all.
Her frowned. “Why do you ask?”
“You know my age.”
He grunted. “I will be three-and-forty on my next birthday.”
“When is that?”
“February twenty-second,” he said. “And yours is April the twenty-first.”
“How did you know?”
“I know many things about you.”
Freddie rolled her eyes. “Tell me your secret—the one that should embarrass you but does not.”
He massaged her belly in light circles. “Sometimes when I am doing other things—tedious things such as going over accounts with Kaplan or reading crop reports—my mind wanders.”
Freddie gave an exasperated huff. “ That is what you wanted to confess?”
“Do not be pert.” He gave her mound a sharp tap.
It was not very hard, but Freddie shivered at the strange blend of pleasure and pain.
His eyelids lowered. “Ah.”
She squirmed under his brooding gaze. “What does that mean— ah ?”
“Just… ah .”
“Fine. If you refuse to explain ah, then tell me why you mentioned your mind wandering.” He raised his eyebrows, giving her that haughty look again. “ Please tell me, Your Grace,” she amended.
“Since you ask so nicely, I will tell you. My mind wanders because I cannot stop imagining what you will look like in three, four, or five months hence.”
“That is no great mystery,” she said with an embarrassed laugh. “I will be as big as a heifer and will probably waddle. You will be grateful to hide me away in the country.”
“When did I say I was going to hide you away in the country? Or anywhere else, for that matter.”
Freddie’s eyebrows shot up. “Wh-what do you mean?”
“I mean that I will enjoy taking you to town and parading you before the ton.”
“ What ?” she demanded with a scandalized laugh.
His hand resumed its soothing caresses. “I will want it to be known far and wide that I am responsible for your swelling belly. That I am the one who put a child inside you.”
Every drop of moisture drained from her mouth. “Er… that sounds—”
“Primitive? Yes, it is. I get the most primitive satisfaction from my imaginings.” His lips spread into a slow smile that caused her sex to tighten. “And it makes me hard. Every. Time.” He punctuated the last two words with two more sharp taps on her mound.
Freddie groaned.
“Ah.” He leaned closer, his middle finger curling and parting her swollen lips, the damp pad finding the perfect place and then applying the perfect amount of pressure. “When I have those thoughts, I get the strongest urge to find you—no matter where you are or who you are with—and take you.” His finger moved lower, until she felt a prodding at the opening to her body. “I imagine bending you over whatever is convenient, lifting your skirt, and filling you.” He thrust two fingers inside her, the stretch so sudden and intense her body tightened as if to keep out an intruder.
“Yes,” he murmured, holding her full to the top knuckle, his fingers curling in a beckoning motion inside her. “I would give you every inch—hard and long and deep.”
“Plimpton,” she gasped.
“ Hmm ?” His fingers caressed in a firm, gentle rhythm that was just enough to make her thrum with pleasure, but not enough to move her from pleasure to bliss.
“Please.” She raised her hips.
“Please?” He eased his fingers out of her body and then lightly, maddeningly, stroked her throbbing peak. “Is this what you want? To be touched here?”
“Yes… that. And…” she bit her lip.
“And—what?”
“Just that.”
“You should not lie to your husband.” He gave her engorged bud a hard squeeze.
Freddie blurted, “I didn’t mean to!”
“What else do you want?” he asked, easing the pressure, but keeping the bundle of nerves imprisoned.
“I want… more.”
“More?”
She growled. “I want you inside, as well.”
He thrust back into her, once again filling her. “You want more of this?”
“ Yes .”
“Then you will have it,” he said in a voice that pulsed with erotic menace. He rolled her onto her back and spread her legs wide before kneeling between them, watching intently as he worked her vigorously enough to shake her breasts with each thrust.
Freddie reached up to steady them.
“No,” he said, his hand ceasing its stroking. “If you want to grab something, grab your knees.”
“What?”
“Yes, like this.” He positioned her hands the way he wanted. “Now pull them toward your chest.
She gawked at him. “But, Plimpton, I will look like—”
“You will look delicious. Do as I say and I promise to make you writhe with pleasure.”
Face scalding, she did what he said. Never in her life had she felt so exposed and vulnerable. Or so wicked and desirable.
“Look at you,” he murmured softly, his eyes blazing and his lips parted hungrily, starved expression causing her inner muscles to clench. “You are perfect,” he said, lowering himself onto his stomach, his hand resuming its pumping, his breath hot on her exposed sex. “It arouses you to be looked at and worshipped, doesn’t it, Winifred?”
It did arouse her. But that did not mean she wasn’t squirming at what he must see in such proximity.
He gave a low chuckled. “Your blush extends even down here.” He parted her netherlips, spreading her open only inches from his face.
“Plimpton!” Freddie gasped, but she forgot all about her mortification when he lowered his mouth over her.
Her eyes rolled back in her head, and she pulled on her knees even harder.
A smug, low laugh vibrated from her mound to her belly, but Freddie could not bring herself to care about her wanton position or her greedy behavior.
As he had done before, he pleasured her so noisily, and with so much abandon, that it was hard to reconcile the haughty aristocrat with this almost diabolically carnal creature.
The contrast between the man the world saw and the one currently feasting between her thighs made his actions even more arousing. Powerful contractions seized her body, the rhythmic spasms scarcely dying away before his lips once again closed around her throbbing bundle of nerves, his fingers working her with mortifyingly wet sounds.
“Please…” she gasped. “Plimpton—just—just a moment to— oh my! ” Freddie arched her back and moaned as he did something with his tongue that turned her inside out and drove every single thought from her head.
***
Plimpton worked four orgasms from his wife’s delectable body before yielding to her pleas to stop.
Even then, it was difficult to make himself release her. Once he had committed himself to a course of action, he liked to see it through. When he admitted as much to Winifred, she groaned.
“If you see it any more through , I will lose what few wits that remain to me.”
“A witless wife?” he mused. “Not entirely a bad thing, I think.” He made as if to lower his mouth again and she yelped and tried to close her legs. “No! Please, please, please. Just—a quarter of an hour to recover.”
“ Hmmm .”
“Please… Wyndham.”
She knew it softened his resolve when she used his Christian name. She was a wise woman and employed her weapon judiciously.
He gave an exaggerated, self-sacrificing sigh. “Very well, a quarter of an hour.”
She nodded, her eyelids already sliding shut.
It took less than a minute before her breathing turned regular and deep.
He snorted softly, amazed at how quickly she fell asleep. But then many things about her amazed him.
For a woman who appeared as ethereal and delicate as an angel, Winifred was remarkably practical and sturdy. Her dainty facade hid a constitution of iron and near boundless energy.
He hated to compare her to Cecily, but it was inevitable given how much they resembled one another on the surface. But whereas both women appeared cool and serene, a warm and passionate nature was just below the surface of Winifred’s facade. Beneath Cecily’s surface perfection had been…more of the same. She was like glass, with only more glass behind the glass.
What a literary masterpiece of comparative thought.
Plimpton snorted softly. It certainly was.
Plimpton sighed and wrenched his hungry gaze from Winifred’s face. A quick look at the clock showed it was just shy of three. Already he had stayed unconscionably late in her bed. As badly as he wanted to curl around her warm, soft body and drift into sleep beside her, he knew that sort of overly affectionate behavior would be met by annoyed resignation if not outright rejection on her part.
As for his part?
He was already taking more of his new wife’s time than she had likely anticipated.
Besides, she was breeding and needed her rest. If he stayed with her, the last thing she would get is rest.
He left the bed, careful not to disturb her, took one last greedy look at her passion mottled body, lingering on the gentle swell of her belly, and then covered her with the sheet and blanket before shrugging into his robe and opening the connecting door to his chambers.
It felt as if scarcely five minutes had passed between the time he’d crawled into his bed and closed his eyes and when Digby opened the drapes, flooding his chambers with pale early-morning sunlight.
Biting back a groan, Plimpton pushed back the covers and swung his feet to the floor.
Digby, who needed even less sleep that Plimpton, instantly emerged from the dressing room with a banyan draped over one arm and a pair of slippers in his hand.
It was Plimpton’s preference that their morning routine be conducted without unnecessary chatter, so Digby wordlessly held out the robe and Plimpton slipped into it, yawning as he tied the sash. His valet dropped to his haunches and matter-of-factly put a slipper on each foot, much the same way a nurse would dress a toddler. Plimpton was amused that these sorts of observations had only begun to occur to him since becoming acquainted with his outspoken wife.
He stared down at his servant. “I know how to put on my own slippers, Digby,” he said, sounding peevish to his own ears.
Anyone else might have blinked at the non sequitur. Digby, as featureless as a wall of ice, rose to his feet and said, “I have never doubted it, Your Grace.” And then, without pausing, added, “Shall I set out your riding gear?”
Plimpton frowned, certain that he had somehow been put in his place. “No. I will wait until the duchess wakes.”
“Very good, Your Grace.”
“Have a tray sent up; I am going to work in my study for a few hours. I want only coffee and a bit of bread and butter.” He gave the other man a stern look. “That is all I want, Digby. Do not load up a tray and try to stuff me. You know I don’t care to eat a full breakfast before I ride.” He was irked by the vaguely querulous tone in his voice—when had he begun to sound like his great aunt?—and then he was irked that he cared.
“Of course, Your Grace,” Digby agreed in a blandly soothing tone that told Plimpton he would soon be facing at least a rasher of bacon, several boiled eggs, and a rack of buttered toast.
He jerked the sash of his robe with unnecessary force before going to the desk in his study. Why was he so irritable this morning?
Because you should have never left your wife’s bed last night.
Yes, that was true. But already he had the restraint of a dog in rut, going to her every night, staying for hours, having her multiple times and in multiple ways. In short, he was treating her like a back alley whore instead of his duchess and the mother of his child. He needed to take himself in hand and moderate his hunger for her.
Why don’t you allow her to tell you when she has had enough?
He was struck by the thought. But immediately dismissed it. She would see accepting him into her bed, as well as her body, as her duty.
The thought that she might be complying with his demands merely to please him—the way she had obviously done with Sedgewick—made Plimpton shudder. She had already been married to one pig of a husband; she did not need another.
If she despises your touch so much, then why did she come to you on your wedding night?
Plimpton’s hand froze in the act of lighting one of the candles in a branch. The annoyance that had been building within him began to dissipate, like steam from a kettle that had been removed from an open flame.
She had come to him. And after he had purposely made it clear that he had no expectations.
He smiled to himself as he lit the rest of the candles, his mind inevitably reliving how erotic she had looked kneeling at his feet. His morning erection, which had just begun to subside, roared back to life.
He glanced down at the vulgar bulge in his robe. “You are of no use to me right now,” he accused. And then felt more than a little foolish for addressing his cock.
He shifted his gaze to something sure to kill his ardor: the pile of correspondence that lurked on the corner of his desk like a coiled adder.
“Damnation,” he muttered. He had spent three hours whittling down the pile yesterday, until only one letter remained, that from Jeffers, his steward at Whitcombe. He did not need to read Jeffers’s letter to know what it contained. The man would have written to nag him about replacing the seventeen windows in the north wing. Plimpton did not require his servant’s nagging. He knew the windows needed repairing, but it was on his mother’s side of the house, and he disliked the thought of displacing her from her rooms while repairs were made. She had been ill last winter, and her health had not been robust since. Moving her from her chambers would agitate her. It would have to happen, of course, but not right now. Perhaps when Winifred was at Whitcombe she would have some idea of how to make the repairs with the least amount of stress.
The thought of Winifred in his home—which he loved dearly, despite the fact that it was a constant drain on his purse as well as his time—caused a pleasing sense of anticipation. This marriage had had a rocky beginning but seemed to get better and better every day. And every night.
He savored the thought for a moment and then reluctantly put it aside, slipped on his spectacles, and commenced to work his way through today’s pile.