“Yes, you are.” Branford let out a short, sharp breath and rubbed his eyes with his fingertips for a moment. When he spoke, his earnest voice was just a little above a whisper. “I don’t know you, Alexandra. I chose you on a whim, nothing more. I’m sure if you ever did think of marriage, this was not the picture your mind painted. If I am to be honest, I didn’t think far beyond the wedding and the idea of marriage itself, and…well…I don’t know what I should do now.”
His candid words surprised me.
“You don’t know me either,” Branford continued. “Regardless, I’m going to ask you to do something that may be difficult at first.”
“What do you need of me?” I asked quietly. I had no idea what he wanted and feared his words.
“I’m going to ask you to trust me, Alexandra. I want you to listen to me and trust what I tell you to be the truth. You don’t know me well enough to know if I can be trusted or not, but I’m asking you to do it anyway or at least try. Will you, Alexandra? Will you try to trust me?”
“Yes, my lord,” I responded.
“Alexandra…”
“I’m sorry—Branford,” I corrected myself.
“Much better.” Branford positioned himself on one arm again and looked down at me. “I'm not going to hurt you. Do you understand?”
“Yes...Branford,” I said.
“There’s one other thing you must do.” Branford’s tone was serious. “If I ask you a question, you must answer me truthfully. Do you understand what I’m saying, Alexandra?”
“Yes, my…Branford.”
“Do not say what you think I want to hear—I want only the truth from you.”
“Yes, Branford. I will.”
“Good.” Branford took a deep breath, and he moved his hand over to cup my cheek. His thumb traced over my cheekbone, and he looked into my eyes. “May I kiss you?”
“Yes, of course.” My answer was automatic, ingrained. When a noble asked something of a commoner, the commoner gave it without question though what the noble required may or may not have been pleasant.
He moved slowly, his gaze still on mine, and his lips brushed against me much like they had during our wedding ceremony. He backed away and smiled down at me.
“Do you like that, Alexandra?” he asked. “Do you like being kissed like that?”
“Yes, Branford.” The ingrained answer was also surprisingly truthful. He had kissed me softly, carefully—almost like he was afraid I would break if he pressed too hard—and I did like it.
“May I kiss you again?”
“Yes, please.”
Again, his mouth touched mine but for a little longer this time. His lips hovered over mine before he descended, moving slowly against me. He turned slightly, changing the angle and kissing me again, but his touch remained light. I could feel my heartbeat in my chest and my breathing increase in time with his movements. He pulled back again.
“Did you like that as well? Do you want me to do it again?”
I could only nod this time, and he kissed me again and again. His hand moved from my cheek up into my hair, twisting through it and pulling me closer to him as his lips danced over my mouth, leaving me out of breath when he finally stopped.
“Alexandra, will you touch me?”
“What?”
“Touch me while I kiss you.”
“Where?”
Branford chuckled slightly.
“Anywhere you would like,” he said.
“I don’t know where I should,” I told him.
He ran his hand down the outside of my arm until he met my fingers. He pried gently, releasing my grip on the bedsheets and pulling my hand up to place it atop his bare shoulder. I hadn’t realized I had been holding the sheets so tightly.
“How about here?” he said with a smile. I nodded again, and this time when he found my mouth with his, I gripped his shoulder a little and felt the hard, tense muscles under his warm skin. He moved his hand to the back of my neck, holding me firmly as he continued to softly kiss my lips. He backed off slightly, and then I felt the tip of his tongue against my mouth.
“Do you like that?”
“I don’t know,” I answered, trying to be truthful. It seemed when he touched his tongue to mine, his kisses would become much more urgent with need than they had been thus far. He looked down into my eyes.
“Would it be all right if I tried that again?” he asked. “You don’t have to if it makes you uncomfortable.”
“All right,” I said, acquiescing. Branford’s hand returned to my face, and he ran his fingers over my jaw.
“I’ll still be gentle,” he said with sincerity. I looked into his bright green eyes and nodded my agreement. He touched my lips with his tongue again, and I opened my mouth a little. He used his tongue to reach inside, and the tip ran along the edge of mine. I tensed a little, but he kept his movements slow, and it only lasted a moment.
“Was that all right?” he asked. I nodded again because it had been all right. I looked up into his darkened, hungry eyes again. “Do you want me to do it again?”
I nodded and closed my eyes as his tongue entered my mouth, caressing me before pulling my tongue into his mouth and sucking on it a little. It felt strange, but I found the taste of him to be…intriguing. He backed off and kissed me softly on my lips again before leaning back and looking intently at me.
“I want to touch you,” Branford said. “But I’ll only touch you slowly and softly. I won’t hurt you, my wife. Is that all right?”
“Yes.” My voice came out in barely a whisper.
Branford traced over my cheekbone and then down along my jaw. His touch was soft, and it left my skin tingling when he passed. He ran the backs of his fingers down my neck, and then he flipped his hand over so his fingertips could glide slowly over my shoulder. Some of my skin was exposed there, where I had earlier untied the lacing from my nightdress. My gaze moved to his hand as he slowly—oh, so slowly—traced the tip of one finger across my collarbone.
The blanket was drawn up to just underneath my breasts, and I could see my chest rising and falling as Branford’s fingertip traced back and forth. His slightly open mouth pressed against my cheek, then moved close to my ear.
“Do you like that, Alexandra?” he whispered into my ear. “Does it make your skin feel warm where I’ve touched you? Do you like how that feels?”
“Yes,” I responded in yet another, nearly breathless whisper.
“I want to touch more of you,” Branford said. He sucked my earlobe into his mouth and then kissed down my neck as I lay there, unmoving, but strangely unafraid now. He said he wouldn’t hurt me, and so far he had not. “Just feel, Alexandra.”
I closed my eyes and did as he said—concentrating on the movement of his lips over my jaw and back down my neck. They followed the same trail over my collarbones where his fingers had recently been. I felt warm moisture when his tongue danced lightly over my skin, then shivered as he blew cool air in the same spot.
“Do you like that?” I could feel the movement of his lips as he spoke with his mouth still touching my skin. I couldn’t even answer him through my shaky breaths. “You’re trembling, Alexandra. Are you frightened?”
I tilted my head and looked down to see him gazing up at me. I shook my head slowly, because I wasn’t frightened, was I? I had no idea what I was feeling, but if I had been frightened, I would have wanted him to stop, and I didn’t want him to stop. He kissed my collarbone while keeping his eyes trained on mine, and then he moved away, leaving my skin cold where his mouth used to be. He stroked over the top of my shoulder again, over to the edge of the cloth that made up the top of my nightdress. Very, very slowly, he let his finger trace the edge of the fabric, down around the open neckline. As he moved his finger, he pushed the edge of my nightdress open just a little farther until his finger was running over the very top of my breast. I gasped, and his gaze flew to mine again.
“Can you imagine what that would feel like,” he whispered, his
voice raspy and deep, “if I touched you like this underneath your clothes?”
Branford tilted his hand until three fingers were now moving over the swell of my breasts, moving slowly and gently across the top of both. I could feel an unusual tingling sensation in their centers, and I felt them stiffen as they did when the winter wind was particularly harsh. It was not unpleasant, though. It was not unpleasant in the least.
“I want to touch you more,” Branford said, his voice still quiet, “but as I said quite some time ago, it is very late, and I need to think of your health.”
Before I could respond, he was kissing me again in a slow, nearly chaste way. When he was done, he looked down on me and smiled.
“Thank you, Alexandra.”
“For what, Branford?” I asked.
“Trusting me,” he said with a shrug. “You finally stopped looking at me like you thought I was about to cuff you.”
Turning away, I blanched at the thought. The idea of him striking me hadn’t truly occurred to me—not in so many words anyway. Branford’s hand cupped my chin, and he turned me to look at him.
“You’ve not given me reason to do such a thing,” he said. My relief was mixed with concern as I realized he may find reason to hit me at a later time. “Don’t look like that.”
I took a deep breath to try to relax myself, and Branford’s eyes narrowed.
“I won’t be violent toward you, Alexandra,” he said. “You would have to do something truly…truly traitorous to incur such wrath from me.”
I tried to keep my mind from the poor carriage driver who nearly lost his life for an accident and instead found myself wondering what Branford would consider traitorous.
“Please,” I heard him say, and when I focused on him again, his eyes held a trace of sadness. “Please don’t look that way. I don’t want you to fear me, Alexandra.”
I could not respond, for his mouth had claimed mine again, and he renewed his slow, gentle assault. It did not last long, but it again left me breathless and left my body crying out for more. More of exactly what, I could not say, I just knew I didn’t want him to stop.
“You need to sleep now, Alexandra,” Branford stated, his tone commanding again.
“You still aren’t going to…um…” I couldn’t even finish the sentence.
“Not tonight, Alexandra,” Branford said firmly, “but it will be soon.”
“When?” I could not help but ask the question.
He narrowed his eyes in contemplation.
“Three nights,” he said with conviction. His gaze met mine, and he looked at me intently as he caressed my cheek. He grasped my head in his hands as his voice dropped to a low, throaty whisper. “I’ll show you what it can really be like to be with me. For the first two nights, we will learn more about each other—what we both may like. And on that third night, Alexandra…I’ll go so slowly. I’ll be so gentle with you; I swear it…just like I have been tonight. Would that be acceptable to you, my wife?”
“Yes, my Branford,” I said and then bit down on my lip in embarrassment, realizing I had just combined both his title and his name. Branford smiled and laughed quietly.
“I like that,” he said. He leaned down and kissed my lips as gently as possible—his mouth just barely touching mine.
“Three nights?” I inquired quietly, wondering what could possibly happen over that amount of time. As far as I could tell, he had remained truthful to me. He said he would not hurt me, and he hadn’t, but that did not change the reality of what was to happen in three nights time.
“Three nights from now,” he repeated, nodding. He leaned back over me, his warm breath rolling in waves over my ear as his fingers glided softly over the line of my jaw. “And on the third night, when you are truly ready, I promise you will tremble underneath my touch. I promise you will feel ecstasy like you never imagined. I promise you will call out my name when I lie on top of you, and I will fill you over and over again until you simply cannot take any more pleasure.”
My eyes widened, and my slowly calming heart began to sputter again in my chest as I tried to process the meaning of his words. My fear was still there, and I could not deny it, but it seemed to be accompanied by something completely different, and it was not a feeling I could name.
And that is how we planned to consummate our marriage.
BOOK TWO: The Seduction
As Alexandra tries to conform to her new life, she soon discovers that betrayal lies inside the castle walls. When noblewomen plot against her, Alexandra ends up on the receiving end of Branford’s rage. Earning the trust of her wary husband will be no easy task for the young handmaid.
Branford may know his way around their bedchamber, but he’s finding himself ill-prepared to handle the duties of both prince and husband. His missteps bring down the wrath of the queen, and he will have to do everything in his power to atone for his transgressions. Branford must find a way to open his heart to his new wife if either of them has a chance of overcoming the treachery ahead.
Chapter 8—Tenderly Nurture
For the second morning in a row, I awakened to warm arms wrapped around me and the slow, steady heartbeat of my husband under my cheek.
With his hand, he stroked slowly from the top of my head all the way down my hair and almost to my waist before he lifted his hand and started at the top again. He stroked my hair over and over, the motion almost lulling me back into slumber. In contrast to the tumult of emotions I had felt when I lay down with him at night, I found waking in Branford’s arms to be strangely relaxing and quite pleasant. He was warm, and lying with my head on his chest was so comfortable, I felt at ease and couldn’t help but smile a little to myself.
I lay motionless for a minute or two, trying to collect myself internally as memories of the previous night flooded back into my head—from the words I heard in the garden, to my continued concern over our lack of consummation, and then to the soft, gentle touches Branford left on the tops of my partially exposed breasts. There had been a strange and unfamiliar tingling feeling over my skin for several minutes after he had stopped touching me, and just thinking about his fingers sliding over my skin so close to an intimate area of my body made my heart beat faster.
Feeling Branford’s lips touch the top of my head and hearing his intake of breath against my hair, I swiftly brought my thoughts back to the present. Deciding there was no real point in delaying, I tilted my head up to meet his eyes and his slight smile.
“Good morning, my wife,” Branford said.
“Good morning, Branford,” I replied and then quickly looked away, feeling shy and blushing when I looked into his eyes. It made the memories of his lips on my skin overwhelm me again, warming my skin. I looked to the windows and saw the sun shining through the cracks in the shutters, so I knew it was well into the morning. It had been very late by the time I had slumbered, for it had taken some time for my body to recover from Branford’s touch enough to relax into sleep. “It’s late.”
“Yes.” Branford’s shoulders moved up and down casually. I looked back at him, and he was still smiling. “There’s no rush today though, and I do like waking with you in my arms.”
“Have you been awake long?” I asked, hoping my words would divert focus from my almost permanently pink cheeks.
“A while,” Branford said with another shrug. “I’ve been thinking about you.”
“You have?” Again, I looked away from his eyes and felt heat rise to my face. Wondering what the specifics of his thoughts might entail, I tried to remember what I might have done either last night or during my sleep.
“Yes.”
“Did I do something wrong?”
“No!” Branford sat up and pulled me with him until I was sitting beside him on the bed with his hands on my shoulders. “Why would you think that?”
I took a deep breath. Why did I think that? Because everything I had done thus far had been wrong, that’s why. I had angered and embarrassed my husband, causing him to go to anoth
er woman on just the second night of our marriage because I couldn’t bring myself to lie back and smile while he claimed my body. Ultimately, I was afraid because doing the wrong thing could cost me my life—if not in one way, then in another.
“Because I haven’t done anything right,” I finally said. “Because I’m…inadequate.”
“Inadequate?” Branford scoffed. “Alexandra, I have no idea why you would say such a thing.”
“I haven’t…we haven’t yet…” I stopped and took a deep breath. Branford found my chin with his hand, and he looked deep into my eyes.
“We talked about this last night,” Branford said. “You offered yourself to me, and I made the decision to wait.”
“Because I wasn’t ready,” I clarified.
“You aren’t ready because I haven’t made you ready,” Branford said definitively. “So it was my decision and my responsibility.”
“I embarrassed you in front of King Camden,” I whispered.
“Again, because I didn’t prepare you properly.”
“You were angry about the carriage driver,” I finally said.
Branford’s fingers tensed against my shoulders.
“Yes, I was. I can only hope it was an accident, and I didn’t let a traitor live because you felt sorry for him.”
“A traitor?”
“Yes, a traitor,” Branford growled.
“I only lost my balance,” I said quietly.
“Which would not have happened if he had kept his horses still,” Branford insisted. “I’m definitely watching him now. If he steps out of line again, I will not stop at your whim.”
I tensed at his harsh words and felt Branford’s hand stop at the lower part of my back, no longer stroking my hair.
“I’m still…lacking…in what you need from me.”
“Alexandra, I don’t understand.”
The door to the morning room opened before I could respond. Branford let out a low groan as Ida walked into the bedroom, stood at the very end of the bed, and put her hands on her hips.
“Ida, for the love of God, you can’t just walk in here anymore,” Branford said, growling at his sister. He pulled the blanket up over my shoulders, partially hiding me from view.