The sky was blue, save for the puffy white clouds that listed lazily across it, casting the landscape in sunny gold and dull grey in turns. By the time she reached the orphanage, she felt refreshed and awake. The haze of her dream had lifted if not the full memory of it. At least, she was able to greet everyone with a smile on her face, and not ask immediately if Jeffrey had arrived already.
As she read to the younger children in the play room, she couldn’t get her mind off of him. Knowing that he could arrive at any moment left her feeling on edge and unable to focus on the words that swam before her on the page.
“Captain Pemberton!” one of the younger children cried suddenly.
Barbara jumped, whirling her head around. He was standing in the doorway behind her and, when several children ran up to him with excitement on their faces, he looked downright alarmed.
“Is it true you’ve fought real-life pirates?” a young girl named Kitty asked.
“What?” he laughed, bending down. “Who said that?”
“Fred’s been telling us all about you.”
“Oh, has he?” Jeffrey asked archly. He glanced up at her and Barbara chuckled, shrugging slightly.
“Will you tell us about it? I’m tired of French,” another young child asked, sidling up to Jeffrey and sliding his little hand into his.
“I…ah…”
Barbara got to her feet and went to his rescue. He was trying to be friendly, but it was apparent that he was unaccustomed to the demands of young children. He had a wide-eyed look on his face that almost made Barbara laugh, though she stifled it.
“Now, little ones, let’s not ambush him. Let the Captain breathe,” she said.
“I’ll be happy to entertain you a bit later,” he said to Kitty. “But I’ve some business to attend to with your mistress first. Is that all right?”
Kitty glanced at Barbara, then back at Jeffrey, and nodded. “I suppose.”
“Thank you, Kitty,” Barbara said. “Run along with the others.”
The little girl bounded away, and Barbara watched as Jeffrey rose once again to his full height. As always, she was struck by the physicality of him. Her desire had always before been for a man in her dreams, as noncorporeal as a ghost. The reaction in her body to the closeness of a man of flesh and bone was new and intoxicating.
“Barbara. May I speak to you? …in private?”
Heat rushed to her face. Was he going to ask about last night? Would he apologize? Perhaps explain that he’d gotten carried away and wanted to correct her impression that he was interested in her.
“Of course,” she said breathily. “Right this way.”
She led him to the parlor just off the front entrance to the orphanage. This was the fateful room where children would first meet their adoptive families. Many tearfully happy moments were memorialized in that simple little room. She pushed the door shut, but not all the way. The door rested against the frame, but the handle did not click. The last thing she needed was rumors spreading.
“I fear, Barbara, that I may have done something presumptuous and may have need of your forgiveness,” he said, clasping his hands behind his back.
Barbara’s heart sank.
“Oh.”
“It’s about Fred.”
Barbara couldn’t mask her surprise. “Oh?”
“I should have asked you first, I know that now, but the letter has already been sent. See, I wrote to my superior about young Fred. He’s underage as of yet, I understand, but I thought that I could put a word in for him and see if perhaps, the next time I am sent out, Fred could come along with me. I think he’s a good fit for the navy, and I said so in the letter. I’ve yet to hear back, but…it was foolish of me to push ahead with this plan without bringing it up with you first, and I humbly apologize.”
The image of Freddie aboard a ship, under the tutelage of Jeffrey, setting out on an exciting life that could surely lift him out of his hard circumstances, filled Barbara’s mind. Her heart swelled and she felt herself smiling broadly.
“There’s nothing to forgive, you fool,” she said, stepping closer to him. “You don’t know what this means to me. What it will mean to dear Fred. Oh, Jeffrey—”
Without thinking, she flung herself into his arms and kissed his cheek.
Immediately, the room seemed to tilt on its axis. She could have heard a pin drop in the heavy silence that fell over them as they froze. His hands had gone, reflexively, around her waist, and her arms were around his neck. She could smell the soap he used to shave his face and feel the rise and fall of his powerful chest as he breathed.
He was looking at her with shock on his face. Shock and something like fear. His eyes darted down to her lips.
Animal instinct overpowered her rational mind and, before she could stop herself, Barbara was tilting her head and then…her lips found his.
He didn’t move, not except his fingers which tightened against the top of her hips. His lips were soft, save for the ridge of a scar that cut across the side of his bottom lip on the scarred side of his face.
“Please,” she breathed against his lips. She knew she was being too forward, too wanton, and shamefully bold. And yet she was not above begging him to kiss her back.
Happily, that word seemed to be the key to unbind him, because suddenly his hand was on her cheek, and he was drawing her lips against his. She gasped, the sound of it melting into a tiny sigh as he grew bolder. She pushed herself shamelessly against him and he awarded her with a new fervency in his kiss. When he parted her lips and she felt the heat of his breath, the heat of his tongue, her knees nearly buckled. His hand drifted down to her neck, the pad of his thumb running over the hollow of her throat. The moan that his touch elicited shamed her and she felt herself blushing, but she was powerless against it.
“Lady Barbara!”
Barbara jumped backwards, covering her mouth with her hand. The small voice was down the hall yet, but the sound of small feet barreling toward the room was unmistakable. She took several deep breaths, trying to regain control of her face before the door swung open.
“Colton said I’m not allowed to play with the red ball!” the indignant child said as he entered the room, perfectly oblivious to what he had interrupted.
“Why,” she said. Her voice was breathless, and she cleared her throat. “That’s silly. Let’s see what this is all about. If you’ll excuse me, Captain.”
He looked as flustered as she felt, and his only answer was a silent nod.
Chapter 20
Jeffrey stood in the wake of all that had happened. Barbara had rushed out of the room, still looking flushed. Anyone with any experience who looked at her could tell right away what she had been doing. Her lips had been reddened, her eyes glittering and wild, and her breathing shallow and frantic.
He swayed where he stood. The empty drawing room felt so much larger without her in it. He felt dazed, almost as if he had just woken from a dream. Or a nightmare, based on the panicked drumming of his pulse. Yet he felt more awake than he had in decades. His blood was on fire, his entire body sparking with need.
Why would she do that?
Even thinking the word kiss was too outlandish.
Could I be hallucinating?
Never in his life, never, not once, had a woman thrown herself into his arms like that. Never had a woman looked at him with such naked desire in her eyes. She had kissed him. Not the other way around.
But why? Why would she want to…do that…with me?
His manhood hardened at the memory of her soft breasts pressed against his chest. She was so soft, lithe, earnest yet pliant. Bold yet supplicating.
Is she just naive? A curious innocent toying with desire without realizing the effect it would have on me?
That had to be it. She’d never had a lover before. Because of his disfigurement, and the perfect impossibility of ever marrying him or loving him in any serious way, she felt that it was safe to test the waters with him. She wanted to have some experien
ce in the realm of men before finding a true lover to share her skill with.
A shudder went down Jeffrey’s spine. Despair and longing fought for prominence in his thoughts and he gripped onto the back of a chair, letting his head hang down.
In the silence of the tidy, yet subtly shabby, room he heard her voice ring out from somewhere in the building. She was laughing.
Her whispered word rang in his ear.
Please…
Barbara, that headstrong hoyden of a lady, she with the pertly raised chin and challenging gaze, had begged him to kiss her. Begged.
Christ help him, what a sound that was.
And there she was, off laughing with the children as if nothing had happened, while he stood there gripping onto a chair for balance, half-hard and half-mad.
He had to get out of there before she came back. In his current state he couldn’t account for what he might do if he was alone with her again. The thought of her wrapping her legs around him as he lifted her into his arms and pressed her against the wall flashed through his mind. Her thighs would surely be as creamy and soft as the rest of her, warm and inviting. He could make her beg again. Beg for much more than a kiss. She was too innocent to know how to ask for it in words, but her wriggling hips would communicate clearly enough what she needed.
The way she had sighed against his lips gave him a fairly clear idea of how she would sound with his fingers between her legs.
I need to leave.
Without seeking her out to say goodbye, he fled the orphanage.
* * *
Barbara was glad of the diversion. The ball game badly needed adult supervision, and she was unable to extricate herself to return to Jeffrey. The fact was, her overwhelming desire to go back to him and test the bounds of his propriety further frightened her.
She had made a fool of herself. What must he think of her now? A common harlot dressed up like a Duke’s daughter. Desperate for male attention, she had literally begged him to kiss her, for heaven’s sake!
The thought made her squirm. Embarrassment flooded her so much that she threw herself into the child’s ball game in a feeble attempt to dispel it.
He hadn’t even wanted to kiss her. She’d thrown herself at him and when he hadn’t reacted, she’d had to convince him. If he’d wanted to kiss her, he would have done it himself.
But it didn’t take much convincing…
The warmth of his tongue against hers and the waves of tingling heat that had surged to her most private, shameful parts clouded her thoughts. His arms had been so strong encircling her. He overpowered her, and it terrified her how eager she had been to relinquish all control to him.
You wanted him to ravish you. You still want it.
He was a man of experience. A sailor, an officer, a man.
A man. So unlike the stuffed shirt fops who’ve tried for me before.
Jeffrey surely had been with many women before. Thoughts of his tanned body entangled in the lovely limbs of other women felt like arrows to her heart. And yet, that meant that he knew exactly what she needed. All of these whirling desires she felt confused and disoriented her. He could take her in hand, he could show her the ways of love.
Love?
Perhaps not love. He did not love her, why would he? He needed a true lady for a wife, someone elegant and refined. Not a tomboyish spinster with dirty hems who begs gentlemen to put their tongues in her mouth.
Her cheeks reddened and she prayed that the exercise of the ball game would provide a good enough excuse for it.
So he doesn’t love you. Do you care? A man does not have to be in love to fondle a woman who asks for it.
The word fondle had never seemed so enticing. Even the shape of the word seemed soft and enticing.
It was in this state of agitation that she managed to pass the hour. By the time she had gathered her wits enough to go back into the building, he had left. Her heart sank.
He’s ashamed of you.
“Lady Barbara?” one of the maids asked her, stepping into the drawing room.
“Yes?” Barbara whirled around, plastering a false smile on her face.
“If you’re looking for the Captain, he left some time ago. He seemed in a hurry.”
Barbara nodded tersely. Yes, of course he was in a hurry to get away after she’d coerced him into kissing her.
“Well, he’s a busy gentleman. We can hardly expect him to hang around all day, can we? Thank you for letting me know.”
The maid bobbed into a curtsy and left.
Barbara dragged her fingertips along the back of the chair near where he had kissed her.
No, where she had kissed him. She had been far too forward, and likely destroyed any attraction he might have held for her. Gentlemen didn’t like ladies who were too bold. Wasn’t that what all the gossips in town had been saying about her all along? Well, she’d proved them right.
The walk home that afternoon was perhaps the longest she’d ever endured. Every leaden step felt like a trial.
How could you be so foolish and impulsive? What a monstrous mess you’ve made.
In one fell swoop she had managed both to ignite a conflagration of carnal need and push away the one man she longed to stoke it.
And yet, that look on his face had been so tender. He seemed almost frightened when she had kissed him at first. He had the look of an animal, frozen, deciding whether or not to bolt.
Perhaps he was not quite so experienced with women as she had thought at first. She found his scars enigmatic, only adding to the ruggedness of his good looks. But perhaps others were not of the same opinion. Her heart broke at the thought of him feeling unloved or unwanted. She longed to caress his scarred cheek and press her forehead against his, whispering, assuring him of how good he was. How kind. How worthy. How attractive.
This thought buoyed her hope. Perhaps his fleeing from the orphanage without saying goodbye was merely an expression of shyness, not rejection.
Once at home, Barbara shut herself up in her room with weak excuses to her maid that she had a headache and wanted to lay down. She did want to lay down, but not because of a headache. Her need to crawl under the covers of her bed had to do with an altogether different sort of ache.
She dropped her shawl on the floor and tugged the fishu out of her bodice. Sitting on the edge of the bed she toed off her shoes before pulling her dress awkwardly over her head. Stripped down to her underthings, she loosened her stays and climbed into the warmth of her bed.
Perhaps rest would soothe her feverish mind.
But when she pulled the blanket up over her head and squeezed her eyes shut, all she could think of was the feeling of Jeffrey’s mouth on hers and his arms clasped tight around her. She pushed the thoughts away.
I just need to rest.
She imagined his mouth traveling from her lips to her neck. His hot tongue trailing along the hollow of her throat where his fingers had touched her. She imagined him tugging on the neckline of her dress, his large, masculine hands grasping at her tender skin.
She squeezed her thighs together and rolled over, tugging the blankets along with her.
Stop it. Rest. You’ll feel normal again after a nap.
But she couldn’t stop it. She couldn’t stop thinking of him. And suddenly, her recurring dream came back to her. Jeffrey’s kiss had felt so familiar, so…right. It had felt almost as if she had been training for that moment her whole life.
The thought of her dream brought with it all the childish lusts that it had always awakened in her. She groaned, covering her eyes with her hand. It was no use.
She glanced over at the door and saw that it was, indeed locked. Sigh, a quiet sigh, she let her hand trail down over her chest. Timidly, she circled the pad of her finger over her nipple through the fabric of her chemise. With her eyes closed, she imagined Jeffrey’s hand replacing hers. Would he like her body if he saw it? Would he want her? The man in her dream had touched her like this, the burning heat under his skin growing hotter a
nd hotter.
Her breath caught in her throat and she let her knees fall apart and trailed her fingers lower, bunching up the bottom of her chemise and letting her fingers find the core from which all of her wild longing seemed to flow.
He’s been with women before. He would know how to touch her here, surely. His hands would be rougher than her own, but tender. With his lips on hers, his fingers would find this spot and he would stoke her to ecstasy with practiced skill.
A Seductive Lady For The Scarred Earl (Steamy Regency Romance) Page 14
