Harder, faster, her body clenched around his as his arms struggled to hold him up, he trembled and flexed. Eliza’s moans reached his ears, words he couldn’t make out over the roaring of his blood. Her nails dug into his shoulders as she held on once again.
When finally that moment of euphoria was upon him, he swore an oath and withdrew, spilling his seed onto her stomach and robbing him of the climax of her sheath to complete the glorious experience. Great heaving breaths filled his lungs but he found his arms could no longer take his weight. He rolled away and fell to his back, still trying to draw breath, still trying to come to terms with what he’d just done.
Some moments later, how many he wasn’t sure, Eliza shivered but she did not move away. She hadn’t moved much at all. For the longest second of his life, he wondered again if she even breathed, but then he heard it, her intake of air, the hold, then the exhalation.
Reluctantly rolling to his feet, Darius went to the washbasin in the corner of the room and wet a linen cloth. He brought it back and wiped Eliza’s stomach clean, her eyes shut all the while, and then he pulled the sheets up to her chin. He blew out a few candles so only two remained burning and climbed back in with her.
“Are you all right?” he asked, terrified of the answer. Had he been too rough? Had he behaved a caveman and a cad and hurt her? Or was it regret that kept her silent? There were no tears upon her cheeks but that didn’t mean she wasn’t in her own world of turmoil.
He on the other hand felt as though he could sing. Loudly.
“Eliza?” he prompted.
She breathed deep, turned her head on the pillow to face him. When she opened her eyes, it was as if Darius’s own soul was reflected there in the sparkling blue depths. “I never knew,” she murmured. She didn’t smile but neither were her lips set in a frown.
“Never knew what?”
“It’s going to sound quite silly,” she demurred, her cheeks turning rosier.
“I promise not to laugh.”
After a brief hesitation, she gave a little nod and then turned her face back to the canopy above the bed. “We are two people but it was like we were one, one movement, one feeling. I never knew I could feel so close to another person. I didn’t think it would be quite so…so…special.”
Darius was quiet as he digested her words and then he smiled so hard he thought his face would break.
“See,” she cried, covering her cheeks with her slender hands. “I told you it was silly.”
He rose to his elbow and coaxed her hands away so he could look at her, the damned ridiculous smile still on his face. “I’m not laughing. Call it pride, if you will. I would guess there not to be a great deal of virgins who say those words after the first time. I’m led to believe it is uncomfortable and painful, not special at all. It strokes my male pride to hear you phrase it so. Especially under our current set of circumstances and the little time we have known one another.”
“Do you think me a terrible strumpet to have given myself over so easily?”
This time he did chuckle. “You are not a strumpet, Eliza. Not even close. We are husband and wife. Imagine how many men and women know each other even less than we do. Think of the couples betrothed from birth to only meet on their wedding day. If I was a barbarian, I would have claimed you on that night.”
“Why did you not?” she asked.
“You were well foxed, if you recall. I would never take advantage of any woman and I’d never bedded a virgin.”
“Never?”
“Never ever. It isn’t something bastards do. Not something honourable men do either unless there is an exchange of promise.”
“Was it special for you? Even though you were not a virgin?”
“That and so much more.” Darius closed the distance and kissed her to silence, once again pouring in every ounce of emotion he could muster. For the first time in his entire life, he had someone he could call his. They’d sworn their vows and consummated their marriage and now she was his.
Forever.
He should have left her then—it was what aristocratic men did, slept in their own beds—but instead, he pulled her close, her back to his stomach with only one thought on his mind as he fell asleep.
Mine.
Chapter Nineteen
Waking next to a naked male should have been mortifying for Eliza but she only snuggled deeper beneath the bed covers. She couldn’t remember another time when she had been so warm or held so closely, Darius’s forearm slung low over her hip.
She wasn’t entirely sure what woke her but she lay for a moment revelling in the warmth. Was it the fire crackling in the grate that roused her? There seemed to be an inordinate amount of smoke, the smell sharp and almost painful to her nose when she lifted her face from the blankets.
As the realisation sank in that there was too much smoke in the room, a pounding sounded on the door. Darius sat upright in bed, a dagger in his hand before Eliza could even draw more thought into her sluggish head.
“What is it?” he called out into the darkness.
The door crashed open and Eliza scrambled to cover herself. Lantern light stung her eyes but not more than the smoke did.
“Fire, Cap’n. Downstairs in your study.”
Eliza pulled the bed sheets with her as she gained
