“But you don’t prefer it that way?”

Considering how to answer her, Christopher reached out to smooth her disheveled hair, which was falling out of its pins. “I do. I’m quite enthusiastic about it, actually. But it’s not right for your first time.”

“Why not?”

Christopher looked at her, a slow smile curving his lips. His voice deepened as he asked, “Shall I show you?”

Beatrix was transfixed.

Taking her stillness as assent, he pressed her back and moved over her slowly. He touched her with care, arranging her limbs, spreading them to receive him. A gasp escaped her as she felt his h*ps settle on hers. He was aroused, a thick pressure fitting against her intimately. Bracing some of his weight on his arms, he looked down into her reddening face.

“This way,” he said, with the slightest nudge, “. . . is usually more pleasing to the lady.”

The gentle movement sent a jolt of pleasure through her. Beatrix couldn’t speak, her senses filled with him, her h*ps catching a helpless arch. She looked up at the powerful surface of his chest, covered with a tantalizing fleece of bronze-gold hair.

Christopher lowered further, his mouth hovering just over hers. “Front to front . . . I could kiss you the entire time. And the shape of you would cushion me so sweetly . . . like this . . .” His lips took hers and coaxed them open, wringing heat and delight from her yielding flesh. Beatrix shivered, her arms lifting around his neck. She felt him all along her body, his warmth and weight anchoring her.

He murmured endearments, kissing along her throat, while he tugged at the buttons of her shirt and spread the fabric open. She wore only a short chemise beneath, the kind commonly used as a corset cover. Pulling down the lace-trimmed strap, he exposed a round, pale breast, the peak already tight and rose colored. His head bent, and he caressed her with his mouth and tongue. His teeth grazed lightly over her sensitive nerves. And all the while, that relentless, rhythmic stimulation below . . . he was riding her, owning her, driving the need to an impossible pitch.

His hands cradled her head as he kissed her again, openmouthed and deep, as if he were trying to draw the soul from her body. Beatrix answered eagerly, holding him with her arms and legs. But then he let go with a hoarse exclamation, and moved away.

“No,” she heard herself moan. “Please—”

His fingers came to her lips, gently stroking her into silence.

They lay side by side, facing each other, struggling to regain their breath.

“My God, I want you.” Christopher sounded far from pleased by the fact. His thumb swept over her kiss-swollen lips.

“Even though I annoy you?”

“You don’t annoy me.” Carefully he rebuttoned the placket of her shirt. “I thought you did, at first. But now I realize it was more like the feeling you get when your foot’s been asleep. And when you start moving, the blood coming back into it is uncomfortable . . . but also good. Do you understand what I mean?”

“Yes. I make your feet tingle.”

A smile came to his lips. “Among other things.”

They continued to lie together, staring at each other.

He had the most remarkable face, Beatrix thought. Strong, flawless . . . and yet it was saved from cold perfection by the lines of humor at the corners of his eyes, and the hint of sensuality edging his mouth. The subtle weathering made him look . . . experienced. It was the kind of face that made a woman’s heart beat faster.

Shyly Beatrix reached out to touch the bayonet scar on his shoulder. His skin was like hot pressed satin, except for the dark, uneven gouge of that healed-over wound. “How painful this must have been,” she whispered. “Do your wounds still hurt?”

Christopher shook his head slightly.

“Then . . . what is troubling you?”

He was silent, his hand settling on her hip. As he thought, his fingers slipped beneath the untucked hem of her shirt, the backs of his knuckles stroking the skin of her midriff.

“I can’t go back to who I was before the war,” he eventually said. “And I can’t be who I was during the war. And if I’m not either of those men, I’m not sure what I’m left with. Except for the knowledge that I killed more men than I could count.” His gaze was distant, as if he were staring into a nightmare. “Always officers first—that sent them into disarray—then I picked off the rest as they scattered. They fell like toys a child had knocked over.”

“But those were your orders. They were the enemy.”

“I don’t give a damn. They were men. They were loved by someone. I could never make myself forget that. You don’t know what it looks like, when a man is shot. You’ve never heard wounded men on the battlefield, begging for water, or for someone to finish what the enemy started—”

Rolling away, he sat up and lowered his head. “I have rages,” came his muffled voice. “I tried to attack one of my own footmen yesterday, did they tell you that? Christ, I’m no better than Albert. I can never share a bed with a woman again—I might kill her in her sleep, and not realize what I’m doing until afterward.”

Beatrix sat up as well. “You wouldn’t do that.”

“You don’t know that. You’re so innocent.” Christopher broke off and drew in a shivering breath. “God. I can’t crawl out from under this. And I can’t live with it.”

“With what?” she asked softly, realizing that something in particular was tormenting him, some intolerable memory.