AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘I did not know you had returned. I realised I could not make love with Henry.’
‘Why ever not? He’s a pleasant, handsome, upstanding young man about to leave the country for good. He sounds perfect to me. What did your sensitive conscience find to object to this time?’
‘Because he is not you!’ she flared, batting away his hand, turning to run. If she reached the hallway he would not, could not, follow. Not without making a compromising scene in front of his staff.
It took one stride for him to catch her, spin her round again. Gray held her, his hands cupped around each shoulder.
He isn’t holding tight. I could twist away, free myself.
Then Gaby looked properly into his face, into his eyes. The hands that curved around her shook slightly.
‘Gray? What is wrong? You look—’
‘I have been down into hell,’ he said flatly, as though he was reporting visiting Richmond. ‘Into hell.’ His eyes were dark with remembered pain, the purple smudges under his eyes were more than tiredness. He had been gone only a few days and yet she could swear he had lost weight.
‘Tell me.’ Gaby moved forward, lifted her hands to his face, her fingertips on the thin skin of his temples, where the blood beat in the vein, blue under the skin.
‘My son. He had a fall, knocked his head. He wouldn’t wake. We thought—’
‘No,’ she whispered.
‘No,’ he agreed. ‘He recovered consciousness the day after I reached home. He doesn’t remember the accident, but he is all right.’ His arms closed round her and she realised his entire body was shaking, a fine tremor, almost imperceptible. Nerves and endurance stretched almost to breaking point. ‘Perfectly all right. Talking and walking and wanting to play.’
‘But you are here.’ Her voice was muffled against his neckcloth.
‘I want a London doctor to examine him, just to be perfectly certain. He is travelling down by slow stages with my mother and his sister and a small battalion of nursemaids and grooms. I will have their rooms made ready and discover the best doctor for head injuries tomorrow. There is no concussion—I know enough about blows to the head to check for that and for fractures. Our local doctor agrees. I am talking too much,’ he added, sounding surprised.
‘Relief. Exhaustion. How much sleep have you had since you left London?’
‘I have no idea. None going up. When I tried to think about something else, all I could do was think about you. Not very restful. I slept in the carriage coming back, I think.’
‘You should be in bed now.’ She was so tight against his body that she felt the change come over him, felt the energy flowing through him, just like the startling electric current she had experienced when she had attended a demonstration at the Institute in Porto.
‘Gabrielle.’ It was a question and she answered it, tipping back her face to look up at him.
‘Gray, you know what I need. You cannot give it. I cannot ask it.’
‘Forget that tonight. Forget all of it. Make love with me, Gabrielle. Just us, tonight. We will worry about everything else tomorrow. Who knows what will happen? Life is a chance suspended by a thread and I have just found out how fragile that is.’ When she hesitated, he stepped back into the bedchamber, leaving her cold and alone on the threshold. ‘I am sorry. I am not thinking straight. You want to go and I should let you.’
‘I want to stay,’ she said, suddenly certain. She loved him, wanted him. He wanted her and needed her. Tomorrow, rested and with his family to worry about, he would know this had no future, but that was tomorrow. Now was all there was. This minute. This man.
Gaby stepped into the room, closed the door behind her, felt for the key and turned it in the lock.
The sharp click seemed to break a spell. Gray swept her into his arms, kissing her on the way to the bed, falling on to the wide green covers with her, still lip-locked, his hands pulling her back into a close embrace. Fully clothed, they strained together, their bodies frustrated by layers of cloth, their legs tangling. She knew his taste now, his scent, the feel of his mouth over hers, and yet it was all new. And not enough, not nearly enough.
She pulled and tugged at their clothes, her fingers clashing with his until finally they calmed enough to work together, unbuttoning, shifting, tugging. Her torn gown fell to the floor, her petticoats and stays after it. Gray knelt back on the bed like a half-naked god in a sea of green and looked down at her. ‘You are so beautiful, I do not have the words.’
Gaby opened her mouth, then closed it again as he bent over her garters. Beautiful? She would take that from Gray, treasure it. She watched as he untied the ribbons, rolled down her stockings, kissed the crease of her knee, making her laugh. She was naked now, bare to only the second man she had ever lain with and it was a long time since Laurent. She should be nervous, perhaps, but she was not.
‘You still have far too many clothes on, Gray.’ His shirt was half out of his breeches so she found the hem, pulled it over his head and then stopped. They were on their knees facing each other and she let her gaze wander down his torso. There was the scar on his shoulder, the wound that had brought him back to England. It was a white dent now, surrounded by a network of spidery lines. The triangle of dark hair on his chest, brown nipples, tight and puckered now with arousal, that tantalising trail of hair down towards his navel... Gaby ran one finger down it, pressing against the hard muscles of his stomach, then gripped the waistband of his breeches, pulling so that they swayed together.
Gray came up on his knees and she saw just how aroused he was. Still she could feel nothing but excitement, anticipation. Need. Love, but I must not say it. Let him believe it is all desire. ‘You are wearing too much,’ she said, meaning to tease, her voice breaking, husky with longing.
‘Only fair. You’ve already seen me in the river.’ There was laughter in his eyes now, but hunger, too. ‘Mind you, the water was very cold, I was hardly at my best.’
‘It whetted my appetite.’ Finally she managed to find the fastening, released his falls and reached for him. He filled her grip, hot and proud and eager, magnificently male.
Gray kicked away his breeches and tumbled her back into the silken covers. ‘I want to spend hours making love to you, slowly, inch by inch, exploring every private corner, every dimple, every freckle.’ His mouth trailed down her neck, detoured so he could nibble at her ears, nuzzle behind into the soft, vulnerable skin there. ‘And if I do that I will go out of my mind. Gabrielle, I’m beyond finesse. I need you now. Forgive me.’
