No, he hadn’t fought. Laurette had gladly shed those clothes, making it impossible for him to ignore his pent-up desire, even when he knew he was pledged to another woman.
Even after he was married.
“As if I’ve gone to all this trouble just to remove you from this earth.”
“You’ve removed me from my home. That’s almost as bad.”
“Ah.” He traced a line from navel to slit. She was, as expected, wet, just as he was hard. They seemed to have this instantaneous reaction to each other, even if Con was fairly sure she wanted to box his ears. He followed his finger with his lips, pausing to look up when he scented the disappointing whiff of vinegar blending with her rose perfume.
Damn. He had meant to surprise her, but she had prepared for his visit.
“When you go back, you’ll find everything tidy and fresh.” He tugged the string but decided to leave it in place. One less thing to fight over.
“I don’t care.” The Vincent chin thrust out.
Yes, she was in a martial mood. This conversation was not going as planned. The Lodge belonged to foolish Charlie in any case. Laurette deserved to live at Ryland Grove, now that it was truly his home.
The time for talk was over. Con parted her folds and proceeded to make love to her with his mouth until she was liquid beneath his touch. He focused his senses on the rose oil on her skin, and kept the string carefully to the side unless it tangle with his tongue and impede his progress. She was sweet, tart, Laurette.
There was no more arguing, or sound of any kind as she kept strict control over her reaction to his attentions. There was no one to hear her anyway—Con had given everyone the afternoon off. He wanted her to himself, every inch of her. Qalhata had prepared a basket for their supper later, which he intended to share with Laurette in their private garden. It wasn’t the green Dorset downs, nor were there standing stones or the steady trickle of the Piddle—just a frothing marble fountain. Tomas had carted a rug and pillows out of doors to place in the shade of the red maple tree Con had planted himself.
He broke through her barrier of silence quickly as she arched beneath him. “Oh! God, Con, I need you.”
Blessed words. He needed her too, to be inside her, to lose himself. To stop thinking of the past and concentrate on their future. Everything was in place. With luck—and continued lust—she’d be his marchioness at summer’s end.
“Take off your shift.” His words had a harsh edge—she would know he was as anxious as she. But he didn’t care that his every action revealed how deeply he was enthralled with her. Did not every woman want a man to master?
No, that wasn’t right—they mastered each other, were complimentary halves of the same whole. But she wouldn’t acknowledge that yet, had resisted all his blandishments beyond the bedroom. He would prevail, or die trying.
But no death yet, just hot friction surrounding his cock. He watched impatiently as she struggled with the ties, then helped her tear the garment over her head. Her breasts begged for kisses, so he complied. Her skin was flushed, dewy. Her pale lashes fluttered as he suckled and stroked, her lips set in the tiniest of smiles.
He took a nipple gently between his teeth and released it. “Tell me what you want again.”
“You know.”
“I want to hear it. I live to hear it.”
“If I don’t say it, will you go away?”
“Not a chance. I’ll never leave you again.”
“I’ll leave you. In four months and eighteen days.”
Con was just as aware of the finite nature of their bargain. “Don’t forget to add the eight and a half hours until midnight. When I opened the door to you, you were mine again.”
He remembered her as she had been in his shadowed hallway, pale and careworn, her clothes—except for the extraordinary undergarments he saw shortly afterward—pitiful. She had dressed to seduce him, but there was no need. He was hers even if she didn’t want him. He could see every lost, lonely year between them in the gaslight, so sharp in the angles of her face and collarbone. At least by now she had lost that pinched look under his protection, even if she fought against his loving restraints.
Laurette shook her head. “Don’t be tiresome, Con. I am yours only through your blackmail. A piece of paper signed under duress can mean nothing.”
She was right, of course, but he had used every means at his disposal, legal or otherwise. And he would do it again.
He cupped her cheek. “Tell me.”
“I’ve changed my mind. I want nothing.”
He should have plunged in when she first asked. When her need was so great that she forgot she meant to be a forbidding stranger to him.
“Say it.”
“Damn you, Con! I’ve had my pleasure. More or less. I don’t care if you have yours.”
He raised a brow. “Selfish, are you?”
“Completely.”
“I don’t believe you. If anything, you’ve always cared too much.” For her rackety drunken parents. For her little brother. For him that summer when he was so miserable he simply fucked her instead of made love.
“Well, I don’t care now! Do whatever you like! I misspoke before.”
“You don’t need me then?”
“Of course not.”
“You don’t need this?” He thumbed an erect nipple. “Or this?” His lips returned to their earlier task. She lay stiff beneath him, furious. Her mouth was frozen in a grim line, her eyes filling with tears.
This would never do. Even he was not so heartless to take a woman against her will.
He pulled back and covered her with a sheet.
She was not content with this reprieve, but felt compelled to hurt him further. “Anybody could touch me in such a way as you do. It makes no difference. What you do is nothing to me. Less than nothing. It’s something to be borne until my servitude is over.”
Con felt an unholy flare of jealousy, but he knew she had never betrayed him. Not once. Sadie had been more than clear on the subject when she rained threats upon his head when he told her what he meant to do to win Laurette back.
“I will not release you from your obligation no matter how cold you are to me, Laurette. It seems pointless to argue when we could be enjoying ourselves. And you cannot tell me you have not enjoyed yourself this past month.”
“One month and thirteen days.”
Lord, but she was stubborn. “Don’t forget the next eight and a half hours.”
“As if I could forget any of it, you horrible man! And yes, wipe that smug smirk off your face! My body is a traitor. I cannot help it if when you touch me—” She broke off, blushing scarlet. “But as I said, my body would respond to anyone with a modicum of skill and hygiene.”
“You once loved me in my dirt. Remember the afternoon you found me after haying? You didn’t care that I was covered in sweat and smelled like a goat. You knocked me up against the hayrick and had your wicked way with me.”
“I was young and very stupid.”
Con sighed. “We both were, my love. But we’re older now, and have more choices. Fucking in a bed is much more comfortable, is it not? And we won’t be vexed by scratchy straw and those tiny insects that bit our arses. I trust you’re completely cured now?”
“I was cured a dozen years ago. Of you and everything you did to me.”
“Are you certain? Let me have a look.”
Laurette gaped at him. “You want to inspect my bottom?”
“I can’t think of anything more delightful.”
“You truly are mad. But I must do as you request, mustn’t I, since you are my keeper. Temporarily.” She made a great show of sighing and rolling over, “accidentally” elbowing him in the process.
Con peeled the linen sheet from her, admiring her pale pink stockings and the lacy garters still holding them up. He might have preferred black had he been consulted, but Laurette was really not the black stocking type. Her narrow back and bum were just as freckled as the rest of her. He smoo
thed a fingertip down her spine, bumping to her waist. She was very tense, no doubt from being sexually thwarted. She did need him, no matter what she said, or how she distanced herself from him.
“Oh! What’s this?”
She turned her face from the pillows. “What?”
“This right here.” He circled a square of skin on her left buttock.
Curious now, her hand came around to touch the spot. “I don’t feel anything.”
“I need a closer look at the thing. Lie still.”
“What does it look like?”
Ah, the old Laurette would have known he was playing a trick on her, and play along with him. This Laurette seemed genuinely alarmed. He didn’t want her to worry. About anything. Certainly not about a tiny heart-shaped freckle on her beautiful white arse that he was going to bite in about six seconds.
“You bloody bastard!”
“Lie still, Laurette.” This way he wouldn’t have to see her ruthless indifference, because Con had decided he was taking her, against her will or not. She could pretend all she wanted that she didn’t care, but he knew differently.
He pulled her up on her knees and stuffed some of the golden pillows under her. And then, with no preamble or discussion, he gripped her hips and entered her. She shrieked, forgetful now to hide her response, and continued to scream as he drove deeper. He was quite sure she screamed with pleasure tinged with some surprise, and as she didn’t reach behind her to squeeze his balls off, he took it all for noisy submission.
Her bottom was luscious split by his cock. He watched as he slid into her pink. He could see her consume him, and reluctantly release him. He was gasping, rocking, rough hot sensation rippling through him. Her fingernails dug and clawed into the bedding, her cries muffled now by the mattress. One more thrust and he bent to nip her shoulder. Mark her as his.
Make her mine. Mine. Mine.
Fill her with seed. Get her with child—no, the damn sponge. But soon. Soon. She belonged to him and always would.
His release shook him to his core, blinded him again. She had to know—had to. He’d paid. Suffered. They both had—she more than he, really. Con would make it up to her. Over a picnic dinner tonight. In the carriage tomorrow, and all the days afterward as they journeyed to Yorkshire. And then hopefully, for the rest of their lives.
Chapter 10
Yorkshire, 1820
Madness. But what could one expect from the Mad Marquess? The carriage pitched despite the well-sprung wheels and skill of Tomas, one of Aram’s sons. Laurette had been thrown against the doors, against Con, and once tumbled to an undignified heap upon the floor. Con had ceased being amused some miles back and was now sitting opposite, grim, his fist firmly wrapped around the carriage strap. He had cautioned her to do the same, and Laurette had lost the feeling in her fingertips as she held her arm up in a death grip.
“How much farther?” she ground out.
“We are on my land now. The road was not nearly as bad last fall.”
“It’s b-bad now.” She slid to the side and clung to the leather for dear life.
“Perhaps we should walk the rest of the way.” Con tapped the roof and the carriage swayed to a shuddery standstill.
Tomas clambered down and opened the door. “Aye, my lord?”
“I believe we’ll walk the rest of the way. Over the field. It cannot possibly be more rutted than my road.”
“Aye, my lord.” Tomas grinned. “Do you care to wager who will arrive first, my lord?”
“I’m not much of a betting man anymore, Tom. Let’s just hope none of us winds up in a ditch. You’ve done well so far.”
“Thank you, my lord. I thought of the lady.”
Laurette tried to smile. If she had truly been in the young man’s thoughts he would have put her out at the last signpost.
This trip was most ill-advised. Just when she was getting used to her little house and garden and making the acquaintance of her neighbors, Con had informed her they were leaving London. He spouted nonsense about the city heat and the crowds, but she had been comfortable in the shady corner of her garden, tucked away in her exclusive street. People were hardly going to seek her out and disturb her peace. Only Con did that, the devil.
Laurette looked down at her rumpled travelling costume and thin-soled half-boots. Just this morning at the inn she had been the picture of perfection, or at least Con’s version of it. Nadia had told her weeks ago that he had selected every stitch of her wardrobe himself. She and Aram were some miles behind in the larger conveyance with all the trunks.
It had suited Con down to the ground to torture her alone over the miles in the confined space. They had done everything they ever thought to do in a bedroom and a few things more. Laurette blushed to think of the day before yesterday in particular. It was as though Con was trying to cram a life’s worth of sexual adventure into the journey to Yorkshire. When she reminded him he’d surely find a bed in which to slake his lust once they finally reached his misbegotten property, he had smiled, and continued his amorous assault.
Laurette simply could not understand why, when he’d gone to all the trouble and expense of Jane Street, he was so all-fired up to see the West Yorkshire dales.
Con steadied her elbow as she nearly tripped over a rock. Certainly now that they were off that dreadful lane, and her stomach had settled, the countryside was quite beautiful. The Pennines were in the distance, wispy clouds obscuring their peaks. White drystone walls crisscrossed the landscape and a few artistically twisted trees broke up the undulating ridges. She heard the water before she saw it and looked questioningly at Con.
“Nothing like Aysgarth, of course, but our own little waterfall, just over the hillock. And if I’m not mistaken, a cave behind it. I’ve been told the limestone hills are riddled with caves and caverns. We should have liked this place when we were children.”
They climbed over the hill, Laurette firmly encased in Con’s grip. She failed to see her young self roaming the fells or anywhere else, until they came upon the waterfall. It was not much, as waterfalls went, just a jumble of rocks and a vibrant splash of silver water eddying below the hill where they stood. The stream cut into the green and disappeared behind a giant boulder. But she was enchanted.
Con led her down the steep bank and to the quicksilver stream.
The air was instantly cooler here. The waterfall and stream it fell into were quite lovely—noisy, too. Good. It would spare her more conversation with Con. It had not been easy keeping her distance from him in the carriage when they were not engaged in lust. She might allow him—welcome—the liberties he took with her body, but each word she spoke was rationed. He was not her friend.
Once he was—her best and only. Laurette had loved her Dorset village home well, mostly because Con was her neighbor.
He had promised to marry her, to love her forever.
He had not.
“It empties into a small lake not far from the house,” Con shouted. “We’re not more than a mile away as the crow flies.” Con picked up a stone and skipped it. He’d not lost his technique. She thought of the pink skipping rock he’d given her all those years ago, easy for him to find amidst the gray and black rocks of the Piddle. She’d left it in the crook of their tree for him to find before she lost Con and it for good.
“How did you come by the property? You never spoke of it at home,” she shouted back, forgetting her vow of silence.
Con grimaced and pointed upstream. They walked away from the rushing water until they could speak in normal tones. “It was left to my mother. Of course when my parents died, my grandfather had no interest in it. He couldn’t manage Ryland Grove as it was. There were tenants for a while. Then the house was more or less abandoned until my uncle was banished here, and I’ve had to spend a fortune on it since. I hope it’s in better condition than the road.”
It was his wife who had solved the problem of his uncle. He had wanted to be revolted when they first met, but he was not. Marianna Berrym
an was pretty, and far more genteel than he had expected a daughter of her father to be. She played the out-of-tune piano more than passably after their first supper together, and sang a duet with her dour chaperone, who had a surprisingly sweet voice. Her conversation was lively and intelligent.
But he felt managed, and so was mulish. For every prod of his uncle’s he became unresponsive, then finally mute. Even Miss Berryman gave up and turned her charm on his uncle, who puffed and swelled like a sun-bloated fish. There had been plenty of dead fish in the chalk beds of the River Piddle this summer, and hungry people who dared to eat them. Miss Berryman’s money would put finer fare on their tables.
Duty. An empty word compared with losing himself in Laurette. He had to—he must—
“Don’t you agree, my lord?”
Con roused himself. He had paid no attention to the conversation. “I beg your pardon?”
“I have just told Lord Robert that Papa will set him to manage one of your lesser properties—the one in Yorkshire. Some farm, I believe.”
His uncle looked stricken. The farm in Yorkshire was so unproductive and negligible Con had been unable to sell it off. The barn was in better condition than the house, and that was not saying much.
Con looked at his fiancée with new appreciation. The Berrymans must be fully aware of the state of all Con’s holdings. They had made their investment in him with open eyes.
“See here,”said his uncle, “I’ve given almost ten years of my life to Ryland Grove. Raising my nephew. I’ll not be turned out like some—some—”
“Mad dog?” Marianna asked sweetly. Con noted she had one dimple in her rounded cheek.
“The nerve! I say, Conover, tell these people you’ll not stand for it!”
Con allowed himself a swallow of weak tea. Soon, that would change, too. There would be strong tea, and coffee, and port, brandy and wine, thanks to “these people.” He’d have oceans of liquid to drown in as he became Mr. Berryman’s son-in-law. Marianna’s husband.
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