Diantha had no experience in such things, but she suspected this was only lovers’ talk. Trembling upon her own tongue now, after all, were words she had absolutely no intention of saying because she believed them only insofar as the pleasure he had just brought her body was indescribably wonderful. And the “for good or ill” part seemed remarkably begrudging, despite being murmured seductively at her throat. So she said what she knew to be true.
“I liked what we just did.”
“Did you?” His mouth against her neck smiled.
“Can we do it again? Now?”
He kissed her chin, then either side of her mouth, slowly, warmly, then finally her lips, and she pressed herself to him.
“Please?” she whispered. “If I admit that I liked it very much, can we?”
“Not quite yet, minx. A man requires time to—”
Her graceful hand wrapped around his cock and proceeded to demonstrate to them both that he required a lot less time than he had previously believed.
Wyn awoke at dawn wanting her again.
Rumpled and glowing with gentle vulnerability in sleep, Diantha breathed evenly, her slumber deep. He could not rouse her, not even to sheer the edge off the scratching thirst that again attended him.
He dressed and went to the stable where Galahad and Lady Priscilla greeted him with soft whickers. Perched on the stool beside the cow, Owen tugged his cap.
“Morning, sir.”
“We depart today. If you prefer to remain here, I will leave the filly in your charge and instruct Mr. Guyther to allow you authority with her.”
The boy gaped. “I’d like that, sir.”
“She is a valuable animal.” Owen was a natural with horses. Wyn’s absence would not be long, and Guyther would oversee. “Are you certain you wish the responsibility?”
“Yes, sir!”
He threw the blanket and saddle over Galahad’s back. “When you have finished milking, go to the village and ask Mrs. Cerwydn for a repetition of the herbs she recently prepared for me. Wait for them, then return here.”
Wyn rode to Guyther’s house. The land steward met him with an improved air from their encounter in the village. The Welsh were a wary, wise folk, and the people of Abbaty Fran Ddu did not understand why he had not returned when his great aunt fell ill that final time, then for her funeral. They’d known he was in London. They hadn’t known, of course, that between the time they had seen him last and his aunt’s swift decline he’d killed a girl—a girl he was trying to help—killed her because he had acted hastily, too proud of his abilities, too confident, and drunk. They hadn’t known that he could not bear to tell this to the woman who had taught him everything about being a good man.
They also did not understand why it had taken him five years to return. But in ten days they had become accustomed to his presence, curious at the circumstances of it and of the lady accompanying him. Guyther made that clear.
He spoke with the steward about the estate then rode back to the house through the mists lifting into the silvery morning. Owen had gone, and Wyn saw to Galahad’s needs then went along the stable to the far end. A stack of new hay beckoned, the sunlight warm. As though he were a boy again he removed his coat, lay down on his back, crooked his arms behind his head and listened to the sounds of the animals and the stream in the distance, the birds in the hedges, the day rising.
He heard her approach before he saw her, her footsteps light on the floor.
“I saw you return with Galahad. No—don’t get up!” She plopped down onto her knees beside him, sunlight spilling through her hair. “I was surprised you went riding when we are to travel today.”
“I imagined you still asleep.” He took her hand and brought it to his lips. She set her other palm on his chest and pressed him back onto the hay.
“I couldn’t sleep.” The bright blue showed pure intention, the dimples full blown. She crawled over him. “My dreams were all about what we did last night and they simply woke me up.”
He laughed. “Have you breakfasted yet, minx?”
She straddled his hips, her skirts a froth about her thighs. “I don’t want to eat.”
“This is unprecedented.”
“I want you to make love to me again. Now. In a stable, the first place I was ever kissed.” Her smile dazzled.
“Your companion—”
“Mrs. Polley is not awake and I haven’t yet seen Owen.” She found his cock through his breeches with the soft core of her femininity. He settled his hands on her hips and groaned as her hand sought him. Then placing her palms on his shoulders, she tilted forward and rocked against him. Her eyelids fluttered. “You make this feel so good,” she whispered almost shyly now, her lashes low.
He slipped his hand up to the back of her head and drew her down. Her lips were no less sweet this morning than the night before. More so.
“It is designed to feel good, minx,” he murmured, twining his fingers through her curls.
Her lapis eyes opened wide. “Do you never claim the credit for anything good?”
“Claiming the credit for the pleasure in sex would be an act of hubris of which even I am not capable.”
“You are not an overly proud man, though I think you imagine you are. And if sex is naturally pleasurable, why are there so many married ladies who go about with their faces pinched in dissatisfaction?”
He laughed and kissed her, and for some time there was no haste, only the warmth of her lips and her body in his hands, her fingers pressing into his shoulders. When she began to make soft sounds of want in the back of her throat, her thighs clasping his hips as she moved herself against him, seeking pleasure, he saw no need to delay further what they both wanted. He slipped his tongue into her mouth to taste her. Her fingers plucked at his shirt and waistcoat impatiently.
“Oh, please remove these,” she said upon a hard exhale, pressing to him. “I want to touch you.”
“There is a bedchamber not twenty yards distant.”
“I am rewriting Rule Number One.” She unbuttoned his waistcoat and pushed it over his shoulders. “ ‘Deny her nothing, even if she is not particularly virtuous.’ ”
“I am obliged to submit, for kind of heart and generous you are in spades, Diantha Lucas.” She slipped from his lap and he drew off his waistcoat, but the twinkle in his gray eyes stole her attention from even the sight of him undressing. “And, of course, I am complicit in your loss of virtue,” he added.
“Only because I forced you.” She touched him and the thrill of it shivered through her. Touching him was not a dream. It was beyond sublime.
“No one forces me to do anything I do not wish to do.” He took up his shirttail.
“Allow that I badgered, at least.” She helped him with the linen, wanting the excuse to run her hands over his back, to feel the strength beneath his skin and revel in the eagerness of her own body. “It’s true that if others don’t initially accede to my wishes, I usually convince them in one manner or—” Her fingertips arrested on his spine. “What—”
“Don’t”—he whipped around and clamped her wrist in a brutal grip—“touch.”
Circular scars ascended in a line from the base of his spine, each the size of a man’s thumbprint, their texture hard and rough.
“Why not?” Her voice was a rasp.
Wyn’s iron grasp loosened. “Diantha, I beg your pardon.” He took a deep breath.
“They are very old. Do they still pain you?”
“No.”
“They look like burns.” Vicious marks. “Intentionally inflicted.”
“Indeed.”
“Was it a fireplace iron?”
“Nothing so dramatic. Merely cigars, my father and eldest brother’s fondest tools of chastisement.”
“Why did they do that to you?”
