“Can you swim, Archie?”
“Like that fish,” he said, and began to unfasten his trousers. “Can you?”
“A little,” she admitted.
“I will hold you up,” he said.
It seemed that he was saying one thing and meaning another, and for a moment she gazed into his eyes, trying to understand. “Why not?” she said at last, suddenly reckless. She might not get this chance again, to swim in a river with a man she had come to love.
And she did love him.
But did she love him enough?
Archie unfastened her dress, helping her to remove it and her petticoats. Her corset was barely laced—she hadn’t wanted to wear it at all but convention had caused her to put it on. And then she was as naked as he, and they looked at each other in the moonlight and liked what they saw.
Archie reached for her hand again, his fingers entwining with hers.
“Come on,” he said, “swim with me.”
Maria smiled and let him lead her into the water.
Tina woke to the sound of birds singing outside the bedroom window. She was in her bed, and Richard was beside her, his arm heavy across her body, a curl of his hair hanging over his eyes, and his mouth slightly open as he slept.
As she watched him she remembered the things they had done, things she could hardly believe, and how much she had enjoyed them. There was a delicious ache throughout her body, a sensation of languid completion. When he had kissed her in the juncture of her thighs, using his tongue and his mouth, he had brought her to such delight, and then he had showed her how to do the same to him.
Tina shivered at the memory, and when she glanced at Richard again she saw that his eyes were open, and he was remembering, too. He smiled that smile that promised her so much pleasure. It had been there all along, that promise, she just hadn’t been able to read it.
“I should go back to my own room,” he said, his voice deep and husky.
“Yes,” she said, and waited.
He reached for her instead, and with a gasp, she went into his arms, naked as he was. Her body was already opening for him like a flower, and her heart fluttered as he began to work his way down with lips and tongue. By the time he reached the place she wanted him, she could hardly bear it, and her body jolted with the shock of contact.
“Richard,” she moaned, and then cried out with a shockingly fast climax.
But it wasn’t enough for him. He kissed her and delved into her, working leisurely, until her excitement had built all over again, and this time when she came it was long and intense, with ripples of sheer bliss that spread through her body. Finally she opened her eyes, and he was grinning down at her from where he knelt at her side, and his cock was clearly begging for her to lean over and take it into her mouth.
This time it was Richard who groaned and begged and shuddered. And afterward, they lay, exhausted and very pleased with themselves, gazing into each other’s eyes until they fell asleep.
When Maria came to wake her mistress an hour later, she found them both still asleep, bold as brass, in the big bed. She froze inside the doorway, her hand over her mouth as if to keep her heart from jumping right out of her throat.
Lady Carol would be furious, and Maria would more than likely get the blame for not protecting her darling adequately. But even so, Maria was more concerned for her young mistress than herself—she was very fond of Tina, and what she was seeing here was not a good thing.
Eventually, when she felt her emotions were under control, she crept to the bed and bent to whisper in her mistress’s ear. “Miss Tina? Wake up!”
Tina smiled, the naughty puss, and then opened her eyes. When she realized what was happening, she sat up like a jack-in-the-box, but although she tried to appear ashamed and repentant before Maria, Maria could see she was neither.
“Oh dear, is it morning already?”
“The household are up and about, Miss Tina. What have you done?”
“Richard?” She was shaking him, and he blinked and yawned and then with a curse leaped from the bed. Maria might have laughed if the situation was not so precarious.
“I must get back to my room,” he said, holding his clothing before him as if Maria had never seen a man’s body before. And quite recently, she thought, with a warm inner tremble, remembering Archie’s arms about her. Perhaps that was why she couldn’t quite castigate her young mistress as she should.
But their cases were entirely different. Miss Tina’s whole life could be destroyed if this was discovered, and Maria would do everything in her power to prevent that from happening.
“I’ll see if anyone is out there,” she said, and hurried to the door, opening it to peer out.