Last Night With the Earl: Includes a Bonus Novella

by Kelly Bowen

  Not that he could talk to Rose about it. Eli hadn’t seen her since that night. She’d made him promise to take this time for himself. To get his affairs in order and to devote his full attention to the birthright that was now his. His days would be hectic and exhausting, and her presence, she had said, would only be a distraction.

  She had been logical and gentle and practical, and he had detested all of it. In the end she had been right. His days had been hectic and exhausting and had required all his attention.

  But she’d been wrong too. Because her absence during those days, and even worse, the nights that followed, was more than distracting. It was becoming all-consuming. Eli had sent messages to her at Haverhall, brief accounts of his progress and longer descriptions of just how much he missed her. But words written neatly on a paper to a woman he couldn’t touch did not even begin to fill the chasm that had opened within him or assuage the need that was growing with every passing minute. The polite, encouraging responses he got back were not enough. Promises be damned, he wasn’t going to survive another hour if he couldn’t see her. Touch her. Be with her.

  “My lord?” Dufour’s rich baritone reverberated from the doorway.

  Eli looked up. “Yes?”

  “The Duke of Stannis is here. He has requested a moment of your time.” The butler made a small moue of distaste, the duke’s prominence seemingly no match for the impolite hour at which he had chosen to call.

  There had been a handful of callers already who had left cards, curious or courteous or both, but all no doubt anxious to get a look at a newly undead earl. Stannis was the first to catch him at home, and Eli was quite sure the hour had been chosen deliberately.

  “Shall I tell him you are unavailable, my lord?” Dufour asked.

  “No. No, that’s fine.” Eli stood and retrieved his coat from the back of his chair. One did not cut a duke, no matter the hour.

  “One of the duke’s sons is with him, my lord.”

  Eli frowned and made his way out of the study. It had been his father who had known Stannis, not Eli, and he could only assume that the duke was here out of deference to the late earl. Eli could not remember ever meeting any of the duke’s sons, the family choosing to reside on its northern estates. So why they were here, in London, in his formal drawing room, and at a peculiar hour, was a little baffling.

  Eli’s boots rang across the marble hall, and he pushed wide the drawing room door that had been left slightly ajar. “Good evening, Your Grace,” he started, but that was as far as he got.

  A pair of eyes the color of a summer sky washed pale by heat met his. Though on this day they weren’t exhausted and red rimmed or set into a soot-blackened face. On this day they were clear and steady and set into a face with a strong nose and a wide jaw, topped by a shock of sandy-brown hair.

  Eli set his hand on the edge of the door as if that would keep him steady.

  “Good evening, Lord Rivers,” greeted a heavyset older man who was standing ramrod straight near the hearth. “It is my honor to welcome you home. I believe you have already met my youngest son.”

  “Lewis Linfield.” The young man inclined his head, his eyes fixed on Eli. “Your servant, my lord.”

  Eli’s gaze slid down Linfield’s finely tailored coat, stopping abruptly where his left hand should have been, his cuff pinned neatly back just below the elbow. “Jesus,” he croaked. “You survived.”

  “Because of you.”

  Eli let go of the door, taking a careful step farther into the room. A bubble of what felt like joy and relief was expanding, pressing up into his chest, and making it difficult to draw a full breath. He reached out and touched Linfield’s shoulder, as if to make sure that he was real. “You stayed on that damn horse.”

  Linfield nodded, his summer-blue eyes suspiciously bright. “I still have that damn horse. Brought it home with me. When it bolted, it bolted straight north. Straight back behind our lines. Surgeons got to me in time.” He glanced down at his empty sleeve. “I don’t know that there are words that will ever be adequate to thank you. You have no idea how many times I’ve replayed that moment over and over in my head. How many times I wondered why you did what you did. Why you chose to save me and not yourself.” He looked up at Eli again, a dark anguish twisting his expression. “I saw you fall.”

  Eli looked away, memories sending cold tendrils creeping through the joy and relief. “As it turns out, I don’t kill very easily.”

  “You let everyone believe you were dead.” It wasn’t an accusation.

  Eli closed his eyes briefly. “Some wounds take longer than others to heal.”

  “‘The private wound is deepest,’” Linfield said softly. He caught Eli’s look. “It’s from The Two Gentlemen of Verona. Shakespeare,” he said, almost apologetically. “I didn’t mean to—”

  “No,” Eli murmured. “You are exactly right.”

  Behind his son, the duke cleared his throat. “My son is right. There are no words that can adequately express our gratitude. Nothing that will ever be able to repay a debt such as the one I owe you for saving my son.”

  “I didn’t know he was your son—”

  “I am aware. No one did.” The duke pinned both Eli and Linfield with a hard look. “He should never have been on that damn field,” he said. “He defied me, fled in the night, and joined the artillery corps with an invented name.”

  Despite himself, Eli felt his lips twitch.

  The duke glared at him, though the effect was ruined by his obvious pride. “You did something of the same, I understand. Your father and I commiserated with each other over our willful, honorable sons. And how we would throttle you both when you returned.”

  Eli swallowed with difficulty, his throat suddenly thick. I think your father was proud of you, Rose had told him. He hadn’t really believed her until now. Hadn’t let himself believe it.

  “I hope the two of you are each blessed with a dozen boys,” the duke was saying. “Each one more headstrong and reckless than the both of you combined.”

  Linfield turned to Eli. “I didn’t tell anyone about…the circumstances of what happened,” he said, looking uncomfortable. “Not even my father. Not until now. Not until I heard that you had come home.” He searched Eli’s face. “I knew who you were. And I heard you call the other officer by name. The one with the pistol. The one who…”

  “Shot me?”

  Linfield’s throat worked. “Yes.” He glanced at his father. “And I didn’t know how I could ever justify or explain…”

  “There is no justification or explanation for such cowardly actions,” Stannis growled. “And to give them any additional attention serves no purpose. But your actions, Lord Rivers, will not go unheralded. Or unrewarded.”

  Eli drew back. “Your Grace, your son’s survival is all the reward I require. There is nothing else I need.”

  “Don’t be daft, Rivers. Despite your modest professions, there will be something, sometime, that you will need. And when you do, you will come to me, and I will make it happen. Is that understood?”

  “Yes,” Eli nodded, knowing it was pointless to argue.

  “We will be hosting a ball in your honor at our London estate a fortnight from today. I know that it is not exactly the pinnacle of the social season, but as the new Earl of Rivers, you will wish to renew as many acquaintances as possible in the coming weeks. Reestablish connections and regenerate relationships. From experience I can tell you that the faster you can do that, the easier it will be to regain your footing.”

  “I can assure you, the extravagance of a ball is not necessary,” Eli protested.

  “It was my wife’s idea,” Stannis said with an ominous expression. “So if we’re talking assurances, then let me assure you that it’s very necessary.”

  Eli glanced at Linfield. The young man gave him a helpless shrug.

  “Additionally, you will come to dinner tomorrow,” Stannis informed him with the authority of a man used to being obeyed. “The duchess ha
s invited a number of our closest family and friends, if only so that you’ll have some familiar faces in the crowds that you’ll face in the weeks and months to come.”

  “Your Grace, that is too much. I can’t impose—”

  “Save your objections for an argument you can win, Lord Rivers.”

  Eli shook his head ruefully. “In that case, it would be my honor to accept your invitation to dinner.”

  “Much better,” the duke grunted. “You may be a humble man, Rivers, but you might as well prepare yourself to be properly welcomed home as the hero you are.”

  Chapter 18

  Rose was wrong.

  He would have made a fabulous thief, Eli thought, as he levered himself silently through the window that had been left open to the warm night air. He had no idea what time it was when the Duke of Stannis and his son had left his place, but he didn’t care. There was nothing and no one that existed in this world that would have kept him from coming directly here.

  Something had broken deep within him and soared free this night. Seeing Lewis Linfield standing tall and proud before him had changed something. Perhaps it was the proof that what Eli had done had made a difference. That his actions had not been in vain. He wanted to tell someone that. Stand on the rooftops and shout it into the night. But he didn’t. Because there was only one person he really needed to see—one person who would understand everything. The way she had always understood him.

  Which was why he found himself slithering through a half-open window of the cottage that housed both Rose’s studio and her rooms, perched on a far corner of Haverhall’s expansive grounds. He needed to see Rose, promises of distance and work and space be damned. He was certainly not going to wait until the morning.

  “Don’t move.” Her voice came out of the blackness as he straddled the sill awkwardly, the tip of something cold and sharp against the side of his neck. He froze, and the bulky box he had brought with him dropped to the floor with a dull thud.

  “If that is another paintbrush, Rose, I’m going to be disappointed.”

  There was a beat of silence, and then the pressure at his neck disappeared.

  “Dammit, Dawes, what are you doing here?”

  “I would have thought that was obvious.”

  He heard her curse softly. “Hurry up, then.”

  Eli swung his other leg over the sill, then yanked his muddy boots off and left them beneath the window. He couldn’t see her in the darkness, but through the faint scent of turpentine, he caught the exotic, warm fragrance that he would always associate with Rose.

  “You shouldn’t be here,” she said quietly, lighting a candle and setting it aside on a tiny table.

  Eli glanced around, taking in the simple furnishings in the small, shadow-filled room. A bed covered in plain gray sheets, rumpled because she had been disturbed. An unornamented armoire, a plain wooden washstand and chair. A small jar of white roses, their fragrance mingling with hers. “I’m sorry. I should have used the kitchen window.”

  “I don’t mean my bedroom, Dawes. I mean here. At Haverhall. You promised me that you wouldn’t—”

  “I lied.” He turned back to her, her hair shining like fire in the candlelight, her eyes dark, unfathomable pools. In a single step, he closed the distance between them and brought his mouth down hard on hers. He felt her stiffen, and then in the next heartbeat she melted against him, kissing him back with the same desperation that was pounding through him. His hands cupped her face, his lips devouring hers. She tasted faintly of wine and that perfect, intoxicating sweetness that was Rose. She opened beneath him, and his tongue swept hers, exploring all of her velvet heat.

  His hands dropped to her back, pressing Rose more tightly against him, as if that could bind her to him forever. “I’ve missed you,” he whispered against her mouth.

  Rose kissed him again, one of her hungry kisses that made him wonder why he had ever let her leave him, if only for three days. She was his, he thought fiercely. No other man would ever hold her like this. No other man would ever draw her clothes from her body, worship her with his hands and his tongue, and hold her as she shattered in ecstasy. He wanted her. Needed her. Loved her. Mind, body, and soul. She belonged to him. Now and forever.

  Eli pulled back slightly, breathing hard with the staggering certainty of that thought. He loved her. More than he’d thought it possible to love someone. And it wasn’t a new love born of mere lust and attraction, the sort of infatuated love that skated over the polished surface and was afraid to look too closely at what might lie beneath. No, this was a love that had started before he understood what it was. A love that had faced every difficult thing and had endured.

  “Are you all right?” Rose whispered.

  Eli squeezed his eye shut, his scars tugging. “Yes.” He’d never be more all right than he was now. He opened his eye and stared down at her. “He survived,” he said.

  In his arms Rose stilled. “I beg your pardon?”

  “The boy. The gunner I put on that horse. He stayed on that horse and somehow made it back to our lines. His name is Lewis Linfield. Youngest son of the Duke of Stannis.” His throat tightened again, and it was suddenly difficult to speak. “They came to my house. And when they left, I came here.”

  She slid her arms around his neck and kissed him softly. “Then I’m glad that there is someone else who saw what I see now, Eli Dawes.”

  He exhaled, a shaky, ragged sound. “And I can’t hate him anymore,” he managed. “Anthony.” With those words he had finally identified what had broken in him. That hatred and despair that had followed Eli back from the battlefield had evaporated, replaced by hope and a belief in something better. And Rose was part of that.

  “Good,” she said. And if she had anything else to say, she never got the chance because he was kissing her again. The first kiss, he thought ardently, of what would be a lifetime of kisses. A lifetime of confessions and debates and laughter and lovemaking.

  His fingers tightened in her hair as he teased her lips open, his tongue dueling with hers. The coals that had been smoldering since he had first pulled her into his arms roared to life, an inferno of longing that he was powerless to stop. Everything around him seemed to recede, this connection between them the only thing that mattered. He deepened the kiss, a prologue to and a promise of what would come next.

  He felt Rose’s hands at his throat, her fingers tugging on his cravat. He pulled back, allowing her space to work. The linen fluttered to the floor, followed by his coat and waistcoat. And then her fingers were on the buttons of his trousers, and they too slipped down his legs. His cock surged free, heavy and hard, covered by the hem of his shirt. Flames licked across his skin, and he shuddered at the sensation.

  Rose stepped closer, releasing the single button at his collar. With slow, agonizing movements she drew his shirt over his head and let it drop carelessly to the floor. He heard her make a small sound of approval as she reached out to touch him. She ran her fingers down the center of his chest, over the ridges of muscle that marked his abdomen, and stopped just shy of his erection.

  “I want to paint you like this,” she said, and her voice sounded a little hoarse.

  “Not right now, you won’t,” Eli growled, dipping his head to nip at her jaw.

  “No,” she gasped. “Not right now.” Her hand slipped down, and she wrapped her fingers around the base of his cock, sliding them up until they found the bead of moisture that had gathered at the head.

  Every muscle in his body hummed with pleasure, his blood roaring in his ears.

  Rose released him and pushed him back until he could feel the edges of the bed against the backs of his legs. Slowly he sank down onto the mattress, his hands settling at her waist. He pulled her toward him, his thighs caging her own legs, his body straining toward her.

  “You’re wearing too many clothes,” he murmured.

  Rose’s hand drifted to the sash of her robe, then tugged on the loop and released it. Her robe slipped open, and E
li realized she wore nothing underneath. He let go of her waist and pulled the robe to the side so that she was standing before him wearing nothing but the glorious mass of fire that trailed over her shoulder.

  Eli’s hands came back to her body, and he stroked the ivory skin at her shoulders, her throat, and then lower, circling but not quite touching the gentle swells of her breasts. She shivered and arched her back in a silent plea. He covered her breasts with his palms, capturing their perfect weight, and then caught her nipples between his fingers, tugging and squeezing gently.

  “So gorgeous,” he whispered.

  Rose’s breath faltered, and her eyes fluttered closed. Eli leaned forward, and his mouth replaced his fingers, licking, sucking, teasing. He heard her moan, and his hands dropped over the curve of her hips to cup her ass, and he hauled her up onto his lap. She was straddling him now, her knees braced on the edge of the bed, his cock trapped and throbbing between them. He let his fingers slide lower over her buttocks and around, until they found her hot, slick center at the juncture of her legs. He pushed a finger into her heat, and her head tipped back in abandon.

  She looked like a goddess in the candlelight. A goddess of fire that tempted gods and brought them to their knees. His goddess.

  Eli lifted one hand and curved it around the back of her neck, bringing her lips back to his, and he ravaged her mouth, setting a tempo with his tongue. Rose rocked her hips, her lower belly rubbing up against his erection, and Eli groaned as that simple friction ignited a new firestorm of pleasure. Without hesitation her small hand slipped between their bodies and grasped him, stroking his cock in time with his tongue. The edges of his vision dimmed, and he broke their kiss, wanting more than to simply rut against her hand.

  “I want you,” he growled against her ear. “I want all of you.”

  He twisted, pushing himself farther up on the bed. Rose lifted herself away from him and retrieved something on the floor near the edge before returning to kneel at his back.