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Crawling into bed beside her, Edwin laid his lips against hers and kissed her deeply, enjoying the soft, loving attention he was receiving from her. He didn't know whether his volatile wife would keep up this sweetly obeisant demeanor tomorrow, but he intended to enjoy it while it lasted.
******
Watching his wife laugh as she galloped across the fields, putting the feisty chestnut mare that he'd presented her with as a wedding present through her paces, Hugh thought that he'd never been so happy. Irene in the county was nothing like Irene in London. Well, that wasn't quite true. She was still sweet and demure, polite, pleasing, but over the past few days he'd begun to catch glimpses of a freer Irene. One whose laugh chimed like bells, whose eyes sparkled with mischief, whose sly wit had surprised him more than once.
Her rampant curiosity was nothing like what he'd expected.
She wanted to explore everything, look at everything on the grounds of Stonehaven. There wasn't a room in the house that she hadn't been in and thoroughly examined with him, asking questions about some of the pieces and artwork and the people in the portraits. They'd even explored the wine cellar, giggling like children who were doing something naughty. Irene's poking through a dusty, dark corner of the cellar had her coming up with a very old bottle of wine that they'd decided to take out and try.
Hugh had spat it out immediately and then laughed so hard he hadn't been able to stand at Irene's nearly cross-eyed expression as she'd forced herself to swallow it. He'd laughed even harder when she'd given up the attempt and run around the corner of the house to try and keep him from seeing her spit it out. Of course he'd followed her.
Then he’d reassured her that he didn't mind her unladylike behavior at all by pinning her against the rough stone and kissing her senseless. The kisses had helped to get the foul taste of the vinegary wine out of their mouths as well.
They were going to be spending the rest of the week exploring the lands around Stonehaven before moving on to their next destination on their honeymoon - his main seat in Westingdon. But this was the land he'd grown up on and he was eager to show her his favorite spots: the small glen where'd collected violets to give to his mother, the creek where he, Edwin and Wesley had caught fish and cooked them on a spit over a fire, the small series of caves that they'd used to play hide and seek. Although he thought he might omit the story about how he'd fooled Nell into following them in there so that they could ditch her when she'd been following them around one time. Of course Edwin had gone back for her twenty minutes later, with Hugh and Wes guiltily following; she'd been hunkered down in one of the caves, crying her eyes out although she stopped the moment they appeared and pretended she'd been doing no such thing, and he'd never felt so bad in his life.
That had been the first time his father had taken a strap to his backside and not one of his best memories.
But he had plenty of other good memories about the caves, and he'd known he deserved that particular punishment, even at the time. He wanted to show them to Irene. Indeed, he found himself wanting to show her everything about his time here as a child.
"She's wonderful," said his wife, finally pulling her mare up beside him and nodding at the beautiful creature’s tossing head. Hugh grinned at her. Rex, his stallion, was about two hands higher than the mare which she'd named Liberty so she had to tilt her head back to look up at him. Green eyes sparkled at him with pure pleasure and the color was high in her cheeks; little wisps of coppery hair had escaped her pins during her gallop and she looked incredibly beautiful. In fact it reminded him of how she looked in their bed. "Thank you so much for giving her to me."
"Well if we're going to go exploring then you need your own mount, as much as I might enjoy having you share mine." Hugh winked at her, enjoying the way her cheeks flushed even darker. Truthfully he was happy she now had her own mount, even though it meant she was no longer pressed up against him. It obviously gave her a great amount of joy, and she was a fantastic rider. He loved to watch her.
Despite the fact that she eagerly and passionately shared his bed, she still blushed whenever he flirted with her. It was a quality that he found particularly endearing.
He was an extremely lucky man. Irene was even more intriguing to him out in the country where they could indulge in their shared interests, and despite her delicate looks he'd already discovered that she was a bruising horsewoman and that she enjoyed being outside much more than being cooped up in a house. Being away from the city - and perhaps being away from her mother was part of it - Irene had blossomed. And she was just as curious in the bedroom as she was around the house.
In fact just this morning they'd had an interlude which had been as erotic as it was frustrating for him, where he'd allowed his wife to explore his body with her eyes, fingers, and eventually her mouth. Although she hadn't taken it quite to the point where he might have liked it to go with her mouth before his control had finally snapped and he turned her onto her back, thrusting his almost angry looking manhood into her soft wetness. He'd given her as much time as he could bear to explore their differences and learn his body, her soft fingers brushing through his chest hair and over his nipples, seemingly entranced by the flat brown discs and the tiny nubs in the center. When she'd made her way, almost shyly, down to his groin he'd already been achingly hard and it was only the expression of curious awe on her face as she gently brushed her fingers up and down his shaft that had kept him from taking her right then and there.
Just thinking about it was already making it difficult for him to sit in his saddle considering the tightness of his riding breeches.
"Where would you like to go first?" he asked her, desperate to change his mind to other matters. Honeymoon or not he couldn't just drag her off to bed this morning. Again. "The flowers in the glen should be in bloom, it's the right time of year for them."
The smile that he received in return was brilliant and so very pleased that he thought his heart might actually burst. Well, better his heart than the front of his breeches. "Then let's go there."
"Catch me if you can," he teased, before making a sharp turn and jolting Rex into a gallop.
He could hear the tinkling of Irene's laughter behind him and the pounding of hooves as she followed.
******
The glen that Hugh brought her to was more beautiful than Irene could have ever imagined. There were plenty of trees for shade in almost a perfect circle around a tiny meadow that was just filled with violets. It was like a sea of purple and green at ankle height, and she desperately wished that she could wade into them without crushing any of the beautiful, tiny flowers. That Hugh looked just as awed and delighted by the glen didn’t quite surprise her, although at one time it might have.
Some men would never be able to look masculine while admiring a tiny violet, but Hugh was not one of them, despite his gorgeous blonde hair and grace of movement. With his broad shoulders and strong limbs, the slightly rugged state of his attire for riding which was so different from the impeccable gentleman he presented himself as in the evening, Hugh was decidedly quite manly and it didn’t matter the venue or what he was doing.
"I used to come here every year at this time and gather flowers for my mother," he said, reaching down to cup a violet in his hand. "Violets are her favorite."
"They're one of mine too," Irene heard herself saying. Hugh looked up at grinned at her, making her heart thumb unevenly.
He plucked one tiny flower from the plant, walking towards her as she stared up at him. When he reached her, he tucked the violet into her hair, just above her ear. Since her mother was not there to lecture her on the importance of keeping her skin lily-white, and because she was already married so what did it matter anyway, Irene had gotten out of the habit of wearing a bonnet when she and Hugh went out. He certainly didn't seem to mind.
"The color suits you," he murmured, cupping her cheek in his hand and leaning down to feather a kiss over her lips.
Yearning surged inside of her and she leaned into him, putting her hands on his chest as she tilted her head back. He teased her lips with the lightness of his kiss, just brushing his over hers again and again as she went up onto her toes to try and catch him. As he purposefully kept her reaching, she couldn't help but giggle.
"Are you laughing at me?" he asked, putting his hands on her waist to steady her as she leaned against him, pulling his head back just enough to look into her green eyes which seemed even brighter out in the sunlight.
