Page 69 of To Wager with Love

She did as he asked, closing her eyes and sliding her mouth down over him and back. The sound he made sent the blood fizzing through her veins with a surge of triumph and she did it again, her confidence soaring as he gasped and moaned, his hips bucking beneath her as she increased the speed. Feeling extremely pleased with herself, it was a shock then when he pulled away from her and moments later she found herself flat on her back.

Jasper flung the golden banyan aside and tugged at the skirts of Harriet’s wedding dress, bunching them up and moving between them with frantic, almost desperate movements.

“Oh, God, Harry,” he said, settling between her thighs and sliding his arousal against her. Harriet leapt at the contact, his silky skin so hot and perfect that pleasure spiked through her. “Let me in,” he begged, and Harriet could say nothing in reply, too focused on wanting the same thing, on the need to feel him inside her.

“Yes, yes,” she said helplessly, tilting her hips as he sought and found and slid inside her in one, hot surge. A startled cry was wrung from her lips and she clung to him, clutching at his shoulders as he rose up over her. Harriet arched as he pulled back and sank into her again and she laughed with the sheer joy of it.

“Do you like that, Harry?” he asked, staring down at her, his eyes lit with pleasure.

“I like all of it, all of you,” she said, gasping again as he tilted her hips just so and stole her breath.

“Tell me,” he said urgently. “Tell me how much you like it.”

“I love it,” she said, fighting to get the words out as her mind fogged with desire and her body melted beneath his touch, at his pleasure. “And I love you.”

“Say it again,” he demanded, wrapping his arms about her and holding her tight.

“I love you,” she said, and then he claimed her mouth but the words were still between them, in the caress of her hands over his skin, in the touch of her lips against his, and she vowed it would be obvious to him from now on, in everything she said and did.

“Harry,” he said, her name torn from his lips as his body convulsed and his climax surged through him, taking her with him as the two of them clung together, bound together at last, with no foolish misunderstandings to ever keep them apart again.

***

“The Chronicles of the Sasanians, the ancient kings of Persia who extended their empire to the Indies, over all the dependant islands, to a considerable distance beyond the Ganges, and as far as China, acquaint us that there was formerly a king of that potent family, the most excellent prince of his time….”

Jasper lay back against a tumble of silken cushions, the golden material of the banyan swathed over them both as Harriet sat in the cradle of his arms and read to him from the stories of The Arabian Nights. He’d teased her for having brought it to their wedding night, making her blush by demanding if she’d thought she’d be bored, but in truth he was beyond touched that she’d remembered, that she’d thought of it. Memories of other nights, a lifetime ago now, flooded back to him… memories of being enraptured by Harriet’s quiet telling of Scheherazade’s stories, and the way he would look up and catch her eye and she would stumble over the sentence she was reading and blush, before finding her place and carrying on again. He’d spent his entire youth knowing that she loved him, that she adored him and thought him without fault. She’d put up with being dragged through mud and half-drowned and kidnapped and rescued and never had that worshipful gaze faltered.

When he’d returned from Russia to find his world so changed, he’d been bereft and confused, and he’d realised how badly he’d taken her love for granted. It wasn’t until he’d lost her than he’d realised what he’d had. Now he knew. Now they both knew. They both knew how close they’d come to losing what mattered most and they’d not risk such folly again.

Harriet’s voice wrapped around him as she spun the first of Scheherazade’s tales and he tightened his arms around her, holding her to him. She paused and turned her head, looking up at him with a smile.

“I’ll not be able to breathe, let alone read, if you hold me any tighter,” she murmured, though it was clear enough that she was not complaining.

Jasper gazed down at her, utterly charmed by the picture she made, her hair tumbled about her in disarray, her body naked and barely covered by the golden fabric of his gift, her spectacles perched on the end of her sweet little nose and, as ever, a book in her hand. He bent his head and stole a kiss.

“Are you happy?”

Harriet laughed, her expression rather incredulous. “You know I am. If I were any happier, I’d burst.”

“Good,” he said, settling back against the pillows. “I wish everyone we care for could find the same happiness too.”

“What a romantic you are,” she said, turning in his arms to regard him.

He shrugged but did not deny it. “I wish Jerome would fall in love with someone suitable,” he added with a sigh. “I despair of him.”

“Oh, there’s time yet, surely?”

Jasper frowned, troubled. “I don’t know. I fear he’s getting himself into a tangle.”

Harriet sat up, anxiety in her eyes. “You mean Bonnie,” she said, and he heard the edge to her voice. “Jasper, I won’t hear anything against her. She’s a lovely girl, and she’s my friend, and if your brother has taken advantage of her—”

Jasper reached out and pressed a finger to her lips. “Then he shall take the consequences,” he said firmly. “But I cannot pretend I think it is a good match.”

“Why not?”

There was a defiant note to the question that made Jasper smile. He knew that Harriet had always had difficulty making friends. She was too shy, too unsure of herself in company to be at ease, but she had found friends within the odd collection of women that comprised The Peculiar Ladies. He was glad of it, and unsurprised by her loyalty. So, he spoke carefully.

“Bonnie seems like a lovely young woman, and I can see Jerome is fond of her, but I fear he views her as he views his friends, not as… not as a lady he wishes to wed. Jerome has always felt the need to rescue fair maidens. He wants someone to protect and cosset, someone who needs him, and Bonnie—”