The Bridal Season

by Connie Brockway

  She didn’t recognize him. Reserved, genteel Sir Elliot had vanished, leaving behind a stranger in his stead, a stranger who played with her body with deliberate nonchalance while the hunger in his eyes dragged her soul from her.

  “Please,” she whispered. His white shirt was two thirds of the way open, affording tantalizing glimpses of hard muscles and the dark hair that covered his chest.

  “Why did you come here, Letty?” he whispered, dropping a soft, warm kiss on the corner of her mouth.

  She couldn’t tell him the truth: that she had come to make love with him. Because if she told him she loved him, he would expect, would have every right to expect, that nothing barred an honest relationship or stood in the way of their marrying. Because in Elliot’s world, people who loved one another married.

  She should leave, wrench herself away from here, but she couldn’t. Because if she left here, she left behind the one chance she might ever have to make love.

  And she wanted that. So much. Her skin danced with awareness. Her limbs trembled with anticipation. Liquid desire pooled in her loins and the tips of her breasts. What if he told her to go away? How could she live with that? Without ever knowing what it would be like?

  “I’ve come for a tumble.” She sounded desperate.

  He went utterly still. A heartbeat passed. Another. Again. She found herself holding her breath, trying to read his unreadable expression, fighting the panic that threatened.

  Why wouldn’t he touch her? Say something? Do something?

  When his response finally came there was nothing vague about it. “You want lust? Lust is easy.”

  Without lifting his gaze from hers, he unfastened his trousers in one short, efficient, sexually charged motion. Before she understood what he intended, he flicked the edges of her robe open and bent, one large hand closing on her thigh, his other forearm looping beneath her derriere. He lifted her, hitching her leg over his hip, spreading her most vulnerable, sensitive part against the opening of his trousers.

  She gasped at the sudden intimacy and flung her arms around his neck to keep from falling. The position was flagrant, the hard length of him ground against her, his objective blunt, crude, and rousing.

  His skin was hot, his body hard.

  “Elliot—”

  He ignored her, the look in his eyes killing her voice. This was raw, focused desire. He walked with her dangling thus until her shoulders hit the wall. His head dropped to the side of her face, his mouth fell open on her throat His hips pinned hers to the wall.

  He moved, a slow, heavy tilting of his loins that sent thought-destroying floods of pleasure careening through her body. Her fingers sank into the white broadcloth covering his shoulders, trying to hold on, caught in a primal wave of need she couldn’t escape, terrified, elated, wanting to do to him what he so effortlessly did to her.

  Even beneath the shirt she could feel his muscles shift and bunch, sleek and hard. He rocked his erection against her. She gasped. He trembled.

  He moved again and again, little pulsing thrusts that exploded bursts of ever-mounting pleasure within her. And now he added a new torture to the game, lifting and settling her in counterpoint to his thrusts. It was excruciating and tantalizing.

  “Elliot. Elliot,” she panted.

  He did not answer. His expression was set, strained, his throat corded and veined with his exertions. He was one-minded, intent only on sexual gratification.

  She couldn’t think, could only feel. She’d never realized how big he was, the breadth of him, the heaviness of him. He enveloped her completely, surrounding her with sensation, hot and satiny-smooth skin, crisp starched shirt and cool, damp hair.

  She wanted more. She wanted him inside her. Filling her. She wanted to complete this ancient dance.

  She closed her eyes. Her hips found the rhythm he urged and moved with it Against her throat he drew a sharp breath. Abruptly he reached down, clasping her other thigh and lifting her higher, settling her at his waist. She was naked there, and he… With a start of trepidation she recognized the blunt width pressed against her. Her legs tightened involuntarily.

  He groaned, lifting his head and, slanting his mouth over hers, kissing her fiercely, possessively, a thin edge of anger in his aggression. She returned his kisses, her hunger rising.

  He pushed and slid into the sleek, swollen entrance. He tore his mouth from hers. She heard him draw a ragged breath, felt him bracket her face in between his hands, pinning her motionless to the wall.

  His breath sloughed over her lips. She opened dazed eyes, needy and agitated.

  His glittering eyes locked with hers.

  “I want to see you. I want to see you take me.”

  He pushed slowly. Her eyes flew wide, startled by the sensation. He was thick, stretching her as he pushed slowly into her. She inhaled with discomfort as her body tried to accommodate him.

  Something flickered in his gaze. He stopped moving, his chest working like a bellows, his skin dusky, a sheen of perspiration covering him.

  But the stopping was far worse than the slight pain.

  “No.” She shifted. His jaw worked reflexively. His eyelids squeezed shut. But he didn’t move.

  She pushed herself down, just a bit. His lips parted in a grimace. She moved, taking him deeper inside, past the pain, leaving only the thick feel of him buried within her. Want returned, redoubled. She moved again.

  “Please,” she said. “Please do that again. Move again.”

  “God!” The oath burst from him, releasing the tight rein of self-control. He drove deep into her, thrusting urgently. Again and again, he thrust into her, building her need all over again, taking her past the point of no return, riding the wave now, cresting with it, making it her own.

  “Give in to it,” he urged hoarsely, straining above her.

  She did. She threw her head back and felt him around her, in her, above her, working her, giving to her. Pleasure engulfed her, speared through her, and blossomed, rippling through her until she sobbed with the pure beauty of it, collapsing in its wake, a house of cards undone by a tempest.

  And when it was over, and her arms hung limp about his shoulders, he eased himself from her body, still potent and hard and unsatisfied. Effortlessly, he lifted her and carried her to his bed and laid her down on it.

  Dazed and uncertain, she watched him stand up and finish unbuttoning the brilliant white shirt. He stripped it from his body in one fluid movement and tossed it behind him. He was just as beautiful as she’d imagined, athletic and lean and clean-limbed. The black hair covering his chest narrowed and thickened into a dark band that rode a flat belly corrugated with muscles.

  He pushed his trousers from his hips, and her appreciation of his body turned to awe.

  “What are you doing?”

  “You’ve had sex,” he said grimly. “Now, for the rest of the night, we make love.”

  Chapter 25

  Passion is tragedy-in-waiting.

  Elliot had never been angrier in his life. She’d stood there, shaking like a leaf, and told him she wanted a “tumble.” As if he were some cicisbeo she could use to garner experience on instead of a man who loved her heart and soul, body and spirit.

  He hadn’t meant it to go so far, but the longing, the desperation and hunger had all conspired against him, driving him to one thought, one intent: She wanted lust. Fine. He could teach her about lust.

  But by the darkest hour of the night, by the time the storm had finally broken, they’d both learned about love.

  He looked down at where she lay deep in slumber beside him. The glow from the sconce above wrapped her in a soft cocoon of diffused light. Damson-colored highlights gleamed in her hair. A golden lacquer washed the satiny hill of her naked shoulder. The pristine bedsheets were tangled about her hips. One slender arm stretched out, her throat arched as though arrested in her culmination, leaving her in her satiation both defenseless and exposed.

  Once again, he felt the stir of desire. They’d
been in his bed for hours. He could not press her again. There had been a tincture of desperation in her hunger for him that she hadn’t been able to hide. Whatever its source, he would vanquish it.

  He loved her and, by God, he knew she loved him. She had not said so, but her arms and lips and touch had spoken far more eloquently than simple syllables could have done.

  In Letty he had rediscovered his own heart, his own capacity for pleasure, for pain, for passion. He could not go back again. And, by God, he wouldn’t. Not now. Not when he knew she loved him.

  He gathered her to him, intending only to revel in the feel of her, and closed his eyes. But soon exhaustion and passion and morphine wrested consciousness from him and he, too, finally slept.

  Morning steeped the room in light the color of weak tea. Letty woke instantly, panic already closing her throat, anguish humming through her like an electrical current. She was in Elliot’s arms, a leg draped across him.

  For one all-too-short minute, she forced all thought from her mind, absorbing the sensations, the flat hardness of his male body, the denseness of the lean muscular arm thrown over her waist, the velvety ladder of his ribs. But her thoughts gnawed at her pleasure, driving her to raise her gaze to his face.

  He was beautiful. His nascent beard darkened his jaw, his lashes lay like thick smudges on his cheek. A small line knit a crease between his brows, and the corners of his mouth curved downward as if his slumber was troubled.

  Dear God, he would hate her when he discovered who she was, what she was. She had to leave.

  A tear slipped from the corner of her eye. She mustn’t sob; she mustn’t wake him. She would simply take what she could, a thief gathering stolen moments from a borrowed life, and slink away. She couldn’t stay; she had nothing left to give him. No more lies left. Just the truth: She loved him.

  And she would not stay to watch his love turn to hatred.

  She was a coward. She had always been a coward, afraid to love. Too many lessons had conspired to teach her the dangers of it. Too many lessons had convinced her it was better to live life as a merry pretender, acting whatever part made it easiest to slide by uninvolved where you might be uninvited. Indeed, she was so afraid of love that she couldn’t even sing a love song convincingly.

  A damn music hall singer and a coward, that’s what she was. That was the sum total of Letty Potts.

  She had to get out of here. Before he woke up.

  Carefully, she eased his arm off of her and shifted her weight from the bed. Quietly, she donned the silk robe and pulled it closed before slipping from the room and hastening down the empty corridor to her room.

  Within twenty minutes she’d dressed in her damp, mud-stained ball gown, found her slicker, and entered Angela’s room. A comfortable-looking, white-haired woman was snoring in a corner chair, her stockinged feet propped up on a little stool. The motherly Mrs. Nichols.

  Letty tiptoed over to Angela’s side. The girl was resting comfortably, her breathing relaxed, her color even. Letty smiled. At least Angela’s problems had been easily enough fixed.

  The girl stirred and her eyes opened. “Lady Agatha?”

  “Quietly. We don’t want to wake the worthy Mrs. Nichols, do we? And, please, my friends call me Letty.”

  A blush of pleasure tinted Angela’s round cheeks. “Letty. Where did you go last night? I was so worried, and Sir Elliot was beside himself.”

  A few days ago she would have been tickled that she’d caused Elliot distress. Now she only felt a stab of guilt. She plastered on a cocky smile. “I went to fetch your letter, little goose,” she whispered. “Can’t have incriminating missives floating about, can we?”

  “You did?” Angela’s eyes widened. “Did you…did you get it?”

  “Yes.” Letty pulled the letter from the pocket of the slicker and handed it to Angela.

  “And Kip?” Angela said, eyes wide on the incriminating paper. “He isn’t angry? He’s accepted that I love another?”

  It took an effort not to make a sharp retort about what Kip Himplerump could do with any ire he felt, but she refrained. It was not her place to question what value Angela set on her past friendship with the boy. It was but another of the lessons she would take with her from Little Bidewell.

  “He’s seen the light,” she said.

  A smile lit Angela’s young face, and seeing the beauty of that suddenly unburdened smile, Letty found herself glad she’d gotten the dratted letter. With a vigor that boded well for a quick recovery, Angela tore the soggy letter into little scraps.

  “How can I thank you enough, Lad—Letty?”

  “Dictate any future correspondence,” Letty suggested dryly.

  “Henceforth I shall only write letters to my Hughie.”

  “And don’t call your poor marquis ‘Hughie,’” Letty said. “At least not in public.”

  Angela nodded solemnly.

  “Have you seen Sir Elliot?” Angela asked.

  The question caught Letty off guard. Her cheeks warmed, and from the interested expression on Angela’s face, she knew they’d colored up as well. Luckily, Angela was too well raised to make a remark about her blush.

  “Yes. I have. And I have thanked him for his aid.” She knew her words sounded stilted but she couldn’t help it. “But now, I have to go back to The Hollies. At once.”

  “Why?”

  “Ah. Because. Because… Sir Elliot didn’t realize I would be in such a pitiable state when he manufactured his story about fetching us from The Hollies during the storm. It would be rather hard to explain why I hadn’t bothered to change before going off with him.

  “So, you see, I must return to The Hollies before your father and aunt arrive home.” Thank heavens her wits hadn’t entirely deserted her. The excuse even made a sort of sense.

  “But what shall you say then? Why would I be here? Alone!” Her eyes widened. “I mean, well, Sir Elliot is very old and very honorable and quite above anything untoward, but…”

  If she only knew, thought Letty. “Angela, don’t worry. I shall tell everyone that we both came with Sir Elliot last night, but that you slipped upon exiting his carriage and hit your head. I shall explain that I came back at first light so I could be there when your aunt and father arrived to inform them of matters.”

  Angela scooted up against the pillows. “But that still means I have been here alone. And I am, after all, an unwed woman, and he’s—”

  “Mrs. Nichols has been in here with you all night. She’s still here. Asleep—if you haven’t woken her up, that is. Your reputation is safe.”

  The girl sighed gustily. “Of course.” She looked a little sheepishly at the recumbent figure across the room. Mrs. Nichols snored blissfully on. “Silly of me. I should have realized Sir Elliot would take every precaution against compromising a lady.”

  “Every precaution,” Letty agreed tonelessly.

  “In fact,” Angela went on, chuckling, “if he thought he’d been the least degree lax in guarding a lady’s reputation, he’d be at the church this very Sunday demanding the banns be read. He is such a stickler for propriety.”

  The girl couldn’t know that her words stabbed Letty’s heart like a knife. “Indeed? I had best be going. I should like to creep down the back stairs before the rest of the staff is about.”

  And find a corner and curl up and die in it.

  “All right.” Impulsively, Angela held out her arms, and after a second’s amazement and another’s awkwardness, Letty bent down and embraced the girl.

  “Now I can forget all about Kip and that letter and concentrate on your wonderful plans for our wedding. Oh, Letty, heaven must have sent you,” Angela whispered, a little catch in her voice, “because you have set everything right.”

  The devil must have sent her.

  It was the only conceivable explanation. Because after leaving him breathless with wanting her, after sharing every intimacy with him, after flinging wide the doors to his cautious heart and making it her own, she’d lef
t. Without a word, without a scribbled note of explanation. With only the memory of her lovemaking to cloud his thoughts, fire his blood, and inflame his anger.

  Somehow Elliot contrived a calm expression for Angela, who sat being spoon-fed broth by Mrs. Nichols.

  “And did Lady Agatha say whether she expected to return?”

  “I don’t think so,” Angela said. “She said she would have to hurry to get everything ready for the wedding by the time she leaves.”

  “Leaves?” A more attentive listener might have noted the careful timbre of Elliot’s voice.

  Angela’s mouth pulled down in the corners. “Yes. She has another wedding celebration to plan. She can only stay to finish the arrangements here, and then she plans to return to London forthwith.”

  “Does she now?” Elliot smiled around his clenched teeth. “Well, I had best leave you to your recovery, Miss Angela. I’m sure your father and aunt will be visiting soon. I’ll show them up as soon as they arrive.”

  “Thank you.”

  Elliot bowed before exiting the room and shutting the door behind him. There, in a calm and moderately pitched voice, he let lose a string of every profane word in his vocabulary.

  As a former army officer, he had an impressive command of the vernacular.

  Chapter 26

  The toughest role is real life.

  “Professor March should be pleased with the results of his party, no doubt about it. Everyone’s having a grand time, and Miss Angela looks beautiful,” Merry whispered to Grace Poole from her position beside the white-draped sideboard at the far end of a long drawing room.

  She, Cabot, and Merry were at the manor on loan from The Hollies, since the March household was inadequately staffed for this large a party. Mrs. Nichols, bless her soul, was a fine daily, but hardly a chef—a term Grace had taken to applying to herself since Lady Agatha had delegated her to make the bridal cakes for Miss Angela’s wedding. And since all the guests were clustered around Miss Angela, at the other end of the room, it was safe to chat quietly.