Voluptuous, page 9
And despite feeling much more comfortable with Oliver now, she still didn’t think she could come right out and tell him she desired him.
But this was ridiculous! Two adult people, married to each other, not expressing physical love. She should march into his room right now and demand her marital rights!
No, she couldn’t do that. If she were wrong and he didn’t want her . . . oh, she’d die of shame and embarrassment. The friendly, cozy fellowship they had between them—the thing that made her happiest—might vanish.
Henrietta went back to her bed but couldn’t find sleep. She’d always tried hard to be content with herself and not to spend too much time longing to be different, but how she wished right now she had been born clever so she could puzzle this out.
She must find a way to sound Oliver out on the subject of copulating with her. But in a safely roundabout manner that couldn’t possibly reveal her true feelings for him.
Could she pretend to sleepwalk into his room one night and get into bed with him? No, after two years of having adjoining bedchambers, he knew she didn’t sleepwalk.
She could ask him to take her somewhere. Cornwall. York. Anywhere. And there might be a crowded coaching inn. And only one room and only one bed. They would have to share, and she would feign sleep and drape herself over him and see what came to pass.
No. Knowing her resourceful and efficient husband, he would find another room, another bed, no matter how full the inn.
If only Oliver were a duke like her father and needed an heir for his title. But even then, Oliver had Nathaniel already. No need for an heir. No need for Henrietta to reproduce.
No. Yes.
Yes, that was it. Because she would like to have babies. It wasn’t a pressing need—not nearly as pressing as her lust for Oliver—but she did want more children in their family someday. Maybe someday was now?
She’d ask him for a child. Not a bedding, but a baby. She’d see what he said.
Having a plan settled her, and she finally slept.
She waited a week. She didn’t want Oliver to make the embarrassing connection between her seeing his phallus and her asking for a baby.
She broached the subject after dinner, in the drawing room, while he read his newspaper and she embroidered.
“I want a child.”
He didn’t say anything for a long time. If it had been anyone else, she would have been worried he was laughing at her behind the newspaper. But not Oliver. She knew he was thinking, considering, weighing.
Finally, he put the newspaper aside and looked at her intently.
First, she was too young. Next, he was too old.
Then, he surprised her by discussing pleasure. She tried to be as honest with him as she could be. But it was all mixed together in her mind. His release. The one she had given herself afterwards. Holding a little baby with dark hair. The dreams she’d had about him for so long.
He promised her he would think on it. She knew he’d come to a decision that was right for him, for her, for Nathaniel. Oh, was it selfish to hope the right decision was the one she wanted?
Probably.
She didn’t have to wait long. When she came back from her morning ride the very next day, he was standing outside the stables. He looked exhausted, as if he hadn’t slept.
“Good morning,” she called out.
“Good morning,” he replied. “I was hoping to speak with you before we break our fast.”
After she had dismounted and left Zephyr in the hands of a groom, she joined him.
“Let’s take a stroll,” he said. “If that’s all right?”
She nodded, and they walked silently next to each other, down the lane.
“I’ve never seen you ride,” he said.
He hadn’t?
“You have a very good seat. But I didn’t expect . . . you ride at quite a fast pace. I didn’t know a draft horse could fly like that.”
“Yes. We love to gallop, and Zephyr is like the wind. That’s how he got his name.”
A pause. “Were you using the saddle you made?”
“Oh, no, that’s . . . no.”
Silence.
“You look tired, Oliver.”
“I have been considering your proposal.”
She had caused those dark circles under his eyes, the deepening of the grooves by the side of his mouth. Oh, how she longed to touch his face with her fingertips and soothe away those lines and shadows.
He went on, his voice somber. “Nathaniel’s mother, she died because— Bearing a child is a dangerous undertaking.”
“Yes, but lots of women have children and survive. My mother, five times. And aren’t most things worth doing also a little dangerous?”
He grimaced. “Like riding your horse so fast?”
Oh, yes. Oliver hated danger. Last month, Nathaniel had gotten it into his head to climb a tree like the caterpillar in her story. She thought he could try the sturdy oak with thick limbs not a yard off the ground, and she was there, ready to give him a boost if needed, ready to catch him. But Oliver had seen and raced from the house and pulled Nathaniel off the tree, scaring the boy.
He hadn’t scolded Henrietta right away, even though she could see he was furious. He had waited until Nathaniel was in the nursery with Nurse Witherspoon, and then the two of them had had a long conversation in his study about what Nathaniel could or couldn’t do. It was the closest thing to an argument they’d ever had.
After Henrietta had explained how young all her brothers and sisters had been when they had started climbing trees, Oliver had relented but said he wanted to have a good talk first with Nathaniel about never climbing anything unless Oliver was there.
“Or me,” Henrietta had said.
He had studied her for several long seconds as if assessing her strength, her agility, her love for Nathaniel, and then said, “Or you.”
But this was not the time to have a conversation about how safe it was for her to ride her horse.
She skirted a rut in the lane and looked across the meadow towards Woldenmere.
“I’m sorry. So sorry for upsetting everything. We can forget I ever said anything.”
“No. I don’t want to forget what you said.”
He spoke as he usually did, with very little emotion, but she knew better than to think he had no feelings on the subject.
“Would you mind terribly being a father again?”
He did not answer for a long time. He looked at the sky.
“Not if you’re the mother.”
She couldn’t help smiling. And despite wanting him to believe she was very much a grown woman and not a girl, she skipped a little, right there in the lane, right next to him.
She didn’t care he might only have been offering a tribute to her as a stepmother. She didn’t even care she still had no idea if he desired her.
She was so happy.
She had given him a way to escape, to retreat, and he hadn’t taken it. Oliver Hartwell, at long last, was going to bed his wife.
Fifteen
Aknock woke her from sleep.
“Come in,” she mumbled.
The door connecting her bedchamber to Oliver’s bedchamber opened. A lamp was lit in his room, and as she squinted into the light, she could see his tall, lean form standing in the doorway.
“Oliver?”
“I’m sorry to have disturbed your sleep. Good night, Henrietta.” The door started to close.
“No!”
If she had not been naked under the sheets, she would have leapt from the bed to drag him into the room.
She had departed the drawing room what must have been hours ago, giving him a hopeful look as she left. Lucy had put her in a nightdress and taken her hair down and plaited it, and once her lady’s maid had bid her goodnight, Henrietta had quickly stripped the nightdress off, shaken loose the plait, given herself a quick wash at the basin, turned the lamp down, and scrambled into bed to wait for Oliver in the dark.
Because when she had asked him for a child yesterday evening, she had also promised him the dark, hadn’t she? Even though she was dying to look at him. So she mustn’t put him off now with her flesh. She mustn’t remind him she wasn’t small and delicate like his previous wives. That might spoil everything.
“Please, Oliver.” She tried to keep desperation out of her voice. “I’m not asleep. Well, I drifted off a bit, waiting for you, but I’m awake now. See?”
The door stayed half-closed. “Yes.”
“Please, let’s get this over with. I’m awfully anxious.”
An odd, strangled noise came from the doorway. Had he laughed?
“Only you could be awfully anxious and still fall asleep.”
Oh. Oh. How delightful. She rubbed her toes together under the bedclothes in a little dance of joy. Her serious husband had teased her.
“You know me.” She’d meant to say it in a friendly way, but it came out as an almost-seductive purr.
He cleared his throat. “Forgive me. I’m very nervous myself.”
Oliver was nervous? Even though he had done this before?
“Don’t be nervous. It’s just me, after all.”
Another strange noise came from him. Oh, no. Was he going to flee?
“Please, come in. Won’t you? Please?”
At first, his silhouette did not move. Then there was a step, and the light behind him winked out as the door closed, and they were in the dark together.
She got up on her elbows. “You’ll have to tell me if I do something wrong. I’m not the most clever, as you know, and I don’t want to . . . I mean, I want you to enjoy it.”
“You’re very clever. And I should be the one trying to make sure you enjoy it.”
How sweet he was being. She swallowed. “I’m sure I’ll like anything you do.”
“I am . . . not sure you will.”
“I liked your kiss,” she said boldly.
He said nothing.
“The kiss you gave me? In my father’s study?”
“I remember.”
She waited as long as she could. Many seconds. “So, are you going to come into the bed?”
“Yes.”
Rustling followed, and she cursed the darkness, longing to light a candle. She wanted to watch her husband undress, see those long limbs in all their glory. See his skin. See his member again and find out if he was aroused as he had been when she had seen it before.
The mattress dipped as he slipped in under the sheet and counterpane, carefully keeping to the other side of the bed, not touching her, not even accidentally.
She smelled something familiar.
“I’ve always wondered,” she said.
“What?”
“That kiss . . . your mouth tasted of . . . well, I’ve never had whisky, but I’ve smelled it on my father’s breath before. Had you drunk some whisky that night you kissed me?”
“Yes.”
“Did you drink some tonight?”
“One glass. I thought it might help my nerves.”
“Has it?”
“I think I might still be downstairs if not for the whisky.”
She turned on her side, towards him, wanting to touch him so badly. “Perhaps you should have drunk more than one glass.”
“Whisky can impede . . . performance.”
“Is that true for women?”
“There’s no question of performance for women, is there?”
She lifted her shoulders, even though he could not possibly see her shrug in the dark. “I don’t know. I don’t even really understand what you mean by performance. Isn’t it something we’re meant to do together?”
He coughed. “You are experienced.”
It wasn’t a question.
“What?” she choked out.
“Last night, when you asked for a child, you said women can have pleasure during the act. And I thought—”
“You thought I had . . . ?”
“Haven’t you?”
She fought against her tears with a rare burst of temper. “I have had one experience with a man. One. My husband kissed me in my father’s study. Of course, he wasn’t my husband then. I suppose that makes me a wanton.”
Then she did cry. Oh, no. She had been on the brink of having physical intimacy with Oliver, and she had ruined it.
Or maybe not.
He gathered her to him. At first, she didn’t notice he was wearing a shirt as he put those heavenly forearms around her, pressed her into his chest, and said, “Forgive me. I’m a fool.”
But after several sobs, she didn’t like the scratch of the linen against her face, the fact her bare breasts were not against his skin. His clothing was as offensive to her as his presumption she was not a virgin.
“You’re wearing a shirt,” she said through her tears.
“I . . . I didn’t know what you would want.”
“I’m naked.”
He didn’t speak for a while. “I know. That. Now.” His voice was as strangled and raspy as it had been after he had spent by his own hand.
She snuffled. “Can you be naked, too?”
“As you wish.”
He released her and there was a whiffle through the air and when he put his arms around her again, her cheek settled against hot skin covered with hair. Hair on his chest. Mmmmm.
“That’s so much better, Oliver.”
He said nothing, so she nuzzled her face into his chest and dared to kiss him there. Under her lips, she could feel his heart beating almost as rapidly as hers was.
“There’s something you should know,” he said.
Mmmmm. His skin tasted as good as it smelled. She kissed his chest again.
“I . . . neither of my . . . I am not . . . don’t worry, I should be able to impregnate you, it should be no problem whatsoever, but I am almost certain you will not enjoy it.”
She stopped kissing his chest. “I’m enjoying this. You holding me. Kissing your skin.”
“About that . . .”
“Yes?”
“I think I had better perform my duty now.”
That must be his way of saying he didn’t enjoy the holding and the kissing. She’d have to learn what he liked in this, just as she had with other parts of their life together.
She rolled onto her back.
“All right,” she said. “I’m ready.”
The devil take him, he should have drunk the whole damn bottle of whisky. He was brimming, on the verge of coming, and he hadn’t even let his cock touch her, angling his lower half away from her as he held her gorgeous body.
If he didn’t use every ounce of restraint he possessed, he would spill outside of her and she wouldn’t get the baby she wanted. But Henrietta was accommodating, willing to go along with his undue haste.
He felt he should warn her. “There can be pain.”
“Yes, I know. My mother told me a great deal about it all. Everything.”
Her mother. Of course, Georgiana would educate her daughters. Oliver should never have supposed Henrietta had already experienced copulation. Yet another regret in a long line of his regrettable actions towards her.
And the duchess was probably the one to mislead Henrietta about pleasure during the act. Oliver knew from hints Crispin had dropped over the last two decades that he and Georgiana had the vanishingly rare experience of sharing a fervent and mutual desire in their marriage bed.
“But the pain has to do with breaking something, doesn’t it?” Henrietta asked. “I ride so much, surely I’m already broken?”
He had not thought of that. Maybe this would be less uncomfortable for her than it had been for Violet who had screamed curses at him the first time or Emily who had cried silently.
He moved towards her under the sheet and got on his knees.
He could actually hear her swallow before she whispered, “What should I do?”
“Can you spread your legs?”
Obediently, she slid her legs apart, and he moved his knees into the gap she had created on the mattress. He leaned down and put a hand flat on either side of her. The wet tip of his cock brushed against the soft skin of her belly, and he hissed.
“Sorry,” he said just as she said, “Are you all right?”and lifted her head and knocked her forehead against his.
If only he were the type who could laugh at their mutual clumsiness and assure her everything was fine.
But he wasn’t. And damn it, he did not think he could afford to delay any longer. Still hovering over her, he took one hand and held his cock and tried to find her entrance.
“Oh,” she said and sucked in a breath. “That’s lovely.” She wriggled just a little. “You touching me there.”
It was more than lovely. It was tremendous, tantalizing, titillating to brush his fingers and the head of his cock over her heated lips and their soft wisps of hair. And deeper in, she was wet in her delicate folds and not just from his own persistent dribble.
“May I?” he said through clenched teeth.
“Yes. Please.”
He put the head of his cock just barely inside her. God, he was close.
“Is that all right?” he gasped out.
Her hands came up and rested on his shoulders. “Anything you do is all right, Oliver.”
That wasn’t true. That had never been true. Nevertheless, he slowly pressed into her. Her sex was ungodly hot and tight, gripping him.
She made a little sound.
“Am I hurting you?”
“Yes, I mean, it’s a full feeling. But, please, don’t stop.” Her hands moved from his shoulders to his upper arms. “Please.”
He slid in farther, clenching his buttocks in the hopes that would keep him from release.
“Yes,” she said.
Another inch from him. Oh, my God. And then another, and another, and another and suddenly he was totally seated in her, totally surrounded by her.
“Is that it?” she said, her voice a little strained. “Is it over?”
Almost, he wanted to say. Instead, he ground out, “I’m going to pull back and push in again.”
Her hands tightened on his arms. “You have to start again? I did something wrong.”
