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THIRTY-EIGHT
Avelvet box sat beside Bess's plate at the breakfast table, and her husband schooled his impatience for her to open it. She dallied over her bread and honey, and sipped her chocolate slowly to tease him, until she herself could stand the anticipation no longer. Finally, she cast him a saucy glance from beneath her dark lashes and lifted the lid.
He watched intently as her face became suffused with surprise, then disbelief, then possessiveness, and finally joy. She lifted one of the eight-foot loops of pearls with reverence, marveling at their size and lustrous opalescence. She knew they had been brought from the Orient by the first Earl of Shrewsbury and that they were now priceless. “Oh, Shrew,” she breathed raptly as she lifted them over her head.
He came around the table and kissed her deeply. “I warrant you are the first Countess of Shrewsbury whose luminous beauty eclipses that of the pearls.”
They spent the summer day outdoors, enjoying the setting that seemed to have been created especially for lovers. Rufford had three streams that meandered through its secluded grounds, and the gardens were walled with the same lovely weathered stone as the cloisters. The wide flower beds held a profusion of delphiniums, larkspur, carnations, nicotine, and stocks. The wooded walks were edged with heavenly-scented lavender and rosemary. Lupines and harebells danced on the warm summer breeze, and flowering vines and English roses climbed up every wall and stone archway.
They held hands and talked and kissed and made endless plans for their future together, as lovers have done since the dawn of time. They knew their time alone would be fleeting, and they reveled in their isolation.
Shrewsbury had brought his favorite cook to Rufford, and as the newlyweds sat across from each other in the formal dining room—behaving with decorum before the servants but devouring each other with their eyes—everything they ate tasted like ambrosia.
Each successive day mirrored the first. After a night of passionate lovemaking, he presented her with another rope of the fabulous Shrewsbury pearls at the breakfast table. It was like an epilogue to his loving, thanking her for the deep pleasure she brought him, telling her that she lingered in his consciousness, and hinting at the coming night's possibilities. He seemed completely under her spell, bewitched by her special magic.
They went for long rides with Bess sitting between his thighs, they went hawking, and fishing, and lay on cushions in a wooden punt as it drifted across the abbey's small lake. Whenever she touched him the blood flowed thick and hot in his veins and flooded his loins with a sweet, heavy ache. Bess was aware of how her loveliness affected him by the way his avid eyes devoured her. He was always close enough to hear the rustle of her petticoat and inhale her intoxicating woman's scent. She could bring him fully to life by just a look or a touch. She filled his senses and fired his imagination. Sometimes both of them were overcome by the most violent, most savage passion, and at other times they rolled in the long grasses, helpless with laughter.
When dusk descended they always went for a romantic walk in the gardens, lingering in the night-scented darkness until the moon came out and turned everything to silver. Then he carried her to bed, oblivious of the servants who did their best to give the lovers privacy. Their week stretched to eight days, then nine, but finally, reluctantly, they made plans to ride to Sheffield after one more precious day alone together.
Bess raised the lid of the antique jewel casket, lifting the strands of priceless pearls, then letting them slide through her fingers so that the reflecting candlelight made them shine with a deep luster. “Now that I have all eight strands, I think I shall have my portrait painted wearing the pearls.”
“Wearing only the pearls,” he suggested huskily.
Bess knew immediately what he wanted. She waited until he went into the dressing room to shave, which he did every night before he made love to her, then she quickly undressed and adorned herself with the ropes of pearls. She stood before the mirror admiring her reflection, allowing the strands to fall about her naked body in different provocative ways.
As they slid across the smooth flesh of her breasts and belly, it thrilled her to think she was wearing a fortune in precious jewels. How many women had been so indulged? Cleopatra perhaps? Helen of Troy? Even Elizabeth Tudor has nothing so fine as these!
Bess gathered up all eight strands and wrapped them close about her throat so that the pearls fell down her back in an opalescent waterfall. They were long enough to loop beneath her bottom cheeks, making her look like a nautch dancer from a prince's harem.
In the mirror she saw the tall, dark figure loom behind her. His face was taut with desire, his eyes black with passion. She felt his fingers trace down her spine, setting her all ashiver, then his hands began to caress her bottom, stroking in circles that went ever smaller until his fingers slid into the deep cleft of her cheeks, seeking pleasure points she didn't know she possessed.
She felt the engorged head of his phallus rub against her, urgent and throbbing. Her buttocks tightened as a spasm quivered up her back and slithered between her legs to her woman's center. Bess was reeling from the dark, erotic sensations he was arousing in her. She felt the hot, wet glide of his tongue trace down her neck and across her shoulder, and fire snaked through her breasts and down into the pit of her belly.
When she moaned his name, he gathered her up and took her to the bed. He placed her in a prone position on her hands and knees with her beautiful bottom arched in the air and curved his long body over hers. When he thrust into her sheath, the sensation was new and strange to Bess, but almost immediately she realized this position allowed him to stroke across her bud directly, stimulating her to climb and build from the moment he entered her.
His hard body fell into a powerful rhythm, and hers began to move with his. Her hands clutched the bedcovers as they plunged together, riding one surging wave after another in uninhibited splendor. Both could feel the loops of pearls rolling sleekly between their bodies, creating a delicious friction across the curve of her bottom that made them feel decadent.
When his hands took possession of her full, lush breasts, glorying in their weight, Bess began to cry out her intense pleasure. They exploded together and he pulled her back against him, shuddering as he unleashed a final surge of raw passion.
Much later, after the storm had abated, she sat up in bed, cradled between his legs so they could talk. Bess asked, “Shrew, do you want more children?”
“Splendor of God, don't you think we have enough?”
She laughed with relief. “I do indeed; I don't want to start all over again with babies.”
“We will have enough to do arranging suitable alliances for the nine children who are not yet espoused,” he pointed out.
“Shrew, I meant to speak of this before we were married, but you were so impetuous, you didn't give me a chance.”
“Sweetheart, if it's about our children, can't it wait? We will be at Sheffield the day after tomorrow. All too soon they'll be dominating our lives again.”
“Darling, I've already waited too long to broach this subject. I have great plans for their futures, and I need your approval.”
He finished his wine as he listened to her talk and knew he had never felt so replete and happy in his life.
“I intend to dower all of my children generously. Upon their marriage each will get one of my manor houses and five hundred acres of property.”
“That is more than generous, my love,” he murmured, closing his eyes contentedly.
