She nodded, understanding his predicament. 'Tour grandfather taught you that women were sweet and mindless creatures meant for cherishing, and giving a man pleasure; but nothing more. Your gentle mother certainly did not give lie to his interpretation. I will wager she always had a very protective serving woman about her to fend off anything that your grandfather couldn't."

"Berthe was with her until she died," he answered.

"Nicolas, you know nothing about women," Skye said.

"I know how to love them," he answered her. "Is that not enough? Perhaps I do not know women of my own class, but there are just as many kinds of women among peasants as among the nobility, and I have met and dealt with them all. Are noblewomen really so different, doucette?"

"Noblewomen are taught to be freer than peasant women, mon brave. Now I will admit that not all of them take advantage of their opportunities as I have done, but many do. If you desire a docile and obedient wife who will never question you or your commands, then I must beg that you wed with a young and innocent girl, and certainly not with me. I am too set in my ways to change."

"But I am not, doucette, for you see that I have far more to lose by not changing than you do." He reached up and wove his big hand into her long, black hair. "I love you, chérie" he said, softly drawing her halfway down to him.

"Oh, Nicolas," she whispered, totally disarmed. Had he really listened to her, or was he simply blinded by his desire?

"Help me to learn about you, Skye," he begged. "I cannot be happy without you, and I will not lose you." Pulling her all the way down for a moment, he gently kissed her lips. "Aimes-moi, doucette!"

"I keep my own wealth, and I want my children here, at least those of them that can come to me. Especially my babies in Ireland, for my uncle and my brothers can hold the Burke lands now, but I cannot let my babies grow up not knowing their own mother. My eldest and his brothers can visit us, but their lives are in England and in Ireland. Willow must come! How she will love Beaumont, Nicolas!"

Her face was radiant with the thought of her children, and he thought she must be a good mother to care as much as she did. "I will love your children," he promised her, "and we will also have our own."

"And my wealth?" She would not let him escape.

"It remains yours, doucette. I want you happy, and besides, I have never had much wealth. What would I do with it?"

"You will learn these things, Nicolas," Skye told him. "The Beaumont coffers are full. Edmond will teach you, for he has a clever head with figures, and oversaw Fabron's wealth as well as the public funds. You must learn lest others less honest take advantage of you."

"I will learn it all if it will please you," he said.

"No, no," she fussed at him. "You must learn because you want to, because you want to be a good duc! It is important to Beaumont de Jaspre." She sighed. His own small holding in Poitou had been a poor one, and there had been no need for him to learn the many and varied things that overseeing a vast estate entailed. "Wealth is a great responsibility, Nicolas. The truly great lords understand that, and so must you. Do not be one of the foolish ones who think that wealth is only for personal gratification. First comes your family, but there will be times when the duchy must come before it for the good of everyone, including your family."

"Doucette, you have convinced me that I have a great deal to learn, and I promise you that I shall learn it, but I do not wish to begin those lessons now. Now I wish to make love to you." His heavy-lidded green eyes were laughing down at her.

"You would then give me lessons," she said teasingly, surprising him. "If you would do so, Nicolas, then you had best rise from my bed and take off your clothes. I have always found it damnably hard to make love in one's clothes." So saying, Skye swung herself off the bed and slipped off the demure pink night rail that he had already unbuttoned. When she turned back to face him he caught his breath with wonder and delight as her lush body was illumined by the moonlight streaming through the long windows and the firelight from the small hearth.

No peasant girl of his acquaintance had had as magnificent a form as Skye. Her small breasts were set high on her chest and thrust impudently forward. Her slender waist curved enticingly, tempting a man to encircle it with his hands. Below it, her hips flared in womanly fashion and flowed into long, shapely legs and feet. He knew the feel of her incredibly soft skin and long thick hair. She was a most sensuous feast for a man, and he groaned low, his desire beginning to swell and pulse beneath his garments. Rising, he tore off his clothes, and then looking across the bed at her, he held out his hand.

Skye let her blue eyes sweep over him as his had so boldly swept over her. Tall and fair-skinned, he was really quite handsome with his sleepy green eyes and his wavy red-brown hair, a recalcitrant lock falling boyishly over his forehead. Without his clothes she could see how long his legs were, and how surprisingly shapely for a man. She could also see how aroused he was, and she smiled mischievously as she stared directly at his open desire. Then she reached out, touched his hand, and climbed back into the bed.

Stretching out her fingers, she teasingly caressed and fondled him as he stood by the side of the bed. He throbbed beneath her touch, and she laughed low; a provocative sound that sent a fierce stab of desire through him. He wanted nothing more than to bury himself within her, to make her beg, to make her cry aloud with her passion; but for the life of him he couldn't move. Her touch was mesmerizing him, sending waves of pure pleasure racing through him, forcing him to stand very still lest she stop. Skye trailed her long fingers up over his belly, and then down between his thighs and around his hips to squeeze his hard buttocks in her small, skillful hands. "Bitch!" he whispered.

"Come to me, Nicolas," she said low. "It is you who began this fever in me. Do you now regret it, or do bold women frighten you?"

It was an audacious challenge, and one that released him from her power. He flung himself atop her, pinioning her firmly beneath him. His hard thighs pressed down against her soft ones, his belly and chest flattened themselves on her as his mouth took hers in a ruthless kiss. Skye gasped, but quickly recovered and returned the kiss, her little tongue daring his to do battle. To her surprise and intense delight, he responded by giving her a sensuous tongue bath, his flicking spear moving like wildfire down her throat, across her breasts, down her navel, thighs, calves. Turning her over, he licked slowly up her legs, across her buttocks, up her backbone, and over her shoulders. Gently he nipped at the back of her neck, pushing her long black hair aside to nuzzle it.

By the time he turned her again onto her back she was gasping with hot desire. It felt wonderful, and she wanted to give him some of the same pleasure she felt in return. "Let me love you, Nicolas," she begged him, attempting to sit up.

"No, doucette," he whispered back. "You may be very good at the facts of business, my love, but I am even better at the facts of love. Tonight you will be loved, and loved, and loved again by me. Another time I will let you love me in return, but not tonight." His hands moved up to fondle her breasts, to tease at the little pink nipples, to kiss them, and nip gently at them, to lick them into hard little knobs of pleasure-pain.

She let him have his way, her will to fight or argue totally lost beneath his skillful hands. She cared not what he did to her as long as he didn't stop the pure bliss that was invading her veins, replacing her blood. She felt him spread her legs, and then his kisses were sending gentle tremors through her as they touched the soft flesh on the inside of her thighs. Then he raised his head slightly and kissed the smooth woman's mont of her. Skye stuffed her fist in her mouth but it still did not entirely prevent the sound of her cries from coming to his ears as his tongue sought out and found the hidden sweetness of her. With wicked skill he ran his tongue down the moist rose-pink flesh, thrusting within the very entry to her. His tongue moved back upward and flicked teasingly at the tiny sensitive jewel of her womanhood.

A starburst of delight exploded in Skye's brain and body. Reaching up, he pulled her fist from her mouth and heard her moans of rapture. Lowering his head again, he once more began the delicious torture, not stopping until her frantic little mewling sounds told him that he had driven her far enough. Swinging over her, he thrust himself deep inside her, pushing her once again to passion's brink, loving the feel of her nails as they dug sharply into his muscled shoulders. He was a master at lovemaking, and he knew it, but this time it was impossible for him to be patient. He wanted his release, and he knew that she did, too. With a shout of exultation he poured himself into her quivering, vibrating warmth.

It was too much for her, and Skye, to his astonishment, began to weep. Nicolas gathered her into his arms, loving her all the more for the passion that could set her to weeping in the midst of their fulfillment. "Doucette, doucette," he murmured, pressing small kisses on her wet face, "doucette, mon amour, je t’ame! Je t’aime! Don't cry, my love! Ah, doucette, you will break my heart!" He held her hard and close, rocking her back and forth like a child.

"I am so afraid," she sobbed. "I am so afraid, Nicolas! I don't want anything to happen to you, but if we wed it will! I just know it will. It does every time I love, and I cannot bear any more! I cannot!"

"You do love me!" he breathed happily.

"Yes-no-I don't know! All I know is that I don't want anything to happen to you!"

They had to deal with her fear, and he was wise enough to know it. "We cannot marry for at least a year, doucette," he said. 'To mourn my brother any less time would be disrespectful. We cannot even announce our intentions before then. If nothing happens to me in that time, Skye, will you believe that nothing will? Surely there must have been some man in your life whom you cared for and who was not hurt by this phenomenon you believe in?"

Skye stopped crying. There was Adam. Adam had never been really harmed for loving her, but then Adam had never been married to her. Some instinct warned her not to mention Adam, for she had seen that Nicolas could be jealous. There is no one," she said softly.

Then I shall have the honor of being the man to destroy your dragon, doucette!" he said gaily. "Do not fear, ma chérie! I am a lucky man. I always have been. I was conceived a bastard, and my father might have disowned me, but my mother and my grandfather did not. They loved me and nurtured me. My grandfather even legitimatized me, allowing me to inherit his title, such as it was. My half-brother made me his heir, the Pope confirmed it, and now I am a duc. A wealthy duc! I shall be lucky in love, too! In a year's time I shall marry you, and we shall make beautiful children together, and we shall live happily ever after as they do in all the children's tales." He tipped her face up and looked down into her blue-green eyes. "Do you believe me, my beautiful doucette? Will you trust me to make everything all right?"

She looked into his eyes, eyes that were filled with love for her, eyes that honestly believed the words he spoke. He was so sure of himself. He was so sure of his ability to make everything all right. She wanted to believe that he could, and why not, she thought. "I will trust you, Nicolas," she answered him. "Oh, my darling, I will trust you! Perhaps this time it will be all right."


***

In the days that followed it seemed that she had made the right decision. Nicolas St. Adrian was a perfect lover, and he was also a man of his word. He worked very hard to understand the sort of woman that Skye was, and as he came to understand her he found he liked an independent woman. He began to admit to himself that as sweet as his mother had been, he had sometimes found her helplessness irritating and cloying. It had been an effort for her to choose between venison and rabbit pastry for her supper, and he wondered why his father had been attracted to her in the first place. He could only suppose that it was his pretty mother's innocence that had been so enticing. Skye, however, had no such difficulty reaching decisions. She was a woman who seemed to know exactly what she wanted, and how to get it. She was a woman who knew power and had dealt with it, and she quite fascinated him.