He raised her head and brought her mouth to his. She tasted cool and sweet, like Turkish sherbet. She tasted hot and dark like brandy held over a flame. She tasted mysterious, like a goddess, and her power over him would have terrified a lesser man.
But he wasn’t a lesser man, and a strong woman was exactly what he wanted. A strong, wondrously curved woman who fit perfectly in his arms. He dipped his head and drew his tongue down the opening of her kamees and along the fragrant path between her breasts. She sighed and dragged her fingers through his hair.
He slid his hand over the beautiful swell of her bottom. She moved under his touch, shifting closer. He grasped that magnificent derrière and brought her sex firmly against his. And stifled a groan.
“You’ll hurt yourself,” she murmured against his mouth.
“That wasn’t a groan of pain,” he said.
He was aware of the wound. Every movement caused a twinge. He didn’t care. She was all soft woman and in his arms, and in his mouth and his nostrils and he was drunk with the taste and scent of her…and she’d said she couldn’t live properly without him. She’d said yes.
“We mustn’t tear the stitches,” she said.
“Then we’d better not move very much.”
“Is that possible?”
“Yes.” He stroked down her belly, over the thin fabric. He loosened the waist string of her trousers and pushed them down. He stroked over the feathery curls and the soft flesh, so warm and wet, so ready and willing. She sighed and moved against his hand. She pushed his shirt up to his waist. His rod sprang up in cheerful welcome, as usual. With a soft laugh, she grasped it and drew her slim fingers down its length. Then she shifted herself, bringing her leg up high on his thigh, and guided him in, and the jolt of pleasure in that joining took his breath away.
They scarcely moved at all. Awareness became all the more intense. He was aware each time her muscles tensed about him and eased, and of the very slight motion of her hip that sent waves of pleasure coursing through him. He was aware of her hands, gliding over him, and making long trails of sparks over his skin.
He opened his eyes and looked at her, and they smiled at each other in silent, wicked amusement, the devil in him recognizing the devil in her. And so they lay, watching each other, making secret love, while from outside came the familiar sounds of footsteps on the deck, voices calling out as they prepared to land.
A long sweet while of rippling pleasure ensued, like the Nile rippling beneath them, and then he was caught in a rushing current. She grasped him tightly, holding him still, while she moved upon him. The world went dark and wild, and he fell into it, into her, and all he knew was feeling beyond any words, a vast, mad happiness.
Then came her voice in his ear: “I give myself to thee. I give myself to thee. I give myself to thee.”
And at last she sank onto him, and he wrapped his arms about her and savored the delicious peace. The stray, funny thought came: we’re married, and he laughed out loud.
Epilogue
IN LATE JULY, FOLLOWING A LONG AND STORM-TOSSED voyage from Egypt, two representatives of Muhammad Ali arrived at Hargate House and presented his lordship with the news of his fourth son’s untimely demise, along with a handsome chest containing the skull of his killer.
The rest of the family being in the country at the time, Lord Hargate was obliged to bear the news with silent and exceedingly lonely dignity.
Not wishing all the world to know before his wife did, his lordship mentioned the matter to nobody. He simply set out a few hours later for Derbyshire, to break the news in person.
He stopped only to allow the horses to be changed. He never slept. He had taken the chest containing the skull with him. He did not know why. This was one of the rare occasions of the earl’s life when he was lost, quite lost.
He arrived at the house at the moment Benedict was leaving. The eldest son took one look at his parent’s face and turned around and went back in with him.
Lord Hargate led his wife out into the garden and told her in a few broken words.
She said only, “No,” and folded her hands tightly at her waist, and turned away and stared dry-eyed into the distance.
Benedict asked to see the letter. His father gave it to him, then put his arm about his wife’s shoulders.
Benedict left them and went inside to read the letter. The house was strangely quiet, as though the servants, who’d not yet been informed, sensed a catastrophe.
It reminded him of the oppressive silence in his own house after his wife’s death two years ago. He’d felt numb, then, too.
Hearing carriage wheels and hoofbeats coming up the drive — at a gallop by the sounds of it — Benedict went to the window. It was a handsome traveling chariot.
Waving the servants aside, he went out to intercept it. His parents were not in a state to receive visitors. Still, Lord Hargate might be wanted on urgent government business — and anyway Benedict needed something to do.
He arrived at the front of the house a moment after the carriage clattered to a stop.
Before he could start toward it, the door flung open, and a man leapt out…and grinned at him.
His brother.
His dead brother.
Rupert.
Benedict blinked once. This, from him, was a sign of overpowering emotion.
“You’re not dead,” he said as Rupert strode toward him.
“Certainly not,” Rupert said, giving him one of his enthusiastic brotherly hugs.
Benedict, still in the grip of strong feeling, patted him on the shoulder.
“Whatever gave you the idea I was dead?” Rupert said when these first transports were over.
Benedict explained about the two emissaries from Muhammad Ali and the condolence letter from the English consul general and the chest with the head in it.
Rupert brushed this aside. “They are ridiculously slow about everything. I daresay the emissaries came to London after visiting all the brothels between Alexandria and Portsmouth. My letter to Father is probably coming by way of Patagonia. But never mind. His lordship will cheer up wonderfully when he sees what I’ve brought him.”
“No exotic animals, I hope,” said Benedict. “He will tell you his family is menagerie enough.”
“It isn’t an exotic animal,” Rupert said.
“No mummies,” said Benedict. “Mother dislikes the smell.”
“As do I,” Rupert said. “It isn’t a mummy.”
“I refuse to play guessing games,” Benedict said. “You may tell me or not at your leisure. I, meanwhile, had better go in ahead and prepare our parents for your resurrection.” He turned away.
“It’s a wife,” Rupert said.
Benedict turned back. “Whose wife?” he said.
Rupert had never, to his knowledge, made off with anyone’s wife before, but there was no predicting what Rupert would do, especially in a foreign country where wives usually came in the plural rather than the singular. Rupert might think this sheik or that bey could spare one.
“She’s mine,” Rupert said. Dropping his voice, he added, “I’ve got her in the carriage.”
Benedict had forgotten everything else in his astonishment at seeing his supposedly dead brother. Now, directing his attention to the carriage, he observed an occupant. A woman, bent over a book.
He turned back to Rupert. “She’s reading,” Benedict said. “A book.”
“Yes, she reads heaps of them,” Rupert said. “Most aren’t even in English. She’s a brilliant scholar.”
“A what?”
“Her brain is simply enormous,” Rupert confided. “But Father won’t care about her intelligence.”
“Beyond being amazed that any woman who had any would marry you,” Benedict said.
“Yes, it is amazing,” Rupert said. “But that isn’t the funniest part.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “She’s an heiress.”
Once more, Benedict blinked. He was aware that his father had told Alistair, his third son, and Darius, the fifth, to find well-dowered brides, because he refused to keep them forever. But Rupert, who came between them, was excused, on grounds that no rational person would give a fortune into his keeping.
“An heiress,” Benedict said. “Well, I am very glad for you.”
“Oh, I don’t care about it,” Rupert said. “You know I’ve no notion of money. But I can’t wait to see Father’s face when I tell him.”