Ah, she had never known.
It went on for what seemed a very long time, the wonderful riding rhythm, the firm thrust and withdrawal, the hot wetness that she could even hear, the aching, the need, the pleasure, the pain, the… But, there were no words.
There were no words.
And then his face was above hers again and some of his weight had been lifted off her. He had braced himself on his forearms to look down at her.
And the rhythm changed. It was slower and deeper. His face glistened with sweat. She bit her lower lip and then frowned slightly.
Pleasure had become pain pure and simple.
And then the rhythm quickened until it became… unbearable.
She closed her eyes very tightly and pressed her head back into the pillow. She untwined her legs from about his, braced her feet against the mattress, and lifted, strained into the pain.
And…
Oh, and.
It shattered into a million pieces and revealed itself to be what it had been all along. Peace. Beauty.
Pure, beautiful peace.
She was aware that his weight had come down on her again, that he was pumping hard into her, that after a few moments he held still, straining into her until she felt a lovely gush of liquid heat at her core.
But it was all peace. All beauty.
Until, after a couple of minutes, he disengaged his body from hers and moved off her to lie beside her and pulled the bedcovers up over them.
She was suddenly damp, cold, uncomfortable, bereft.
Bewildered.
Herself again. Though not quite that. Not yet.
She turned over onto her side, facing away from him. She needed to get herself back. She needed…
She was aware of him turning onto his side too-away from her.
Why had peace given place so soon to turmoil? To two separate solitudes?
Because peace had been without thought? Without… integrity?
How could she have felt like that without love?
Was love essential?
Did it even exist-the love she had dreamed of all her life?
If it did, it was too late now for her to find it.
Must she make do with this instead, then?
Only this?
Pleasure without love?
Despite the troubled turmoil of her thoughts, she finally fell into a sleep of sheer exhaustion.
Jasper did not sleep. He lay staring at the door leading into their private sitting room. It stood slightly ajar.
The candles were still burning. He did not bother to get up to extinguish them.
He had known that she lied-duty rather than desire, indeed! He did not know why he had even asked the question. Just to see if she would be honest with him, he supposed.
And then she had challenged him with just the sort of defiant spirit she had shown at Vauxhall. She had challenged him to make her desire him.
He half smiled despite the fact that he was feeling very far from amusement.
It was something he was good at, something he excelled at-making women desire him, that was. He ought to excel at it-he had had enough practice, by God.
And so he had made her desire him until she was mindless with need. He had not had to use all his skills, either, or even nearly all. Which was just as well-they would simply have shocked her and killed her desire. But he had used enough. He might even say that he had gone coldly about arousing her, except that it had not been cold at all. He had aroused himself too. Or, to be more fair, she had aroused him.
He had worked on her until she had admitted that she wanted him, until she had begged.
Please…
And then he had taken her slowly and thoroughly-all the way to completion. He had surprised even himself over that. He had never before had a virgin. He had heard that it was impossible to bring a virgin to the ultimate completion her first time.
He had done it with Katherine.
And he had proved a point. He had vanquished her just as he might have done at Vauxhall if he had chosen. Despite all her scruples and misgivings about him and her marriage to him, she was like clay to mold in his hands when it came to sex.
Which made him one devil of a fine fellow.
His peers would clap him on the shoulder, slap him on the back, roar with mirth and appreciation if he could only tell them.
Monty, the ultimate Lothario.
He stared relentlessly and sightlessly at the door.
But Katherine Finley, Baroness Montford, had a mind of her own and a morality of her own-and dreams of her own even if he could make her temporarily forget all three with his lovemaking.
He had felt her withdrawal as soon as he drew free of her body. And she had turned onto her side to face away from him just as he had been about to slide his arm beneath her head, amuse her a little with some nonsense to make her chuckle, and tease her into admitting that her wedding night had been the most enjoyable night of her life.
As soon as he was sure she slept-it was a dashed long time-he folded back the covers on his side of the bed and eased himself out so as not to wake her. He went to stand naked at the window.
If he was at Cedarhurst now, he would have gone out for a brisk gallop on his horse, darkness be damned. But he was not there, and it would be considered more than a trifle odd if he were to abandon his bride to go cantering off into the night-he stayed here often enough that the innkeeper had realized that she was his bride.
He would not expose her to the ridicule that was bound to follow such a move. Not to mention the fact that he would be the laughingstock.
Damnation! And devil take it! He would not forgive Clarence for this even if they both fried in hell for a thousand years and the only way out was through forgiveness.
And then he stood very still.
Either she had not been deeply enough asleep when he got up or he had made more noise than he realized getting out of bed. She had made no discernible sound or movement, but there was a quality to the silence that made him realize suddenly that she was awake, and sure enough, when he turned his head to look, he could see that her eyes were open.
“The candles are still burning,” she said. “You must make a pretty sight for anyone who is out there looking up.”
There were a dozen answers he might have made. Instead he made none but reached up and jerked the curtains closed. He made no move to cover himself. And she made no move to look away.
“I suppose,” he said, “you believe there ought to be more than lust.”
It came out as a bad-tempered accusation.
“And you do not,” she said, neatly turning the tables on him. “It is a fundamental difference between us, my-Jasper. It is a difference we must learn to live with.”
It irritated him no end that his name did not come naturally to her lips, that even after marriage this morning and sex tonight she still had to stop herself from addressing him as my lord.
“Or not,” he said.
She gazed at him.
“Is there an option?” she asked him.
“If I cannot bed you without feeling the necessity of loving you first and wooing your love,” he said, “and if you cannot enjoy the aftermath of a bedding when it has been simply lust, then pretty soon we are going to be sleeping in very separate beds, Katherine. Probably in different houses since my appetites tend to be healthy ones. Though probably in your vocabulary that would be unhealthy ones. I enjoy sex.”
“Yes,” she said. “I do not doubt it.”
He sat down on the chair where she had been sitting asleep when he came into the room earlier. It was unlike him to be bad-tempered with a woman. To accuse and complain. This was a fine way to start a marriage.
He tried again.
“I find that I like you,” he said, “that I enjoy your company and your wit, that I admire your beauty and desire your body. I am even prepared to attempt affection and fidelity. But I cannot offer what you call love because I really do not know what the word means in the context of a relationship between a man and a woman. And I certainly cannot expect you to love me or even to like me particularly well. Not after what you have been forced into and with whom. This whole marriage business is looking to be impossible, in fact.”