One Week As Lovers (Somerhart 3)
The distance cleared from her eyes. “You don’t need to do that, Nick.”
“I do. I need to. If you would just be slow?”
“Yes, of course.”
He slipped free of her body and knelt to untie her hands. “And don’t…don’t touch my hair, all right?”
She was still for a long moment before she finally nodded. Then her hands were free.
Nick fell to his back and pulled her astride him.
“Like this?” she gasped.
“Yes,” he said, “like this.”
She lowered herself onto him carefully, eyes widening with every inch, but she kept her hands on her own thighs.
His cock strained as if desperate to fill her completely.
“You have no idea how beautiful you are.” Another new experience, and though butterflies danced in his stomach, he wasn’t afraid. Even when her hand fluttered down to his chest.
She flattened one palm against his skin, then the other. He closed his eyes and pressed his hands over hers, pushing her fingers into his flesh. She was touching him, and still he could hold her and know he had nothing to fear.
“Yes,” he breathed as she began to ride him.
He let her set the rhythm, let her find the pace. She dug her nails into his chest, and he startled at the pleasant pain of it. And when he finally spent himself inside her, Nick’s cheeks were wet with tears.
A knock invaded her slumber, just before the sound of a door banging into the wall woke her fully.
“They’ve snuck away,” a female voice said from the dark.
“What?” Cynthia clutched the blanket to her chest. “Who?”
“Our men. Hurry. Get dressed. I’ve brought your clothes.”
“The duel!” Cynthia cried out as memory hit her full in the gut.
“Yes, yes. Hurry.”
She hesitated for a moment, aware that she was very naked in a gentleman’s bed, but the circumstances were obviously clear to Emma. She’d brought clothing, after all.
Decision made, Cynthia jumped from the bed and pulled on the chemise that Emma handed over. Five minutes later, she was dressed and rushing after Emma as she led Cynthia through a maze of hallways and steps.
They finally reached the front door and stepped out into a dawn of gray and fog. A curricle awaited them, and Emma leapt into the driver’s seat.
“Do you know where it is?” Cynthia called over the crunch of the gravel.
“I eavesdropped when that Bram returned to negotiate the details. I don’t think we’ll make it.”
Cynthia held on tight as they raced straight out onto the lawn and started up a low hill.
She’d meant not to fall asleep at all, but after such an exhausting day, she hadn’t stood a chance. Had Nick slept? Would he be too tired for good aim and a quick trigger?
The curricle crested the hilltop, and Cyn braced herself for a frightening scene, but the hill was bare, and Emma pushed on toward the valley below.
Cynthia spied one horse tied near a dense copse of trees. Just one horse. What could that mean? She spied another mount as a great flock of birds burst from the trees below. Cynthia jumped as if she’d heard a shot fired. “Oh, God. Oh, God.”
“We’re almost