Captivating the Scoundrel

by Darcy Burke

  He laid everything out except the petticoat. That should go over the chair too. But she was in the other chair. As he stood there dithering about what to do with the garment, she stood up.

  “Put the petticoat here,” she said. “I’ll go to the bed.” Had her voice grown husky?

  “You should stay by the fire where it’s warmest.”

  She turned and looked at him over her shoulder. “The bed will be warm.” Her lids drooped over her eyes in a seductive fashion.

  Gideon reached for her, his body flushing with desire. He worked to keep his arousal at bay. “We have much to discuss.”

  She nodded, her gaze dropping to the floor. “Yes. I hope you can forgive me.” She looked back up, her hazel eyes connecting with his. “I only pretended to take my father’s side so you could get away.”

  “I know that now.” But in that moment… He’d been devastated. “There’s nothing to forgive.” His voice was dark and raw.

  She gave him a shy look. “Did you mean what you said downstairs?”

  “That I love you?” She nodded. “Yes.”

  “Show me. Please.” She curled her arms around his neck. Gideon lifted her and carried her to the bed, laying her back as she spread the coverlet beneath her.

  Gideon swallowed. Though she still wore the chemise, the shape of her body was visible beneath the white linen. She was a gift he was certain he didn’t deserve.

  “Daphne, I’m not sure I’m worthy. Some of the things your father said… I did steal the sword from Cate. And I led a group of men that shot her maid when I wasn’t with them.”

  She pushed herself up and knelt before him, cupping his face. He hadn’t shaved since Brue Cottage the previous morning, and her fingers rasped against the whiskers. “Gideon, you are not a bad person. I can think of no man more worthy for me than you.”

  She leaned forward and pressed her lips to his. He didn’t know if she meant it to be a sweet joining, but he grabbed her to him and kissed her as if he were a starved man. Which was true. He was absolutely ravenous for her.

  She clutched at his shoulders as he drove his tongue deep into her mouth. She angled her head and began to pluck at his cravat, tearing the silk away with a few easy flicks. Then her fingers began unbuttoning his waistcoat as he pulled the pins from her hair. He tried to toss them on the table beside the bed, but he had no idea if they hit his target.

  Once his waistcoat was open, he shrugged it from his shoulders, then whipped his shirt over his head, momentarily breaking their kiss. But it was quickly resumed, their lips and tongues meeting with fierce passion.

  She wanted him to show her he loved her? He knew precisely how.

  He trailed his mouth from her lips to her jaw and then down along her neck. She cast her head back, and he gently guided her to lie on the bed. He bent with her, licking and sucking her flesh, at one point leaving a dark pink mark at the top of her breast that quickly began to fade.

  She gasped as he worked, her fingers tangling in his hair. He paid special attention to her breasts, which he adored. She was so sensitive, and he loved to make her moan and writhe. And he knew he could intensify her sensations.

  He kissed between her breasts and dragged his tongue down her abdomen, swirling it around her navel before descending farther. Skimming his hand across her hip, he found her sex, stroking his finger along her wet folds. He could smell her arousal and couldn’t wait to taste it.

  Parting her dark red curls, he teased her clitoris, making her hips come up off the bed as she groaned. Then he replaced his fingers with his mouth, licking her sex.

  “Gideon!” She dug her hands into his scalp.

  He looked up her body to see her watching him, her eyes slitted. “Didn’t your research reveal this act?”

  “Yes. But I—” She opened her eyes wider. “I don’t know. It feels so strange.”

  He used his thumb to tease her flesh. “Strange good or strange bad?”

  “Strange…good. I suppose it’s just new and different.”

  “Like when I put my finger in you the first time.” He followed his words with the motion, stroking his finger into her wet sheath. “That was strange good?”

  “That was strange divine.” She closed her eyes and cast her head back with a sound that was part sigh and part gasp and entirely seductive.

  “When I’m finished, you can try to think of a word to describe this.” He parted her and dipped his tongue inside her. He braced his hands on her inner thighs and held her while he ravaged her with his mouth, licking and sucking as she cried out again and again.

  She moved with him, her muscles tensing. He guided her legs over his shoulders and cupped the back of one thigh. Suckling her clitoris, he pushed a finger into her, driving in and out to send her to the edge of release. She clenched around him, and he used two fingers, triggering her orgasm.

  She tightened and cried out his name. He buried his tongue inside her and worked her flesh with his fingers until her body relaxed beneath him.

  He stood back and bent to pull off his boots. His stockings and breeches quickly followed, as did his smallclothes. He went to join her on the bed and found her looking up at him, her cheeks flushed and her eyes a bit glazed.

  “That certainly felt like you loved me.”

  Gideon couldn’t help but laugh. “Daphne, you are incomparable.”

  She held her arms out to him, and he lay down beside her, drawing her into his arms. “As much as I enjoyed that—and I did immensely—I want to feel you against me.” She kissed him, her tongue sliding along his.

  He rolled her to her back and settled between her legs. “Like this?” he asked between kisses.

  She wrapped her legs around his hips. “Yes. But more. I want all of you.” She brought her hand up and smoothed his hair back from his face. “Gideon, I don’t care about your past or the man you used to be. I only know the man you are now and the future we can have together. I want that. I want you.”

  Overcome with emotion, Gideon kissed her again, his mouth devouring hers as if he could take her very essence into himself. That was what he wanted—to be joined with her. Now and forever.

  Unsealing his mouth from hers, he gripped his cock and guided himself into her sex. When he’d slid as far as he could go, he stroked her clitoris, drawing a low, soft moan from her lips. He took that into himself too, kissing her again, more softly this time as he mimicked the rocking of his body into hers.

  Gradually, he increased the rhythm, making longer, faster strokes. She caressed his back, skimming her fingers over his muscles and down to his backside. She gripped his hips, urging him faster, and moved her legs up, opening herself to him even more.

  Desperate for release, he increased their speed, slamming into her as his pleasure built. His orgasm was so close. He wanted her with him.

  He bent his head and kissed her cheek, then her ear. “Come with me,” he rasped, driving into her as his body began to release.

  She wrapped her arms around his back and held him close, her body rising to meet his. Blood rushed to his cock as he came, her muscles clenching around him. He pumped into her until he was spent, his body collapsing onto hers as he fought to catch his breath.

  She cradled him against her, kissing his cheek, his neck, his shoulder. Some minutes later, he rolled to his back, and she snuggled against his side.

  “That was different,” she said. “You…finished inside me. You didn’t do that at Brue Cottage.”

  “No. I was trying to prevent a baby.” He hadn’t even thought about it this time.

  She pushed up onto her elbow and looked down at him, her hair draping across her shoulder and tickling his. “I don’t want you to do that.”

  “Good, because I didn’t.” He turned his head to look at her. “But maybe I should have. I don’t know how to be a parent. I’ve had terrible examples.”

  “If we had a contest for whose father is worse, I am confident I would win.”

  Her tone had held a wry not
e, but tears pooled in her eyes. He drew her against him, stroking her back and kissing her forehead. “Don’t cry, Daphne. There is no contest. They’re both horrid. And I’m going to do my best to not be like them.”

  She looked up at him, her gaze fierce. “You couldn’t ever.” She glanced away for a moment. “Could we not talk about them just now?”

  He didn’t particularly want to discuss them at any time, but he supposed they must—at least her father and how they would deal with him after they restored the treasures to Gareth.

  Gideon kissed her temple and ran her silken dark copper hair through his fingers. “We don’t have to talk about anything.”

  “We should probably discuss the plan to return the treasures.”

  “Actually, we have plenty of time for that. As luck would have it, the weather is not conducive for the crossing.” He hadn’t thought it was lucky, but his opinion had completely changed. “The wind is too high today and will likely be again tomorrow. I’ve retained a captain to take me—us—over day after tomorrow.”

  “So we have the rest of today and tomorrow to…?”

  “Wait for your clothes to dry.” He reached for the edge of the coverlet and worked it from under them, pulling it over their bodies to keep her warm.

  “Is that all?” She pouted up at him.

  “I am fairly certain we can come up with other activities.” He gave her a devilish grin and pinned her to her back once more, eliciting a gasp from her lips.

  She narrowed her eyes at him in seductive promise. “I was hoping you would say that.”

  Chapter 19

  “When are we leaving on the morrow?” Argus asked after they’d finished dinner in the common room the following evening. He’d pledged to come with them and provide whatever assistance he could, for which Gideon had said he was grateful.

  “Not until midafternoon,” Gideon answered. “I’d hoped to leave in the morning, but the captain wanted to be sure the wind had passed.”

  The day had been miserable, with the rain coming down sideways at one point. It had been the perfect day to spend indoors with one’s husband. Daphne couldn’t stop sneaking looks at him or finding a reason to brush his arm. She’d even reached under the table and stroked his thigh. That had earned her a heated look filled with promise.

  “I’ll be ready,” Argus said.

  They bid good night to Argus, and Daphne preceded Gideon up the stairs. He’d brought a bottle of port for them to sip in front of the fire.

  Gideon unlocked the door, and they stepped into the room. He’d barely closed it before she turned and pressed herself against him, quickly untying his cravat and exposing his throat. Grabbing both ends of the silk, she pulled his head down so she could kiss him.

  After a long, thorough exploration, she released him. “I’ve been waiting some time to do that.”

  His mouth curled into a heart-stopping smile. “Should we forgo the port?”

  “I’ll have a small glass.” She took the bottle and glasses from him and went to the table to pour. “You stir the fire.”

  He went to the hearth and stoked the flame, and a moment later, she brought him a glass. He tapped it to hers. “To tomorrow.”

  “To tomorrow.” She sipped her port. “I do hope Penn makes it in time.” She sat in one of the chairs, which they’d left angled before the hearth.

  “I do too, but I don’t think we can wait if he doesn’t,” Gideon said, sitting beside her and taking her hand in his.

  “We could. It’s not as if my father is on his way here.”

  “I will feel better—no, I will feel right—when the treasures are where they belong.” He glanced toward his saddlebag beside the bed where the cloak and heart resided. The sword leaned against the corner. “We will watch carefully for his arrival.” Argus was going to position himself at the road on which they expected Penn to arrive in order to direct him to the boat.

  “Will he come alone?” She’d wondered if his wife would join him but hadn’t asked Gideon before now.

  “I don’t know. He would certainly have brought his assistant—Egg. But he’s otherwise engaged.” He frowned, his forehead creasing into deep lines. “Or perhaps not.”

  “Why do you look so concerned?”

  “We haven’t discussed the earldom, and we should.” He let go of her hand and turned toward her. He took a drink of port, perhaps for fortification. “Penn is my half brother. His mother left our father when she was carrying Penn. My father had no idea there was a child. Everyone thought she had died. Indeed, the rumor was that he’d killed her.”

  “Wasn’t that also a rumor about you…and your wife?” she asked.

  “Like father, like son, apparently.” His tone was wry, but she knew the gossip had to have hurt him.

  “You are not like your father.”

  He gave her a sardonic look. “We can debate that later. To continue the story, Penn’s mother delivered the child in the parish in which she grew up. The vicar recorded Penn’s birth and promised to reveal it whenever she asked or upon the death of our father. Penn’s mother became ill when Penn was around nine or ten, I think. She took him to Rhys to foster and told him the truth of Penn’s sire. But she swore Rhys to secrecy, and Penn never knew the real identity of his father until several weeks ago.”

  Daphne couldn’t imagine learning such a thing after so much time. “How did he take that?”

  Gideon pressed his lips into a grim frown. “Not well. Penn is a scholar like his father—Rhys, I mean—and an adventurer. He was not raised to be an earl, nor does he have any desire to be. In fact, he’d prefer to avoid being the earl even more than I’d like to have the title.”

  “That seems like an easy problem to fix, then.”

  “Yes, but it’s not. As soon as we learned about Stratton being Penn’s father, Penn dispatched Egg to search for the vicar to stop him from sharing his proof and revealing Penn as the earl. But the vicar went missing on his way to London.” Gideon looked away from her. “The next part is why I didn’t tell you about any of this.”

  When his gaze met hers again, there was empathy and regret. “Your father kidnapped the vicar and has been keeping him somewhere on the estate at Ashridge Court. He promised to destroy the proof of Penn’s birth if I married you.”

  Daphne stood, her legs shaking with anger, and she clutched the glass in her hand. “I wish you’d told me.”

  He stood with her and took her glass, putting them both on the table. “I didn’t want to be the one to destroy the love you had for your father. I’m so sorry, Daphne. I know how that feels—to look up to someone and love them so much only to learn they’re not the person you thought they were.”

  She fought to find her voice. “Because of your father?”

  He nodded. “Two very despicable men. And in your case, something beautiful came from it.”

  She turned to him and took his hands in hers. “Stop denigrating yourself. I’m not going to allow it anymore. You are incredibly beautiful to me.” She tipped her head to the side. “Perhaps beautiful isn’t the right word. Ruggedly handsome.” She brushed her hand along his beard, which he still hadn’t shaved. “You take my breath away, actually.”

  He brushed his lips over hers. “As you do mine.”

  She blinked up at him. “And how did you take the news about Penn?” she asked softly, thinking it must have been devastating to learn he wasn’t the heir as he’d thought he was and that he was illegitimate.

  “Also not well.” The edge of his mouth ticked up into a half smile. “My father raised me to be the Earl of Stratton. That’s all I ever expected to be—a debauched lord who drained every drop of pleasure he could from life.”

  “You aren’t a debauched lord.”

  “I very easily could have been, if not for Rose.” He exhaled. “That’s not entirely true. I’d begun to see my father for what he was, and I didn’t want our family’s reputation forever stained. I sought to find a well-respected young lady to make my wif
e.”

  Daphne summoned the courage to ask about her. “Margery said you met her in Monmouth.”

  He nodded. “She was shy, but also witty. I could tell right away she was a jewel just waiting to shine.”

  Daphne’s heart twisted. “I can see you loved her.”

  His features darkened. “I grew to, but I didn’t realize it until she was gone. That emotion was completely foreign to me.” His gray gaze met hers. “Until you. And this...this is much different from what I felt for Rose. What I feel for you is like a…storm on a summer day. It’s calm and beautiful, and then it rages with power and a different kind of beauty.

  “When I lost Rose, I fell into despair, but when I thought I lost you at Ashridge Court, I wasn’t sure I would continue on after I returned the treasures. Without that purpose and without you—”

  She stood on her toes and kissed him hard and fast. “You have me. We have each other.”

  “I was going to say that I’d considered staying on Flat Holm and becoming a hermit.”

  She arched a brow at him and tried not to laugh. “Like St. Gildas?”

  “Without the sainthood, probably.”

  Now she did laugh. “Lucky for you, I am here and we have a lifetime ahead of us after we return the treasures to Gareth.”

  He didn’t smile with her. “And what of your father? He’s not going to be happy that you betrayed him or that we hid the treasures. I doubt he’ll rest until he finds them again.”

  She walked to the chair and sank into it in defeat. “You’re probably right. I have no idea what to do.” She looked up at him, feeling helpless. Her father was obsessed, and he’d never rest knowing his daughter knew the location of the Thirteen Treasures.

  Gideon sat beside her and took her face in his hands. “I promise you we’ll find a way to live without him interfering in our lives.”

  Daphne didn’t know how, but she believed he would try. “I don’t want to think about him anymore tonight.” She left her chair and hiked up her skirt as she climbed onto his lap, straddling him. He’d shown her how to ride him in bed last night, and she’d enjoyed the power the position had given her.