The Heiress Bride - Catherine Coulter [135]
“I think it’s foolish to continue as we have. I have forced you to it and you have been very kind, very giving, too giving. I have been selfish. But now, I want to do everything with you.”
“As in everything?”
“Oh yes.”
CHAPTER
19
“BUT THIS ISN’T the way it’s supposed to be done,” Colin said slowly, staring down at his wife, all visions of his future very gentle and tender seductions taking flight toward the window.
She just stroked his face with her fingertips, hugged him close, kissed his mouth a dozen times, his chin, his nose, tugged on his earlobe with her teeth. She said between kisses and bites, “I’ve been selfish and quite childish. I’ve been a coward. You’re a man. You expected a woman when you married me. That’s what you will have, right now. I don’t care about any pain. It’s not important. I want to give you what it is you must have. I will give myself to you as often as you wish, with no moaning or plaints.”
“Ah, Joan, but the pain. I know you remember the pain. I have no wish to torture you. I don’t wish to make you weep.”
“I won’t weep. I’ll be strong. I was raised to be stoic by Douglas and Ryder. Ryder used to box my ears when he thought I was acting like a girl. I won’t disappoint you, Colin, ever again.” She drew a deep breath. “I swear it.”
He gripped her forearms in his hands, slowly pulling her arms from about his neck. “I can’t allow this sacrifice. It’s too much to ask of you. Perhaps once a year you will allow me to come inside you—to create a child, nothing more.” He sighed deeply and assumed the expression of a martyr. “I don’t mind, truly. To give you pleasure night after night will suffice me. It must. I’m no monster to make you scream with pain.”
“Oh, Colin, you’re so noble, so very kind, but I have made up my mind. I’ve decided that I will do it right now. That way I should be fully recovered by dinner. Also, if I happen to cry out from the pain, there’s no one near here to hear me. Now, I wish to undress you.”
He could only stare at her, utterly amused, trying to keep the laughter well under hatches. “To believe you love me so much to offer yourself to me like this,” he said, his voice thick with emotion. “Despite what you know will happen, you are still willing to open yourself to me. It moves me, Joan. It makes me realize how very strong and giving you are. It humbles me.”
She was fumbling with the string on his shirt, tugging at the buttons on his britches. He laughed, slapping her hands away. “We’ll do it together, all right?”
She nodded, not looking at him now, and proceeded to strip off her clothes.
She wanted to seduce him on the carpet? She wanted to ravish him right here? Upon brief reflection, he thought it was a grand idea.
Colin was tugging off his left boot when she was naked, standing in front of him, her hands at her sides. She was trying to give him a siren’s smile, but failing woefully at it. She looked scared but determined. She looked like her namesake Joan of Arc on her way to martyrdom, elated that she was guarding her dignity even whilst she contemplated the flames. The foolish little twit.
When he was naked, he knew her eyes were on his belly and nowhere else. He wasn’t fully aroused, so she shouldn’t yet scream with fright.
He started to resume his role of the tender seducer, to end this damnable charade, when she jumped at him. His quick reflexes saved both of them. She was holding him in a strangle lock about his throat and kissing him until he was laughing.
Let her do it, he thought. He stroked his hands over her buttocks and hefted her legs around his waist.
“Oh,” she said and kissed him until she had to stop for a breath.
“What do you want me to do now, Joan?”
“I want you flat on your back so I can kiss you. I don’t want you to move, Colin.”
He obliged her, easing both of them onto the Aubusson carpet. Late afternoon sunlight sent silver beams through the narrow windows into the chamber. The air was soft and warm. She was lying on top of him, her legs between his, his sex hard against her belly.
He saw the fear