The Changeling Bride (28 page)

“You admit to having previous lovers.”

“My life has not been what you think.” She was angry now. “Yes, I’ve known other men. I already told you that. I believed myself in love with them at the time. We expressed our feelings physically, like any normal couple would.”

“Did they teach you things? In bed?”

“Of course they did! And I taught them. I read, I have an imagination, I have fantasies just like anyone else. I’m a grown woman.”

“A woman without honor.”

“Don’t you dare be hypocritical about this, Henry Trevelyan! You’ve been with women before, and I wouldn’t even think of holding it against you. I’m glad for it! It means others have taught you, and I reap the benefits.”

She could not bear the closedness she saw in his eyes. “If you would just open your mind a bit, maybe you’d see that a little experience is a good thing.” She took a step closer to him, so that her chest lightly brushed against his, reached up, and softly stroked his face. “I can prove it to you.”

He grabbed her hand, stopping the caress. Her other hand, still free, crept around to stroke his buttock. She could not stand for him to reject her, not for this. If he did not want her, let him not want her for something that mattered, not a sexual history about which there was nothing wrong.

“Men are not animals, Elle,” he told her in a choked voice. “Lust cannot wipe all thought from my mind.”

She gently disengaged her hand from his and pressed her palm to his chest, rubbing small circles. Her hand slid down, then around to join the other, and she slowly pulled his hips against her belly, gripping and kneading the smooth contours of his buttocks. She stood on tiptoe and licked the bottom of his jawline. She brought her hands up to the back of his neck, massaging the base of his scalp, and pulled his head down to her. The tense resistance of his muscles began to give way. “You’re my husband, Henry, and I want you.”

He reached up, his own hands digging into her hair, his mouth coming down to hers.

She pulled back from him. “I touch you. You do nothing, unless I say so.”

“I will do what I—”

She covered his mouth with her hand, then slid one finger into his mouth. “Suck it,” she softly commanded. He closed his eyes and obeyed, and she pressed herself against him. After a few moments she stepped back, took
a bottle off the dressing table, then pulled him into the bedroom.

She set the bottle by the bed. Henry still looked angry, but an unwilling curiosity was holding him in place.

She started with his coat, slowly stripping him, dragging her fingers over his skin at every opportunity. When his torso was bare, she licked trails across his flesh, letting her body and hair brush against him as she went.

She unfastened the double set of buttons on his breeches, carefully sliding them and the linen liner down over his hips, freeing his manhood. She went down on her knees and for only a moment took him into her mouth, her hands caressing his buttocks at the same time. His manhood flexed in response, and she released him, her hands going to the buttons at his knees, her cheek lightly touching his erection as she worked.

Henry felt caught in the web of pleasure she was weaving over his body, his mind wound tight in his own anger and lust. He wanted to take control of her, but at the same time wanted to do nothing more than submit to her hands and lips. He wanted her to prove to him that she wanted no one else, that she had no desire for his friend or any other man.

She grasped his hips and forced him to sit on the edge of the bed, then removed the rest of his clothing. She placed one of his hands palm-up on his thigh and straddled his leg, pulling her skirts free. She lowered herself onto his hand, and he could feel the dampness of her, a dampness there for him. She rocked against his palm, and took his face in both hands and kissed him, playing with his mouth, instructing it to open with her tongue. Her breath came in little gasps.

She leaned away from him and began to unbutton her dress. Her stays had laces in the front, and she unfastened them to her waist and then untied her chemise. She was bare from her breasts to the top of her belly. She stood,
and with gentle hands caressed his manhood in her hand.

“Kiss them,” she ordered, leaning forward, her head high. He did as she directed, laving her breasts as she ringed his manhood with her hand, pulling back and forth.

She drew away and picked up the bottle, and with his eyes intently on her, she slowly dripped several drops of the oil over and between her breasts, then smoothed it over her skin with her fingertips, coating her breasts with the shining oil. Her eyes locked again with his, she sank to her knees between his legs. She licked the tip of his manhood, then leaned forward and surrounded it with her breasts, using her hands to press them together and keep him in place between them as she began to move up and down, just as he had fantasized doing with her on their first night at Brookhaven.

His hands moved towards her, and she shook her head, stopping until he leaned back, his breathing heavy, every muscle in his body tense. His eyes slipped from her face to what she was doing, his body jerking with each change of pace as she varied her movements against him.

He was losing control, and he tried to pull away from her. She would not let him; his body was her prisoner. She clasped her hand over the head of his manhood, still between her breasts, and held him motionless while he found release in warm bursts against her palm.

He gave a long shudder. “I am sorry,” he said, recovering, his eyes going to the small mess.

She said nothing, but released him, and then traced a finger through the creamy substance that had spilled onto her chest, no revulsion at all on her face.

He groaned, deep in his throat, and hauled her up onto the bed. He clenched her to him; his arms were bands around her back, his naked leg pinning her clothed ones to the mattress as they both sprawled across the bed. His mouth took command of hers, his tongue delving deep. His hands moved at will over her body, pulling up her
skirts, and she let him have his way now, revelling in the passion she had aroused.

Within minutes, the excitement that had only half faded with his release was back, pressing against her as his hands and mouth harshly mapped out the contours of her body. She felt one of his fingers sliding into her, massaging her. She wanted his energy, his lack of control.

He pushed back her skirts and guided himself to her. The stretching force of his entry burned for a moment, and then he was deeply embedded within her, and moving. He raised her hips off the bed, his strong hands cupping her buttocks, and she surrendered to the power of his thrusts.

She felt his hand move on her buttocks, and he pulled her up off the bed, so that he was sitting with her straddling his thighs, and continued to move deep within her. His mouth once again took hers, his insistent tongue claiming entrance.

Penetrated by him so fully, the nub of her sex rubbing against him with every thrust, her unbound breasts brushing against the hair of his chest, she became the one helpless to his commands. The overload of sensations quickly brought on her climax, and she tightened around him in the long, undulating waves of release. He grasped her tightly to him, holding her motionless as he spent himself within her.

After a long moment frozen in the culmination of desire, they crumpled together onto the bed, drenched in sweat. Henry pulled the coverlet half over them and nestled her against his body.

Elle stared at his chest, stunned by his taking of her and the sensations it had aroused. She didn’t know who had won this battle. Did this coupling mean he would be able to accept her history? She looked up at him, and whispered a quotation she remembered from one of her French literature courses.

“
C’est une des superstitions de l’esprit humain d’avoir imagine que la virginite pouvait etre une vertu
.”

He was quiet, apparently on the verge of sleep.

She repeated the quotation and was gratified by a very faint chuckle, rumbling deep in his chest. It gave her hope. Given time, he might adjust to her past. And maybe he would see the wisdom of Voltaire’s words.

“
It is one of the superstitions of the human mind to have imagined that virginity could be a virtue
.”

Chapter Twenty

“Charlotte, it’s wonderful! You’re a genius, an absolute genius.” Elle turned around again in front of the cheval mirror, admiring the first of the gowns that Charlotte had finished for her.

“I did steal the design from a drawing I saw. The style has been growing quite popular, ever since Marie Antoinette wore it in that famous portrait, poor woman, though it certainly brought her nothing but grief. They called her a whore for it, you know, saying she was running about dressed in nothing but her chemise.”

The dress was made of lightweight white cotton. It had a plain scoop neck, and full sleeves gathered once mid-bicep, and a second time at the elbow just before the wide, soft ruffle. The bodice and skirt were loose and full, given shape by the wide sea-green sash around her waist. It was flattering, it was comfortable, and best of all, she wasn’t wearing stays. Charlotte had designed a
sort of half corset for her that served the purpose of a bra and was only lightly boned.

The other gowns they had designed together were not yet finished. They tended toward the empire styles Elle could remember from the spate of Jane Austen movies in theaters. It would probably be several years before they were popular in this time, but they should prove comfortable with those high waists and loose column skirts, and it never hurt to be a little ahead of the fashion game.

Figuring that the maids and other female employees of the household had even more need of comfortable clothing than she herself, Elle and Charlotte had designed dresses and undergarments in a similar vein for them. The Allsbrook colors were red and royal blue, and the dresses were going to be in several prints that incorporated those hues, with white aprons and caps.

In a good mood due to her new dress that allowed her to breathe, Elle sought out Henry and Lawrence. She and Henry had avoided discussing the issue of her past relationships these last few days, and she was more than content to leave the topic alone. She worried a bit about the unprotected sex they had had, but if the rhythm method had any validity, it should have been a relatively safe encounter.

Both men proved to be out of the house, gone to inspect their various projects on the estate. Her mood had to be shared with someone, and her mind lit on Lady Annalise.

She couldn’t find the hidden door that came out onto the great hall, so with candlestick in hand she set off with Tatiana into the maze of the unused portions of the house. It took her less time than before to become lost, as she was not stopping to look at every room through which she passed.

“I give up, Tatia. You find her.”

As if the dog could understand, she trotted ahead and
turned down a corridor. Elle followed, and minutes later found herself outside the richly carved door to Lady Annalise’s suite. The door was half open, as if she had been expected.

Tatiana pushed her way in, as she had on the last visit, and Elle barely had time to knock a warning on the door.

“Come in,” a faint voice called.

Elle pushed the door the rest of the way open, then closed it gently behind her. Lady Annalise looked as if she hadn’t moved from the last time Elle had seen her. Even her clothing looked the same. Tatiana had her head resting on the old woman’s knee, her eyes shut in bliss at the scratching her head was getting. Lady Annalise weakly waved Elle forward.

“You are looking well,” the woman said, peering at her through squinted eyes. “It looks like Brookhaven agrees with you.”

Elle shrugged noncommittally. “I’m adjusting.”

“You have my great-grandson flustered.”

“Henry?” She smiled. “I suppose that’s true. I don’t think he knows what to make of me.” Lady Annalise was proving much more talkative than last time. How could Henry have thought the woman was senile?

“Maybe he will stop trying to decipher you and simply accept.”

“Possibly.” She shrugged. “I don’t fit the world he’s used to.”

Lady Annalise remained silent a few moments, then asked softly, “Are you sorry you came here?”

Elle wandered to one of the tapestries on the wall, touching the woven face of a woman mounted on a horse, a member of a hunting party. “I don’t know. I feel as if this marriage was not my wish, but in part I suppose it was. I’m not sure if this is a better life, or a worse one than that I left behind.”

“If only we could see what our wishes would truly give us. Those tapestries tell a story about a wish.”

“Do they?” The tapestry face under Elle’s finger suddenly turned, and for a fraction of a second the hunting party surged forward, horses at the gallop. Elle stepped back, eyes wide.

“It is just the light, my dear. It makes them look alive.”

Elle looked at Lady Annalise, then back at the tapestry. The mounted woman was facing as she originally had. The hunting party was motionless.

“The story starts with that hunt. It was led by Bartholomew, a terrible man, and a very rich one. He hunted for the brutality of the sport, as so many do.” Lady Annalise’s voice took on a strength it had not had before, and Elle had the sense that she had told this story many times before. “He set man traps in the forest, to maim the legs of poachers, and he set his dogs on trespassers. Not remarkable behavior for the time, but he took an unholy pleasure in it.

“On this day, he had spotted a white stag. It was beautiful, pure snowy white, like nothing of this earth.”

Elle found the white stag in the tapestry, and blinked as he bounded up onto a boulder to look down upon his pursuers.

“The poor folk of the countryside knew of it, and hungry as they ever got, they never tried to hunt it. They saw it as an emblem of their faith in God. It was just a deer, but they needed to believe it was more. And maybe it was—if one believes something, who is to say it is not true?