His laugh was wheezy. “You can tell, can you?”
She sat up, nervous but determined. “Is it as wonderful for a man?”
He just smiled, tight and fierce. Of course it was.
“I want to please you,” she said. “It’s only fair.”
He jerked backward, almost falling over. “No.Not here. I’ll make love to you in a bed, properly, not up against a tree—” He stopped, his face frozen.
So he’d done it up against a tree, probably here in Vauxhall, perhaps with one of those women they’d met earlier. Bianca pushed aside the spike of jealousy; that was all in the past. She focused on the pertinent issue, namely that he had pleasured her and she wanted to do the same for him. Fair was fair, of course, but she also felt a driving desire to see how he felt under her hands. Shewantedto touch him. “There must be some way...”
He swallowed. His eyes closed. “Well—yes... there is...” Slowly he unbuttoned his waistcoat and pulled it apart. He opened his eyes and looked right at her as he sat back on his heels and reached for the fall of his breeches.
She moved to the edge of the bench. “Should I—?”
“No,” he growled. “You... watch. If you touch me, I’ll perish on the spot.” He peeled aside the front of his breeches, staring at her as if in a trance, and untied his drawers.
Bianca leaned forward to see better as he took himself in hand. Lady Dalway had taken her to an art gallery, where she and Lady Carswell had openly admired the naked figures in the paintings and sculpture. Bianca had studied them more analytically, having never seen a man completely unclothed before. And Max...
... was not what she had seen in the gallery. His erection was longer, broader, rising rigidly from his groin. He sank back, knees spread wide, and wrapped his fist around himself, boldly displaying himself to her. Slowly he slid his fist down, then released and pushed into his hand from the top.
“My fingers are still wet from you,” he said in a low voice. “From your pleasure.” Another stroke of his fist.
“Is that why... I was wet?” She ought to be fainting of embarrassment to be discussing this, but she couldn’t take her eyes off his hand as he raised it for another stroke.
“Yes.” His voice broke, and his knuckles whitened. “To make it easier when our bodies become one. To make it exquisitely satisfying for both of us.”
She imagined his straining erection sliding into her instead of between his fingers. She felt hot and flustered all over again. “It’s much larger than your fingers...”
“And how much pleasure did they bring you?” He let out his breath in a hiss at the end of the next stroke.
More than she’d imagined. She watched his strokes grow rough, his grip tighter. “Max,” she whispered urgently, “I want to touch you. Please.”
He inhaled sharply, and bowed his head. His fingers went still, squeezing his shaft, and liquid spurted over his hand. He threw back his head, his face taut, and let out his breath in another long shuddering sigh.
“Next time,” he said in a ragged voice, to the sky. “Next time you shall touch me as much as you desire.”
Next time. Of course there would be a next time. And it wouldn’t be on a bench in the public garden, no matter how alone they were or how dark it was. Bianca was done fighting. She only nodded in agreement, and offered him her handkerchief.
He buttoned himself back up and helped her straighten her skirts. With touching devotion, he smoothed down her hair where she couldn’t see it, and assured her the headdress was on properly. Then he offered her his arm and escorted her back to the illuminated grove, as courtly and proper as ever, as if nothing exceptional had happened.
But it had. It had shaken her world.
Tonight she had seen him, heard him, felt him. In London they had both come out from behind their fortifications—dropped their masks, quite literally—and it gave her a great burst of hope for the future. They could have a good marriage, cordial, cooperative... pleasurable.Deeplypleasurable. It wasn’t love, but it was far better than the cool standoff they’d had to date.
And for the first time, the thought sent a rush of happiness through her.
Chapter Twenty-Three
The night at Vauxhall, unfortunately, turned out to be the pinnacle of their London visit.
Max had lain awake the rest of the night, letting each exquisite moment play again and again in his mind. He’d known that day in the sacristy that Bianca, unlike her sister, had the potential to bewitch and enthrall him, and now she’d done it. If God had seen fit to smite him in his sleep that night, Max thought he would have died a happy man, with his last vision that of Bianca on the bench, her head thrown back in abandon, her skirts around her waist, her pale shapely legs spread wide for him.
That, he thought, was enough for one night. Gambling had taught him never to stretch his run of luck to the breaking point. Better to retire early and secure his winnings than to keep playing, become reckless and risk what he’d won. So he took his wife home, kissed her tenderly, and bade her good night. The lingering, curious look she gave him tempted him to finish what they’d started, and take her to his bed, but he reined it in. He was going to do this the right way, so that when she finally came to him, she would be utterly, completely his.
If he’d known what was to happen in the next few days, he might not have been so sanguine about that delay.
A letter was waiting for him when he returned home two days later. Lawrence pursued him up the stairs and closed the bedchamber door before handing it over.
