by Erica Ridley
“No man has ever seen me even partially naked,” she murmured against his mouth. “Until you.”
She could taste his smile.
“May I?” The words were husky.
She nodded. “Please do.”
He pulled off her shift and let it float to the floor. She’d expected to be nervous. For someone who had spent a lifetime hiding her smile from people she loved, being fully nude ought to be terrifying.
But if he could be brave, so could she.
He looked as though he wanted to consume every part of her. Perhaps he did. She blushed in remembrance. She hoped he “kissed” her there, again.
She reached for the buttons of his fall and startled when the fabric twitched against her fingers.
“Sorry.” He did not look sorry. “All of me is pleased to have you naked in my arms.”
His member jutted free of his fall before the last button was undone. Olive’s heart beat faster. Soon, he would be inside of her.
As she tugged his trousers down over his thickly muscled legs, her mouth drew parallel to his shaft. Experimentally, she pressed her lips to it as he had done to her, and glanced up at him as she touched the tip of her tongue to his hot flesh.
With a growl, he tossed her into the center of the bed and climbed atop her, shucking his trousers with a shake of his leg.
“You didn’t like—”
“I loved.” He rained kisses from one breast to the other. “Let’s save that for tomorrow.”
This time, she knew what was coming, before his mouth made its sensual way down to where she throbbed for him. Rather than ruin the surprise, it made the yearning sharper, hotter, her body’s reaction to his talented tongue almost instantaneous. Her legs tightened about him as he brought her to her peak.
She was barely capable of breath when he fitted himself atop her, the tip of his shaft nudging the sensitive nub he’d just licked.
His voice was ragged against her ear. “Last chance to change your mind.”
“I’ve wanted you for longer than you think.” She wrapped her legs about his body. “Stop making me wait.”
“All I’ve ever wanted is you.” He surged inside in one thrust.
She gasped at the sharp pain and he caught her startled cry with his kiss.
Soon, the pain was gone, replaced by the beginnings of the familiar sensual pressure. She moved against him and he groaned.
He joined their bodies fully together, then retreated, in long, slow strokes that grew faster and more frenzied the closer she came to reaching her peak.
She dug her fingernails into his back. “Elijah, I’m—”
Words disappeared from her mind completely as her body pulsed with waves of pleasure. She could feel him inside her as it happened, the knowledge of which only made it better, wilder, stronger.
The moment her contractions ceased, his shaft jerked out of her, his seed spilling hot against her thigh.
After tending her with a clean handkerchief, he rolled onto his back and pulled her with him, cradling her to his scarred chest and wrapping his strong arms about her protectively. He pressed a kiss to her forehead, softly, reverently, then lay his cheek against the spot that he’d kissed.
This means nothing, she’d told them both, repeatedly. She’d always known it for a lie.
He meant everything.
Chapter 13
The Ninth Day
Eli’s eyelids sprang open. It was dark. Mostly dark. The edges around the curtains were visible, indicating the sun would soon be on its way up.
And he was in Olive’s bedchamber.
She was curled into him, her cheek half on the pillow, half on his arm. He had never seen a more beautiful sight. If they weren’t under imminent risk of discovery, he would have happily snuggled her close until late afternoon.
He eased his arm out from under her and tucked the blanket in close about her. It was their first night together and hopefully not the last.
Quickly, Eli slid on his clothes. He retrieved Olive’s apparel from the various places they had dropped or thrown each piece, and folded it all neatly, lest her maid be scandalized upon entering the bedchamber.
The maids! He opened the door as carefully as possible. His heart nearly stopped when the hinges gave a last-second creak.
Poking his head into the corridor like an emerging mole would be no less scandalous than walking out boldly. Eli chose swiftness over subtlety, and dashed from Olive’s chamber down the short corridor to his own.
He heard a murmur of distant voices around the corner, but managed to slide into his room and bolt the door without being called to account for his actions.
Before a maid or footman caught him standing about in fashionable but suspiciously wrinkled apparel, Eli washed with the basin of cold water and donned fresh, unwrinkled attire.
What now?
He raked a hand through his hair as he gazed about his guest chamber.
When he’d first arrived, he hadn’t expected to stay for more than a day, and as such, had packed more books than clothing. A few days with Olive wasn’t enough. He wanted to spend a lifetime with her. He wanted—
His books.
He stared bleakly at years of meticulous, hard-won research piled atop the dressing-table he’d been using as a makeshift desk.
There had to be a way to save lives without destroying Olive’s in the process.
But how?
Once his father learnt of Eli’s romantic interest in the daughter of his mortal enemy, there would be no funding for future cures. No further research at all.
Father would forbid chemists and botany and physic gardens altogether.
There would be no hope of helping women like Eli’s mother. No lessening the chances of the same tragedy befalling children, helpless babies, like Eli had once been.
He put his books away. Without Olive, nothing else mattered.
No matter what life threw at her, she didn’t just climb back in the saddle. She adapted, she raced ahead, she beat Fate at its own game.
Every time she heard “Ladies don’t do...” she went out and did it. She’d trained the most infamous horse in all of England.
Eli would have to do the impossible, too.
He had to deal with his father.
Swiftly, he retrieved his hat and coat, and strode out of the front door and into the bracing air.
Father would be awake at this hour. As far as Eli knew, the marquess never slept. He was too busy plotting revenge against all perceived wrongs.
It was no way to live.
Eli chose Olive. Even if he could never convince her to marry him, even if all they could ever be was lovers, even if all they had was one more night, his answer did not change. He chose her.
He chose love.
Despite the early hour, the castle doors were wide open. The staff bustled about the interior, stoking fires, arranging the refreshment table, attending to guests.
Eli walked past them. He headed up the marble stairs, his pace never flagging despite the knowledge that he was walking into war.
The Marquess of Milbotham’s lair was the true enemy territory.
Eli rapped on the door.
It was wrenched open at once, almost breathlessly so, as though the London under-butler had perched at the threshold for an entire week without sleep, just in case Eli chanced to call.
Well, here he was.
The marquess turned from the window as though he’d been expecting this meeting. He probably had. The Harper farm was visible in the distance. The marquess would have seen Eli step outside and plotted his next move accordingly.
Father’s eyes glittered. He rubbed his narrow hands together, his crafty smile resembling that of a scarecrow.
“Tell me you’ve accomplished it.”
Ah. He had not been preparing to strike. He had been preparing for victory. It had never occurred to the marquess that his wishes would not be obeyed.
“No,” Eli said.
The word echoed
in the stone chamber, simple and clear.
Father’s hands slashed through the air. “Why are you dragging your feet? This is a simple mission, Elijah. If you’re not persuasive enough to win the hand of a long-in-the-tooth spinster, just humiliate her some other way, so we can go home and celebrate.”
“No,” Eli said again. Louder. Clearer.
“Don’t tell me.” The marquess shook clawed hands at the heavens. “You’ve fallen in love with the impudent chit whose heart you’re supposed to break.”
“I won’t do it,” Eli said.
“You will,” said his father, “if you care about your pretty flowers.”
“It’s not about beauty,” Eli burst out. “It’s about the cures chemists can create using the properties of certain plants. It’s about saving lives. It’s about—”
“It’s about time you realize none of that is going to happen.” Father’s smile was rapacious. Wolfish and sharp. “If you disobey me, you will become as poisonous as hemlock. There will be no more physic gardens. No more precious research. Not a single soul will work with you, for fear of losing their own livelihoods. There will be no cure.”
Eli clenched his teeth. “Before I left, you promised you wouldn’t do that.”
“Did I?” The marquess lifted a shoulder. “I give, and I take away. The choice is yours.”
“I gave you my answer.” Eli repeated it louder this time, drawing the word out for emphasis. “No.”
Servants fled the room as if fearing an apocalypse.
“I see.” The marquess steepled his long fingers, tapping them together rhythmically. “If you embarrass that hoyden and her father as instructed, I will dissolve your responsibilities to my farm and to me, and fund botany research for the rest of your life, if that is how you wish to spend the family money. I’ll sign a legal contract to that effect.”
Eli opened his mouth.
The marquess cut him off. “However. If you deny me in this matter, you will be disinherited completely. As of this moment, you will have no home to return to, no allowance to spend, and no friends or colleagues left in London. It will be as though you were never born. As though you had died along with your mother rather than lived to disappoint me.”
Eli kept his fists stiff at his sides. “You disgust me.”
“Then we have something in common after all.” The marquess smirked. “Do you think I won’t do it? Of course I can. As you are so fond of pointing out, I’ve only a courtesy title. I’m not obliged to hand anything down to an ‘heir.’ If you side with the Harpers over your own father, I’d sooner entail my holdings to a dog than give a farthing of it to you.”
Splendid. Absolutely the outcome Eli had been hoping for when he’d knocked on the door. He was homeless, penniless, and prospect-less, in addition to being a deceitful two-faced blackguard.
Had he thought Olive’s reaction upon learning the truth was the worst he had to fear? Now he had nothing to offer her at all. Although Eli would play no further role in his father’s machinations, the marquess’s thirst for vengeance would double in strength.
Eli was an enemy now, too.
“Side with the Harpers over my own father?” he repeated hollowly. “When have you ever been a father to me?”
But there was no point attempting to mend the cracks in a bond that had never been whole to begin with. Every time Eli attempted to keep pieces together, his father was there to kick them apart. Theirs was not a relationship worth protecting.
Eli would fight for the ones that were.
“I gave you every opportunity—” his father began.
Eli turned toward the door.
“Where do you think you’re going?” the marquess roared, his voice ricocheting off the stone walls.
“I’m disowned,” Eli reminded him over his shoulder. “I don’t have to listen to your selfish tripe anymore.”
He yanked open the door.
“If you don’t do it,” came his father’s low, insidious voice, “I’ll find a way.”
Eli turned around, every muscle vibrating with the effort to control his rage.
“If you so much as whisper their names,” he said viciously, “you will regret it. Banishment won’t stop me. I keep your legacy in here.” Eli tapped his temple. “I know how you think. I know what you value. I know your tactics and your weaknesses and your fears.” He curled his lip. “You never fathered an heir. You forged your most powerful enemy with your own hands.”
His father stared at him, shocked and speechless.
“Don’t fear me,” Eli said relentlessly. “Fear the copy of yourself you created.”
He stalked out of the chamber, pulling the door shut behind him.
No footsteps followed him.
No shouts of anger.
Energy rushed through Eli’s veins. He’d done it. He’d given his conscienceless father something to fear. The gamble had worked.
Eli hadn’t the least idea how he’d make good on such a threat, but the beautiful part was that he wouldn’t have to.
The marquess believed fully in his own omnipotence, which would extend to his ability to father an equally powerful son. The marquess would be able to think of ways a motivated, ruthless enemy might damage him, and would scramble about shoring up perceived weaknesses, only to think of some other way, and throw himself into preventing that, and so on.
Perhaps not into infinity, but for months or even longer, the marquess would live in a hell of his own making. He would not dare to harm the Harpers until he was absolutely certain he’d left no vulnerability through which his son could retaliate against him.
Eli clattered down the marble steps, out through the castle doors, and into the brisk morning air.
The sunrise was glorious, but already the exhilaration from standing up against his father had begun to fade. While the dragon chased its tail, there was a fair maiden who deserved the full truth.
In doing so, Eli risked adding Olive-less to his homeless, penniless, and prospect-less future. He was not an attractive suitor from any logical perspective. His role in his father’s deception was by far the worst of his sins.
The wheels of destruction had been put in motion even before he’d arrived on her doorstep. His stomach clenched in shame.
Olive never deserved to be deceived and manipulated.
Eli did not deserve Olive.
Soon, she would know it, too.
Chapter 14
Olive did not wake up alone.
A maid was adding fresh kindling to the fire.
Olive stretched out her arm in alarm. The emptiness of a cold blanket was both a disappointment and a relief. As much as she missed Elijah’s warmth, Olive would rather wake alone than to the startled shrieks of a housemaid.
She felt different today. A little sore perhaps, which was to be expected, but this new sensation wasn’t physical. It was more internal than that. She had taken a lover! She, who had only ever had one kiss, had spent the past nine days comporting herself with increasingly scandalous behavior, and did not regret a single moment of it.
Her mood was buoyant. With an irrepressible grin, Olive dressed in plaits and breeches, and scooped up a carrot from the kitchen on her way out to the stables to exercise the horses.
A lover!
And not just any lover... she had Elijah Weston.
Her heart fluttered at the thought of his name. And the thought of his hands. And the thought of his mouth. And the thought of his—
Was there anything she disliked about the man he’d become? He’d hurt her in the past, but that had been years ago. He’d been a child then, just like her. Now he was a full-grown burly botanist whose greatest passions were helping others and kissing her.
He’d been a perfect gentleman from the moment of his arrival, taking great care not to pressure her at any point. Nor did he become peevish when she turned down his marriage proposal... twice. He let her be in control and trusted her to make her own decisions. Her happiness came first. Olive frowned.
Was taking a lover what would make her happy?
She tightened Duke’s saddle, then moved on to Rudolph and Mr. Edward. Taking a lover was fantastic and freeing, like riding over the hills with the wind in her hair.
But wild rides and lovers were temporary. Now that she’d fallen in love with Elijah, she wasn’t ready to give him up. Olive suspected she never would be.
How she wished he had come on his own, and not at the behest of her father!
If there were some way to be certain that Elijah’s interest lay only in her, and not the attractive dowry of one of the most famous stud farms in England, then...
Then, yes. Yes, she would marry him.
But how could she be sure?
Olive tightened Charley’s saddle, then gave him a pat on the rump to go and join the others.
She couldn’t be sure, that was the thing. In the same way that the hurts of their pasts could not be undone, nor could her father’s manipulative actions. In the hopes of repairing an old rift, Papa had dangled the farm as bait. Elijah had come to claim it—and her.
And... the rift was repaired. Oh, perhaps not between Papa and the Marquess of Milbotham, but that was between those two. Olive and Elijah had more than made up.
It came down to a matter of trust.
There would never be proof. If she wanted to decide things for herself, well, here was her opportunity. Did she trust Elijah with her heart or not?
As she emerged from the stables, he was just approaching the fence.
Her heart gave a little flip.
Entrust him with it? Her heart was already his.
She ran up to lean over the fence in greeting. The horses followed, four hair-tossing bridesmaids dressed in the finest leather, hoping to catch the carrot.
He stopped her before she could kiss him.
“Olive.” His eyes were strangely serious. “We need to discuss something.”
This time, the flutter was not in her heart, but deep in the pit of her stomach, where all bad things lurked and churned.
