Oh. Yes. Eleanor had needed to observe it all for a very long time indeed.
The trouble was, she’d had no idea how to insert herself into the moment, and later on, she had no idea how to approach anyone about it. Whenever she rehearsed a conversation in her head with the countess or any of the other guests, she sounded fumbling and awkward even to herself, and of course, she’d have to admit to her sneaking around the folly. Her willful voyeurism. She’d been too terrified of being scolded, ostracized…or worse, laughed at.
So she’d kept that afternoon inside herself, imagining that one day she’d be brave enough to ask one of the people she’d seen in the folly about it. Brave enough to ask for some kind of invitation or initiation. The kinds of slow touches and lingering kisses that led to long, shivering releases.
The Duke of Jarrell would be good at those, she wagered. He seemed the kind of man who would scoff at short, cursory pleasure. Her body sparked anew just to think of it.
And it felt quite nice to rest now. Her hands didn’t hurt so much, and neither did her feet. The shivers too had eased and melted off, and she nearly felt warm.
Maybe she was warm, now that she thought of it. Warm enough not to worry about the gusts that spattered her face with rain, warm enough to stay here like she planned. She could rest and think of Jarrell touching her, of her and Jarrell in that folly, his hand between her legs and his mouth everywhere, everywhere…
“Eleanor. Eleanor, please. Please wake up . . .”
She’d rather not. She’d only just fallen asleep, and the dream of her and Jarrell in the folly was too exquisite.
“Eleanor.” The voice was rough and deep, and it would not be gainsaid. It was a voice used to getting its way. She frowned and tried to roll away, which the voice did not like. “No, little blossom, come here.”
It said more things then, its words low and impatient and threaded with fear, but she couldn’t make them out. She was too tired, and the rain was too loud, and she wanted back to her dream now, please.
Then suddenly she was being held. Cradled. Carried.
She tried to turn into the touch, snuggling into it, but this wasn’t allowed her. She was hefted, settled, and tugged back into his arms, and then the swaying and jolting began.
A horse, she realized dazedly. I’m on a horse.
But further thoughts were beyond what she could do.
She nestled into the shelter of a broad chest, shut her eyes, and fell back into darkness, back to the folly where her dream-duke waited impatiently.
A fire crackled. Light moved on the other side of her eyelids—reddish and flickering, and underneath her was something more firm than soft, but not uncomfortable. A blanket spread over a floor, maybe.
Warmth—like melting butter—was everywhere. In her chest and in her stomach, along her thighs and the arch of her neck. Low in her belly and between her legs.
In fact, she was aware of the melted-butter feeling before anything else, before the fire and the blanket, and was aware she’d been feeling it for some time now. It was strange, this warmth, because it made her dozing fitful and full of more dreams of Jarrell and the folly, but the sensation resisted action, it resisted fully waking. She didn’t want to wake up and move from here; she didn’t want to leave this feeling with its beautiful aches behind.
And the aches were so beautiful, but so cruel too. The tips of her breasts throbbed. The soft place between her legs cried out for contact so strongly that she squirmed for it, seeking pressure, friction, relief.
She found it.
There, all along one side, was a wall of firm, wonderful heat. She arched against it, feeling damp linen and silk, smelling something like fresh heather and cold rain, and something else she couldn’t identify but that stoked the torment roiling in her body. She continued arching, seeking, until her body was pressed entirely against it.
And then—to her immense frustration—the wall tried to move away, making her hiss softly in displeasure.
She followed it. Him. Jarell.
Just like in her dreams.
But better, because he felt—oh, he felt like she thought he might. Long and muscular and superb.
I shouldn’t touch him.
I should open my eyes.
But this dream feeling, this sleepy, shivery wonderfulness of him and her—and finally—
He was lying on his back now and she could drape herself over him. Just partly. Just enough to make a large arm band around her back in instinctive support, and enough that she could press her neediest spot against a hard, silk-covered thigh.
“Eleanor—” a deep voice said in warning, but she rocked against him anyway, a little noise escaping her as she did. It felt so good; it felt necessary. Each time she ground against him sparks flew everywhere in her body, like a blade on a grinding wheel. She was catching fire; she couldn’t stop. Inside of her, there was a twisting, a hot and urgent twisting, and all around her was a strong body and the sharp scent of the moors at night, and—
Right as the voice muttered a low curse, the twisting inside of her snapped.
Her mouth opened against his chest and her teeth scraped over the fine linen of his shirt as sweet and agonizing release shuddered through her . . . waves of greedy pleasure wringing everything below her navel into absolute disarray. Delicious disarray. She wanted more of it, and more, and more—until the shudders gradually faded away and she slumped back against the muscled arm cradling her close.
The satisfaction of it all was almost enough to lure her back to sleep, but then Jarrell spoke her name again, and with an abrupt mental lurch, she came all the way awake.
Chapter Six
He didn’t know what his face looked like then, only that it must have reflected all the fear he’d felt earlier, all the barely leashed lust, all the needs of a man too long denied.
She blinked up at him, her smile fading but her eyes staying curious and bright.
It was the brightness that undid him. Goddammit, didn’t she know what it could do to a person, having her looking at them like that? Right after she’d used their body to give herself pleasure?
What slid through his veins then was something that wasn’t rage or terror or lust. It was something far, far more dangerous.
Possession.
“We are going to talk now,” Jarrell told her very quietly, doing his best to ignore the possessive burn in his blood, but fuck, it burned so hot. “You have choices to make about what happens next.”
She pulled her lip between her teeth and then released it, nodding. The sweet sleepiness in her face was melting away, receding, and in its place was a look that brought him back to his senses.
Mostly.
He carefully separated their bodies and reached for the blanket behind him, draping it over her chemise-clad body, studying her as he did. He’d been terrified earlier, terrified in a way that made him realize he barely knew the meaning of terror at all. How could he have when he’d never before felt the chilled, limp weight of Eleanor Vane in his arms?
Only a single day ago, he would not have thought himself capable of so much fear. Even Helena’s death—and the excruciating worry which preceded it—hadn’t been marked so much by fear as by dread. He’d known he was going to lose Helena; he’d already lost everyone else by then too.