“I tried but there was far too much sunlight,” he lied.
Nicole Beauvoire rolled those beautiful eyes and he laughed, grabbing her arm as she walked away.
“Here,” Daniel handed her the journal with detailed observations up to twenty minutes ago. “He’s been gone for…” Daniel glanced at the mantle clock as she opened the journal. “Two and a half hours.”
“Three-quarters.” Her dark head was bent over the open journal and her index finger pointed to the middle of the last page on which he had written. “Minister LeCoeur has been gone for two and three-quarter hours.”
Daniel nodded his head. “Oh, well, that’s different then.”
“There is no need to be rude, Monsieur Damont.”
“Nor, apparently, is there a need for gratitude.” The lady blushed and he added, “And my name is Daniel.”
“You’re correct.” Mademoiselle Beauvoire closed the journal, folding her hands over it and sighing as if he were some old woman to be coddled. “Please, accept my apologies.”
“No.” Daniel shook head and her fine black brow furrowed.
“No?”
“No, I don’t accept your apology.” He leaned forward. “You dinna mean it.”
“What?”
“You dinna mean a word of that apology and we both know it.”
“I did too!”
“No, you did not, but you can have another go if you wish to make it right.”
“Oh, this is ridiculous, but if it will ease your sensibilities…” Mademoiselle Beauvoire swallowed and looked into his eyes with exaggerated contrition. “Viscount DunDonell,” he nodded. “Please accept my apologies for…” She blinked. “Please, accept my apologies for not…”
“See! You dinna even know why you are apologizing.”
“Of course, I do,” she said and he grinned, indicating doubt. “I apologize, Viscount DunDonell, for being rude.”
“There,” Daniel cooed, full of sarcasm as he placed his hands on her delicate shoulders. “That was not so difficult and if you like I can sit here with you while you watch the empty apartment across the way.”
“Shut up.”
Daniel laughed, his arms dropping to his side as he walked toward his bedchamber.
“I’ll just retrieve my book and I suggest you find something to entertain yourself. Joseph LeCoeur will most likely be gone to the ministry for the rest of the afternoon.”
Daniel opened the door to his chamber and reached across the bed, lifting the leather bound copy of Atala from the velvet duvet. The door closed and Daniel spun round only to see the deadly Mademoiselle Beauvoire staring up at him.
“Did ya want my book?” he held the novel out, confused.
The lady took snatched the book from his hand then tossed it on the bed as she continued to stare, making him decidedly nervous.
“You suggested I find something with which to entertain myself.”
“Aye,” Daniel agreed with considerable trepidation.
“Well, I don’t have time to read,” she said, pushing him in the chest. Daniel sat down on the bed, overbalanced and looked up at the woman who was already unfastening the second button of his shirt. “You don’t object do you, Daniel?”
Daniel?
“Hell no, lass,” he chuckled, anticipation widening his eyes the moment Daniel took her sensual meaning. “I don’t mind at all.” She was standing between his thighs and he kissed her neck. “I only hope all future apologies are equally as satisfyin’.”
A feminine tisk of irritation sounded overhead and she thought to step away from him, but Daniel had placed a firm grasp on that lovely backside, whispering, “I’m only jesting, Nicole,” as he kissed her neck just below the ear.
Nicole.
He liked the sound of her on his lips, the taste of her as he made his way down her neck. She pealed his shirt over his shoulders and the lass liked what she found, he could see it in her eyes, her touch. He was forced to let go of her delightful derrière as she impatiently yanked the voluminous sleeves from his arms.
His desire swelled, bolstered by her eagerness as her eyes fell to the counters of his arms like a foundling at a Christmas feast. She was a woman starved and he was determined to let the lass have her fill. He looked down at her hands on his body as they slid rounded the muscles in his chest and the sight; the feel of her touch all but drove him wild.
Daniel leaned back slowly and she liked that too, following him as if joined by threads of mutual attraction. Her palms descended to the flexing muscles of his abdomen as they rolled out on display before her.
Nicole Beauvoire was straddling his thighs, her left hand planted on the mattress as the fingers of her right traced the delineation of his belly as if he were fashioned from glass.
“You like that?” His eyes darted to hers, anxious to capture the foundations of her lust so that he might build on his own.
Her eyes roamed over his chest and stomach, accessing every dip and curve with her lovely hands.
“Yes,” she nodded imperceptible, annoyed to be distracted from her assessment of his form.
Daniel grinned, the airy word winding him tight.
“I’ll not break, lass. Have a good, long feel.”
Her hands splayed on his stomach and he closed his eyes with pleasure, unable to keep them open so that he might witness her shortening breath, her spiraling need. Daniel thought to open them when the moist heat of her mouth closed over his left nipple. He groaned, his hips instinctively flexing, his arms tensing as his hands found her tiny waist.
“Oh, God. Now that’s entertaining, lass.”
Nicole Beauvoire said nothing, moving her warm lips between the taut muscles of his chest. He could feel her soft breasts brushing his hips but his mind was focused entirely upon her lips. She kissed him again were his chest gave way to the flatter, more defined muscles of his abdomen.
Her nose tickled his increasingly sensitive belly and Daniel would have flinched had he not been so aroused. She kissed him again lower, choosing to follow the central line of his stomach. His right hand wandered to the back of her ebony head which contrasted deliciously with the gold of his skin.
He was breathing heavily by the time the lady sat up and pulled the pins from her long hair. The ebony strands fell about her shoulders and Daniel found himself reaching to remove her gown, aching to see her silky hair against her even softer skin.
Her garments were strewn across the floor and she stood before him, more beautiful than Botticelli’s depiction of Venus. But this Goddess was very real and Daniel reached for her, but she stepped away, not allowing herself to be captured.
She glanced at his buckskin and bent down to unfasten only the buttons necessary to pull them from his body. She sat on her knees, pulling the pantaloons from his feet and then her hands were on his thighs. Daniel sat up on his elbows and looked at her as she whispered, “You have such beautiful legs,” her heated breath enveloping his erection.
“Beautiful?” he asked, his voice strained.
“Aye,” the lass nodded, meeting his eye as her hands felt their way up his thighs. He stared, unable to move as Nicole Beauvoire crawled over him. “Very beautiful.”
He swallowed, saying, “I’m glad you like…”
But his mind seized when she pressed her lips to his left hip.
“I do.” The lady lifted her head, her black hair skimming his sensitive length as she moved her head to kiss his right hip. “And do you know what else I find astonishingly alluring?”
“No,” Daniel said, hoping that he did.
“Oui, I think that you do,” she said, her lips hovering inched from the tip of his shaft.
She met his eyes, leaning forward and he was torn between holding her gaze of staring at those moist lips.
“Show me,” Daniel grated through clenched teeth.
His siren ran her tongue lightly round him and he groaned, forcing himself to keep his eyelids open so that he might watch her next caress. The las
s smiled, knowing damn well the torture she was inflicting upon him. He licked his lips, his mouth opening in anticipation of her doing the same.
However, this time she stroked his shaft so gently that all he felt was the tease of her excruciating touch. “You’re killin’ me, lass.”
She ignored him, too lost in her own lust to satisfy his needs. And just when Daniel thought he would fall to his knees and beg the woman to end his torture, she took him fully in her mouth, stealing his breath and his mind.
She touched him only briefly before Daniel was lifting her to his lap least he lose all control. The stunning creature was breathing heavily when she sat facing him, her bare backside settling onto his thighs. Daniel met her clouded eyes and kissed her deeply.
His right hand dove between them, but when he felt her wet, swollen sheath, Daniel grunted with anticipation. He leaned forward to capture her mouth, but stopped short when he felt her fingers wrap round his length.
“I want you like this,” Nicole Beauvoire stared at him, her head falling back as she took him inside.
“Alright,” Daniel groaned his ascend, lifting his hips to drive that much deeper.
She produced a soft moan of satisfaction then clutched his neck, lifting herself on her knees, which was almost as pleasurable as her sinking down again.
He sat on the bed grasping her backside, her breast bouncing before Daniel as she rode him. He closed his eyes, concentrating his attention on their joining the pleasure that she was giving, and taking.
It was that thought that was driving him wild, the obvious desire she had for him. He lifted his hip, matching her enthusiasm, driven by every cry of encouragement. She was so close Daniel could sense her abandonment of all else. Sense her need to find pleasure at this moment, at this time.
And he gave it to her, rolling his hips in one deep thrust as she cried out, shaking in his arms. He watched her for a moment and then closed his eyes, releasing himself and his mind of everything but the woman in his arms.
***
Nicole lay sprawled across Daniel Damont’s chest, sated and spent. Just as, she was sure, every woman the man had ever made love to. Her forefinger twirled around the sprinkling of dark hairs on his muscular chest and Nicole wondered aloud.
“How old were you when you first bedded a woman?” Nicole asked in keeping with the playful tone of the afternoon.
Monsieur Damont chuckled, the baritone rumble curling her toes. “A lady should not ask such things.”
“Of course, I shouldn’t ask but I am.” Nicole positioned her chin on her arm so that she could see his striking eyes. “Perhaps I’m merely curious about the private lives of the British aristocracy.”
Curious if other gentlemen were so gentle in their lovemaking, so affable in their demeanor.
“You're not penning an article for some lady’s periodical, are ya?”
Her heart seized at the sight of his lopsided grin, making Nicole want to know all the more. “How old were you?”
“Guess.”
“Nineteen.”
“Fifteen,” the rogue said, impishly.
“Fifteen!” Nicole raised her head in shock.
“Aye, fifteen.” He absently ran his finger along her bare ribs.
“Who was the lady?”
The viscount lifted his arm and placed it behind his head as he searched the canopy and his evidently countless conquests, for the name he sought.
“Mary.”
“Lady Mary,” Nicole said, thinking how much she disliked that name.
“Oh, Mary was no lady.”
“Obviously not,” Nicole mumbled.
The viscount grinned ignoring her slight of his first paramour as he said, “I was rather large for my age, as you might imagine, and that fact did not escape the notice of our upstairs maid, Mary.”
Nicole watched his alluring lips as he spoke, thinking this man incapable of escaping any woman’s notice.
“A week before my birthday I retired to my rooms, only to find Mary lying atop my bed naked as the day she was born.”
“You could have asked her to leave,” Nicole pointed out with a raised brow.
“Aye, I could have, but Mary was a worldly woman of twenty-one who proceeded to share her knowledge for the next six weeks.” He sighed, adding, “’twas the best birthday of my life.”
The blackguard paused a bit too long in blissful remembrance of Mary the wanton maid, causing Nicole to elbow him in the ribs.
“Oww,” he complained.
Nicole rolled her eyes at the enormous man’s low tolerance for pain. “What happened after six weeks?”
“My brother Lackland, who was seven at the time, went to my mother’s bedchamber and told her that he heard a ghost. A ‘wailing woman’.”
Nicole giggled. “He did not!”
“He did,” the viscount said, affronted. “Of course, my mother dinna believe him, but she walked the lad back to his bedchamber only to hear the ‘wailin’ woman’ with her own ears.”
“Oh, dear.”
“She threw open my door, and there I was, bare arsed and banging away a Mary.” His eyes sparkled at the retelling of the unfortunate scene.
“What on earth did you do?” Nicole asked, burning with curiosity.
“I ran like the coward that I am when confronted by my mother, but she cornered me before I reached the bedchamber door. So I stopped in front of her and she looked me straight in the eye,” he recalled, staring at the wall with affectionate respect. “And said, ‘Just because you can rut with a woman does not mean that you should’.
And then she told me to ‘sleep in the barn with the rest of the animals’.” Daniel Damont looked down at her rubbing her shoulder. “I slept there for a week, in the dead of a highland winter, mind ya.”
“As you deserved,” Nicole pronounced, laying her head on his chest. She nestled against him, still smiling and wanting to stay there for the rest of the day.
The thought was disturbing.
She planted her hand on his exquisite chest, pushing against his strength.
“I’m afraid that I have things--”
“Don’t,” Daniel instinctively pulling her against him, unwilling to let her go. “Just stay here with me a while longer. The weather is miserable and we’ve nothing to do but snuggle.”
“Snuggle?”
The lass said the word as if she’d no notion of its meaning and Daniel leaned back to catch a glimpse of her expression.
“Aye, snuggle.” He wrapped both arms around her waist, luxuriating in her soft heat as she leaned her head back against his shoulder. “Like two rabbits in a burra’.”
“Minus the dirt and smelly fur.”
“It’s a hard woman that does not like bunnies, Nicole Beauvoire, but I shall forgive ya as you’re very warm. I suppose you dislike children too?”
“No, I adore children.” Daniel smiled with surprise, pulling her tighter. “Just not smelly ones. I’ve always wanted…” The lady stiffened and Daniel’s heart clenched. “I always wanted four or five of my own.”
I, a devastatingly singular word. “I’m so sorry you lost your husband before—“
“I have to prepare for my meeting with Minister LeCoeur,” she interrupted, getting out of bed. Daniel felt her loss against his side as he watched her bend down to grab her rumbled dress from the floor. “Are you still willing to help me prepare the meal?”
“I said I would.”
“Yes, well…” She disappeared beneath her dress and emerged, saying, “People say lots of things they don’t mean.”
“And I,” he said with such emphasis that the woman turned to meet his eye. “Am not one of them.”
“Forgive me, Viscount DunDonell,” she said, distancing him and leaving Daniel bleeding on the ground he had just lost.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Nicole stared through her carriage window at the drizzling rain that continued to blanket the capital. She adjusted her coverlet for the third time, finding
it difficult to stay warm. She was cold from the inside out and as Nicole rolled to a stop before the Ministry of Police, she wondered if she would ever be warm again.
As she had been today.
“We have arrived, Mademoiselle Beauvoire,” her coachman said as he opened the carriage door.
Nicole glanced at the ornate building and looked down at her man, his black hat turning gray with a fine layer of mist.
“Please take this,” she handed him a missive, “to the office of Minister LeCoeur.
Nicole sat back and waited, positioning herself flatteringly in the corner of the squabs and trying desperately not to think of Daniel McCurren. She had never met a gentleman such as he, nor, she suspected, would she ever meet one again.
The viscount was so large, so physically dominating yet he never used his size, his pure masculine power to threaten or intimidate her in anyway. The man seemed to have a true appreciation, no more than that, he seemed to have a true affection for the fairer sex that Nicole had never witnessed before.
When he spoke today of his mother there was an underlying respect for the woman that had raised seven McCurren males. He had even admitted, exaggerated thought it may be, his cowardice when dealing with the countess.
How many gentleman of the ton would treat a woman not only as his equal but his better?
Nicole smirked and the rain fell.
The viscount was too good to be true and she reminded herself to be on her guard. She had only known Daniel McCurren a fortnight and Nicole was sure he would disappoint soon enough. It was far better for her not to give him the opportunity to do so.
She would rely upon herself as she always had done and perform the assassination. For men like Joseph LeCoeur never disappointed. They were bastards from the start and at least with the minister, she knew what to expect.
***
Joseph LeCoeur opened the door to his outer office and was surprised to see a liveried coachman speaking with his assistant, Major Rousseau. The two men looked toward him and Joseph knew instantly that he was the subject being discussed.
“Bonjour, Minister LeCoeur,” the coachman bowed. “I have a message…” He pointed to a communiqué in Major Rousseau’s suspicious hands. “My employer, Mademoiselle Beauvoire, has instructed me to await your reply.”
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