Prince of Dreams (Stokehurst #2)(43)

“You're quite the most enjoyable English lady I've met,” Brixton said. “So friendly and open. It's a nice change.”

Emma forced her attention back to him. “I'll admit the English have a well-earned reputation for being reserved.”

“Why aren't you, then?”

“I don't know,” she answered, smiling. “I'm just odd, I suppose.”

Brixton gave her a blatantly admiring glance. “Perhaps so, Your Highness. But in the nicest possible way.”

Emma blushed and looked across the table. Nikolas stared at her impassively, his lips touched with a mocking smile, as if she were some foolish child he had caught in a lie.

Although the interplay between Emma and Nikolas was never what anyone would call affectionate, at least they had always managed a friendly banter in front of guests. This evening it was impossible. Emma was miserably aware of the strained silences between them. Nikolas was at his most obnoxious, treating her to cold stares and jeering taunts. Emma longed to snap at him that she had done nothing to deserve such treatment. Had Nikolas guessed somehow that she had been affected by Oliver Brixton's presence tonight? Did it annoy him that she still had feelings for Adam? Was he jealous? No, Nikolas had never shown any signs of caring for her that way. It must be that his pride had been stung.

Emma suffered through the rest of the evening, profoundly relieved when the guests finally took their leave after midnight. Without a word to Nikolas, she hurried up to her suite and slammed the door. The effort of smiling and eating and making conversation had exhausted her. Trying to calm her jangling nerves, she rang for Rashel to help her undress, and paced around the suite until the maid arrived. Seeming to understand her mistress's fury, Rashel was silent and efficient as she unfastened Emma's gown and unhooked her stays.

“I can do the rest,” Emma said shortly, motioning for her to leave. “Thank you, Rashel. Spahkóynigh nóchyee.”

“Good night, Your Highness,” the maid replied in kind, slipping out the door.

Emma donned an embroidered linen nightgown and went to bed, pausing only to jerk the pins from her hair and run her fingers through it. She lay in the darkness with a sheet pulled up to her br**sts, and tried to recall Oliver Brixton's face in detail. Did Charlotte Brixton resemble her brother? The same round cheeks, the same light, thin hair? I hope she has a fortune big enough to satisfy you, Adam, Emma thought grimly, if that's what you really wanted. She remembered Adam at their last meeting, at the Angelovsky ball…his warm brown eyes, his boyish smile, the pressure of his lips on hers, his voice saying, I adore you…A tear squeezed from beneath her lashes, and she buried her face in the pillow.

She had almost drifted off to sleep, her body curled and relaxed, when there was movement in the darkness. Making a drowsy, questioning sound, Emma began to roll onto her back. A heavy body pounced on hers, a spring of coiled muscle. In her drugged confusion she thought she was dreaming and was being attacked by her tiger, Manchu. A man's hot breath pelted against her ear, and she was stunned to realize it was her husband.

“Nikolas?”

He pinned her to the mattress with his weight. Although he was fully clothed, the insistent jut of his arousal was unmistakable as it pressed against her bottom. Emma gasped in surprise, wriggling to free herself as his liquor-soured breath wafted to her nostrils.

“You're a possession to me, do you understand?” came Nikolas's sneering voice. “I own every damn bit of you. I knew what you wanted tonight—I saw the way you flirted and smiled while Brixton looked down your dress. You wanted me to be jealous, my scheming little wife, but it didn't work. I will never be jealous of you.”

Emma recovered enough from her astonishment to jab her elbow against his ribs. “Get off me, you drunken ass,” she cried in a muffled voice.

Nikolas flipped her over and pressed himself between her thighs. He was breathing heavily, from rage or passion, or from some volatile mixture of both. “You want to tie my soul into knots,” he muttered. “But you won't make me feel anything I don't want to feel. I will never love you.”

“Who asked you to?” Emma replied hotly. Then she was still, and in a peculiar flash of understanding she knew that Nikolas was afraid, that he was fighting desperately against his own feelings. Wonderingly she reached up to his shadowy figure, her fingers touching the rumpled locks at the side of his head. “Nikki—”

He jerked back with a furious sound. “Don't call me that.”

“Coward,” she said, the accusation soft but clear. “Why are you so terrified of being close to me?”

Emma felt his tremor of anger as he crouched astride her hips, anger that made his bones lock and his muscles clench. Then Nikolas gave a defeated groan and bent over her. His mouth sought hers, yearning, passionate, and his hands tore at her nightgown to find her willing body beneath. She moved to help him, pulling at her own clothes and his, ripping his white lawn shirt, yanking at his trousers with such urgency that the buttons popped.

When their clothes were shredded and disarranged, Nikolas pressed his bare skin against hers. He fastened his mouth against the sweet softness of her throat, sucking and licking, working down to her br**sts. Moaning in pleasure, Emma opened her thighs and reached down to guide him inside her. He was taut and enlarged, filling her until she quivered with the ecstasy of it. She pushed upward to take more of him, and gasped as he rolled over in an unexpected movement. She rose above him, riding him steadily, pleasuring herself on his aroused body.