Page 19 of Duke in Darkness

She had to stop this. Immediately.

Lilian gripped his wrist. “That is sufficient,” she blurted. “I’m ready.”

SUFFICIENT?

Gabriel begged to differ.

Nothing about this damned evening had gone the way he’d hoped. More like the destruction of any last remaining shreds of pride as his lady wife inadvertently said and did everything she could to cool his lust.

And yet it hadn’t cooled. His cock still throbbed beneath the thankfully thick quilted robe. Which just proved how pathetically desperate he was to bed her, to have that intimate connection with another person. But Lilian wasn’t ready, not truly. Even though her clitoris had begun to swell against his thumb, she hadn’t climaxed. And her tight, hot center was slippery only with the oil he’d used, not her own juices. He didn’t even know the color of her nipples, hidden as they were under the godawful nightgown. And yet he did know they were sensitive. Before she’d yanked away from him, the peak had hardened with the barest of touches. Who knew how firm and jutting he could make them with a little stroking and sucking?

Gabriel swallowed a groan. Then there was her cunt, which he’d also only felt rather than seen thanks to the wretched cloth barrier. What shade were the crisp curls that had tickled his fingers? How would the silken, petal-soft folds of her labia, the swollen bud of her clitoris taste when soaked with her arousal? When she finally did reach orgasm, would Lilian be a woman who sighed and arched? Moaned and writhed? Who screamed the house down and shredded the sheets with her fingernails?

At this rate, he would never know the answers to his own questions. Not when his wife could be as changeably hot and cold as a spring day.

“Exton? I am…that is, ah…”

He forced a polite smile. Another thing he would never get used to, the cold impersonality of being referred to by a title. In public, he could understand. But hell, they were in bed. “Of course. Let’s get on with it, then.”

Lilian nodded and shifted her gaze to a spot somewhere across the chamber. God damn it, how, in the face of such reluctance, could he still want her so much?

Moving again on the bed, Gabriel eased himself between her spread thighs and folded her nightgown up out of the way. The curls between her legs were golden, perhaps a few shades darker than her hair, framing a dusky pink cunt and the darker folds of her labia where he’d stroked her.

Hunger, raw and overwhelming, surged through him like a storm. Fortunately, his robe remained belted tightly, if she saw the rest of his horrific scars, or the size of his engorged erection, she would bar him from her chamber forever.

“Must I do something?” Lilian asked suddenly. “To assist? Or should I just lie here? That is what I was told to do. But I don’t know if that is what you wish. I don’t know anything. It is so…so disagreeable not knowing anything.”

Gabriel stilled at the unexpected frustration in her tone. Curiosity at least offered a sliver of hope that in future she might be willing to learn. To experiment. But he didn’t want to overwhelm her this first time, and if his bloody foot began to misbehave and cramp his leg, they would never have a wedding night. Besides the fact that it had been so long since he’d bedded a woman, his cock was practically screaming to get inside her. Hell, the erotic contrast of her half-naked on the bed, from the waist up so prim and proper, and below, her thighs spread and cunt on display like some sort of carnal fallen angel would be etched in his mind forever.

“I’m sure it is,” he said gruffly. “But it will be easier this time, if just me.”

Lilian’s cheeks pinkened, then she took a shuddering breath. “Very well.”

He swallowed. Instinct demanded he mark her as his and fuck her rough and hard and deep. But he couldn’t. He had to be slow and gentle, and take her virginity as quickly and painlessly as possible so she wouldn’t be traumatized by the experience and reject any chance of pleasure in the act. Had he ever actually bedded a virgin? Before Bayonne there had been widows and high-end courtesans aplenty. But he couldn’t recall anyone inexperienced.

Excellent. They both had no bloody idea, then.

Gabriel partially parted his robe and fisted his cock, carefully smoothing the remaining oil over the length as additional lubrication to the moisture dripping from the head. Then he lowered himself down to the bed and braced his weight on knees and one elbow, rubbing his cock against Lilian’s labia, before positioning it at her entrance. “Lilian?”

She nodded, and shut her eyes.

Slowly, so slowly, Gabriel began to penetrate her. He felt her wince of discomfort—she was so damned tight—but he caressed her thigh reassuringly, and continued to inch forward. The sooner he got this part over and done with, the better. His breathing quickened, and perspiration gathered at his temples. Christ. The sensation of her cunt gripping his throbbing cock like a scalding hot glove was incredible. But more than that, knowing he was her first, that she would belong to him in this one special way forever…he’d never felt so primitive in his life. And yet he would cause her pain. Far more than the discomfort she currently felt, as he stretched her with the girth of his cock.

“Sorry,” he gritted out.

Then he thrust hard.

Lilian arched like a bow, briefly pressing a hand to her mouth to muffle a sobbing cry.

Momentum had him instantly buried to the hilt, and while he wanted to pause and allow her to adjust, he couldn’t stop himself moving, greedy for the warmth and exquisite friction of advance and retreat. Yet he wanted to make this good for her.

Changing his angle, he ensured his groin rubbed against her mound on the down stroke, teasing her clitoris again and again. A soft mewling sound escaped Lilian’s mouth, her inner walls rippling around him, before she bit her lip and looked away, as though wishing herself a thousand miles from him.

Don’t turn from me. I’m not a monster, even if I look like one. I’ll make you come. This marriage bed will be good for you, I swear…

The words sat on the tip of his tongue, but then his cock surged again, pushing him past the point of no return. With a groan of dismayed ecstasy, Gabriel climaxed hard, his seed gushing inside her in several wrenching, blissful spurts. He allowed himself one moment of weakness; dropping his forehead onto the pillow next to her, and tentatively pressing his unmarked cheek against the silken softness of hers while he fought to catch his breath.

Touch me.