‘It would pain a certain part of my anatomy,’ he corrected softly. ‘A part of my anatomy that has been erect with that same anticipation since the moment you walked into my study today,’ he added as she continued to look up at him blankly.
Julianna’s gaze dropped instantly to the front of his pantaloons, her cheeks aflame with heat as she saw the long length of that erection beneath the material. Marcus gripped her chin and tilted her face up, leaving Julianna no choice but to look into those pale green eyes glittering down at her with such displeasure. His cheekbones were taut, his mouth a thin angry line. ‘Whatever you may have suffered at the hands of the man who had no right to call himself any woman’s husband, it will not be any part of what the two of us will share together. Do you understand me, Julianna?’ he pressed gruffly.
She did understand. In that instant, looking up into those beautiful pale green eyes, Julianna understood exactly what Marcus was offering her. Gifting her. It was the gift of appreciation. For her own femininity. For her beauty. And perhaps even tenderness, for her inexperience. Gifts never bestowed upon her by the man who had been her husband for three long years.
Julianna straightened her shoulders, and she stood several inches taller as she looked up unflinchingly into Marcus’s eyes before answering him. ‘I understand, Marcus.’
He continued to look down at her searchingly for several long seconds before giving a satisfied nod of his head. ‘Good.’
‘I—do you intend to kiss me?’ she prompted as he made no effort to release her.
Marcus drew in a sharp breath even as he felt a nerve pulse in his tightly clenched jaw. ‘Touch does not enter into your instruction for several more days yet.’
‘But did you not say that lovemaking should always be spontaneous?’
He smiled inwardly as he heard the teasing beneath her challenge. ‘I have also heard it said that anticipation is good for the soul!’ he drawled self-derisively.
‘But painful,’ Julianna reminded, the definite light of mischief now in the dark grey of her eyes as she looked up at him.
It was teasing and mischief that gratified Marcus, as he acknowledged he had not seen that playful light in her eyes for some time now, and realized how much he had missed it. How much he had missed Julianna the hellion.
And how much he wished to do exactly as she challenged and kiss her. A capitulation guaranteed to reveal to her that it was in fact the pupil who controlled the tutor.
A knowledge he could not yet give her.
Marcus released her abruptly before stepping back to resume his seat behind the mahogany desk. ‘I believe that to be enough instruction for today.’ Any more of this and he was seriously in danger of revealing how his love for her ruled him.
‘But I have been here but a few minutes—’
‘I have said today’s lesson is over!’
Just when Julianna had felt herself on the precipice of a discovery, she knew herself dismissed. Quite what that discovery might have been she had no idea, only that she had felt something in the gentling of Marcus’s fingers against her chin, seen an elusive something in his eyes, some nuance of emotion she had not quite been able to grasp before a shutter had come down over his gaze, and Marcus had abruptly released her before moving away and dismissing her.
An elusive something that Julianna, aware of this man in every particle of her being, longed to see and to feel again.
She hesitated. ‘Shall I return tomorrow morning at the same time?’
Marcus looked down the length of his nose at her. ‘That is our agreement, is it not?’
‘And tomorrow is smell?’ Julianna wrinkled her nose delicately at the thought of what form that smell might take.
Marcus’s tension eased slightly and he gave a grin as he leaned back in his chair to watch as Julianna refastened her hair in preparation for leaving. ‘Somehow I do not believe we are thinking of the same thing at all.’
‘Smell is smell, surely?’ she dismissed as she straightened.
‘One might imagine so.’ Marcus nodded slowly, eyes hooded by heavy lids. ‘Have you ever smelt yourself, Julianna?’
Her eyes widened indignantly. ‘I will have you know that I bathe at least once a day, sometimes twice!’
‘I am gratified to hear it,’ he drawled, all too aware of how many of the ton chose to try to hide their unwashed bodies beneath strong perfumes. Try. Because they never quite succeeded. ‘That is not the sort of smell I am referring to, Julianna. Everyone has a subtle, natural perfume, one that a lover inevitably finds themselves drawn to.’
Such as lemon and sandalwood, and clean healthy male, and an underlying musk Julianna was sure was all Marcus, and which had drawn her to him when he had stood so close to her just a few minutes ago.
‘Your own perfume is that of roses, with an underlying scent of desirable woman—’ He broke off as Julianna’s cheeks flushed a fiery red. ‘You know, of course, of the fluid a man emits during lovemaking? Obviously you do,’ Marcus answered his own question grimly. ‘But have you never smelt the perfume of your own unique arousal? Touched, and perhaps breathed in the scent of the arousal which dampens your thighs?’
Julianna was too shocked now to even gasp. ‘Certainly not!’ But she had, Julianna acknowledged wonderingly, as she recalled the dampness she had noticed when she’d returned home yesterday after being with Marcus, something she had never ever experienced in John’s company, in bed or out of it.
Because she was aroused? Because just looking at Marcus, smelling that lemon and sandalwood she would now always associate with him, and discussing such intimacies with him, had caused a desire she’d never experienced before? If that was so, then what would happen if he should touch her with that same intimacy?
‘Sound,’ Marcus murmured appreciatively.
Oh dear Lord, had she really just groaned out loud just thinking of having Marcus’s hands upon her? She had, Julianna acknowledged restlessly, knowing she had given a low and husky groan of longing as heat flared between her thighs.
She gave an agitated shake of her head. ‘You are right, it grows late and I should leave.’
And, much as he might wish it otherwise, for the moment Marcus knew he must let her go.
But his thoughts were grim as he recalled the look of disgust on Julianna’s face moments ago, when he’d talked of the result of a man’s arousal. Even worse, her pained expression, her surprise, her curiosity, when he’d talked of a woman’s physical reaction to lovemaking made it evident that she had never experienced that arousal with John Armitage.
Damn it, had the man shown no consideration at all for Julianna’s innocence? Was it really possible, that even on their wedding night, Armitage had taken Julianna’s virginity without caressing her, reassuring her, loving her, without giving her any preparation at all? That the other man—damn and blast Armitage to hell!—had just parted her thighs, climbed on top of her, taken his own pleasure, and then left her shaken and disillusioned? And that each subsequent taking had been equally as inconsiderate and brutal?
The possibility of that having been the case filled Marcus with a blaze of hot fury, and caused his eyes to gleam with unholy vengeance toward a man who was no longer accessible to him.
‘Yes, you should go now, Julianna,’ Marcus agreed as he rang for his butler; and she must go now, quickly, if she was not to bear witness to Marcus punching his fist through one of the walls of his own study.
The last thing he wished to do was frighten Julianna with the force of his present turmoil of emotions. Emotions that he needed