She chuckled and arched round to brush a soft kiss to his lips. “I am all anticipation, sir.”
He lingered for a deeper kiss, tipping up her head and threading his fingers into the thick cluster of silken ringlets on her crown. Elizabeth felt a prickle race along her skin as pins began to fall.
She groaned her delight as he teased and tempted, and then gasped in startled pleasure when his other hand began to stroke and explore over her silken nightgown. A moment later, her hair had been fully loosed, and he slipped an arm behind her back to lift her.
He laid her out upon the bed, pausing for a moment to admire her in all her sultry innocence, then stretched his body beside her. “Elizabeth!” he moaned hoarsely, then captured her lips. One hand stroked over her body, kindling shared desire until he caught his breath and hooked her knee, shifting his weight fully upon her and pressing intimately to her centre.
Elizabeth cast her head back, arching to his touch and meeting each eager pitch of his body as he kissed her exposed skin. She had known it would be something like this—giving herself freely to the ardour of her beloved, cradling his body to her own and bearing, for these few delicious moments, both the exultant pain and searing pleasure of his passion. She would pass through the flame, would offer to him the very essence of herself, and would rest in his embrace—changed, and forever his.
A deep, almost feral growl rumbled through his chest, and he coaxed her to raise herself slightly, then her gown slipped over her head. She closed her eyes, resting back against his forearm and waiting for the hot brush of his mouth over her skin, but he had gone still. She blinked.
He was gazing lovingly over her form, his eyes brimming with feeling and his breath halting. “Elizabeth,” he whispered, as his fingers burned their first, ardent path over her untouched flesh. “Tell me again that I am not dreaming—that this is real. Tell me that I am truly yours, and that when I awake, you will be here. Let it not be sorrow I shall face by the light of day! Let me not love you only in my dreams.”
She slid her hand up his chest, then beneath the collar of his night shirt, pulling him down near her. “Those dreams, William, they are another life. This life, the real one, I was meant to live with you. Even when torn from you, I could only be yours. So long as I have life in my heart, it beats for you, and so long as my eyes can see, they will search for you. I let you go once, and spent a year lost and alone. I shall never lose my life again to the cold! Nothing will ever take me from your arms, my love.”
He wrapped her up in his embrace and burrowed his face in her hair, then clasped her to his heart as he trembled with supplanted grief. Tears of blessing and peace filled his eyes, and he kissed her tenderly. “Elizabeth,” he murmured, “this is not right. One moment, my love.” He slipped from the bed, his fingers grazing her sensitive thigh as he moved from her.
Elizabeth lay back and closed her eyes. Whatever he was about, she would know soon. She heard the shimmer of fabric, then the room dimmed as one candle, then another, and another were snuffed. She opened her eyes to utter darkness. There was only the distant sound of a faint breeze whispering through the trees behind the townhouse, but a moment later, that too was silenced as he closed the window. Then there was only him, the warmth of his body, the flush of his breath, the scent of his hair and the thrill of his skin—all of him, touching and caressing and claiming her as his own.
She knew his desire, sensed how to give of herself. She offered him sweet surrender, but before he accepted, he rolled to his back and drew her to his chest. With one hand, he slid a coverlet over her for warmth, and with the other, he teased her hair to fall all round their faces, enveloping them in an intimate cocoon.
Elizabeth stiffened hesitantly. “William, are you certain?”
He slid his hands possessively over her curves. “This is as it should be, Elizabeth. Only you, here to sustain me. I have no need for light, or sound, or even for air, for you are my very breath and pulse. My bed was once my prison, but now it shall be my sanctuary. Love me, Elizabeth, and I shall dream of you to the end of my days.”
And she did.
Epilogue
Pemberley
One Year Later
FitzwilliamDarcyfondlycaressedthe dark curls of his son’s head. The boy slept soundly, his cherubic lips sucking faintly in dreams. That mouth, it was his, as were the thick curls and the brooding forehead, but young Richard’s eyes, when they were opened, belonged entirely to his mother.
“William! There you are, my love. I thought you would be downstairs already.”
He did not turn, but he looped his arm back to capture his wife and draw her near to their son’s cradle. She came willingly, although not without a teasing accusation of brutish handling. He tugged her close and rested his chin on her head as they gazed in rapt admiration upon their child.
“He has grown so already!” Elizabeth lamented. “I shall have to have another soon, for it has only been a month, yet my lap is not quite large enough for him.”
“Mine is large enough for the both of you. Would you care to see?”
“Perhaps later,” she lovingly squeezed his shoulder. “Our final guests have been sighted, and Georgiana is absolutely demanding that you receive them properly.”
“I presume, then, that we do not have time for you to…” he grinned, and there was a mischievous twinkle in his eye, “…straighten my cravat?”
“Not if you wish to preserve your dignity. Georgiana would not be above searching the house for you.”
“It was a noble cause, even if thwarted,” he sighed.
“Come, William, it is your house party, after all. I think we should make this a summer tradition, but no one will return next year if you do not trouble yourself to greet them.”
“And if I show myself too amiable, I shall be over-run with guests.”
“Oh! How you tease me, sir! Have you no compassion for my poor nerves?”
“I thought your parents had remained in Hertfordshire,” he arched a dry brow.
