“You desire me as much as I desire you.” He appeared furious. “I didn’t misread the signal you sent yesterday at the church.”
“No, you didn’t misread it.”
“Since then, I’ve thought about you every second.”
“You couldn’t have.”
“I did, so don’t play the shy maiden. I’ve had several glasses of whiskey, and my circumspection has fled. Let’s keep on, or let’s go. Shall we leave? Shall I walk you to the vicarage? Is that what you want?”
“No!” she said more stridently.
He studied her, his gaze narrowing. He had a way of looking at a person, as if he could peer through her heart and straight to her soul. She squirmed with dismay, for apparently, he saw what she’d meant to conceal. His demeanor softened.
“What’s wrong?” he asked again. “You can confide in me, remember? Do you loathe carnal activity? Is that it?”
“No, no, I . . . love it,” she blurted out.
He grinned. “That’s my girl.”
“But you overwhelm me with your caresses. I don’t know how to lie still.”
“Why would you lie still?”
His perplexed expression confused her. Weren’t women supposed to be submissive? If she’d heard it once, she’d heard it a thousand times: Sexual congress was for procreation and no other reason. A female shouldn’t revel in it.
“My husband,” she tentatively ventured, “informed me that I shouldn’t . . . ah . . .”
“We’ve already established that he was an ass.”
“Yes, yes, he was.”
“Why would you believe what he told you?”
“I don’t necessarily believe it. I would just hate for you to think I’m . . . loose.”
His grin widened. “Listen. If you want to be a tad loose, that’s fine with me. In fact, I’d prefer it.”
“You would?”
“Yes, so when we’re alone like this, you’re free to shout or scream or scratch or bite.”
“You won’t mind?”
“Why would I? Your squealing with pleasure is half the fun.” He took her hands and placed them directly on his backside. “If you don’t participate, I can’t predict what I’ll do.”
It was all the permission she needed. They started in again and, letting him be her guide, she did whatever he did. If he stroked her arms, she stroked his. If he riffled her hair, she riffled his. She hugged and petted and licked and tasted.
Their ardor rose to a fevered pitch, and she didn’t try to hide her enthusiasm. She couldn’t hide it. She was writhing beneath him, struggling to get closer and closer, but never getting near enough.
He opened the front of her dress and pushed at the fabric, baring her bosom. Then—to her astonished surprise—he dipped to her breast and sucked on her nipple.
She’d never felt so wicked, and she moaned and hissed, bucking with her hips, fighting to throw him off. She was mumbling under her breath, begging him to stop, begging him not to stop, but he ignored her pleas.
He yanked her skirt up her legs, then his fingers were in her drawers and sliding into her sheath. The instant he touched her, she exploded and cried out. Her voice was deep and low and needy—like that of an injured animal.
He merely chuckled and laid a palm over her mouth. His lips at her ear, he whispered, “You vixen! I said you could scream and shout, but I didn’t mean you should wake the whole bloody neighborhood.”
“Desist!” she whimpered. “I can’t bear it.”
“If you continue to raise a ruckus,” he teased, “people will think we’re . . . fornicating in here.”
Somehow, without her noticing, he’d unbuttoned his trousers, and as he uttered the word fornicating, he rammed himself inside.
At feeling how big he was, how thoroughly he filled her, she was swept away by another wave of ecstasy. She wailed with relief, with a twisted combination of glee and shame, and he kissed her to swallow the clamor of her release.
“You’re going to be the death of me,” he said, laughing.
“Why?” she asked when she could speak again.
“Because you’re wanton as hell, but you try so hard not to be.”
He was braced on his elbows, working himself into her, and she was delighted that he would talk during the event. With her husband, it had always proceeded in an angry, tormented silence.
“How do you do that to me?” she inquired. “You make me so . . . so . . .”
“I’m a sorcerer.”
“I believe it.”
“Let me show you some other magic I know how to perform.”
He began sucking on her nipple again, and she exulted in it, amazed and astounded, as he kept on and on and on. Just when she assumed she could take no more, that he couldn’t possibly hold back, he withdrew and spilled himself on her stomach.
Though flattered by his caution, he needn’t have bothered. She’d had seven long years to conceive, and she’d accepted that she was barren. She wore her condition like a yoke of disgrace.
His hips ground to a halt, and with a grunt of satisfaction, he rolled off her. They stared at the roof, and he started to quietly chortle. She joined in, just as softly, but just as heartily.
The silliness of what they’d done, the . . . wildness of it, was thrilling. What had come over them?
They were practically strangers. They’d been strolling down a dark street, then they’d peered at one another, and voila!, they’d raced into a barn and had rutted like animals.
“Gad,” he mumbled, “I must be drunker than I thought.”
“I’ve never had a drink in my life,” she pointed out, “so what’s my excuse?”
“You have none, you minx.”
“I’m telling myself that I succumbed to your wily seduction.”
“You loved every minute of it.”
“Yes, I did.”
He grabbed a handful of straw and swabbed his seed from her belly. Then he lowered her skirt and straightened her clothes. She watched him, mute and contemplative, as questions careened in her mind.
What would happen now? At any other time, with any other man, there would have been a hasty proposal as well as a promise to confer with her brother in the morning.
