Page 58 of The Scholar’s Spy

“When you used to stride about the beach on the days you weren’t in breeches. Hiking about in them without a care in the world.”

“Aye,” she mimicked his earlier response, her own reply to him, husky at the press of his body, all that she was crying out for. “But now, I have to wear sensible London clothes, and those stockings were deemed entirely suitable. The establishment we bought them from swore they were the sort of things fashionable ladies wear. Judith bought us half a dozen each.”

She almost added that she did feel guilt for the wanton way her sister was spending money in Town. Especially now that she knew where the funds had come from. Surely Robert would be angry. But when she glanced up, she caught Robert’s eye.

“Other people don’t matter. Not here, not between us,” he said. The sincerity made her smile.

He stroked her cheek, the touch both soothing and illicit given their position. The other lay possessively on her thigh, giving her close to his body. Robert leaned nearer, his voice and breath tickling against her skin, the underside of her ear, fanning at the curls at the base of her neck. “Do you remember when I first touched you? How my fingers stole up your thighs, how I made you gasp? I tasted you afterwards on my skin—so wickedly delicious.”

Words were sticking in her throat as she tried her best to formulate a response. Having their previous deeds discussed, raised—no, whispered in her ear was making her burn for him. It was more than she could have ever expected, and when his ice blue eyes flashed at her, Abigail knew all too well that he was enjoying her reaction.

“I dreamt of you at night, in my chamber, just next door. Pictured you again and again whilst sleep escaped me. Recalling the sweetness of your cunny. The sound of your mewling. How you felt above me. What it was like to be inside you…” As Robert spoke, his fingers moved higher up her thigh, the touch light but insistent. Soft and seductive on her already clenching leg muscles. When he finally danced his hand over her curls, Abigail cried out—a moan of frustration, encouragement, and desire.

She pulled him flush against her, and busily captured his mouth, greedily kissing him, certain she would never get enough of these feelings. The undeniable, constant demand for him. Her body allowed in the sweep and exploration, the teasing motion of his fingers inside her. Heavy, pulsing sensation swept through her body, gathering strength where his fingers rocked within her.

When his mouth drifted away from her lips, leading a pathway down her neck, her torn collar, over the swell of her breasts and then with a tip she was pushed back onto the desk. Exposed before him. The gathered sweep of her gown bunching around her middle. Yet there did not seem to be a vulnerability here. In fact, everything they shared simply brought them closer. She had realized that earlier when she confessed her love.

Bending over, Robert kissed over her thighs, his breath warming her skin. When he parted the folds of her sex, and caressed her core with his tongue and then his teeth, Abigail closed her eyes. The emotion was too much. So too was the press of his mouth on her. It was overwhelming. Slowly he continued his sweet torment, the kissing sweeping over each part of her folds he could reach, and then when he couldn’t he tipped her hips a fraction, giving himself better access. Then his fingers joined the play, tracing and encouraging Abigail to lose herself. The tension burst, causing her to cry out. The waves of feeling, of intensity made her lift her hips, whilst his fingers continued to pulse within her, encouraging every particular feeling out of her.

“So sweet. You taste like sin, but of the very best kind.” His accent was stronger she realized when he was aroused, a pleading earnestness that made her feel lightheaded in precisely the same way his touch did. She could listen to his timbre for hours, and it would make her tizzy with desire. “Abigail, you are the sort of sinful delight I will never forget. Or regret.” There was fire to his voice, heated and warm, and she knew he was watching her. Gaining pleasure from seeing how wild he drove her.

Then it shattered. The pressure. The sensation. Bright and pleasurable, quaking through her body. Opening her eyes, Abigail tasted the salt of her tears. She wanted what she had missed for weeks, the strength of Robert inside her. Close to her. Around her. He had not been the only one who’d dreamt of their coupling. Been tormented by the loss of it.

The shaking, clenching delicious feel of her release was still pounding its way through her veins, as Abigail sat up and wrapped her legs around his waist. Keeping Robert close to her.

“I am yours, and you mine. We are as one.” To her it has as much weight and solemnity as the marriage vows. There was an answering look in his clear gaze. A recognition of the truth she spoke.

“Always.” He kissed her. Abigail tasted her own release on his tongue and smiled at the sweet musk in her mouth.

Chapter Twenty-Four

They staggered back from the hotel desk, inelegant and desperate for one another as they clung to each other. They kissed ferociously with a tender eagerness that hurt. Their hands scrambled against one another, catching between their bodies as they tried to find a way out of their clothes. Loosening bits of material, and then casting them aside. A strangled, desperate laugh at their own wild actions slipped from his lips, although any humor was rapidly fading, compared to the all-consuming need that overrode all. A yearning for Abigail. Has Robert ever wanted anything more? He doubted it. This desire, love, passion—a battle between these three emotions, has seeped through into his very skin. It was ablaze in his very flesh. And would be remembered in his soul. He hoped to God above, he never felt differently.

The memory of being held inside her clenching, welcoming sex was mounting within him, so that his very limbs were now shaking with the strength of his lust. The single-minded passion of it. Robert could not think straight, all that mattered was dropping onto his knees and finding a way to be inside Abigail. The feel of flesh against felt the sheer tension of his cock sliding into her.

Robert’s body, his knees in fact hit hard against the end of the sofa. This action caused him to drop down onto the ground before it. As neatly as he could, in one swift move, he pushed Abigail onto the plush cushioned rump of the divan. Keeping her protected.

“It won’t fit us both.” Her words cut through the haze of his need. The taste of her release was still warm on his mouth.

Abigail sat upright and pushed off and down the cushioned end. She landed awkwardly in his lap, deliciously so, with part of her back visible to him. He kissed the gaping part of skin. She arched herself against him, her bottom curving into his stomach and her neck exposed and tipped so he could continue to kiss her back.

“God,” he said, and thought for a moment he might be left in this excruciating state, slowly going mad with this painful erection, until insanity was the only thing left to him.

In haste, he pushed up the ends of her skirt, bunching the plush material around her waist. If only he’d pulled the dress away from her body earlier, but there wasn’t time now. Her body ground back against his, and Robert had to bite back the oath that suddenly came to mind. Abigail made a small gasping noise at the stroke of his hands.

“Hush, hush,” Robert said. With shaking hands, he nudged her into the right position—placing her hands out before her, so she could grab hold to the end of the divan, as he entered her from behind.

Abigail turned her head, her smile a twist that made him moan. Just the angle of her mouth was enough for him to fear he wouldn’t be able to finish inside her. He might just spill himself now. He took a steadying breath and kissed her deeply, then dropped his hands to lift her a little off his lap. To get the angle right. Almost immediately the pressure on his erection lessened and he wanted nothing more than to surge into her. But he had to do what was right. One of his hands slipped between her legs. Slowly, he started to stroke the damp folds of her sex, testing her warmth and welcome before he removed his fingers. She was ready. The little cry of need told him that. He loosened the ties of his breeches.

“Shh,” he said. One of his hands moved up to her mouth covering her lips, and in some wanton spirit Abigail smiled at the touch of his fingers caressing her chin.

“I can taste myself on your hand.”

Don’t say that. How he’d like to beg her.

With a nudge of his hips, the tip of his erection brushed against her sex, the temptation overwhelming. She was ready, eager for him. His hands gripped her hips, resting on the curve of her body, drumming on Abigail’s soft skin. Then he pushed himself up and inside her. It was heaven. Pure and rich and the most glorious feeling he could imagine.

Abigail started to rock herself, grinding and moving against him in such a way that Robert was flooded with sensation. He forced himself to steady his breath or else they would control him. She gasped and he took over, his body sitting up, adjusting as he started to rock more deeply with it. Again and again as Abigail’s hands snatched at the divan’s cushioned rump, holding herself present to milk every feeling from this position.