And then there were the innocently lustful, needy, and wanting looks he’d caught her casting in his direction.
Those yearning looks—to be wanted with such ferocity—were like an aphrodisiac. His heavy eyelids drifted shut and he fisted himself with slow, firm strokes as he recalled that morning, and the greedy way her gaze had slipped down to his hips and then jerked back up. And then slid down again and again in those few precious seconds.
The memory of her raw desire made his balls tighten and he spread his legs and reached between his thighs, pulling at his sac with his free hand, holding tight to the memory of her wide eyes, her flushed cheeks, her plump lips that he imagined wrapped around his cock, sucking him so bloody hard—
Hugo flung himself into bliss, his spine arching until he hurt, until only his shoulders and heels were on the floor, his buttocks clenching and thrusting as he pumped himself with savage strokes, fucking his fist as if it were her.
He spent so hard that ribbons of hot seed crisscrossed his chest and shoulders. Even after nothing more came out, he continued milking himself, until his touch hurt, the mingling of pain and pleasure making him feel alive. Alive and free.
Sated and boneless, he lowered his exhausted body to his blanket and heaved a huge, contented sigh.
He was drifting in a pleasurable post-orgasmic daze when a sound startled him. He opened his eyes and glanced around. But there was nothing, only the breeze gently rattling the open doors on their hinges.
Hugo enjoyed a long, languorous stretch before picking up the corner of the bottom blanket and wiping the cooling spunk from his skin; he would wash the blanket tomorrow.
He’d begun to get goosepimples so he padded over to the doors and closed both before wrapping the lightest blanket around his hips so he’d be decent in the morning.
After all, he thought with a huge yawn, it wouldn’t do to shock the vicar’s daughter two days running.
Chapter 12
Martha had not seen Hugo for a week—not since he left the meeting house last Monday morning, heading out for his first day of work.
She’d watched him from the safety of the house, lurking in the kitchen window and spying like a sneak thief, consuming him with her eyes as he left, his few possessions in a neat bundle under one arm, his step jaunty.
Every day she’d expected him to call, or at least stop by on his way to the Greedy Vicar, where Albert told her he’d seen Hugo give a letter to Joe Cameron, who collected the mail for the mainland.
Tuesday through Friday she’d told herself he was probably too exhausted from his first week of strenuous work to do much other than eat and sleep.
But when she went to the Greedy Vicar late Saturday on the pretext of buying something or other, she learned that Hugo had been in earlier, not to the taproom, but to purchase some items from the small store.
And still he’d not stopped by.
Martha told herself she was grateful for his absence, good riddance to the man. Besides, Mr. Clark had been coming by and asking her out walking more often. Martha wished she were more excited about his attention, but she was still displeased by his willingness to expose his neighbors to possible prosecution merely to spite a man who turned out to be innocent. Well, at least innocent of whatever had landed him on that ship. She had a strong suspicion that Hugo Buckingham was guilty of plenty of other things.
When it came to Robert, Martha had reminded herself that it wasn’t her place to judge her fellow human beings, and so she’d gone walking with him and they discussed the matters they’d always talked about: his work, her day, his sister and mother, her father—all the while carefully avoiding any mention of the man who now stood between them.
Although Martha didn’t see Hugo during the day, she saw him—to her lasting mortification—every night in her dreams.
What she’d witnessed last Saturday night in the meeting house had been shocking. But surely such a vision should have become mundane after the fiftieth time she’d relived it—or certainly by the hundredth. Yet the images burnt into her mind’s eye had not lost their potency. Indeed, they’d become more powerful, escaping the confines of her dreams to spread into her waking hours.
Like right now.
She was supposed to be cleaning the meeting house; instead, she was standing motionless, her mind’s eye filled with images of Hugo stretched out on his back, naked, the last sullen rays of the sun painting his rippling muscles and pale skin a dull, devilish red. The thick muscles in his biceps and forearm bulged while he stroked himself, the thrusting of his hips primal and savage.
To her shame, she had begun to tingle and swell between her thighs. She’d squeezed her legs together to stop the tingling, but that had only intensified it.
One squeeze had led to another. And another. Until soon she’d found herself clenching along with his thrusts.
Each stroke had tightened him like a clock key turning a spring, his impossibly hard body arching until his back no longer touched the floor, his movements becoming less controlled, guttural sounds escaping his open mouth, his head thrown back, eyes closed in ecstasy—
And then Martha’s own pleasure had seized her, the intense physical sensations doubling her over until her forehead rested on the cold flagstone step. Part of her mind—the tiny part that was not given over to sensual gratification—shrieked at her to leave, to run, to get away before Hugo saw her.
Please, Lord, she’d prayed, even while she’d continued to flex her inner muscles to draw out the pleasure, I know I’m a wanton sinner, but if you let me get away from here without him seeing me, I’ll never do anything like this again.
Martha knew—even as she made the promise—that it was
