The freshly turned earth was already frosted over, hard, frozen, and final. Beatrice bent and placed her handful of Michaelmas daisies on the grave. There wasn’t a stone yet, merely a wooden marker. The words jeremy oates had been crudely scrawled on it.
“I’m going to marry him,” she whispered to the pitiful marker.
The words were carried away by the wind, whipping through the small graveyard. As if to emphasize her sorrow, the day was overcast and gray. Jeremy’s parents had chosen to bury him in a little churchyard outside of London proper. It wasn’t even a family plot. Perhaps they thought by hiding him so far out of the way, they could forget him altogether. Jeremy would’ve smiled and reminded her that a tiny graveyard was just as good as a cathedral when one was dead.
Beatrice shook her head and frowned fiercely to hold back the tears. Jeremy wouldn’t have cared, but she did. This was no way to memorialize a good man. She closed her eyes for a moment, simply remembering him, and the tears came anyway, whether she wanted them to or not.
When she finally opened her eyes again, her face was cold and wet, and her head was beginning to ache, but oddly she felt better.
She wiped her cheeks and glanced at the churchyard gate. Reynaud leaned against the stone wall there, waiting patiently for her. The drive here had taken over an hour, and he hadn’t made any complaints. Although he hadn’t visited her room in the week since she’d agreed to marry him, Reynaud had made sure to attend her when he could. Of course, he was a busy man. He was in daily consultation with solicitors about the estate and his title, and he met with his friend Lord Vale very often as well. Beatrice frowned. She wasn’t quite sure what they discussed, but she was glad that they seemed to have recovered from their initial animosity.
She knelt to touch the frozen earth over Jeremy’s grave one last time, and then she stood and dusted her hands. In the spring she’d bring some lily-of-the-valley pips to plant here. That would keep him company. Beatrice began picking her way back to the carriage and Reynaud. The little churchyard was sadly neglected, the stone path overgrown with weeds. The wind blew her skirts against her legs, and she shivered as she neared Reynaud.
“Finished?” He put a hand under her elbow to steady her.
o;Everything.”
She nodded, inhaling as if bracing herself, then reached for the fall of his breeches. He placed his hands on her shoulders as she worked, watching the top of her head rather than where her hands were. She knelt to pull down his breeches, and he stepped out of his shoes and stockings as well. When she reached for his smallclothes, her hands shook.
“Are you frightened?” he murmured.
She paused and looked at him. “No.”
And he had to clench his jaw. That frankness, those wide gray eyes above freckled cheeks, looking at him so innocently, without guile or disguise, nearly undid him.
She took off his smallclothes, and he kicked them aside, entirely nude now.
“What do you want me to do?” she asked.
He looked at her, kneeling at his feet, her face so close to his crude erection, and several thoughts came to his mind, but in the end, he held out his hand to her. “Come here.”
She rose, placing her hand in his, and he led her to the bed. He threw back the covers and laid himself down on his back, propped against several pillows. He pulled her down beside him so she was sitting on the bed, her gown bunched around her folded legs. “Make yourself comfortable.”
“I am.”
He wanted to smile but found that the rigidity of his muscles prevented him. “Then touch me.”
“Here?” She placed her palm on his chest, trailing her fingers through his chest hair.
“Yes.” He watched her face as she explored, circling a nipple. She looked intent, solemn like a little girl mastering a needlework stitch.
“Does it feel sensitive? Like mine?” she asked.
He half closed his eyes. “It’s sensitive.”
She nodded and stroked lower, following the trail of his body hair to below his navel. Here she hesitated again, looking uncertain.
He waited, not prompting her anymore. Slowly she ran her fingers through his pubic hair, drawing ever closer to his cock. When at last she touched him—too delicately, too softly—he let out a sigh.
Her eyes darted to his face, watching him as she traced up his shaft. He held her gaze, though he wanted to close his eyes at the sensation of her warm fingers on his flesh. When she reached the head of his cock, she looked down again, bending closer as if fascinated.
“It’s so hard,” she murmured, circling the helmet. “Does it hurt?”
“No.” His mouth twisted. “Not as long as it’s eventually assuaged.”
Her eyes rounded. “You mean it stays like this until—”
He laughed rustily—it was that or howl. “No. It, ah, goes away after a bit if there’s no stimulation.”