Rules for Heiresses by Amalie Howard

Thirteen

The rage was suffocating.

It gnawed at him like a starving creature.

Hell, if he didn’t do something, he was going to explode, and proper English society would not soon recover from the scandal. Courtland rubbed at his bare knuckles, barely bruised from the brutal punch to his half brother’s face.

How dare that maggot insult his wife?

Fury and bitterness crashed through him in unforgiving waves. The fact that his brother had seen fit to insult a duchess in public was galling! And Courtland knew it was because of him. His brother and stepmother viewed him as inferior, so Ravenna was inferior, too. He’d seen the degradation in Stinson’s eyes, heard it in his stepmother’s crass insinuation that Ravenna had made the wrong choice of husband.

The sight of Stinson’s blood had been gratifying, but Courtland ached to thrash his brother senseless. How dare he embarrass him in his own sodding home? How dare he humiliate Ravenna? For the first time in years, Courtland had felt utterly powerless, much as he had when he’d been a boy.

“Fuck,” he swore aloud, raking his hands through his hair and demolishing Peabody’s excellent work. Cursing a blue streak, he stalked deeper down the wide hallway leading to the unlit conservatory. He hadn’t meant to head this way, but his agitated, wandering footsteps had led him here. This was the one place he’d secretly adored as a boy whenever he’d been allowed to visit Ashvale Manor. The one place he’d always belonged.

Plants and flowers never judged. They loved attention and bloomed in return for the smallest measure of affection. Rumor had it that his grandfather had had a similar affinity for plants, though he’d have to take the old head gardener’s word for it that they shared the same green fingers. The man had insisted that the conservatory was the duke’s quiet pride and joy, and so it had also become Courtland’s secret haven.

The conservatory was deserted, though he could smell the variety of lush plantings of lemon and orange trees interlaced with the sweeter musk of night-blooming roses. Thankfully the gardeners had kept his fondness for this sanctuary a secret. If the marchioness had suspected his love for the place, she would undoubtedly have set it on fire or forbidden him from entering. Then again, without the splendid conservatory, she wouldn’t have had an impressive venue to hold her lavish tea and garden parties à la Queen Victoria.

And impressions were everything.

He inhaled deeply, letting the peace fill him and chase away the remnants of his anger as it had done so many times before. Perhaps it was habit, something ingrained like muscle memory.

Fresh horse dung splattered on his clothing in the wardrobe? He’d come here.

His careful school notes scattered across the lake? He’d come here.

Worms dumped beneath his bedsheets? He’d come here.

And each time, he’d left his rage, his fear, his pain at the door. The fist around his chest loosened as the fragrant air enveloped him and the sweeping stained-glass panels crested above him. The flowers, shrubs, and vines were lit only by moonlight, giving them a silvery cast that was no less beautiful than their natural coloring. It felt as though he were inside some forbidden fairy-tale forest. A reluctant smile curled his lip. He hadn’t had such a fanciful thought in a decade.

He wished Ravenna could see it.

A soft noise behind him made him turn, and there she was framed in the arched doorway, as though his unvoiced desire had summoned her. His wife. His duchess.

Gilded in opalescent moonlight, she was the undisputed fairy queen of this vale. Her burnished auburn hair looked dark, her creamy skin dappled in shades of silver, that stunning dress of hers draping her beautiful body in seductive lines. His heart climbed into his throat, the blood thickening in his veins. Courtland didn’t want to speak. Didn’t want to disturb the thrall of this place. For the first time since he’d arrived in England, his soul felt at ease.

“I followed you,” his wife said softly. “Do you wish to be alone?”

“No.”

“Good, because I’m afraid I might no longer welcome at the party.”

He frowned. “How so?”

A smile trembled over those lush lips before she tugged the lower one into her mouth. “I might have called your stepmonster a bigot and told her karma was coming for her arse.”

Courtland couldn’t help it; he chuckled, and it felt like a huge weight had lifted off his chest. “You did?”

“I did. And then when she threatened to throw me out, I might have said you owned this house and everything in it.”

“Is that so?” he said, smiling, his heart giving a slow, aching throb.

“There’s more,” she whispered, eyelashes falling. “Then I told her that I had to go find you because she has the intelligence of a rock.”

Courtland barked a laugh. He’d have given anything to see his stepmother’s face. After the rest of her confession, his wife didn’t say any more, standing there like a woodland nymph, eyes darting around the space, catching on a wide-frond palm and then flicking up to the vaulted glass before returning to him.

“This is beautiful,” she said softly.

“My grandfather built it,” he said. “They said it was his favorite place when he was in town. It was meant to be a reflection of the gardens at Ashvale Park.”

“I remember.” Courtland caught the gleam of her eyes, the expression in them hidden by the dimness, but heard the amusement in her voice. “My mother was ever so jealous of the duke’s grounds, constantly berating our gardeners to achieve the same level of splendor. She never succeeded, of course. Your grandfather had exquisite taste and an eye for design that no one could replicate.” She gave a tiny laugh. “Not even horticultural experts brought in from France and Italy. Trust me, Mama tried for years to best him before giving up in defeat.”

Courtland prowled toward her, noticing the slight hitch in her breath at his approach. When he stood an arm’s length away, he held out his ungloved hand. Whether she took it or not would be up to her, but if she did, all bets were off. He needed her more than he needed breath in his lungs.

His wife stared at his calloused palm, the seconds trudging on, his pulse drumming in his ears. For a shaky heartbeat, he almost snatched his hand back out of reach. What was he doing? He’d promised himself to stay away and here he was…begging for her touch. He moved to retract his hand, curling his fingers into a fist.

“Wait, don’t,” she whispered.

Curious, he stared at her as she dropped her fan and reticule onto a nearby bench, and then proceeded to unbutton the tiny clasps of her left glove. In a daze, Courtland watched, mesmerized, his breath seizing at the pop of every button, his groin clenching at the inch-by-inch reveal of pale, unblemished skin when the ivory kidskin parted. By the time she finished the first and was done with the second, his entire body was on edge.

“There,” she said, discarding both gloves with the rest of her belongings. “Now that’s better.”

With that, warm fingers slid over his, the bare rasp of skin against skin so erotic that a groan nearly spilled past his lips. She laced their fingers together. Courtland closed his hand around hers and pulled her in, hard enough to feel her intake of breath. “You shouldn’t have done that,” he growled.

“Done what?”

“Undressed.”

“Then don’t let my efforts be in vain.” A wicked smile lit her beautiful face.

It was his turn to be confused. “What do you mean?”

“Follow me and find out, why don’t you?”

His vixen of a wife yanked on his palm, pushed herself to tiptoes, and pressed a cheeky kiss to his mouth before veering off into the depths of the conservatory. Frozen, he stood there for a moment, forgetting to breathe, before touching a finger to his burning lips. Desire burst through him in like a tropical downpour.

Checking that the door to the conservatory was secured from the inside, he made to follow his wife. He knew every inch of the glasshouse like the back of his hand, but she wouldn’t, which meant he had the advantage. At least, so he thought until he came upon something that did not belong in a such a place. An elegant, beaded dancing slipper.

He chuckled. Had she lost her shoe? Again?

Courtland gathered it up, mesmerized by its delicate shape. He smiled as he circled past an ornate trellis that boasted climbing wisteria and miniature roses rising above a multihued flower bed. Thereafter, he discovered a second slipper. Scooping it up, he studied the match to the first. One could be considered lost; two could not be a coincidence.

Unless she’d kicked them off in a hurry to aid in her flight.

It was only when he spotted the next item a few feet away on the ornate paving stones that his throat went properly dry: a lady’s stocking…Ravenna’s stocking. The slippers had been no error, and stockings could not simply come loose on their own, which meant one thing. She had removed them. Purposefully. His devious wife was undressing in the middle of his conservatory. Courtland’s heart hitched, while blood rushed elsewhere.

To his groin, to be precise.

“Ravenna, where are you?” It was a miracle he could even speak.

“Come find me, Duke” came the reply, followed by hushed, decadent laughter. “I seem to have lost my undergarments.”

Arousal spiked, making him grunt.

Devil take it, he now had to be sporting the most obnoxious cockstand in existence. Doubling his speed and attempting not to hobble, he came upon the second silken stocking near a sundial, and then a pair of flimsy petticoats resting on a decorative urn. The overlay of her skirts followed, and at the next turn, the rest of the gown itself.

The discovery of each garment made his breath shorten and his chest tighten. And by the time he discovered the last item—an unlaced lady’s corset—he was so fucking hard it hurt. Because he knew that when he caught her, she would be wearing only a chemise.

The thought demolished him.

Though when he finally came upon her sitting at the edge of the ornate fountain at the far end of the conservatory, her fingers wading in the still waters, Courtland could only stare in captivated silence. He’d thought her a fairy queen before, clad in all her finery, but wearing only her shift, his wife was an otherworldly creature.

Her hair was unpinned, her feet bare. Moonlight danced across the water and limned her shapely form in silver. He could see the outline of one round, luscious breast and the decadent curve of a hip beneath the near transparent lawn. Courtland’s mouth went unspeakably dry.

Her face turned, in profile. “Have you ever seen anything so magical?”

“Not until now,” he replied softly.

She smiled up at him. “You’re only trying to make me feel better as I’ve lost all my clothing.”

“Good thing I’ve found them,” he said, lifting the pile of garments.

“Good thing it’s also rather warm in here.”

“Special heating for the more sensitive plants,” he said. Setting the bundle down on a nearby bench, Courtland approached his nearly naked wife, each step unsure as though she might be easily spooked. “What are we doing here, Ravenna?” he asked quietly, sitting beside her and trying not to react to her distracting state of undress.

“Forgetting. Remembering.”

His brows gathered. “Those are two different things.”

“I want to forget who we are while we’re here and remember who we were on our wedding day on the island.” A pair of beautiful glimmering eyes met his, the honesty in them almost taking him to his knees. “I know how things happened…wasn’t perfect, but well, here we are. Married. You have a wife, and I have a husband.”

“Ravenna.” He sighed.

She reached out to push a curling lock of hair off his brow. “Courtland, can’t we just take this moment for us? Regardless of what the future holds, I want a wedding night. I want the man I married for one night, even if we have to go back to pretending to being strangers.”

He couldn’t move a muscle at her soft touch, though inside every nerve ending came violently alive. He wanted that, too. But he was also afraid of what taking that step meant for both of them. Things would never be the same, no matter their intentions. Intimacy had a way of changing everything, and deep down, Courtland already knew that once he touched her, once would never be enough. Not for either of them.

He rolled his lips between his teeth, his face giving away nothing when she dragged her finger over his cheekbone to cup his jaw, her thumb feathering across his hidden bottom lip. “Let’s pretend that we met each other here in this magical space,” she whispered, pupils wide with pure desire. “No pasts and no futures. A man and a woman. In the now.”

Her words were intoxicating, casting a spell about him, and for once, logic fell to feeling. He didn’t stop to think that they were in a conservatory with a crowded ballroom a few corridors away, and even with a locked door, they could be discovered at any moment.

His wife pulled lightly down on his lip, releasing it from the hold between his teeth and skating over its tingling contours, eyes locked onto the movement of her finger as though she were bewitched, too. Courtland could hardly think, the soft press of her thumb maddening. He wanted to touch his tongue to it, suck it into his mouth, and feast on her flesh.

“Please, Courtland. Give me this.”

The plea was his undoing. He bent toward her at the same time that she slid her fingers around his nape and arched up to him. The meeting of their mouths was hungry, nearly making his eyes roll back in his head as he molded his lips to hers, parting them and delving deep. Her tongue touched his, softly at first and then with more fervor when he growled his approval deep in his throat. Tremor after tremor of pure pleasure slid through him.

How had he kept himself away from such gratification? Kissing Ravenna was like diving from the highest of cliffs and soaring for an eternity before plunging into the balmy depths of a tropical ocean. All consuming, intense, and shattering. Courtland swallowed her moans, delighting in them, and groaned when she tugged at his hair. Breaking the kiss, he nibbled at her lip, kissed down her jaw to her throat, relished the sweetness of her taste, and dragged her body closer, filling his palms with her feminine curves.

He pulled away, staring down into passion-glazed eyes the color of molten copper streaked with gold. “Are you certain this is what you want?”

“More than anything. I’m yours, Courtland.”

Her lips met his again, sealing her words with another torrid kiss. Unable to resist the decadent feel of her, his palm slid up her ribs, the friction of the silky fabric of her chemise over her hot skin making him delirious, until he felt the underslope of her breast. Ravenna flung her head back with a strangled gasp when his thumb grazed over one tight, beaded nipple.

Hell, she was too lovely to be real. His nymph. His queen. His.

Courtland gathered her into his arms and stood easily, taking them both toward the back of the conservatory where a worn chaise lounge was tucked into a nook, hidden in an alcove behind an enormous fern. It used to be one of his favorite places to curl up and read, or hide when he didn’t want to be found. Faint music and lights from the adjacent ballroom filtered through the trees, glittering across the panes and dancing over the glass roof.

He set Ravenna gently down on the embroidered cushions, coasting his palms over her bare ankles and calves, and feeling her eyes holding on to his. Slowly, he sank to his knees in front of her, grasping the seat on either side of her legs. Never one to deny herself, she bent down to steal a kiss from him, eyes bright and eager.

“You have exquisite feet,” he told her in a husky voice, and she bit her lip, releasing a tiny gasp when his big hands skated over the delicate arches. They were so fine-boned and elegant, much like the rest of her. He wanted to kiss them, work his way up every single mouthwatering inch of her endless limbs…chart her with his tongue. He wanted to expose all of that velvety skin to the moonlight. See her for the ethereal sprite she was.

Soon.

On the ocean liner, Ravenna’s long legs had been covered in stockings, but he could recall the beautiful lines of her with precision—her shapely calves, rounded knees, and soft thighs that all led to the warm heart of her. Visions of her coming apart just from the touch of his hands filled his brain. Courtland wanted to see her fall to pieces again and again. His fingers twitched against her skin, his cock straining against his falls.

He loosened the tapes of her drawers, drawing them down over her legs before lifting the hem of her chemise. With every inch of skin he exposed, her breath hitched. His was quick to follow, his heartbeat thudding in his ears. Courtland’s hands trembled as the embroidered edge grazed the tops of her thighs, and then she was completely bared to him. He sucked in a ragged breath at the sight of those slender thighs and the tantalizing V of her groin nestled between them. A fiery thatch of hair greeted his hungry gaze, and a grin broke over his lips.

A huff of laughter had him looking upward. “Don’t you dare,” she warned, mischief and lust warring in her beautiful eyes. She’d been studying him carefully, watching him as he unveiled her, desire burning in that open gaze. A smile played over her lips, too.

“Don’t I dare what?” he asked, his grin widening. “Call you gingersnap?”

A blush tinted her cheeks. “I have no idea why the hair on my head darkened, but that didn’t.”

“I love it,” he said, lifting his hands under her plump bottom. He kneaded the soft globes for a moment before shifting her forward on the seat, and then settled himself between her legs. She fought him when the motion made her knees push outward, exposing her to his gaze.

“What are you doing?” she whispered, eyes going wide when he kissed the inside of her knee.

“Exploring.”

Her breath caught as he trailed his lips upward, wedging his shoulders in between her thighs. Fingers clutched at the seat before coming to rest in his hair. His mouth was watering as her intoxicating scent filled his nostrils. Courtland stared up at his wife, her eyes half-lidded but fixed upon him. Curiosity burned in them, trepidation, too. Once more, he was struck by the opposing counterpoints of her innate sensuality and her obvious inexperience.

“Has anyone ever done this to you before?” he asked.

She blinked, voice hoarse. “Done what?”

“Kissed you.” His fingers skated over her mound. “Here.”

Ravenna shook her head, eyes widening with shock, though the curiosity in them intensified. “Why would anyone want to do such a thing?”

Courtland found himself smiling—another first that would soon be his. “Because it feels good.”

With that, he set his lips to her body. His eyes nearly rolled back in his head at the first silken taste of her, and if he hadn’t been gripping her thighs with his palms, she would have bucked off the chair. Warm color flushed through the skin of her thighs, suffusing her hips and torso. One of his hands drifted up to her belly, stroking gently and holding her in place, before he swiped his tongue from her entrance to the knot of nerves that made her gasp. Courtland barely held back his groan of sublime delight. She tasted better than he’d imagined, the tart sweetness of her bursting on his tongue like fresh, ripe mangoes. One lick and he was lost.

“You’re fucking delicious,” he muttered, inhaling deeply.

She moaned, trembling beneath him, legs falling open in hesitant invitation. He knew what she needed, and he gave it to her, settling down to feast on the banquet in front of him, his tongue gliding hungrily through the hot, wet folds. Within moments, her fingers were yanking at the roots of his hair, and he worked his mouth faster, flicking the bud at the top of her sex. The tightening of her limbs wound more with each stroke, her body reacting beautifully to his ministrations. She was so responsive, he couldn’t help thinking about what it would feel like to be buried inside her. To be joined in such a moment.

Ravenna writhed against his mouth. “Please, Courtland.”

When his finger slid into her sheath, her thighs clamped around his ears, her body shuddering uncontrollably as she cried out and shattered around him. Wringing the last drop of pleasure from her, Courtland climbed up her still quivering body and took her lips in a deep kiss before pulling himself to his feet to shuck out of his coat. He stared down at her, skin rosy and flush from her orgasm, eyes bright and fastened on his.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Looking at you.”

And he was. He could look at her until the end of time and still not have his fill. Half-dressed and mussed, her body still quivering with pleasure beneath that gossamer scrap of a chemise, his wife was the most gorgeous thing he’d ever seen. Everything about her captivated him—her effortless beauty, that smart tongue, her razor-sharp mind, that dauntless spirit. She was twisting him into knots he never wished to escape.

Fuck. She could demolish him without even trying. He stood there uncertainly for a moment, his own arousal coursing through him, but his usual demons were not gone, just momentarily subdued. He would destroy her—destroy that incredible spirit. His unsteady hands stalled on his waistcoat buttons.

Blast, he couldn’t do this.