She had come down. She fully expected nastiness from him, brazen innuendos, baiting. But as yet he had said nothing.
“Would you like some crimped salmon, Frances?” he asked, his voice as smooth as honey.
She shook her head. She didn’t want anything, be it crimped, broiled, baked, or raw.
“Some boiled capon?”
“Yes,” she said finally, knowing something had to join the vegetables on her plate, A footman rushed to serve her. Of course, she thought. He couldn’t bait her until they were alone.
But he didn’t dismiss the servants. Otis hovered.
Hawk spoke of his long association with the Melchers, a most unexceptionable topic to the point of boredom.
When he took a final bit of plum pudding, he shoved his chair back and regarded her. “I don’t believe I will drink any port. Shall we go to the drawing room, Frances?”
There was no hope for it. At least he hadn’t demanded she go with him to his bedchamber.
Otis helped her with her chair. She gave him a shy thank-you and walked beside her husband to the drawing room.
Frances seated herself close to the fireplace. It had grown cool and there was a small fire burning. She clasped her hands in her lap and stared at the orange flames.
“How do you feel?” he asked abruptly.
She quivered at those particular words. Get a hold of yourself, ninny! She managed to say with credible calm, “I am quite all right, my lord. Quite myself again.”
“A pity,” Hawk said, his voice still smooth.
Her eyes met his, and she saw irony in his, and something else she didn’t understand.
“Would you play for me, Frances?”
He was offering her escape! She nearly leapt to her feet. “Yes, certainly,” she said, her voice so pitfully uncertain that Hawk was hard pressed not to smile.
She launched immediately into a very difficult Haydn sonata, only to discover that her fingers had no intention of obeying her. She slaughtered several measures, then with a grimace lifted her hands from the keys.
Hawk said gently, “I should prefer something more gentle, perhaps. Another Scottish ballad?”
He was standing behind her; she felt his warm breath against the top of her head.
“I don’t know if I can,” she blurted out, so mortified that she wanted to scream and cry at the same time.
Hawk smiled down at her, a painful smile. He looked at her white shoulders and wanted more than anything to touch her, caress her, ease his hands over her shoulders and downward to her full breasts.
He’d been so close this afternoon, so very close. He closed his eyes a moment, his fingers curling at the memory of her exquisite response to him. It had been in those few moments that he had realized that Amalie was quite right. A wife could be seduced, a wife could experience as much pleasure as a man’s mistress. He realized suddenly that he’d been silent too long, and quickly said, “Why don’t we play piquet instead? Should you like that?”
Piquet! She was an excellent player, for her father had drummed rules and strategy into her head at the age of ten. She wondered briefly if she would be able to tell the difference between a king and a jack.
“Yes,” she said, “I should like that.” Why was he being so nice? So very unmenacing?
Frances watched silently as a footman brought in a card table, Otis behind him, holding two decks of new cards.
After Frances was seated, Hawk dismissed the servants. He said to Otis, “Take yourself to bed, Otis. I shall ensure that all the candles are doused in here.”
“As you will, my lord.” Otis paused a moment, his eyes on Frances. She was behaving very oddly this evening, saying next to nothing, eating less, and her face was pale. He said very gently, “My lady?”
The two words held a wealth of question, but Frances merely forced herself to smile at him. “I am fine, Otis. Good night to you.”
Otis bowed and took himself from the drawing room.
“Shuffle and deal the cards, my dear,” Hawk said, “and I shall get us some brandy.”
At least he wasn’t standing over her to see her mangle the deck of cards. By the time he set the brandy snifter at her elbow, she had managed to deal the correct number of cards.
Hawk picked up his cards and sorted them. He said, “Do you enjoy brandy, Frances? Perhaps you would prefer something else?”
“N-no, this is fine.” She raised her glass and sipped. The warm liquid slid down her throat and landed squarely in her nearly empty stomach.
She began to sort her own cards, staring at them stupidly, half-listening to Hawk. “I suppose I became quite the successful gambler in the army. There were stretches of inactivity, you know, and not much for the officers to do after drilling the men. Many times we didn’t play for money, which was probably just as well, as I remember both winning and losing fortunes.”
He looked up and smiled at her. “Four,” he said.
Frances managed to consult her hand with some intelligence. “How much?”
“Forty-one.”
“Equal.”
“Quart,” Hawk said.
“That is good,” Frances said.
“A tierce also, my dear. Three aces.”
Play continued. Hawk found himself a good deal impressed with her skill, but as they continued, she lost her edge rapidly.
His wife, he saw with gleaming eyes, was becoming quite drunk.
“More brandy?”
Frances shook her muddled head and selected a card, a ten of hearts, and blankly watched Hawk gently place a queen of hearts over it. “You did not count,” he said.
At the close of the game, Hawk said lightly as he tallied the score, “Pity we aren’t playing for money. You are in a dreadful situation, Frances.” He dropped the pencil and leaned back in his chair. “A long day.”
“Yes,” Frances agreed, toying with an eight of spades.
“I find myself quite fatigued.”
Her mind sharpened with sudden miraculousness. “I too,” she said quickly.
“You held excellent cards, my dear.”
She shrugged but was forced to agree.
“Shall we go upstairs now, Frances?”
He watched the myriad expressions cross her face. The expression that remained was one of wariness. “What will you do?”
“I think I should like a bath,” he said calmly.
“Yes, I should too!”
“I do not believe that there would be enough room for the both of us, more’s the pity.”
She stared at him, her tongue at half-mast.
He said nothing more, rose, and stretched. She found herself unwillingly looking at him. He was a magnificent specimen, but of course he knew it. Her eyes dropped to her hands, but she saw him with blinding clarity, striding out of the loch, his muscular body dripping water.
She gulped. He was her husband. There could be no more running away. She would bear it. “Will you visit me?” she asked.
That brought him up short, and he blinked. A direct assault, he thought, smiling to himself. Perhaps, just perhaps she was still in the throes of her experience of the afternoon. With the assistance of the brandy, perhaps, just perhaps ...
“I shall think about it, Frances,” he said. He offered her a brief nod and took himself out of the room. His body was throbbing with lust, and he feared that he would ravish her on the drawing-room carpet if he remained.
Frances stared at the embers in the fireplace. Her mind felt sluggish and quite at ease. Her body felt languid. She rose, doused the candles, keeping but one to take upstairs.
Agnes had her bath prepared, and steaming, scented heat reached Frances’ nose as she came into her bedchamber. “His lordship told me you’d want a bath, my lady,” Agnes said matter-of-factly.
“How kind of him,” Frances said vaguely.
It didn’t take Agnes many moments to realize that her mistress was tipsy. She smiled, thinking that her ladyship was going to enjoy herself this night. She g
ave a delicious little shudder remembering the gleam in the earl’s eyes when he had given her instructions. She frowned a bit, seeing that Frances was on the point of sleep in the bathtub.
“My lady,” she said softly, gently shaking her mistress’ shoulder.
“Am I become a prune yet?” Frances said, grinning hazily up at her maid.
“Very nearly. Come now, let me dry you off.”
Frances was a pliant creature, but when Agnes refused to braid her hair, she merely giggled. “I lost at piquet,” she said.
“No wonder,” said Agnes in a starchy voice.
“I did not play as I usually play,” Frances continued, frowning down at her bare toes.
“Probably not, my lady,” said Agnes. “Come, let me help you into bed.”
Frances was on the point of climbing into her bed when she stopped and spun about. “I am hungry, Agnes.”
Agnes sent her eyes heavenward.
“Yes,” continued Frances thoughtfully, her greed growing, “I believe I shall visit the kitchen. Surely Cook has left something about.”
Agnes sent an agonized look toward the adjoining door. She temporized. “If you wish, I can have something sent up to you, my lady.”
“No,” Frances announced, searching for her slippers, “I wish to forage for my own food.”
To Agnes’ utter relief, there came a light knock on the adjoining door. She rushed to open it, saying when she saw the earl, “Her ladyship is hungry.”
Hawk grinned at his wife, who was endeavoring with great concentration to put her right slipper on her left foot. He nodded dismissal to Agnes. “I shall see to her,” he said, and didn’t move until Agnes closed the bedchamber door behind her.
“I understand from Agnes, my dear, that you are hungry?” he asked, coming toward her.
“Why won’t this idiot slipper do what it’s supposed to?”
He watched her sit on the floor, stick her foot out, and try to fit the recalcitrant slipper. “There,” she said with triumphant. “But it looks so very odd. My toes are in the wrong direction.”
He wanted to laugh, but for a moment he didn’t. He was breathing too hard. Her nightgown was spread about her, and her glorious hair hung loose down her back. He looked at the slender ankle and the foot with its toes in the wrong direction.
“Let me help you,” he said, and dropped to the floor in front of her.
“Thank you,” she said with great seriousness.
Hawk took the slipper and tossed it over his shoulder. Then he picked up her foot and kissed the tip of each toe.
She stared at him, befuddled. Then she started to giggle. She wiggled her toes in his face and giggled all the harder.
Hawk bit her little toe.
Frances fell on her back, hugging her sides as she burst into merry laughter.
Hawk stared at her for a moment, then grinned unwillingly. After all, it had been he who had encouraged her to down the damned brandy. His fingers began sliding up her leg.
“That tickles!” Frances cried, and tried to pull her leg away from him.
Hawk held her leg firmly and with his other hand pushed up her nightgown. He had a sudden view, a very close view, of two long white legs. Slender ankles and calves, he saw, and beautiful thighs. Lord, even her knees were lovely. Suddenly Frances, still in the throes of drunken giggles, lifted her other leg and thrust her foot into his chest. It took him off guard, and he landed on his rear, still holding her ankle.
He pulled her toward him, grabbing her other ankle. Her nightgown rose higher as he brought her closer. He held her legs apart, enjoying her wriggling and the ever-increasing view.
Her nightgown bunched about her waist and he felt himself perilously close to the edge of his control. He swallowed.
“Frances,” he said on a gulp.
She tried to sit up and he released her ankles. She balanced herself on her open palms and stared at him owlishly, her legs widespread, her nightgown tangled about her hips.
“Are you ticklish?” she demanded, her eyes sparkling with mischief.
“I ... uh, well—”
He got no farther. Frances lurched to her knees and dived for him. She smashed him onto his back, laughed down at his stunned face, and sent her fingers flying toward his ribs.
Hawk was very ticklish, and her fingers found his most vulnerable spots in a matter of seconds. His laughter burst forth, for the moment easing his nearly painful desire. He finally managed to catch her hands, holding them away from him.
He became instantly aware that she was between his spread legs and that his dressing gown was parted. She was naked against him to the waist. He looked up into her laughing face.
“Frances,” he said very softly, clamped his hands about her arms, and brought her face down to his.
“Kiss me,” he said, and moved his hands to the back of her head, pressing her down.
“All right,” she said agreeably, and pursed her lips.
“Not quite like that” he said, smiling despite his growing urgency. He lowered his hand and lightly parted her lips with his fingertip. “Keep your mouth open but don’t talk. That’s the way it’s done, you know.”
She obeyed him and he thought he would leap out of his skin when her lips touched his. He wrapped his arms around her back and pulled her tightly against his chest.
Suddenly she raised her head and asked with grave seriousness, “Now what do we do? The kissing part is easy.”
“Hmmm,” he said, gently fiddling with a long curl that fell onto is face, “You want to do something else besides kissing now?”
Her expression changed abruptly, and he knew that she was thinking about those few moments in the tack room. Her pupils darkened. Hell, so was he. His hips thrust upward without his conscious instruction, and he saw that she felt him, hard and demanding, against her belly.
“Hawk,” she said, her voice suddenly uncertain.
“Yes?”
“I ... this is all very odd, I think.”
“Not odd at all, I promise you. Come to bed now, Frances.”
Her eyes looked troubled, uncertain, but she was grinning. Ah, the benefits of brandy, he thought as he rolled over, bringing her with him. He grasped her under her arms and brought her to her feet.
He grinned as she had obvious trouble in holding up her own weight. He hoisted her over his shoulder, lightly patting her bottom with the palm of his hand.
When he eased her onto her back, she said in the most worried voice he had ever heard “Where is the cream?”
He blinked down at her. “I really don’t believe that we will have need of it.”
“Well,” she began thoughtfully, troubled, “perhaps you’re right, I feel very odd, you know ...” To his utter surprise, her hips squirmed.
“Frances!” he said, and gulped.
21
In vino veritas.
—LATIN PROVERB
Frances felt her head spinning, and she shook her head back and forth, trying to clear her mind.
“Frances,” Hawk said gently. “Hold still.” He quickly divested himself of his dressing gown and eased himself down over her.
“I saw you,” she said very clearly, staring up into his beautiful face. “You are not nearly so ... grand as Gentleman Dan.”
“Lucky for you I am not,” he said, and tweaked the end of her nose.
“However,” Frances continued, her word so lilting with a Scottish brogue that he could scarce understand her, “however, you are very ... inviting.”
“Thank you. Now, if you don’t mind, I should like to remove this damned nightgown of yours.”
“All right,” she said, and helped him ease it up. When the thin lawn was covering her face on its journey upward, she giggled again, and said, “You look so terribly serious, Hawk, even through my Salome’s veil.”
It’s because I want you so badly I’m going to embarrass myself!
“So you have finally decided to make me ‘Hawk’?” he said as he tossed her
nightgown to the floor.
“I’m beginning to believe that a hawk is a very nice bird,” she said, and to his utter amazement, she lurched up, grabbed his face between her palms, and kissed him soundly.
“Can I look at you, Hawk?”
He blinked, so confused at this new Frances that he couldn’t gather his wits together.
“Please, lie down.”
He complied, feeling very peculiar. He should be easing her, caressing her, whispering encouragement to her. He spread himself on his back. Frances came up on her knees and proceeded to give him serious study, from his eyebrows to his toes.
In his turn, he gazed at her, the intent expression in her gray eyes, the taut dark rose nipples on her full breasts, breasts almost too full for her slender torso, her supple waist. He thought he couldn’t control himself when his eyes fell to her thighs and the nest of chestnut curls. He forced his eyes back to her face, and jerked when he saw she was staring at his enthusiastic manhood. He watched her flutter her hand above him, then very slowly descend until she was slightly touching him.
“Oh,” she said, blinking. “How very odd. You are soft, like silk, I think, but you’re so hard and alive and almost ... throbbing.”
“Frances,” he gritted between clenched teeth. “Please.”
“You want me to kiss you again?”
Lord yes, he wanted her to kiss him, but he knew it wouldn’t occur to her to take him into her mouth. “Yes,” he said, his voice very thin. The damned Scottish chit was seducing him!
He came up quickly, and with one swift movement spun her onto her back. He gently smoothed her hair from her face. He brought his thigh over hers, and closed his eyes a moment at the feel of her smooth flesh against his legs.
He thought he would burst from want, but then she giggled again, so he was forced to laugh at himself.
He had to get control again. He said very deliberately, cupping his hand over her, “Remember this afternoon, my dear? Do you remember how you felt when I did this?” His palm pressed against her, and she looked profoundly worried.
Midsummer Magic Page 24
