by Lisa Torquay
A half-smile crossed thin carnal lips. “What an imaginative hellion.” The rasp of that deep voice readied her.
“We have not taken dessert.” She reminded him, gyrating and nearing the table.
There were an array of compotes, cakes, honey and jam jars she had demurely asked cook. A pear compote caught her fancy, she took one, not caring it dripped in her hand.
An unhurried stroll to the column, she offered it to him. He bit at the sweet succulent delicacy and she did it too, their mouths eating at it and hungering for one another. The juices trickled down their chins as she licked it from his rough jaw in the same time he turned his head and followed suit. They savoured the last of it, before devouring each other’s lips. The kiss came savage, unrestrained, voracious.
She might faint with the avalanche of sensation it brought her. Scattered strength gathered, she went back to the table.
“This table used to display torture instruments, you know.” He said at her back.
“Torture is exactly what I intend.” She devolved. And it was. He would find it out in due time.
Jar of honey in hand, she carried it to where he stood.
“The idea is,” he paused. “Enticing.”
Not giving an answer, her fingers dived in the satin viscosity of the honey. To rest on his chest, through the mid-chest gaping shirt, lathering his hair peppered expanse with it. He groaned, his head tilting to the column behind him. The smell of him, earthy and man, mixed with the honey perfume invaded her nostrils with an invitation to touch.
Her tongue followed her hand to his collarbone, descending to one side on the top of the prominent muscle and encasing his nipple. Her mouth stayed there tasting his salty tang mixed with the sweetness and almost losing control. Her hand continued down, though, to the trail of hair, his navel, under the shirt and the top of his trousers. The thick shaft straining the fabric reacted to her caresses eager. Romulus sucked in air as if suffering.
“Annabel.” He muttered. “You are driving me to the edge.”
Good. It was precisely what she wished. “You never told me why your regiment thought you missing.” Her mouth travelled to his other nipple while she sensed him tensing.
“This is for real.” He concluded, none too surprised.
She lifted her head. “Yes.” Giving him no time to think, she knelt before him, fingers on the buttons. Honey jar forgotten on the floor. “Answer me.” Silky voice, she undid the first, his breath quickened.
“No.” His tall frame leaned back on the column as if his life depended on that.
The second button became open. “Where did you go?”
His eyes closed as his open lips worked with the oxygen. “None of your…” fast breath. “Business.”
The third button fell open. She rubbed her palms over the length of him. “Did you try to desert?”
The chains shook with his effort to escape the torture. “I will not tell you.” Uttered as if in pain.
No buttons left, she lowered the clothing to see his glorious erection pop out. “Unfortunate.” Honeyed fingers closing on the hot, hard length, she looked up at him.
His expression held a sort of calamitous tantalization, his eyes on her, in unsuccessful resistance. “Annabel.” He rumbled when her fist moved up and down his iron erection.
Touching him was making her insides molten. “Are you a traitor?”
Those rugged features froze to a stony stillness. He was not taking it.
But then her hungry mouth covered the fat tip of him and all she heard was a scratchy wild sound. “Are you?” She pressed when her lips distanced some inches from him.
Murky gaze trained on her, his fabulous lips drafted a sardonic side smile. “Torture me, yes.” Hips jerked to her. “We will both pleasure from it.”
She took him in again, his boasting ending suddenly to give way to another groan. Salty, hard and silky, he was delicious. “No information?” Mouth away from him anew. “What a pity.” She murmured, meaning anything but.
The tip went inside her lips again and she savoured him as he became harder and the tip produced wetness.
Not giving him completion, she stood up, toe to toe with the blasted man, battling in their eyes. “Unclothe.” He had the cheek to order.
As their gazes locked, his hypnotised hers, a fiery current running between them. It was her turn to become breathless. Not even noticing it, her peignoir fell from her shoulders and the strings of her nightgown pulled as if by magic to follow the peignoir. His hands tightened on the chains to a whitish hue. She intended to step back to cater him with the view of her which he could not touch. Turning, she moved one foot.
He was quicker. He swivelled his body under the chains, hooking her foot and taking her with him. She landed against the column, facing it. How the darn did he do that? Trapped between hard muscle and cold stone, she could not move. His open moist mouth landed on her neck in a rough grazing along it. In moans, her had fell on his chest, the chins tinkled as they twisted..
The contrast of cold stone and heated muscle set fire to the whole of her. One cheek to the petrified material, elbows to the sides of her head, midnight hair falling all over, breasts meeting sandpapery surface, she was the picture of capitulation.
“Arch your body for me, Annabel.” The dry command weakened her even more.
There was no choice other than succumb yet again.
In a swift move, his pelvis adjusted, and he drove inside her wetness, merciless, delicious. Her only response, a ragged groan echoing in the enclosed space. It unleashed a volcanic response in her centre.
This position made him fill her so completely, the abysm threatened.
“Touch yourself.” He issued, coarse.
Dear me! She had never done that, not in the presence of this man at least. Her hand obeyed him though, and her feminine parts surged starved and anxious for fulfilment. The nails of the other hand scratched the stone as air became scarce.
Neither of them needed much more time. He moved hard and fast. Deep and furious. The chains clinked over her head, her pelvis smashed against the column. She would be chafed tomorrow, but she did not give a darn. His ragged breath fanned her ear, together with his gross grunts.
He slogged in her, ever more torrid and desperate. The feminine parts opened wider for him, willing him further as madness took them over once more. Erratic hands fuelled her perdition, her insides intent on that abyssal paradise.
Helped by her own touching, she erupted in blinding contractions with a harsh moan. Panting, he followed with uncivilised grunts, pouring in her unrestrained. Sated at last, they sagged against each other.
A long time passed before she deemed herself able to move and right his clothes.
“This was one hell of an interrogation.” The chains clinked as he pivoted to her, that derogatory half-smile on his devilish lips.
He did not miss a single movement of her dressing back her lacy things.
“And you are one hell of an intractable blackguard!” She snapped lifting her chin, their stances unmoving on each other.
An eyebrow rose sardonic. “Since it is over, you can unchain me now.”
It was her turn to scoff humourless. “That is where you are wrong.” A finger tapping on her chin, eyebrows risen to convey smugness. “I depart to London tonight.”
A blasting fury shot through his eyeballs as he shuttered them back. “I see.” Perusing all of her, he jabbed. “You were merely using me to make up for lost time.”
The tilt of her head and a faint smile told of fake pensiveness. “You might be right.”
His length relaxed against the stones, flaunting his muscled frame. “This tryst may go on, despite our… political conceptions.”
She breathed a dismissive laugh. “With so many… likeminded options in London?”
If his stance had showed fury before, it became murderous at that. “If any other man touches you, I will kill him!”
“You do not get to decide about my lif
e, Your Grace.” The annoying man had no limits.
His chin lower, his eyes pierced her invasive. “You can take any paramour you wish; it will never ever be the same as with me.”
The arrogant scoundrel! “I believe I have learned enough to make it good, regardless.”
He became statue-still, his body thrummed with so much tension, she feared he would thrash. He did not, naturally. If possible, his stance acquired a more glacial quality.
Trudging to the table, she lit more candles to keep the cell warm and arranged them on the cold floor to avoid fire.
When her glare focused on him again, he watched her attentively. “I am borrowing Iseult.” She informed casually.
“So that I do not catch up with you?”
“Exactly.”
“I do not think I could possibly.” He eyed his cuffed wrists with a meaningful glint.
“I am not taking risks this time.” She started plaiting her hair while his murky beacons followed each twist.
He made an acknowledging sound through his throat.
“I will drop her at your town house.” She tied the braid with a ribbon, which had been on the table.
“No need. She is yours.” The low timbre a caress to her ears.
The confusion must have shown on her face because he continued. “She has always been yours.”
At a loss as to accept of refuse a gift from a probable traitor she said nothing as she headed for the door.
“Annabel.” He called, and she froze with a hand on the frame.
“Promise me you will let me know.”
She rounded to him. “If you are being arrested?”
Unpreoccupied, he retorted. “No. If you are with child.”
Blanching to an ashen hue, she almost lost balance, but caught herself in time. “You did it on purpose.” She accused hotly. How could she have been so neglectful to think of this possibility. It was not like she did not know of these things.
“On purpose?” Arching his brows, he pinned her with his stare. “We always go too wild to care; would you not say?”
From ashen, her skin burned at the reply. Eager to hide it, she rotated to the door.
“Promise me.” He insisted firmly.
Incapable of anything else, she nodded weak before she forced herself out of the cell to close the peep iron door behind her. She would instruct the nearest innkeeper to deliver a note to Miller informing of His Grace’s whereabouts, so he could release the unnerving man.
That she might be expecting his babe filled her with excitement and terror in equal measure, she thought, climbing up the stone stairs to emerge near the chapel. She would have to plan for the possibility of it, nonetheless.
There were more pressing matters to carry out though. Reaching town, the first of them. Resolutely, she exited the castle to have her carriage prepared and Iseult saddled, while the maid readied her trunk.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Busy, smelly and smoggy London offered Annabel no welcome as she neared her house in the newly constructed Chesterfield Street. Not big, not small, it accommodated herself and the servants comfortably.
Tucked in her carriage from the last stop, she sought to preserve her privacy. Iseult tethered to it, the harnessed horses sailed through the crowds and the noise like a boat cutting masses of water. Two days in rainy, then dusty roads and shabby inns made her weary. So, it was with relief that she greeted her butler at the entrance upon requesting tea and a bath.
Inside silence and cool greeted her. The fireplaces unlit, since no one expected her, reflected the sense of emptiness she was reluctant to admit even to herself. She knew Romulus would not follow her for he had no chance of capturing her again. The impression something had remained back in the castle, like a forgotten piece of clothing, would not abate. She could not tell what it was, but it lingered.
The night received her with a frosty bed. It was when that impression came back to her. The longing became undeniable, together with the flood of memories of those couple of weeks in Cornwall. Even the thought of the stained glass-windows in the castle’s library provoked a rush of nostalgia, as if they belonged to a time and place distant and impossible to retrieve. Fortunately, sleep overtook her, saving her from having to look deeper into these feelings.
*
Useless to waste any time to report to her superior’s office, which took her there early next morning. Lord Wingfield received her with his usual round bellied complacency, one that always caused her a mild displeasure.
“Lady Winchester.” He bowed over her gloved hand. “I began to wonder if you forsook us.”
For this meeting, she dressed a dark blue dress with a modest neckline covered by a fichu up to her neck.
With an elegant curtsy, she schooled a neutral expression. “Lord Wingfield, I would not do such a thing.”
He motioned her to a seat in front of his desk and sat at his chair. Annabel proceeded her account of the assignment, her discoveries and the difficulty to send word to London. Though each word brought her back to her days in Blackthorne, she succeeded in tamping them down quick.
“Lady Winchester, your impressive accomplishments inspire admiration though the news are not so fresh, I must say.” Hands rested on his belly, he looked at her with reluctant approval.
“I find the delay unfortunate, indeed, my lord.” Straight back, she tilted her coiffed head in acknowledgement of his praise. “But I hope it helps the current investigations.”
“It certainly will, my lady.” He scribbled something on a sheet of paper. “Every evidence points to the Duke’s treasonous actions.”
Heart plummeting to the bottom of her stomach, she kept her composure despite the disappointment those words wrecked in her. “I am happy to have contributed, my lord.”
“So am I.” He conceded. “Notwithstanding, our agency will need solid confirmation.”
Evidently, they would not cast one of the highest peers of the realm into the gallows without incontestable proof, she thought with a grim twist of her insides.
After a few more formalities, the countess took her leave expressing willingness to move on to future assignments. Anything that would wipe the past weeks from her mind.
The sinking feeling clogged her throat with the possibility of Blackthorne’s very real crimes. While it dwelled in the realm of suspicions, there had been a chance of it being cleared. Nothing else to do now other than blanking out the whole thing. And the man. The latter being wrenchingly troublesome.
Her carriage joggled on the way back home, her thoughts scattered and something too akin to desolation threatened to take her over with inexorable force. It would be impossible to separate her feelings from her previous mission and from that man. Her body missed him already, and she did not want to think about the other ways she might miss him too. The only way was to keep herself busy hoping it would be enough to avoid the memories.
*
Romulus stood by the window of his study, a week later, perfectly convinced that he did not come to London after her. Obviously not! He had several affairs to see to and his presence would be cherished if he decided to visit his club.
The castle became a phantasmagorical tomb after her departure. He roamed the walls, trying to keep his attention of the many tasks his people called him for, to no avail. The nights had been the worst. The agonising want of her would not leave him the hell alone.
No novelty that he should talk to her about her suspicions. She had been transparent when she disclosed the nature of her work to him. Not that he agreed with the fact she involved herself in such kind of thing, but still… He did not pay in kind. Because he did not want to expose her to harm, sure. That came out as a feeble excuse after their time together. He could have done that. By the time she left, everything had been underway, and there would be no effect if the government interfered. The plans were delicate; the team must carry them out with accurate precision if they wanted to succeed. There was not turning back though.
He rubbed his nape under his hair tied in a queue. As he lifted his head again, he saw a too familiar horse. It could not… Bloody hell! The hellion rode the side-saddle as if she was Boudicca incarnate.
His blood heated to explosive temperature just at the sight of her in a fashionable ridding habit made possibly for exhibition in town. Those riotous midnight ringlets caught under her hat and her liquid brown eyes straight ahead.
A groom came to take the horse. She exchanged some words with the boy and turned towards the front gate on foot. She came to give Iseult back. Anger at the rejection of his gift imploded his self-control, as it happened with everything that involved that woman. Launched out of the study, he rushed to the front door, throwing it open.
“You cannot stand even a gift that has come from me.” He growled to her in deep voice.
Swivelling to him in one graceful movement, her eyes clasped on his, the world stanched. Neither said anything for long seconds. The absolute one thing he wanted to do was to grab her and take her to his chambers and lock the both of them inside it. Preferably forever.
“I must not accept it.” She curtsied with that haughty poise of hers, in the motion to leave.
Never!
He surveyed the street, satisfied with the deserted state of it. “Come in.” He uttered, knowing the insubordinate woman did not obey his orders. Ever.
For a flashing moment, her stance hinted at an expression so akin to disappointment. “Your Grace will forgive me, but I have to go.” She began to turn to the gate.
“You either enter with your own legs or with mine.”
That fascinatingly red-hot fury splashed on her flawless face. And he went more aroused, if possible, with the bright crimson on her delectable skin. The same colour that she displayed when she… Damnation!
A derogatory little smile drew in those cushioned lips that once closed around his… “I dare you.” And she gave him her back, him, a Duke, for pity’s sake! Had the curvaceous woman no decorum?
He assumed a nonchalant posture. “Alright. I do not think you would mind a certain tale of a certain dungeon to circulate in The Times, would you?” He would not tell it to a soul even under torture. Well, not if it was not her torture anyway, the best one of his life.
