Engraved (A Private Collection)

by Fresina, Jayne

  Her mind was quite made up about him, just as she knew his was about her.

  Her body, however, went its own way.

  Chapter Four

  He listened to her steps retreat and then he left the parlor, moving quickly to the narrow stairs. It wouldn’t particularly bother him if the maid saw, but he knew it would upset Lina. So he was very quiet, curbing the excitement that leaped and bounced through his gut and up into his throat. The upper floor was cramped, the ceilings low and uneven. There were three small rooms, one he immediately identified as hers. The scent of violets led him to it, drew him in. It was a very feminine room, cabbage roses on the wallpaper and lace trim on the bed linens. He caught his reflection in the cheval mirror and smiled broadly, checking his teeth. All in their place, no food caught between them. Good.

  Somewhere below he heard a door close and his heart beat slowed. He listened intently. No footstep on the stairs yet. She must be placing a guard over the fire in the parlor or locking the front door.

  He slipped off his jacket and threw it across the chaise at the foot of the bed. She’d better not keep him waiting. Unbuttoning his shirt, he stepped up to the window and peered out in time to see a small, plump figure he assumed to be her maid closing the front gate and walking away across the common.

  “Let’s get a few things straight.”

  Surprised, he turned, shirt open, one hand paused at his cuff. He hadn’t heard her steps approach despite being attuned to every sound in the cottage, his senses on high alert.

  “This is merely sexual intercourse,” she added smoothly, brows arched, hands clasped before her like a schoolteacher addressing a troublesome pupil. “Nothing more than that.”

  He continued undressing, his arousal encouraged further by the word sexual on her refined lips. The more prim, distant, and haughty she acted, the more he needed to get her into bed and make her scream for mercy. Taking out his pocket watch, he checked the time again before he placed it carefully on her bedside table. Almost twenty minutes past noon. Appropriate since that was the exact time of day he first laid eyes on her.

  “You will tell no one you came here.” She swept by him to close the lace curtains. “Should we meet anywhere in public, we are slight acquaintances, nothing more. You will never come here again after today.”

  He flung a frown over his shoulder. Still fully dressed, she watched him in the shadowy, drifting light through the lace panels. “Is that all of them? Your rules?” he demanded coldly.

  She nodded.

  “Good.” A deep anger, sharp-set and perilous, took root within. She let him know she did him a favor, lowering herself for this sordid afternoon in his company. If that was the way she wanted it, that’s the way she could have it. “I’m glad we’re of like mind, Mrs. Phillips. No complications, no attachments, just sex. Emotions make things messy, don’t you think?” He let his trousers drop and then stepped out of them. “Just plenty of good, hot, hard, pulse-pounding sex. Couldn’t agree more.” Arm raised, he clicked his fingers at her. “Off with your drawers and petticoats then and let’s get down to it.” He paused, contemplative finger to his lips. “This is a convenient time of the month for you?”

  She didn’t flinch at his crude mention of such a delicate matter. “That depends what you mean by convenient.” Her words whipped out, sharpened with scorn. “None of this is convenient.”

  He grinned slowly, not in the least put off by her prickles. Whatever she said, he knew it must be a safe time for her or she wouldn’t have let him come upstairs. She was a woman with two ex-husbands and probably several past lovers, yet she’d never had a child, so she must know what she was doing.

  “Well, I’m ready,” he muttered, one hand reaching down his body to stroke and show-off the overt sign of his concupiscence.

  One of her dark brown locks had just fallen loose at the side of her neck and another was ready to follow. She was looking at his body, particularly the part of him standing at attention, as it had been since he held her chin earlier and saw the sparks of restrained temper wallowing within those prismatic, intoxicating eyes. She always tried on the mantle of a harmless, demure lady, but that passionate temper could never be fully hidden. On the outside she was cool as a cucumber. Inside she was on fire. It might have chased other men away, it would never frighten him. Adam Blackwood dearly loved a challenge. A fact he was newly discovering thanks to the stubborn, pernickety Mrs. Phillips.

  “You have no rules to discuss about this arrangement?” she inquired snappishly, punctuating the question with a frigid smile. “I find it hard to believe you’re agreeable to all mine, while you have none of your own.”

  She was trying to delay, he realized. He just wasn’t sure whether she lost her gumption, or whether she did it to titillate him further. “There are no rules for me when it comes to sex.” He let that remark linger, heating the room a few more degrees. “Nothing is off limits, Mrs. Phillips. For either of us.” Point made, he thought, beyond negotiation, he dropped back onto the bed with a languid sigh and stretched out, hands behind his head. “Hurry up, madam.” He grinned, unable to stay solemn, victory at last within his grasp. “You have a purchase to negotiate.”

  * * * *

  She undressed slowly, making a mute objection to his unseemly haste and, at the same time, ensuring he knew she was unaccustomed to shedding her clothes in the middle of the day. His proprietary tone, his assumption that she owed him something, was simply outrageous. If this singularly ill-advised encounter was going to happen–and apparently it was, since she wanted her painting back, and she was incapable of resisting the wretched man’s allure–she would make her protest known by delaying as long as possible.

  Finally down to her corset and chemise, she sat on the edge of the bed and instantly felt his fingers on the laces, too impatient even to wait for an invitation. Her hair fell, dripping down her neck, tickling her shoulders. She closed her eyes and told herself to expect nothing from this. Her hopes had been dashed before. First as a naïve virgin on her wedding night, sacrificed to a man who rushed in carelessly before collapsing in a drunken stupor all over her. Then with her second husband, who shared her bed only rarely, a duty to be disposed of efficiently and with as little emotion as possible.

  Freed of her corset, she exhaled in relief. His hands now loosened the rest of her hair, working speedily, careful not to pull, placing each pin side by side on the little bedside table. She glanced over at his clothes, neatly folded and laid across the chaise. He was too orderly. How many times had he done this, she wondered acidly. Too many.

  Outside her window a bird chirped merrily, reminding her it was the middle of the day, an innocent, spring day about to be sullied by the two of them. On the common a dog barked. It echoed around her head, spiraling in an endless vortex. Her heart hammered away, vibrating through her lungs. With trembling hands she lifted her chemise over her head and tossed it to the carpet.

  “After tonight you will give me my painting back, Mr. Blackwood,” she said, turning to look at him, hair falling over her breasts. “Send it back to me in the morning. Or I can fetch it myself.”

  One hand cupping the back of her head, the other around her waist, he drew her closer across the quilted coverlet. “We’ll discuss that later,” he breathed, his eyes intense, focused on her mouth. “Now kiss me, Mrs. Phillips.”

  “I’m thirty-five, you know.”

  “That’s nice.”

  “No, it isn’t.” He wasn’t even listening, she thought desperately. “You’re…too young.”

  His hands tugged more insistently until their lips almost collided. “I’m thirty.”

  “You’re just twenty-nine.” Evangeline knew his birthday was in December, an entire nine months away. December the thirty-first, to be precise. It was the kind of detail she’d gathered about him that she probably shouldn’t care about. Like his penchant for lamb with mint sauce, that when he was five he broke his arm falling off a rocking horse, and at nine he turned a whip
on his old nanny when he caught her kicking his dog. She also knew all his clothes were made by the same Saville Row tailor, and that he had one cashmere scarf he refused to part with. “I’ll be thirty-six in August,” she added. “And you’ll still be twenty-nine.”

  A little grin swept his mouth and she felt it against her own. “Kiss me, Mrs. Phillips. I’m running out of patience. You know how young people are.”

  And so she kissed him.

  He swept her hair back over her shoulders while his lips parted hers, his tongue taking quick possession. Her nipples were hard, burning, and when his palms grazed over them, almost casually, she shivered, a low purr resonating deep in her throat. He groaned in reply and lay back, sliding her over him, pressing his hands to her spine, stroking up and down, holding her body to his, length to length, heat to heat, skin to skin.

  His body was rock hard, well exercised, probably seldom idle. She felt his manhood shift and thicken, pressing into her belly, but he wouldn’t let her up. He made her lay on him for a while, his fingers stroking her, holding her bottom, squeezing it gently.

  He must have shaved shortly before coming to her, she realized. His cheek smelled of citrus and rosemary, stirring her appetite. She hadn’t meant to be an active participant, but Evangeline changed her mind with a rapidity that surprised and alarmed her more lady-like side. Before she could prevent herself, she slid down, her tongue darting out to caress his nipple, lavishing the tiny bud with hungry attention. When her lips closed around it and she sucked, he arched beneath her, his hands tightening, fingers spread around her bottom, his head pressed back into the pillow. She’d never done this before, but imagined it, speculated how it might please a man as it did a woman.

  His breathing changed and she sucked harder, moving from one nipple to the other, alternately licking and teasing. Then, stretching over him again, she reached for his lips, kissing him as forcefully as he had kissed her, letting her breasts stroke his chest, nipple to nipple. Lightening, white-hot desire flashed through her mind, through her body, and into his. He pressed first one knee and then the other between her legs, parting them. His erection was enormous, she realized, slightly bewildered by it, reaching down to feel it in her hand, to run her fingertips along the rigid veins, to rub her palm over the throbbing head.

  Curious, she slid down for a better look and he moaned, breathless, hitching up onto his elbows. “Ride me.”

  Bossy, she mused. He could wait until she was ready.

  He thrust his hips at her and she bent her head, taking the crest into her mouth, slow and careful, tasting cautiously. Salt, sweat, and musk. She licked the tip and sucked up the liquid pearl that quivered there.

  “Ride me, Lina,” he grunted out her name, jerking her up by the hair.

  She laughed. It burst out of her. Oh God, the neighbors!

  Afraid he might become loud and demanding if she delayed further, Evangeline straddled his hips, up on her knees. He fell still except for his chest heaving with each rush of tortured breath. His dark eyes were barely open, but she knew he was staring at her intimately. She thought briefly of covering herself in a sudden moment of shyness, but he read her mind. In a flash he reached for her wrists, pinning her hands to her bare thighs.

  “No,” he muttered, low and husky. “I want to look at you.”

  Want, want, want. There it was again!

  He arched once more, this time pressing the soles of his feet on the bed, lifting his lower body until the sticky head of his cock touched her where she was already sensitive, swollen with desire.

  It’s only intercourse, she reminded herself. Nothing more. Just lust, plain and uncomplicated.

  Wicked.

  Wonderful.

  His feet anchored to the bed, his strong fingers around her wrists holding her hands to her thighs, he lifted again and she felt him, pulsating and hot, pushing at her threshold. She spread her knees, lowering her body, the need to feel him inside her almost brutal now, ravaging her senses. She’d wanted to make him wait, but it was impossible.

  When he thrust a third time, she cried out and then the weight of his hands pressed her down onto him. There was a moment of shock and she tensed on impulse, but the dripping, heavy heat quickly returned to relax every limb, every inch. She opened to accommodate his length and then closed around him tight, felt the ripples snaking through his shaft, his pulse aligned with hers. Evangeline had never experienced this before, never needed this much, neverimagined this level of delight. Sex before this was either a painful duty or a wearisome chore, as regular and eagerly anticipated as washday.

  Tears pricked behind her eyelids. She threw her head back, stifling a sob of intense pleasure.

  She’d gone into this with her eyes open, expecting nothing.

  But nothing would never be the same again.

  He bucked and shuddered under her, his eyes fierce, his dark hair sticking to the perspiration on his brow. Clamping her thighs around his hips, she stayed in the saddle, taking him over every jump with a mastery she never knew she had.

  * * * *

  The flesh and blood woman was even better than the fantasy, he mused, thrusting again, his gaze pinned to her breasts as they jostled above him, the nipples lengthened, dark ruby red with lusty arousal. He curved his torso upward, tongue stabbing out to lap at her, to wet those tender gems and make them swell.

  As the noon sun strengthened, fumbling through the lace curtains, it left a distorted, shadow pattern of flowers across her belly and his hands, where they now closed around her waist. Tips of sunlight touched the little hairs on his forearms and glazed a thin layer of sweat on her skin. Her perfume was even stronger now and his nostrils flared, drinking it all in. Every creak of the bed, every sizzle of her knees across the quilt, seemed loud in the small room, but above all that was the beat of his heart, drumming frantically in his ears, blood pounding through him with a new energy.

  She was tight and hot and she rode him like an Epsom Derby winner. He thought about flipping her onto the bed and finishing on top in the more dominant position, but it was too late for that. He’d known he wouldn’t last long the first time, yet they had all night, many more hours alone together. And with that happy thought, he let himself spend, violently jerking upward, her gorgeous breasts bouncing above him, her long hair surrounding them both.

  Only as he fell back to the pillow, observing her through drowsy eyelashes, did he see she was scowling, her cheeks flushed, her hair very prettily disordered around her shoulders.

  She’d better not have the gall to complain about anything. He had warned her, shouting out a few seconds before ejaculation. At least he thought he made some sound just before his skull ripped apart and the rushing sound in his ears temporarily rendered him insensate.

  Here it came. “I know I probably shouldn’t expect polite manners from a nefarious Blackwood.”

  He let his head roll to one side as he looked up at her, wishing she was not quite so beautiful, so damned irresistible. No woman should have so much power over him. She was aloof again already, eyes brooding and disdainful. But her lips were still moist from those sultry, steamy moans of bliss and despair. She didn’t fool him. He smiled lazily. “Hmm?”

  “I expected you to withdraw,” she explained, pulling his hands from her waist, shaking off his tenacious grip. “Don’t ever come inside me again.”

  “That wasn’t one of your rules.” He stretched out, wonderfully relaxed, watching her climb off him and reach for her chemise on the floor by the bed.

  “I didn’t think it needed to be said.”

  “I asked you if it was a convenient time of the month.”

  She muttered a low curse, bending over and treating him to a very pleasing view that completely swept any other thoughts from his mind. “Surely you know a man should always withdraw, to be safe…”

  He wasn’t listening at all and her voice drifted away. Finally, it registered in his mushy brain that she was planning to dress. Oh no! He rolled over, wrapped
his arms around her waist and pulled her back to the bed. “We’re not done.”

  She sighed heftily, but let him hold her against his body, her bottom resting in the curve of his groin, her spine curled within the warmth of his chest. “I was going to prepare lunch.”

  “I’m not hungry.” He was ravenous, actually, but he didn’t want her to leave his arms. He’d starve first.

  Adam had never lingered in bed with a woman before. Once the act itself was over, he had nothing to talk to them about and generally was already thinking how to extricate himself from any uncomfortable goodbye.

  On this afternoon, as gentle spring sunshine filtered through a pair of genteel lace curtains, he was thinking about the hours to come and the many ways he could make her climax. She was everything he’d dreamed of and more.

  It was only sex, of course, as she’d said. What else could it be? In a few days he’d return to London and marry Miss Hawkesworth, having gotten this last streak of wickedness out of his system. An itch simply had to be scratched. Once it was over he could set his mind seriously to that new leaf. Obviously this woman needed to be exorcised from his thoughts and there was only one way to do that.

  She wriggled over to face him, propped up on one elbow, her face solemn, thoughtful. “Surely you’re finished for the time being. It will be hours before…”

  For a woman twice married, she was remarkably naïve. With a quick snort of laughter, he led her free hand down his body. “Don’t judge me by your other lovers.”

  * * * *

  Evangeline was astonished. Neither husband had ever managed more than once a night, and that night was usually several days, even weeks, since the last occasion. Of course, she thought grimly, Adam was younger than either husband and considerably more energetic. There was no telling what he might do to her.