Too Wilde to Wed (The Wildes of Lindow Castle, #2)(54)

She giggled, and her arms wound around his neck. “I don’t want to hurt your feelings, but I am relishing my freedom.”

“I know you don’t love me,” he said, keeping his voice even. “Just so you know, I do love you. I think it is a lifelong condition.”

Her eyes filled with remorse, but he shook his head. “Love should never be regretted. But what might be regretted by you is this evening, Diana. You wish to marry for love. Won’t the man you choose expect you to come to him without knowledge of men?”

Never mind the fact that he had every intention of being the man she chose. Look what happened to Godfrey’s father. What happened to the men in his regiment. Life should never be taken for granted.

“Whoever marries me will already know that I jilted a ravishing future duke,” she said firmly, and then, with a twinkle, “You can take ‘ravishing’ in two ways.”

Who would have guessed that his melancholy fiancée could have such a naughty grin?

“My husband will love me enough not to care,” Diana said, her eyes shining with faith.

Everything in North chilled at the idea of Diana being loved by another man. Loving another man. He cleared his throat, because he had the feeling she wouldn’t approve of her romantic ambitions making him homicidal.

“Miss Belgrave, are you giving me permission to ravish you?”

She dimpled at him. “Yes! I requested just that, Lord Roland.”

A gentleman wouldn’t agree. But that perfect gentleman likely wasn’t as focused on winning as North was. Sometimes winning involved breaking some rules. Taking risks. Thinking creatively.

Diana kept stealing glances at his lips.

“A gentleman never refuses a lady,” he said, making up his mind. He rose onto his knees, pulled off his shirt, and threw it over the side of the bed. “What do you know about intimacy?” he asked, enjoying the way she was looking at his chest, wide-eyed.

“Everything.”

It took a moment for the word to register.

“I’m glad one of us is an expert,” North said, suppressing the wish to smile. He’d bet his life that Diana was a virgin. He bent and traced her lips with his tongue. The expert was shy, and he chased her mouth, demanding entrance. When her mouth eased open, he kissed her, deep and wet and desirous.

And let his hands wander.

Every caress made Diana jump—and then moan. He wrapped a hand up one lush hip. She startled, and then smiled, letting her legs fall apart.

“You’re perfect,” he said, the word rasping in the quiet night. His hand slid down and curled around a plump thigh. “Not scrawny.”

“I like buttered muffins.”

“I will have muffins sent to your bedchamber every morning.”

His hand slid over the softest skin he’d ever felt, making him reel with the desire to tear off her nightdress and leave kisses all over her pale skin.

She let out a little scream when his finger stroked her core. In his head, North was shouting something incoherent, made up of a string of curse words, forged from soft, wet, plump, trembling, heat. Heat.

With every caress, her eyes got larger and larger. He paused, his hand cupping her, one finger poised at her entrance. “Is this all right?” he whispered.

“Is that allowed?” his expert whispered back, stunned. Her hips arched, just enough so one broad fingertip sank inside.

“Oh, my,” Diana gasped, her hands curling around his arms, fingernails biting into his skin.

North stroked her again, loving the way her hips were twisting. “I need to kiss you,” he said, his voice a jagged sliver of sound.

Diana’s thighs were rising toward his hand. He took her gasp as agreement; he sat up and eased his hand away.

“North!” She sounded fierce, like a thwarted warrior queen.

He drew up her nightdress, allowing moonlight to glimmer over giving, soft thighs. Perfect thighs.

A groan burst from his chest. Between her legs was a twist of red hair, strawberry-colored, lighter than the hair of her head. Below it, the perfect pink of a wild strawberry, gleaming with moisture and desire.

He came up on his knees, letting her see everything he had: thighs and chest corded with muscle, and arms the same. No softness, because if there had been any, it had been carved away by war.

His cock was thick and broad, standing out from his body and straining toward her. He watched her eyes go up and down his body, fascinated. Pause on his balls, which felt heavier than ever before.

Back to his cock.

“Even an expert like yourself might still have a question or two,” he said, reaching down and gripping himself. He felt as if his loins were on fire.

Her eyes widened as he ran his hand down his cock, and pulled upward with a twist of his wrist. It was all he could do to keep his eyes on her face. Not to look down her body.

She sat up and her slender hands closed over his.

“Do it again,” she whispered. A moment later she batted away his hand and took over, her hand surprisingly strong, pulling his cock just right.

He forced his hands to stay still and allowed her to play with him however she wished. She stroked him, one hand clenching, the other wandering. Each time a groan erupted from his lips, she would repeat what she’d done less tentatively, until she had him trembling like a boy of fifteen, head thrown back, his entire body focused on the deep burn in his balls.