The Rebel Bride by Catherine Coulter

The Rebel Bride by Catherine Coulter

The Rebel Bride by Catherine Coulter

1

Julien St. Clair, earl of March, flicked a careless finger over her white belly, lay back on the large canopied bed, and gazed beneath half-closed lids at the dancing patterns cast by the firelight on the opposite wall. He felt a sort of lazy satisfaction that, for the moment, relieved his boredom.

“I have pleased you, my lord?” She twined her fingers in his fair hair, her own body languid from the pleasure he had given her.

“Of course, Yvette,” he said, annoyed that she disturbed the silence he wanted.

There was a flash of anger in her doe-brown eyes. She knew full well she had pleased him but a short time before, and it galled her now to see him again remote and withdrawn. But from her long experience with noblemen, she realized that reproaches would gain her nothing. She let her face soften into an inviting expression and lowered herself onto his chest, pressing her breasts against him. She slid her arms around his neck and gently tugged until he turned his face to hers. She smiled knowingly as he brought his arms lazily from behind his head downward through her chestnut hair and began to explore her back and knead her hips.

To Yvette’s surprise, she soon felt a quiver run the length of her body, and she sighed, a low moan of pleasure.

In a graceful motion Julien rolled over on top of her. He took her mouth. He would give her what she wanted. His hands stroked her body, teasing, caressing, feeling the soft flesh of her buttocks.

He watched her eyes widen when his fingers found her. Her lashes fluttered and her mouth worked, making her look very real, very human. A dull flush began to creep over her cheeks, and her body trembled. She urgently willed him to enter her, and he drew up so she could guide him into her.

Though his body responded with rhythmic motion, Julien felt strangely detached from the very soft, giving woman beneath him, unable to let himself feel the passionate intensity of her need. Yet he felt his breathing quicken as she reached her final tensing. He drove deep, heard her cries of release, and let his body respond.

He allowed himself to be locked to her for one long moment before falling full length on top of her, his head beside her face on the pillow.

Yvette calmed, becoming relaxed and still beneath him. She was certain this time she had pleased him. Her own pleasure she discounted. She waited for him to utter some slight words of endearment, but he lay quiet above her, his breath becoming even.

Her body began to protest against his weight, but she didn’t move, for fear of disturbing him.

“Yvette, what is the time?” he asked, his voice muffled by the pillow.

“It lacks but a few moments until ten, my lord,” she said with definite edge to her voice.

“Be damned.” He rolled away from her. Yvette watched him rise from the bed and briefly stretch his tall, muscular body. As always, she was unable to look at him without admiring him. For months she had called him her golden god. But now, she thought bitterly, he was a fickle god, leaving her with scarce a backward thought.

Her frustration grew as she racked her mind for a charmingly turned phrase to catch his attention. Finding herself unequal to the task, she sighed and raised herself up onto the pillow, pulling a cover over her body.

He drew on his white ruffled shirt and turned to look at her. “I must leave, Yvette. I am promised to meet Blairstock at White’s and am already late.”

“When am I to see you again, my lord?” she asked with controlled sweetness, half-rising to go to him.

He halted her progress with an impatient wave of his hand and replied with only casual interest, “That is difficult to say. I’m meeting friends in the country for hunting and shall be absent from London for some time.”

She sucked in her breath, now wary. He had not told her of his imminent departure from London.