Summer Is for Lovers (29 page)

Chapter 34

D
AVID KNEW
C
AROLINE
was anticipating a wedding night on the renowned Bedford Hotel linens. And she surely deserved one, after the hellish wait they had both just endured. If they had been in Scotland, where an irregular marriage could be had on any street corner, the deed would have been done two weeks ago.

But he had wanted their vows to be said in Brighton, the town she loved so much. Had insisted on it, in fact. He had filed a notice with the civil registrar, knowing it was faster than posting the banns, but even then they had to wait the required fifteen days. Invitations had been penned. A reception planned. His father and brother had come down from Scotland on a Friday train. It was all a bloody circus.

And now he was a married man. He wanted nothing more than to lay his new wife down on a bed of crisp, white linens and run his hands over her lithe body. But while Bedford linens were indeed high on his list of things to show her tonight, first he had a surprise.

He pulled her down a path he knew she would not recognize, heading east along the high edge of the chalk cliffs. From this dizzying height, the wind howled in his ears, and the promise of the ocean was but a distant memory below. The half-moon offered a sliver of light to guide them, not nearly as much as the last time he had ventured out at night, and he had to rely on the lantern in his hand for much of the way.

Though she seemed content to let him lead, she was not silent a single moment of the half-hour journey, suggesting her nervousness over the coming night might match his own anticipation.

“Did you like my gown?” Her voice floated up over his shoulder. “Madame Beauclerc spent an entire week sewing seed pearls onto the bodice.”

David nodded, wondering if it would be ungentlemanly to admit he had scarcely noticed that she still wore her wedding dress. He still felt dazed by his good fortune, unable to wrap his head around the fact that not only had she married him, she
loved
him. It had been difficult to appreciate what was covering his new wife’s body when all he could think of was discovering what she looked like beneath.

“It was kind of Lord Avery and his daughter to attend the wedding.”

“Yes,” he murmured, still distracted.

“He and Mama seem to be spending a great deal of time together. He’s gotten her to go walking with him on the Marine Parade twice in the last week.”

David nodded, thinking about another possible use for Caroline’s busy mouth.

“And I was pleased to see that the Countess of Beecham came to the wedding, even if Mr. Duffington didn’t. Mama was thrilled to have such a prominent guest.”

“Mmhmm.” He listened with only half an ear, though he was achingly aware of every syllable. He reveled in the husky sound of her voice, imagined the glow of her skin as he undressed her, one agonizing inch at a time.

Mine
, the beast whined, scratching at its cage.

Soon
, he reassured it.

David shone the lantern to the right, looking for the landmark he had come to know so well over the past two weeks. Caroline leaned over his shoulder, peering into the scrubby growth of trees that had caught his attention. The press of her body felt like the softest of caresses, and he leaned back into her a long, simmering moment. It was the most thorough contact he had permitted himself in sixteen excruciating days, and he savored it, committing each of her breaths to memory.

“Why did you stay away from me before the wedding?” Caroline whispered, breaking through his thoughts. Her voice rang faintly with hurt, and he smiled into the night to hear it. A husband liked to know that his wife wanted him.

It stood to reason that a wife would wish to know the same.

He set down the lantern and pulled her into his ready arms. “Didn’t you know, lass?” He cupped her face in his hands. “I couldn’t resist you. One touch, one kiss, and I knew I would be ruined.”

“I had been hoping you might ruin
me
.” She tilted her cheek into the palm of his hand and wet her lips in a gesture that shot straight to that most neglected part of his body.

“I wanted to wait for our wedding night.” His new realization that he was, in fact, a man of some honor demanded a principled path. Waiting wasn’t just something he had wanted to do.

It was something he had
needed
to do.

He brushed the pad of one thumb across the smooth texture of her cheek. He could not see her freckles in the meager light, but he knew where each one lay, and his lips longed to trace their path. But first there were things he needed to say.

“I didn’t do that with Elizabeth, and I regretted it. I told myself there would be time to get it right later, a lifetime of exploration to make up for my fumbling lack of acuity.” He swallowed, looking down on his beautiful wife who stared so trustingly back from his cupped palms. “I know now not to take such a thing for granted.”

“I think I can understand that,” she whispered. “As long as you promise to ruin me soon.”

She lifted her mouth, seeking his, but he angled higher, brushing a kiss to her brow instead. At her sigh of frustration, he dropped his hands, fighting a smile. “Come,” he told her, picking up the lantern and pulling her under the branch of a small tree that had a “No Trespass” sign nailed to its trunk. “I have something to show you first.”

“What is it?” Concern tempered the sensual exasperation that still simmered in her voice. “We cannot go this way.”

“Trust me.” He tugged her deeper, starting down the steep path that angled away into blackness.

“But this is someone’s land, and we cannot just—”

“Caroline,” he said sternly. “If you would just hold your tongue and follow me, I promise that in two minutes’ time I will offer it a more pleasurable use.”

She fell silent at that. He led her down a good two hundred feet, the scent of the ocean and the sounds of the waves growing stronger as they descended. When they finally came to a fence with a chained gate, David pulled a box from his jacket pocket, his fingers surprisingly steady against the black velvet.

“I have been waiting two weeks to give you this wedding present. I trust you will agree it was worth the wait.”

She looked down at the ribbon-wrapped box. Her mouth opened in a perfect O that had him thinking of very unladylike uses for it. Not that he wanted a lady tonight. No, David wanted the wild temptress she kept loosely bound inside her. He was determined to unlock her pleasure, and this gift was only part of his plan.

She untied the ribbon, and he held up the lantern so she could see what lay inside. “You have given me a key.” She sounded perplexed.

“It opens the padlock.” When she hesitated, he took it from her and removed the chain from the fence. “Go on,” he urged.

She pushed a few feet in, and then her gasp echoed against the high cliff walls. “Why, it’s the cove!” she said, a delighted hitch in her voice. “But . . . we didn’t walk nearly far enough. And I never knew there was another entrance!”

David joined her, taking up her hand. “There wasn’t. I made this one. Hacked the footholds out of the cliff wall. And surprisingly, the distance to the cove was never that far from Brighton. The old seaside route just took twice as long because of the irregular coastline.”

“So this is what you’ve been doing the last two weeks?” She looked up at him, one dark brow raised high.

“Aye.” He chuckled. “A man has to spend his frustration somewhere. It’s yours, lass. The beach, the cliffs, the land above . . . all of it.”

She stared at him, her ever-changing eyes dark pools in the light from the lantern. “How is that possible?”

“ ’Tis a wedding gift from my family.” David grinned, recalling how excited he had been when he had discovered the land above the cliff was for sale. “My father arranged its purchase for us. I covered over the old seaside entrance and put up the new fence, so no one else can find their way here without this key.”

He kissed the top of her head, breathing in the warm, vanilla scent of her. “You do not have to worry about others using it, not anymore. You can swim here, whenever you want, dressed however you like.” Although if he had anything to say about it, naked would be the preferred state of dress tonight. “We can build a summer house overhead, once my investments begin to pay out.”

She reared back, her eyes searching his. “But . . . I thought we had decided to live in Scotland.” She was squeezing his hand so tight his fingers had started to tingle, along with other neglected parts of his body.

“Who is to say we cannot have two homes?” He chuckled. “Scotland in the spring, Brighton in the summer. Now come.” He tugged on her hand. “There is more.”

He drew her in further and her second gasp echoed in his ears. He held the lantern up high and could see his instructions had been followed to the letter. A bed had been prepared, there on the rock. A profusion of pillows lay at the ready with the Bedford Crest embroidered on the cases. A picnic basket sat nearby, a bottle of good Highland malt peeking from the rim.

He turned to her, and smiled. Everything was ready.
He
was ready.

He only hoped she was.

“Welcome to your wedding night, Mrs. Cameron.”

S
HE SHOULD HAVE
told him thank you.

Somehow, he had known. Known who she was, and what she needed. He did not expect her to knit socks, or require her to be someone other than who she was. He had given her the most perfect gift imaginable, and a proper thank you was the least she should give him in return. But the sob that caught in her throat left her literally unable to form the words the moment required.

She flung herself against him, and he caught her up in arms so strong they made her knees buckle. He chuckled against her hair, seeming not to care that she was proving herself an unmannerly sort of wife. She lifted her lips to his, seeking the joining her heart had been missing for two long weeks.

But once again, he avoided her kiss.

Caroline wanted to gnash her teeth. What was the matter? They were married. They were alone, surrounded by nothing but moonlight and ocean. It was dark, for heaven’s sake, so he could not see her too-long legs or her too-flat chest. It was
perfect
.

Unless . . . unless he thought she was too forward. That sobered her a bit. After all, she was beginning to realize she was a woman who reveled in physical pleasure. His lessons had taught her that far more effectively than any book, and her curiosity over the last two weeks had fueled thoughts so wicked she was afraid to give voice to them, even in her head.

But that was who she
was
. Surely he understood that such a woman lurked inside her, every bit as much as the fearless swimmer.

“I have wanted to do something since I saw you standing in this very spot three weeks ago,” David said. His voice was a rumble, and at the sound, Caroline felt as if the waves on shore were actually tumbling in her chest. His hands came up and curved around her head, fingers stretching through hair that Bess had spent an hour putting up, just this morning. Pins dislodged like flying artillery, raining down as his fingers tugged gently against her scalp. And then her hair was down, and he was busy searching for the last remaining pins, his fingers taunting her with their bold strokes.

Finally he stood back, admiring his handiwork. “Beautiful.” He smiled at her, and she could see in that smile the rake he had once been. “You still are owed a lesson, I think. Turn around, Caroline. And face the cliffs.”

Her lungs seized up, but her feet, thankfully, retained their function. She turned as her husband instructed and waited to see what he would do next.

Her inability to see him only heightened her want. His fingers brushed against her neck in a slow, tantalizing sweep, smoothing her hair to one side and making the fine hairs on her arms stand at attention. And then his lips replaced his fingers, there along her nape. Her skin crackled beneath the blazing touch of his tongue and she sagged against him, feeling the insistent press of his erection notch against her backside.

Relief caught her up in its arms. She might be forward, but clearly, he wanted the same thing she did.

The strong band of his arm snaked around to pin her waist. Cool air met the skin of her shoulders as he used his other hand to unbutton the row of buttons that marched down the back of her wedding dress. Seed pearls scattered beneath his fingers, but she could not bring herself to care as he slid it down off her shoulders.

She started to turn around, but the wall of his arm prevented her. “Stand,” he warned, nipping her earlobe with his teeth.

She stood with her back pressed against him. Trembled as he unlaced her corset and sent it the way of the beautiful gown. Obeyed when he instructed her to kick out of her slippers.

But when he reached around and untied the ribbon that closed the front of her shift, she placed a hand over his.

“Can we not leave it on?” Thoughts of her body’s inadequacy made her fingers tremble. Divested of the protection of her gown and corset, she could feel his hard length, seeking her core through the thin layer of cotton. Her shift posed no barrier to physical intimacy, as his earlier lessons had already taught her. But it did relieve her fears, a thin shield that guarded her vulnerability.

His chuckle slid down her spine and centered with remarkable alacrity on that place between her legs that had grown moist with want. “Oh no, love. This is the other thing I have wanted to do, ever since you tortured me in the bathing machine with that hideous robe. Modesty has no place in a marriage. And I will not be denied my rights.”

Chapter 35

T
HE MINX THOUGHT
she could spend their wedding night in her shift.

Clearly, there was more here to teach.

David pushed her protesting hand away. Grasped the tie that haunted his dreams.

Pulled it free. Her gasp told him he was heading in the right direction, even if she couldn’t bring herself to admit it.

He slid her loosened shift off one shoulder, then the other, then knelt to slide the filmy piece of fabric the rest of the way down. He permitted his fingers the luxury of trailing her bare skin as he went. When he finally had her free of the thing, he placed his palm against her soft calf. “No stockings?” he whispered, swallowing in anticipation.

“I do not wear them in the summer.”

Her voice teased down at him, reminding him that he held a very long length of leg in his hands. His lips begged for the privilege of charting its contours, and he gave in to the demand, delivering a series of tiny kisses upward until he reached the hollow behind her knee. “I believe summer may have to become my favorite season, lass.”

Her body shook, whether from amusement or want was difficult to tease out. “I like it when you call me lass.”

“I wonder if you’ll still like it when you’re seventy.” He hoped so, because he was planning on calling her that for a good, long time.

He was concentrating on the taste of her thighs now, and he swirled his tongue ever closer to where his instincts demanded his mouth go. Her labored breathing was painting a very clear map, but he reminded himself that she was still innocent. One step at a time.

He was fast losing his hold on the tenuous restraint he had been gripping most of the evening. He rose and stripped off his clothing faster than he could have ever imagined. And then his arms were reaching around her again, this time to cup her breasts. He brushed his fingers over her nipples, thrilled by the shudder he could jerk out of her with little more than a touch. Her gasp of surprise told him he had made the right choice in keeping his lips to a more conventional purpose. If a mere touch from his hand sent her trembling like this, anything more would have been too much, too fast.

The feeling of her bare back pressed against his own heated skin had him groaning against the nape of her neck. He pressed another kiss against the impossibly soft skin there, and then slowly released her. As difficult as it was to hold himself back, there was one more thing he wanted to do.

He stepped around her. Turned. And stared.

The moment stuttered to a stop, and David knew he had a new vision of this woman, to be held in miniature and tucked away for special occasions. Her skin glowed white against the meager light of the half moon and lantern. Her hair tumbled like a dark curtain over her shoulders, a riot of curls and waves that he wanted to wrap around his hand. The ocean lay at her back, the half-moon reflected on the horizon. It occurred to him that she belonged here, uninhibited, untamed.

And moreover, that she belonged to him.

“I love you, Caroline. I shall never tire of looking at you, I fear, so you’d best get used to the idea of swimming without your shift.”

Her lips curved up, an open invitation that made the picture she offered that much more poignant. “Are we to swim, then?”

He nodded, his chest squeezing tight against the thought of even a moment’s additional delay. “Aye. Among other things I have planned for tonight. But not the first.”

He lifted her up and hooked an arm beneath her bare legs, carrying her toward the bed that had been laid out on the rock. “I think,” he said, his voice gone hoarse with the want that threatened to consume him, “that it is time to finish this lesson.”

D
AVID LAID HER
down on a pile of linens so luxurious that in another time and another place, Caroline would have been tempted to roll over and bury her face in them. But he scarcely gave her time to contemplate the feel of it because in what seemed like an instant, he was kneeling between her legs and running his hands up and down the length of her nude body.

It was unbearably dark. He had left the lantern where they had been standing, and now she had only moonlight to see him by. But it proved enough, given that at the moment, her eyes wanted only to flutter closed. Her skin caught fire at his sure, deft touch, licking along her limbs to center with delicious promise in the juncture of her thighs.

Yes.
This was what she had been wanting, this pleasure-pain that the sight of him promised, but couldn’t quite deliver. She arched up against him, trusting him to show her what she needed, convinced that if he didn’t hurry, she might expire on the spot.

And then he was lowering himself on top of her and taking her lips in a kiss that left her panting. His tongue danced against hers, teasing, withdrawing, coming back again. He kissed her a long, long time, seeming to take pleasure in her rising passion. But it wasn’t enough. She wanted to throw off her skin and meld into him. She wanted a touch from this man so sure, so deep, it would bind them as one breath, one thought.

She moaned into his mouth. “More,” she gasped.

And he obeyed. Notched his hips against hers. Slid inside her ready body an agonizing inch and . . . stopped. Caroline opened her eyes in frustration. The moonlight seemed brighter now that her eyes had adjusted to the dark. She could see his large body looming over her, a look of pained uncertainty on his face. Surely he wasn’t going to stop now. She was lying beneath him, her legs wrapped around his waist.

If he stopped now, she was going to kill him.

“I want more.” She was demanding now, not asking.

“And you shall have it,” he told her through gritted teeth. “Just . . . kiss me, lass.”

She pulled his head down, her mouth open and willing, and then, at the moment when their lips met, he pushed into her body, making a raw sound of need that quite covered up her squeak of surprise.

While the brief flash of pain was distracting, the aftermath of it was not . . . unpleasant. Far from it. She adjusted to meet him. To welcome him. She might be innocent, but her body seemed to know the movements as if they were imprinted on her soul. When he began to rock her gently, she responded with an instinctive arching of her hips.

“Better?” he asked, his words a breathless question.

“I still want more,” she gasped against his lips.

He chuckled and moved faster, apparently satisfied that she wasn’t going to break or run shrieking into the night. Caroline’s soul strained upward, reaching for that spark he had previously shown her, realizing, in that moment, how powerful she was with him.

How perfect they were together.

Whatever momentary discomfort she had felt on their joining dissolved. She reveled in the building storm. She felt no hesitance this time, no resistance to launching herself toward those swirling emotions. She knew her final destination now, and she
trusted
him. With her heart, her body, her pleasure. He had learned her body well, and she could sense he guided her toward that place, as skillfully as a captain at the helm of his ship.

And then she was there, breaking over the crest of that wave, shattering like the water against the nearby rocks. She felt bounced against the stars, lobbed high against the stark black canvas of the night. Dimly, she realized David was right behind her. He gasped against her neck, straining into his own release.

Falling back to sanity took nearly as long as the falling apart. She became aware, in slow degrees, of the cool night air and the perspiration on their bodies. David shifted so his weight fell beside her, and then she drifted in the beauty of his arms, sated and happy. She experimentally stretched her toes, to see if they still worked. Her body felt disjointed, as if he had taken her apart piece by piece. She wondered if she would ever be set back to rights.

“How did you find the final lesson?” His voice reached out to her through the shadows, curling about her thoughts and sending a frisson of warmth through that place on her body where they had just been joined.

Caroline opened her eyes to see this man who was her match. A smile worked its way onto her face. “Surely that wasn’t the
final
lesson.” She knew there was more to discover, knew it as surely as she knew how to breathe. Her innate curiosity about things of a physical nature, her athleticism, those things that had always set her apart and marked her as an oddity bound for gossip and ostracism, had finally found a place where they belonged in this man. “I suspect I may need more practice, if I am to acquit myself well in the future.”

A low chuckle reached her ears. “We’ve the whole night, lass.”

Caroline lifted herself on one elbow. She was this man’s wife. The thought filled her with awe. They could do this whenever they wanted, and there was no doubt in her mind she wanted to do it again. She skimmed a questing finger down his chest, and repeated the motion when he shuddered beneath it. He had taken great care with her, of that she had no doubt. She felt a little sore, but nothing to the degree that she had expected.

She reached out a hand and touched the length of him through the darkness. He felt soft in her hands, a man well spent.

Caroline permitted herself to give voice to the wicked idea that had plagued her ever since he had stood in front of her, glorious in his own nakedness, even as he had stared down on hers. “Would you like me to put my mouth on you?”

A beat of silence followed her question, and then she heard his unsteady response. “Where did you learn about that?”

“Pen’s book,” she admitted, fitting her fingers around him in an experimental fashion.

“I thought it was a medical text.”

“Well, it
might
be a medical text. About Far East practices. My father collected travel tomes. Some of them are rather . . . revealing.”

Another long silence. “Well lass,” he sighed, though it was a happy sound, “not that I do not find the idea pleasing, but the truth of the matter is that such a thing works better before the act. It shall take me a few minutes more to recover to the point of being ready.”

“How many more minutes?” she asked, genuinely curious. She tightened her fingers, and his body, which had been so quiescent only moments before, stirred to life in her hand. “Because I confess, I want more. And it seems to as well.”

He rolled her onto her back and reared up over her, a dark, tortured prince come to life. “Christ, you are a surprise, wife.” He leaned down and caught her lips in a gentle kiss, but now that she knew where gentle kisses could lead, now that she knew she could force him to that place where he lost his mind and became as much animal as man, she did not mind his careful restraint. “More, is it?” he asked, his breathing already becoming ragged.

She nodded, quickening again in that place where her body arched up against his.

“Well, Mrs. Cameron. You are a woman in luck, because it just so happens there is
much
more. And given that you are such a quick study, I think I can manage another lesson.”