Fortune's Bride (22 page)

Because she had already fixed her mind on the move,
Esmeralda was able to get Robert to the bed where the better light showed the
tears and dark stains on his clothing. Robert had, of course, intended to ride
back to Caldas before he had been caught up in the minor action at Brilos, and
he had not taken along fresh clothes. Thus, he was still wearing the garments
in which he had taken part in the fighting. The rips on sleeve and shoulder
from the near misses gaped.

Anxiety swamped all other emotions in Esmeralda and made her
voice high and frightened as she asked, “Where are you hurt, Robert?”

He had allowed her to push him gently to a seated position
on the edge of the bed, relaxing his tight grip, but the hand that had clutched
her to him still rested on her hip. The fear in her voice came through to him,
distracting him momentarily from the feel of her flesh under his fingers.

“Hurt?” he repeated. “Who’sh hurt?”

Esmeralda was nearly intoxicated herself by the
concentration of wine on Robert’s breath and reeled back half a step, but the
odor and the blurred speech were a welcome revelation. Still, to be sure, she
asked again. “You. Are
you
hurt?”

But the intensity was gone from her voice, and Robert’s
attention fixed again on the lovely body exposed to him. Now Esmeralda was
illuminated from the side, but that view was equally entrancing. He was dimly
aware of the question, however, and replied after a short delay, rather at
random, “I don’t think sh-so.”

Since the light from the lamp was full on his face,
Esmeralda was in no doubt about where Robert’s attention was fixed. She could
also see that he was somewhat flushed rather than pale, as he would be from
weakness or loss of blood. Moreover, before he answered her, his eyes had moved
slowly from her throat to her breast to her hips to her bare legs and up again.
Esmeralda flushed, but she felt no impulse to hide herself. Her body responded
to the touch of his glance with an odd, inner trembling that was intensely
pleasurable and with an increased sensitivity that made her suddenly aware of
the tiny movements of her shift against her skin as her breathing quickened.

At the same time, her mind seemed equally stimulated. She
realized that if she wished, her marriage would be consummated that night and
that once he made love to her, Robert would honor the commitment. There would
be no annulment. With the thought came a prick of conscience. It was not really
fair to take advantage of his drunkenness. And that knowledge was followed by a
pang of fear. Would he hate her for trapping him? Was the desire he so plainly
exhibited only bred of wine?

When Esmeralda had stepped back a trifle, Robert’s hand had
slipped from her hip. The loss of contact was painful to him, and as he spoke
he looked up into her face, his eyes both puzzled and pleading. She asked if he
was hurt, and he was deeply confused, knowing he
was
hurt although not
by war. She was his wife. Then why was she not his wife? Why was it wrong to
touch her as he wished to touch her? Why did she withdraw from him? He raised
his hand again, uncertainly, not grasping for her body but seeking reassurance,
although for what he did not know.

The look and the gesture ended the war in Esmeralda’s heart.
She did not understand either one completely, thinking that the pleading in his
eyes and the reaching out were born solely of sexual need. Far from angering
her, this only stimulated her own passion. She had to know what it was to be a
woman, and she had to know it with Robert, whatever the cost. There might never
be another opportunity. It had to be now. And his words had given her the
perfect opening.

Esmeralda stepped close again and bent forward. Robert’s
outstretched hand fell upon her breast. She drew a short, deep breath and
murmured, “Let me take off your coat. That way I can see if you are hurt.”

To Robert at that time, the movement seemed an answer to his
unasked questions. It assured him that it was not wrong to desire Merry. He
heard the words, but they did not trouble him then. He was too taken up with
the offering under his hand, and he fondled it gently, cupping it and extending
his thumb to stroke the nipple. He could feel Merry’s breath catch, and he
looked up at her again and smiled slowly. He no longer felt drunk, only
slightly lightheaded and very, very happy.

Despite the distracting sensation that made it hard to
breathe and made her knees feel like jelly, Esmeralda had managed to unbutton
Robert’s coat. She could not draw it off, however, without pushing his hand
away from her breast, and she could not bear to do that, both because the
sensation was so exquisite and because she was afraid any movement of denial
would break the spell. She had lingered motionless, eyes locked with Robert’s
until he smiled. Then she put her hand on the edge of the coat to pull it off,
but he released her breast and took her hand and kissed it.

“Boots first,” he said, his voice clearer than it had been.
He felt very odd, at one and the same time throbbing with eagerness and yet not
at all in a hurry. In fact, he wanted every moment to last forever.

Esmeralda knelt at once and seized one boot. It came off
more easily than she expected, and she fell back, sitting down hard. Robert
reached forward and caught her, drawing her back toward him with one hand,
lifting her face with the other so he could kiss her lips.

“I’ll manage the other,” he said, but Esmeralda shook her
head and pulled it off. “I never had such a beautiful boot boy,” he commented,
laughing and kissing her again.

It took a long time to get the rest of his clothes off.
Wherever she moved, his lips followed. When she pulled off his coat and shirt,
he kissed her arms and breasts. When she bent to undo the buttons of his
breeches and slide them off, he kissed the back of her neck and her shoulders,
played with her hair, pulling it so that he could reach her lips and ears with
his mouth. Under the circumstances, Esmeralda was not very efficient. Her
fingers trembled so much that she had difficulty pushing buttons through
buttonholes, and her breathing became so erratic when she began to pull off
Robert’s smalls that she felt dizzy and had to stop what she was doing
altogether.

Robert seemed to understand. He held her against him,
stroking her back to quiet her. However, as soon as she seemed steady, he upset
the apple cart again by running his fingers between her legs. Esmeralda began
to shake.

“Please,” she whispered, “please.” But she did not know for
what she was pleading, only that the sensations Robert was generating in her
body seemed about to tear her apart.

He gripped her hard, then reached down with one hand and
pulled off her shift. She uttered a short, wordless cry, not of protest but of
eagerness.

“All right, love,” Robert murmured. “It’s all right.”

He stood up suddenly, lifting her in his arms and turning to
lay her on the bed. Then he bent over her and began to caress her with lips and
tongue, licking her breasts and her belly, kissing her nether lips, sliding his
tongue along and between them.

“God help me! God help me!” Esmeralda whimpered.

Her hands scratched blindly at the bedclothes, pressed
Robert’s head tighter against her, then pulled it away. The teasing was driving
her mad, but she was totally ignorant of what was necessary to satisfy her.

“Help,” she gasped, “help.”

Because he was drunker than he realized, Robert’s body had
not responded with its usual speed to sexual stimuli. Had he been ready, he
might not have extended his foreplay so long. However, the prolonged caressing
of Esmeralda’s body had a cumulative effect. When readiness came upon Robert,
it came in a red, blinding rush that would not be long denied. He heard
Esmeralda whimper, “God help me,” and then gasp, as if she were dying, “help.”
By then it was too late for consideration or thinking about what Esmeralda
meant. He heard the words, but they mingled with his own feelings and had no
associations for him outside of passion.

He mounted her swiftly then, passing a hand between her
thighs to position himself. The head of his shaft slipped easily between the
lips he had so thoroughly lubricated. Robert groaned softly with pleasure,
removed his hand, and thrust gently, expecting to slide home. However, nothing
much happened. He thrust harder. Esmeralda gasped. Robert slid in an inch or
two and met a barrier. This was outside his experience. He opened his eyes,
which he had closed in the expectation of total bliss when he first entered,
and gazed with gentle reproach at Esmeralda.

The lamp still burned high, and at first glance Robert
realized that whatever was obstructing his path, it was no deliberate act of
Esmeralda’s. She looked both surprised and frightened. And then he realized
what was wrong. Of course, Merry was a virgin. Robert hesitated for just a
moment, torn between his urgent need and a qualm of doubt. But passion and the
destruction of inhibitions caused by the alcohol in his blood urged him on, and
below those physical pressures was another desire, deep and hidden, to make
Merry his own forever.

He bent his head and kissed her lips and her throat,
murmuring between the caresses, “This once, just this once, I must hurt you,
love.” Then he slid a hand down her side, brought it back up, moving his
fingertips in gentle circles along her hips and ribs and on up to her breast,
rubbing the nipple gently. Esmeralda’s breath shuddered in, and he took that
for acceptance; but he had closed his eyes again so he could not see her face.
She would fight him, he told himself, if she were unwilling, or cry out, but he
hardly gave her time to respond, drawing and thrusting again with the greatest
force he could bring to bear. She did cry out then, a muted whimper, for
Robert’s mouth was on hers, but it was too late for second thoughts. Robert was
lodged, and Esmeralda was no longer a virgin.

His purpose achieved, Robert lay still, kissing and
caressing and murmuring love words. The tight grip on his shaft was heavenly,
and there seemed to be an infinitesimal quivering inside Esmeralda that sent
chills of pleasure up and down his spine. For the moment he was content not to
move, and he concentrated on trying to arouse Esmeralda again.

His efforts were rewarded. After a minute or two, she moved
against him in a way that was unmistakable, and he took the chance of drawing
out a little way and pushing in again. The sensation was too exquisite to
resist, and he continued moving, slowly at first but then faster and harder as
all consciousness beyond that of his own intense pleasure was blotted out.

Esmeralda felt his growing rapture, and it increased the
excitement generated by his hands and lips. There was a swelling thrill in her
own body, a deeper, stronger echo of the pleasure Robert’s mouth had wakened in
her earlier. It was too mixed with pain to come to fruition, although as Robert
finally cried out and convulsed in his climax, Esmeralda gasped with an
empathic reaction that was very near fulfillment.

“Wife,” Robert murmured as he subsided swiftly into a sleep
demanded by the exertions of the day, the wine he had absorbed, and this last
effort. “Lovely wife.”

His voice was blurred again, and Esmeralda’s eyes filled
with tears. He had called her beautiful when she took off his boots and now,
lovely. Was it only the wine and the sexual need that had elevated her
plainness to beauty? Was it at all possible that Robert’s growing affection for
her had illuminated her ordinary face in his eyes? And affection added to
desire—was that not love?

Robert’s weight atop her was making it difficult for
Esmeralda to breathe, but instead of pushing him off, she embraced him, the
first time she had dared to do so aside from throwing her arms around him in
excitement when he first came in. He made a soft sound, and Esmeralda tensed,
not knowing whether it was satisfaction or a protest, but he did not move away,
and she lay holding him, the tears that had formed trickling gently down her
temples.

She would not let him hate her, she vowed. She would not let
it come to that. If he showed anger, seemed to feel trapped, she would let him
go. And then, the thought of her great wealth came into her mind. That would
help. No man would object to a wife with more than half a million pounds as a
dowry. Surely the money in addition to the real liking she knew Robert felt for
her would reconcile him to the bargain he had so unintentionally made. But if
he accepted her only for the money, could she bear that? Not
only
for
the money, she thought. Robert’s family was wealthy, and he seemed to have
plenty of money of his own. If he loathed her, the money would not matter, and
she knew he did not loathe her.

Then another specter that had haunted her from the beginning
rose again. Would Robert consider himself heart-free even if he accepted the
legal bond? Would he give that free heart to another woman? But there were no
other women with the army, except camp followers and soldiers’ wives, and they
were not likely to be a danger. It was a stupid thing to worry about just now.
The first question remained. Was it only wine that had brought Robert to
consummate their marriage, or had he had some desire—no matter how small—to do
so anyway?

The question was unanswerable at this time, Esmeralda knew,
but the morning might give the answer. New tears formed in her eyes, and she
bit her lip. She did not want the answer, she wanted to cling to hope as long
as she could. She needed more time to demonstrate how perfect a wife she could
be to a military man.

Robert made a slight movement, and his softened shaft
slipped completely from between Esmeralda’s legs. He stirred again, started to
slide sideways off her body. She uttered a very faint sob, helplessly
devastated by the feeling that he was retreating from her totally and forever.
Robert stretched his neck and kissed her cheek, mumbling almost
indistinguishably except for two words that Esmeralda made out—sleep, which
could have been expected, and love.