“Shh. I know you’re sore, I know I shouldn’t do this, that I’m a rutting animal to even think of it so soon. But, God, I have to.” He raised his head and his eyes were wild. How had she ever thought them cold? “Please?”
How could any woman resist such a plea? Her heart warmed and her mouth curved in a sensuous smile. “Yes.”
She had no time to say more. At her consent, he was pulling at her clothes. She heard cloth tear. Her breasts were bare, and he fastened his mouth on one, sucking strongly. She gasped and clutched at his head, feeling the scrape of his teeth. He moved to her other breast but teased the first nipple with his thumb, rubbing and tweaking. She couldn’t catch her breath, couldn’t assimilate what he was doing to her.
He reared back and stripped off his waistcoat. His shirt drifted to the floor a moment later.
She stared at his bared torso. He was pale and taut. Long ropes of muscle shifted on his arms as he moved. He was breathing rapidly, and the fair hairs on his chest sparkled with sweat. He was such a beautiful man, and he was all hers. A ripple of arousal pulsed through her. He stood and shucked his breeches and hose; then he was unfastening the buttons to his smallclothes.
She held her breath, watching avidly. She’d never seen a man fully naked, and it seemed long overdue. But he climbed atop her, hiding that most interesting part of himself before she could see. And a strange thought ran through her mind: Was he shy? Or was it that he was afraid of shocking her? She raised her eyes to meet his gaze and opened her mouth to disabuse him of that notion—she had, after all, spent her life in the country, where farm animals abounded—but he spoke first.
“You’re making me harder, looking at me like that.” His voice was rough, almost hoarse. “And it’s not as if I need any help to get a cock-stand around you.”
Her eyelids drooped at his words. She wanted to taste him, to do things to him that she was only vaguely aware of. More. She wanted more.
“I want to put myself in you,” he said, guttural. “I want to stay inside you all night, to wake with you around me, to make love to you before you even open your eyes.” He knelt above her. His face was not kind, and she gloried in his savagery. “If I could, I’d place you on my lap, darling angel, and hold you throughout dinner, my cock inside you. I’d feed you strawberries and cream and not move. The footmen would come and serve us and never know that my cock was in your sweet cove all the time. Your skirts would cover us, but you’d have to remain very, very still so they wouldn’t guess.”
She felt a wild pulse of desire at his carnal words. She squeezed her legs together, helplessly listening as he told her wicked, forbidden things.
“And after we’d eaten,” he whispered, “I’d order the servants away. I’d take down your bodice and suck your nipples until you came, creaming all over my cock. And I’d still not leave you then.”
She shuddered.
He kissed her softly on her neck, his caresses at odds with his hard words. “I’d place you on the table. Very carefully, oh, so very carefully, so that we never broke contact, and then I’d make love to you until we both screamed.” His words brushed her skin. “I can’t seem to help myself. I don’t know what to do with these feelings. I want to make love to you in the carriage, in my library, my God, outside in the sunshine, lying in green grass. I spent half an hour yesterday calculating how soon it would be warm enough to do so.”
His words were so erotic, so dark, it almost frightened her. She’d never thought herself a sensual creature, yet with him her body felt out of control, helpless to feel anything but pleasure. He leaned over her and flipped up her skirts so she was nude below the waist. He looked down at what he’d exposed.
“I want this.” He placed his hand over the juncture of her thighs. “All the time. I want to do this”—he parted her legs and lowered his hips until his hardness nestled in her folds—“all the time.”
She moaned. What was he doing to her?
“Do you want it, too?” He moved, not entering her but thrusting his erection through her wetness. He was rubbing against her bud.
She arched helplessly, whimpering.
“Do you?” he whispered into the hair at her temple. He thrust his hips again.
Pleasure. “I—”
“Do you?” He bit her earlobe.
“Ohhh.” She couldn’t think, couldn’t form the words that he wanted. She could only feel.
“Do you?” He cradled both her breasts in his hands and pinched the nipples as he thrust over her again.
And she came, grinding her hips against him, seeing stars in the darkness of her eyelids, moaning incoherently.
“God, you’re beautiful.” He positioned himself and pushed.
She felt a twinge, a slight ache, but she no longer cared. She wanted him inside, as close as possible to her. He wrapped his hand around her knee and hitched up one of her legs and pushed again. She was opening, parting, accepting him. She moaned, listening to his rough breathing. He pushed once more and his entire length came into her.
He groaned. “Do you hurt?”
She shook her head. Why wouldn’t he move?
His expression was strained. He bent his head and kissed her softly, brushing over her lips, barely making contact. “I won’t hurt you this time.”
He pulled her other knee up until she was sprawled open beneath him. Then he ground down on her. She moaned. His pelvis was exactly where it should be, and she was in heaven.
He circled his hips and grunted, “Is it good?”
“Um, yes.”
He grinned tightly. And ground down again. Then he kissed her with long, luscious strokes of his tongue, his mouth making love to hers, and always the pressure of his hips, hard and demanding. She was drifting in a sensual haze and didn’t know how long he made love to her. Time seemed to have stopped so they could be wrapped together in a cocoon of physical pleasure and emotional rapport. She held him tightly to her. This was her husband. This was her lover.
Then he stiffened and his movements became jerkier, faster.
She gasped and caught his face between her palms, wanting to be connected to him when it happened. He thrust hard against her and she felt his seed, hot inside her, right before her world started swirling. His mouth became slack on hers. She continued kissing him, licking along his bottom lip, tasting his mouth.
He pushed up from her, but she tightened her arms to hold him. “Stay.”
He looked at her.
“Stay with me. All night long. Please.”
His lips quirked in a small smile before he whispered, “Always.”
Chapter Thirteen
“It’s not a game for you, is it?” Christian asked several nights later. His voice was low, but Simon glanced uneasily around nonetheless.
Drury Lane Theater was as crowded as a corpse bloated with maggots. He’d procured a gilt-edged box on the second level for himself, Lucy, Rosalind, and Christian. The box was close enough to see the whites of the actors’ eyes, high enough that any stray vegetables couldn’t reach them, should the play turn sour. The rabble in the stalls below was relatively well behaved. The prostitutes working the floor kept their nipples covered—mostly. The noise was low enough that he could actually hear David Garrick, playing a rather elderly Hamlet, recite his lines. Of course, it helped that the actor had lungs like a fishwife’s.“SBLOOD,” Garrick bawled, “do you think me easier played on than a PIPE?” Spittle glittered in the stage lights.
Simon winced. He much preferred reading Shakespeare to attending it. This was assuming he had to consume the bard at all. He glanced at Lucy. She was enthralled, his angel, her eyes half-closed, her lips parted as she watched the play. Behind her, the crimson velvet curtains lining the box framed her head, making a foil for her pale profile and her dark hair. She was almost unbearably beautiful.
He looked away. “What are you talking about?”
Christian scowled. “You know. The duels. Why are you killing these men?”
Simon arc
hed an eyebrow. “Why do you think?”
The younger man shook his head. “At first I thought it was honor of some kind, that they had insulted a lady close to you.” His gaze skittered to Rosalind and away. “I’d heard rumors . . . Well, they were repeated everywhere a couple of years ago, before your brother died.”
Simon waited.
“And then I thought perhaps you wanted a reputation. The glory of having dueled and killed.”
Simon repressed a snort. Glory. God, what a thought.
“But after James”—Christian looked at him, puzzled—“you fought with such ferocity, such viciousness. It had to be personal. What did the man do to you?”
“He killed my brother.”
Christian’s jaw dropped open. “Ethan?”
“Hush.” Simon glanced at Rosalind. Although she was obviously less interested in the play than Lucy, her eyes were still on the stage. He turned back to Christian. “Yes.”
“How . . . ?”
“I’m not going to discuss this here.” He frowned impatiently. Why should he bother explaining himself at all?
“But you’re looking for another one.”
Simon rested his chin in his open hand, half covering his mouth. “How do you know?”
Christian shifted impatiently in his velvet and gilt chair.
Simon glanced at the stage. Hamlet was creeping up on his kneeling uncle. The Danish prince raised his sword, babbled verse, and then sheathed it again, another opportunity for vengeance lost. Simon sighed. He’d always found this particular play tedious. Why didn’t the prince just kill his uncle and have done?
“I’m not stupid, you know. I’ve followed you.”
“What?” Simon’s attention swung back to the man sitting beside him.
“The last couple of days,” Christian said. “To the Devil’s Playground and to other sordid places. You go in, don’t drink, roam around the room, question the staff—”
Simon interrupted this laundry list of activities. “Why are you following me?”
Christian ignored him. “You’re looking for a big man, a titled aristocrat. Someone who gambles, but not as compulsively as James, otherwise you would’ve found him already.”
“Why are you following me?” Simon grit his teeth.
“How could all these men, men of standing and good family, have killed your brother?”
Simon leaned forward until his face was inches from Christian’s. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Lucy glance around. He didn’t care. “Why are you following me?”
Christian blinked rapidly. “I’m your friend. I—”
“Are you?” His words seemed to hang in the air, almost echoing.
On stage, Hamlet drove his sword through Polonius. The actress playing Gertrude cried shrilly, “O, what a rash and bloody deed is this!” In the next box someone shrieked with laughter.
“Are you my true friend, Christian Fletcher?” Simon whispered. “Do you guard my back with a loyal eagle eye?”
Christian looked down and then up again, his mouth grim. “Yes. I am your friend.”
“Will you second me when I do find him?”
“Yes. You know I will.”
“I’m grateful.”
“But how can you keep doing it?” The younger man’s eyes were intent. He leaned forward, drawing Lucy’s gaze again. “How can you keep killing men?”
“It doesn’t matter how I’m able.” Simon looked away. James’s open eyes, staring into nothing. “The only thing that matters is that it’s done. That my brother is avenged. Do you understand?”
“I . . . yes.”
Simon nodded and leaned back. He smiled for Lucy. “Enjoying the play, my lady?”
“Very much, my lord.” She wasn’t fooled. Her gaze darted between him and Christian. Then she sighed and looked back to the stage.
Simon scanned the audience. Across from them, a lady in embroidered scarlet turned her lorgnette on him, posing self-consciously. He looked away. Below, a broad-shouldered gentleman pushed his way through the crowd, elbowing a wench. The woman shrieked and shoved back. The man turned and Simon leaned forward to catch sight of his profile. Another man rose to join the argument, and the first man turned aside.
Simon relaxed. Not Walker.
He’d spent the past few days since he’d received the threatening letter searching everywhere for the last man in the group that had killed Ethan. Christian may have followed him to the gaming halls at night, but the younger man hadn’t seen Simon during the day at the coffeehouses, at horse auctions, or roaming the tailor shops and other establishments for gentlemen. Walker was nowhere to be seen. And yet, he hadn’t gone to ground at his estate in Yorkshire either. Simon had paid ears in that vicinity, and there’d been no reports of Lord Walker. He could, of course, have fled to another county or even overseas, but Simon didn’t think so. Walker’s family was still in his town house.
On stage, an overlarge Ophelia sang her despair at the desertion of her lover. God, he hated this play. He shifted in his chair. If he could just get it over with. Duel Walker, kill him, put the man in his grave, and let his brother rest at last. Maybe then he could look Lucy in the eye without seeing accusation—imaginary or real. Maybe then he could sleep without fear that he’d wake to the destruction of all his hopes. Because he couldn’t sleep now. He knew he woke Lucy at night with his movements, but there seemed no help for it. His dreams, both waking and sleeping, were filled with images of Lucy. Lucy in danger, or injured or—God!—dead. Lucy finding out his secrets and turning from him in disgust. Lucy leaving him. And when he had respite from those nightmares, there were the older ones to haunt him. Ethan imploring. Ethan needing. Ethan dying. He fingered the place where the Iddesleigh signet ring should have lain. He’d lost it. Another failure.
The crowd erupted in shouts. Simon looked up and was just in time to see the final bloodbath that ended the play. Laertes’s sword work was particularly egregious. Then the audience applauded—and jeered.
Simon got up to hold Lucy’s cloak for her.
“Are you all right?” she asked him under cover of the noise.
“Yes.” He smiled for her. “I hope you enjoyed the theater.”
“You know I did.” She squeezed his hand, a secret wifely touch that made the entire tedious evening worth it. “Thank you for bringing me.”
“It was my pleasure.” He lifted her palm to his lips. “I shall take you to every one of the bard’s plays.”
“You’re so extravagant.”
“For you.”
Her eyes grew round and liquid, and she seemed to search his face. Didn’t she know the lengths he would go to for her?
“I never know what to make of Hamlet,” Christian said behind them.
Lucy glanced away. “I adore Shakespeare. But Hamlet . . .” She shivered. “It’s so dark at the end. And I never think he fully realizes the hurt he’s done poor Ophelia.”
“That business when he jumps into the grave with Laertes.” Rosalind shook her head. “I think he felt the most pity for himself.”
“Perhaps men never do comprehend the wrongs they’ve done to the women in their lives,” Simon murmured.
Lucy touched her hand to his arm, and then they were moving with the crowd toward the doors. The cold air smacked him in the face as they made the entrance. Gentlemen stood on the wide theater steps, shouting as they ordered footmen to fetch their carriages. Everyone was leaving at once, and naturally there weren’t enough runners to go around. Lucy shivered in the winter wind, her skirts whipping against her legs.
Simon frowned. She’d catch a chill if she stayed outside much longer. “Stay here with the ladies,” he told Christian. “I’ll fetch the carriage myself.”
Christian nodded.
Simon shoved through the milling crowd, making slow progress. It wasn’t until he’d reached the street that he remembered he shouldn’t leave Lucy. His heart jumped painfully at the thought. He glanced back. Christian stood between Rosalind
and Lucy at the top of the stairs. The younger man was saying something that made Lucy laugh. They looked fine. Still. Best to be cautious. Simon started back.
Which was when Lucy suddenly disappeared.
LUCY STARED AFTER SIMON as he made his way through the crowd in front of the theater. Something was bothering him, she could tell.
Rosalind shivered on the other side of Mr. Fletcher. “Oh, I do hate these crushes after the theater lets out.”The young man smiled down at her. “Simon will be back soon. He’ll be faster than waiting for one of the footmen to get the carriage.”
Around them the crowd surged and flowed like the sea. A lady bumped Lucy from behind and muttered an apology. Lucy nodded in reply, still staring after her husband. Simon had disappeared the last couple of nights and had returned late. When she tried to question him, he’d joked, and if she questioned him more, he’d made love to her. Urgently. Relentlessly. As if it was the last time every time.
And tonight during the play he’d been muttering with Mr. Fletcher. She hadn’t caught the words, but his face had been grim. Why wouldn’t he confide in her? Surely that was part of marriage, for the wife to be a helpmeet to her husband and take some of his cares onto her own shoulders. To provide relief from his worries. She thought when they’d married that she and Simon would become closer. That they would attain that state of harmony that she’d glimpsed in some older couples. Instead they seemed to be growing ever further apart, and she wasn’t sure what to do. How to bridge the gap, or was it even bridgeable? Perhaps her marriage ideal was merely the naive dream of a maiden. Perhaps this distance between them was the reality of marriage.
Mr. Fletcher leaned down. “Should have tipped Simon better.”
Lucy smiled at his silly jest. She turned to reply and felt a shove from her right. She fell to her knees on the hard marble steps, her palms stinging even through the leather of her kid gloves. Someone grabbed her hair and pulled her head back painfully. Shouts. She couldn’t see. Her vision was composed of skirts and the dirty marble beneath her palms. A kick landed on her ribs. She gasped and then her hair was released. Mr. Fletcher was grappling with another man directly over her. She shielded her head as best she could, fearful of being trampled or worse. Rosalind screamed. Another blow to Lucy’s bottom and a weight shoved against her back.
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