Page 95 of A Figure of Love

Chapter Twenty-Two

They left at first light. The atmosphere in the carriage was somber, and Gareth knew she had not forgotten last night. He had cursed himself in the hours since; he should have locked the door. But he knew that was weak thinking. Serena was not the type of woman to accept locked doors, separate rooms, separate lives. If he had married a true daughter of the aristocracy, as he had once planned, he would have gone to her once a week and then returned to his own bed and none would have been the wiser.

He looked up from his thoughts to where she sat, facing the horses. She was waiting for him.

She slid to one side of the narrow seat. “Will you not sit beside me?”

Her words warmed him inside. “Will you not be cramped?”

Her eyes flickered over his body like a heat wave. “Yes.”

Gareth moved across the short distance and lowered himself beside her, her body warm and soft along his side. She put her hand on his knee and he took it in his. They both stared down at their linked fingers.

“I have ugly hands.”

Gareth spread her smaller hand open in his palm, turning it to view both sides. She had been working lately and there were hard callouses, a small slash on the pad of one finger, the skin chapped on the back, and the shape of her thumb proof of her hand’s strength and skill.

He raised it to his mouth and kissed her palm.

“I like your hands.”

She nudged him with her shoulder. “You are supposed to argue with me, Gareth, tell me how lovely and dainty and delicate they are.”

His mouth curved into a smile, as it seemed to do so readily in her company. “I am not adept at flattery or flirtation, Serena. I can tell you they are beautiful hands to me, because they are yours and because they are capable and create art and because they give pleasure when they are on my body.” Her cheeks flared at the last words, her eyes dropping shyly away. He tilted her chin, forcing her to meet his eyes. “You will find me a dullard, I am afraid. Laughter and smiles and jests do not come easily to me as they seem to with other men. Declan says that is because I do not exert myself, but that is not true. I have no capacity for poetry or flowery prose, anything so obscure tangles my thoughts. . . pollutes my reason.” He turned and slid an arm behind and beneath her, lifting her into his lap, her hip resting against his arousal.

She gave him a smile of pure bliss, her emotions as easy to read for him as a book.

He kissed the tip of her nose. “I have very little experience with women, Serena. And I have only ever loved one.”

She cupped his jaw and brought his face lower to kiss him. “I don’t like to think of you with another woman. It makes me want to break things.”

He brushed a kiss over her mouth, warmed by her possessive words.

“I fell in love with you the way you are, Gareth. You can say more to me with a look than most other men can say in an entire volume of poetry.”

“I don’t like to think of you with other men,” he said, his words an echo. “It makes me want to claim you again—to take you and remind you that you now are mine.”

She shifted in his arms, until she sat astride him, her eyes heavy and her smile lazy and hungry. “I have never made love in a carriage.” Her dexterous hands were already busy at the closure of his breeches and he lifted his hips so she could pull them down. Her hand closed around him and a low grunt of pleasure escaped him.

She stroked him to slick hardness, her eyes never leaving his. “I will want to sketch you like this, you know.”

He hardened even more at her words. “You have not paid me for my last sitting.”

That made her laugh. “You are not a professional model, you should be grateful for the opportunity to become part of a great work of art.”

Gareth thrust into her hand. “Even a novice should receive some payment.” He lifted her skirt and petticoats to her hips, his cock pulsing at the unbearably erotic sight of her serviceable stockings and the plain garters that held them just above her knees, nothing but smooth, naked thigh above them until . . . His mouth flooded with moisture at the sight of her curls.

She lifted her eyebrows high. “Novice?” Her thumb swirled his hard, slick head and she grazed him lightly with her nails.

Gareth jolted under the intoxicating combination of pleasure and pain. “Dammit, Serena!”

“Language, Gareth.”

He pushed away her hand and positioned himself at the hot, wet entrance to her body, bringing her down hard. They both gasped and then froze, reveling in their joining.

The carriage struck a massive rut or bump and she grabbed his shoulders to keep from falling off, her sheath tightening around him while her lush bottom bounced up and down.

Gareth groaned. “I love the road to Dover,” he murmured, guiding them both to pleasure while her laughter filled the carriage.