She inhaled slowly and audibly, and her fingers twined tightly in his hair. "Oh, please," she said, but did not elaborate.

He moved on top of her and pressed his knees between her thighs, pushing them wide until he could kneel between them. He gazed down at her with half-closed eyes. She was gazing back at him, her hair a riot of dark glory over her shoulders and breasts.

Candlelight flickered over her face.

She lifted her arms and spread her hands over his chest before moving them in slow circles there, her fingers bent back, smoothing the light hairs with her palms in one direction and ruffling them again in the other. She looked back into his face and smiled.

He could feel the soft smoothness of her inner thighs against the outsides of his legs. He could see the heavy fullness of her breasts. He could smell lavender and wine and woman.

And his erection was so taut that if he did not bury it inside her soon, something very embarrassing was going to happen. "Forgive me," he said, lowering his head and kissing her lips, "I cannot wait any longer." "Good," she said, still smiling. "Neither can I." He could have stretched out on top of her then and taken her with swift, urgent strokes. He would feel that whole lovely, curvaceous body beneath his, and the feeling would further ignite the fire in his loins.

She had said she was ready.

But to her their wedding day had been wonderful. This, the consummation, was the culmination of the wedding day. He would not let it be a disappointment to her.

It was the least he could do.

He spread his knees, lifting her legs over them until she twined them about his. And he slid his hands beneath her buttocks, lifted her and held her firm, positioned himself at her entrance, and pressed firmly inside.

He both watched and listened to her inhale slowly, her eyes fluttering closed until he was deeply embedded in her. He held still.

Lord God, she was all wet heat and soft sheath and clenching muscles.

And he –

He clamped his teeth together for a few moments. He would /not/, by Jove, give in to pure instinct.

She opened her eyes and looked up at him. He slid his hands from beneath her, moved them up her sides, pressed them beneath her breasts, and brushed his thumbs over her nipples. "Oh, no," she said. "Oh, no, it is too much, Duncan. It is too much." "Is it?" He settled his hands on her hips and withdrew from her and pressed in again and withdrew and thrust, beginning a deep and steady rhythm, gritting his teeth against too early an ejaculation.

He looked down to watch what he did. And he glanced up to see that she watched too, with heavy-lidded eyes and parted lips – until her eyes drifted closed and her hands, spread on the bed on either side of her, pressed into the mattress and her head tipped back against the pillow and her inner muscles clenched hard about him and she breathed in labored gasps.

He took her hands in his and raised them above her head, straightening his legs and bringing his whole weight down on top of her as he did so.

He quickened and deepened the rhythm, pumping hard into her until she cried out, shuddered convulsively against him, and fell limp and relaxed beneath him.

Her hands were hot and slick with sweat. So was the rest of her body.

The blood pulsed through him, hammering in his ears, thundering in his chest, making his erection an agony. He worked her swiftly until the climax came, and then he sighed against the side of her face and relaxed.

He listened to his heartbeat return to normal, perhaps drifted off into a sort of sleep while it did so, and marveled at the feel of her beneath him – and at the realization that she was a woman of great passion. "Duncan," she whispered, "are you awake?" "Mmm? No," he said. "Am I heavy?" "Yes," she said, "but you need not move yet. It was lovely. Thank you." The prim lady again – lying naked and sweaty beneath him and all twined about him.

He propped himself on one elbow and looked down at her. "It was," he said, "and thank /you/, Maggie. But it might grow a little tedious if we feel we must thank each other every time." She cupped the free side of his face with one hand. "I am not sorry," she said. "That I married you, I mean. I am really not." As if she had thought she might be.

Because of Dew? It had been a little disconcerting to see the man at their wedding breakfast – to see her talking with him, to see him take her hand.

He opened his mouth to say something, but changed his mind. "I am not sorry either," he said. "However, if there is to be any more to this wedding night, Maggie, I am going to have to get some sleep, I'm afraid." "Oh," she said – and smiled.

He disengaged from her body, rolled to one side of her, and lifted the bedcovers up over them. He looked across at her and realized that, just like that, she was asleep.

He lay beside her, looking at her for a while until sleep overtook him too.

Tomorrow they would be on their way to Woodbine and the rest of their lives. Within a few days Toby would join them. He was to live with them, just as if he were a normal, regular child – as he was, of course.

He would, Duncan thought, forever be grateful to her for that.

His heart ached with longing.

Daylight was making a bright square of the window behind the curtains when Margaret woke up. She stretched tentatively, remembering instantly – how could she forget? – and was aware of her unfamiliar nakedness between the sheets.

She felt wicked and wonderful – and amused by the former.

She turned her head, smiling. The bed was empty beside her, the covers thrown back.

She had slept through his getting up and leaving the room? She could scarcely believe it. She had always been a light sleeper and an early riser. Of course, it /had/ been a busy night.

They intended making an earlyish start this morning, though they had promised to wait until her family and his mother came to wave them on their way. And they were to call at Claverbrook House.

It was his grandfather's eightieth birthday.

Oh, goodness, what if everyone was already downstairs waiting for her to wake up and dress and make herself look respectable? Whatever would they /think/ of her? What sort of a wedding night would they imagine she had just spent?

Would they guess the truth? But /of course/ they would.

Oh, dear, she would die of mortification.

She was about to throw back the covers when the door opened. "If I were a proper lady's maid," Duncan said, stepping inside the room, carrying a tray, "I suppose I would have anticipated the exact moment of your waking and would have had your chocolate steaming beside your bed and your curtains drawn back so that you could see it when you opened your eyes. I am not a proper lady's maid." He set down the tray on the table beside her bed. It held two cups of chocolate and four sweet biscuits on a plate. "I would hire you anyway," she said, drawing the covers up to her chin, "but Ellen would be out of employment and I would miss her. I daresay you cannot dress hair as well as she does, anyway." He sat down on the side of the bed. He was dressed, but only partially – in pantaloons and a shirt that was open far enough to reveal the light dusting of hair on his chest. His hair was damp. He was freshly shaved. He was looking solemn and black-eyed – but he had joked with her. And she had joked back. And he had brought her chocolate and biscuits.

They were such little things, but they warmed her heart on this, the first day of her marriage. The wedding day was over. So was the wedding night. "I feared I had slept half the morning away," she said. "Which," he said, "would have been a marvelous compliment to my skills.

But instead, you are awake and it is still early." Oh, he was still joking with her. It felt so very strange to have a man in this room, into which even Stephen had scarcely ever set foot.

Her husband. It had a new reality today. Yesterday he had been her bridegroom and she had viewed him through all the euphoria of the nuptial celebrations.

Today he was simply her husband.

They had had relations three separate times during the night. The second time must have lasted an hour or more. She had had no idea that the female human body had so many places that could be aroused almost to madness. She had had no idea that the marriage act could consist of more than just preliminary kisses and the entry and the swift ride to release – to the man's release, that was.

She had had no idea that a woman could find release too – a total and mindless abandonment to … Well, to pleasure. There were actually no words to describe the experience. "A penny for them," he said. "For my thoughts? Oh, nothing," she said, but her cheeks were hot, and she knew she was blushing. Per haps within the next few days she could become very blasГ© about all this. "If you are going to lie there," he said, "with the covers clutched to your chin, you are not going to be able to drink your chocolate, Maggie.

That would be a shame. It smells delicious. You are shy this morning?" "No, of course not," she said.

But he looked at her and cocked one eyebrow, and she really had no choice now but to prove it by lowering the covers to the tops of her breasts. But if she sat up … And then he did what he had done in the drawing room last night. He laughed deep in his eyes while his face remained perfectly serious.

She lowered the covers to her waist and turned her head to look at the tray. The chocolate really /did/ smell good. "This is most unfair," she said. "You have had time to dress." "You had an equal opportunity," he said. "But you did not take it. Do you want me to wander into your dressing room in search of a dressing robe? They are probably all packed. Or shall I remove my shirt?" Oh, this was a very different Duncan this morning. This was – perhaps this was the intimacy of marriage. Perhaps things would always remain like this between them. Perhaps … "And your pantaloons too," she said.

He pulled his shirt off over his head and dropped it to the floor beside the bed. He stood up and moved his hands to the buttons at his waist. "Only if those covers get pushed the rest of the way down," he said.

She threw them off, and he dropped his pantaloons and then his drawers.

Oh, goodness. /Oh, goodness/! "Are we supposed to drink our chocolate now?" she asked.

He raised both eyebrows. "What if Stephen comes home?" she asked. "Or Nessie and Elliott? Or your mother?" "It is seven in the morning, Maggie," he said. "And even if any of them should take it into their heads to come here at such an ungodly hour, I seriously doubt any of them are going to come bursting into your bedchamber." She opened her arms to him.

It was all breathtakingly swift and deep and fierce after that – and every bit as satisfying as any of the more lengthy sessions during the night.

She was sore, she realized when they were finished. She had been sore even before they started, but that fact had not diminished her pleasure one little bit. "I will wager," he said against her ear, "that that chocolate is still warm. I believe we were running a race that time. Shall we try it and see?" And so they sat side by side, naked in her bed, propped against the banked pillows, and ate sweet biscuits and drank chocolate that was still a little bit better than lukewarm. "I think, Maggie," he said, "I am going to tell my mother this morning what I told you before our wedding. Will she keep the secret, do you think?" "If you ask it of her," she said, "I am quite perfectly sure she will, Duncan. She loves you." "And I am going to tell my grandfather," he said. "I owed my loyalty to Laura while she lived, but I think I owe something to my family now.

Would you not agree?" "I /would/ agree," she said. "Your grandfather loves you too, you know." "Yes," he said. "I believe he does. But that love will be put to the test again." She took his free hand in hers and curled her fingers about it. Oh, /this/ part of marriage felt very good indeed. This talking and confiding in each other, this asking for advice of each other. "I think love is always being put to the test," she said. "It bends, but it never breaks. Not if it is real. Your grandfather and your mother really love you." And perhaps, she thought, she would too.

Perhaps soon. "I think," she said, "I ought to go and get dressed." "A pity" he said. "I like what you are wearing now." She turned her head and laughed at him.

19