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Her hips swayed and shuddered, and she was past caring. Past embarrassment. Zeke was taking her body to a place she never dreamed existed. A place where love and desire, tenderness and sensation, excitement and need entwined.

“ Zeke, Zeke .” She clutched at him, dragging herself into his chest as if, by being close to him she could reach that unknown pinnacle, just out of reach.

She sensed that illusive peak growing nearer as his whispers of encouragement gave way rasping breaths. His body, half covered hers, and his own gyrating hips told her his need matched her own.

“Now, Kitty. Now ,” he choked.

No sooner had his words left his lips then glorious release swept through her. Wondrous pleasure bloomed inside her, like a thousand shards of sparkling light spreading as far as the eye could see.

Time stood still as Zeke wrenched every last drop of the heady sensations out of her until her stuttering breaths slowed and her body went limp in his arms.

When she turned to gaze at him with wonder, he pressed his forehead into hers. He stared at her with hot, possessive eyes the color of a stormy dusk sky.

“Kitty, I—” He hissed in a breath, and in one rough move, ripped off his drawers. Then he eased himself on top of her, pressing her pliant body into the mattress.

Zeke reached between them with a shaking hand.

Pressing her chemise up and out of the way, he brought his hips into alignment with hers, nestling the tip of his throbbing cock into the entrance of her swollen sex.

Her sweet, hot liquid welcomed him, daring him to thrust into her.

His entire body shook with the effort it took to resist his own carnal need.

Her release had nearly undone him—something that had never happened to him, even as a greenhorn lad. But, then, he’d never wanted a woman the way he wanted her.

She was his. He would be the only man she would ever know.

She lay beneath him, a siren gazing at him with passion-drugged eyes. Black hair tumbling around her shoulders in sensuous waves. Creamy skin aglow from the climax he’d coaxed from her body.

She smiled shyly. Love and trust shone in her green cat’s eyes.

Love. She loved him.

His insides twisted with gut wrenching need. “Kitty,” he rasped, her name sounding like a prayer to his own ears. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I’m afraid it’s unavoidable.” At least he thought so. He’d never had a virgin. Never wanted to bear the responsibility before now.

“It’s all right, Zeke. I trust you.”

Blood roaring in his ears, he closed his eyes and pressed into her heat. Her sweet flesh pulsed around him. It was like nothing he’d ever known. He opened his eyes and looked down at her.

Kitty’s brows were furrowed. “I think…this may not work.”

Sweet Jesus . He’d laugh if he weren’t so desperate for her. Sweat trickled down the center of his back. He pressed forward another inch, then another.

She shifted, probably trying to accommodate herself to his size, but it was too much.

“Kitty,” he said in a strangled voice as his hips jerked and he thrust past the fragile membrane, sinking himself to the hilt. The sound of his ragged breath filled the air.

She felt so good. Too good. He held himself perfectly still, for his sake as much as hers.

A teardrop escaped the corner of her eye and rolled down her cheek.

He kissed the salty track. “I’m sorry, sweetheart.” He wanted to tell her the pain would recede, that making love would improve with practice. But he was past the ability to speak.

“I’m all right. Are we…is it done?”

This time he did give a shuddering laugh, before pressing a kiss to her temple. “Not quite.”

He eased himself nearly out of her, then pressed back in, kissing her all the while.

Again and again he buried himself in her. Long, slow, delicious, tortuous thrusts. Time stopped. Only Kitty existed. Her sweet body, her mouth, her sighs, her heat. Her love.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him to her. Then her hips arched up to meet his, matching his rhythm. Oh God. Torture. He fought the urge to thrust harder, faster, deeper. Fought it with everything in him.

A low keening sounded in her throat. It built, growing louder. Then her thighs tightened around him as her second release gripped her.

She choked out his name, and he was gone. His climax tore through him. He poured himself into her, gritting his teeth against the overwhelming ecstasy.

Afterwards he collapsed on top of her, utterly spent, and inwardly shaken by the power of the release she’d wrenched from him.

He didn’t know how much time passed before he moved again. Five minutes? Ten? “Kitty?”

At her muffled response, he cracked one heavy eyelid and saw his blankets practically engulfing her.

With a world-weary sigh, he rolled to his side, taking her with him so she nestled in the curve of his body.

He draped an arm over her and closed his eyes.

They’d earned the right to rest. Just for a few moments.

It occurred to him his head no longer hurt. A satisfied smile spread over his face. The old wive’s tale was true. Sex really was a remedy for the headache.

***

Zeke came awake with a start. A bright beam of daylight seeping through a crack in his drapes told him it was morning. He was cold. He was lying on his stomach, atop seriously rumpled sheets instead of under them, and he was naked.

Last night’s events came back in a rush. He jerked upright and scanned his bedchamber for Kitty. She was gone.

He erupted from the bed and combed the floor for telltale signs. Hairpins. A petticoat.

He found nothing except his drawers. The lady had covered her tracks. Except…

He turned back to the bed and searched the bed covers. Dried blood marred the sheets. A brief memory of he and Kitty, tangled in the linens, of Kitty’s soft flesh, yielding to his insistent hardness, flashed before his eyes.

It shouldn’t have happened like that.

Despite the prick of guilt, the lower part of his anatomy came to full attention. He grinned. He wanted to see her. Now.

First the sheets. The injury he’d suffered could explain the blood, not that any of the servants would question him. But why court trouble?

He finished stripping the bed, and had them balled in his arms when two knocks sounded on the outer chamber door. He shoved the sheets in the bottom of his wardrobe, and pulled up the bed covers before throwing on his dressing gown and striding through the antechamber.

He found his brother in the corridor, leaning against the wall, arms crossed.

“Caden. Since when have you ever waited for me to open my door?”

Caden craned his head to look past Zeke. “Since you acquired an adorable fiancé who had to be forcibly ejected from your bedchamber.” He crossed the threshold.

Zeke gave his brother an innocent look. “Kitty was here?”

“Yes. We let the doctor bear most of the blame for ousting her, out of fear for our lives. Cowardly, I know, but we were fairly sure she’d spare him for your sake.

Even after he pronounced you the most hard-headed man alive, and her brother dragged her to her bedchamber, I half feared she’d sneak back. ” Caden gave Zeke a shrewd look.

Zeke moved to the open door leading to his bedchamber, propped his hip against the doorjamb, and met Caden’s eyes with—he hoped—a guileless stare.

Caden let the subject drop. “How are you feeling, by the way?”

Zeke smiled broadly. This he could answer truthfully. “Aside from a nagging headache, I’m on top of the world. And starving. Have you eaten?”

“I’m about to, but thought I’d check on you first.”

“Very thoughtful.”

“As I mentioned, I half feared I’d find you in bed. With company.”

“Kitty’s hardly some trollop likely to throw her reputation away for a quick tryst.”

“Wasn’t her character I was worried about,” Caden muttered. “Do you remember anything?”

Zeke was beginning to get irritated. “I just told you, I had no idea she was even in my bedchamber.”

Caden arched a brow. “I meant, do you remember the accident?”

“Oh. That. Not much. I assume I got assaulted by the butt of Randall’s gun?”

“Exactly.” Caden pushed past Zeke to wander his bedchamber. He glanced around the room as if he’d never been inside it. Nosy bastard.

“Don’t get any notions about blaming Kitty, either. You brought it on yourself, standing too close to her. Poor thing was quite beside herself.”

“I’ll do my best not to hold anything against her.” Zeke turned his back on Caden to hide his grin and disappeared into his closet. “I’ll see you downstairs, eh?”

***

“Speak of the devil,” the earl said. “Zeke, we were just discussing you.”

“Good morning to you, too, Grandfather, Aunt, Randall. Caden I’ve already had the pleasure of greeting.” Zeke sauntered into the breakfast hall. “What, no Lady Kitty yet?”

“Perhaps all that nurse duty tired her out,” the earl suggested.

Caden drained his coffee and rose from the table to approach the sideboard alongside Zeke. “I just informed Zeke of Kitty’s vigil. Apparently he had no idea he had an angel watching over him.”

Zeke grinned down at his plate and piled on the eggs.

“It is a bit odd neither Lord Hastings nor Kitty have put in an appearance this morning,” Lillian said. An odd tenor in her voice had Zeke glancing her way.

Her hand fluttered at her throat in an agitated manner. “Lord James hasn’t breakfasted yet, either.”

Zeke waited for her to say something more, but after a moment she dropped her gaze and resumed eating.

“No, indeed,” the earl said, not seeming the least concerned as he read this morning’s copy of the Times.

Zeke took his filled plate and sat across from the earl. He picked up his cutlery and set to work on his salted ham.

“My, but someone’s in a good mood today,” Randall marveled.

Zeke glanced at his friend, his brows arched in query. “Are you referring to me?”

“I am.”

Zeke chuckled for no apparent reason. “True. Not sure why you'd say so, however.”

“Because you were whistling.”

He thought a moment. “So I was.”

“Odd to be so jubilant after getting a nasty knock in the head, don’t you think, Randall? Perhaps we should have tried that on him earlier in the week.”

Zeke refrained from rising to the bait. By George, he was in a grand mood.

“Ah. That ought to suffice for the journey back to London,” Caden said a few minutes later, when he’d consumed a copious amount of eggs, ham, beans, and toast.

“Alas, it is that time, is it not?” Randall asked.

“We’ll miss you,” Zeke said with a grin.

“Don’t pay any attention to him. The house won’t be the same without the two of you here to wreak havoc on us all,” the earl said. “Isn’t that so, Lill?”

Aunt Lillian appeared lost in thought. With everyone’s eyes on her, she gave a start. “You were saying?” she asked of no one in particular.

Caden threw his head back to laugh. “On that note, I’m off to my chambers to gather my things.”

“I’ll do the same,” Randall said.

Both men rose. “What, you’re leaving today?” Lillian asked them.

Her look of indignation had no effect on the hoots of laughter her question heralded, though Zeke’s affectionate wink seemed to mollify her.