Romancing the Past

by Darcy Burke

  “Good,” he said, a little hoarsely. “Some women don’t like arse play, so I wasn’t sure you would. But if you don’t like this or anything else, you must tell me so.”

  In answer, she cupped his balls with her free hand and said, her words slightly muffled, “I like everything you do to me. Now stop talking and do it.”

  He half laughed, half groaned at her words, and then for quite some time, there was nothing but wet sounds and rapid breathing as he used his fingers and mouth to bring her to yet another climax before surrendering his own. Sabine swallowed the hot spurts of his seed, savoring the way his breath caught in his throat as he came. When he was finished, she licked him clean, every but like the cat who got the cream.

  They lay still for some minutes afterward, both recovering from their exertions, before sitting up and maneuvering into a spooned position on the narrow bed. Thomas draped his arm over her shoulder, one hand cupping her breast as he burrowed his face against the back of her neck.

  She sighed with contentment and snuggled tighter against his broad, muscular chest. “Where did you learn to do that?”

  “From a lover I had when I was at Cambridge,” he said drowsily, not bothering to ask what Sabine meant by the word that. “She was very experienced.”

  The prickle of jealousy that pierced her heart was completely unjustified. After all, Sabine herself had asked the question. Moreover, she was perfectly aware that Thomas had taken women to his bed before her, and she ought to be grateful for the skill he had developed in the course of those affairs. She was certainly the beneficiary of his experience. Even so, she could not help but be jealous of this other woman—or perhaps the right word was “envious”—and all the other women who have ever been with him. Who had ever truly been with him in all the ways a man and woman could be together.

  She knew she should not ask. The answer could only bring her more pain, but curiosity got the better of her. “Who was she?”

  Thomas made a noise low in his throat that indicated he knew the effect his response might have on her. “The wife of one of my masters. He was more than three decades her senior and, according to her, unable to perform his husbandly duties. She was unfailingly devoted to him in public; however, and in exchange, he looked the other way when she took lovers, to the point that he did not even set her aside when, some years after I left, she bore a daughter who quite obviously could not be his. That was when I realized I was probably not the first young buck under her husband’s tutelage whom she seduced, as I certainly was not the last.”

  “Did you love her?” Another question she knew she should not ask, yet could not repress.

  He levered himself up on his elbow and turned her gently so she could see his face. His expression was tender as he gave an emphatic shake of his head. “No, sweetheart, I never loved her. I was enamored with her—or, more accurately, I was enamored with her body and the access she gave me to what every lusty adolescent male wants—but outside of the bedroom, we were practically strangers. It was a mutually satisfactory arrangement, but that was all, and when it ended, we both moved on without looking back.”

  Sabine rolled onto her back and reached up to stroke his cheek, delighting in the raspy sensation of the long day’s stubble against her palm. “That sounds…a bit cold.”

  His smile was rueful. “Oh, it was hot enough—the physical part, anyway. There just was nothing more between us than that.”

  Well, yes. And that was what worried her, now that she had time to consider it. “So how do you know this is more than physical? How do you know you are not merely enamored with my body?” How do I know I am not merely enamored with yours? Because she most certainly was enamored with his body…and with what he could do with it. How did one separate the desires of the flesh from the desires of the heart? Was it even possible to do so?

  Thomas turned his head and pressed a kiss into her palm. “I know because I want to spend every waking moment with you, whether we can be together like this or not. I know because you fascinate me, amuse me, and sometimes even irritate me, and I want you to keep doing all of those things. I know because being with you makes me feel like my best self, like the man I am meant to be. But most of all, I know because I will walk away when the time comes rather than take the risk that you will come to resent me for loving you too much to let you go.”

  Her eyes stinging with tears, Sabine choked back a sob and gave him a watery smile. “Right now, I wish you were a little less sure.”

  Chapter 23

  Thomas could not fault the Montagues for his foul mood; they were excellent traveling companions, adept—as spies usually were—at witty conversation as well as comfortable silences. He did not blame them for anything except their presence, which prevented him from being alone with Sabine. And it wasn’t only their nights together that he missed, though he certainly missed those. He just hadn’t realized how much he had come to enjoy on the easy intimacy that had grown between them in the days since they’d left La Perche. And as their time together grew shorter and shorter, he resented having to share her with anyone, even people he found perfectly pleasant.

  And perfectly necessary.

  The coaching inn they stayed at the first night after departing Paris was abuzz with the story of the red-headed young lady who had been abducted from her home along with a valuable pair of Percherons by a suavely handsome blackguard who clearly had designs on either her virtue or the horses. Or possibly both. The poor girl’s uncle, devastated as the prospect of what might become of his favorite niece, was offering a substantial reward for any information leading to her safe return to the bosom of her family. The portly coachman-for-hire who bellied up to the bar beside to Thomas gleefully related all the details to him—including an uncomfortably accurate description of Thomas’s own appearance—without seeming to notice Thomas’s resemblance to the man he’d just described. Thomas managed to keep a straight face when the coachman assured him that if he encountered the scoundrel who would do such a thing to an innocent young lady, he would punch the man in his too-handsome face before turning him in for the reward money. But it was a near thing.

  They encountered similar gossip at each of their stops, although Thomas noticed that the farther north they traveled, the more muddled the story seemed to become. In some versions, it was her father who was offering the reward and in others, her brother. The amount of the reward on offer was in dispute as well, but generally crept upward so that, by the time they reached Rouen, the number had reached the princely sum of ten thousand francs. And although there were always two horses—a stallion and a mare—there was confusion as to their colors and even their breed, which meant their coach with its three gray and one black Percheron drew no particular notice. Finally, everyone agreed that the girl had red hair, but Rousseau’s description must have been vague on other details, since some people were certain she had a great number of freckles on her face, others that her eyes were bright green, and still others that she was not a grown woman, but still a child. That last bit of misinformation troubled Thomas the most, since if anyone ever did look at him long enough to really see him—the one part of the tale that seemed to remain consistent was the rather detailed description of him—he might not live long enough to find himself in the gentle custody of the gendarme.

  All in all, it was a damned good thing he and Sabine had not attempted to travel the rest of the way to Le Havre in the guise of husband and wife. Thomas had no doubt they would have been recognized the very first day, and he was grateful that Montague’s intelligence had warned them of the danger. He was also relieved to discover that the French were, as he had posited, as oblivious to servants as the English. Even members of the servant class seemed to ignore the possibility that a lady’s maid with sunset-gold hair and a valet who precisely fit the description of the villainous kidnapper might actually be the very people they were seeking.

  But he was still not happy, because this was to be their last night in France—barring some unfores
een disaster, of course—and Sabine was upstairs, sleeping on a cot in a chamber adjacent to the Montagues while Thomas was down in the tavern, trying to drink himself insensible. While he knew he would feel like hell in the morning, it was preferable to the alternative, which was to lie awake all night on his own narrow cot in a dormitory occupied by a dozen or so other working-class men who could not afford a chamber of their own for the night. Better to drink until he passed out than to toss and turn while everyone else around him slept like lambs.

  He had just signaled the bartender for a third snifter of brandy when he felt a presence at his elbow. Turning his head, he found Montague sitting on the stool beside him. Thomas gave the head spy a quizzical look. “Something amiss?”

  “Not at all.” He nodded at the two empty glasses sitting on the bar in front of Thomas. “How drunk are you?”

  “Barely getting started.” He estimated he was a good five more glasses away from anything approaching unconsciousness.

  A grin flashed across Montague’s craggy features, hinting at the handsome, devil-may-care young man he must have been. “That is good news, because I would hate for you to be too far into your cups to use this.” The spy held out his hand and opened his fingers. A key rested in the center of his palm.

  Thomas frowned. “What is this?”

  “The key to the room the wife and I rented for tonight. Take it.”

  “But—”

  “There is a lovely hotel on the river less than a mile from here.” The bartender entered Thomas’s peripheral vision, a glass containing a finger of golden liquid in his hand, but Montague held up his hand. “Give us a moment, please,” he said. He looked around, verifying that no one else was near enough to eavesdrop on their conversation before returning his attention to Thomas. “Maggie will enjoy spending the night there far more than here, which means you can have our room for…whatever purpose you would like.”

  Thomas could only stare at the older man in disbelief. “You cannot mean that I should…that she and I should…” He trailed off, unwilling to complete the thought aloud.

  Montague closed and opened his hand emphatically. “I am not blind and neither am I stupid. Nor is my wife. We remember being young and in love, and we are perfectly capable of recognizing the symptoms. Do not squander your opportunity at one last night together.”

  Thomas couldn’t think of one damn thing to say in response. He understood what Montague was offering him—him and Sabine—but he couldn’t quite process it. One more night with her to last a lifetime. It was the most precious gift anyone had ever bestowed upon him…and the most potentially dangerous.

  “Take the damned key,” Montague growled. “I will never tell a soul, and neither will Maggie.”

  “Does she know?”

  “Maggie is talking to Miss Rousseau now.”

  Joy and gratitude surged in Thomas’s chest. Snatching the key from Montague’s extended palm, he rose to his feet. He extracted the coins to pay for the three brandies he’d ordered and set them on the counter. “That one is for my friend here,” he called to the bartender. “Thank you,” he said to Montague.

  The man laid his hand on Thomas’s upper arm and squeezed. “You are most welcome.”

  Thomas strode down the corridor to the Montagues’ room, his emotions twisted a tangled knot.

  My last night with Sabine.

  He ached to make love to her. Not that he did not think of what they had been doing as “making love,” but rather he wanted—nay, needed—to be inside her. A complete, proper joining of bodies to hold onto in his memories after they parted.

  But his conscience warred with his desires. He did not want to subject her to even the smallest risk of pregnancy. No matter how badly he longed to bury his cock in her sweet, wet pussy—and no matter how much he knew she wanted the same thing—the guilt and anxiety that would follow such an act would be intolerable.

  Keeping her safe—in every way—was his first and most essential priority.

  That meant either confining himself to the territory they had already explored or introducing her to a decidedly esoteric variation of sexual intercourse that he wasn’t certain she would enjoy, much less be game to try. Granted, she had liked it when he had used his finger there, but enjoyment of that did not guarantee acceptance of—let alone pleasure from—anything more adventurous than that.

  And just the thought of getting inside her already had his cock at more than half staff.

  He reached the appropriate door and turned the key over in his fingers, willing himself to some semblance of calm. If he was going to broach the idea to her, the discussion needed to be calm and rational, the positives and negatives laid out in as detached a manner as possible. Which meant he couldn’t go in slavering for her like a rutting beast. Even if that was how she made him feel.

  His hand trembled only slightly as he inserted the key into the lock—an action that reminded him all too uncomfortably of coitus, given his current state of arousal—and turned the door knob.

  The Montagues had rented one of the largest rooms the coaching inn had to offer, which meant that rather than being composed of a single chamber, there were series of interconnected spaces. Not precisely separate rooms, with the exception of the small nook that served as a sleeping space for a lady’s maid or valet, but rather areas with specific uses divided by partial walls and casemented openings.

  The space in front of him was a dining area and sitting room, with the door that led to the servant’s room to his right. Beyond that to his left, he could see a privy screen in what was no doubt intended to be a dressing area, and behind that must be the main bedchamber.

  He shut the door behind him with an audible thump to announce his arrival.

  “Thomas?” Sabine’s voice was pitched low but loud enough for him to easily hear her. The way she said his name made the throbbing in his loins kick up a notch. Not Tom-ess, like an English speaker, but Toe-maas. He’d never known before now how much he preferred the French pronunciation of his given name.

  “Yes,” he answered, taking off his coat and hanging it on the peg beside the door. He considered removing his waistcoat and cravat as well but decided that might be going a bit too far too fast. She might want to talk and if he was already on his way to being undressed before he reached her, he might give the impression that all he wanted was to get inside her drawers.

  Which he admittedly wanted to do, but that wasn’t the only thing he wanted to do. He could wait.

  “I am already in bed,” she said. “Waiting for you. Naked.”

  Christ. Every drop of blood in his body rushed into his cock and balls as if drawn by an excessively powerful magnet.

  He started unbuttoning his waistcoat and walked—because running would have been undignified—through the sitting room and then the dressing room. By the time the bed was in view, he was bare-chested and his waistcoat, cravat, and shirt were strewn on the floor behind him like a trail.

  Sabine lay on her side, facing the entrance to the room, her head propped up on one hand. Her hair was down, the fiery tresses cascading over her shoulder and around her magnificent breasts. She looked up at him with unabashed hunger—and, he thought with amusement, no small amount of impatience—in her azure-bright eyes.

  “Waiting long?” he asked, surprised to discover his voice was hoarse.

  Her pretty pink mouth curved into a smile. “Forever. You are lucky I did not fall asleep.”

  Reaching the bed in three long strides, he rested one knee on the edge of the mattress and bent down to kiss her. Losing himself in the sweet warmth of her mouth would have been easy, but when she parted her lips to allow him to deepen the contact, he broke away. At her moan of protest, he muttered, “Overdressed,” and sat down beside her so he could remove his boots, breeches, stockings, and drawers.

  There was no hiding his rampant erection when he stretched out on the bed facing her. Not that he wanted to hide it, but he wanted to determine where her boundaries lay befo
re he pushed them too far. He couldn’t do that if she took matters—in other words, his cock—into her own hands first.

  Their eyes met, and hers were so full of heat and eagerness that he almost lost his focus. “We need to talk,” he managed to say, though less convincingly than he might have wished, because talking was way down his list of needs at the moment.

  “Can we not talk after?” She trailed her fingers down his bare chest, her smile sultry.

  “Before,” he croaked. “I need to know how far you are willing to go on our last night together.”

  Her hand slowed. “You already said we cannot—” she paused, then finished with the coarse English term he had taught her, “…fuck.”

  God, would he ever get to the point where hearing that word from her lips didn’t make him hard enough to pound iron? “Not in the—” He started to say pussy, but changed his mind. Words for body parts did not, by themselves, adequately express the leap of faith he was asking her to take. “Usual way,” he finished. When she only looked at him quizzically—and a bit impatiently—he continued, “Our last night together, in Paris, I put my finger in your arse. Remember?”

  “Yes. I was…” Her English vocabulary was still shaky, so she paused to find the right word. “Shocked, yes?” He nodded to indicate she had landed on the proper meaning. “But then it was good.” She blushed, perhaps remembering how long and hard she had come that night. “Very good.”

  He let silence rest between them as she worked it out in her own head. She was too clever to need help completing the puzzle on her own, and he did not want to steer her to his way of thinking by framing the idea in his own words.

  Comprehension, when it came, widened her eyes and stained her cheeks an even darker pink, but he noticed that the flush continued down to her chest and that her nipples had grown tighter. She was scandalized, yes, but also aroused. “You want to put your cock in my arse.” She managed to say this matter-of-factly, despite the pulse ticking visibly in her throat.