“Oh, that is wonderful news.” Cara could have danced a jig. “How long should he remain in bed?”
“Daresay the worst is behind us, but he must continue in a reclined state until the bone heals to some extent—perhaps, three weeks.” Dr. Handley removed his spectacles, pulled a handkerchief from his coat pocket, and wiped the smudged lenses. “After that, he must limit his movement and shall require the use of a cane. Once his lordship is completely recovered, he will be as before.”
“And how much time might that require?” In silence, she calculated, because if she were to succeed, she had to avail herself of every moment spent exclusively in Lance’s company. Given that her intended was at present, for all intents and purposes, unconscious, she could hardly persuade him to marry her. “I ask only because the marquess does so love Christmas.”
“Well, one never knows with these things.” He returned his spectacles to his nose and shrugged. “So it is difficult to predict. But, as his lordship is in excellent physical condition, I would wager he will be up and about, hale and whole, by the holidays.”
Lady luck shone on Cara, because she had months to capture Lance’s heart. It was too perfect, and she bit her tongue to keep from shouting for joy. If she could not seduce Lance by then, with no competition, she did not deserve him.
The physician pulled his timepiece from his waistcoat pocket and consulted it before returning it to the fold. “Well now, must be off. Have two more calls to make before lunch.” He reached for his hat, plopped it on his head, and bowed.
“Good day, Miss Douglas.”
“And the same to you, Dr. Handley.”
Once they were alone, Cara retrieved the kerchief from her bodice and smoothed the initials. “Oh, Lance. I do love you.”
Then she stepped on the platform, took a long look at her personal sleeping beauty, of a sort, sunk a knee into the downy mattress, and touched her lips to his. To her inexpressible disappointment, he did not move.
How on earth was she supposed to entice an unconscious suitor?
Nagging skepticism nipped at her heels, and she stomped a foot in insouciant salute. She would not quit the field before the battle commenced. Visions of her wedding day, as well as her honeymoon, quieted the troubling doubts plaguing her conscience.
“I brought a new book today.” She pushed a stray lock of hair from his face and cast a side-glance at the leather bound collection of sonnets. “I hope you like Shakespeare. And papa sent today’s edition of The Times.”
With a frown, she slid from the mattress. Assuming a familiar position in a chair beside the bed, she picked up the diminutive work and flipped through the pages. The words came to life before her eyes, rose-colored images danced merrily in her head, and a chorus of fanciful cherubs sang a rollicking ditty of love. She imagined Lance reading aloud the romantic poetry and stifled a giggle.
Just as quick, she recalled the advice imparted at her request, illicit instructions on how to seduce the stronger sex. To her embarrassment, her sister had spared no detail. Sabrina had even summoned a maid to bring them a banana, so she could demonstrate as she described various techniques. But, Cara reminded herself, she had asked for it.
Now was not the time to be squeamish.
Before she knew it, she once again perched beside Lance on the bed. Sabrina said that for a woman to tackle the understandable and quite common fear of the male body, and one part in particular, she had to dive in—headlong.
Take the bull by the horns—or horn, so to speak.
Determined to stay her course, she had composed a mental list as a guide, of sorts. Cara was certain that, when the moment was right, she would turn the situation to her advantage. With that in mind, she gave her attention to the front page of The Times.
“Oh, dear. It says Napoleon marches on Moscow. How tragic.” After summarizing the main points of the story, she peered at another article. “And Wellington closes in on Burgos, where it is estimated that some two-thousand French troops defend the fortress. Sounds as though our redcoats are in for a difficult battle.”
In that instant, she spied something unusual from the corner of her eye. Cara folded the newspaper and tossed it to the chair, and then studied a rather curious protrusion from beneath the covers.
“What on earth is that?” With a narrow stare, she searched her memory. Had the odd bulge been present when she arrived? If so, how could she have missed it? And then it hit her—Dr. Handley must have misplaced a tool of his trade during his examination of Lance. With a finger, she poked the mysterious lump, which felt rather firm. What if the unknown item caused further injury to her hero? From her vantage, the utensil appeared quite large, so she could not simply ignore it.
But as she suspected Lance remained nude during his convalescence, she could not bring herself to lift the sheet. Yet she had to retrieve the object before it harmed her intended bridegroom. She spared a glance toward the door, checking to make sure no one witnessed her questionable foray. Biting her lip, Cara scooted to the edge of the mattress and then slipped her hand under the blanket.
“Fear not, my darling.” She smiled at her future husband. Grasping fistfuls of the sheet, she inched forward. “No harm shall befall you on my watch, and I shall—oh.”
The first touch, the initial contact with his most male member had her gasping for air, because it was not as Sabrina had said—soft and mushy. Far more threatening than she could have anticipated or imagined, his miracle of flesh was as forged steel encased in the softest velvet. But why had it roused? According to Sabrina, men required stimulation to achieve an erection, with the exception of the early morning hours.
Yet Cara had only read to Lance and nothing more.
Was it possible—had her mere presence inspired his reaction? Could it be that he was not so indifferent as she had thought?
Groping, unseeing, she located the soft pouch at the base and fondled it gently.
Lance shifted his hips and moaned his appreciation.
Cara nearly jumped out of her skin.
She told herself she should not touch him, at least, not without his permission. Taking a man unaware had to be the greatest breach in etiquette, and no doubt an unforgivable abuse of hospitality. But then she reminded herself of her goal. They would never move beyond friendship, sharing polite discourse over poetry. And Sabrina did say he would enjoy it.
What could it hurt?
So she returned her attention to his ever-hardening protuberance, and then Cara remembered her sister’s tutelage. She explored him at her leisure, trailing his intimidating length with her fingers. Rubbing her palm to his searing flesh, he seemed to bounce in her hand, and Cara marveled at her ability to provoke him. She felt powerful. She felt...naughty.
And naughty never felt so good.
A deep longing, an unfamiliar hunger fluttered in her belly, and gooseflesh covered her from top to toe. Closing her eyes, she soared as a sensate being, operating wholly on instinct, with her senses commanded by their point of skin-to-skin contact. With her heart beating wildly in her chest, Cara sighed.
Working him, back and forth, in a repetitive rhythm, she took her first temperate steps toward the life she desperately desired. Then she recalled her carefully noted lessons. According to Brie, it was well nigh impossible to be too rough when exercising the Jolly Roger.
Her cheeks went up in flames.
Almost as quickly, Cara snorted as Sabrina’s words of warning filled her ears: Just do not put your teeth to it. Tried that once and poor Everett was out of commission for a week.
Until that moment, Cara would never have conceived of putting into her mouth what she now held in her tenuous grasp.
Such behavior did not seem acceptable.
But she was prepared to shed her prim and proper shell if it meant gaining Lance as a husband. And if she could not be comfortable with him, a man she had known since she was born, with whom could she be comfortable?
She continued to tempt him, scrutinizing his fa
ce as his hips rocked in concert with her movements. While his brow creased, a faint trace of a smile fell on his lips, lifting the corners of his mouth. She moved faster, and he lauded her efforts with another husky groan.
“I believe I left my bag in his lordship’s chambers.” The voice of Dr. Handley reverberated through the house.
Sheer panic replaced virgin passion.
Cara flinched and withdrew with a gasp of horror, as she spared a glance at the door. “Oh, dear.”
After resituating the covers, she pushed away from the bed. Just as she was about to take her seat, she spied the telltale hump beneath the bedclothes, which all but proclaimed her risqué behavior.
“Oh, no.”
Conscious of the footfalls growing near, she launched herself at the bed. Pulling back the blanket and sheet, she found herself face-to-face—so to speak, with the marvel she had held in her tremulous clutch. Jutting flagrantly in the air from its nest of black curls danced the dreaded Jolly Roger.
“Put it away, dearest.” Cara rued the fact that Sabrina hadn’t disclosed how to reverse the arousal process. “You must.”
When Lance failed to respond to her plea, she fanned at his unruly appendage with her hand, as she would a dish that had been served too hot to consume. “Go down.”
Largely ignorant of the mysteries of the male form and fearing discovery, she leaned forward and blew on his erection in an attempt to extinguish him like the burning flame of a candle. To her abject terror, the Jolly Roger seemed to thicken and grow even more animated.
“I will only be a minute,” the doctor declared. “I know exactly where I left it.”
The door to the bedchamber opened, and the grey-haired physician crossed the threshold.
“It says Wellington’s troops have—oh, Dr. Handley. What are you doing here?” Sitting in the chair, Cara struggled to portray an image of cherubic innocence and smiled. She set aside the copy of The Times and prayed he did not note her trembling fingers. “I thought you had calls to make.”
“Sorry to disturb you, Miss Douglas, but I left my bag.” He motioned to the table. “Got halfway to the Hogart’s and had to turn around.”
She peered to her right. There, on the bedside table, sat her undoing—the black leather satchel of his trade. “Here it is.”
The good doctor accepted the bag she held for him and then stepped to the platform to check his patient. At his back, Cara held her breath, her ears rang, and her knees buckled. Painful minutes ticked past as a tortuous death knell, and she was just about to confess her offense when the doctor stood upright.
He turned and assessed her with a stern expression.
She gulped and thought she would surely swoon, as the physician must have discerned her illicit activity.
“He seems to be faring well.” He smiled. “You are doing a fine job, Miss Douglas.”
Though her legs weakened, she managed a not-so-graceful curtsey. “Thank you, Dr. Handley.”
“I shall drop by tomorrow to check his progress.”
“I will see you then,” she said with a curt nod.
With an awkward prayer of thanks, she held her position until the door closed. Despite the urge to flee, she remained stock-still until the clip-clop of his footsteps dissipated.
Quiet returned to the household.
With a shriek, she shot forward. Wrenching the bedclothes from Lance, she spied the copy of Shakespeare’s sonnets covering her intended’s crotch and whisked the tome from his body.
The Jolly Roger sprang forth in a stout salute.
Proud. Formidable. Mocking her with its one good eye.
With nary a gaze at her future groom, Cara shrieked again and threw the covers over him. With the book in hand, and heedless of everything save her desire to be gone from his chamber, she ran.
Vowing never to return again.
ONE-KNIGHT STAND
CHAPTER FOUR
Through a haze of pain a familiar voice came to him, and how well he knew its owner. How many hours he had passed listening to her gentle lilt he could not estimate. As fond memories warmed his heart, he smiled. Fluttering his lids, Lance opened his eyes.
In a bedside chair Cara sat, picture-perfect and poised, reading some heart-rending tale of love lost and never found. For a moment, he savored the smoothness of her elegant inflection. Gowned in pale blue muslin, with her black curls piled high atop her head, she was a fantasy, an ethereal vision powerful enough to make him doubt his consciousness and his sanity.
How he loved watching her, a habit that reigned supreme for the better portion of his life.
With a pair of crystal blue eyes, a delicate, heart-shaped face, a neck like a swan, and the body of a sylph, she was the sort of lady every young man dreamed of marrying. But at five and twenty, she had yet to take a husband, and for a woman her age, society considered her on the shelf.
Every year, as the Season came to a close and betrothals were announced, he held his breath in anticipation of the dreaded news of her impending nuptials. And to his begrudged relief, no such pronouncement presented itself.
He knew one day she would speak the vows, and it had to happen at some point soon, as Admiral Douglas would not allow her to waste away. So Lance prepared for the inevitable and knew exactly how he would react. He wanted the best for her and would not settle for any less than what she deserved. Neither would he accept just anyone wedding his Cara.
And she was his Cara.
They had been the closest of friends for as long as he could remember, and whomever she married would have to understand and tolerate their friendship, because they would always share a special bond. Never would he give her up, and it would take a confident man to live with their relationship.
Once she was safely wed, and his youthful fantasies dashed, perhaps then he, too, would find a spouse.
She turned the page and rubbed the back of her neck. When her hand again rested in her lap, he focused his gaze on the rise and fall of her bodice. To the creamy skin, soft as silk, he knew continued beneath the edge.
As children, they had spent many afternoons swimming naked in the pond at Pembroke, the Elliott ancestral home. Of course, their other friends were there, as well. But somehow he had, without fail, managed to accidentally swim next to Cara, and when their wet flesh came together for however brief an instant, she always gasped with charming shyness and pulled away.
For his part, it was an innocent maneuver, with no ulterior motive other than an immature desire to be near her. For as long as Lance could remember, he considered Cara the most fascinating creature of his existence. There was something special about their friendship. Some indiscernible but very real entity joined them, and whatever it was, the mysterious connection was noticeably absent in his familial ties with the other Brethren.
With good humor, he recalled the first time in his life he fell victim to a rampant erection. On a particularly hot summer day, Blake ran from the pond shouting that he had seen a snake. Though it had been nothing more than a mischievous prank, Cara had thrown herself into Lance’s arms.
Having a naked female, more specifically one he had often pretended was his wife whenever they played lord of the manor, pressed against him had sent unsettling sensations soaring through his loins. Lance had been terrified and curious at once. The only problem was that in the time it took his exuberant new friend to calm down, the rest of him resembled a prune.
For some reason after that, he had always looked on Cara as something more than a harmless playmate, more than a friend. But he had never told her, or anyone else for that matter, otherwise. And he had no intention of doing so, because he was not worthy of her.
Lance closed his eyes, and salacious imagery assailed his senses.
Cara kissing him.
Cara touching him.
Cara arousing him.
In a flash, he responded, as would any red-blooded male.
Since the accident aboard his ship, he had enjoyed some pretty odd dreams involvin
g his childhood friend. Must’ve been the laudanum that damn Dr. Handley kept shoving down his throat.
Thankfully, Cara was an innocent. He comforted himself in the knowledge she would not notice the fast rising bulge south of his belly. Or, if she did, she would not know what it was, much less the cause.
But the force of his reaction perplexed him. It had been years since he had suffered an erection in her presence. As a man, he had learned to marshal his thoughts and his body—especially where Cara was concerned.
Then he reminded himself it had been a long time since he’d had a woman, because his last importuning conquest had left him a tad battle shy. Surely that was sufficient cause to garner such a response? Yes, given his current state, a ripping release would feel good about now. Were Cara not present, he would take care of the deed himself. After all, there was nothing wrong with his hands.
The mere thought elicited an involuntary groan.
In an instant, Cara glanced at him.
He caught her gaze and smiled.
“Lance?” Immediately, she stood, closed the book, set it on the seat, and approached him. “You are awake.”
“Aye.” His heart warmed at her enthusiasm.
She drew a wet cloth from the basin and stepped on the platform. Leaning forward, she wiped his brow, and a hint of lilac teased his nose. Unbeknownst to Cara, when she stretched long, the bodice of her dress puckered, providing him an ample display of her bosom.
While only a cad would take advantage of the situation, Lance was in no mood to be noble, so he dipped his chin, affording himself a better view. How he ached to taste her, to cover a pebbled nipple with his mouth as he palmed the other tempting peak.
Painfully erect, he bit back another groan.
Almost instantly, Lance chided himself, as she was a friend—nothing more. He had known her since she was born. They had grown up together. They had played together.
And he wanted to play now, but not the games to which she was accustomed.
Brethren of the Coast Box Set 2 Page 5
