He laughed against her skin but wrapped his hands around her thighs to hold her still.
And then, finally, he went to her sex. She moaned at the first touch of his tongue. He licked her thoroughly, then added his fingers, sliding them into her as he moved his lips over the slick area above, first slowly and languidly. As her movements became more frantic, he moved quicker, pressed his fingers deeper as he tasted her.
He didn’t need to hold her thighs anymore. They were locked tight around him.
She grew wetter, hotter, stiffer. He pushed his fingers deep, and she cried out. “Yes. There. Please. There.”
He did it again and again. Her sex clenched around him, viselike. Then she came, her body squeezing and releasing, pulsing around his fingers and beneath his tongue. He continued his thrusts and his licks until she relaxed around him, her thighs falling away.
He kissed her sex one last time, gently, and then kissed his way down one of her legs until he arrived at her foot, which he pressed and rubbed for several minutes, ignoring the demanding pulse of his cock.
He gave the same attention to her other foot, then moved up her body, finding her watching him.
“It is too dark to see the waterfall,” she murmured. “It disappeared when … when …”
“When you came?”
“Yes.” A wide smile spread over her face. “Exactly then.”
He grinned.
“Oh, my Sam,” she chastised. “You look far too satisfied. Like the cat who ate the canary.”
Raising his brows at her, he licked his lips. “Mmm.”
She grabbed his shoulders and flipped them over before Sam knew what she was doing.
“Now it is my turn.” Her eyes, flecked golden from the firelight, gleamed wickedly.
She crawled down his body, giving it the same attention he’d given hers earlier. She tugged up his shirt, her hands playing over his torso, teasing his nipples, gently pressing her lips around his scars. She followed her touches with teasing, playful kisses.
His cock was so hard it felt like it might burst. As she kissed his chest, she rubbed wantonly against it.
The vixen knew exactly what she was doing.
She trailed downward until her lips feathered against the head of his cock. He groaned aloud. He’d never had a woman’s lips there before. Not for lack of fantasizing about it. And holy hell, it felt good.
She took his cock in both her hands and began a sweet torture that he was fairly certain might just kill him.
She kissed, licked, sucked. She fisted him in her hands and worked her palms up and down. She took his cock deep into her mouth and stroked him with her lips and tongue, mimicking the motions of carnal intercourse.
The pleasure … it was too much. Too strong. He was …
He groaned loudly. His hips moved now, out of his control, thrusting in her hands and her mouth as she hummed against him, the vibrations traveling all the way to the tips of his ears.
“Élise,” he moaned. “Stop. Stop.”
He should pull away. But she gripped him harder, took him deep into her mouth. So deep. His cock tightened, heated. And then the orgasm crashed through him, rushing like the waters of the nearby falls, filling his every pore with pleasure.
She didn’t move away. She kept sucking him, milking every drop from him. It seemed to last forever. Her throat worked as she swallowed, pressing more seed out of him each time.
Until, finally, her movements gentled and her lips slipped off him. He lay spent, half dead, the crashing pleasure still ringing in his ears, though a tiny voice of reason told him it was probably just the waterfall.
She kissed her way back up his body as he had done with her earlier. Then she settled against him, pulling the blanket up over them.
Cradling her in his arms, he squeezed his eyes shut.
He loved her. He needed her.
He hadn’t wanted either. He would never wish his love or need on anyone.
“Sam?” she asked in a low voice.
“Hm?”
“Are … you all right? Did you … not like it?”
He pulled her tighter against him. “No. I loved it. It was …” He shook his head. There really were no words to explain what it was.
She sighed. “What’s wrong, then?”
“Nothing.”
She was quiet for a moment. Then, softly, “You lie to me.”
Yes, he did. She was too clever.
She stroked his chest, moving her fingers up and down. He couldn’t help but find her touch soothing.
He squeezed his eyes tighter. Then he said in a grating whisper, “I didn’t love them.”
Her hand stopped, held still for a moment, then started again. “Whom?”
“Charlotte. And Marianne.”
He felt her body move as she released a long breath. “I’m sorry.”
“Marianne and I were children. Only seventeen when we married, the same age as you when you married Dunthorpe. She was eighteen when she died.”
“Oh, Sam,” she whispered.
“I married her because my mother and Marianne’s father thought it would be a good idea, and I wanted to appease them.”
“As I married Dunthorpe partly to appease my uncle. It is a valid reason for many to marry. Those kinds of matches are certainly more common than love matches.”
“Nevertheless, she died, Élise. I didn’t love her. I hardly knew her. And she died because she married me.”
“It wasn’t your fault.”
He was silent for a minute. “And then … Charlotte. I married her to appease the colonel. For advancement in my military career.” He gave a scoffing laugh. “I was a damn fool. It didn’t take long for me to realize the mistake I made. Charlotte was sheltered—an innocent in all things. But she always resented me.” Élise stiffened against him, but he continued. “She despised the fact that I was a bastard, and I think that tarnish on me, and by extension on her, ate at her until she began to loathe me.”
“I hate her,” Élise said stiffly. He could literally feel her bristling against him. His protective little fireball.
“She was also very young,” he said softly. “She never had the chance to become wise.”
Élise blew out a breath through her clenched teeth. “I shall not speak ill of the dead. Even though I am tempted. Very tempted.”
“But I … I didn’t love her. And she died because of the child she carried. Because of me …”
She squeezed him tight. “That isn’t your fault, either. How could you have known?”
“I always th-ought …” His voice broke, but he pushed through, needing to tell her this, to confess to her what he’d told no one in his life. “I thought she and our son were taken from me as a punishment because I didn’t love her enough. If I had, if I’d paid more attention to her instead of working all the time, if I’d encouraged her to leave her bed more instead of languishing in it all day …”
“Sam. How could you have known? Even if you’d loved her more than life itself, she would have died.”
He was silent. That logic had crossed his mind in the past, only to be pushed away by his guilt.
“I cared about them both.”
“Of course you did. Because you are you. You are caring by nature.”
“But I never loved them,” he said quietly. “And they both suffered and then died. Because of me.”
“No.” She seemed very confident in that rejection of his guilt. But she hadn’t been there to see the plethora of mistakes he’d made with both his wives.
He loved Élise. He needed her.
But to have her would be selfish, as he’d been with Marianne and Charlotte.
“I can never form a connection with another woman. I … I am no good for women. I am … lethal.”
“That is utter nonsense,” she said.
“Is it?” He sighed. “You have several people who want you dead, thanks to me.”
“My Sam, you have saved me from those people, and more t
han once. It is because of Dunthorpe they want me dead, not because of you.”
“This is why I joined the Agency. It doesn’t lend itself to family life. As I am sure has been made obvious to you.”
“Yes, that seems very clear.”
“Then you can see … You can see why this can only be temporary between us.” He tried not to flinch. Hell, but it cost him to say those words.
“No.”
He blinked down at her. “No?”
“No, I cannot see why it can only be temporary.”
He sighed, surprised he’d need to spell it out for her. “My line of work is too dangerous. Even more so now than when I was in the army.”
“Well then.” He could hear the smile in her voice as she snuggled closer to him. “It is very good that you are no longer in this line of work.”
“What do you mean?”
“You have left it, no? To become my knight in shining armor. You have made that your new line of work. For which I am grateful,” she added.
It felt like something yanked his heart in two different directions, pulling him apart from the inside out. He wanted Élise like nothing he’d ever wanted in his life. But forging a deep connection with a woman would lead only to suffering in the end.
Élise had suffered enough. He couldn’t bear to see her suffer anymore.
“You don’t understand,” he told her gruffly. “It’ll be even worse—”
She pressed a kiss onto his pectoral muscle. “You are forgetting something, my Sam.”
“What’s that?”
“We’re together now. That makes us twice as strong. I’m afraid. Of course I am.” Her lips brushed over the front of his chest as she continued. “But I trust you, and you must trust me. If there is any possibility for us to escape this dire situation we have found ourselves in, we will find it. Together.”
Chapter Nineteen
Sam and Élise didn’t find the dowager duchess the next day. Nor did they find her the day after that. While Sam had kept an unhurried pace, Élise would have preferred to gallop across the countryside in pursuit of his mother and running from the men she knew were after them. She wouldn’t have stopped until the duchess was found once and for all, and then she and Sam would have escaped somewhere to hide where Dunthorpe or Adams would never find them.
Sam, however, insisted on being slow and steady. She knew why—he was concerned for her health. He touched her often, and Élise knew it was not just for the pleasure of it. He was checking for fever.
He was very careful, too, asking subtle questions about the visitors to any given place, not only to find out whether the gypsy and his mother had been there, but if Dunthorpe or anyone from the Agency had been looking for them.
While they found hints of the dowager and Steven Lowell, all was quiet when it came to Dunthorpe and the Agency. If Élise didn’t know better, she would have guessed they’d given up on the search. But she did know better. They were out there. Somewhere.
Late on the fourth day of their waterfall explorations, they approached Ullswater, where Airey Force was located. Airey Force was a celebrated waterfall, arguably the most famous of the cascades they’d visited. They left the horses and cart at the edge of the road and walked to the falls on a well-trodden, rocky path, the greenery overhead like a ceiling blocking the sunlight.
“Ooh,” Élise murmured when it came into view. They stepped onto the wooden footbridge spanning the stream and stared. It was majestic—taller and heavier than any of the others they’d seen. It carved a chasm into the wall of rocks it cascaded over and crashed into the large pool below with such force, the water seemed to vaporize. Far above them, another footbridge connected the two ledges of the steep chasm at the top of the falls.
There was no sign of Sam’s mother, or anyone else, for that matter.
Frustrated, Sam thrust a rough hand through his hair.
Élise slipped her hand into his and squeezed. “We will find them,” she said loudly so as to be heard over the roar of water. “We are very close.”
He sighed and squeezed her hand back.
Hand in hand, they gazed at the falls for a long while. “I wish I could paint, or at least draw,” she said. “Then I could capture this moment. But as it is, I must engrave this picture into my memory and only hope that time doesn’t wear it away.”
“You don’t draw?” Sam asked.
“No. I am very bad at all those feminine pastimes. I cannot draw or sing or play an instrument. I am dismal at sewing and embroidery, and I’ve never in my life touched a knitting needle.”
He chuckled. “What interests you, then?”
“Oh, many things!” she exclaimed. “But I am sorry to say that not very many of them are acceptable in society.”
That brought a wicked gleam into his eyes, and his gaze dropped down her body.
She swatted him good-naturedly. “I meant things like reading books in Latin and grouse hunting. I did not mean those things! You are a scoundrel, after all.”
“With you I am.”
“Well, he finally admits it. Perhaps you will also admit that I knew it properly from the beginning.”
“Perhaps.” He slanted her a glance, a grin playing on the edges of his lips. “Perhaps not.”
She made an unladylike, disgruntled noise. “Difficult man.”
He bent down and kissed her temple. “We should move on. There’s another cascade about half a mile from here, and then we need to find a safe place to make camp for the night.”
She nodded, and they turned away from Airey Force. The path to the second falls was slightly more treacherous, the rocks on the ground slippery with moss and the angle of the slope increasing. Sam kept a firm grip on Élise’s elbow, ensuring she didn’t fall. But it wasn’t long before they came to the second cascade.
This was a pretty waterfall with a lovely prospect but far less significant than Airey Force. It wasn’t nearly as tall, but it was slightly wider. The pool at the bottom was small, with large moss-covered boulders erupting from its surface.
A couple sat on one of those boulders. They reminded Élise of her and Sam, the way their arms were wrapped around each other and the way they gazed at the falls. Élise turned to Sam to tell him they should leave and give them some privacy, but just then, he lurched to a halt.
He stared at them, his lips parted. Élise’s heart began to thud against her ribs, and she turned slowly back to the pair.
They were about a hundred feet away and had their backs to Sam and Élise.
His mother. Could it be?
As if she’d felt the weight of Sam’s stare, the woman turned her head to glance behind her. She, too, froze. Then she jumped up, half stumbling on the moss-covered surface of the flat rock. Élise couldn’t hear her over the sound of rushing water, but she saw the word form on the woman’s lips: “Sam.”
She lunged for them, slipping on the wet rocks, splashing in shin-deep water but not seeming to care. She wore a heavy indigo blue woolen skirt that went to just above her ankles, and no shoes. A colorfully striped shawl was tied about her waist, and another shawl, this one of pale yellow, covered her dark, gray-streaked hair, which was loose and tumbled to the middle of her back.
Sam dropped Élise’s arm and strode toward the woman with strong, determined steps.
Élise picked up her skirts and hurried after him. Seconds later, the woman—well, Élise supposed she should admit to herself that this unassuming, handsome woman was indeed the Dowager Duchess of Trent—hurled herself into Sam’s arms at the edge of the stream bank.
Élise watched, fascinated, as the duchess burst into tears.
“Oh, Sam. Sam, my darling. I thought I’d never see you again!”
Ever the strong one, Sam stood tall, holding his mother in his arms as she dissolved against him.
Élise glanced beyond them to see the man picking his way over the rocks, making his way toward them at a much slower pace than the woman had.
The man was tall a
nd large-boned, more conservatively dressed than the woman, in dark trousers, white shirt, and a simple dark coat. Though he didn’t wear shoes, either, he would have been more likely to pass for an Englishman than the duchess in her exotic garb. He had a thick head of shock-white hair, dark only around the temples. His face was round, though he was by no means fat, and good-humored, and his dark brown eyes were vibrant and brimming with curiosity.
Sam patted his mother’s back. “Shh, Mama. Shh.”
The man came to stand beside her. She pulled back from Sam slightly, glanced at the man, glanced back to Sam, and then burst into fresh tears.
The man took a deep, fortifying breath and spoke loudly to be heard over the combined noises of the falls and the duchess’s weeping. “Good afternoon.” His English was perfect, with only the slightest inflection of a Roma accent. “I am Steven Lowell.”
Sam hardly spared him a glance. “I know.” He hesitated, stroking his mother’s hair, then added, “I am Samson Hawkins.”
The man gazed evenly at him. Then said simply, “I know.”
* * *
It took some time, but Sam managed to calm his mother down. He wanted to shake her, to demand answers immediately, but he knew there would be no point to it. His mother wouldn’t be able to communicate with him until her emotions had run their course. The sound of crashing water was too loud to be conducive to conversation anyhow, and not only was his mother emotional, but the bottom of her skirts was soaked, and if she stayed out here she’d catch her death.
“Let’s go dry off and find a place to talk,” he said into her ear.
Snuffling, her eyes bleary from all her tears, she nodded. She stepped away from him, still gripping his arms tightly, and as she gathered her composure, she caught sight of Élise and asked in a clear voice loud enough for Élise to hear, “Who is that, darling? She is familiar to me.”
So, she hadn’t lost her directness. “Mama, this is Lady Dunthorpe. Lady Dunthorpe, my mother, the Duchess of Trent.”
How odd to make these introductions in these circumstances. There was a false ring to the words as he said each woman’s name. For his mother certainly had sloughed off all the skin of the Duchess of Trent. And Élise … hell, it almost hurt to call her by her legal name, but he was beyond calling her Madame de Longmont. She was important enough to him now that he couldn’t imagine deceiving any member of his family about her true identity.
The Scoundrel’s Seduction Page 23
