“Grab your… your command of Latin has me agog, Spathfoy.”
She was talking vocabulary when what was wanted was reassurance. Tye focused on where their bodies were close but not joined. “What about this? Does this leave you agog?”
He pressed forward, not even an inch, and she went still. “Oh, Tiberius.” She gave a luxurious roll of her spine, as if she’d take him into her body all at once. “Yes, please. That leaves me quite, quite…”
He did it again, not enough to penetrate her sex but enough to tantalize. Her legs closed around his flanks, a snug hold embodying reassurances of its own.
The moment of joining his body to a woman’s was a little interval of tedium, usually. It bridged the gap between preliminaries and escalating pleasure, and yet it required focus and patience.
With Hester sighing and moving beneath him, Tye wanted to prolong their joining in all its aspects. He moved slowly, slowly in the advance-and-retreat rhythm of coitus. He offered her kisses; he offered her an embrace that cradled her close and cherished that closeness at the same time. He shoved his own gratification as far from his awareness as he could, listening instead for the signs that her arousal was gathering steam.
“Tiberius?”
“Here.”
“This is… Oh, God.” She convulsed around him with no more warning than that, bowing up to clutch at him while he resisted the temptation to drive into her faster and harder. When her pleasure subsided, he stilled.
“Are you all right?”
“Uhn.” She drew her foot up the back of his leg.
“When you plan your trousseau, you must add a number of pairs of wool socks, Hester.”
“I’m not planning anything at the moment.” She sounded dreamy and sated, poor dear.
“I’m planning something.”
Against his chest, Tye felt her eyelashes flutter open. “You are the sort of fellow who’s frequently planning something. Maybe you’re planning your journey south.”
“My journey to points south on your body, perhaps.” He started moving again, slowly, but with purpose. “Shall you gallop again, Hester, and feel the wind in your hair?”
“Again?” She lifted her face to peer at him by the waning firelight. “Isn’t it time you sprang your own horses, so to speak?”
“Soon.”
For form’s sake, he pleasured her once more without permitting himself to spend; and because he was a gentleman, he did not labor the point any further. Because he was human and male, he in fact could not labor the point any further.
“Tiberius, can we do this all night?”
The wonder in her tone did his heart good. “Eventually, but because you are inexperienced, to persist much longer would leave you sore.”
And himself dead or committed to an asylum for men who’d suffered excesses of self-restraint.
“Sore?”
“You’re going to want a soaking bath in the morning.”
“I see.”
“Hester?”
She nuzzled his neck, which he took for as much answer as he was going to get. He shifted so his mouth was right near her ear. “Hold me.”
She’d long since caught the knack of moving with him, and closed her arms and legs around him. “You’ll fly with me, Tiberius? Take the last fence with me?”
He’d meant to pull out. Coitus interruptus was a term even the scholars failing their Latin knew before they left public school. The sweet, snug heat of her removed this useful phrase from his vocabulary, though, flung it right out of his mind, tossed it far from his heart.
He thrust steadily, hard and deep, and within moments felt her sex fisting around his cock in great, clutching spasms.
“Tiberius, please.”
She sank her nails into his arse, bit his shoulder, and obliterated his awareness of anything save the soul-deep pleasure of joining her in a shared moment of ecstasy. He gave up his seed into the welcoming depths of her body, gave up his self-restraint, his heart, his all in the act of loving her.
* * *
“Aunt Ariadne, what are these trunks doing here?”
Hester examined the brass hasps on three large valises airing out in the hallway of the family wing.
“One never knows when one might go on an extended journey.” Ariadne thumped past at a stately gait. “Perhaps I’ll head south soon and avoid the coming cold weather.”
“Cold weather is still months off.” Weeks, anyway. Hester gave the trunks one more puzzled glance, then followed the older woman to the head of the stairs. “I can’t believe you braved the steps merely on a whim, Aunt. What is going on?”
Ariadne did not have to look up very far to face Hester, but rather than do that, she laid one hand on top of the other on the knob of her cane. “I do believe dear Ian has come to call again, and with more rain threatening by the moment. Go greet him, Hester, I’ll be along directly.”
Something was afoot, something wild horses and handsome Cossacks could not pry loose from Ariadne This puzzle added another touch of unease to a day that was already unsettled, probably because Spathfoy would be leaving in less than twenty-four hours.
While Hester would be remaining behind. She wasn’t going to tell him “no,” she was going to give him a “maybe”—an encouraging maybe, an almost-certainly-yes maybe, but a maybe nonetheless. She could not leave Fiona and Ariadne alone, for one thing, particularly not when the child had been through so much upheaval already.
And she needed time to sort out her feelings, to parse infatuation from deeper attachment, to test her own judgment. How she would convey these things to Tiberius had yet eluded her, but she hoped on the strength of their growing friendship that he would listen and give her the time she requested.
“Ian, welcome!” She accepted the earl’s green-eyed scrutiny and his kiss to her cheek. “You’ve come alone?”
“Aye, my countess says His Bairnship might be coming down with a wee cold, so I’m left to wander the heather all on my lonesome. Has Fee been running you ragged, Hester Daniels? You look a touch fatigued.”
“I’ve been up late reading old journals.” Not a lie, but Ian’s steady scrutiny suggested he understood it for a half-truth. He patted her hand and laid it on his arm. “We’ll feed you some scones and tea, flirt with you a bit, and you’ll perk up in no time. Ariadne MacGregor, are you scampering about unescorted again?”
Ian did flirt, and charm, and yet all the while, Hester had the sense he was masking an alert watchfulness, and then it occurred to her Tye was not yet in evidence. Hester had seen him cantering up the drive—yes, she’d watched out her window like the veriest schoolgirl—which meant he was likely in the stables, fussing his horse.
“If you’re looking for Spathfoy,” Hester said, “he’s not yet back from making arrangements to ship Flying Rowan down to Aberdeen on the train. Tea, Ian?”
“Of course. Where’s my little Fiona, then? Did she cadge a ride with her bonny new uncle?”
Ariadne glanced up from the tray. “The child is in the library, reading and drawing pictures. She’s taken to drawing lions and is getting quite good at them.”
Ian accepted his tea and stirred it slowly. “If she drew one more unicorn, I’d have to paste a horn to poor Hannibal’s forehead. I’ll look in on the girl before I go. You’ve not said anything to her?”
He aimed his question at Aunt Ariadne, which was odd. Hester had been the one to greet him, and if Fiona had learned Ian was visiting, she would have dropped her lions and stories and insinuated herself into her uncle’s company in the next instant.
So what had he meant, about not saying anything to Fee?
Ariadne glanced at Hester fleetingly. “I haven’t said a word.”
Hester set her cup and saucer down carefully. “Is there something you two aren’t telling me?”
“Yes.” From Ariadne.
“No.” From Ian.
They exchanged another glance, then Ian shot to his feet and went to the window. He spoke with
his back to them. “Am I to understand Spathfoy has said nothing to Hester?”
Ariadne remained seated. “As far as I know, he’s said nothing to Hester or Fiona.”
“Said nothing about what?” Hester didn’t recall rising, but she was somehow across the room, beside Ian, her gaze locked on his.
“Now, lass, there’s no need to get into a dither. We’ll get it sorted out soon enough.”
She wondered wildly if Jasper Merriman had decided to come visit her in the Highlands. “No need to get into a dither about what?”
Ian shot her a single, tormented glance. “Come with me.” He took her by the wrist and led her toward the door. “Ariadne, if Spathfoy shows up, kill him for me.”
“Of course, Ian.”
“Ian, you are not making sense. Why would you want to kill—?”
He came to an abrupt halt outside the library door. “The sodding bastard is taking Fiona with him when he leaves tomorrow, Hester. That’s been his purpose for coming here, though I suspect he’s a reluctant minion for old Quinworth. I’ve come to tell Fiona she’ll be taking a journey with Spathfoy, though how I’ll look that child in the eye—”
He looked away. His grip on her wrist was nearly painful.
“Spathfoy is taking Fiona from us?”
Ian dropped her wrist. “I canna stop him, lass. The local courts can’t help, because Fee’s possibly an English citizen. Mary Fran left me no documents, and Spathfoy has an affidavit from the marquess. The old man swore in writing that Gordie’s will says Fee is to be raised by her paternal relatives. We will get her back, though. I vow that to you and to the child herself.”
He sounded as if he was trying to convince himself, but all Hester could think, all she could take in, was that Tiberius Flynn had become her lover all the while he was planning on stealing Fiona away to be raised by strangers.
Her lover, and if he had his way, her fiancé. Doors were slamming, Ian was speaking, but Hester could not make sense of the words over the thundering of her heart.
“Balfour, I wasn’t aware you’d scheduled a call.”
The voice was coldly, obscenely beautiful. Hester could not face the man who spoke, the man who’d joined his body so tenderly to hers just the previous night.
“Fiona deserves at least a day to make her good-byes,” Ian said. He did not offer Spathfoy his hand, and at that moment, Hester would have been glad to see Ian draw a pistol on their guest.
Their guest. Her would-be fiancé, Fee’s long-lost uncle, Hester’s suitor—his list of transgressions grew with every breath Hester took. She fisted her hands at her sides and raised her chin to meet Spathfoy’s calm green-eyed gaze.
“My lord, perhaps you’d like to join us. Ian and I were just about to explain to Fiona that you’ll be taking her to live in England.”
“To visit,” Ian said though clenched teeth. “It might be a ten-year-long visit, though I can assure you, Spathfoy, it will be the longest, most miserable ten years you or your benighted excuse for a father pass on earth. I will bankrupt you with lawsuits, spread the scandal wherever I go, trade on my acquaintance with the Sovereign, and deluge my niece with letters, ponies, and visits from her Scottish relations until that girl comes home to the people who love her—and my efforts will be as nothing compared to what Mary Fran and Matthew will do.”
Hester risked a look at Spathfoy’s face. His features might have been carved in marble, so austere was his expression. “You do what you must, Balfour, as do I. Miss Daniels, I regret that you’ve learned of this development from someone other than myself. I had intended to tell you after the meal tonight.”
Was he insinuating he’d have told her when she was naked and panting in his arms?
“Ian has spared you the trouble, my lord. Perhaps we ought to concern ourselves with conveying Fiona’s good fortune to her?”
She kept her voice perfectly, lethally civil.
Spathfoy looked uncomfortable. “Hester, I had hoped to be able to tell the girl you’d be joining us on our travels.”
“Hopes get dashed with appalling regularity, my lord. Ian, this task is not made easier by putting it off.” She took Ian’s arm and let him escort her into the library, leaving Spathfoy to trail after them and close the door quietly.
“Uncle Ian!” Fiona shot away from the big estate desk and wrapped her arms around Ian’s waist. “Is Aunt Augusta with you?”
“She is not, though you’ll see her soon, I’m sure. What have you been drawing, Fee?” He hoisted her to his hip, as if she were a younger child, and carried her to the chair behind the desk.
“I’m working on my lions, like the lion that was Androcles’s friend. I can’t get the nose right, but I thought I’d go out to the stables and look at the cats, and maybe that would help.”
“Any excuse to visit the stables, right?” He sat with her in his lap, leaving Hester to go to the window and try to shut out the conversation taking place. She was aware of Spathfoy standing beside her and tried to shut his presence out as well.
“Fiona, you know your uncle Tye must leave us tomorrow?” Ian’s voice was conversational and pleasant, not at all the tone of a man imparting bad news.
“Yes, but he might visit again, mightn’t he?”
“He’s your uncle, so we’d never turn him away, but he’s offered to take you with him on his journey. To take you on the train clear down to Northumbria.”
Ian made it sound as if this were a grand adventure, an unparalleled opportunity, and viewed dispassionately, perhaps it was.
More likely, Spathfoy’s “offer” would ruin a fragile child’s last prayer of happiness. Hester wiped a tear from her cheek and tried to figure out what, exactly, Spathfoy had done wrong. She wanted to name his sin and hold it close for as long as it took to forget him.
“If you’ll agree not to do this, I’ll marry you, Spathfoy.” She kept her voice low while Fiona asked Ian a question about how fast the trains went.
“You’d hate me if I accepted that offer, Hester. I’d hoped you would understand. This is for the child’s own good, though if the choice were mine, I’d leave her here.”
“The choice is yours.”
“It is not.” He held out a handkerchief to her. She ignored it and fumbled for her own.
“Tiberius, how could you?”
She hated herself for asking, mostly because there was no explanation he could offer—not for stealing Fiona away, not for lying about the purpose of his visit—that would ease the ache in her heart.
“We’ll talk.” He squeezed her shoulder, which had her fisting her hands at her sides again lest she tear into him physically. Perhaps he sensed her growing ire, because he moved away.
“I don’t think I want to go right now, Uncle Ian.” Fiona fiddled with a pencil as she stared at her drawings. “I’d rather wait until Mama and Papa come home, and then we can all visit together. You and Aunt Augusta and Aunt Hester can come too.”
“But not your wee cousin, eh, child?” Ian had switched to Gaelic, which meant Hester had to concentrate mightily to follow the sense of his words. “I do not want to hurt Spathfoy’s feelings, Fee. His old papa wants to meet you, and that’s your own papa’s father.”
“Is he as old as Aunt Ariadne?”
“He’s quite old,” Ian said, letting the inference of impending death hang in the air. “I would hate for him never to meet you, Fee, as bonny as you are.”
“I’m your favorite niece.” She dimpled at this long-standing joke.
“You’re Connor’s favorite niece too. He’ll come call on you with your aunt Julia, to be sure.”
“I miss Uncle Con.”
“I would be very proud of you, Fiona, if you accepted this invitation. You have aunts at Quinworth, and I’m thinking there might even be a pony or two.”
Hester silently commended Ian for that.
“A pony?”
“Possibly two, though Spathfoy will have to teach you to ride them. You might even find a pet rabbit
. An English marquess can surely afford a pet rabbit for his favorite granddaughter.”
“A rabbit?”
Hester glanced over to see Spathfoy was studying the rose gardens beyond the terrace. The damned man would be procuring a menagerie for Fiona at the rate Ian was making promises to the child.
“And I’ll write to you, Fee. We’ll all write to you, and I’m guessing your mama will go directly to Quinworth when she comes back to England.”
“But that’s why I don’t want to go.” Fiona hopped off his lap. “Mama will think I did not miss her because I went to Grandpapa’s, or maybe she’ll think I’m angry at her.” Fiona had spoken in English and crossed the room to take Spathfoy’s hand. “I don’t want to hurt my mama’s feelings.”
Spathfoy glanced down at the girl who peered up at him. Hester held her breath, waiting for some imperious pronouncement spoken in clipped, precise tones.
Instead he went down on his haunches and met the child’s gaze. “Now here’s a difficulty, Niece. I don’t want to hurt your mama’s feelings, either, but I have my papa to deal with. He asked me to fetch you south, and I told him I would.”
“I can write my grandpapa and tell him you tried very hard. I’ll come visit as soon as Mama says I can.”
Spathfoy studied her much smaller hand in his. “Your uncle Ian is right, Fiona. Your grandpapa is not a young man. I think he’s looking forward to meeting you very, very much.”
“Do you have a pony there?”
“I’m sure we can find a pony for you.”
“And you’d teach me to ride it?”
Hester could not watch while Spathfoy reeled the child in—guddled her trust—with the means Ian had handed him.
“You already know how to ride quite well, if my experience with you on Rowan is any indication, but yes, I will provide what instruction you need.”
“And a rabbit?”
Spathfoy bit his lip, probably the first time Hester had seen the man hesitate over a word. “I’m not teaching you how to ride a rabbit, Niece. I’ve no notion how such a thing would be undertaken.”
Fiona grinned hugely. “No, Uncle, may I have a rabbit for my pet when I’m at Grandpapa’s?”
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