Carole Mortimer - Historical Romance – The Best Of The Year

‘No! I have not... I am not a woman who has attracted men that way. But once, I would like just once...’

That, he could give her.

They could not run. Here. It must be here. Now. If they waited until it was easy or convenient, he, both of them might come to their senses. And for once, that was not what he wanted.

He opened the door to her room, and held out his hand.

Chapter Eighteen

I must remember everything, Anne thought, as the door closed behind them. Every moment so that I can relive it later.

Until Nicholas, she had known nothing of loving or kisses. Yet she had spent a lifetime near a woman who loved men. Lady Joan had borne Thomas five children. Some nights, Anne had heard them, through the door. The panting, the groans, the screams. And with the Prince, it was the same.

But for herself, beyond the kisses she had shared with Nicholas, there was only the mystery of want.

He put the candle down beside the bed and she looked at the straw mattress, hesitant to take that step. Now. It must be now.

Suddenly, he scooped her into his arms and carried her there and all her awkwardness fell away.

Tonight, she would be the Anne she was inside.

Nicholas sat beside her on the bed and looked at her, head to toe, without speaking. The silence lengthened, her cheeks grew hot and she looked away, unaccustomed to being examined instead of overlooked.

He reached for the fall of her hair and lifted it behind her shoulder to reveal her face.

Her breathing quickened. ‘What are you doing?’

A gentle smile in answer. No need to be urgent this night.

‘Looking at your hair,’ he said. ‘It is one of my favourite parts of you.’

Foolish flattery. ‘Red hair is frowned on.’

He furrowed his brow and skewed his lips into mock consideration. ‘Then I will not call it red. Shall I name it sanguine? Or gules? What shall I call it?’

‘Call it nothing at all. Don’t look at it at all.’

‘You’ve taught me to see.’ His fingers played with her hair, a gesture as intimate as if he was stroking her skin. ‘Yet you do not want to be seen?’

No. She did not. She wanted to close her eyes and disappear into him, consumed by this mysterious thing between men and women.

‘You have always seen me more clearly than others do.’ Be brave. Look at him. But she could not.

‘That’s what I want to do. I want to spend this night looking at you, from head to—’

‘No! You must promise me.’ She bent her knees, drawing up her legs hiding her foot, still in its red hose, safely beneath her skirt. ‘Don’t look...’

And of course, he did. ‘I’ve already seen it. You don’t have to hide.’

But she did, she had to hide so many things. ‘Don’t look at me at all.’ She leaned over and, with one breath, the candle went dark.

Outside, the sun had set. Fading light still smudged the room, but she felt safer now. More hidden. Less Anne.

He inhaled, as if to argue, and then her lips took his and there were no more words.

He broke the kiss and pulled off his tunic and hose. In the near dark, she was brave enough to shed all but her chemise, letting him help.

She felt his hands stroke her arms, explore her neck and she could scarcely breathe for the joy of it.

A human touch. She had not realised that skin could crave such a thing. Air, velvet, linen, silk, sun—all had stroked her skin without her notice.

But when had any man ever touched her with tenderness, with passion?

Touched her at all?

Now, everywhere, his fingers, lips, as if kindling flame wherever he touched. She succumbed to the feeling, to being pleasured, and then, as he cupped her hip, stroked her thigh, she tensed.

No lower. He must not go lower...

‘Shh. I promise.’

And because she believed him, she let the want crash through her.

Soft surprise, to discover how alive she could feel. Skin, breath, something even deeper trembling, fighting to break free, escape, faster than a horse could gallop, mobile as a falcon in flight. Soaring. Never, never wanting to touch earth again.

Here, now, finally, she was not slow or awkward. She did not stumble or hobble. Nothing held back her kisses or her touches.

Even though she had never loved a man before, it felt easy and natural. As if she were not the Anne everyone saw, but the Anne she had always wanted to be.

Free.

* * *

This, Nicholas knew he would remember.

Don’t look at me, she had begged. Yet as the last light of dusk ebbed from the room, he filled his eyes with the sight of her face, lips parted, eyes half-closed, freed of pain and worry, feeling only the pleasure of his touch.

He explored her skin with gentle fingers and watched her stretch and sigh and offer herself for more. His lips took the tip of one breast and she moaned in delight. Trailing kisses, he discovered one, then the other, the same, yet different, until he was certain he would know one from the other, even in the dark.

Now came the curve of her hips. A kiss where a bone lay beneath skin impossibly fair and pale. Skin no man had ever seen.

Her belly next, and a kiss for the dip of her navel, the centre of a woman’s wantonness. Yet she did not writhe, as he expected. Instead, she laughed, truly and lightly, with only the rounded edges of joy. And at that, he laughed, as well, as glad to coax her joy as her passion.

The passion would come.

Her legs next, for him to explore, but as he went lower, she tensed, so he stopped, and let her pretend that she could move as freely as any other woman.

Here, she could.

Her thighs were firm beneath his palms, the muscles grown strong from days of gripping the horse. But between them, ah, between her thighs he would find the seat of her passion.

A kiss there, too. A kiss on her secret centre. No hesitation now. No resistance. She opened to him, her slick scent showing that she was ready.

But he was not. He wanted to savour this moment, to relish her release instead of his own. He wanted to see her face when she felt for the first time that shift in the earth that signalled she had crossed to the other side.

And so, instead of taking her, he led her. First, with his tongue and kisses, tasting her sweetness, loving the sound of her breathing, shorter, faster. Then, because he wanted to miss nothing, he moved his kisses higher until he could look at her face again.

Her eyes, still closed, fluttered open. Then, a smile.

‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘Now.’

And he did not take his eyes from hers as he slipped inside her.

* * *

Anne had thought she understood something of lovemaking. But as Nicholas filled her, she realised she had known nothing at all.

Man and woman did not fit together as two people who clasped hands, but remained in their own bodies. Instead, they merged into one being, no longer separate. He breathed in. She exhaled. His heart beat. So did hers. He pulsed within her and she answered, over and again, higher and faster and stronger.

And then, the strength exploded into shards of shining weakness and in that, too, she knew they were as one.

* * *

Nicholas awoke feeling as if his world was upside down.

Anne still slept beside him, but restless, he left the bed, pacing, realising quickly how small the room was.

Standing as far away as he could, he looked at her, curled atop the bed. Her pale reddish-blonde hair hung over the side of the mattress. Her foot was safely hidden beneath the covers, but the red woollen hose that had covered it had escaped and lay tangled in the linens.

And he thought of last night.

He had prided himself on many things during his life, but this, knowing that his lips, his fingers, had brought her such joy...

This made him feel finally, truly, a man.