“Only you, Montgomery, have marked me,” he whispered.
Dougless wanted to ask him about his wife. Did he care for her, Dougless, as much as he loved his beautiful wife? But she didn’t ask, as she was too afraid of the answer she’d hear.
Nicholas turned her around, turned the water back on, then rinsed them both. When they were clean, he pulled her out of the shower and began gently combing her hair. Dougless wanted to put on her robe, but Nicholas wouldn’t allow it.
“I have dreamed of you this way,” he said, looking at her in the mirror. “You have fair driven me mad. The smell of you.” He stopped combing and slid his hands down her arms. “The clothes you wear . . .”
Dougless smiled, her head back against his. He had noticed, she thought. He had.
When her hair was combed, he toweled it dry, then held up the white terry robe the hotel furnished. “Come,” he said, putting on the other robe.
He led her downstairs, through the darkened hotel lobby, and into the kitchen.
“Nicholas,” she said, “we shouldn’t be here.”
He kissed her to silence. “I am hungry,” he said as though that were excuse enough.
Being in the hotel kitchen when she knew they shouldn’t be added excitement to this most wonderful night. She looked at the back of Nicholas as he opened a refrigerator door (and felt a little pang that he had learned of refrigerators from someone other than her). Now he was truly hers, she thought, hers to touch whenever she wanted. Holding his hand, she pressed her body against his and put her head in the crook of his shoulder.
“Nicholas,” she whispered. “I love you so much. Don’t leave me.”
Turning, he looked into her eyes, and his face was full of longing. He looked back in the refrigerator. “Where’s the ice cream?”
She laughed. “In the freezer. Try that door,” she said, pointing.
He wouldn’t let her out of his sight or touch as he pulled her toward the freezer. There were big cardboard vats of ice cream inside. Clinging together like Siamese twins, they went about the kitchen and found bowls, spoons, and a steel ladle. Nicholas scooped out an enormous amount from one vat into each bowl, then slipped the vat back into the freezer. He dribbled vanilla ice cream down the front of her, then licked it off, the ice cream traveling lower, just below his tongue. He licked the last just as it reached her red-gold curls.
“Strawberry,” he said, making Dougless laugh.
They sat facing each other, legs crossed, on the eight-foot-long butcher-block cutting table (“Unsanitary,” Dougless said), but she didn’t get down. They ate quietly for a moment, but then Nicholas dropped ice cream on Dougless’s foot and licked it off. Dougless leaned forward to kiss Nicholas and “accidently” dropped ice cream on his inner thigh.
“I’ll bet that’s awfully cold,” she said against his lips.
“I cannot bear it,” he whispered.
She slowly, so that her breasts raked along his bare body, made her way to the splat of ice cream on his thigh, licked it off, and when it was gone, she continued licking. The ice cream was forgotten as Nicholas leaned back against the table and pulled her up to him. As though she weighed nothing, his biceps bulging, he picked her up and set her down on top of him, his hands moving up her body to clutch her breasts as Dougless moved slowly up and down.
It was a long time before they arched together, Nicholas pulling her down to him to kiss her hungrily and fiercely.
“I believe, madam,” he whispered in her ear, “that you have melted my ice cream.”
Laughing, Dougless snuggled against him. “I’ve wanted to touch you for so long,” she said, her hand caressing his chest and shoulders inside the sleeve of the robe that he still wore. “I’ve never met a man like you.”
She lifted on one elbow and looked down at him. “Were you an unusual man in the sixteenth century, or were they all like you?”
Nicholas grinned at her. “I am unique, which is why the women—”
She kissed him to silence. “Say no more. I’d as soon hear nothing more about your women—or your wife.” She put her head down. “I’d like to think I’m special to you, not just one of hundreds.”
He lifted her chin to look at her. “You called me across centuries, and I answered. Is that not enough to make you ‘special’?”
“Then you do care for me? At least somewhat?”
“There are no words,” he said, then kissed her lightly and pushed her head back down, but as he stroked her damp hair, he felt her relax against him and knew she was falling asleep. Closing her robe, he bundled her into his arms and carried her out of the kitchen and up to their room. Once they were inside their room, he removed both their robes, put her into bed, then climbed in beside her. She was already asleep as he snuggled her to him.
But Nicholas wasn’t sleepy at all. He tried to pull her closer to him, her bare bottom up against his half-swollen maleness, his leg over hers, but she was as close as could be.
She asked if he cared for her, he thought. Cared for her? She was becoming all to him, his reason for living. He cared what she thought, what she felt, what she needed. He couldn’t bear more than minutes away from her.