Victoria lay her head against Robert’s chest, her fingers twisted into the folds of his jacket. Before marriage, she’d never understood why sane women would let rogues seduce them, but these intimate moments with her husband had given her blinding clarity. Because any sane woman who didn’t allow a man to love her body the way Robert did was a damn fool.
“Tell me you like this, that I make it good for you,” he whispered.
Good. Was he in jest? The man was a master at the art of making love. “Yes.”
He wrapped his arms around her and thrust up hard. As his cock brushed against her sensitive bud, Victoria drew ever closer to coming apart.
His long, deep strokes gentled and slowed. He’d already learned her body well enough that when she was this close to her climax, he could read the signals. Every fiber of her being was hardwired to him, to receiving pleasure from this man.
She lifted her gaze and met his pale blue gray eyes. They shone with the promise of forever. “Tell me, Victoria, how close are you? I want to be with you at the exact moment you reach your crisis.”
Close. So close she didn’t know how to put what she felt into words. Victoria swallowed deep. “I…I…”
He let out a low groan. “That close? Good, because I’m not sure how much longer I can keep my passion at bay. I need to have you.”
His words and one last delicious stroke sent her plummeting over the edge. Their gazes remained locked as Victoria cried out and her whole body shook with pleasure.
“Keep looking at me,” he commanded, stroking her through her orgasm. “Take everything you need. Let me give you it all.”
It took a long minute for her head to slowly clear, for the haze of her desire to release its hold. Victoria blinked. “I am yours. Claim everything that is yours. Everything I can give you Robert, even my soul.”
He stole her lips in a fiery kiss, plundering her mouth as he thrust hard and deep into her body. His hands dug into her hips, gripping tight. She would have bruises tomorrow, but today she wanted to give Robert what he craved. For him to have and hold.
“And to think I thought you were such a straight-laced little miss when we first met. When in truth underneath all that haughty manner was a fiery minx.”
His thrusts grew harder, stronger. The pots on the bench rattled. One tipped to the floor, smashing to pieces as it hit the ground. A second quickly followed.
“Robert,” she moaned.
He slammed in deep one last time then stilled. His chest rose and fell as he sucked in a hard breath, then another.
“Remind me to clear things out of the way next time I have you in here.”
Robert’s sex-ruffled voice was full of promise. This would not be the last time her husband would claim his marital rights in the garden shed.
She snorted. “Yes, saffron is far too expensive to waste.”
But every moment with him was fast becoming priceless.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Victoria woke in the middle of the night and reached for Robert. Her fingers touched empty sheets. She waited for a few minutes, thinking perhaps he had gone into the washroom, but when he didn’t return, she sat up and lit the bedside candle.
They had been at Tolley Manor for four, almost five days, and every night it had been the same. She’d stirred from deep slumber in the early hours and found him gone. The first couple of nights, she’d been too tired to do anything about it, and had fallen back to sleep. Robert was a devil in the bedroom and when he was done with her, she was left sated and utterly exhausted.
He always returned before the dawn, often waking her with his kisses and demanding male needs, but she still wondered where he went.
Tonight, when she had woken, Victoria couldn’t go back to sleep. Where on earth did Robert go in the middle of the night? Victoria glanced at the door, as a sense of unease grew in her mind.
Was he having sex with one of the servants? He wouldn’t be the first nobleman to keep a wife and a mistress under his roof.Maybe that’s why he hadn’t bothered to seek out a wife until now.
Her instincts told her she was wrong, that he wasn’t the sort of man to do that. Then again, they hadn’t been wed all that long. It would be the ultimate irony if she had passed up all those other nobles only to find herself married to a serial adulterer.
But Victoria was her mother’s daughter. She wasn’t going to lay here in willful ignorance. She placed her hand flat on his side of the bed—the sheets were still warm.
He can’t have gone too far.
Throwing back the bedclothes, Victoria hurried to the armoire and pulled out some clothes. Quickly dressing, she grabbed one of Robert’s coats from his wardrobe and put it on. It swam on her, but with the belt secured tightly at the waist she was able to lift the coat up and avoid standing on the hem.
