‘Unrelinquished keys, don’t forget. Giles won’t go easily. He means to be the duke, not spend his life working for that little tyke of hers,’ Nathan scolded. Webster was playing a deep game there, gambling on marrying into the ducal family through Alicia’s claim, a claim Giles Montague had not officially acknowledged. Nathan preferred a more direct game himself.
‘That leaves Phaedra, you old devil,’ Webster said with a grin.
‘Phaedra. She’s my kind of game,’ Sir Nathan confirmed, rubbing his hands together with glee. ‘Giles would hate it.’
‘He wouldn’t be the only one. So would Basingstoke.’ Webster hung his bit of news out there like a carrot. So this was what he’d come to share. Well, it was about time. They’d talked around the juicy titbit now for the better part of a half-hour.
‘All right, I’ll bite. Tell me why Basingstoke would care who she marries? He’ll be gone by summer.’ Sir Nathan stretched out his legs on the fender of the fireplace ready for a naughty story.
‘Basingstoke’s hot for her.’
‘Well, that’s a given. A saucier derriere in breeches I have yet to see. Makes the rest of her tolerable.’ Phaedra was all spit and fire. Sir Nathan shifted in his chair to dislodge the growing bulge in his trousers. He was already imagining the games he could play with her, ropes and whip at the ready.
‘Listen.’ Webster set aside his glass and leaned forward, hands on his thighs. ‘She and Basingstoke went swimming today, out to that little island, you know the one. I caught sight of their horses on my way home from Alicia’s.’ Hugh Webster winked. ‘They left their clothes on the shore.’
Hot images of Phaedra Montague rose in Sir Nathan’s mind, along with jealousy. How dare that scrapper of a groom take such liberties...how dare she? But he knew how she dared. She was as hot-blooded as they came, she probably couldn’t help herself.
‘Better yet,’ Webster was saying, ‘there was smoke coming from the island. They stayed long enough to build a fire.’
He didn’t need to explain the implications. If they’d stayed long enough to build a fire, they’d stayed long enough to engage in other activities too. Nathan’s mind was running rife with what those activities might be. Marrying Phaedra would provide a perfect way to strike back at Basingstoke for the public humiliation he’d meted out in Buxton and to get back at the Montagues and their high-handed rejections of his very decent offers of marriage. At the least, maybe he could use this to steal her colt from her, perfect retribution for the humiliation of outbidding him in Buxton.
There was still the issue of acceptance. He had to ensure Phaedra took his offer. The invitation for the ball at Castonbury that had arrived in the afternoon would be an ideal opportunity to make his intentions known.
‘It looks like we have the perfect ménage-à-trois: revenge, blackmail and a wife in the bargain.’ Sir Nathan rose. ‘Let’s go down to the village and celebrate. Must celebrate while we can, you and I won’t be bachelors for ever.’
Chapter Twelve
She was going to have illicit sex with Bram Basingstoke. Phaedra climbed the steps to Bram’s rooms over the stable, humming a little tune under her breath. If today’s events had proven anything to her it was that she could not wait for ever. The threat of discovery had not deterred her. In fact, it had heightened her need to act. Exposure meant Bram would leave, either under his own free will or be forced to it by Giles’s sense of honour and Aunt Wilhelmina’s attempts to hush up the incident.
She might have come anyway, Phaedra reasoned. The lake had been too much temptation and she’d wanted to even before then. The moment he’d made his proposition, she’d thought of nothing else. Phaedra smiled to herself. Bram had probably known she’d accept. He just didn’t know when. That part would be her surprise.
Light peeped out from under Bram’s door at the top of the stairs. She’d thought of this moment all through dinner, letting talk of Aunt Wilhelmina’s party roll over her without effect. Let them talk about marrying her off. Tonight she didn’t care. Tonight she’d have her fun.
Phaedra smoothed her skirts one last time. She’d dressed carefully too, selecting a simple evening gown of blue sarcenet that would easily come off. She raised her hand to knock.
‘Come.’
She pushed open the door and stepped inside, shutting it firmly behind her. Bram sat at a small table acting as a makeshift desk, dressed in breeches and a shirt open at the neck. He was writing, his tanned forearms exposed beneath his rolled sleeves. It was a sexy scene and it held Phaedra’s attention. Bram Basingstoke was literate.
She should have guessed sooner. He’d made that joke about windmills at the lake but she’d been too caught up in the issue of discovery to take note of what it might signify.
He looked up, his surprise genuine. ‘Phaedra, what are you doing here?’
She smiled, pleased she’d caught him off guard for once. All too often it was the other way around. Phaedra put a hand to the loosely arranged curls atop her head in the French style, pulled a pin and let her hair fall. ‘I have come to accept your invitation to sin.’ Seconds later she was treated to the rare sight of Bram Basingstoke rendered speechless.
* * *
His mouth went dry, his body went hard at the sight of those wild honey tresses cascading over Phaedra’s shoulders like a waterfall in motion. Was there anything so lovely as Phaedra Montague offering to be his? God knew he wanted her, consequences be damned. After the lake today, he’d not thought she’d come. He should have known better. He could see now he’d misjudged her. Nothing would deter Phaedra if she wanted something.
He rose and went to her, letting a slow smile spread across his face. ‘I’m glad.’ He took her mouth in a lingering kiss, tasting the sweet remnants of wine, savouring what it meant: she’d come to him straight away. She had not dithered and worried over her decision. She’d known what she wanted without hesitation. He liked a lover who seized what she wanted.
‘Why tonight, Phaedra?’ he whispered, moving his attentions to the curved shell of her ear. She might not have hesitated but he didn’t want her coming as a reaction to something else. He didn’t want her driven here because of a quarrel with Giles, or pressure from Aunt Willy, as he liked to think of the aunt he had yet to meet and probably never would. ‘It’s not because of today, is it?’ Bram feathered a breath past her ear.
‘Of course it is.’ Phaedra’s own breath hitched in response. ‘How could you tease me with such pleasure and think I wouldn’t want to claim all of it?’
Bram laughed. Good. That was the only reason he wanted her in his arms, the pursuit of pleasure. Her arms were around his neck, her body pressed to his as if to demonstrate her point. He kissed her again, his hands buried in her hair, his nose taking in the apple-cinnamon scent of her, his arousal growing.
He pushed at the delicate puffed sleeves of her gown, moving them down over her shoulders. ‘You chose well,’ he murmured against her neck, feeling the excited race of her pulse beneath his lips. The bodice gave easily and it was the matter of two well-placed gyrations from Phaedra’s hips and the gown fell to her feet.
The thin cambric of the petticoat with its white-on-white embroidery was an aphrodisiac in itself. ‘You’re a veritable angel.’ Bram could hear the huskiness in his own voice. The lamplight teased, bathing the fabric in transparency. He could see the tantalising outline of pink nipples beneath the square-cut bodice of the undergarment, the dark shadow of wild honey curls between her thighs beneath the thin skirt.
He spun her around in his arms, dancing with her like they had danced on the beach until they reached the cot. He laid her back on the narrow bed. ‘Maybe not an angel, maybe Sleeping Beauty.’ He smiled down at her with her hair spilling across his pillow.
She laughed up at him and scolded, ‘There will be no sleeping tonight.’
Bram stepped back from the bed, his eyes never leaving hers. ‘Watch me, Phaedra.’ He stripped for her then, pulling his shirt over his head and tossing it to the roo
m’s one chair. He pulled off his boots, noticing her gaze travel the length of his thighs. He revelled in her perusal. His Phaedra was bold.
He rested his hands at the waistband of his breeches. ‘Are you sure?’ He had to ask one last time, prodded to it by his rusty conscience. He hoped she was.
She grinned. ‘I’ve seen it before.’
‘But you’ll be meeting him in truth tonight,’ Bram said gently. He wanted her to understand tonight would be different than the encounter at the lake. That had been spontaneous and unplanned. This would be deliberate and the results would be for ever. They’d been playing at the lake.
She reached for him, pulling him down to her. Her eyes danced with mischief but she was serious. She knew exactly what she was doing. ‘I know, Bram. I want you.’ She let him go.
The words were a heady ambrosia. Bram felt his need ratchet up another level. He slipped off his breeches and knew a moment’s pleasure as Phaedra’s eyes roamed his body as they had at the lake.
‘I didn’t know a man could be so...so...beautiful,’ Phaedra said appreciatively, looking her fill before he slid onto the cot beside her. She ran a hand down the expanse of his chest, coming to rest on his soft tip. She rubbed her thumb across it. She reached lower and squeezed lightly. Bram sucked in his breath. Untutored or not, Phaedra instinctively knew how to touch a man. ‘You like that,’ Phaedra said.
Bram decided to reassert his authority. If she kept this up, they wouldn’t get much further and he’d be spent. ‘It’s the equivalent of what I can do to you.’ To demonstrate, he took her breast in one hand and stroked the rosy tip beneath the fabric until it pebbled beneath his thumb. Phaedra’s breath came on a sharp intake, signaling her pleasure.
‘Bram?’ Her voice was shaky.
‘Hmm?’
‘It’s time for this petticoat to go.’
He couldn’t agree more.
At last they were naked, together, skin against skin, and Bram revelled in it. He took her breasts in his mouth by turn, sucking and nipping, Phaedra arching against him with a moan, her own pleasure mounting. He moved his worship lower, blowing softly into her navel, holding her firmly by the hips as she pressed against him. Then he was at the apex of her thighs, the scent of her indicating her readiness.
Bram kissed her damp curls, foreshadowing what was to come. Phaedra was not shy, she opened for him, and he took her gently with his mouth, his tongue bringing her to the brink. Her hands fisted in his hair, her body a riot of sensations as she shattered beneath him, her breath coming hard and fast in the aftermath. She was ready for him, ready for more. His body was not inclined to wait any longer. The exquisite agony of foreplay had heightened his senses beyond all logic.
Bram moved over her, covering her with his length, his dark hair falling forward in his face, giving him the look of a Celtic warrior of old, wild and primal and possessive. Oh, how she wanted to be possessed! Her body was primed for it, driven to matchless lengths of pleasure by all that had gone before. He probed for her entrance as he settled between her thighs. Her legs bent, her hips lifted towards him invitingly, her body intuitively knowing how they would fit together in this most intimate of joinings.
He entered her with a swift thrust, meeting with little resistance. He stilled within her, letting her body adjust. She felt herself stretch, felt him push forward, felt herself take the whole of him. Was there anything more divine than this feeling right now?
There was. Bram moved back and then forward, establishing a rocking motion. She found the rhythm and joined him, creating a heady friction that mounted with each thrust. They were climbing, careening towards an unseen peak. Bram’s breathing came hard and fast, her own came in unmitigated gasps. If they could go a little harder, a little faster, they would reach the great unknown. And they did. Just when she thought they could do no more, something deep at her core fractured, shattered into a brilliant release. Bram collapsed against her, his own release achieved in a final, powerful thrust.
She was spent, absolutely spent. She wanted to sleep, Phaedra thought drowsily. Beside her, Bram rose. Where he found the energy for movement was beyond her. Everything that had happened tonight was beyond her. She hadn’t known, she’d leave it at that. The simple phrase said it all.
The lamp had burned out long ago. In the dark of the room she could see the outline of Bram’s form as he splashed water into a basin. She heard the clank of an ewer being set down and the wringing of a cloth.
Bram returned to the bed and pressed the cloth between her legs. She jumped a little, slightly self-conscious now that the heat of their intimacy had passed.
‘I’m sorry it’s not warmer, still, it will do.’ A skilled lover and a considerate one, Phaedra thought, looking up into Bram’s face.
‘What was that? At the end?’ Phaedra ventured.
In the dark she could see him smile. ‘Le petit mort, the little death.’
Bram set aside the cloth and lay down beside her, wrapping his arms about her for warmth. ‘Every culture has its own name for it. It refers to the release that comes with completion.’ Bram played with her hair. ‘The Egyptians felt that part of a woman’s life force was expended in intercourse.’
‘I feel boneless enough right now to believe it.’ Phaedra laughed softly. ‘All I want to do is sleep.’
‘That’s natural,’ Bram murmured softly. ‘Some scientists, physicians and so forth hypothesise that the orgasm is necessary for pregnancy, it keeps a woman lying down long enough to let the sperm penetrate her womb.’ His hand stilled in Phaedra’s hair and she knew a moment’s concern.
‘You needn’t worry on that account,’ Bram assured her. ‘I withdrew in time. There will be no consequences to our pleasure. I know it’s not romantic to speak of such things, but it must be done.’
Phaedra lay in silence after that, savouring the warmth of Bram’s arms, piecing together the remnants of what they’d done. She had to go back. She couldn’t spend the night in Bram’s room but the thought of making the journey up to the house was singularly unpalatable at this point.
‘You can sleep awhile,’ Bram said, drawing a blanket up over both of them. ‘I’ll wake you in time to get you back, and who knows, maybe we’ll have time for an encore.’
Phaedra hoped so. Her last thought before drifting off to sleep was that Bram was a man of his word. He’d most definitely kept his promise.
Chapter Thirteen
It was a promise Bram kept repeatedly in the weeks that followed. Spring had proven true and Phaedra spent every minute she could spare riding out with Bram. There were picnics by the river, swims in the lake; they returned the boat and replenished the firewood on the beach. There were rides along the forested trails of Castonbury and up into the heather-covered hills. Always, the outings ended in the same way, with her in his arms, their clothes atangle, their passion replete. Bram was a tireless lover and an exciting one. Phaedra had not dreamed anything could be like this.
‘It’s like flying across a field on Isolde, the wind in my face, knowing no one can catch us, only better,’ Phaedra tried to explain one afternoon as they lay on a blanket looking up at the blue sky, her head on his chest.
Bram laughed. ‘I’m glad to know I’m a better ride than your horse.’
Phaedra laughed too. She could always count on laughing with Bram. ‘Why is it that everything is so easy with you?’ Phaedra traced an idle pattern on his chest where his shirt fell open. ‘You don’t need dances and manners. Why can’t it always be like this? No pretensions, no complications.’
Bram’s hand caressed her hip in a familiar manner as he thought. ‘I don’t want anything from you that you’re not willing to give.’ There was sense in that. Giles and Aunt Wilhelmina wanted things from her she was not willing to commit.
‘May I assume from your comment that things are not “easy” elsewhere? How are things at home? How’s Aunt Willy?’
The way he said it, as if he had great familiarity with her family, when in ac
tuality he’d not met any besides Giles, made Phaedra laugh again. ‘Aunt Willy? I dare you to call her that to her face.’ She could just picture the shade of red her aunt would turn if someone called her that.
Bram shrugged beneath her. ‘I’ve been calling her that in my head for some time now. Seems natural enough. It will be our secret name for her.’
‘Secret name or not, she’s awful. Aunt Willy is obsessed with her party plans. I’ll be glad when the party is over.’ The gala, as her aunt insisted on calling it, would be futile. She wasn’t interested in anyone but Bram. ‘She and Giles are probably up at the house right now deciding who I’m going to marry.’
‘Any news from Captain Webster? Still nothing?’ Bram asked tentatively. It had been two weeks and nothing had materialised from the incident at the lake. They were starting to feel safe, or at least safer.
‘Nothing,’ Phaedra affirmed drowsily, letting the sun work its magic. There would be nothing better than falling asleep with Bram. The only thing that marred her happiness was the reality that it was finite. This affair with Bram would have to end and her happiness with it.
She was living on borrowed time as it was. Warbourne had come down with a minor bout of lameness in his left leg, not uncommon when a horse’s diet changed from winter grain to fresh spring clover. But it had put her off mounting him and continuing his training. As soon as Warbourne was healthy, she’d have to decide on a departure date for Epsom. She had no illusions Bram would be there when she got back. Tom Anderson had fully recovered and was able to take over his responsibilities.
‘You’re a million miles from here, Phaedra,’ Bram prompted. ‘Thinking about Warbourne? He’s fine. I checked on him this morning. You should be able to mount him tomorrow.’
Phaedra sat up slightly. Bram would be surprised to know she thought about him more than she thought about her horse these days. She didn’t want to think about tomorrow or any of the tomorrows that were to come. They would only be one step closer towards heartache. ‘What about you?’ Phaedra said playfully. ‘Are you fine?’ She slid a leg over his hips and straddled him with a knowing smile. ‘I’d like to mount you today.’
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