Unclaimed (Turner #2)(49)
When he let his trousers fall to the ground, he was thinking about taking off her chemise. Of raising it, to show ankles he’d seen—and then more that he hadn’t. Calves. Thighs. If lust had clamored in him before, it rose up in him now—powerful and impossible to displace. His skin seemed on fire.
He was still standing. He shrugged out of his shirt; in his mind, he was not the only naked one. He caught hold of the carved wood post of his bed with one hand. With the other…
It should have been a clinical act, what followed. It was a sin, after all—a lesser one than actually taking a woman to his bed, but a sin nonetheless. But it didn’t feel like a sin when his erection filled his palm. It didn’t feel like a sin when his grip tightened around his member. And when he thought of her lips against his, remembered the taste of her mouth, sweet against his tongue—she felt right, no matter what his reason said.
It was not his own practiced touch that he felt, but the cool brush of her fingers. His imagination conjured up her body, sliding against his. Her hair, draping like cool silk over his chest. He strained forward, as if he might find her mouth.
His hand worked, quick jerks that sent little shocks of pleasure through him. As he moved, as he grew harder, as his lust grew more insistent, Mark opened his eyes and stared out the window into the dying sun. But even that fierce, red afterimage couldn’t steal the vision he had of her.
He was tight all over—his muscles contracted—thought washed away in a rush toward pleasure. His eyes shut at last, and he was bombarded by sensation, a barrage of images. Her hands. Her lips. The curve of her waist. And then, at the very end: Jessica, fully clothed, standing on the edge of the harsh rocks of the Friar’s Oven. Her skirts belled out around her in the wind, and she looked out over a sea of mist.
His release pounded through him, sweeping him away. It was welcome, so welcome. All that pent-up lust burnt like so much tinder in a wildfire. It savaged him, choking him, ripping his breath away.
Passion ebbed, and he was left with the furious pound of his pulse, the only echo of what had come before.
Mark opened his eyes. The light in the room was fast fading to navy-darkness. He breathed out; one final jolt of pleasure shook him, before his body subsided.
It was done. He’d banished his want.
Mark gingerly unwrapped his fingers from the wood post and walked to the basin on the other side of the room. The water was cold against his skin, the towel rough as he cleaned himself. He washed his hands, his skin. He could see the night sky outside his window. A lingering line of light painted the edge of the hills in claret.
With his want satiated, his thoughts should have been clear and rational. Instead, he felt even more muddled than before. He was alone with himself in the dark.
And he was in trouble.
With the sun of his want set, he’d expected relief from the blinding light of lust. He’d hoped for an utter absence of desire. Instead, he’d discovered stars—a thousand pinpricks dancing around him; an entire constellation of yearning, sketched into his skin.
He got into bed by rote. Once there, he longed for her touch as he drifted off to sleep. For her body, to pull parallel against his, that he might explore her skin with his fingers, his mouth. Not for lust. Not for sin. For…comfort. He’d uncovered a cavernous desire that was impossible to satisfy with fingers and palm.
Mark opened his eyes and blew out his breath. With every exhale, he banished her image. He called to mind dark, cold things: caves under water, winter storms blocking all hint of the sun. He concentrated on the reckless cry of a cricket somewhere in the night. Nothing danced in front of his vision but darkness now—black of night, shadow playing on shadow.
Even with his mind cleared, he could feel the subterranean tug of his desire.
Mrs. Farleigh—Jessica—wasn’t comfortable. She wasn’t demure. She wasn’t even respectable.
She was none of those things. And yet… Mark inhaled deeply and faced a truth that he had been trying to avoid for far too long.
He was done resisting her.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“I DON’T SUPPOSE there’s anything here for me again today?” Jessica asked.
The post office was dark—dim enough, she hoped, to hide the familiar flush of humiliation that touched her cheeks. She hated asking after the post. It always made her feel like a beggar, ringing her bell on the street corner while passersby slunk to one side, avoiding her eyes.
The letter she’d received a handful of days past had taken away everything she’d hoped for. It was foolish to think that she’d receive any communication today. Still, hope, obstinate as that creature was, whispered that maybe she would receive something to make up for recent pain. She was owed something good in the post. It had been years since her family had sent her away. Why should today not be the day on which the embargo was lifted?
Because, Jessica thought grimly, I’ve already had a letter from my solicitor this week.
But the proprietress crinkled her forehead instead. “Happens there is.”
Jessica hadn’t realized she was holding her breath until she sucked air in, light-headed all at once. She squeezed her hands together, hard, and tried not to lunge at the woman and demand her letter. Possibilities flashed in front of her—her father had written; her mother, maybe Charlotte—
“That is, assuming you are who is meant by Jess Farleigh.”