The Princess in His Bed (25 page)

“Good Lord, you’ve been trapped!” Vincent’s expression had turned to alarm. “She’s going to tell her family and you, dear brother, are going to be hauled to the altar.”

“That’s not going to happen.”

“Of course it’s going to happen! You’re the heir to a duchy.” Vincent began to pace. “We’ll say you were with us. That the lady is lying or mistaken and—”

“Well, actually, she thinks you deflowered her,
Vincent
. You’re the one who would be hauled to the altar.” Joseph’s words arrested Vincent’s steps. For the first time since entering the room, Joseph felt a smile coming on.

Vincent’s expression was one of abject horror.

“Me?! That’s why you used my name? So you wouldn’t be trapped?”

Joseph chuckled. “Be at ease, Vincent. I assure you she has absolutely no such intentions.”

“Was the tumble any good?” Gilbert asked.

Both his brothers shot him a look.

“What?” Gilbert said to Vincent. “You’re not curious?”

Vincent turned to Joseph. “Actually, I am. Was it any good?”

His greedy cock gave an instant hungry throb. “It was heaven.”

The best he ever had.

“A virgin? Really?” Gilbert pondered the notion.

“So why not take credit for the tumble?” Vincent asked. “Just who is this woman? Since you’re using my name, you could at the very least tell me.”

Joseph stared silently at his brothers. As much as they needled him—and it was going to be incessant over this—he knew they wouldn’t relay any information he gave them to anyone else. Perhaps if he enlisted their help, it might make it easier to get through the week?

If he didn’t count the nerve-grating, aggravating ribbing he was going to endure from them.

Joseph drew in a breath and let it out slowly. “The lady is Emilie . . . de Sarron.”

Gilbert and Vincent exchanged curious looks until dawning changed their expressions to mouth-gaping astonishment.

“You fucked
Emilie Embers
?” Gilbert exclaimed.

Fury rocked Joseph. He grabbed a fistful of Gilbert’s justacorps and yanked him forward. Their noses butted. “If you ever—
ever
—call her that again—or anything similar—you will rue the day, brother,” he hissed out through clenched teeth.

Gilbert’s dark brows rose. “All right. I’m sorry, Joseph . . . It . . . It’s just a shock . . . That you’d bed someone who has . . . er . . . who hasn’t been seen in years.” He quickly corrected himself.

Joseph released him.

Gilbert had the good grace to look contrite.

“Let me see if I have this correct.” Vincent rubbed the back of his neck. “You had a woman no one has seen in a decade, who you knew was both a virgin and Emilie de Sarron? And you used my name. Why?”

“Because she doesn’t much care for Joseph. And I don’t blame her. If I were her, I wouldn’t either. Neither of you were at that party that night at the Marquis de Sere’s château. Sere and his wife raised Emilie. Since their daughter was of similar age, they were both introduced to society that night. It was a grand affair. One that eventually garnered the Marquis’s daughter her future husband. It turned out wonderfully for her and disastrously for Emilie.” Joseph raked a hand through his hair.

“Augustin and Henri were well into their cups when the nasty commentary began,” he continued, his tone sharper. “Comments about Emilie’s likelihood of finding a husband. About her always wearing cloaks. Comments that drew a crowd around her and those two fools.” Joseph shook his head. “I’d had my share of merrymaking and drink. I’d laughed along with the others around her at some of the things Augustin said. In my brandy-soaked mind, I actually thought Augustin’s comments were to her benefit. That maybe the laughter and comments would cause her to finally cease wearing the unflattering garb. I behaved like a colossal ass. She kept looking at me, glancing my way. She knew a word from me would have silenced Augustin, Henri, and the crowd. I did nothing.”

Those three words were as bitter as bile on his tongue. As always, whenever he thought about that night, his stomach clenched. “That party changed everything for her,” he said. “She’d finally had enough—and withdrew from everything and everyone. After having to tolerate names like Emilie Embers and worse all her life, who can fault her?”

“And you’re making amends by lying to her and—despite being the last man she’d ever want, aside from Augustin and Henri—by claiming her maidenhead.” It was Gilbert’s turn to shake his head. “She isn’t going to be very happy if she ever learns the truth.”

No, she wouldn’t be. She’d be deeply hurt. “That’s why we’re going to make certain she never learns the truth,” Joseph countered and couldn’t ignore the sharp pang of regret he felt. She’d cried out Vincent’s name twice last night in ecstasy.

Joseph didn’t know how much more of that he could take.

For the first time in his life, Joseph was caught in his own web of lies. He couldn’t stop wanting her. Couldn’t get her forgiveness. Couldn’t find peace without it.

“Joseph is making amends—in his own way. He’s pleasuring the lady.” Vincent turned to him. “You are pleasuring the lady, aren’t you? I do have a reputation to uphold, you know.”

By the mischief in his twin’s eyes, Joseph knew Vincent was trying to leaven the moment. And he loved him for it.

Gilbert threw up his hands. “All right. I must know. You’re going to get angry, Joseph, but I simply must ask. It’s driving me mad . . . her scars. Everyone has heard rumors about how disfigured she is. How badly is she injured?”

A smile tugged hard at the corners of Joseph’s mouth. There was nothing wrong with Emilie. It was time his brothers knew that. Joseph moved between his two brothers, hooked his arms around their necks, and drew their heads closer to him.

“I’ve seen nothing but the softest, most perfect, lavender-scented skin.”

“Really? You have?” Gilbert asked.

“I have. Her body is lovely, and so sensitive to my touch, Gilbert, I can melt her with the lightest caress.”

“Oh?” Intrigue and excitement tinged Gilbert’s tone. He was affecting him.

Joseph hid his amusement. “And you’ll appreciate this, Gilbert, knowing how much you love women’s breasts . . . Hers are perfect.”

“Perfect?” Gilbert asked.

“Perfect. She has the most beautiful tits you’ve ever seen. Unmarred, soft plump mounds with delicious pink nipples, made for a man’s mouth. The tastiest teats, a man can’t help but savor . . .”

Gilbert shifted. “Th-They’re that good?”

“Oh, yes. That good. And then there’s the blinding pleasure of being inside an untried, passionate woman, like Emilie. All that snug silky heat squeezing you so tightly, it makes you throb.”

Vincent cleared his throat. “Th-Throb? Really?”

“Yes, really. You never want to leave her honeyed sheath. The torture is sublime. One that you want to go on,” he said to Vincent, then turned to Gilbert, “and on . . .”

Smiling smugly, Joseph removed his arms from around his brothers and walked away, knowing he’d accomplished what he’d intended.

“
Merde
, Joseph.” Gilbert adjusted his stiff cock in his breeches.

Vincent shook his head, his prick just as stirred. “You did that on purpose.”

Joseph grinned. “An eye for an eye—for playing me earlier.” Talking about Emilie hadn’t been without a personal price. It had served to heighten his hunger. Hot excitement was rushing through his veins straight to his already engorged sex. “Now then, your clothes,” he said to his twin. Taking off his knee-length coat, he tossed it onto a nearby chair. “I have a beautiful woman waiting for me—whom I’m most anxious to enjoy.”

He wished it was no more than lust motivating his eagerness to see her. But there was an undercurrent of softer sentiment beneath the untamed need.

One he hadn’t yet mastered.

Or quieted.

7

Emilie waited. And wondered.

Uneasy.

She could make no sense of the kiss Vincent had given her. Crowds funneled through the corridor in both directions, and she was growing impatient for him to return.

Something was amiss. She wanted to know what. She had questions and wanted answers.

Glancing down the hall, she spotted him approaching through the throng. Or at least she thought it was him. He had on Vincent’s clothing but Joseph’s dark blue demi-mask.

It only added to her disquiet.

“Vincent, why are you wearing Joseph’s mask?” she asked the moment he neared.

He halted his advance, touched the mask, and shrugged. “I must have picked up the wrong one after speaking to him.”

It was the last thing he said before he shoved her hard against the wall and crushed his mouth to hers, snatching her breath from her lungs, his tongue possessing her mouth on her gasp. Her face trapped between his strong palms, he kissed her with dizzying intensity. Every nerve ending in her body leapt to life.

This was
it . . .

The bud between her legs began to pulse, her questions dissolving as delicious raw hunger swamped her senses.

She laced her arms around his neck and held on to him during the maelstrom he caused with his powerful fiery kiss. Her nipples hardened and pressed against the inside of her chemise, eager for the carnal care he would bestow on them. She loved it when he touched them, what he did to them. What he did to her. She felt out of control, consumed by the yearning for him to fill that needy void between her legs. To feel that delicious stretching of her private muscles—bordering between pain and pleasure—as he fed her every delectable inch of his thick solid length.

“I need to fuck you,” he growled against her mouth. His blunt statement practically buckling her knees. “I need to fuck you right
now
.” In the hallway, with crowds of people moving about, he lifted her up against the wall, her toes barely touching the floor. She clung to his mouth, unwilling to relinquish it. She didn’t care about anything except feeding her starved senses—with the only man who knew how to. He rolled his hips, pressing his solid shaft against her throbbing clit with the perfect pressure. Her cry was muffled against his lips.

“You have one moment, possibly two, to tell me whether you want me to take you right here or in private. Choose!” he rasped, and lowered her back down onto her feet, purposely brushing her sensitized clit down the bulge in his breeches. She lost her breath, the sensation stunning, despite the clothing between.

He had her mouth again, the heat and hunger of each kiss intoxicating her, inciting her further, obliterating everything but his mouth. His body. Him. His enlarged sex was up against her belly holding her focus, making her sex ache and leak.

Vincent tugged at her bodice, undressing her. She felt it loosen. Suddenly sounds around her rushed into her ears.

Her eyes snapped open and she saw that some people had stopped and were watching from across the corridor. It unsettled her down to the marrow.

She pulled her mouth away and grasped Vincent’s hands, stilling them, her breathing quick and shallow.

“Private,” she said in earnest.

His eyes were darkened with desire, his breathing as rapid as hers. “Pardon?”

“In private.” She glanced over at those observing them from across the hall.

Vincent followed her gaze, tossing a look over his shoulder.

“Forget them.” He pulled his hands free from her grasp, dipped his head, and reclaimed her mouth. His clever fingers were at her bodice once more.

Old insecurities rushed in on her. And a ten-year-old memory loomed—one where she’d been the center of attention in the crowd. One that threatened the wonderful sexual excitement she felt. Emilie may have found the courage to reveal some of her body to Vincent, but she couldn’t do this in front of all of them.

She pulled back once more. “I can’t.” Not with those people watching.

He smiled. “
Ma belle
, you’re at one of the Comtesse’s gatherings. People do what they want wherever they want.”

“I can’t,” was all she could say, a lump starting to form in her throat.

Thankfully he didn’t argue or ask her to elaborate but simply took her hand and pressed a kiss to it. “Come with me.”

Vincent led her through the throng in the hallway, away from the
voyeurs
who instantly protested their leaving, and through the crowded Grand Salon, passing a number of couples engaged in heavy copulation. Some against walls, others in chairs and on various other items of furniture. Chatter, laughter, and sounds of pleasure filled the air.

Vincent pushed open the doors leading to the gardens.

The night air was fresh and warm. Emilie filled her lungs with it as she rushed along behind him, trying to keep up with his purposeful strides.

He’d cut a sharp right, walking along the perimeter of the château away from the groupings of people in the gardens. He didn’t stop until he’d rounded the corner of the grand abode.