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His hands stroked her back and she opened her mouth, inviting his deep kiss. His fingers slid into the cleft between her buttocks and she immediately arched against his arousal. His eyes brimmed with amusement. “You already know how to get exactly what you want.”
The tip of her pink tongue came out to trace his lips, and her fingers undid the buttons of his shirt. “Give me another lesson; I want to learn everything.”
He lifted her from the bed and she wrapped her legs around him. “We are so alike; we both have ravenous appetites when we awaken.”
“Will you slake my hunger and thirst?” she teased.
“Will you slake mine?” he demanded intensely, his lids heavy with desire.
“Each and every morning,” she vowed.
An hour later, as Bess lay sprawled across him on the floor before the ashes of the burned-out fire, William stirred. “You need a bath. You have my male scent all over your lovely body.” He sniffed her with lusty appreciation and rolled his eyes heavenward to make her laugh. “I wonder if that bathtub is large enough for two?”
As they rode from St. Albans, heading back to Northaw, Bess patted the glossy neck of the black mare he had just bought her. “I'm sorry I called you a scabby old jade,” she crooned into the filly's ear. “That was just a bargaining tactic.”
Cavendish grinned at her. “I honestly thought you fancied the white palfrey.”
Bess grinned back. “Aye, and so did the old horse thief, but I had my eye on the black all along. We can put her to your stallion and add to our stable at Northaw.”
He didn't hide his amusement at her ambitious plans. On the ride to St. Albans, as she'd sat before him in the saddle, she had told him of her ideas to improve the house, redesign the garden, and now she was starting on the stable. She tossed her head at his laughter. “I'll show you!”
“I bet you will.” His eyes swept over her possessively. “Just don't show any other man. St. Loe couldn't keep his eyes off you.”
“I almost fainted when Elizabeth's captain of the guard rode in.”
“St. Loe was buying horses for Hatfield. It's a small world, Bess. For your sake we have to be discreet for a while.”
“I know we shouldn't be together yet.”
He couldn't bear the look of guilt that clouded her eyes. “Come on, I'll race you!”
“What stakes?”
“I'll think of something—I'll tell you in bed tonight.”
“Cocksure devil!” Bess kept abreast of him, hoping he was too gallant to trounce her unmercifully. When the gate to the Northaw property came into view, she recklessly darted her mare in front of his stallion, causing him to rein in, causing him to lose the race.
He grabbed her bridle. “I should take you across my knee.”
“A dangerous position—I might bite.”
He rubbed his shoulder. “You do bite.”
By the time the evening meal was over and darkness descended, the lovers were in a fever of longing to be alone. As the minutes dragged by, they seemed like hours. Cavendish thought he could get some of his paperwork done before they retired, but he finally got up from the desk, abandoning all pretense at concentration. He went to the sideboard and restlessly picked up a flagon of wine.
“Would you bring that upstairs, Sir William?” Bess asked sweetly as Mistress Bagshaw came into the room to draw the drapes.
“Of course.” His eyes glittered as he watched Bess climb the stairs as innocently as a nun going to vespers. He followed her immediately and secured the door. “Hell's teeth, the woman couldn't keep a straight face. Sir William indeed.”
“She doesn't suspect a thing,” Bess insisted stubbornly. “She helped me prepare separate bedchambers.”
“And what do you suppose she thought when she changed our sheets today?”
Bess thought it over for a second. “Who cares? I'll race you to bed!” She kicked off her slippers and stripped off her stockings. She began to laugh as she struggled with the fastenings of her gown and watched him fling off his shirt and reach for his boots. She was naked before he was and ran up the bed steps and did a little victory dance. With a yell of triumph, he launched himself at her and they rolled together into the big featherbed.
Bess reached up and grabbed his hair, shuddering with the intensity of her feelings. “Rogue, I want to make love all night!”
He couldn't stop laughing at her. “Do you hear that, Mistress Bagshaw, she wants to fu—”
Bess covered his mouth with her hand to silence him. “You devil,” she whispered. “I'll never let you bed me again. Well,” she amended, “at least not until you pour me some wine.”
