Not Wicked Enough

by Carolyn Jewel

  “Thank you,” she whispered.

  “I don’t allow anyone in here but a few trusted servants.”

  Lily put a hand on his arm. “I’m honored you’ve shown me. It needn’t go in the professor’s book, you know. It’s enough that I’ve seen this.”

  He gave her a sheepish grin. “I was quite a young man when I came to Bitterward. You can suppose the effect this room had on someone of my tender years. I kept it secret from Nigel and Eugenia. They were far too young to see…” He gestured at a vaguely bearlike creature in congress with a centaur.

  “I understand completely.”

  “Before I knew it, this room was the only place where I could escape my fate.”

  “Sanctuary.” She tilted her head, her hand still touching his arm. “I have a similar retreat at Syton House. Without the stonework, alas. I am green with envy that you have monsters and gargoyles.”

  “By all means study them.”

  “I will.” She turned to the wall and drank in the cavorting beasts and monsters.

  From behind her, Mountjoy said, “I remember the day the attorney came to Haltwhistle, that’s where Eugenia, Nigel, and I were living at the time, with our mother’s sister. He sat at the best table in the only parlor we had and showed me the family lines that led to me. I made him go over and over it, and each time, he ended up at our branch of the Hamptons. With me.” He let out a breath. “He’d been researching five years, he said, on behalf of the dukedom. Following the branches. They’d somehow lost track of my father’s branch for a while. I suppose in those earlier days they thought us too remote. The attorney, it happens, had set out to prove the line was extinguished. Instead, he found me. Each time we went over what he claimed was incontrovertible proof, I thought sure he’d find he’d made a mistake, that if anyone was to be the next Mountjoy, it would not be me.”

  She turned just enough to see him. “Yet, here you are.”

  The duke shrugged. “There was no time to air out the country smell or knock the dirt from my boots.” Lily went still when he came to stand behind her. She found it difficult to concentrate on anything but him. Why, oh why, had he been so kind as to show her a room like this? He would break her heart. He truly would. “I went from Haltwhistle to the house in London, then Bitterward and a seat in the Lords with hardly a breath in between.”

  “Who doesn’t dream of one day discovering one is secretly royalty?” To her left stone animals cavorted above and between the windows; a stag, a bear, a boar, and even a swan. She could make out the broken chain that identified the creature as representing the Hampton family sigil that had found its way into the Mountjoy coat of arms, with the later addition of the ducal coronet.

  He leaned a shoulder against the wall where there was a smooth space between the window-well and the carved stone forest. His mouth twitched. She did so like the way he looked when he was trying not to smile. “I never did. Never once.”

  “Well, I can assure you I grew up convinced I was a princess.”

  “You would.”

  Lily’s stomach did a flip. They stood so close. So close. “Hidden away for safety while my father bravely and in secret fought against our country’s enemies. I was to have married a prince and taken my place on the throne of my beloved subjects.”

  “Where you would prove yourself a fair and benevolent ruler.”

  “Precisely. Alas, no one ever came to the house with papers to prove my true identity. My father is my true father. Not that I’d want any other. I love him. Despite everything.”

  “I’ve not met the man, but I’ll own I do not care for what I’ve heard.” He frowned. “He neglected you when you were a girl. He abuses your generosity now that you are a woman. Was there no one besides you and your father in the house? A governess to see to your education?”

  She tipped her head to one side. “Our housekeeper taught me to read and do figures. To sew and knit, too, and how to cut fabric. She was a genius with scissors and a needle.”

  “And she taught you to run a household.”

  Her urge to touch him rose up again, threatening to overwhelm her. “Skills that have stood me in good stead all these many years, I must say.”

  “Could your father not spare twenty pounds to educate you?”

  “Why would he, when I was so wicked that my education would surely have been a waste?”

  He backed up a step to allow her to advance along the wall and continue her study. “Because he was your father. Did he never sing to you or read you stories?”

  “Others are not as lucky in their families as you were.”

  “I’m no prince, but I was indeed fortunate in my parents.”

  “There’s still hope that someone will inform me that I am a princess and much beloved by my subjects who long to have me back in my rightful place as a gentle and benevolent ruler.”

  He grinned. “You’ll tell me the moment that happens, won’t you?”

  “Oh, certainly.”

  Mountjoy put a hand on a smooth bit of the wall by the window. “I was fortunate in my aunt and uncle, too, that they took in a family of orphans. We might have been split up, you know, Eugenia, Nigel, and I.” He smiled, but his eyes stayed serious. She did not speak into the silence. The quiet went on too long. With his other hand, he touched a rabbit carved at his eye level. “My good fortune persists, Lily, for you came here. To Bitterward.”

  “You flatter me, your grace.”

  “Flattery?” He drew a finger along the stone back of a gargoyle having sexual relations with a nymph, and she, God help her, watched the slow movement of his finger. “Have you any notion, Lily, of the effect you have on men?”

  “Some. I’m not a fool about that.”

  “You walk into a room, and no one can think of anyone but you. Where before there was tedium, now there is life. We all want that warmth and joy for ourselves.”

  “We?”

  “Dr. Longfield. My brother. Every man to cross your path.”

  “You?” she asked.

  His eyes pierced her through. “Beautiful. Elegant. Never wearing anything that isn’t the height of fashion and exquisitely made.”

  “I spent too many years deprived of elegant attire, forbidden anything pretty.” She licked her lower lip. “Now that I am free of that, I refuse to live my life without fashion or beauty. When I’m old and wrinkled and breathing my last, I won’t be sorry for having lived a life with beauty in it.”

  “Your damned father. You shouldn’t go back to him.”

  “I must. You know that. Besides, if I were to stay here, you’d soon reach a point where you wished me gone. Best to leave while your hosts still like you, that’s what I’ve always felt.” She breached the space between them to touch his cravat. “You could do with a little of my conceit. Don’t deny you aren’t aware of your appeal.”

  “Tonight,” he said, “I deny nothing.” He stepped forward and put his hands on her shoulders. His thumbs brushed along her collarbones. “Not you. And not me.”

  The world vanished from beneath her feet.

  Chapter Sixteen

  IN THE BACK OF HIS MIND, MOUNTJOY KNEW HE STILL had a chance to stop this from happening. He could step away from her and turn the conversation to her plans for treasure hunting or to bloody architecture. Lily, being the intelligent creature that she was, would know he’d lost his nerve.

  To be honest, though, whatever guilt he might feel over involving himself with a woman besides the one he was supposed to marry, he could tuck away very far from this particular moment. He stayed where he was, his hands on her shoulders and his thumbs sweeping over her soft skin. Her eyes stayed on his face, and he could see she was deciding what she would allow to happen.

  There was no telling what she would decide about the two of them.

  Without letting go of her he said, “I dreamed about you last night.”

  “I’m not responsible for your dreams.”

  “No, but that damned medallion of yours might be
.” He reached out and touched the metal. “What if that Gypsy’s magic works and that’s why I can’t get you out of my head or my dreams?”

  She burst out laughing. “Oh, it doesn’t, and well you know it.”

  “Are you certain?” He dropped the medallion and moved closer. She retreated, but that put the wall at her back.

  “Very,” she said. “There’s no such thing as magic.”

  Their eyes locked, and he smiled because of the challenge there. Beyond anything, he wanted her in his arms. “Last night,” he said, “my dreams were filled with you.”

  “Proper dreams, I hope.”

  “Not very.”

  “How odd, your grace. For I dreamed of you last night.”

  “Was yours a proper dream?”

  She lifted her chin. “You kissed me.”

  “On the cheek, I presume?” He held her gaze. He wanted to be sure he would leave this room having stripped them both naked and left no passion unexplored between them. The uncertainty of gaining what he wanted aroused him. She was so maddeningly forthright and in control of herself. She might well tell him no.

  “No, your grace. That was not where you kissed me.”

  “Perhaps it was your forehead I kissed. I might have done that.”

  She put her hands behind her back and shook her head. “Not there either.”

  He arched his eyebrows. “Your hand?”

  “No.”

  “I confess myself baffled.” He moved close enough to draw a finger along the top of her shoulder. “Such warm skin, Lily. Soft beneath my touch.” He continued stroking her. Caressing her. He trailed the backs of his fingers along her collarbone. “Yours is skin a farmer or a duke would enjoy beneath his own.”

  She pushed away from the wall and walked past him to the table. She turned with a motion that sent the fabric of her skirts snapping. Her eyes swept over him from head to toe. “I do believe you are being deliberately wicked, your grace.”

  “Do you object?” He walked to her, and he took her in his arms and turned so they ended with him backed up to the table and her with a hand on his chest.

  “Wickedness does not become you.”

  “I think it does,” he said. “But in any event, I cannot help my dreams.” He resisted the urge to pull her into his arms. Lord, but she was astonishingly pretty. “Or what you do in them. And you have done things in my dreams, Wellstone. Such things.”

  “Infamous, your grace, that you lay the fault at my feet.”

  He gripped the edge of the table on either side of his legs. He was mad. Mad to be pursuing this. He could not imagine doing anything but this. “In your dream, where did I kiss you?”

  A grin flashed over her face. “Where else but in the library?”

  He’d brought her here, where they would not be interrupted, and if it was not a bedroom, that hardly mattered. They were alone. He leaned forward, still holding on to the edge of the table. He was very much aware that he was responsible for what was happening between them. He wanted to fuck her, and she knew it and had come here with him. “That’s not where I kissed you in my dream. Shall I show you?”

  She touched a finger to his chin. “Let me guess.”

  Once, he thought. Once with her would be enough, though if this alluring, fascinating woman wasn’t averse to an affair, well, then. His life would become much more interesting for as long as they lasted. “Try.”

  “Only if it would please you, your grace.”

  “I’ll tell you if you don’t.”

  She took a step closer and went up on her toes. His stomach bottomed out. He saw her lips part just as his eyes closed. She put her hand to his cheek and slid the cool tips of her fingers across his skin. She kissed his chin and drew back.

  He stayed just where he was, leaning slightly forward. He opened his eyes. “How disappointing.”

  “In what way?”

  “That’s not where you kissed me.”

  Her eyes glinted with humor. “I’m sure it’s where I meant to kiss you.”

  They weren’t far apart. He leaned forward another inch or two and brushed his mouth over hers. She went still. Only for a moment, but enough that his heart gave a lurch. Then her palm cupped the side of his face, and she kissed him, and he let her. He invited her to kiss him, and she closed the distance between them until she stood between his spread thighs, and her torso pressed against his.

  He leaned into the kiss and opened his mouth over hers, and she did reciprocate. Her hands moved to the back of his neck and her fingers pulled his head to hers. Lily Wellstone kissed the way she lived. Boldly. According to her taste. With conviction. Never married, and she kissed like this? Like a courtesan.

  For all that she was bold and taking exactly what she wanted, she wasn’t a courtesan or his mistress. He knew better than this and didn’t give a damn.

  His hands disengaged from the table, and he was holding her tight against him. Bringing her closer, closer. Jesus, not close enough. The hell with holding anything back. No man in his right mind would hold back with her.

  She made a small sound in the back of her throat, and his tongue was in her mouth, and hers met his, touched, swept away, and her hands cupped his face as if he were precious to her, when, how could he be?

  She did not break the kiss but gentled it. So tender, and he was content with that, too. Part of his mind was engaged with imagining her naked and accepting the pleasure her body afforded. They’d burn to ashes, the two of them, if things progressed to that.

  At last, she drew away. Her hands stayed around his shoulders. He left his arms around her waist. “Mmm,” she said, low and throaty. Gratified. She ran her fingertips underneath his eyes, along the line of his cheek, his nose and jaw. And his mouth. “I suppose your other lovers tell you how much they adore kissing you.”

  Other lovers. He wanted that to mean she now considered herself a member of that cadre. “Not in so many words.”

  She smiled. “Well, you’re a lovely, lovely man, and I adore kissing you.”

  “But not enough to make you lose your head?”

  “Or you yours,” she said.

  “It was a near thing, I promise.” He lowered his head to hers, his lips hovering above hers. “Perhaps we ought to try again. See if we can discover where we went wrong.”

  “Perhaps we should.” She drew away, but he closed his thighs, trapping her gently between his legs. She could move away if she wished. “I wanted to kiss you tonight, and now I have.”

  “And?”

  Her eyes lost their glitter of humor, but he didn’t dare ask her what made that vanish. Not yet. “And,” she said, “I quite enjoyed it. Did you?”

  “You know the answer to that.” He brought her close. The smile that curved her mouth made him mad to know what she was thinking, what she intended. Had she decided what would happen here? Between the two of them?

  “I don’t think I do.”

  They ended up looking at each other, and Mountjoy didn’t know what to do or say in response. So he kissed her again, and she melted against him and damn him to Hell if he wasn’t even more aroused. He took the lead this time and, yes, her kisses drove him mad. Wonderfully mad.

  When they broke apart again, his brain must have been addled because he heard himself say, “Have you been to bed with a man before?”

  That pert smile of hers danced on her mouth. “Have you been to bed with a woman?”

  He stared at her lips and then looked into her eyes. She was a passionate woman, but unmarried, and whatever else had happened between them, she might not be as experienced as he’d assumed. “Several times. Have you? Been to bed with a man?”

  “Of course.”

  “Your soldier.”

  “Does that bother you?”

  He brought her closer. “That you’ve been with a man before? Not at all.” A half-truth. He was jealous of her previous lover, of the way he’d captured her heart. “But if this was to be your first time, I’d be more careful. That’s
the only reason I asked.”

  “How thoughtful.” She leaned closer. “If this were your first time, I promise I would have been gentle with you.”