Page 69 of An Ill-Made Match

She nodded her head, and he pressed his thumb, applying the pressure she needed there. Holy hells. She went up like wildfire. Roland gritted his teeth, throwing his weight on top of her to pin her to the mattress. Her back arched. He kept his fingers deep inside her as she cried out, bucking against him, riding his fingers. His cock throbbed, feeling neglected, wanting in. She needed to take her pleasure first, he reminded himself. He had only bedded her a handful of times. He had to take it slow and initiate her right. They had years ahead of them. Years for him to get it how he wanted it, with his cock deep inside her. This was about her wants, and what she needed for it to feel good. How long did it take virgins before they adjusted anyway? He had no idea. When he felt her tremors subsiding, he thrust his fingers again, her tender flesh quivering around them, and she sighed. He kissed her brow, then her mouth, and she let him without murmur, tangling her tongue with his. Nice. Or it would be, if his cock wasn’t about to explode. He jerked back his head.

“Eden,” his urgent tone roused her from her languor. “My turn,” he said and watched a certain trepidation enter her expression. She nodded her head though, licked her bottom lip nervously and peered down between them. His cock flexed, almost as if the damn thing was trying to impress her. She winced, and he could tell his size was not a source of pleasure for her yet. Still, she let her legs fall open for him and he took himself in hand, guiding himself where he most wanted to be. “Relax,” he said, wishing he sounded more in control, less like he was imploring her. He knew full well he’d been too rough last time. He poised himself at her entrance, letting his broad cockhead grow wet from her juices, and sink into her until he felt resistance. “Please Eden,” he breathed, closing his eyes. “Ah gods.” She pressed her thighs into his hips, and taking this as encouragement, he pushed until he found himself making progress again. “Sweetheart,” he gasped, as he slid deeper into to her tight, silky sheath. He shuddered, striving for control, his brow beading with sweat. He dug his fingers in the bedsheets, as he slid the final inches until their pelvises were touching. For a moment, speech was beyond him. Then he spoke very carefully. “Is that-?”

“Yes,” she said tightly, and he felt her take a deep breath and then release it, relaxing her limbs against him.

Thank fuck. He wasn’t sure how much of this gently, gently approach he could stand. Tensing his muscles, he began to move, not as gently as he would have wished, but not as hard as he longed to either. Eden bore it stoically and he seized her hips in his hands to haul her against him, showing her the rhythm he craved. When she attempted it independently, moving against him, striving to please him, his brain shut down and he thrust inside her, until he came roaring.

**

Roland woke suddenly at the sound of a falling log. Reaching across Eden, he pushed one of the box-bed doors open to survey the room. All was quiet. The fire needed stoking, but he didn’t want to move. Eden was curled into him in a deep slumber, dead to the world. He frowned noticing the dark shadows under her eyes and swiped his thumbs under them. Had she been sleeping poorly without him, then? The notion made him feel a curious pang in his chest. Though, it was only fair, when you considered how long he’d lain awake in his bunk of an evening thinking of her. His friends had teased him something fierce, saying they found him sadly changed, a staid married man now. Not that he’d cared. He had caught them sending odd looks his way when he’d bought her trinkets from the hawkers, or casually dropped her name in conversation. Eden shifted, flinging an arm around his waist, turning more fully into him, and carefully, he moved his arm to accommodate her. Was that a bruise? Her shift had slipped down one shoulder, showing a purple mark on her upper arm. How had she done that? He touched it lightly with the back of his fingers and she murmured against the pillow. He lay still, waiting for her to fall quiet again. She really was a most restless sleeper. Peering out of the box bed doors again, he guessed the hour was not much more advanced than four or five o’clock. He really should wake her, but was strangely loth to do so.

In the end he dozed back off himself, and woke an hour later to find Eden watching him. She glanced hastily away, as soon as she realized he was awake.

“What hour is it?” she asked, clearing her throat.

“It must be supper time, or thereabouts,” he said with a yawn. “We may as well take our meal here, in our room.” Eden turned her head to look at him suspiciously. “I’m tired from my journey,” he pointed out reasonably. “And there’s a perfectly good table in here we could use, for the two of us.”

“It’s true that it’s draughty in that dining chamber,” she agreed cautiously.

Roland smiled to himself, and when she went to wriggle out from underneath his arm, he suffered her to. “Don’t trouble yourself getting dressed,” he told her, when she made her way toward the chair with her gown draped over it. Eden stopped and looked back over her shoulder at him.

“I brought you something you can just slip on over your shift. It’s very unlikely you’ll want to go abroad again today,” he said, with a nod toward the window where the rain was bucketing down.

“What did you buy me?” asked Eden. “A dress?” she sounded so suddenly hopeful, he felt a little sorry to disappoint her.

“A mantle,” he corrected her, “Fulco and Cuthbert should have brought everything in by now.”

“Oh,” she hovered uncertainly, and he pulled himself out of bed and pulled on his braies, chauses and tunic.

“I’ll go, you stay here.” When he returned, twenty minutes later carrying packages, she was brushing her long, dark hair in front of the fire. “Here, for you. Open this one first and put it on. Fulco is bringing up more logs for the fire shortly.”

The bundle was large and when she unfurled it, Eden found a stunning mantle of navy brocade with a gold motif pattern. She shook it out. “It’s beautiful,” she exclaimed.

“There are two slits to put your arms through,” Roland showed her. The mantle was lined in a gold silk.

“Let me braid my hair first,” she said when he held it out for her to put on.

“Leave it loose. It’s only the two of us at supper.” She acquiesced, and he helped her don the robe before passing her another parcel. “Open this one.” Inside, were some gold satin slippers for indoor wear. “Put those on too.”

“You’ve bought me so many gifts…” she said awkwardly.

She hadn’t even seen the half of them.

A knock on the door interrupted them, and Fulco came in bearing logs, Brigid following on close behind with things to lay the table. Supper was a simple meal of stewed rabbit with prunes and pearl barley served with onions and raisins. Roland suspected they were eating the same meal below stairs. He preferred his meat roasted, but ate heartily all the same. Eden seemed to mostly toy with hers and slip tit-bits to whatever dogs had snuck in with the servants. He watched her covertly as they ate their meal. She seemed skittish and kept looking at him out of the corner of her eye when she thought he wasn’t looking.

“Is there aught amiss with my face?” he asked her at one point.

She took a critical look. “Well, you’ve got a new bruise at your left temple, if that’s what you mean.” She took a sip of wine. “Did you lose again?”

“That’s not-” he broke off in exasperation. “Why do you keep stealing glances at me like that?”

Eden stiffened and turned red. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

“And I did not lose,” he said narrowing his eyes. “And what the devil do you mean ‘again’?” Gods, it was a wonder he had any ego left these days, the way she kept battering at it!

Eden shrugged. “I thought from the way your friends spoke at Tranton Vale, that losing was a regular feature of the tournaments.”

“You thought-!” he broke off, giving her a baleful glance. He could see from the look on her face that she hadn’t meant to intentionally insult him. Taking a deep breath, he decided instead to patiently set her right. “That’s just how men are, Eden. They don’t brag of their friend’s successes, only glory in their defeats.”