Rules for Heiresses by Amalie Howard

Fourteen

Ravenna saw the doubt and the unworthiness start to creep in like the poisons they were. She would not have it, not now, not when this was the most unguarded and open she’d ever seen him. Not now, when he was real. Pushing up to her elbows, uncaring of her own nudity, her gaze held him. “Stay with me.”

Panicked dark eyes shot to hers, nostrils flaring. “I—”

“No, stop. You promised me one night. No dukes, no heiresses. Just you and me. Are you so faithless as to renege on your word?”

“Promise me you won’t want more than this, Ravenna.” His voice was tortured. “I couldn’t bear disappointing you. Can you do that?”

“Fine.”

Clearly torn, he let out a breath. “I don’t want to hurt you when this is over.”

“You won’t. Now strip, lover.”

She hoped. Deep down, though, Ravenna had the feeling that a man as closed off as he was would hurt her without even knowing it. The fortress that surrounded his heart would not let anyone get too close. Not even his wife. But if she wanted him—and she did—she would simply have to separate the two…the physical desire from the emotional attachment. Not insurmountable, but not easy either.

This was about pleasure, not intimacy.

Ravenna adjusted herself and crossed her bare legs, seeing his hungry gaze instantly go to them. The pose was provocative, though she hadn’t meant it to be. Notwithstanding the fact that she was nearly naked in a location that was not a private bedchamber and a man who had just pleasured her to infinity was staring down at her like she was his last meal, a beat of shyness pulsed through her. She almost giggled. Said man had just spent a great deal of time lodged between her thighs, his sinful mouth pressed to her most intimate place, devouring his fill.

At this point, modesty was laughable.

A devious smile curled her lips as she remembered what the boatswains on the clipper had said about mouths going there. It had seemed shocking, unpleasant even, but disgust had been the last thing on her mind in the moment. No, her mind had been teetering on the knife edge of pleasure until Courtland’s sleek tongue had hurled her off into the abyss.

Summoning her inner temptress, Ravenna peered up at him, bringing a knuckle up to her lower lip and brushing it back and forth. An obsidian gaze lifted to fix on the movement. “One would think a man of your considerable…acumen could follow simple instruction.” Her hand drifted down toward the ribbon at her throat, and his hot stare followed the teasing path of her fingers. “Do I need to resort to more overt tactics?”

Ravenna lifted her upper body off the bench, and in one swoop, tugged the fine lawn of her chemise off her shoulders. She resisted the natural urge to cover herself and, instead, stretched like a contented kitten. She felt herself heat from the force of the gaze snapping to her exposed breasts, but not with embarrassment. With pleasure. The way he looked at her was the exact opposite of apathy.

The growl ripping from his chest urged her on. Her palm skated across her stomach, inching up in slow, torturous strokes to the underside of her breast. With each ragged heartbeat that threatened to punch through her ribs, she felt his resolve lessen, saw the smoldering lust in his eyes rise. She gasped as her knuckles grazed over a taut nipple.

“Will you make me beg, Courtland?” she whispered.

It broke the spell holding him in thrall.

Within seconds, the buttons from the waistcoat scattered on the flagstones in his haste to get it off. A ripping sound followed, the cravat torn from his neck, before his trousers were shoved down and his shirt yanked over his head. Within seconds, the duke was as bare as he was born, and she’d never seen a more heart-palpitating, lip-smacking sight in all her life. She had to remind herself to breathe.

Because the man was magnificent.

Ravenna had seen countless other men shirtless and pantless before. One could not live on a ship with dozens of sailors without being exposed to bare chests and random sightings of a bare arse or two, but none of those men had been built like this. None of them had ever made her feel such uncontrollable yearnings, such bone-deep desire. She wanted to leap up and bear her prize to the floor, staking her claim over that splendidly sculpted body like a lioness on the prowl.

“Still wish to beg, Duchess?”

Registering the smirk on his lips, she wanted to retort with some smart response, but instead, she went with the truth. “I’m way past begging now. We’re into the part where pouncing and having my wicked way with you seems more fitting.”

His deep rumble of laughter was music to her ears. Ravenna lifted her eyes to his, seeing his soft expression. She couldn’t have been more obvious if she’d licked her lips and wiped her mouth with a napkin. He had to know how attractive he was. Had other women seen him thus? She ignored the spike of jealousy that lanced through her. He was a man, and given his stellar performance earlier, was not lacking in either experience or skill.

“Do you often get this reaction from women?” she teased.

“I’ve not had complaints.”

He wouldn’t. Her duke fairly emanated masculinity. The teasing hints of the strong body she’d glimpsed and felt while massaging him in his study had in no way prepared her for the banquet of sumptuous male flesh displayed in front of her now. She wanted to freeze this moment so she could examine his physique from every possible angle at her leisure.

Muscles upon muscles rippled from the top of his deeply bronzed chest down the stacked, ridged plains of his stomach. Crisp black hair curled over the top half, narrowing to a thin line at the start of his corrugated stomach and arrowing down, down, down. She hadn’t wanted to gawk before, but she could hardly stop herself now. Breath and good sense deserted her.

Thatpart matched the rest of him.

Long, thickly formed, and just as hard. She forced herself to take in his well-built legs below, though her eyes flicked back upward to the thatch of black hair at his groin and the mesmerizing piece of him that most interested her. Despite her own inexperience, thanks to her scandalous adventures on the high seas, she had a general idea of what parts went where.

According to chatter she’d overheard on the ship, a man’s tallywag, prick, or broomstick was meant to enter a woman’s lucky bag, prat, or cunny. She’d reddened and chortled at the scandalous names of the sex organs as well as the act itself: a bit of business, charver, swive, dip one’s wick, and her personal favorite, horizontal refreshment. Heat and lust sizzled through her, a hysterical giggle breaching her lips.

“What’s so amusing?” he asked.

Ravenna had a feeling that if she told him what she had overheard from the boatswains, it would not be as hilarious to him as it was to her. Biting her lip, she blushed. She really had no idea how Courtland was going to get that monster into her body. “You’re rather well endowed.”

“You can take me,” he said, which made her only want to giggle more.

Courtland knelt, one knee bracing on the edge of the chaise, and all amusement fled from her as his tall frame came to hover over hers. His mouth lowered and claimed hers in a hot kiss, and for a moment, Ravenna was lost in sensation as his lips glided over hers.

The man knew how to kiss. His tongue speared into her mouth, tangling with hers, licking at her like he couldn’t get enough of her taste. She couldn’t get enough of his! Brandy and darkness and utter sin. Pleasure flooded her nerve endings as his mouth left hers to trail down her neck. He sucked at the spot where her collarbone met her throat, making her moan and arch backward, thrusting her pelvis up into his hips. The searing contact of his hard sex to her inner thigh nearly made her stiffen, but then the brush of his lips over her breast made her forget everything but the hot, wet seal of his mouth closing over her nipple.

Gracious, she nearly came off the chaise when he sucked, his hot tongue lapping around the beaded tip. Wanton heat streaked through her all the way down to her core, throbbing between her legs and making her ache to be filled. Ravenna had never imagined such sensations…that a man’s mouth on her breasts could provoke such intense ribbons of need. Not any man’s mouth.

Courtland’s. Her husband’s.

No other man had ever deconstructed her to this raw, carnal version of herself, transformed by his touch alone. She’d never let one get so close. Was this what Clara had meant when she vowed that Ravenna would one day find her match? That she would desire him in a way that was obscene, that went beyond anything she’d ever felt for anyone? Was this passion or was it something more? In truth, she feared the answer. Lust was acceptable. Anything else was…not.

She could not, would not, lose her heart to this man. It would be pure folly.

Ignoring her thoughts, she focused on the pleasure at hand.

And there was so much of it!

Courtland lavished her other breast, alternating between bites that made her toes curl and deep drugging sucks that she felt throb between her legs, until she was a roiling mess of want. Not one to lie idle, she wrapped her leg around his thickly muscled calf, digging her heel in to find purchase, to get more of the delicious friction she craved at her core. Her fingers scoured his hard back, the bunched strength there a testament to how careful he was being with her. Though she was not a small woman, a man of his size could crush her easily.

His mouth moved down her belly and she moaned, her body turning to cinders under his careful attentions. Courtland’s hands roamed the rest of her—skimming her ribs, cupping her bottom, squeezing her hips—before landing at the drenched heart of her. If she had two thoughts to rub together, she’d probably be mortified at how wet she was, but she didn’t care. Ravenna rolled her hips, seeking his fingers.

“Touch me,” she moaned.

“Touch you where?” he said, glancing up at her from where he nipped at her navel, gray eyes almost black with passion. His fingers skimmed her inner thigh. “Here?” They lifted to her crease, teasing the curls soaked with her arousal. “Here?” Then, they reached down, sliding through her folds. “Or, here?”

With each teasing here, his voice grew huskier, and she grew bolder. With a wicked grin, her other leg wrapped around him and she rolled her hips up, gasping as his knuckles rubbed right against the center of her pleasure. “There.”

Rocking against his hand and taking what she needed without shame, it took mere seconds for her vision to go white. Her body seized and bliss tore through her like wildfire. His mouth came up to swallow her cries, his talented fingers drawing every quake, every decadent ripple of her orgasm to its breath-stealing end. A moment passed before she realized that Courtland’s hands were now gripping her hips and the thick part of him grinding against her sex was no longer his fingers.

It made her burn hotter.

“Courtland, now,” she commanded against his lips, needing him to fill her.

“Demanding little thing, aren’t you?”

“I know what I want.”

He gave it to her, sliding home with one hard, slick thrust.

* * *

Ravenna went still beneath him, a sharp cry breaching her lips. Courtland forced himself not to move, to give her time to adjust. She was so fucking tight, he could barely move. He glanced down, seeing her mouth parted on a gasp, those pretty eyes glimmering with a hint of pain.

“I’ve never felt so full in my life.” She broke off, eyes closing with mortification. “It’s too much.”

“Take a moment to breathe,” he said through clenched teeth. Hell, she was a virgin?

A puff of laughter left her lips. “As if I could possibly fit anything more into me.”

Her body tightened with the fervor of her words, and Courtland nearly spent then and there as her tight sheath clenched down upon him. He gritted his teeth, fighting for control. Being inside her was every bit as transcendent as he’d imagined it to be. “I should have taken more care.”

She sniffed and met his gaze, her hips canting slightly as she adjusted her position. “It was more of a pinch than pain. I expected it to hurt the first time.”

Courtland flinched. God, he was a thoughtless boor. He should have guessed, despite her confident command, and instead of going slowly, he’d rutted into her like an animal.

“Don’t,” she said.

He frowned. “Don’t what?”

“Do whatever it is you’re doing in that head of yours,” Ravenna said. “It was my choice. I wanted this, and the truth is if you had known, you probably wouldn’t have done it.”

She wasn’t wrong there—virtue was valued in their world—but she was also right in that it’d been her choice to make. Courtland was not of the opinion that a man should have any sway over a woman’s body, unless it was by her express wish.

“How do you feel now?”

“Better.” Her eyes dilated when he flexed slightly, not enough to move but enough for her to feel his fully seated length. She moaned. “Do that again. Now, Courtland.”

He grunted. “Who knew my wife was such a tyrant in the bedroom? I was promised obedient and demure.”

“We’re not in a bedroom, and whoever told you that was a fibber.”

Blushing wildly, she stuck out her tongue and he captured it with his mouth, making her gasp as the movement drove his body deeper into hers. Courtland claimed her lips, sucking and nibbling, showing her with his tongue exactly what he wanted to do to her body. Soon, she was kissing him back and jerking her hips in needy little pulses.

He rolled her nipples between his fingers, causing her to writhe beneath him. Leaving the haven of her lips, he suckled her breasts until her body undulated against his in a sensual roll, letting him know without words what she wanted. That she craved more.

“Do you wish me to move?” he asked with a tilt of his hips, his voice tight.

“It feels like I’ll die if you don’t.”

He knew exactly what she meant. Moving as slowly as possible, he withdrew so that only the tip of him rested in her channel and then pushed back in. Her eyelashes fluttered closed on a sigh when he repeated the motion. “All right, love?”

Her fingers dug into his flesh. “Faster.”

“As my duchess commands,” he said and then groaned the moment he quickened his movements. There was no way he was going to last, not with how deliciously tight she was. With each drag, the pressure built. He found her lips again, making love to them as fervently as he was elsewhere. He couldn’t get enough of her taste. Or the feel of her. Her untried inner muscles gripped him, cradled him, and Courtland’s eyes drifted closed in utter pleasure from the torturous friction. She felt perfect, as if her body had been made for his.

This felt like home.

On the thought, he stilled for a moment, but he wasn’t going to explore its deeper meaning right now. He was going to give Ravenna—and himself—this stolen pleasure. Tomorrow would be soon enough to move forward with the future of freedom from him that he had promised himself he’d grant her.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

His eyes flashed open. “Nothing. Why do you ask?”

“You looked like you were in pain.”

Courtland forced a smile to his lips, unnerved at how easily she seemed to be able to read him, even in the midst of passion. “Far from it.”

“Then be here,” she whispered, reaching up a hand to cup his jaw. “Be here with me in this moment. At least give me that, Courtland, if nothing else. Let me see you, please.”

He didn’t know what she was asking. He didn’t want to know, but the look in her eyes gripped him as tightly as her body did. He quickened his strokes, feeling the heat building between them, watching her eyes dilate and her mouth part when the hair on his chest abraded her sensitive nipples. Moaning, she arched wantonly against him. Within a handful of heartbeats, he was close to the edge.

She was, too, if her flushed face and shallow pants were any indication. Her eyes still had not released his, forcing their joining to something much deeper than he’d ever experienced with any other woman. It unsettled him, and yet, he could not release her gaze.

“Courtland, I’m close,” she whispered.

He reached a hand between them, pressing at the bundle of nerves at the top of her sex and felt her stiffen beneath him. With a low cry, her entire body jerked as she shuddered, and then convulsed gloriously all around him. It was the most magnificent thing he’d ever seen. For a breath, Courtland reveled in her beauty, the gorgeous flush of color that suffused her pale skin while the tide of her orgasm dragged her under. Lost to passion, his wife was the most stunning woman on earth. This moment would be etched into his memory for the rest of time.

One more deep thrust and he felt his own paroxysm gathering upon him. Courtland withdrew from the haven of her body, pleasure convalescing at the base of his spine and making him see stars as he spilled his hot seed onto her belly. With a growl of masculine satisfaction, he collapsed on top of her, breathing hard. He lay against her, gathering his breath, his wits, and his scattered thoughts.

“Am I crushing you?” he asked when he could speak, shifting his weight a little to the side.

She shook her head. “Why did you—” She broke off, her cheeks red. “Do that?”

“Do what?”

“Spend outside of me,” she said in a rush.

Reality was quick to return, along with all the feelings of who he was and everything he did not want or deserve in this life, one of which was children. “To prevent conception.”

“You don’t want an heir?” she asked, her face instantly shuttering.

“I already have one,” he said, sitting up and reaching for his handkerchief, which he used to mop up the stickiness between them. A pink smear of blood lay on her thighs and on his staff.

“Who?”

Courtland did not meet her eyes as he cleaned them both, knowing what he would see there. Hurt, disappointment, anger. Maybe all three. They had never discussed children—having them or not having them. But he supposed she should know his position on the matter. “All of this,”—he waved an arm—“is a means to an end. For you, for my sisters. Stinson is next in line, and when I die, as my living heir, he will finally get what he has always coveted.”

He reached for his clothing, standing to draw on his trousers and then his shirt. Ravenna pulled her chemise over her head. They dressed in silence, him finishing much faster than her. When he offered to help with fastening her corset, she declined pointing out the ingenious side closures, so he watched while she put herself to rights: undergarments, petticoats, stays, and lastly, her gown. The sight of her dressing was almost as provocative as the undressing, and he felt his sated cock stir when Ravenna slid on her stockings and retied her garters.

“What about what I want?” she asked, smoothing her fingers through her short mess of curls and repinning the pins that had fallen out.

“When this is over, you can do as you like.”

Her gasp was loud in the wake of his cruel words, and Courtland felt the rage in her stare as she turned to face him. “We are married, Your Grace. I do not plan to bring any children born on the other side of the blanket into the world.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

She stepped closer. “Then what did you mean?”

“I meant to speak to you sooner about this. About us.” Courtland let out a frustrated breath, meeting her furious eyes. “I supposed there’s no better time than the present, but once my sisters are settled, there will be no need for this pretense to continue. I’ll be returning to Antigua, but I’ll grant you a divorce under any grounds you wish. Adultery, excessive cruelty, I don’t care.”

“A divorce?” Her reply was barely audible.

“Yes. You deserve to be happy, Ravenna. I am not the man to give you the future that you deserve, trust me on that.” He shook his head, gesturing to the chaise lounge where they’d coupled, regret pervading him. “I knew we shouldn’t even have done this. Sex needlessly complicates things.”

She glared at him. “Every time we take a step forward, you insist on taking a hundred back. Well, you know what? You can take you, your divorce, and your needless complications right to hell.”

There was no warning before her fist cracked into his jaw, nearly slinging his head sideways. Courtland had three consecutive thoughts before his wife stormed off and left him in the darkened conservatory.

One, his wife threw a mean punch.

Two, clearly, she wasn’t keen on divorce.

And three, if he’d wanted to make her hate him, he’d well and truly succeeded.