Pleasure for Pleasure

Her new husband was something of a will-o’-the-wisp…which meant that she should enjoy him as much as she possibly could, while he was still interested. Though how he ever grew tired of the sort of pleasure they shared last night, she didn’t know. Couldn’t imagine.

Of course when he opened his eyes she was smiling like a fool. Josie snapped her lips together. “Good morning.”

He propped himself up on his elbows, looking utterly bewildered. The sheet slid all the way down to his waist in a most enticing fashion.

“I’m your wife,” Josie prompted him, pushing the heavy weight of her hair back over her shoulder. “Josie? Otherwise known as Josephine?”

The bewilderment disappeared from his face and a bleak look passed over it instead. “Damn me to hell,” he said, flopping backward and putting an arm over his eyes.

At least he didn’t damn her to hell. “I gather that you do remember me?”

“Of course I remember you.”

“Gracious of you.”

“I damn well went and slept with a woman who is barely old enough to be my niece, although I had made up my mind to annul the marriage. What in the bloody hell came over me?”

“Me?” Josie asked hopefully.

He groaned.

“Although it was more like I was under you than you were over me,” she said, coming up on her knees. He couldn’t get away now. Not for years and years.

“Oh God, you’re even talking like a Bartholomew babe,” he groaned. Without removing his arm from his eyes, he reached out with the other one and pulled her down to him.

She fell against his chest with all her usual grace. Probably other women had cuddled against him like lithesome kittens but she was taken off guard and thumped down on top of him. He smelled wonderful, spicy, with a flavor of the outdoors. She took another deep breath. He had a hand in her hair, untangling it.

“Why are you snorting into my chest?” he inquired.

“I’m not,” she said, her lips muffled by the roughness of his chest hair. “I’m tasting you, not snuffling you. And”—she touched him delicately with the tip of her tongue—“you taste very good.”

“Ah,” he said.

Garret tasted a little salty, a little like soap, a little like something else…essence of Man. Or essence of Mayne? He shivered when she kissed his flat little nipple, so she did it again. And again.

He wasn’t saying anything, but Josie had heard about men in the morning. They were bears. Everyone knew that. Sulky. Sullen. Fine. He could simply lie there and sulk, and allow himself to be used. So she…used him.

She trailed her fingers and sometimes her lips all over his broad chest. Muscles, Josie discovered, weren’t hard the way they looked, but warm and rather silky to the touch. And if she put her lips against his skin, tasted him, even nipped him with her teeth, he shuddered again, a tiny shake, as if a chill wind blew over his skin.

His heart was beating harder and faster, and she smiled inside herself. He had almost no chest hair, which was, she thought, rather unusual for a man. At least…

“Why don’t you have chest hair?” she asked. She had just discovered that when her hair trailed across his chest he made a tiny sound. A good sound, she thought.

When he answered, his voice was slow and dark, and the smile inside her grew. “I don’t have chest hair because…I don’t have any.” He wasn’t making a lot of sense, but she could forgive him that.

He deserved a bit of punishment, though, for saying that she spoke like an infant. “Of course, I don’t know why you should have chest hair,” she said, drawing her hair across his chest again, and enjoying the little puff of air that came out between his teeth. “I would look very odd with chest hair.” She looked down at her chest and then looked up to meet his eyes.

Her nightgown was caught under her knees, and her breasts stood out against the light fabric as if she were wearing nothing at all. One thing that was good about her breasts was that they didn’t sag down toward her waist, the way women’s breasts sometimes did. He seemed to like them too.

“What do you think?” she said.

He blinked at her.

“Of my breasts?” she prompted him. “I think they’re rather cheerful.”

He cleared his throat. “Cheerful?”

“Well, I would prefer to have a smaller version because they go so well in gowns. I have my mother’s figure, as I understand it. But anyway, I’ve always thought that my breasts were…cheerful. They stand up, see?”

His lips parted.

She was really enjoying herself. Of course, she was playing a part. But wasn’t she always playing a part? Wasn’t everyone always pretending to be something they weren’t? And didn’t he deserve it for acting as if she were a brainless little twit, too young for marriage?

So she pulled her nightgown even tighter against her chest. Her breasts were rather lovely, if she said so herself. Now that she’d got over the idea they were too large.

“Well,” she said, “perhaps I should go find a bowl of porridge…in the schoolroom, don’t you think?” She narrowed her eyes at him. “Isn’t that where we babies belong?”

He was reaching out for her like a man in a desert. “Stupid of me,” he said, his voice sounding rather choked.

“Yes, well,” Josie said, swinging her legs over his as if to leave the bed, which caused her nightgown to fall back on her thighs.

“Come here, you dastardly infant,” Mayne said, and then he moved so suddenly that she didn’t even sense it happening, and she was pinned beneath him. “Make fun of me, will you?” he growled at her.

“You’re the one who called me a Bartholomew babe,” she taunted, loving the weight of his body on hers. “Perhaps I’m just too young for marriage?” To prove her point she arched her back just a bit, just so that her breasts rubbed against his bare chest.

“Vixen,” he muttered, bending his head.

But she twisted away from his kiss. “Why did you look so surprised to see me when you woke up? Tell the truth. Had you forgotten who I was?”

“Did I look surprised?” His head moved lower and he began doing the oddest thing: kissing her breast through her nightgown…Josie moved her legs restlessly. It felt wonderful.

“Yes, you did,” she said, gathering her thoughts together. “I do believe you had no idea who I was.”

“I knew who you were,” he said, drawing her nightgown off her shoulder.

“Then why the confusion?”

“Because I’ve never woken up with a woman,” he said. His lips skated along the skin of her shoulder, leaving a little path of fire.

“Nonsense,” she said rather breathlessly. “We don’t have the sort of marriage where you must ladle on the fibs, Garret. I know you’ve woken up in beds all across London.”

He made a muffled sound that seemed to be a negative.

He was kissing her breast, and the rough feeling of it washed over her like a wave, drawing her into someplace where she couldn’t seem to think of a clever retort.

When Mayne raised his head he found that his wife was lying in an attitude of pure, boneless pleasure. He pulled her nightgown down even farther, over her other shoulder. There was a small sound of cloth ripping and Josie opened her eyes. He rubbed his thumb across her nipple and she closed her eyes again.