“Apologies, love.” She hoisted the glass skyward. “But whatever’s in it, it tastes good.”
Too good. It was the perfect accompaniment for her dark, damp, and sour mood. Maybe it would help sweeten her outlook, for she did have much to be thankful for. The wine, for instance.
George couldn’t have cared less about wine, or what went into a vat in addition to grapes. But architecture? He could talk the day long about balance and counterbalance, peaks, and roof valleys.
Sugar Hill had many roof valleys. Secret roof valleys that hid glass domes capping secret torture rooms and books detailing that torture.
“Honestly, man.” She scowled at the first of the stars to wink out of the darkness. “How could you not mention that disturbing architectural and moral artifice? Shouldn’t I have been informed of it when you made the propitious decision to leave Sugar Hill to me?”
Gulping down the remainder of her glass, she refilled it and padded out the terrace doors on to the balcony, breathing in a welcome breath of cool air even as a shiver rattled through her at the transition from the heated room to chilly night. To the west, faint slashes of gold and violet skated through the upper branches of trees, jagged fingers as the sun lost its grip on the day.
Grasping the rail with one hand, she tipped the goblet to her mouth and drank, and over its rim she watched bats swoop and dive faster than the eye could track through the thin arcs of fading light, reminding her of a fencing match she’d witnessed in France.
The expert swordsmen had parried and riposted with blinding speed. It had been an enthralling and brilliant match to watch, and it had left her breathless with admiration and titillation. William, on the other hand...
“Yes, they were very good,” was all he’d offered in staid response to her exultant praise of the fighters’ skill.
She’d been a new and relatively naive bride of eighteen years to his seasoned and worldly twenty-five years, and had felt a fool, as if she’d embarrassed him in some way. Not wanting to disappoint him again, she had concentrated on emulating his reserved and knowledgeable mannerisms, even when she’d felt completely at a loss or, conversely, thrilled and overjoyed. It hadn’t been easy.
Nothing had ever been easy in her life.
A flaring shaft of sunlight arrowed through a gap in the trees directly into her wine glass, filling the bowl with a golden glow before winking out as if someone had blown out a candle flame.
Like she had smothered her innate nature to enshrine William’s pride in an aura of admiration.
Papa was one of few people in her past she recalled who’d seemed to appreciate her intellect and curiosity—her desire to learn what she could about anything and everything. Zest for life, he’d called it. It was what made her a good teacher now, if not the best of students then.
She’d found it impossibly difficult as a child to sit still and listen to someone when diving in and discovering for herself was so much more fun.
Action before inaction. It was a motto she’d lived quietly during her marriages, feigning guile as she guided William or George through pleasantry and approval even when she’d held a strong opinion on a matter.
She sipped more wine.
She’d learned to avoid direct confrontation and to instead offer up tentative suppositions and vague posits of concern—to sow seeds of discontent and then let nature take its course until she eventually harvested the result she’d delicately planted.
God, how she’d hated it.
She downed the last of her wine and returned inside for a top-up.
Turning away from the credenza with her full glass, she blinked when her brain failed to keep up with the abrupt action. Closing her eyes, she waited for a momentary dizziness to dissipate before crossing to frown at George’s and William’s likenesses on the dresser. She narrowed her gaze on George.
Oh, he had been sweet and loving and gentle and kind in comparison to William’s taciturn and patrician ways, but at least William had been honest. He’d made plain his disregard for directness and opposition and always made clear what he thought or felt. But George...He’d been a charlatan. Petting her ego, telling her she was special.
If he’d truly believed that—truly and honestly thought her wondrous and worthy of his heart—he would have shared it with her. He would have been honest with her. He would have trusted her with this mess long before he dropped it in her lap.
“Damn you, George Sweeney,” she muttered. “Damn you all to hell for putting me and Mr. Banner in this...untenable position.”
Is it so untenable?
Only so much as she couldn’t seem to shake Mr. Banner from her thoughts. He was a sheared-off thorn embedded in her foot. The more she tried to draw him out, the deeper in he went. Yet she couldn’t leave him be and try to forget about him any more than she would leave a thorn in her foot to fester. But if she didn’t find some way to get him out from under her skin, he would continue to poison her thoughts. Her mood.
She needed salve.
Or pliers.
Man-sized salve.
Man-sized pliers.
But the only salve or tool that had ever worked for her before—
Action before inaction.
I will.
I am.
I can so.
THE SMALL DESK CHAIR in his borrowed bedroom creaked as Joe slid the telegram, in its envelope, under his half-empty plate of congealed food. Or half-full plate of congealed food, depending on how one viewed it.
Miss Alma would see it half-full and wonder if she’d failed to please his palate with her choice of evening’s cuisine. But it wasn’t his palate that was displeased. It was...him. All of him. His palate. Stomach. Head. Chest. Even his fingers and toes.
Everything inside and outside of him ached and itched as his mind divided itself between two women: one who’d walked away willingly and who, until two months ago, he’d spent a decade trying to forget; and the other who, in two short months, had invaded his senses to the exclusion of all else, including Simone.
The feel of her and smell of her in his arms while her hands worked his cock...
He was still trying to make sense of how he’d let that happen when for over a decade he’d restrained himself, blocked other women’s attempts to breach his defences.
He’d had ten years of saying no with very little compunction or regret. Mrs. Layton had been by far the most brazen, but there’d been others—married and unmarried women varying in appearance, age, and approaches. But he had remained singular in his always polite but definite disinterest.
So, what made Margaret different? Why did she get to him, weakening his resistance and spurring him to impulses he could usually control?
She was like whisky. Worse than whisky. At least too much whisky left him feeling nauseated at the thought of imbibing again anytime soon. But her...He couldn’t imbibe again soon enough. He craved a repeat offence. Craved her.
Even now, after his bath, after scrubbing his skin and shaving as though that might somehow cleanse him of the sin of inconstancy, he could smell jasmine and hear her voice.
He stiffened and looked at the door.
Another muffled mumble, and fumble of the doorknob, brought him to his feet. He crossed to the door, eased it open.
She stumbled back a half step and blinked up at him.
“You’re here,” she whispered.
Was she slurring? Was that a wine glass in her hand?
Yes, and a two-thirds-empty wine bottle in her other hand.
“You’re drunk,” he muttered, shooting a look past her at Maisie and Miss Lisette’s closed doors.
They’d gone to bed an hour earlier and should be sound asleep, but...He scooped an arm around her waist and dragged her into his room. Closing the door, he locked it and turned around.
She was facing him, a coy smile curving her mouth as she wobbled slightly, glass and bottle in hand.
Her dressing gown fell in cascading layers of voluminous, lace-edged pink sil
k, its cut purposefully provocative, nipping in where white ribbon ties held it closed in a dense ruffle of white lace at her bosom and arced away to the floor to puddle around her feet. If not for the matching floor-length nightdress she wore beneath the robe, the robe’s white edges would form a ruffled frame around her sleek thighs and that glorious patch of red curls nestled at their juncture.
“Am I?” she murmured.
He dragged his eyes back to hers to find their emerald colour smoky with heat. His cock, already twitching, lunged to full strength.
For a second, he couldn’t figure out what she was talking about or take in enough air to ask her what she meant, and then she hefted the bottle.
“Well, that explains this, then,” she said, lowering it. Raising the empty wine glass, she waggled it like she might a finger at a naughty student. “I’ve a thorn in my foot, Mr. Banner. A big ol’ thorn. And I need you to take it out.”
Chapter 27
Pain Relief
SHE SWALLOWED A LAUGH when he looked at her feet.
He looked up, frowning. “From earlier today?”
“Earlier today, this week, this month—” She gestured at him with the wineglass. “You, Mr. Banner. You’re the thorn in my foot. A pain only you can relieve.”
With a smile of wicked satisfaction, she turned and set the glass and bottle on the writing desk, mildly mollified by the presence of two dinner plates acting as paper weights for the scatter of drawings covering the top. At least he hadn’t lied about working through dinner, or about Maisie joining him.
Her feeling of smug satisfaction was heightened by the sight, on the dresser across the room, of the Glenlivet she’d sent, its contents down a quarter. His disapproval in her having gifted it to him obviously didn’t extend to his drinking it, which boosted her confidence.
Holding his gaze, she plucked at one of the ribbon ties securing her dressing gown at her bosom.
“If you don’t want this”—she shimmied the rail off her shoulders, leaving her only in her negligee—“tell me. Tell me you don’t want this as much as I do, and I’ll go.”
HIS MIND WAS A VAST empty corridor echoing with her soft lilting taunt. “Tell me you don’t want this as much as I do, and I’ll go.”
He wanted to. He wanted desperately to tell her to go. But he couldn’t remember why. Was he mad?
She radiated desire. He felt it as tangibly as he smelled the combination of jasmine and wine swirling around her. Tasted it like he had tasted her.
His erection throbbed, testing his trousers. Testing his will. The trousers stood to win that battle because he could not for the life of him remember why he’d ever thought this a bad idea.
She was a woman. A woman damn committed to having her way, and if it was with him, who was he to argue?
He was a man. A man damn committed to having his way, too, and at that moment, his way aligned as perfectly as a sundial with her way, despite logic’s whispered suggestion that he see her safely—and prudently—back to her chamber and leave her there without acting on the primeval energy thrumming between them.
She was a widow, not a virgin. Not somebody else’s wife. He wasn’t a different woman’s husband. They were of legal age, sound mind, and very much alone. Completely alone, and would be until morning when Rufus came in to tidy his chamber.
That was hours away. Twelve, at least. Plenty of time.
More than enough time.
Not nearly enough time. For he knew once he had her in his arms, he’d never want to let her go.
He closed his eyes and inhaled strongly, seeking oxygen and strength to reinforce his next words, but before he could open his mouth, her hands grasped his face.
“Kiss me.” Her small fingers were warm and insistent on his jaw. “Kiss me, and then tell me you want me to go.”
He kept his eyes closed and, with effort, lifted his hands from his sides, intending to grasp her wrists, to ease her hands away and break the contact searing his skin—to lie to her and tell her didn’t want her. But instead, he cradled her neck with one hand while his other descended to clutch her buttock through soft silk and crush her to him as his mouth found hers.
She tasted of wine.
He groaned as she drew his tongue into her mouth and tipped her pelvis against his thigh.
With an animal growl, he scooped her up, carried her to the bed, and laid her on it. He stripped off his shirt and shucked his shoes, socks, and trousers.
She raised on her elbows to watch, green eyes glittering, mouth parted to reveal the soft pink tip of her tongue touched to the tops of her white teeth. Her hair, pinned in a messy topknot, was a rapture of coiled curls, her cheeks were dashed with pink, and pert bosom was heaving. She was beautiful.
A pink-and-white after-dinner confection.
He dragged her to the edge of the bed, rucking her nightwear to her hips in the process. She offered no resistance as he lifted one of her small feet and, balancing her ankle in his palm, eased off her pink, fur-ruffed slipper with his free hand.
Her toenails were painted rose pink, a perfect complement to the lighter hue of her dressing gown, her ivory skin, and the flush of her cheeks.
He stroked her calf up to the tender skin behind her knee, earning a gasping shudder from her, before he bent to kiss her ankle. Then he gently released her leg to repeat the action with the other foot.
She tipped her head back, arching her spine, which had the effect of raising her modest bosom as though in offering, her taut nipples begging to be suckled through the filmy material.
Her thighs quivered as he traced his fingers up and down the inside of her leg, inching ever higher with each stroke.
He could slide a finger or two into her, or pull her to the edge of the mattress, fit her legs around his waist, and drive his cock into her, and she would welcome it. Welcome him. But not yet. Now that he’d decided to go this far, he intended to make it last.
Like a connoisseur of wine, he wanted to sample and taste, sip and swirl. He wanted to inhale her aroma, savour her body, her flavour, and feel. He wanted to know every of inch her, every curve, every valley, every sweet, sweet hollow and sweeter cleft.
He wanted to imprint her on his body, his mind, his soul. So when the dawn came and it was over, and her curiosity and need for release were assuaged, he would leave with something indelible, something he would never forget long after he’d become a fond—or forsaken—memory to her.
HER HEART HAMMERED and skin burned. She was going to implode. Or explode. She couldn’t decide. Couldn’t think.
Fingers curled into the bedding in a desperate bid to anchor herself, she trembled as he teased and caressed her to greater and greater heights. His fingers were light as feathers as he skimmed over her skin from her ankle to the underside of her knee and up along her inner thigh to brush her damp curls, only to skate away again, leaving her anxious and hot. Restless and irritable.
Desperate.
“Please, Joe. Please stop playing, and take me. Take me now.”
“Are you sure?” His voice was low, a purring rumble as he shifted her leg outward to slide his hand yet higher. “Maybe I should kiss you and tell you to go? Do you want me to do that?”
“No.” She shook her head. “I want this. And so do you.”
“Are you sure it’s not the wine talking?”
His fingers swept gently forward and back on either side of her nub, fanning the furnace.
“It’s not the wine,” she rasped. “The wine is only an excuse. I wanted this, this afternoon. I wanted it yesterday. I want it now. I want you, inside me. Please, Joe. Please.”
He pulled her to the edge of the bed, her legs on either side of his solid hips, his cock nestled in her cleft, hard and silky, silky soft.
“Oh, my,” she whispered as he slowly rocked forward, gliding the hard length along her slick fold, his hands firm where they gripped her thighs. “Oh, my,” she said again as he drew back.
She couldn’t remember it being like
this. Wanting it like this. Feeling hot and needy as small spasms jolted her hips upwards with each glide of his cock over her tender nub.
William had been an undercover, lights-out lover. She’d never seen him without his nightshirt on, and their lovemaking had been true to his personality—reserved and practised. Predictable. George had been less covert and plodding in his lovemaking, but he’d never put on a performance this raw and beautiful. He’d never looked at her the way Mr. Banner was looking her, eyes half-lidded and full of predatory promise, as if he wanted to eat her.
Devour her.
He could tell her that he wanted to sink his teeth into her jugular and drain her blood, and she would have angled her chin up and begged him to please do so.
She’d never behaved this way or seen her former husbands this way—broad and solid and magnificent, chest and abdominal muscles flexing with each languid thrust, smooth honey-brown skin glowing with the vitality of youth and Mediterranean ancestry—because either it had been too dark, or she hadn’t looked. She hadn’t felt the need to look, but now...She couldn’t close her eyes. Couldn’t look away. His eyes were magnets, fiery, and fascinating, as irresistible as green diamonds.
“Is this what you want?” he murmured.
“Yes.” She clutched at his hands still holding her legs up and apart. “But in me. Now.”
“Oh, I will,” he muttered. “But not yet.”
He hooked her legs around his waist, grasped her hips to haul her closer yet, and, leaning, braced his hands on the bed to suckle her nipple through her nightgown. He continued the sensuous rocking of his hips, sliding the swollen tip of his member over her nub until she wanted to scream with the frustration of it.
She was so close. So bloody close to the blissful la petite mort she craved, but he was refusing to give her relief.
Action before inaction.
I will. I am. I can so. She angled and reached. He jerked and gasped as he brought his head up, his half-lidded eyes flaring in surprise.
My One True Love Page 25
