The General’s Wife: An American Revolutionary Tale (26 page)

Afterward, she was at first unwilling to let him examine the disfigurement of General Strathmore’s attack, but finally turned her back to him giving him a full view of the scars left by the general’s abuse. The whip had lashed around her torso, leaving marks not just on her back, but around her waist toward her abdomen, on the sides of her breasts. Patrick traced the silvered lines with the tips of his fingers, wishing so much they could simply be erased. Anguish and hatred boiled inside him, and yet, thrilled to be with his true love, he gave in to relief and joy instead.

He kissed her lusciously, then settled her under the covers in the crook of his arm.

“Connie,” he said with a touch of trepidation. “Sam and I had just left. We could have saved you.”

She sighed heavily. “Patrick, I’ve done it before. There was no reason for you to think something horrid would happen this time.”

“Why didn’t you scream? Bridgers would have stopped them.” Pat snuggled against her a little more closely.

“I did scream. Then I was gagged and Strathmore refused to follow the rules when I stomped. He just kept beating me.”

“Did he say or do anything to indicate why he was acting so violently?”

“Only once, at least I think. He mentioned his wife and her pregnancy.” She looked up at him. “But why would a man be angry about having children?”

Pat snorted. “A reminder of his own mortality. He probably considers a son to be a usurper.”

She inhaled deeply, then exhaled with a shudder. “At one point I fainted.” She pressed against him, her eyes screwed shut, squeezing out tears that dampened her lashes. “You know I can withstand quite a bit, but this was more than that. This was too real. My mind usually can control the pain, but I couldn’t this time. I was terrified. I truly felt trapped, like a scared rabbit being attacked by a pack of wild dogs. I had no chance.”

Pat tried to smother the sorrow and anger welling within. He had to be strong. Had to protect her. But when her arm wrapped around his waist more firmly, the emotions burst forth. He tried to muffle the sobs, but could not stop his body’s shaking.

Constance pulled back. “Pat!” She reached up to trace the trail of tears down his cheeks, then nuzzled her own tear-stained face against his chest. “Patrick Hamilton, why haven’t you asked me to marry you yet?”

His heart swelled as anguish bled out. “Connie? Would you?”

“I don’t want the other life anymore.”

“You’d have to live here, in the fort.”

“My sister lives in the fort with her cadet. I already have family here.”

“And if I have to move, you have to follow me. I’ll never leave you alone again.”

“You have to promise to make this war end soon. I want a normal life with cooking, cleaning, and making babies.”

Pat laughed at what she thought was a normal life. It had never been as such for either of them.

He cupped her face and brought it up to his. “Constance Gibbs, will you be my wife?”

“Yes, Patrick Hamilton, I will.”

She was smiling the biggest smile he had ever seen on her lovely face. For a moment he just wanted to look at how happy she was. But she protested, wanting her first kiss as an engaged woman. As he kissed and wrapped his arms around her, a torrent of emotions rose inside of him. This sweet, kind, beautiful woman, his woman, had been subjected to the most vile abuse. It would never happen again.

General Strathmore would never harm anyone again.

Chapter Twenty

When Corporal Bowman deposited Clara at the captain’s door that night, the first thing she noticed was the absence of Lieutenant Hamilton.

“Pat’s with Constance,” Sam explained, pacing behind his desk.

“Yes, of course.” Clara quickly shuffled to one of the straight-back chairs, setting her sewing basket and shirts to be mended on the floor.

“Take the wingback.” Sam smiled weakly and indicated the stuffed chair.

“Thank you.” She moved her sewing while Sam moved the lamp for her benefit. She picked up a shirt.

Sam sat. He gathered up some documents and tucked them away in a drawer.

It was just too painfully obvious that the lieutenant had been the impetus of conversation for their evening colloquia. But what was she supposed to say to Sam? Ask him how his day had been after she had fled from his room, and his arms, that morning? That she had thought of nothing all day but his touch, the memory of their intimacy still smoldering in her core?

Perhaps a bit of gossip from the women’s workroom. “Susie Gibbs will be having her baby any day now.” Well, it was something to say, anyway.

“Yes, Jenny is excited to be overseeing a birth rather than the dead and wounded.” Sam ran the knuckles of one hand over the other in rhythm to some unheard melody.

Their vacuous words simply prolonged the agony of unspoken desire. Clara had to say something.

But it was Sam who finally conceded. “How did you sleep on the featherbed last night, my lady?” he asked with a quirked brow. “Much better than the camping cot, don’t you think?”

She hid a smile. “I will admit it was a far better experience than my attempts at comfort in that pathetic solitary bedstead, captain.”

He got up from behind his desk and walked toward her, unbuttoning his jacket and waistcoat. “I would like you to share my bed tonight, Clara, if you so wish.” He shed his outer garments.

Clara’s breath hitched in her throat. It was far too early to actually go to sleep.

He offered his hand and she stood before him, biting her lip to suppress a smile of desire and happiness. For a moment they stood staring at each other, their fingers lightly touching. Clara flushed, then raised herself on tiptoes and brushed his lips delicately with her own.

Instantly, his mouth devoured hers, his hands tearing at every button, untying every string, until, finally, they held each other, panting, clad only in shirt and shift. Before she knew what was happening, he had lifted her in his arms and carried her to the bed, unceremoniously depositing her on the mattress amidst her giggles. He straddled her lustfully, his shirt tenting out from his body indicating precisely how he felt about her at that moment. She peeked under the hem playfully before he tore off the garment, revealing his spectacular masculine form in all its glory, his erection bobbing tantalizingly before her.

She propped herself onto her elbows and flicked her tongue along the eager purplish head, lapping up the drop of excitement that pooled at the tip. Sam pushed her onto the bed, holding her down at her shoulders.

“Not tonight, love. Tonight, I want you in the proper way, as a man should be with a woman.” He tugged off her shift then pulled away and simply stared. “My God, you are so … so …
perfect
.” His gaze wandered over her admiringly.

She grabbed hold of his hips and lightly drew her thumbs over the ridges of muscle leading to his groin, licking her lips in anticipation. “So are you.” She smiled up at him.

He urged her back down to the mattress, then cupped her breasts with both hands, pinching the peaks between his fingers, inciting desire below. He bent over and took a nipple in his mouth, his teasing tongue liquefying her core, swelling her sex. He trailed kisses down her belly, stopping at the hairline of her mons, moving lower at an excruciating pace, his hot breath hovering over her yearning clit, taunting her with the promise of pleasure.

“Please, Sam. Please.”

She exhaled a juddering breath as he drew his tongue slowly through her wetness. But it wasn’t enough. She needed more. She tilted her hips, encouraging him.

He chuckled. And then he sucked her clit mercilessly.

It was exactly what she needed.

She thrashed against him as he gripped her hips, digging his nails into her bottom, holding her steady as he took her to the heights, then clamping his hand over her mouth when her moans began to rise with her climax. She jerked against him in glorious culmination as he drank her release, continuing his ravishment even as she was beyond satiated.

And when he was finished, he settled his body on top of hers, nudging aside her legs to nestle between them, laying his cock in her spent wetness.

“Have you had enough, my lady?”

“No, captain. I fear you have not quite finished the act.”

Sam chuckled and pecked her neck and shoulders. “Insatiable wench.” He rocked his hips to slide his cock through her swollen sex, until the head found its aim. Yet he did not enter her fully, instead continued to tease her, poised over her on straightened arms, his unbound hair falling in loose waves to frame his face.

She reached up and touched his cheek, rough and masculine. She wanted him, his body in hers, but something so much more than that. “Sam,” she said softly. “I want you to stay inside me.” She met his eyes. “I want you to spend inside me.”

His playfulness dissolved. “Clara, you know what you are asking? I cannot do that, love.”

“Please, Sam.”

“Sweet, there might be … consequences.”

She swallowed the lump of emotion in her throat. “My husband does not know I’ve lost my child. And now you’re returning me to him, childless, barren.” Tears stung her eyes. “When we married our agreement was that I could not go home until I bore him two sons. Two, Sam. Now I don’t even have one in my womb.”

His brow furrowed. “Is that why you want to make love to me?”

Shocked at his implication she grabbed his arms. “Oh, God, no. Sam, no. I didn’t mean it in that way.” She tried to calm the torrent of regret and mortification that welled within. “Sam, love, believe me, if I were to stay with you, I would insist you … be cautious, but as you are sending me away, I must ask this one favor.”

Sam rolled onto his back, his legs still tangled in hers. “Clara, I’m not sending you away,” he said bleakly.

She drew in a long, steadying breath. “Then what is it you are doing?”

He stared up at the ceiling. “I don’t know,” he sighed. “I guess, if I had known about you and Bridgers I never would have sent the missive to the British. I would have waited for him. But, I cannot go back on my word now.”

She lifted herself on an elbow. “Why not? Why not simply say you are ignoring your previous bargain? This is war, isn’t it?”

Sam inhaled deeply, tremulously. “Because when I sent the letter to General Strathmore, I also sent one to my superior, Colonel Axford of the Continental Army, informing him of the situation.” He touched her face, wiping her tears, his own trickling down his cheeks. “I have to honor the bargain. Bridgers did not provide us with some expected supplies, so unfortunately you are the only way to get them. The army is desperate.”

A bargaining chip. Like what she had been for her father’s ambitions.

Sam disentangled his legs and folded her in his arms. “I’ve been attracted to you since the day we met. In fact, I had hoped you were not Lady Strathmore. Had you been the maid I would have bedded you a long time ago. Pat, too, most likely.” He chuckled grimly. “Now I regret I did not trust you, or, at least, claim to trust you. You would have told me about Bridgers and we would have waited.” He kissed her hair and spread his hand on her belly. “You have every right to ask for my complicity in your scheme. But, you do realize that even if you were to become pregnant tonight, your baby would not come for another nine months. That’s nine months in addition to the how many months you are supposed to be pregnant at the moment? Wouldn’t your husband be suspicious that the child was so long in your womb?”

Clara sniffled and laughed bitterly. “Once I’m returned to him he’ll simply send me away again. He’ll have no interest in when the child is born, just whether he has a son or not.” She flattened her palm against Sam’s chest, threading her fingers through the soft hair. “I would love to have your child, Captain Taylor.” Her teary eyes found his and she smiled.

He grinned and pushed her onto her back, easing his way between her legs once more. “And I, my lady, would love the opportunity to give you one.”

He bit her neck and she arched her back in response, pressing her breasts against his sculpted chest. His fingernails grazed down her sides, her hips, tickling her. She jerked a shivering retreat from his touch. He held fast to her waist.

“Where do you think you are going, my lady?” His breath was hot on her neck. “Trying to escape again? Perhaps you need to be restrained.”

The shivers shot straight to her sex. Somehow he knew it was what she wanted.

He massaged her clit and bent over to lick and nibble her too-sensitive nipples, her natural instinct to writhe kept well in check by the weight of his body. She submitted to the all-encompassing ecstasy, letting him take control, letting him take her to the brink. He smiled at her purring moans, a devious smile, a thrilling smile that took her to the absolute edge. She gulped air to bolster her climax…

And then he took his hand away.

“You want to spend, my lady, do you not?” he said, casually sucking her nipples.

“Yes,” she breathed helplessly.

“‘Yes’?” His tone was velvety smooth.

She was aching to come, even more so with his sensual teasing. “Yes, please. Sir.”

He slammed into her. She shattered around him with a sharp cry muffled quickly by his dew-slicked hand. He was hot inside her, hard as iron, and she clenched so tightly he slipped out, only to plunge in more deeply, more resolutely with every thrust, holding her gaze as she stared up at him, open-mouthed, delirious.

“Touch yourself,” he commanded.

A thrill coursed through her even before her fingers stretched to rub her aching clit. One touch shocked her into oblivion, and she flinched her hand away.

Sam grabbed her fingers and pressed them to her mons. “I did not tell you to stop,” he rasped.

“No, sir.” His forcefulness was exciting, the perfect accompaniment to her ministrations, taking her to a glorious climax.

She exhaled a sigh.

“Again,” he commanded, his face somber, his eyes solidly black.

She was determined to take him with her this time. She massaged the slick folds just below her clitoris, keeping herself on edge, all the while teasing him with relentless squeezes.