Eleanor sobered. “She owes you more than the value of a single silver ring,” she said with that same ferocity she had shown earlier. Alexander’s heart warmed that she was protective of him. To his astonishment, she eased closer and laid her other hand upon his chest. “Her folly could have seen you dead.”
Alexander’s heart skipped at her proximity. He felt himself beguiled once again, and for the moment, at least, he felt no trepidation. Eleanor was nigh against his chest,
her lips full and inviting. There was a slight flush upon her cheeks and a sparkle in her eyes. He felt his pulse quicken at the prospect of another of the lady’s kisses.
“I suspect no soul in this hall would have missed me,” he said, hoping no such thing.
Eleanor’s eyes glittered and he was transfixed by this
glimpse of her passion. “You suspect wrongly, Alexander Lammergeier,” she said with resolve. “
For I would have missed you.”
To his amazement, Eleanor stretched and touched her lips to his.
* * * * *
H
ers was a rational choice, or so Eleanor told herself. Indeed, she did not know why she had not thought of it sooner.
A marriage could be annulled for two reasons alone: common blood between man and wife, or a failure to consummate the match. She and Alexander shared no blood, so any argument he cou
ld make to the bishop would be
based solely upon their failure to meet abed.
And that argument could be eliminated quite simply.
She had never seduced a man. Truly, she had never wished to meet either of her husbands abed and had fulfilled her marital debt with
some reluctance. Further, had
she dared to initiate an embrace with either of those men, she would have felt the back of a hand for her wanton audacity.
Alexander not only coaxed her passion, but did not force her to surrender to him. And neither, it proved, did it trouble him when she showed ardor. She kissed him,
cautiously at first. She tasted his surprise, heard his incoherent murmur of pleasure, and knew she had chosen aright.
She closed her mouth over his, mimicking his earlier embrace, and touched her tongue to his Ups. Alexander growled and his arm locked around her waist. Eleanor rose to her toes, she framed his face in her hands and pulled him closer. She could feel the slight stubble upon his jaw, could smell his skin, could hear him groan.
Alexander caught her buttocks in his hands and lifted her against him. Eleanor closed her eyes and kissed him again, letting desire claim her fully.
Sex had always been a matter of conquest for Eleanor, the conquest of her body by a hostile assailant. It had been about submission and surrender and the pleasure of a man, even if it came at her expense. She was unused to savoring such intimacy, but Alexander was content to kiss with leisure. To be sure, she could feel the vigor of his response, but he did not rush her. He did not hold her down and take his due.
He invited her to join him in the pursuit of pleasure.
That alone would have been sufficiently tempting, but there was also the thunder of his pulse beneath her fingertips. She could feel his heart pounding against her own; she could feel the pulse leaping in his throat; she could hear him quickly inhale when she kissed him more boldly.
She had power in this transaction, a power she had never known she possessed, a power that she would have to learn to wield. She had no doubt that Alexander would savor her every effort to do so, and the prospect made her smile beneath his kiss.
“What is amiss?” he asked, lifting his lips an increment from hers. He studied her, his eyes brilliantly blue, and her smile broadened.
“Perhaps I should have let you coax my smile with a kiss,” she murmured, and he grinned.
“I seem to recall being forbidden to touch you,” he mused. “Perhaps my caress is not so onerous as you feared.”
“Perhaps not,” she said, holding his gaze.
“And now you offer a kiss.”
“I offer far more than a kiss,” she whispered, delighting in the way his eyes darkened. Beneath his ardent gaze, she loosed the tie of her chemise and pulled it out of the garment. Her breasts were revealed, her nipples beading beneath his perusal and the chill of the air.
He raised a hand and cupped her breast in his palm, the silk of her kirtle gathered beneath his hand. He bent then and kissed the peak and Eleanor gasped with pleasure. She arched back and closed her eyes, letting him taste her, letting him grant her pleasure.
She knotted her fingers in his hair, pulling his lips to hers when he lifted his head. They kissed with newfound fervor and Eleanor felt his fingers loosing her braid. Her circlet fell, her veil was cast aside. She felt like the courtesan she had claimed to be, and she did not care.
“
I
tire of your gallantry, sir,” she murmured into his ear, then kissed that ear so leisurely that he moaned. “Perhaps you merely jest with me. Perhaps you do not desire me at all.”
“Perhaps you are deaf and blind,” he retorted, and Eleanor laughed. He caught her up in his arms, then seated her upon the table. He braced his hands upon the wood and looked at her. “I thought you feared men.”
Eleanor smiled, knowing that demon was banished in this man’s presence. “I have feared men in the past.” She untied the laces on the sides of her kirtle, well aware that he watched her avidly. “You would seem to have cured me of that malady.” She removed the laces, then cast the silken garment aside. The chemise she had been lent was sheer, indeed, and little of her was hidden by it.
Alexander looked and swallowed.
Emboldened by his response, Eleanor removed the last ribbon that bound her hair and shook the long tresses out over her shoulders. He surveyed her, a wonder in his eyes that only emboldened her further. She shed her chemise, then leaned back upon the table, the cold wood against her bare buttocks. She wore only stockings and shoes, and felt a moment’s vulnerability beneath the heat of his gaze.
He smiled then, smiled a smile that lit his eyes, and caught her nape in his hand. “Do not fear,” he whispered, and her heart skipped a beat that he had glimpsed her uncertainty. “Your trust is an honor I will fulfill.” She might have smiled, so reassured was she, but Alexander bent his head and kissed her fully.
His seduction was both gentle and demanding; he awaited her assent, then left her gasping for more. His fingers caressed her as he trailed kisses down her shoulder, along her collarbone. It was as if he would learn her every curve, her every mole by touch alone. Eleanor had never felt so cherished, had never been so sensuously explored. There was no violence in him and he did not restrain her. Eleanor knew that she could urge him aside with a fingertip and that was intoxicating, indeed.
Alexander showed no haste; he savored her. He captured her nipple with his lips and discovered the best
combination of teeth and tongue to tease it to a pert point. He found the ticklish spot behind her knees and caressed her there until her very bones melted. He deduced somehow that a kiss beneath her ear dissolved her every inhibition. He bracketed her waist with his hands, showing that his hands could almost encircle her completely.
“Wrought for each other,” he whispered, and Eleanor dared to hope that such a thing was possible.
Eventually he lifted his head, looking so tousled and mischievous that she knew he had some other feat in store. Eleanor knew she was flushed and disheveled and aroused as she had never been before. She fairly ached to feel his heat inside her.
Alexander granted her a wicked smile, locked his hands around her waist, and then his kiss turned intimate, indeed. He ducked between her thighs, the heat of his mouth landing upon the most secret place of her. Pleasure soared through Eleanor and she fell back, gasping, upon the table.
Alexander did not cease his caress and, truly, she did not want him to do so. He roused a passion she had never guessed she possessed and did so with such ease that she marveled at what she had missed. Her very flesh seemed to be afire; there might have been sparks flying from her fingers; she burned with so fiery a lust that she feared it might consume her.
She moaned his name, and he chuckled, his breath tickling her yet more. Relentless, he coaxed the inferno within her to bum more brightly. She writhed and twisted; she sought some goal she could not name. She moaned and did not care who heard her. There was nothing in all the world save Alexander’s teasing kiss.
Suddenly Eleanor was engulfed with pleasure, the fire
bursting with unexpected ferocity. She shouted; she locked her knees around him; she clutched at the table. She had never felt such passion; she had never been shaken to her very core.
She stared at him in awe when the tremors ceased and he grinned, knowing full well what he had done.
“More,” she whispered when she caught her breath. “I desire more.”
Alexander was quick to comply. He was atop her, his chausses undone but otherwise fully garbed. There was a determination in his expression, and a wild light in his eyes that made her heart race anew. She gasped as he entered her, for he was uncommonly large, then gripped his shoulders when he waited for her.
She smiled at him, liking the heat of him well. The strength of him sated her as little else could have done— or so she thought, until his mischievous fingers found that tender place once again. He kissed her throat, that place behind her ear, and Eleanor fairly swooned with the pleasure he conjured. He caressed her even as they moved together in that ancient and intimate dance.
His eyes glittered a fearsome blue, his hair was tangled and damp with perspiration, his attention was wholly fixed upon her. Eleanor felt both potent and captive, free and ensnared. She knew that this was right, that this was how man and wife should meet abed, that this was how pleasure should be shared.
Tears rose to her eyes that he should show her such a wondrous truth. She held him fast, wanting both to make this moment last forever and also to find that spellbinding release again. The heat rose ever higher between them, her heartbeat raced, and Alexander smiled at her. They
moved as one, enthralled with each other as they fed their passion; then lightning struck her very marrow.
“Alexander!” she shouted, not caring who heard.
“Eleanor!” he bellowed, and buried himself deeply within her. They shuddered together in their mutual release, then fell still. He rolled to his back, keeping her clasped against him, and lay back on the table with a moan of satisfaction. Eleanor sprawled atop him, well content, and laid her cheek upon his chest.
She put her fingertips on the pulse in Alexander’s throat as she closed her eyes in exhaustion, smiling at the rhythm of their
hearts b
eating as one.
* * * * *
E
leanor would kill him.
That much was certain. Should Eleanor seduce him thus every day of his life, Alexander would not have to bear the burden of the lairdship of Kinfairlie for long. He was shocked that he had claimed her without even disrobing—but she had left him the chance only to unlace his chauss
e
s. He knew even as he caught his breath that he would never be able to sit at this table and labor over his accounts again without recalling this moment.
She smiled at him shyly, her flesh so rosy and her hair so tangled that he was tempted to claim her again without delay. He slid a fingertip down the side of her chin and her lashes dropped shyly. “Were you pleased?”
Her smile turned impish. “Could you not guess as much?”
“
I
suppose I could,” he mused, much taken with the woman who filled his arms.
Whatever else Alexander might have said never made it past his lips. There was a pounding of footsteps on the stairs. Those footfalls crossed the floor outside his chamber and he had the blink of an eye to realize what was going to happen before it did.
“No!” he bellowed, just as the door of his chamber was thrown open. He rolled the lady beneath him, hiding her nudity from curious eyes.
“Alexander, are you well?” Anthony demanded.
“I heard shouting, and feared violence,” Isabella said, even as she tried to peer around the castellan. Alexander braced himself over Eleanor, striving to hide her—and their intimate pose—from those two at the portal.
Anthony swore with uncharacteristic vigor and pushed the curious maiden back into the corridor. He slammed the door with force and much coughing and harrumphing carried through the wooden portal.
“God in heaven, there is no peace in this abode.” Alexander groaned and dropped his forehead to Eleanor’s shoulder. To his relief, the lady began to laugh.
“You have need of a lock.”
“I have a lock upon that portal,” he retorted, then granted her a wicked glance. “Had I known that you intended to seduce me, I would have used it.”
She feigned consideration of this. “Perhaps in future, I should lock the portal when I have such a scheme.”
“Perhaps you should,” he agreed. They smiled at each other, then Alexander left her welcoming heat with reluctance. “You will become chilled.” He shed his tabard and granted it to her. He kindled a larger fire in the brazier, then offered her the basin of water and cloth.
Anthony cleared his throat pointedly from the other
side of the wooden portal. “I trust then, my lord, that you will not be dispatching a missive to the bishop?”
Alexander glanced to Eleanor, who held his gaze. They looked as one to the missive he had so recently written, and he realized that he no longer had grounds to request an annulment.
And there were witnesses of that fact.
Eleanor became suddenly intent upon ensuring that her laces were properly tied, her very manner feeding Alexander’s suspicion. She looked guilty, just as his sisters did, when one of their schemes was revealed.
“Tell me that you did not contrive this deed,” he said, his voice husky.
She said nothing, merely knotted a lace more tightly. Her lips were set, though, with a stubbornness he knew well.
He stepped to her side and caught her elbow in his hand, compelling her to meet his gaze. “Did you seduce me to ensure there could be no annulment?”
“I do not have to answer you.”
“Yes, you do,” he said with heat. “I will have an answer, and I will have honesty between us, or we will have no match. If you cannot tell me the truth, I will find some way to put you aside, upon that you can rely.”
Her eyes flashed and she lifted her chin, holding his regard boldly. “I would be wedded to you, Alexander Lammergeier. I
choose
to have you as my spouse and so, yes, I did decide to ensure that our match was consummated. I did decide to ensure that you had no grounds for annulment.”
“I can still put you aside.”
Her
li
ps tightened. “It will not be so readily done.”
“Did you ensure that there would be witnesses?”
Her cheeks flamed at the very notion. “No!”
Alexander believed her, in that at least. He paced the width of the chamber and shoved a hand through his hair, not liking the truth she surrendered. He stared at her from across the room. “Why?”
She grit her teeth, then regarded him warily. “Because you are not like the men I have known. Because I would seize the opportunity to be wed to a man who would treat me with dignity.”
If she had pled for passion, if she had confessed love for him, it might have been easier to give her impulse credence. But Alexander studied the defiant woman before him and knew that she knew little of passion and love, that even dignity was a novelty for her.
And that made the choice for him. His heart wrenched that she had been treated so poorly, and though he knew that he could teach her to expect better, he also knew the course would not be easy. He heaved a sigh.
“Truth,” he insisted gently. “We must have truth between us.”
She took a breath and nodded agreement. “You shall have all the truth from me that you desire, Alexander Lammergeier. I would ask you not to blame me if you do not like its taste upon your tongue, however.”
Their gazes locked and held across the span of the chamber. “Fair enough,” he said, hearing a wealth of history in her words. He lifted the missive from the table and cast it into the flames of the brazier. He watched her shudder in her relief, saw the shimmer of her unshed tears.
“I thank you,” she said quietly, and he was humbled by her beauty and her pride.
Eleanor would never beg for any morsel from his table, though she had no qualms in telling him that he was wrong. He respected her wits and her knowledge. Her counsel would be invaluable to him, to be sure.
He could teach her, in turn, that a lady was owed more from her spouse than her former husbands had offered to her.
Alexander smiled at Eleanor, liking the sight of his mother's ring upon her finger, liking that his heart had leapt when first he had glimpsed her. He took her hand within his and kissed her knuckles, and when she flushed, he dared to be encouraged that her wounds would heal.
Then Alexander raised his voice, not looking away from his bride. “You have guessed aright, Anthony. There will be no annulment, and Kinfairlie has a new lady on this day.”
“Hoorah!” Isabella cried from the other side of the door. Eleanor and Alexander shared a smile when that maiden clapped her hands. “I will tell the others!” Isabella’s feet could be heard scampering away; then the older man cleared his throat.
“Very good, my lord.” Anthony lowered his voice. “Might I anticipate that you will be occupied this afternoon, my lord?”
“You might, indeed,” Alexander said with a smile. “As you well know, it is imperative that I thoroughly review my accounts before year end. There are assets at Kinfairlie for which I do not as yet have a full inventory.” He caught Eleanor in his arms and she began to smile, both of them forgetting Anthony’s presence until that man cleared his throat.
“Very good, my lord.”
“Lock that portal,” Eleanor whispered when they reached the bed, and Alexander was only too glad to comply. That he surrendered the key to his lady wife with a flourish earned him a smile, one that warmed him to his very toes.