To her relief, the evening rolled on in pleasant vein. Nothing of any great note occurred, no difficult situation arose to challenge her, or them. The small hours of the morning saw them heading back to Waverton Street, tired but content with the way their plans had gone. Geoffrey parted from them at their door. Tony accompanied them in, ultimately accompanying her up the stairs to her bedchamber, and her bed.
Tony shrugged off his coat, dropped it on the chair, felt very much as if he was shedding some physical restraint along with his social facade.
I don’t like this. No more do I.
Charles’s words, his answer. A statement that grew more accurate with each passing day. Despite his erstwhile occupation, its shadowy nature and often nebulous threats, he and his colleagues had always, ultimately, dealt with foes face-to-face. Once the engagement had commenced, they’d always known the enemy.
Never had he had to cope with a situation like this. The action had commenced with Ruskin’s murder; subsequent acts, strikes at their side, had been mounted and executed with impunity, causing damage and difficulty in their camp. A. C. had forced them to respond, to deploy to meet his threats and the actions he’d unleashed, yet even though they’d managed thus far to weather all he’d thrown at them, they’d yet to sight his face.
An unknown enemy, with unassessed capabilities, made the battle that much harder to win.
Yet it was a battle he could not lose.
Glancing across the darkened room, he watched Alicia, sitting at her dressing table, brush out her long hair.
He couldn’t even contemplate conceding a minor skirmish; there was too much here that was now too precious to him.
Yanking his shirt from his waistband, he looked down, started sliding buttons free. Beneath the loosening linen, he shifted his shoulders, aware of muscles subtly easing in one way, tensing in another. A primitive want welling as the civilized screen fell.
I want him.
Dalziel’s tone had been lethal, yet no more than an echo of his own resolve. Whatever it took, he would find A. C. and ensure he was brought to justice. The villain had focused on Alicia, struck at her not once but multiple times; for him, there could be no rest until A. C. was caught.
Yet they did not, after weeks of searching, even know his name.
He shrugged off his shirt and felt the last shreds of social restraint fall from him. For a long moment, he stood, his shirt bunched in his hands, staring unseeing at the floor, inwardly watching the volcano of his emotions surge and swell.
The scraping of wood on wood snapped him out of his state. Alicia stood, pushing back her dressing stool.
He dropped his shirt on the chair; unbidden, he padded barefoot across the room to help with her laces.
She glanced at his face, then gave him her back. He could feel his need building; rapidly, with far less than his customary languid sophistication, he unpicked the knots, hooked the laces free.
He glanced up, met her gaze in the mirror.
Saw that she’d sensed the change in him.
She searched his face, then looked down.
Normally, he would have stepped back, given her space to remove her gown…he didn’t move.
Nor did she. Instead, she looked up, again met his eyes.
Her gaze was direct, questioning, waiting.
He dragged in a slow, deep breath, and reached for her.
Stripped the gown from her, let it and her chemise pool about her feet. Murmured darkly as he stepped close and wrapped his arms about her, locking her silken back to his bare chest, spreading his hands and claiming her glorious bounty. He shifted evocatively against her. Bending his head, he whispered, half in French, half in English, asking her to put her foot on the stool and remove her ruched garters and silk stockings.
Her breath shuddered as she breathed in, and complied.
While she did…he let his hands roam. Let them take and claim as his need willed, set his senses free to wallow and seize all she surrendered to him, would surrender to him, in that moment, and the moments to come.
One arm crossing her body, his palm covering one breast, fingers evocatively kneading, with his other hand, he lightly gripped her nape; as she bent forward to roll the first garter and stocking down, he traced her supple spine, possessively stroking down, over the back of her waist, through the indentation below it, smoothly stroking over the swell of her bottom, down and around to caress the soft, slickly swollen flesh between her thighs.
With one foot on the stool, she was open to him. He parted the soft folds and found her, flagrantly caressed, then worked two fingers deep.
By the time she’d paused, gathered herself, changed legs, when she finally dropped the second stocking to the floor, Alicia was hot, wet and quivering with need.
Her foot still on the stool, her body riding the repetitive probing of his fingers, she looked into the mirror, from under heavy lids met his gaze.
Breasts swollen and full, peaks tight and aching, her skin heated, her breathing already ragged, she waited.
Withdrawing his hand, he grasped her waist; the instant she straightened and her foot touched the floor, he turned her.
She’d expected something else. Instead, he stepped back, drawing her with him, with one hand unbuttoning the flap of his trousers, the only clothing he still wore.
The backs of his thighs hit the bed. He paused only to free his fully engorged staff from the folds of his trousers, then he lifted her. Ignoring her smothered gasp, he sat and brought her slowly down, setting her on her knees astride his hips.
With the broad head of his staff nudging into her body.
She could feel him there, throbbing, sense the promise of all that was to come. The hot, aching emptiness within her swelled.
She looked into his face, into his black, fathomless eyes. Raising her hands, she framed his face as his hands closed hard about her hips. Under mutual direction, their lips met. Clung, held.
Beneath his control she sensed all he held back, sensed the power, the desperate need.
She shifted fractionally on him. He caught his breath, broke from the kiss. Screened by their lashes, their eyes met.
He whispered against her lips, his breath a hot flame. “Take me. Give yourself to me.” His gaze dropped to her lips. “Be mine.”
Gravelly, rough, another seduction, a dark temptation to a deeper level of giving.
She didn’t hesitate. Drawing in a breath, tightening her hands about his face to anchor her, she angled her head, set her lips to his, and slowly eased down.
Inch by slow inch, she took him inside her, gloried in the feel of him filling her, stretching her. She’d never before been so aware of how her body closed about him, enclasped him. Took him in.
His hands were hard as iron about her hips as he ruthlessly guided her down; he let her set the pace only until he was fully seated within her, then he took the reins, took control, and the giving began.
Hard, hot, and complete.
Without restrictions, limits, or reservations.
Their bodies merged deeply, compulsively riding a wave of sensual desire higher than any before, a tide of need more desperately urgent, more powerful. More addictive.
Their tongues tangled, their mouths feeding in frenzy. He took her as he would, seizing and claiming every sense she possessed, demanding more even as she gave him all.
In the end, on a gasp, she surrendered completely, opened her body, her soul, her heart, and let him plunder.
Let him capture, take, and make her his.
Beyond all thought. Beyond all denial.
Beyond this world.
She was his. Forever. He would never allow anyone to take her from him.
When he slumped back on the bed, drained, replete, to the very depths of his soul sated, the darker side of his nature for the moment wholly satisfied, as he tumbled her down with him, then kicked off his trousers and wrapped them in the covers, those were the only thoughts to cross Tony’s mind.
The
y were the only thoughts that mattered.
SIXTEEN
IN THE DARKNESS BEFORE DAWN, ALICIA STIRRED.
Awareness slunk into her brain. Her body still thrummed; her hair was a wild tangle, a fine net ensaring them, wrapped about the muscled arm lying protectively about her. Eyes closed, she lay still, safe, secure, warm. Freed by the night, by the silence, her thoughts crept from the corners of her mind, dwelling on the strange twist her life had taken—the deception she’d never intended to practice, not on so many, not to this degree.
The role of her own making now haunted her.
Not in her wildest dreams had she expected to rise to such social prominence, never imagined calling so many of the powerful friend. Yet in her and her family’s time of need, they’d come to her aid—how could she now draw back from them, from the protection they’d so generously offered?
Thanks to A. C. and his latest attempt to cast all suspicion on her, she couldn’t even slip away, fade from the scene. She had to remain, head high, and face down his rumors, at least for the next weeks.
Had to continue to pretend she was the widow she was not, while parading through the haut ton, the subject of the latest on-dit, the central character in the most amazing, attention-getting story.
The idea that someone from her little part of the country might, like Ruskin, pop up and recognize her had assumed the status of a nightmare. No amount of reasoning, of reiterating that there truly were few families of standing near Little Compton, and none who had known her, did anything to lessen its effect; like a dark, louring cloud it hovered, threatening, not breaking but always there, swelling in the back of her mind.
What if the cloud burst and the truth came raining down?
Her heart contracted; she dragged in a breath, conscious of the vise closing about her chest.
Tony had so publicly nailed his flag to her mast, had so openly committed himself to her cause, and brought with him so many of his aristocratic connections…if the ton ever learned the truth of her widowhood, how would that reflect on him?
Badly. Very badly. She’d now gone about in society enough to know. Such a revelation would make her an outcast, but it would make him a laughingstock. Or worse, it would cast him as one who had knowingly deceived the entire ton.
They would never forgive him.
And no matter any protestations to the contrary, deep down, in his heart, he would never—could never— forgive her. By making him a party to her deception, she would have ripped from him and put forever beyond his reach the position to which he’d been born, the position she suspected he never even questioned, it was so much a part of him.
She wanted to twist and turn, but with him breathing softly, deeply, beside her, she forced herself to lie still beneath the heavy arm he’d slung across her waist. Dawn was sliding over the rooftops when she finally accepted that she could do nothing to change things—all she could do was move heaven and earth to ensure that no one ever learned her true state.
She glanced at his face on the pillow beside hers. His dark lashes lay, black crescents over his cheekbones; in sleep, his face retained the harsh lines, the austere angularity of nose and jaw. In her mind, she heard his voice dispassionately reciting, describing what the last ten years of his life had been, how they’d been spent, and where; he’d avoided stating in what danger, but she was not so innocent she couldn’t read between his lines. When his mask was off, as now, the evidence of that decade still remained, etched in the lines of his face.
Last night—early this morning—he’d needed her. Wanted her. Taken all she’d given, and yet needed more, a more she’d found it possible to give.
His satisfaction was hers, deep, powerful, and complete. She had never imagined such a connection, that a man such as he would have a need like that, and that she would be able so completely to fulfill it.
Her joy in that discovery was profound.
Lifting a hand, she gently brushed back the heavy lock of black hair that lay rakishly across his brow. He didn’t wake, but stirred. His hand flexed, lightly gripping her side before easing as, reassured, he sank once more into slumber.
For long moments, she looked, silently wondered.
Faced incontrovertible fact.
He now meant more to her, at a deeper, more intensely emotional level, than all else in her life.
Tony left Waverton Street before the sunshine hit the cobbles. The tide of satisfaction that had swept him last night had receded, revealing, to him all too forcefully, the vulnerability beneath.
He couldn’t—wouldn’t—lose her; he couldn’t even readily stomach the fact she was at risk. Therefore…
Over breakfast that morning, as always efficiently served by Hungerford who, despite knowing full well Tony hadn’t slept in his own bed for the past week and more, remained remarkably cheerful, he made his plans. Those included Hungerford, but his first act was to repair to his study and pen two summonses. The first, to Geoffrey Manningham, took no more than a few minutes; he dispatched it via a footman, then settled to write the second, a communication requiring far more thought.
He was still engaged in searching for the right approach, the right phrases, when Geoffrey arrived. Waving him to the pair of armchairs before the hearth, he joined him.
“News?” Geoffrey asked as he sat.
“No.” Sinking into the other chair, Tony smiled, all teeth. “Plans.”
Geoffrey grinned, equally ferally, back. “You perceive me all ears.”
Tony outlined the basics of what he intended.
Geoffrey concurred. “If you can get everything into place, including your beloved, that would unquestionably be the wisest course.” He met Tony’s gaze. “So what do you want me to do? I presume there’s something.”
“I want you to remove Adriana for the afternoon—or the day, if you prefer.”
Geoffrey widened his eyes. “That all?”
Tony nodded. “Do that, and I’ll manage the rest.”
Just how he would do that last…they sat for ten minutes debating various options, then Geoffrey took himself off to accomplish his assigned task.
Tony remained before the fire for a few minutes more, then, struck by inspiration, returned to his desk and completed his second summons, disguised as a letter to his cousin Miranda, inviting her and her two daughters, Margaret and Constance, to visit him in London, to act as chaperone while the lady he intended to make his viscountess spent a week or so under his roof.
If he knew anything of Miranda, that last would ensure her appearance as soon as he could wish—namely, tomorrow.
The letter dispatched in the care of a groom, he rang for Hungerford.
Dealing with his butler was bliss; Hungerford never questioned, never made difficulties, but could be counted on to ensure that, even if difficulties did arise and his orders no longer fitted the situation, that his intent would be accomplished.
Telling Hungerford that he proposed protecting his intended bride from social and even possibly physical attack by installing her under this roof, within the purlieu of Hungerford’s overall care, was all it took to get everything in Upper Brook Street ready.
He had little notion of what arrangements would be required to prepare the house to receive not only the widowed Miranda and her daughters, ten and twelve years old, but his prospective bride, her family, and her household, but he was sure his staff under Hungerford’s direction would meet the challenge.
Beaming, clearly delighted with his orders, Hungerford retreated. Tony considered the clock; it was not yet noon.
He debated the wisdom of his next act at some length; eventually, he rose, and headed for Hendon House.
At two o’clock, he paused beside Collier, leaning on his street sweeper’s broom at the corner of Waverton Street.
The big man nodded in greeting. “Just missed her, you have. She returned from some luncheon, then immediately headed off with the three lads and their tutor to the park. Kites today, if you’ve a mind to join them.�
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“And Miss Pevensey?”
“Lord Manningham called ’bout eleven and took her up in his curricle. They haven’t returned.”
Tony nodded. “I’m going to talk to the staff, then perhaps I’ll fly a kite.” He paused, then added, “I plan to move Mrs. Carrington and her household to Upper Brook Street, but I’ll want you and the others to keep up your watch here. I’ll leave Scully and one other in residence, to keep all possibilities covered.”
Collier nodded. “When will this move happen?”
Today if Tony had his way. Realistically…“At the earliest tomorrow, late in the day.”
Leaving Collier, Tony strode on; reaching Alicia’s house, he went quickly up the steps. Maggs answered the door.
Tony frowned; Maggs forestalled him. “Scully’s with ’em. No need to fret.”
His frown darkening at the thought that he was that transparent, he crossed the threshold. “I want to speak with the staff—all of you who are here. It might be best if I came down to the kitchens.”
From beneath the wide branches of one of the trees in Green Park, Alicia watched, a smile on her lips, as Scully and Jenkins wrestled with the second of the two kites they’d brought out.
The first kite, under Harry’s narrow-eyed guidance, was soaring over the treetops. David was watching Scully and Jenkins, a pitying look in his face; Matthew’s eyes were glued to the blue-and-white kite swooping and swirling above the trees.
“There you are.”
She turned at the words, knowing before she met Tony’s eyes that it was he. “As always.”
Smiling, she gave him her hand; his eyes locking on hers, he raised it to his lips and pressed kisses first to her fingers, then to her palm. Retaining possession, he lowered his hand, fingers sliding about hers, and looked out at the scene in the clearing before them.
“I wonder…” He glanced at her, raised a brow.
“Should I rescue Jenkins and Scully from sinking without trace in your brothers’ estimation?”
She grinned; leaning back against the tree trunk, she gestured. “By all means. I’ll watch and judge your prowess.”
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