by Gayle Callen
He gripped Emmeline’s elbow and pulled her away from the pit. When they reached the grounds outside the entrance, he continued to drag her along.
“You can let go of me now.”
“I don’t think I shall.” He managed to frown down at her. “You’re drunk enough to be a danger to yourself.”
“I am not inebriated, I assure you,” she said, pulling away and straightening her doublet.
“You must have been drunk to even think of coming here dressed like that. This is a dangerous place for a woman alone.”
“But I’ve got you to guard me, don’t I?” Grinning, she leaned against his arm.
As Alex felt the insistent pressure of her breasts, perspiration broke out above his lip. When he gave her a little push upright, she stumbled and staggered ahead of him.
“So why are you here?” he asked.
She didn’t answer. He stayed behind her just to watch her hips sway, then realized what this might look like to other men.
Suddenly her feet went out from under her, and he caught her from behind, his arms beneath hers, his hands overflowing with her breasts. His palms burned as he felt her pointed nipples. With perfect aim, her backside landed against his hips, and his erection went from a possibility to a certainty.
He stood her upright so fast she almost went face-first into a ditch. He grabbed her elbow and steered her across a little river of sewage, trying not to breathe in the odor.
“Where are we going?” she demanded.
“Down to the river. I’m going to make sure you arrive safely home.” He leaned nearer and whispered, “Unless you wish to return to my lodgings. I live nearby, you know.”
“I know.”
Though her voice had a huskiness that intrigued him, she also sounded guilty, and he tried to read the truth in her face. Had she been to the Rooster today? Was she following him?
For a moment, he desperately wanted to take her to his chamber, because from the look on her face, she wouldn’t refuse.
Desperation? he thought suddenly. Was that what Emmeline Prescott had reduced him to? No, he would have none of it.
He escorted her through an alley to the river’s edge, then tossed a sovereign to a waterman standing near his boat. The man gaped into his hand and back at Alex.
“Let me borrow the wherry,” Alex said, helping Emmeline in and stepping down beside her. The craft almost capsized as she sat back heavily on the wooden bench. “I need to take the lad across while I speak to him alone. I promise to return this to you within the hour.”
The man fisted his hand about the coin and bobbed his head. “Aye, guv’nor.”
Alex settled down between the oars as the man gave them a push away from the dock. He began to row slowly, watching Emmeline. Their knees practically touched, and her gaze was almost a caress. He had to think of something besides the unfulfilled passion gnawing a hole in his gut.
She had been following him, he reminded himself. Why?
He knew she probably wouldn’t answer such a direct question, so he let the rocking of the boat and the cry of the gulls relax her. Gradually they pulled away from the city traffic as they headed upstream.
Emmeline swayed, then straightened stiffly. Her gaze narrowed on him, and when she spoke, her words were cautious and slurred. “You obviously know you are sinfully handsome.”
“I beg your pardon?”
She rolled her eyes. “Now you sound like me.”
He could barely keep from gaping. She reached out to touch his hand when it neared her as he rowed. He pulled back hard on the oars, cursing their lack of privacy.
“There’s another bench behind you,” he said. “Why not lean back?”
She hesitated, then glanced over her shoulder. With a sigh, she leaned back on her elbows and lifted her face to the sun. The cap fell off and her auburn hair tumbled down her back. Alex felt a hitch in his breathing as he watched the sun highlight the red in her curls. The pace of his rowing slowed.
How could she not understand how truly beautiful she was?
He studied her face, devoid of the paint so many women used to whiten their skin. She glowed with health and a touch of the sun. Her nose was pert and her lips the perfect fullness for kisses. Leisurely his gaze traced a path down the long elegance of her throat. With her elbows back and the doublet gaping, the shirt was tight across her breasts, which she had not bound.
His throat went painfully dry as he stared at her dusky nipples thrusting against the white fabric. She was laid out like a feast before him, her legs spread apart, the line of her throat begging for his kisses. He imagined finding a tree at the water’s edge, its branches drooping to trail in the water and form a natural bower. He would row beneath, and the leaves would close over them like bed curtains. In the dim coolness he would rise above her, then settle between her thighs. He’d start with her magnificent breasts, suckling them to hard points until the damp shirt was transparent.
“You’re not rowing,” Emmeline said.
Alex gave a start and glanced about them, noticing that the city had given way to the sloping lawns leading up to the mansions along the Thames. Hellfire, he’d almost come in his breeches at the idea of merely touching spinster Emmeline Prescott.
It wasn’t as if he would take advantage of a drunk virgin anyway, he thought as he adjusted his breeches. He picked up the pace of his rowing.
Unable to help himself, his eyes were drawn again to her relaxed body. He couldn’t stop thinking about what her breasts would look like in a damp shirt. Mischievously cupping a handful of water, he splashed her chest. He thought she would jump up indignantly, but she only laughed, and he ogled the spreading wetness as it enveloped one breast and practically revealed her nipple. It tightened into a little point and he almost groaned.
She slowly lifted her head and smiled at him, a womanly smile full of promise and passion. Alex told himself she was unaware of what she was doing, but she might as well have kicked him in the stomach, for the effect was just as profound.
He watched the slide of her hair along her arms and neck as she slowly let her head fall back again.
She licked her lips and spoke. “I still remember your tongue on my hand.”
He stared at her and his voice became hoarse. “What are you talking about?”
“That night—in the stables. Your tongue touched my palm when I was trying to keep you quiet.”
“Yes. I…remember.”
“I would have thought such a thing to be loathsome.”
“Was it?”
She laughed. “Not at all.”
“Might I do it again?” he asked softly, seeing Kent Hall slide ever closer and wishing he could stop time. “I long to taste other parts of you, as well.”
She looked wide-eyed at him and he could see a shiver move through her. She made him feel so unlike himself. Where was his easy control?
The wherry bumped against the stairs leading up to Kent Hall. Emmeline was the first to look away, and as she stood up, almost capsized them. Alex grasped her waist. Her hands dropped to his shoulders and they stared at one another a moment too long. When he let his thumbs rub across her stomach, she leaned over him, her hair a curtain about them. Would she actually kiss him? But her eyes went wide and she broke away to climb out of the boat.
“Thank you,” she called over her shoulder as she disappeared up into the garden.
Alex dropped his head to his chest, then gripped the oars and rowed as fast as he could away from Emmeline Prescott.
Emmeline slammed the door to her chamber and leaned back against it, breathing heavily. Her head ached—from the sun, she was certain—and her mind was racing a thousand ways at once.
The day had not gone at all as she’d expected, though she could put Alex’s gambling on her list of his shortcomings. She should feel embarrassed to be caught and escorted home by him—but she wasn’t. Even though the details of her wherry ride home seemed rather vague, she still felt like she’d won a contest of so
rts.
And she wasn’t going to stop proving to herself—and Blythe—that Alex was not a suitable suitor.
Chapter 11
Alex thought for certain that Emmeline was cured of her curiosity, but he was mistaken. When he took in a play at the Curtain with a young woman he frequently escorted, there was Emmeline in the balcony across the theater, her narrow-eyed gaze taking in everything he did.
Alex only smiled at her, bowed his head, and then threw an arm about his companion. Emmeline nodded once in challenge, then left, as if him seeing her was all that mattered.
What was her game?
Even an afternoon spent fencing with Edmund at the Queen’s tiltyard could not keep him free of Emmeline. He felt her gaze before he saw her. He parried Edmund’s blade aside, then shielded his eyes as he searched the balconies at Whitehall. He saw her then, standing alone at a railing just above, watching him. He swept his hand before him and bowed low.
Was that a glimpse of a smile? What did she hope to achieve by following him?
But still she didn’t go away, so he turned back to Edmund and gave her the show he was capable of. Edmund stumbled back a few paces, eyes wide. He glanced between Alex and Emmeline speculatively, then brought his sword up and attacked. Steel met steel and rang repeatedly through the tiltyard. Soon Alex’s breathing became labored, and his arm felt afire. He had never beaten Edmund before, for Edmund had raised himself up from poverty through mercenary work, and his body was massive because of it. Alex was good enough to survive a duel, but Edmund was good enough to survive a war.
Inside Alex’s focused mind he and Edmund were youths again. Edmund had been the best friend of his childhood, a poor laundrywoman’s boy who’d never shown fear of his masters, only belligerence and stubbornness. After a fight, the two had become fast friends, and as they’d aged, Alex had insisted Edmund be his squire, instead of the noble boy who fostered with the Thorntons. Side by side they’d learned and trained, until Edmund had left to make his own way in the world.
Suddenly with Emmeline watching, Alex was determined to hold his own.
And Edmund knew it. With a grin, he increased the tempo, increased the power of his sword thrust. From somewhere Alex thought he heard the sounds of men cheering, the call of bets.
Emmeline gripped the balustrade so hard that the stone scraped her palms. The skill and grace Alex displayed were mesmerizing. She could tell that Edmund would soon triumph by sheer size alone, but Alex was crafty and intelligent, as she already knew.
With a sudden flurry of motion, Alex drove hard at Edmund, who stumbled back and tripped. As he landed on his backside, Alex knocked his sword away, threw back his head, and laughed.
Then he turned and looked up at her, as did all the soldiers in the tiltyard. She was on display, conspicuous beneath the glare of the sun. But it didn’t seem to matter. All she could do was stare at Alex, who wore a sleeveless leather jerkin that bared muscular arms the likes of which she’d never seen displayed. She’d been held tightly in those arms, pressed against that body he now used like a weapon. She felt overheated and overwrought, and very aware that he was a man and she a woman, because his eyes told her so.
Suddenly he dropped the sword and came toward the palace.
With a gasp, Emmeline drew back from the edge of the balcony and fumbled for the door handle. She knew he was coming to her.
All week she’d followed him, taking notes on his behavior, telling herself she would use it all against him somehow. Yet she’d said nothing to her sister so far, even as she’d watched Blythe open Alex’s letters, or set his gifts next to all the others she’d been sent by various admirers.
All Emmeline had accomplished was to make Alex suspicious, and now he was coming for her.
A little thrill shot through her as she ran through a dimly lit parlor set aside for the Queen’s ladies. Thankfully, no one was about to see her haste. She went out into the corridor, where there were enough people that she was forced to slow to a walk.
“Lady Emmeline,” Alex called in a loud voice, “might I have a word with you?”
She glanced over her shoulder and saw him at the far end of the wide corridor. She picked up her pace, knowing none of these important courtiers would know who she was. No one would care that she was ignoring Alex—except Alex.
She turned down the next hall, then ducked through a door leading to one of the queen’s private gardens. A sudden brisk breeze made her shiver as she pressed her ear to the door. When the handle shook, she gasped and tried to hold the door closed with her body.
“Emmeline!”
His voice was low, intimidating. She could not fight him on strength alone, so she lifted her skirts and ran, knowing the paths that circled the elaborate marble sculpture almost as well as her own gardens. She heard the door slam open, then closed. Her breath came rapidly in her chest, she was almost gasping—but she wanted to laugh, to fling her arms wide at the exhilaration of the chase.
“Emmeline!”
He was close now, just on the other side of the statue. She skirted a pear tree, then ducked through a vine tunnel, which was ripe with the new greenery of spring. She just knew there was a door through the wall somewhere. Queen Elizabeth liked to have more than one exit, in case her life was in peril.
Emmeline came out of the tunnel and saw the door across a patch of blossoming flowers. She had taken one step away from the gravel path, when suddenly Alex caught her arm, spinning her about.
With a cry she tripped and fell backward, tangling her legs with his and landing amidst the daffodils. He came down on top of her.
The weight and pressure of his long body felt dangerously intriguing, touching her in all the places that burned. Wide-eyed, she stared up into his shadowed face. He wore a small smile but said nothing, just used his lazy, dark gaze to roam her face and settle on her mouth.
Emmeline was stunned by how delicious sin could feel. No man had ever touched her like this, and she felt the first inkling of uneasiness. Alex wielded a special kind of power, making her feel like she was the only woman in his mind—at least, for that moment.
The sensation was…overpowering.
Every breath she took pressed her breasts even harder against his broad chest. Her hands shook where they touched his hot, bare arms that had just performed feats of incredible strength and skill. Even though all their clothes separated them, she could feel his thigh between hers, resting against her.
Her mouth was suddenly so dry that she had to lick her lips, and she discovered with astonished wonder that this somehow affected him, because he tensed against her.
It was up to her to stop this. She had to master her emotions, fight him, force him off her.
But all she could manage was, “Alex, you should stand up.”
“I should, should I?” he murmured, his laughing gaze sweeping her face.
“I mean you must.”
He lifted himself up the slightest bit, and his gaze continued from her face to her neck to her chest.
“You’re very comfortable, Emmeline.”
She sucked in a breath, then wanted to groan because it only made her ridiculously large chest look bigger. And he was staring at it!
She slapped at his shoulder. “Please, Alex, stop looking—there!”
“Where?”
“You know! My—my—”
“Your breasts?” he murmured.
She sucked in a breath. “It is improper for you to say such things.”
“But ’tis the truth. I’m looking at your breasts.”
A blush burned her cheeks.
“And they’re surely a lovely sight. Shall I describe how they make me feel?”
With a gasp, she covered her breasts with her hands. A groan rumbled through his chest, vibrating deep within her.
“Maybe I don’t have to describe what I’m feeling,” he whispered, leaning down over her. “Can’t you tell?”
He slowly ground his hips into hers, and she felt something lon
g and hard and dangerous. She gaped at him in shock, so embarrassed that she felt suddenly warm and wet between her thighs. What was the matter with her?
Alex lowered himself even farther, until their mouths were dangerously close. She saw nothing but his face; her world was the strength of his body, and she was frightened because it felt so right.
“Don’t I even deserve a kiss for all you’ve put me through?” he murmured.
“A kiss!”
She pushed against his chest, and he rolled to his side almost too easily. She scrambled up and away from him, brushing down her skirts, feeling for leaves in her hair.
“No kiss?” he asked in mock sadness.
She meant to give him her best glare, but he suddenly rolled onto his back in the yellow daffodils, folding his bare arms behind his head as if she’d just left him in bed.
Oh my lord. A wild, wicked side of her wanted to lie back down with him. What was he doing to her—no, what was she allowing to happen?
“Why the sudden blush?” Alex asked.
“Was not your—your—groping enough of a reason?”
He looked so relaxed, stretched out at her feet, as if he was not nearly as affected as she was. She whirled and stalked away, but he quickly rose and appeared at her side.
“Emmeline, surely I deserve to know why you’ve been following me.”
“Is it not obvious?” she retorted.
“Have you been reporting my activities back to your sister?”
She caught her breath and looked away. “Not…everything.”
“And what does that mean?” he asked, tugging on her arm and pulling her to a stop.
How could she explain? She hadn’t told her sister all the truth, not because of Alex, but because of her own unusual behavior. Every decision she’d made where he was concerned turned out wrong. Even if she told Blythe that she’d been following Alex for Blythe’s protection, was it true? Or was it only her own curiosity, the fact that she was enjoying his scandalousness too much?
She’d become a different person somehow, a woman who truly understood how much she was missing, what she’d never have in her life. And it hurt.
