Madcap Miss

by Claudy Conn

  Felicia pouted, realized she was pouting, and dispensed with it. “Well, drat that. It is the worst part of this adventure. I wish she could stay on with us and make the trip to London as well. What fun we would have.”

  Becky had gotten up and walked near enough to hear this last and said with a small snort, “I daresay every moment you are awake is a terror of adventure, Felicia.”

  “Yes, but now I should like you to join me in my adventures,” Felicia said and laughed. “I shall miss you terribly,” Felicia added, genuinely distressed over this.

  “Madcap!” Becky pronounced. “I don’t mean to let you slip out of my life so easily.”

  Felicia moved and put an arm about her new friend’s waist. “I don’t know how it is, but I feel as though we have been friends forever, or at least should be.”

  Becky laughed and said, “I quite agree.”

  Scott grinned and took up another apple tart and downed it, appearing well pleased with the situation. He swallowed and added, “Aye, I agree with Flip. Don’t think we should allow your father to take you away.”

  Felicia smiled and turned back to Ashton. “So if you aren’t writing Becky’s father … oh, you must be writing home? No doubt a wife … or sweetheart?”

  He refrained from the mirth that nearly choked him and said gravely, “I am not married and do not at the moment have a sweetheart.”

  Their eyes locked as before, and Felicia felt the breath catch in her throat. “Ah, no wife, no sweetheart? I am surprised.”

  “Are you?” he asked and then wickedly, his eyes bright, he said, “Perhaps it is because I have too many of them to write them all.”

  Her face must have shown her dismay, as he laughed and said, “I am only jesting, love, only jesting. But, you must have realized by now that I don’t allow anyone to question what I do or don’t do, but in your case, I shall make an exception, this one time.” His gaze swept over her face, and his eyes were warm as they looked into hers. “I am writing to my sister, whom I was to have met. By now, she may be seriously worried. There, minx, are you satisfied?”

  Felicia blushed and noted that Becky was eyeing them curiously. Oh, what must she think? Felicia almost giggled like a schoolgirl. His words had made her giddy with pleasure.

  It was at this moment, however, that Becky’s attention was taken by Scott, who had put a few questions to her. As the two put their heads together, laughing over some anecdote he told her, Felicia once again met Ashton’s eyes. Oh, she thought, I am quite thoroughly taken—so very taken with this titan of a man.

  * * *

  An hour later, Becky’s father arrived on the scene, and a tearful meeting took place that warmed all their hearts.

  Between tears and laughter, hugs and handshakes, he whisked his daughter off. There was an awkward moment when Ashton felt a twinge of guilt as he continued the lie of omission during the introductions. There might come a time in the future when the squire would discover that he was actually not Mr. Glen Ashton but the Duke of Somerset, and what would he think? He should have introduced himself as the Duke of Somerset; it was the only right thing to do, but he simply wasn’t ready to give up his identity. Perhaps this omission would go unnoticed?

  Scott sighed and looked forlorn as he watched Becky leave. He then announced that he was fatigued and would return to his bed for a nap. Ashton turned to see Felicia sigh sadly.

  She was tireless. Like him, restless. What they both needed was to get out. “Shall we take a bit of a ride, you and I?”

  Her face brightened at once. “Oh, yes.”

  He found himself reaching for and receiving her hand. It was a thrilling experience. He couldn’t remember ever feeling this way before when he touched a woman’s hand. A shiver rushed through his body, and he couldn’t think of anything he wanted more than to be with this imp of a woman, watch her flitting expression, look into her eyes … kiss her.

  Kiss her? Where had that come from? Damn, but if he were honest with himself, he had been wanting to kiss her from the first moment he’d found her.

  When they reached the stables, Felicia meandered over to a small, grassy paddock. A stranger’s horse was prancing about and snorting. Ashton watched her as she watched the handsome gelding.

  He followed and stood by her. After a moment, he said, “Come, Felicia … they have our horses saddled.”

  She turned to him, and, for a moment, she took, literally took, the breath right out of his lungs. She was stunning. Every single time he looked at her, he found her more beautiful than the last.

  Without trying, with her hair blowing about her uncovered head, she simply caused his breath to hitch in his throat. She smiled and said lightly, “Yes, of course, but do look at him. Is he not handsome?”

  Ashton glanced again towards the snowy gray prancing about and ignoring the hay that he had been given in a pile in one corner of the paddock. “He is … now come, and I will give you a leg up.”

  She eyed him. “You do always want to have control, do you not?”

  “I know what is needed,” he said simply, “and attend to it.”

  It was at that moment that the owner of the gray turned, and Ashton’s eyes narrowed as the man actually looked Felicia over from her head to her boots.

  Ashton had a sudden urge to commit the man to the ground when Felicia politely inclined her head towards the gallant smiling too warmly at her.

  Ashton knew she was still naïve enough not to snub a young man for smiling at her, but he saw that the bloody devil took it as encouragement.

  Cross, as much with himself for allowing her to be in such a situation as with the young man, he leveled a withering look at the bold man and saw her take note with a repressed giggle. She seemed to swallow a laugh, and he said softly, reprimanding her, “Ignore him and come with me.”

  “Yes, master,” she teased.

  He ignored this and said as she took her reins, “Up with you on the count of three.”

  He saw her mounted, and as she adjusted her black velvet riding skirt around her gelding, he walked over to the groom holding his horse. He took up his reins to nimbly mount, landing lightly into his saddle.

  The owner of the snowy gray had, during this short time, managed to sidle up to Felicia. He patted her horse’s neck and told her quietly, but within Ashton’s hearing, “What a charmer, the like of which I have never seen before.”

  She arched a brow at his bold meaning and lifted her chin. “You cannot mean that, as your horse is far more prime.”

  “I wasn’t speaking about the horse,” he answered, and this time his smile was a leer.

  Ashton had already maneuvered his horse and came around to tell the young gallant, “I don’t think we have been properly introduced, nor do I think I intend that to happen.” So saying, he nodded to Felicia and made certain she started off by giving her horse’s rump a light pat.

  A giggle forced its gurgling way out of her throat. She grinned at Ashton, looked back at the gallant Ashton had summarily dealt with, and giggled again. “You were quite dreadful to that poor young man,” she told him.

  “He was ogling you and deserved worse than I gave him, and he dashed well knows it.” Ashton frowned. “It is my fault taking you about without even a maid or a groom in attendance. Men will get the wrong idea, you see.”

  Her expression flitted over her features as apparent dawning lit in her brain, but instead of shock, she burst out laughing. “Oh! That is why he was so very forward. I wondered at it.” So saying she laughed again and added, “So then he thought me a veritable light-skirts, eh?”

  He turned a shocked expression to her. “Felicia!”

  This only made her laugh even more, and he found himself joining in on her mirth, at which point she said, “Come on, then, if we mean to ride before we lose the best of the day.”

  “As you command, m’lady,” he returned grandly, giving her a mock bow from his saddle and trotting his horse up to ride alongside her.

  “Be careful,
madcap,” he said. “You can’t canter him off now, as I see you mean to do, without a proper warm-up.”

  “I have been riding for as long as I can remember, often without a saddle,” she answered with her brow up. “I know what I can and cannot do.”

  Scott’s horse under him nipped playfully at her horse, and he reprimanded him. Felicia laughed, he presumed with the joy of being on horseback, and during that moment he realized he had never been happier.

  Just what—what was happening to him?

  ~ Thirteen ~

  FELICIA WAS WELL aware what her heart was experiencing and just what was happening to her. She had fallen hopelessly, endlessly in love with Glen Ashton. She knew so very little about him, about his life, his family, but she didn’t need to know details. She loved not only the look and cut of the man, but she loved the way his mind worked.

  She had had ample opportunity to observe him in several complicated and exhilarating situations in which another man would not have so excelled. He had shown his mettle in each and every encounter they had experienced together, and she was more than impressed. She was thoroughly enamored. The only problem was, she wasn’t sure he felt anything close to what she felt.

  She could see, for she was a woman with very good instincts, that he was more than a little attracted to her. She could see that he was holding himself back, for there had been several times she thought he was about to kiss her but then he did not. No doubt he thought her the innocent she was and did not wish to hurt her? Well, she was going to have to do something about that, wasn’t she? He was a man of the world. There was no doubt in her mind that his mistresses were widows, or even married, but never maids. His honor would make him resist her, and she didn’t want him to.

  What then? Ah, she would have to be bolder than an innocent maid and perhaps find a way to break down that resistance of his? Yes, she would break down that sense of honor that kept him from taking her into his very desirable arms—that was the ticket, as her Scott would say.

  “So, then, you rode over hill and dale all your life without a saddle, did you?” He smiled.

  “Oh, not often, but, yes, very horsey, my family. It was natural for us, living in the country, and as a young girl it was acceptable to play the hoyden and have more fun than a prim miss might in London at her stitching.”

  “I can just see you running amok, with that glorious hair of yours all around your beautiful face,” he said almost wistfully. He sighed. “But I see you know well how to play the lady, which you shall have to do in London, you know.”

  “Play the lady?” She took no offense. “Indeed, I am a lady, but I have no wish to put on airs simply because I mean to have a season.”

  She saw it then, she saw it in his smoldering eyes, in the way that his breath caught in his throat. He was leaning in towards her as though he was about to take her hand …

  But she didn’t want him to take her hand. She wanted him to take her waist and bend to kiss her. She slowed her horse with just that intent and eyed him as flirtatiously as she knew how. Scott would have laughed right out loud, but Ashton didn’t laugh, not at all.

  “You are many things, my beauty, a hoyden of a wild child for one, a lady who knows just how to carry herself, and an emerging woman.” He did, in fact, take up her gloved fingers, move the cuff from her wrist, and place a warm and lingering kiss there.

  Shivers swept through her body, and she trembled at his touch. If his kiss to her wrist could do so much—what then when he kissed her lips? “So, you think that,” she stuck in breathlessly if only to try and ease herself, “I shall manage with the very pink of the ton?”

  “I am,”—he inclined his head with a chuckle—“considered to be amongst the ‘pink of the ton’ and can tell you that for those of us who enjoy seeing past the veneer of the new debutantes hopeful of entering our world, you shall manage very well. In fact, you have the carriage of a duchess.”

  He said that with such feeling that she glanced at him for a very long moment and answered, “Do you think I would care for the opinions of people who put value on all the wrong things—like that? It isn’t the fashion I choose to wear but the heart I carry.” She shrugged. “I don’t give a fig for who is ton and who is not, but I might enjoy attending their routs and balls.” She laughed at herself over this.

  “Bravo!” He smiled warmly at her. “Now that is the duchess in you.”

  They bantered in this style, about manners, hers and society’s. She ventured questions about some of the famous fashionables she had read about and listened raptly to his descriptions, until all at once she noticed they had reached the cottage in the woods.

  “Oh, did you mean to ride here—to this cottage for a reason?”

  “Yes, I wanted to give the place a thorough going over. Perhaps a clue might be found as to where the other two men took off to. I haven’t forgotten about them, you know. The magistrate sent off a note that their prisoners aren’t yet speaking honestly about anything and probably don’t know where the other two have gone.”

  She pulled her horse to a halt and jumped neatly to the ground. He frowned at her and said, “And that is another thing you must learn to do.”

  Oh, she thought, she loved his silver eyes. “What other thing must I learn?”

  “To allow a gentleman to assist you, even if you can do it yourself.”

  “Always? Must I always allow every gentleman that comes along to assist me?” she said coyly, drawing him closer with the curve of her lips and the sway of her body.

  He was towering over her then. “No,” he answered firmly, and his arm slipped around her waist and drew her in close, so close the delicious scent of him wafted through her brain and made her lean into his hold.

  His embrace was gentle at first, but suddenly, as though a dam had broken, he crushed her to him and his mouth covered hers. His tongue teased her lips apart and found her receptive tongue and taught her the steps to a new and exotic dance she had never done before.

  He took his time, as his velvet tongue gave her a first lesson, and he responded to the way she molded herself into him. His kiss blossomed into another and then another.

  She couldn’t breathe and didn’t care. She wanted this. She wanted his kisses, and his hands on her body just like this was thrilling. She wasn’t a fool. She knew this didn’t necessarily mean love … perhaps, at the moment, it was lust. Perhaps?

  Could she make it blossom—could she make him love her? She couldn’t think straight. She only felt, she only desired. She wanted to be a woman—his woman!

  Indeed, she rather thought she could go on kissing him forever. She simply had to make him love her as she loved him.

  When he let her up for air, she surprised herself by being collected enough to smile and softly ask, “Is that another thing I must learn?”

  “No, no, again, sweetheart. You need no lesson there.” He then set her aside with obvious resolution and moved towards the cottage, saying only, “Stay with the horses.”

  She did, but her eyes followed him in total adoration. Here now was a man. Here now was her knight in shining armor. Her stepmama had said for every woman one would come, albeit the armor would be different for each. Here was the man of her dreams.

  ~ Fourteen ~

  FELICIA WASN’T SURE when the thought came into her head. Was it during dinner that it had hit her what needed to be done? It could have been. She could still feel the sensation that rocked her when their gazes had met and held. She felt as though she was burning from the inside out.

  At the moment she was overwhelmed. Her body was flushed and needing something that made her clench her thighs. She had at one point closed her eyes when his hand had lingered on her bare arm. Her belly had tightened, and she had been flooded with desire. She knew, absolutely knew, she was a fallen woman, or would be very soon. Men had awful rules. She would be a fallen woman if she broke those rules—the rules of men, even of most of the women of her time. There were other women who wrote about break
ing free from such constraints, and her beliefs matched, in part, with theirs.

  She knew he would not come to her room.

  There was no point in hoping and waiting for that to happen.

  Thus, she had made up her mind and, with that mind-set, had taken extra care with herself, dabbing a bit of the scent he had purchased for her to her ears and between her naked breasts.

  She stood before the mirror and regarded herself in the flimsy, creamy-colored and lacy nightdress. She could see her nipples pressing up against the transparent material, and they were hard and made her yearn just as the cleft tingling between her legs made her yearn.

  She was like a mare in heat. What an awful thought, but it was true. It was nature … natural.

  If she waited till everyone was no longer about, she could make her way to his room unseen. Would his door be locked? She would have to try, and if it was locked … then it was not meant to be.

  She had to try. Soon he would accompany them to London and leave her there at Scott’s aunt, and she might never see him again. She couldn’t bear it. She had to make a push to make him feel more for her, want her even more … need her.

  If she gave herself to him. If she pleased him and herself by so doing … would he want her forever? What would he think of her? She was going against all the social rules of the day—would that make her less in his eyes? Men took what they wanted. He wanted her … if she offered herself, would he take her?

  It was a chance she simply had to take. She bucked up her spirit and went to her door, cracked it open, looked about the dark hallway, and hurriedly tiptoed over the creaky wood to Ashton’s door, a long distance from her own.

  She stood there, rattled with herself, with fear, with expectations, with hope, and then reached for the latch. It opened with scarcely a sound, and she went inside, closed it quietly at her back, and stood, uncertain what she should do next.

  The room was clothed in black shades of night. Only small embers burned in the fireplace grate, giving off shadowy silhouettes.