by Anne Renwick
The pulse at his neck jumped. “Don’t move.” He pointed at her. “Not so much as a single extra button.” With deft fingers, he slid the punch card into its slot, then quickly wound the skeet pigeon’s mechanism. Wings flapping, Nick tossed the bird into the gray London sky before turning the full force of his intense gaze upon her.
“Does a rooftop aviary qualify as exotic?” She hoped so. For once they were alone with no one in pursuit and nowhere else they needed to be. A brief window of time open to them before a message arrived.
He glanced at her, swallowed, then flipped the hatch closed, kicking a bar across it to ensure there would be no interruptions from below. “Do you want it to?” Desire darkened his eyes as he closed the gap between them.
“Desperately.” She tugged at his cravat, urging him closer.
He gripped the edge of her jaw, tipping her face upward, searching her eyes for any objection. “Anyone might catch a glimpse.”
She shrugged a shoulder. “In this weather? Unlikely, but they might. Will that stop you?”
“Not a chance.” The dam broke and his mouth crashed down upon hers. Their tongues tangled and plundered as spikes of pleasure zinged though her body. She tightened her hands upon his coat, anchoring herself upright as her world tilted off center and plunged her into a kiss so deep it stole her every last breath.
He pulled back, nipping at her lip. “More?”
“You need to ask?” Her voice was huff of frustration.
Impatient fingers fell upon the buttons of her bodice, finishing the task, pushing the silk from her shoulders and down her arms until the garment fell away. He tossed it over the railing, then froze. All his attention focused upon her as she tugged the drawstring of her chemise loose and slid the straps down her shoulders. The lacy-edges caught upon the swell of her breasts.
“All the way,” he ordered, his voice hoarse.
“As you wish.” A cold, damp breeze drifted across her bare breasts, peaking her nipples. She arched her back and dragged a fingertip over their swell, a clear invitation.
His eyes flashed, but he spun a finger in the air, denying her. “Turn around. Hands against the glass.”
This was new. And most definitely exciting. She complied, bracing herself. In front of her, all of London glittered with light and swirled with fog. She might miss the countryside, but the city held such an interesting variety of secrets within its many nooks and crannies. Including—the corners of her mouth curved upward—rooftop trysts.
Hands skimmed over the boning at her waist, over the metal fastenings that held her corset closed. But made no effort to free them. Instead, his broad, warm palms moved upward, cupping and caressing her breasts as his mouth sank against the skin at the nape of her neck. A soft bite that spoke to primitive desires, electrifying every nerve ending and sending her heart racing.
“Is this what you want? A touch of danger?”
She rocked back against him—against the stiff evidence of his arousal—and groaned at the sensation. Need built to a fever pitch.
He nipped her earlobe. “Say it,” he whispered over the skin beneath her ear.
“Yes,” she breathed. “Don’t stop.” This moment—atop and apart—far exceeded anything her imagination had dared to conjure.
For too many years, she’d dreamed of ending their flirtatious dances by dragging him from the ballroom onto a dark balcony to steal a kiss. But with a reputation to maintain, propriety had always won. No more. At last he was hers, and she intended to make the most of it.
With a groan, he nudged her forward, pressing her bare breasts against the cool, smooth glass and her hips to the low, brick wall. His body was hot and hard at her back, crushing her with just the right pressure as his warm, demanding mouth explored the curve of her neck.
She let her head fall backward onto his shoulder. Every touch fanned the flames that licked across her skin as a wet heat gathered between her legs. Was this really her, tossing all inhibitions aside to give in to every wanton desire? It was. Her only regret was that they’d wasted so much time denying each other.
His fingers caught at her skirts, hiking them higher still, settling them about her hips. “Yes,” she breathed, rocking her head sideways to nip at his neck. Waiting with sweet anticipation.
He eased back, giving himself room to touch her. To run his fingers across the top edge of her stocking, to discover she wore no knickers. Abandoned in his room, they lay among the last vestiges of her inclinations to follow society’s rules. “Aether,” he whispered. “I’d thought to find red silk.”
“Last night you would have.” She pushed backward. “Disappointed?”
“Not at all.” His hand shifted and dipped between her legs to stroke her. Gentle yet firm, extracting the maximum of pleasure. Her hips flexed, eyes drifting shut as need coiled and twisted, tighter and tighter and—
Rough, calloused hands gripped her bare hips and spun her about, lifting her, propping her on the edge of the low wall. “Wait for me,” he growled.
Feet dangling, she grabbed at his shoulders to brace herself. Her lungs dragged in a ragged breath. “Hurry.”
“Foot on the railing behind me.” He tore at his waistband, as desperate for her as she was for him.
He was going to take her—back to the glass—where discovery was a distant, but real possibility. No gentle, careful explorations in the dark. Rather a raw, primal coupling. Perfect. She lifted a leg, catching the heel of her boot upon the steel bar, watching as his cock fell free, thick and heavy.
“My turn to touch.” She caught his length in her hand—smooth, hard, hot—and stroked from tip to base. Aether, she wanted him deep inside her.
From his coat pocket, he drew forth a wrapped sheath and pressed it into her palm. Another first. Never had a man placed so much control in her hands. Without letting go, she tore the paper with her teeth, covered him, then lifted her gaze to his.
Dark with arousal, his eyes stared down at her, hazy with lust and… something more. His gaze pierced straight through her heart. “Have you any idea how many times I’ve imagined this?” His voice was a growl. “At the end of a shadowy garden path. Behind a rooftop chimney?”
“Atop a sturdy desk in a stranger’s study? I’ve lost count.” She clawed at his cravat, pulling his lips down to hers. As his mouth devoured hers, she unfastened the buttons of his waistcoat, of his shirt. At last, the warm, firm skin of his chest and stomach met her hands. Skin she wanted to feel against her own. Wrapping hands about the mounds of his tight buttocks, she tugged him closer. “Stop wasting time.”
Again, his hands slid up her thighs, shoving aside layers of skirts and parting her legs before him. He touched her center and—finding her wet and ready—entered her with one hard thrust. “Yes!” Lightning ran up her spine and shot through her limbs as he claimed her, and she gasped at the sensation of him filling her.
Slowly, he began to move, his long length sending darts of pleasure radiating through her. Heart pounding, she panted, digging the tips of her nails into his skin, urging him deeper still.
His intense thrusts came faster now. She closed her eyes and mewled her pleasure as the smooth glass at her back grew warm, as the rough brick beneath her dug into her soft flesh, as the rough scattering of hairs upon his chest brushed across the sensitive tips of her breasts. So many sensations, all of them building as he drove into her again and again and again pushing her ever closer to her peak.
“Nick!” The tension snapped and pleasure exploded in repeated waves of pleasure.
Once, twice more he plunged into her, stiffening as the spasms of his own release overtook him.
Braced against rough and smooth, Colleen wrapped her arms around his hot and heaving chest, hanging on as her world tilted, as she rearranged every expectation she’d ever had for a husband. Nick had shattered them all and the pieces no longer fit together. Worse, the tender feeling tugging at her heart would need to be ruthlessly leashed and caged, lest he glimpse the emotion
s roiling through her mind. She needed to think about this, about how—a mere two days from freedom—a man had managed to steal a piece of her soul.
She rested her head against his chest and listened to the steady beat of his heart.
Was it possible to see stars in a cloud-covered sky? Nick closed his eyes and found the celestial bodies still dancing before them, a lingering euphoria unlike anything he’d ever experienced. In his arms, Colleen’s soft curves melted against him, mere moments after she’d come apart, screaming his name. A wildcat in… well, not in bed. On a wall.
He grinned, entirely too self-satisfied for such a brief encounter. With the pent-up passion of days, weeks, no, months of flirtation finally released, might they manage to take things slower next time?
Next time.
Hot and sweaty, their bodies were still fused. His skin touched hers at all the right points, and he was reluctant to part, to let so much as a thin layer of cool air rush between them. He’d been a fool not to act sooner.
He’d kept his past affairs simple, short and sweet. Much like their own flirtations had begun. But with each passing interaction, words shared between them had grown richer with meaning, as he’d caught glimpses inside her curious and exceptional mind. She’d wormed her way into his heart, and he could think of nothing he wanted more than to call one Lady Colleen Stewart his wife.
As her fingertips traced cords of muscle up and down his back beneath the linen of his shirt, an unsettling twist buried itself deep in his gut. He’d managed to make her his fiancée, but would two days be long enough to convince her they ought to stay together?
Fiancée. Shit. He’d meant to tell Colleen about the very real wedding plans that might even now be taking place several stories beneath their feet, but when she’d sliced that punch card from the edge of her corset, his mind had short circuited, leaving behind only the most basic of thoughts.
He would warn her. In a moment. After he’d stolen a few more seconds to revel in the glory of finally holding the only woman to ever steal his sleep and invade his dreams. He brushed his lips over the skin of her neck and felt her shiver beneath his touch. “Walls and desks and chairs are all well and good, but I want more.” More than rooftop trysts. “I want to stretch you out fireside so that I might peel away and examine all your layers. Slowly. One by one.”
Her head lifted and a cool rush of air invaded the space between them. “Likewise.” She pressed an open-mouthed kiss to the hollow of his throat. “But as we’re trapped here on the roof, we might move to the bench and explore other options.” Eyeing the rosy tips of her nipples, he stirred inside her, and she laughed, throaty and low. “Or we could stay here.” She flexed her hips. “That works for me.”
“Vixen.” He caught her face in his hands and brushed a thumb over her swollen lips, grateful fate had landed them both on the same roof—chimney side—one particularly dark night.
Her fingers slid down his backside, urging him—
Crack.
A dull crunching sounded against a glass window pane. Their gazes caught, then turned toward the noise. A rusty skeet pigeon jerked and slipped upon the rooftop, dragging a broken wing as its internal programming insisted upon reaching the final, preprogrammed destination. Not far away, an overlarge black cat crouched, tail twitching.
“Is that… Sorcha?”
“It is.” She sighed at the interruption. “It’s rather a habit of hers, I’m afraid.”
“That makes two wildcats on my roof.” He grinned against her skin. “It appears we must postpone our activities. Work calls.”
“Flaps,” she amended, her lips curving upward as she tugged the two halves of his shirt together. “No worries about the message, she’ll drag it inside in a moment.”
He relaxed his grip on her hips, pulling free as he lowered her onto the rooftop and silently cursed the resilience of one particular mad scientist. “The constabulary prefers boots on the ground and the element of surprise—the better to read a guilty expression—and sees no reason to invest in maintaining a flock.” A poor investment, his coin. The bobby had done no more than pocket it. “When forced to send a skeet pigeon, they snatch up the closest bird. One that is clearly no match for an interested feline.” He tucked himself away as she drew her chemise back into place and reached for her bodice.
“Indeed. I, for one, want to look into Dr. Farquhar’s eyes while I ask my questions.” Anticipation lit a flame in her eyes. “Before we’re done with him, I’ll want to know who supplied him with a cat sìth. Fairy tale or not, such cats are rare and ought not be stolen away from their homes.”
“Not only that, but I want to know who was funding his research. And why.” He held her gaze, even when guilt urged him to look away. She needed to know. Now. “About our engagement—my father insisted upon a few slight alterations to our plans.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Setting a date is not slight.” Had her uncle known the Viscount Stafford would also insist upon a prompt ceremony? Without doubt. Foolish of her to act as if she would be free from society’s expectations the moment she vacated her uncle’s property. A touch of panic swirled in her stomach. Everything was happening so fast, and she was being pressured to make life-altering decisions without enough time to consider all the possible outcomes. A verbal promise was one thing, but a signature upon a marriage license? That was binding. “This is all very… rushed.”
She tore her eyes away to focus upon the clockwork bird as it turned itself about and hopped toward the door of the aviary. Behind the skeet pigeon stalked Sorcha, alert and fully prepared to keep the contraption from taking wing. Colleen opened the door and snatched up the beady-eyed bird, focusing upon unfastening the message canister all while willing away the slight tremble of her fingers.
“I’m sorry.” Nick took the still-twitching clockwork pigeon from her hands, smoothing its wing back into place and turning it off before setting it beside the others. “If you’d prefer, I can escort you to a hotel.”
Sorcha, with the skeet pigeon no longer an item of interest, turned her back upon them with an air of nonchalance and returned to watch for a new victim.
“No.” She pushed her worries aside, focusing upon another emotion that thrummed though her body: yearning. “Your family only wants what’s best for you. As they should.” Her own parents would have guarded and protected her so. She missed it. “I’m staying.”
Nick stroked a finger down the side of her cheek. “If you change your mind…”
“I’m not opposed.” Her heart tripped as she spoke the words. “But I won’t walk blindly into such a commitment. Might we discuss expectations later… fireside?”
“Done.” He dipped his head and pressed a soft kiss to her lips. “Make a list of your demands.” A provocative smile curved his lips. “I look forward to experiencing your persuasive techniques.”
Did he mean… Her mind began to consider various possibilities, rendering her mute. And slow. For Nick snatched the paper scroll from her fingers with a laugh. “But don’t think I won’t exploit your every weakness in return.”
Grinning, she smacked his arm, then leaned close. “That trick will only work once.”
“We’ll see.” He read the note aloud, his voice sobering.
Apologies, sir. Your man was removed from my custody without explanation. Carted away, while only semiconscious and muttering about hearts and worms. I objected and demanded an explanation from my supervisor, but was told the Queen’s agents had no business interfering in private matters.
“Damn it.” Nick crumpled the message in his fist.
“Private matters?” Colleen’s eyebrows drew together. “Might it be time for your long, complicated story about Queen’s agent’s business?”
He pinched the bridge of his nose. “He’s the missing connection, Dr. Farquhar.”
“Missing being the operative term.” Colleen crossed her arms. Ice crystalized on her next words. “I can’t help if I don’t have all the rel
evant details.”
“My hunt for the cardio-pacing device began when a stray comment crossed my path. A laboratory technician glanced at MacWilliam’s paper.”
“The one I read?”
“One and the same. Though the technician couldn’t recall details, he remembered that the Lister Institute had once considered hiring someone whose work had reached similar conclusions. That there’d been talk of constructing a device that might supersede or alter the automatic pacing of a heart. But that nothing had come of it.”
Colleen wrapped her hand about his fist and squeezed.
“I took my questions to Lord Aldridge, a board member of the Lister Institute.”
She drew in a deep breath as all became clear. “That’s why you were in his study in the dead of night?”
Another nod. “I’ve no proof he’s involved in anything. Nothing but the slightest of hesitations when I inquired about past cardiac electrophysiology applicants.”
Hesitations could mean something—or nothing. But Nick’s instincts had pointed him in the direction of decidedly suspicious research activity. “And, like a cat with a mouse, you couldn’t stop toying with the idea.”
He threw her a twisted smile, then opened his fist and caught her hand in his, lifting it to his lips. His eyes were two deep pools that might hide any number of secrets. “Would a business partner and fiancée agree that any secrets a Queen’s agent shares are sacrosanct?”
Warmth spread through her chest, driving back the frost. “She would. Tell me what this has to do with Sorcha.”
“We’re not old enough to remember when it began, but there was a time when biologists scoffed at the mention of such creatures as kraken and pteryformes, but now—”
“They darken our skies and choke the Thames.”
“And cryptozoology is an established science.” He took a deep breath. “There are rumors of a shadow committee known as CEAP, the Committee for the Exploration of Anthropomorphic Peculiarities.”
