Governesses Under The Mistletoe. Liz Tyner
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close. Her fingers spread naturally, fitting against the taut skin. He trailed her fingers upwards, moving them over the ribs, the orbs, the lines and swirls of his chest.
Silken. Taut. Flexible and firm.
She’d never heard a song written about such an experience, never understood why people acted in manners not suitable to their station. In one brush of her hand against William’s chest she understood things no one could have explained if they’d spoken for a million years.
Like a creature burrowing against another for shelter, William put his face closer to hers. ‘Isabel... Is...I don’t think we’ve kissed before. I wanted to—I wanted to lean towards you and kiss you during the wedding. I ached to do it.’
He loosed his clasp and took his hand away, but her fingers stayed above his heart. He touched his lips to her nose, petal-light, brown velvety eyes watching blue.
‘Our first,’ he whispered. ‘But do not try to keep count, because if you can do so the night will be counted a miserable failure in my eyes.’
The world disappeared when he pulled her close and melded her into his arms. Her mind could not think past the feel of being held and she became light as thistledown, and wafted along on the warmth, held aloft by the rushing breaths. The soft brush of lips against lips joined them in a world of nothing but their heartbeats.
She didn’t know when the sash on her gown loosened and the garments fell away. But somehow, without her knowledge, William removed her clothing and his, and lifted her to the bed.
Their bodies twined close, skin heating skin, and for once, warmth on an August night soothed.
He paused, pushing himself up so that she looked into his eyes. The darkened room didn’t allow her to see the exactness of his features, but she could visualise him easily. His lips were parted and he studied her face, then moved to the side enough that he could reach to her cheek. She didn’t feel the touch, but his hand heated much like sunbeams travelling over the skin.
His fingertips dropped to her skin, moving to her jawline and down her neck to her shoulder. He trailed down her arm and took her hand, putting it against his cheek, moving to place a kiss against her palm. The bristles of his face mixed with the softness of his lips. She traced his jaw, taking in the transition to a world she’d not known existed. Tendrils of his hair brushed against her knuckles.
‘Isabel,’ he whispered, so softly she knew it was not a question, but a caress with words.
He moved forward to kiss her, but something inside her had changed so that the tilt forward seemed to take a thousand moments, but she savoured each one.
His lips, warm and moist, took her thoughts away so that she could only feel.
His hands brushed over her breasts, bringing the feel of a caress to her entire body. He outlined her hips, her stomach, and pulled her against him, his hardness between them.
Again the warmth of the night became a balm as the slickness of his heated body bonding to hers swathed them in a cocoon of togetherness.
When he entered her, the murmurings whispered into her ear made her feel more protected and loved than she’d ever imagined at any moment of her life.
In some knowledge she didn’t know how she’d gained, William did all he could to protect and cherish her with his body.
* * *
William stood at the side of the bed, looking down. His head kept lowering as he fell asleep on his feet and then he’d raise it and jolt himself awake. She lay so still and looked more fragile than any glass figurine with her resting lips, the lashes resting over closed eyes and the skin pale in the moonlight.
He leaned over her and brushed a kiss at her hair, hoping she would wake. She didn’t move. Then he brushed a knuckle against her cheek, and her eyelids flickered and she rolled over.
Stepping away he turned, controlling his breathing. She was well. She would remain well.
He should have met Isabel in her chamber. Even after she’d knocked on his door, he could have easily walked her back to her room and then left as she fell asleep.
He was not cad enough that he could ask her to leave his bed, and he didn’t think she had plans to go. If she had, she would have left earlier.
He could not become attached. He could not experience anything deeper than he might feel for any other person. To care enough that you didn’t want to hurt someone was how it should be. But he could not care enough that the person could damage him. If he had learned one thing in his life, that was it.
He didn’t don his trousers or shirt, but slowly began gathering his clothing. Devil take it. His face itched. He touched it again. This would be the second day without shaving and he simply could not stand another moment of it.
But he couldn’t ring for his valet and ask the man to simply ignore the woman in his bed—the wife in his bed.
This was what the vicar had meant about marriage, but William had been too absorbed to see. A wife did differ from a mistress. He’d not expected that since no love was involved.
The simple act of declaration of marriage in front of a few witnesses and it wasn’t just nonsensical words. But he had suspected that all along.
His thoughts had tried to warn him when he’d not been able to think the night before. He’d babbled on to the vicar as if he’d swallowed a crate of ale, but he’d not had any spirits until the one before the wedding, hoping it would steady him. The portent of knowledge, and the sleeplessness, had taken him out at the knees and gutted what was left of his thoughts.
This oddness, at seeing Isabel asleep in his bed, helpless in her slumber, was a reminder of all the conflagration he’d experienced during the past days. Surely, soon this would dissipate. Distance would help.
With his clothing bundled in one hand and his boots in the other, he made it out the door and pulled it closed behind him. In the hallway, he dressed, resting his back against the wall as he tugged on his boots.
Marriage had reduced him to—secreting himself out of a married woman’s bed in the night as if she might have a husband appear at any moment.
He would have to find another place to stay, at least temporarily until he had accepted the routine of someone living in his house. But he could not turn to his friends. He would be the laughingstock. So, Will, wife toss you out on the wedding night? What didn’t you know how to do?
He would go to his sister’s house. He wouldn’t have to explain there. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t stayed there many times before when he’d been playing cards with her husband, or talking with her, and the night had flitted away. The servants always let him in as if he owned the property.
* * *
Someone knocked at the door and Isabel’s eyes opened wide and she pulled the covers to her neck, feeling the strange slide of bed fabric against bare skin. She was in the middle of a monstrously large bed, she was naked and she was alone.
‘Yes?’ she asked, that being the only word she could think of. William. He didn’t wish to startle her.
‘Pardon.’ A male voice, rising high at the end, as if his foot had been trampled. Not William. ‘Later, sir.’
Oh, that was most likely William’s valet to wake him.
She looked around the room. He was not about, nor were his boots, nor any sign of the clothing, except hers.
Well.
She jumped out of bed, dressed as best as she could and darted to her room. How did one approach the servants and ask where one’s husband had wandered off to? She could not pen this in a note to the butler.
Back in her chamber, she sat on the mussed covers where she had tossed about the night before waiting to see if Mr Husband remembered he had got married. She reflected on what a small bed the room contained. Oh, it fitted her shape perfectly, but didn’t quite measure