Touch of a Lady

by Mia Marlowe

  “Please,” she whimpered. “I’m so empty.”

  He didn’t make her ask him twice.

  He was careful to hold his upper body’s weight on his elbows, but he let his lower half settle between her legs. He found her sweet entrance at once and slid into her in a long slow thrust.

  She gasped at the rending of her purity, but he kissed away any pain he might have given her. In a few heartbeats, she was tilting into him, urging him to move.

  He tried to go slow. Really he did. He’d heard it added to a woman’s pleasure to be taken at a more leisurely pace, but he couldn’t hold back. Pressure built inside him, like a thunderstorm gathering under lowering skies, all its power concentrated in one place.

  Tristan thrust into her, but Del rose to each one, moving to meet him. Finally, she wrapped her legs around him and locked her ankles at the small of his back. She moaned his name, begging him to go deeper, for God’s sake, deeper. He arched his spine and she convulsed around him, her small muscles tightening on his thick rod.

  His release was sudden. Unstoppable. He could only hold on while he poured his life into her. She cried his name and he wished he could give her the world.

  After it subsided, he settled onto her, still careful not to crush her with his weight.

  The storm that had built inside him was finally stilled. Beyond their little circle of two, nothing had changed. He still didn’t know how he’d meet the needs of the Devonwood estate and take her to wife, but somehow, he’d do it. Whatever happened, it would be all right so long as he had her.

  She was his home.

  Delphinia smiled up at him and rubbed her heel along the crevice of his arse. “Can I predict the future or what?”

  His belly jiggled with a chuckle as he slid out of her. “You, Madame Zola, are nothing short of amazing.” He rolled to one side and took her with him, tucking her against his body. She laid her head on his shoulder and he stroked her hair, its softness a stark contrast to the hard future he foresaw for them.

  “Now I have a prediction or two of my own. First, you are going to become my viscountess.”

  “Very well,” she said, “since you asked so prettily.”

  “I’m sorry. I’m not good with words.”

  “Maybe not, but you’re wickedly good with something else.” Her hand fluttered over his chest, past his navel and gave his cock a leisurely stroke. He roused to her, but bridled himself because there was still more he had to tell her.

  He pressed a kiss to her crown to soften what he was about to say. “No one will understand if we simply announce our intention to wed.”

  “You mean your family will fight it.”

  “Exactly.” He was grateful she didn’t make him innumerate why the earl would consider it a misalliance for them to wed. “I’ve no doubt I’d win that battle, but I’d rather not start married life with the cloud of family strife hanging over us. So, we’re going to have to do something that will make our match inevitable.”

  “We’re going to have to be caught in flagrante delicto,” she said. “That way, Society will demand we wed.”

  “How very quick you are.”

  She walked her fingers up his chest. “Sounds like we’ll have to be quick in other ways, too. Where shall we plan for this disaster to overtake us?”

  “How about the duke’s library? There’s a sturdy desk that will do nicely.”

  “A desk? Where’s your sense of romance?”

  “All right,” he said, a little disappointed. He was looking forward to propping Del up on the polished mahogany and spreading her legs. She’d be delectable with her stockings sagging to her ankles. Once they married, he’d convince her that a desk could be wildly romantic. “You name the place then.”

  She was silent for a moment. “I know. There’s a lovely little parlor on the second floor with a nice tufted settee. If we’re going to be caught in the act, we may as well be comfortable.”

  “I don’t know.” He trailed a hand down the length of her spine and stayed to trace lazy circles at the small of her back. “It seems pretty out of the way. How can we be sure someone will catch us?”

  “I could ask my friend Harmony to meet me there—oh! Better yet, I’ll ask her to bring Lady Bettendorf with her. There’s no bigger gossip in all England.”

  “That’ll do.” He nodded. “Now for the time.”

  “The ball to end the house party is tomorrow night. Let’s slip away from the rest of the party at a quarter to twelve. I’ll tell Harmony to collect Lady Bettendorf and join me in the parlor at the stroke of midnight.”

  Tristan tipped her face up so he could kiss her deeply. “You, my dear lady, are a devious woman.”

  “Oh, my dear viscount,” she said as she climbed atop him. “You’ve no idea.”

  Chapter 7

  Sir Rupert Digby shifted his weight, silently cursing the unyielding granite that jabbed him in the left buttock. When he liberated the last bottle of the duke’s rare ’08 vintage from the wine cellar earlier in the evening and stole off to the grotto to polish off the drink, he’d never expected to be interrupted by a pair of randy lovers.

  It meant he had to keep still till they were done unless he wanted to be caught with the incriminating bottle.

  The ’08 was terribly dear. No one Rupert knew had ever had a taste of it, though His Grace had prattled on about the vintage for years to anyone who’d listen, which since he was a duke, meant anyone whose ear he wished to bend about it. The exceptional wine reputedly embodied all that was best of the French vintner’s art—full-bodied, yet “nimble,” it caressed the tongue with a range of flavors, finishing with a faint aftertaste of the English oak cask in which it had been aged. The duke’s father’s father had actually bought the original case and now there was only one bottle left.

  Rupert tipped the bottle and downed another mouthful.

  Make that no bottles left.

  In all honesty, the wine wasn’t even that good.

  ‘Nimble,’ my hairy arse.

  Another month or so, and it would have gone to vinegar completely. But left corked, there was no telling how much the rare vintage was actually worth to collectors. There’d be hell to pay if the Duke of Seabrooke ever learned what became of this final bottle. His Grace was not known to forgive debts of that nature.

  Which was why Rupert stayed still as a stone while the couple writhed together on the man’s cloak.

  It was damned unfortunate that the moon was waning. It was so dark in the grotto, Rupert didn’t get more than a few glimpses of skin. A white nightrail here, a gentleman’s lawn shirt reflecting the meager light there.

  No peek at a pair of pips or a sweet bum for poor ol’ Rupert, he thought, the wine making him melancholy. But on the plus side of the ledger, the fact that he couldn’t see them meant they couldn’t see him either.

  So long as he didn’t move from that spot.

  At least the girl was the vocal sort. Her little noises of distress before the buck finally gave her ease made Rupert wish he could get in line. She fairly sang the lad’s name when she came.

  Tristan.

  Add that to her reference to him as her viscount, and Rupert had no trouble deducing that the Casanova in the middle of the maze was none other than Lord Edmondstone, the man who’d been publicly courting Lady Florence for the past sennight.

  And the girl he was privately pumping was certainly not His Grace’s daughter.

  Normally it wouldn’t matter a fig to Rupert who Lord Edmondstone was rutting on the side—and he was obviously doing it quite well if the lady’s sighs, moans and rhythmic breathing was any measure—but this was more than a quick poke for the viscount. If their furtive conversation after the deed was done was any measure, he meant to marry the chit.

  Not the duke’s daughter.

  Rupert had hovered around the edges of His Grace’s conversations often enough to know that in addition to his passion for rare vintages and ridiculously expensive horses, the duke was ada
mant about seeing grandchildren sooner rather than later. And those grandchildren were expected to be the most beautiful progeny ever conceived. Hence, the suit of Viscount Edmondstone was encouraged on the strength of his pleasing proportions, full head of hair and granite chin.

  Rupert sniffed. Hair was vastly over-rated. A man could always wear a wig. He’d never had much hair to speak of, unless one counted what sprouted on his back, but it hadn’t impeded him one whit.

  Then the viscount and his doxie began to disentangle themselves for a second time. Rupert stiffened like a rabbit hiding in plain sight. He had almost as much to lose as they did if he were discovered.

  Fortunately, they were much too preoccupied with each other to wonder if they shared the dark grotto with any other soul. They recited their plans to each other again—second storey parlour, quarter to midnight, the friend and the gossip were to turn up at the stroke of twelve to catch them on purpose—and then they wasted an inordinate amount of time kissing and fondling and bidding each other farewell.

  As if they weren’t intending to swive each other again in less than twenty-four hours.

  Privately, Rupert would have laid any amount of money that they wouldn’t be able to wait till the appointed time.

  Then finally, they left.

  He stayed immobile till he could no longer hear the rustle of the gravel under their feet. Then he upended the bottle and polished off the last of the ’08. He gave it a toss to the opposite corner and was satisfied by the tinkle of shattering glass. With luck, no one would be able to prove what the myriad shards had ever been.

  Then Rupert rose and began making his shambling way back out of the maze. He wasn’t sure how to use the information he’d learned. He couldn’t very well go to His Grace with it. That would lead to all sorts of questions about why he was in the grotto in the first place and if the shattered bottle were discovered and somehow connected with the missing ’08 . . . oh, why had he thrown the thing aside like that? He ought to have carried it out of the maze and maybe hidden it in the stables to implicate a groom or taken it down to the river where it would never be found.

  He wasn’t thinking clearly. And after taking a tumble tail-over-teakettle, he found himself staring up at a leafy dead end. He’d missed a turn in the maze.

  Rupert backtracked until he thought he knew where he was and pressed on.

  “Should tell Lady Florence,” he mumbled. “After all, this touches her more than anyone.”

  No, that would never do. Beside the fact that it would be indelicate in the extreme to describe the rutting festival he’d just witnessed to a lady of such decorum, Lady Florence had never spoken two words to him. He could hardly introduce himself, then proceed to destroy whatever lies she might be telling herself about the man whom her father had chosen for her.

  From somewhere in his pickled brain, a proverb floated to the surface.

  “Faithful are the wounds of a friend.”

  That was the ticket. Rupert would tell Lady Florence’s friend, Lord Sanders. He’d know what to do about it.

  Now that his course of action was settled in his mind, Rupert picked up his pace…and walked into another leafy box canyon.

  He sank down onto the gravel path, head in his hands. He needed to think.

  It hurt to think.

  He slumped to lay spread eagle, face turned to the sky. There were few clouds overhead. It wasn’t likely to rain on him. Things could be worse.

  At least I have until tomorrow night to get out of this maze.

  Chapter 8

  “We won’t be able to speak again till this is over,” Tristan said softly as he led Delphinia from the dining room where the long table had accommodated over fifty guests. They filed down the broad staircase to the ground floor ballroom where the musicians were tuning their instruments in disjointed runs and wavering long notes.

  Del wondered how he’d managed to time matters so they could promenade together. He wasn’t on her dance card for the rest of the evening. Unless she counted the very private gavotte they’d be performing on the second floor parlour settee later.

  “Are you having second thoughts?” she asked.

  “Not a one. You?”

  She shook her head. Delphinia supposed she ought to feel some trepidation over the prospect of being caught in a compromised position, but if it meant she’d have Tristan forever, she was willing to endure a short period of public censure. She was more worried about how Tristan would deal with the fact that she brought nothing to their union but a handful of empty fingers. She’d Seen their future together and knew it would be a happy and prosperous one, but she still had no idea how that might happen.

  As they left the grand stair case and continued down the broad corridor toward the ballroom, her hand slipped off the back of his hand and onto his broad cuff. A row of silver buttons graced the edge of the cuff before the lace on Tristan’s shirt sleeves spilled out. Del’s fingertip brushed over one of the buttons and she received a flash image from the precious metal.

  It shot into her mind like heat lightning, but dissolved just as quickly. Still, the button had tried to tell her something. She ought to listen.

  She repositioned her hand so she could cup a button and press her palm against it. In bright trilling tones, the silver spoke to her in no language she’d ever heard. Her vision faded. The hall before her disappeared into the mist as if someone had lowered a sheet of watered muslin before her eyes. Superimposed over that hazy reality, a shattered stained-glass window of images burst into her brain.

  She stumbled on her next step and Tristan was quick to catch her elbow.

  “Are you all right?”

  Delphinia nodded. She moved her hand away from the button and her vision quickly returned to normal. The button’s shrill voice ceased, but a pinprick of a headache jabbed behind her right eye the moment the connection to her ‘gift of touch’ was severed. It was the first time she’d experienced pain after using her unusual ability. Clearly, there was much she needed to learn about how to open herself to it this deeply and how to protect herself from it.

  But for now, she was more concerned about what the button had just shown her.

  “Where did you get those silver buttons?” she whispered as they entered the ballroom where candelabras blazed. The light hurt her eyes and she cast her gaze to the polished floor.

  “They’ve been in the family for generations. The ore was mined on my father’s estate. But the vein played out years ago.”

  That’s what he thinks. The button had shown Delphinia its ancient home, deep in the earth. And there in the dark and the silence, the mother lode of ore still waited only another few feet beyond where the silver that had formed Tristan’s buttons was unearthed.

  It wouldn’t matter that she had no dowry. Once she told Tristan about the silver, the future of Devonwood was secure for some time to come.

  He smiled down at her when they had to part at the center of the room so they could each follow the man or woman ahead of them in the procession. Del let herself enjoy one last lingering glance at Tristan. Once Delphinia took her place along the wall on the side of the room where the women lined up, she studiously avoided looking at him.

  She’d tell him about the silver later. He was still willing to risk everything for her. She’d promised him that everything would turn out all right. The fact that he didn’t know how everything might turn out all right made what he was planning even more precious.

  Besides, she had to rid herself of this headache before it ruined the whole evening. As soon as the promenade music ended, she excused herself and made for the ladies’ retiring room. With any luck, she’d be able to press a cool, wet cloth to her eyes and lie down until it was time to make her way to the second floor parlour.

  * * *

  Lady Florence smiled with satisfaction. The string quartet her father had engaged for the evening was in rare form. Each dance was set at the perfect tempo, giving the dancers every chance to display their grace
to full advantage. The chandeliers had never shown so brightly. The silver at supper had never gleamed with such radiance. Florence was disposed to be pleased with everything. Several of her father’s friends who held important positions at court were present, so rumors had been popping up thicker than pheasant in the fall. Every tongue seemed to be whispering that Lord Edmondstone’s choice would be revealed this evening. He’d never shown a preference for anyone but her, never danced with any other debutant as often as he did with her. If the gossips were correct, she’d be affianced by the end of the ball.

  Lady Florence finished her gavotte with Lord Edmondstone, pleased with the way he’d bowed over her fingers during the final strains of the piece. Such decorum and civility surely boded well for a decorous and civil union.

  She was about to congratulate herself on pleasing her father with her pending engagement, when Sanders swept her up.

  “Time for our minuet,” he announced and led her back onto the dance floor as the stately music started.

  The first time they came together, he whispered, “I’m glad your hand wasn’t entirely frozen by the chill of Edmondstone’s ardor.”

  “He’s only being polite,” she hissed back. “And reserved.”

  “And cold.” When Sanders twirled her in for a close hold, he took advantage of the pose to brush her lips with his. “I would not be.”

  A little thrill washed over her. “Sanders, please.”

  “You don’t have to beg, my lady. I live to please you.”

  She clamped her lips together into a tight line. Anything she said would be an encouragement to him. But she couldn’t deny that his attentive flirting made warmth spread through her chest.

  He led her through the turns and close holds of the minuet. At one point, when his hand touched her waist, the heat of his palm radiated through the layers of brocade.

  Why couldn’t her insides flutter like this when the handsome Lord Edmondstone danced with her?