The Husband Plot Page 13

  Adrian waited for her to open her eyes before moving his fingers again. She was still wet, perhaps more than ever, so he stroked again, returning to the circles around her nub. “Have you ever done this before?” he asked as he did, relishing the lazy happiness in Lisbeth’s eyes. She was smiling now, a dreamy, moony grin.

  “Only to myself,” she whispered. “Not like this.”

  “Shall we do it again?”

  She was already writhing at his touch, closing her eyelids, frowning in that delicious concentration.

  “Always,” she breathed. Then she opened her eyes again. “Except I do believe it is raining.”

  Adrian couldn’t quite bring himself to stop circling, even as he discovered the cold drizzle she mentioned. Lisbeth leaned her head against the garden wall. “We’ll catch our death if you don’t stop that.”

  “Do you want me to stop?” he growled into her neck.

  “No,” she sighed.

  But the rain picked up, no longer just a spittle, and even with his fingers inside his wife and an erection the size of the Great Wall, Adrian had to admit they couldn’t stay outside much longer. Gently, he pressed one final kiss to Lisbeth’s shoulder, then returned her feet to the ground.

  “I hope we haven’t missed supper,” he said, trying to conjure a bank of indifferent white faces to return his body to a state of boredom.

  “We aren’t staying,” Lisbeth replied, throwing out the words with disdain. Then she cut her eyes to him with a certain fear. “Are we?”

  Adrian wondered what she was frightened of. That he would command her to stay? That he would take her home and insist they continue what they had just started? Or that he would take her home and not continue what they had started?

  A week ago, he may not have noticed that she was scared at all. Perhaps in another week, he would be able to read her even better. For now, he merely bowed. “I am at your command, Mrs. Hathorne.”

  Seventeen

  Chapter Seventeen

  The household was quiet when they returned to Upper Norton Street. Ford and Mrs. Siswell had retired for the night, leaving only a few candles burning in the foyer as well as the lamps in the upper corridors. Lisbeth nearly trembled with wickedness, though there was nothing unusual about a husband and wife returning from a ball to a slumbering house. Adrian had held her the whole carriage ride, one arm around her shoulders and the other reaching into her lap to clasp her gloved hand. Now he led her up the two sets of stairs to their bedrooms, pausing on the silk carpet outside the doors.

  “Perhaps you would like to sleep,” he murmured, his voice low enough that no servant could hear, even were they awake.

  “Perhaps I would not,” she murmured back.

  She saw rather than heard how his breath caught in his throat, his eyes flaring, his lips parting. How long had she waited for this, to have a man weak for her? Lisbeth touched his hand, a promise. “Hannah is waiting to help me undress. May I knock on your door in a quarter hour?”

  He nodded, then cleared his throat. “I am at your service.”

  Lisbeth smiled to herself as she sashayed into her room. He had certainly been in her service in the garden. She had not known fingers alone could be so powerful. Adrian’s had not done anything so different from what Lisbeth had done to herself these past years in the dark of night, yet somehow his touch had set fire to what had only ever been an ember; her limbs still floated from the white-hot heat of pleasure that he unleashed.

  Hannah paled when she saw the state of Lisbeth’s outfit: crumpled skirts, rain-stained satin, the wilted ostrich feather.

  “I behaved wildly, I’m afraid,” Lisbeth said by way of explanation, and something in her demeanor must have said more, because Hannah smiled a slow, wicked grin.

  “Which nightdress would you like to wear, then?”

  Lisbeth’s trousseau – originally purchased for her marriage to an earl – included a number of French nightdresses designed to entice a husband. Her mother had recommended the one she wore on her ill-fated wedding night: white lace that revealed a shocking amount of skin.

  Tonight, Lisbeth decided, she would wear what made her feel beautiful. The French modiste had argued that yellow silk made Lisbeth’s skin look sickly, but in the candlelight, Lisbeth rather thought it set her brown eyes aglow. The lace pattern was suggestive more than it was revealing, streaming down beneath her breasts, narrowing near her navel, and then falling in soft pools from her thighs to the floor. Hannah brushed out her hair, letting it loose to reach down past her shoulder blades, then dabbed eau d’ange behind Lisbeth’s ears before declaring her ready for the evening.

  “Have a good night, Mistress,” Hannah said with a smirk, and Lisbeth could only giggle.

  How could she be embarrassed to have a husband who yearned for her?

  Assuming, of course, that in the past fifteen minutes he had not changed his mind.

  Alone in her room, Lisbeth took a moment to collect her thoughts. Neither of them had said it, but Lisbeth could feel in her bones that if she knocked on that door – if Adrian still awaited her on the other side – that their marriage would become real. No longer could she threaten to run home to Frampton Square. When he declared unilaterally that she couldn’t do something, she would have to fight back without threatening annulment.

  If she knocked on that door, she was accepting him, tyranny and all, for the rest of her life.

  It sent a shiver down her spine, especially when she remembered her rage that very afternoon at how he silenced her in the coffeehouse.

  But she knew now why he did it. Knowing that Adrian was a secret abolitionist – a careful, serious abolitionist – Lisbeth could see why he had silenced her each and every time. He was afraid of being found out. He was afraid of showing his hand too early.

  Despite the fire in the hearth, the room grew cold as Lisbeth sat still, deciding. Her skin turned to gooseflesh, and the silk of her nightgown chilled.

  Lisbeth still didn’t agree with Adrian’s overabundance of caution. But it was easy to forgive, now that she knew his reasons. Now that she knew Adrian: a gentleman, a kind man, an inexperienced man trying his best to undo generations of wrong in his one lifetime.

  She rose, silk rustling at her ankles in delicious licks. Adrian was her husband, and he wanted her. There was no more thinking to it than that.

  He answered her knock almost immediately. He wore the same robe she had seen previous nights, but it was tied more loosely, revealing a peek beneath of bare chest and white drawers.

  Her heart tripped.

  “Would you like a sherry?” he asked after a long moment – a moment during which, she dared believe, he raked his eyes over her body.

  She knew she should probably accept it, to set them both at ease, but she wanted nothing more than to slide that robe over his shoulders and see her husband’s body once and for all.

  “I’d like you to kiss me.” Her voice came out a little squeaky, and she laughed at it.

  Adrian smiled. He was so handsome when he smiled, so light and real and devastating. She could lose herself in it.

  “I wish you would smile more,” she said, reaching up to touch it. His lips were warm and soft beneath her fingertips. “It’s my favorite thing in the whole world.”

  Adrian caught her hand, pressing her palm against his cheek. His jaw prickled with freshly-shaved hair. “I smile when I have good reason to.”

  “I’ll have to give you more good reasons, then.”

  They lost words after that. Adrian’s free hand came to her waist, pulling her closer, and then he dipped his head to meet hers.

  His kisses were heaven, a pillowed nirvana where Lisbeth could lose track of time and thought and simply feel. But her body burned for something more just now. Untying the sash at his waist, she tucked her thumbs beneath his robe and pulled it off one arm, then the other. She only retreated when it had fallen to the floor, roaming her eyes over the muscles defining Adrian’s body. Wiry curls danced across
his chest, narrowing in a trail that disappeared down his breeches.

  She would have followed it right then and there if Adrian hadn’t touched her in turn. His hands slipped under the bodice of her gown; his palms cupped her breasts as his thumbs drew circles around her nipples.

  It was the third time that day he had touched her so, and Lisbeth hoped he would never stop.

  She reached out, hooking her fingers at the rim of his drawers, tugging him closer, and then running her hand down to palm the bulge.

  She loved his groan of appreciation almost as much as she loved the firmness that twitched in her hand.

  “I’ve never been allowed to see one, you know,” she murmured, running her thumb along its length the way Adrian had touched her in the garden.

  “Proper ladies are supposed to faint dead away if they see it, even on their husbands,” Adrian said between breaths. His hands had fallen away from her breasts, resting at her waist now as she explored him.

  “I’ve never been very proper.” If she had her way, Lisbeth would have unclothed him already.

  But Adrian interrupted, lifting her into his arms and carrying her to the bed. The covers were already drawn back; he deposited her on the soft cotton sheets. He kissed her again.

  “Are you sure you want to do this tonight?”

  Lisbeth loved that he stared at her with those glowing green irises as he asked. “I’ve wanted to do it since I saw you at the altar.”

  He shut his eyes in shame even as he smiled. “I didn’t go about it well that night. I want to do it properly now.”

  She anchored her hands on his neck to steal a hot, heady kiss.

  Adrian trailed his fingers up her arms, clasping her palms in his. “I’ve heard it may hurt you.”

  “Yes, and I will bleed, and I may cry.” Lisbeth couldn’t help laughing at how horrendous the words sounded in the air. “I’ve heard that for some women, it doesn’t hurt at all. Some don’t bleed, even though they’ve protected their chastity. One friend hated it. Most of them like it. Come to think of it, I believe it is so popular an act that kings have thrown off churches in the name of sexual congress. It must not be that bad.”

  Adrian kissed her left palm and then her right. “May I confess I’m a little nervous?”

  “That’s because you’re thinking too hard.” Lisbeth propelled herself onto her knees, pressing close against him so she could feel his chest on the other side of her lace. “Kiss me and then take me. If we don’t get it right the first time, we’ll try again.”

  Adrian complied. His hand plunged into her hair as he took her lips with his. Lisbeth had never felt so consumed. She loved it. Her hands went again to his drawers, and this time, he let her undo the laces, though she fumbled because she was so busy being kissed she couldn’t see what she was doing. He stepped out of his pants and stood naked before her, all sinewy muscle and a strong member that nearly pulsed with desire.

  Lisbeth felt her nether regions flood at just the sight of it.

  He wanted her. There was no more evidence than this.

  Adrian reached for her with his long fingers, exploring her wet folds as he had in the garden, and Lisbeth lost track of her thoughts. She wanted more this time, not with intellectual curiosity but with a deep, primal need. Her hips started bucking, and Adrian whispered against her neck, “Are you ready?”

  She breathed her answer, or screamed it – she didn’t have control anymore as she awaited him. Whatever she did, Adrian heard her yes. Slowly, gently, he positioned himself against her. For a moment, his tip caressed her wet nub the way his fingers just had, and Lisbeth nearly exploded. But then it descended, and next, he was plunging inside her.

  It hurt. She couldn’t deny that. Her muscles seized in protest, and she let out a gasp of pain. But she didn’t want him to stop, didn’t want to lose this experience. So she eased her hips and whispered, “Keep going, please.” She focused on the feel of his thighs braced against hers, the wiry curls of hair prickling her skin. The cotton under her bum growing hot from their friction. The heat of his breath coming in quick staccato exhales on her shoulder. The pain, she realized, had evaporated, replaced by a growing, frenzied desire. Adrian was inside her, his eyes squeezed shut, his body pulsing needily in and over and around her, and Lisbeth let herself disappear into the moment.

  When he came, the most beautiful smile overtook his face.

  She erupted the next instant, ignited from the sight of it.

  Eighteen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Adrian had never been so relaxed. So at peace. So alive.

  No wonder men risked health and wealth in pursuit of sex. He had never known something more precious than this: floating beyond all problems, feeling nothing but flesh and fire, tasting the full satisfaction of desire.

  Stretching onto his side, Adrian surveyed the wife beside him. Lisbeth wore a dreamy smile and nothing else; he decided it was his favorite of her outfits. Her naked body didn’t match the slim Grecian statues he’d seen, nor the voluptuous cartoons passed around the Eton boarding rooms, yet Adrian couldn’t imagine a landscape more erotic. The soft expanse of her skin, the muddy rose of her nipples, the rising hill of her stomach, and the silky black forest at her center.

  And he was naked, too, bared for her to see in all his shy brown glory. He wondered what she made of him, whether she found him too hairy or if his cock was alarming or if she had been revolted by the constellation of moles across his shoulder.

  Better not to worry about such things. Adrian sneaked a palm onto her hip to reclaim her attention. “Did you enjoy that as much as I did?”

  She turned to face him, her breasts wiggling ever-so-slightly as she did so. Adrian dragged his eyes back to meet hers as she said, “I don’t think I’ll mind sacrificing myself on the altar of wifely duty after all.”

  “Wifely duty,” he repeated. “Are you to remain my wife, then?”

  She trailed a finger across his lips. “Will you still have me?”

  The question was so absurd, Adrian almost laughed. But for a split second, he saw the fear in her eyes. The insecurity beating in her heart. Lisbeth believed somehow that he might say no, even after this. After all they had been through together, and after all the physical joy they had given each other.

  This was the woman, then, who had chosen to marry a stranger rather than stomach another Season.

  He tightened his grip on her hip. “I never wanted the annulment, remember?”

  It didn’t seem to be quite the thing to say. Lisbeth didn’t immediately burst into rapturous wonder at how romantic a husband he was, nor did she throw her arms around him and shower him with kisses – both outcomes he wouldn’t have minded. She lowered her somber eyes.

  “Can you tell me what your chess game is, then?” Her hand closed over his, small and soft and warm. “How do you plan to win abolition, if not by preaching it publicly?”

  Adrian’s blood pounded. If he told her now, the secret he had so jealously pressed to his breast all these years would be free in the world. Lisbeth need only whisper one piece of it to the wrong person and his plans would unravel. He would lose his edge of surprise; he would likely lose his father’s love, too, and his inheritance and possibly all family connections.

  But if he didn’t tell her now, he sensed, he would lose Lisbeth.

  “When the privilege bill is approved, I’ll inherit Inglewilde Plantation upon my father’s death. I’m going to free every last person that the Hathorne family owns. If they want to stay, I’ll offer them wages to keep their positions. If they want to leave, I’ll give them money to get started in their new life. Either way, I’m going to free them and support them and hopefully prove that our economy does not need to balance on slavery in order to function.”

  Adrian was aware, by the end of his speech, that he was no longer serene. His words flamed with the heat in his heart; his fingers at Lisbeth’s hip curled into a fist.

  The anger didn’t feel as good, now that he
had known a few moments of peace without it.

  “You’re the only person I’ve told,” he continued, locking his eyes on Lisbeth’s to make sure she heard him. “It means my family will lose money, friendships, respect…They’ll likely disown me. They may try to sue me to take the property away from me. That’s why it is so important I do things the right way. I can’t give the court any extra reason to declare my inheritance illegal. And they can’t find out what I’m planning to do.”

  Lisbeth threaded her fingers through his fist. “They can’t find out what we’re planning to do.”

  He wasn’t sure how he felt as her words linked themselves around his heart. His wife had never been more than a pawn in his plan, an ivory piece to leave in place in London.

  Adrian hadn’t yet reckoned with how to expect Lisbeth – the woman whose soul sparked like flint against everything she encountered – to stay in one corner of the gameboard.

  For the moment, he drew her knuckles to his mouth and pressed kisses to each precious finger one by one. She would keep his secret; she might even fight for his secret. That was enough for him to know.

  Her irises darkened at his kisses, which prompted him to trail his mouth farther along her arm, dotting his tongue across her wrist, inside her elbow, up her shoulder, until finally capturing her earlobe. She hissed; he was coming to love her hisses.

  “Are you tired, Mrs. Hathorne?” he whispered.

  She answered with a kiss, hot and eager against his lips. Earlier, their mouths had explored each other with an urgency, a prelude to how their bodies would join. Now, with his lower half still languid in satisfaction, Adrian could simply enjoy Lisbeth’s lips. Her kisses were like smiles bottled into a potion, a secret elixir only for him that spread sunshine across his skin.

  He couldn’t believe he had wasted so much of their marriage, afraid of this.

  “Earlier,” Lisbeth said, presenting her neck as his canvas, “I started reading The Harrowing Adventures of Captain Urselious Bigsby.”