He levered up slightly, tucked Ellen a little closer, and pressed a kiss to her temple. She made no protest, so he kissed her again, letting his lips cruise over her cheek, inhaling the rosy scent of her, drifting his hand along the flat of her stomach.

Was there any greater pleasure than seducing a willing woman on a lovely summer day?

Beneath him, Ellen opened her eyes and then closed them. In the brief glimpse he’d gotten of her mood, Val saw the dawning of pleasure, but something else, something a little sad or forlorn.

Gently, he shifted her to her back and maneuvered his body over hers. He kept most of his weight from her but put his forearms and knees close to her body, not quite trapping her but sheltering her. She lay passive beneath him, and he almost smiled at the challenge that presented.

“Touch me,” Val whispered, pressing a soft kiss to the side of her neck. “Put your hands on me, Ellen, wherever you please.”

He ambushed her impulse to argue by settling his mouth over hers and seaming her lips with his tongue. When she offered no resistance, he invited himself into the plush heat of her mouth, exploring the contours and textures to be had there and inviting her to do likewise.

She was slow to respond, and he liked that too. Liked the savoring and the need to pay attention to her. She was shy but moved her tongue over his and took his lower lip between hers. Val felt his shirt being tugged from his waistband and had all he could do not to rear back and tear it off. Her mouth carefully exploring his kept him in place.

That and the desire to press his body more closely to hers, to find that exact spot where he could wedge his cock against her sex and push, gently at first, to test her arousal and increase his own.

She understood, bless the woman, for she raised and spread her knees so her dress dragged up her legs and the cradle of her pelvis accommodated him more closely. The fit was good—too good—and Val knew a moment’s consternation as his body suggested that coming—right now, in his breeches, merely by thrusting a few times against the woman—would suit famously.

He silenced that thought and raised up enough to see Ellen’s face. She met his gaze and brushed his hair back from his forehead, her expression a little dazed and bewildered.

He couldn’t merely use her like that. Couldn’t live with himself if he did, couldn’t find any pleasure in it. None. He shifted to lie on his side beside her but kept a leg across her knees.

“Don’t…” Ellen frowned and caught his right hand, bringing it to her stomach.

“Don’t?” Val kissed her mouth then rested his forehead on her sternum.

“Don’t stop touching me,” Ellen said, her hand tangling in his hair. “Please.” She held his hand over that place in her body where Val suspected the emptiness gathered most intensely, where a child should grow but hadn’t. Where life should start but where, for her, it had stubbornly refused to.

He stared down at her, trying to fathom what exactly she was requesting—and what she wasn’t.

“I’ll touch you,” he said softly, “however you want, for as long as you want.”

But she wasn’t going to give him any more clues, so he began where he was, by stroking gently over her stomach. She closed her eyes and let her hand drift to the blanket, a small gesture Val took for a sign of submission.

Trust, even.

Through the thin cotton of her dress, he traced the crests of her pelvis, the contours of her navel, and the undersides of her ribs. She sighed, her fingers twitching on the blanket.

Lower, he surmised. She wanted him to touch her sex, and he was happy to oblige. His hand drifted to her thighs, and Ellen opened her eyes long enough to meet his gaze. He saw acceptance there and knew he’d guessed right. She wanted him to touch her intimately, and yet she couldn’t ask for it overtly.

He held her gaze as he gradually slid the material of her dress up, until it lay across her thighs, shielding her sex from his view but not from his touch. He leaned in and kissed her, not a polite, teasing kiss that invited and dallied and flirted. This was a kiss of possession and arousal and challenge, informing her in no uncertain terms where he intended to take her and demanding she acknowledge the destination.

She tugged at his shirt again, her body coming slowly alive under his. He broke the kiss only long enough to let her pull his shirt over his head, and then he was back, his chest arched over hers, his mouth sealed to hers. She wrapped her arms around him and pulled him closer, her grip surprisingly strong when he resisted slightly.

“Valentine,” she chided, physically urging him to give her some of his weight.

“Behave,” he growled back, angling his body only partly over hers. His hand covered her breast, and she went still, a shiver going through her body. Carefully, he closed his hand over the soft fullness, and she turned her face into his shoulder.

“Tell me.” He repeated the caress, watching her carefully. She was so quiet, so focused, he honestly could not determine if she was enjoying it, until she arched her back, pressing herself into his hand, and he had his answer. As he shaped and stroked and teased, he wondered if her precious baron had ever thought to pleasure his wife, or if Ellen had been deprived of the most basic accommodation between spouses for the entire five years of her marriage.

She made a soft sound in the back of her throat, and her hand closed over his, asking him to touch her more assertively. Gently, Val disentangled their fingers and untied the bows at her bodice. It was the work of a moment to loosen the front of her dress and ease the décolletage and chemise down, so the fullness of her breasts was exposed to the soft summer air.

No stays. God bless the woman; in this heat, toiling in her garden, she’d not worn stays.

“Valentine.” Ellen’s voice was faintly questioning but not scolding, and Val looked up to see her watching him soberly as he beheld her naked breasts.

“You are beautiful.” He leaned in and kissed the slope of one pale treasure. “Lovely.” He slid his mouth down to nuzzle the underside. “Breathtaking.” He grazed his mouth along the furled pink flesh of her nipple. “Beyond glorious.” He settled his mouth over her and felt her whole body gather itself toward the sensation as he drew on her softly.

She arched up and pressed his hand to her other breast, hard, beseechingly, and Val understood that at least five years of sexual solitude was driving this surrender on her part. She was in a torment of longing and asking him for relief.

It humbled him and gave him the determination to ignore the feel of her hand slipping down his back to dive into the waistband of his breeches, pulling him closer, begging him to cover her with his weight.

He’d be lost if he allowed that. Beyond control, hopelessly cast to the winds of his own pleasures. He eased his hand from her breast and stroked down her body, provoking an undulation of Ellen’s torso that turned into a subtle, rhythmic press of her body against his.

“Part your legs for me,” he whispered against her heart. “Just a little. Let me touch you.”

He had to nudge at her thighs with his hand before his words bore fruit, but then she complied, her legs falling open in a boneless, welcoming sprawl. God in heaven, what he wouldn’t give to settle himself between those thighs and start…

He would not trade her satisfaction for his own. Would not, so he let his hand stroke up Ellen’s thigh by slow degrees, ready for her to stop him, as wanting and allowing oneself to have were two different things. His mouth at her breast no doubt quelled some of the last-minute clamorings of her conscience, and perhaps the feel of his erection pressed against her hip obliterated the rest.