In part, she knew, it was because they were both working on the same cause. While Jamie was writing, Olivia made lists of Clary’s habits, tastes, and foibles for use in the stories. They both wanted everyone who knew Clary, in any degree at all, to recognize him immediately. And when a shudder of fear or disgust rolled over her, as she thought about the man who had terrified her for the last year, she thought of him being humiliated and scorned by the very society he took refuge in, and the words came easily.
One night Jamie came in as she was getting ready for bed. “Here,” he said, handing her a stack of paper.
Intrigued, Olivia turned up the lamp on her dressing table. So far he hadn’t let her read anything, even though he’d told her bits and pieces of what he planned to write.
He sank down on the nearby chaise as she read. Within minutes he was stretched out, one arm hanging off the side and one hand behind his head. He stared up at the ceiling, looking exhausted. Olivia stole a glance at him over the pages. “Has Constance worn you out?” she teased quietly.
One corner of his mouth quirked. “It’s a fine line to walk: too much about Clary and it will lose all appeal. Too little and it won’t serve our purpose.”
She laughed and read on. Within a few lines she was able to forget that Jamie had written every word, and let herself become absorbed in the story. He had handed her not one but four issues, a third of the total left, and she read straight through to the end.
In the first one, Lord Brarely, a dark and imposing man with powerful connections and a very advantageous marriage, began paying Constance attention. She refused him, as she had refused all other married men, and instead turned her favor on a distinguished gentleman of some scientific renown. Olivia shivered at the delicate way he “scientifically” probed Constance’s skin for points of particular pleasure.
The second story saw Constance stop for a cooling swim in a secluded pond during a trip, only to be discovered by Lord Brarely. She accused him of following her and he replied that no one would believe she hadn’t enticed him. Fortunately, a handsome country squire passed by, and Constance explored the pleasures of making love in the water after Brarely went on his way.
The third story featured letters from Brarely, trying to coerce Constance into being his mistress. Constance, who had long since avowed that she would never belong to one man, burned them, but the specter was already clearly shaped. The fourth issue took place at a ball, where Brarely did nothing more than stare at Constance the entire evening. Even though Constance landed in the arms of a notorious rake who was only too pleased to spirit her away to a secluded and secure bedroom, Olivia felt her own stomach knot at the description of Brarely’s dark, hawkish eyes following Constance around the room. Jamie had perfectly woven that unease, as well as the urge to dismiss it as womanish fear, into Constance’s words.
“Well?” asked Jamie when she lowered the pages, her heart thudding.
“It’s good.” She cleared her throat to rid her voice of its husky quality. “Very good.”
“Excellent. Now come here.”
She moved to sit on the end of the chaise. Jamie sat up and slid one arm around her waist. “I don’t want to disappoint my loyal readers,” he murmured, tugging down her nightgown and brushing his lips against her bare shoulder.
Olivia smiled. “As one of those readers, I can safely promise you have not.” In spite of Lord Brarely’s ominous presence, Constance still indulged in her customary erotic interludes, all the sharper for diverting her mind from him.
“As the most important reader, yours is the most important opinion.” He caught the end of the ribbon that tied her nightgown closed. “Which one did you enjoy especially?”
She inhaled as he pulled the ribbon. There was no doubt the issue set at the pond struck deep, and roused a hundred memories. “There’s something to recommend them all . . .” She looked down at the pages in her hands. “How do you think of this?”
“A gentleman shouldn’t say.”
She very much wanted this gentleman to say. She wanted to know what inspired his ideas. He’d said Bathsheba offered suggestions from time to time, but Jamie hadn’t spoken to Bathsheba in days; he’d been closed up in his room, writing. Everything on these pages sprang from his own imagination, and Olivia was desperate to know more about that. Did he imagine similar encounters between himself and other women? Was this interlude of theirs doomed to end, once he’d had his fill of her? Olivia could not ignore the fact that Jamie had been a healthy, virile man during her marriage. He hadn’t married anyone else, but she was keenly aware that he had had several affairs. Thankfully Penelope and Abigail had only mentioned such things in passing—the beautiful French vicomtesse being the most notable instance—but it would have astonished Olivia more if Jamie hadn’t had lovers.
“Is Constance based on a particular woman?” she asked.
He stopped kissing her shoulder, and his hand, now nestled inside her nightgown around her breast, went still. “No.”
She wet her lips. “More than one person has remarked that Constance goes through lovers like a dedicated rake might. Is—is she based on you?”
He didn’t reply for a long time. Olivia smoothed the pages of his draft and let them drop to the floor. “I never thought you lived like a monk,” she said, trying to explain. “I could hardly blame you if you did have numerous lovers. I don’t blame you, in fact. I . . . I am just curious. You know what my life was like with Henry, but I only know of you what your sisters told me.” That sounded dreadful, and she cringed. “Never mind. You don’t owe me an explanation.”
“There were other women,” he said in a low voice. “Yes. In the first years of your marriage. More than one, although I wouldn’t say numerous. It drove me a little mad, thinking of you with Henry. I wanted to scrub you from my mind and forget how you felt in my arms—I wanted to forget you, even though I knew that was impossible. But it didn’t work.” He sighed. “Every time I took another woman to bed, I wished she could be you, or enough like you to fool me for a night. It never worked. Finally I gave it up as a hopeless cause and stopped trying.”
Her breath caught. “Stopped trying?”
He lifted one shoulder awkwardly, not meeting her gaze as she twisted to see his face. “I haven’t had a woman in almost two years.”
“Oh.” She felt her heart give a little leap, then suddenly wrinkled her nose. “Only two! That leaves eight years of other women!”
His mouth curved. “Well, it took me a while to realize the truth.” He paused. “Some of them lasted a while, some only a few nights. I knew none of them would last longer, or be more than a brief liaison. I was no good for any woman then, Livie. But I did learn something from all of them.”
She knew he didn’t mean erotic acts, although she had a feeling that was also true. “I don’t doubt it.”
“But as to what inspired Constance . . .” He shifted his weight, angling closer to her. “I thought of you.”
Olivia jerked. “I never—!”
He touched one finger to her lips. “No, not in that way. I know you better than that. But in other ways . . .” His finger trailed down her chin and skimmed her throat, pausing on the point where her pulse pounded. “I imagined a woman able to explore her deepest desires, even those she thought dark or unseemly. I wondered what she might do, if she were freed from any worry about scandal.”
Her heart was slamming into her ribs. Hadn’t she done just that? From the moment she first told the innkeeper that Jamie was her husband, Olivia had given in to more and more of her deepest desires. She wanted everything from him—every smile, every secret, every shattering climax. She wanted him to know that she was his, completely, and always would be.
“And I think you’ve proven me right,” Jamie breathed against her neck, his lips teasing the skin below her ear. “There is a far more sensual woman inside you than you even realize, Olivia, and the thought of drawing her out drives me wild.” His finger traced loops and whorls across her bosom, as s
oftly as a butterfly’s wing, before catching the gaping neckline of her garment. “Tell me you agree . . .”
“Yes,” she whispered as he slid the sleeve down her arm. “With you I am . . .”
“And you like what Constance does.” The other sleeve fell away from her shoulder, leaving her bare to the waist.
“Yes . . .”
“What did you like best?” One by one he tugged her arms free of the nightgown. “Was it the whip? Was it the blindfold? Do you long to tie me up while you make love to me?”
She opened her mouth, then closed it. Her face burned. “What are you suggesting?”
“Have you ever thought of doing that?” he asked again. “Or of being tied up? It can be quite arousing.”
She sat like a wide-eyed statue, barely breathing. “Tied . . . with what?”
He raised her hand and brushed his lips over the fluttering pulse in her wrist. “For you? Silk ribbons. As blue as your eyes and soft enough not to mar your skin, even as they hold you exposed and defenseless against a lover’s ravishment.”
“Tied to what?” she asked faintly.
His teeth nipped her shoulder, and her whole body spasmed. “My bed. Completely open and vulnerable, hiding nothing . . . denying nothing.”
Her throat worked as she swallowed hard. “I haven’t denied you . . .”
“It’s the ultimate trust, to give yourself into your lover’s hands and cede all power to him. Or to her,” he added. “All pleasures go both ways. Would you prefer to tie me?”
Olivia gulped for air. It was one thing to read about such a thing, and another to do it herself. But the image of Jamie bound and in her power . . . “No.”
He growled in satisfaction. “Not at all?” He unknotted his cravat. “Not even a little?”
Olivia watched in dazed disbelief as he pulled the linen loose, unwinding the long cloth as if to deliberately show off the length of it. He wanted to tie her up and ravish her. Or for her to tie him up and ravish him. She should be shocked, and yet her pulse throbbed and she had to press her knees together to keep from sliding off the chaise. She should not find this arousing or exciting, but God help her, she did.
It was all Jamie’s fault, too. Olivia rued the day she’d ever begun reading 50 Ways to Sin. Everyone had been talking about it, and the way it recounted one very loose lady’s erotic adventures with various gentlemen of London. It was completely ridiculous and yet . . . well, widowhood was lonely. Discreetly, feeling somewhat embarrassed by her own unhealthy interest in them, Olivia read every one. And now she was reaping a full penance, as sinful images and ideas bloomed in her mind while Jamie whispered provocative things to her. Even worse, they were his images and ideas . . . inspired by her.
“Do it,” he murmured, dropping the cravat in her lap. “Tie me.” Calmly, deliberately, he unbuttoned his cuff and rolled up his sleeve before extending his arm, wrist bared and fist clenched.
She stared. Slowly she plucked the cravat from her lap and wound a loop around his wrist. At his sharp intake of breath she paused. Jamie’s face was set in stark lines and his eyes blazed with hunger. He didn’t say a word.
She wound another loop.
You’re mine, she vowed silently. Mine to seduce, mine to love, mine to hold. I will do everything to persuade you of it. Her heart raced and she felt wild and powerful. She twisted the cloth around his wrist again, but when he raised his other hand and held it to the first, inviting her to bind his wrists together, she pushed it away.
“This way,” she whispered, clasping her own fingers through his. Jamie’s eyes widened but he made no protest as she coiled the cloth around their entwined hands, binding her hand to his. One-handed, she couldn’t make a knot, so she pulled the loose end down between their wrists.
“Now what?” His voice was deep and guttural.
She put her free hand on his chest and pushed him until he sprawled back into the pillows on the chaise behind him. “You’re mine.”
His eyes drifted closed as she worked at the buttons on his trousers. “I always have been, Livie . . .”
It took longer than it should have, working with only one hand, but finally she pushed the tail of his shirt out of her way. His abdomen flinched as she ran her palm down the length of his erection, circling her fingers around the head and taking his measure in a firm grip. Jamie swore under his breath but he stayed still and taut. The hand bound to hers trembled as she lowered her head. Olivia stole a glance at his face and saw him watching her through half-closed eyes. “Mine,” she said again, feeling as reckless and wicked as Constance.
He gasped as she flicked her tongue over the head of his cock. She smiled and braced herself more comfortably. Slowly she closed her lips around him, marveling at the response of his body. She had heard of this act before 50 Ways to Sin featured it in one issue, but never before had she realized the intimacy of it. Even though she was on her knees pleasuring him, it was obvious that Jamie’s entire being was focused on her; his muscles trembled with rigidity and his breath hissed between his teeth with every stroke of her tongue.
With a sudden movement, he yanked on her hand, dragging her on top of him. His kiss was dark and desperate, and Olivia reveled in it. He broke it off and sat up, turning her around until she sat on his lap, her back against his chest. Their bound hands pulled his arm around her, giving him leverage to pull her hard against him. With two hard shoves he pushed her twisted nightgown down and off, leaving her naked in his arms.
“No,” she panted. “I want to please you . . .”
His laugh was harsh. “You do, darling. Now open your legs and let us please each other.” Straddling the chaise, he draped one of her legs over his knee, exposing her quim, as Constance would call it. Olivia felt wicked just thinking the word; her eyelids fluttered open for a moment and she realized they were facing the mirror. She blushed deeply as she saw herself reflected there, her eyes glittering, her hair wild, Jamie’s strong arm wrapped around her middle and his hand on her knee, urging her to spread her legs farther open . . . and his face, hard and fierce with want as he watched everything in the mirror over her shoulder.
“Jamie,” she squeaked, her voice melting to a sigh as his fingers stole up her thigh.
“Livie,” he breathed, his teeth playing at the delicate skin where her shoulder met her neck. “Be wicked with me.” His fingers swirled through the dark curls between her legs before plunging between the dark pink folds there.
Olivia moaned and writhed. He knew just how to touch her . . . But she wanted him to feel the same exquisite ache. She dug her toes into the carpet and rolled her hips. With a whispered curse, Jamie moved, holding her tighter, and then he was inside her. His breath caught as he went still, and she realized he couldn’t move.
She spread her knees wider and pushed. His fingers paused. Olivia watched his face in the mirror as she sank down. She felt him tremble. His grip on her hand, still bound to his, tightened until his knuckles went white. Olivia slid her free hand down her belly, insinuating her fingers among his. “I’m always wicked with you.”
“Show me.” He tugged his hand free and clasped her shoulder. His gaze remained fixed on her hand, but he seemed to stop breathing as she stroked herself.
Olivia knew quite well how to pleasure herself. For the last few years of her marriage to Henry, it had been her only way to climax, and her bed had been just as lonely after Henry died. But she had never touched herself so openly, so boldly, and certainly never with a man’s cock deep inside her while he watched with a burning fascination. Be wicked with me. She focused on his face and circled her finger just so before finding the rhythm she knew would send her over the edge.
It built faster than ever, almost taking her off guard. When she felt it rise up and take hold of her, she barely had time to gasp before the floor seemed to fall away from beneath her feet. Jamie crossed his free arm over her chest and bowed his spine, forcing himself deeper inside her before he jerked in the throes of his own release.
For what seemed an eternity neither moved. Olivia opened her eyes a slit and marveled at the decadent picture they presented, she sprawled wantonly across him with her hand still between her legs, Jamie with both arms wrapped around her and his forehead on her shoulder. A tiny satisfied smile tugged at her lips. Wickedness had never been so wonderful.
“Livie,” Jamie rasped, his breath hot against her neck. “Olivia, I love you. I’ll love you till I die.”
The same emotion was flooding her, a tidal wave of love that swept everything else away. She kissed him, her heart too full for words. She knew he loved her, as surely as she knew that she loved him—and always would.
But he never said anything more. And later, when he slept next to her in bed, one ink-smudged arm thrown over her waist, Olivia couldn’t help wondering if that omission meant something.
Chapter 25
Winter descended in force on London, gray and dismal and so cold Olivia could see her breath in all but the warmest rooms of the house. Jamie wrote and wrote. Every now and then he would put on his hat and coat to go for a walk, but otherwise he spent his days shut up in the house, hunched over his desk.
Although society was smaller at this time of year, there were still a few parties and public balls. Bathsheba went out as usual and reported back via penny post on what she heard. The first of Constance’s stories involving Lord Clary caused barely a ripple, but as the issues came out, Bathsheba heard more and more whispering about the horrible man stalking Constance.
“It’s working,” she wrote in one note, “although not as rapidly as one might like. At present people are not sure if he is a real threat or a future lover. I really think several more issues will be required . . .”
Jamie threw it on the desk. “More! That woman is determined to drive me mad.”
Olivia smiled. “You cannot fault her. They’re selling better than ever.” It was true. Every print shop and bookseller within fifteen miles of London was wild for copies, it seemed. Even more crucially, Daniel was meeting that demand. He’d persuaded Mr. Hicks to come from Gravesend to help, and somehow Jamie had engineered a partnership between Daniel and Liam MacGregor, who published the London Intelligencer newspaper. Olivia had been as startled as anyone to hear that, but at this point nothing Jamie did should surprise her. MacGregor took a third of the profits, and in return he enabled them to more than double production.
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