Celeste Bradley - [Royal Four 04]
Page 13
“Oh—”
Her squeak of protest was lost as he whirled her about to press her to the wall, lifting her high to gain better access to her bosom. The plaster was cold against her back and his mouth was hot and wet on her nipple. He sucked hard and she forgot to protest, instead burying her hands in his hair to press him closer.
He pushed his body hard to hers, keeping her pinned to the wall. She felt his hand lift her skirts to scorch a path up her thigh and forge past the gossamer drawers she’d thought would be her own private secret.
He found her with urgent surety, cupping and claiming her with his big hand. A long hard finger pushed inside her without preamble. It was a crude and wicked invasion. In some corner of her mind she knew she ought to care, but all she could do was to hang there in his grasp, allowing his rough, nearly cruel caresses.
The finger thrust deeper, then withdrew to begin a merciless, plunging rhythm. She took the carnal ferocity with utter lack of will, controlled only by the heat of him rushing through her body, claiming her, robbing her of self and self-protection.
His mouth moved to her other breast, leaving the first sore and damp and bare to the chill air. Her sleeves were now both down to her elbows, trapping her arms to her sides. Her hands were lost in his thick hair, grasping and fisting in it as he continued his rough rhythm deep inside her.
She felt impaled and imprisoned and wickedly, erotically violated—and entirely, exquisitely alive in his hands.
He found a way to penetrate her, a new angle or pressure, that suddenly caused her to cry out. She felt another large finger join the first, pressing hard into her tightness, forcing her to open her thighs wider to accommodate. She had a sudden impression of how she must look, half-naked and roughly handled, with her skirts hiked to her knees while a man sucked at her nipples and forcibly violated her vagina.
Part of her was horrified at the fact that she wasn’t . . . well, horrified. The rest of her exploded in a spinning burst of pleasure that swept her last conscious thought away. She didn’t care that she cried out shrilly. She didn’t care that Wyndham’s fingers were well slicked with her wetness. She didn’t care that he’d left stubble-reddened patches and teeth scrapes on her breasts or that her nipples were hard and swollen and sore from his hungry mouth.
There was nothing left of her but white-hot pleasure and freedom and him.
Then she came back to herself, became aware that her breath still sobbed from her throat, that he had removed his hand from beneath her skirt and now held her by the waist, his forehead dropped to rest upon her neck.
She could feel his hot breath gasping against the tops of her breasts and knew he’d not reached the same release.
She lifted her hands from where they’d somehow moved to clutch at his shoulders and softly stroked them through his hair. “Stant—”
“Lady Alicia,” he interrupted, his voice a rasping grate. “I must beg you to accept my deepest apology. I had no right to use you so cruelly.”
“Oh, dear heavens,” she said with a nervous, breathless laugh. “I hope you never show me kindness, then. It might very well kill me.”
Stanton didn’t hear her. He was consumed by the magnitude of his error. He’d completely lost control. It had not been until he’d heard the keening sound of her orgasm echoing through the marble halls that he’d come back to himself, to who and where he was.
Now, with his trousers still trapping a mountainous erection and his fingers still wet with her juices and his arms still full of shivering, satisfied woman, he forced himself to consider the situation coldly.
He’d always secretly hoped that if he ever did someday find that one woman who could penetrate his reserve, if he ever found someone whom he craved more than control and duty, she would his and only his, forever.
Someday.
But now was not the time. This worldly bacchanal was not the place—God, no! Not with a conspirator on the loose.
Moreover, notoriously immoral Lady Alicia was most assuredly not the woman.
14
After Wyndham waited for her to pull herself and her gown together—turned half away with his gaze on the floor, mind you—he led her to the first step of the sweeping staircase that led up to their room.
He bowed shortly. “My thanks, my lady, for a most enjoyable . . . evening.”
She hesitated, then nodded in return. “It was my pleasure, my lord. Shall I see you tomorrow . . . ah, later today?”
He spent a moment adjusting his cravat. “Of course,” he said without looking at her. “We have the Masque to attend.”
“Ah, yes,” she said softly. “The Masque. Lord Cross spares no imagination in his entertainments. I shall see you then.” She turned away and began to climb the stairs. Three steps up she halted and turned back. “This was a terrible mistake, wasn’t it?”
Stanton took a deep breath, then lifted his head to meet her eyes. “It was.”
She nodded slowly. “My best ideas usually are.” She frowned slightly. “I have no idea what to say to you. Am I supposed to reassure you and make you feel unobligated and all that rot?”
His lips twitched. She was unsinkable. “Consider me adequately reassured.”
She let out a breath. “Very well then. Have a pleasant morning then.” She turned and lifted her hem to trot briskly up the stairs.
Stanton watched her go. It had been a capital error, all around. She seemed to be taking it well—although the look in her lovely eyes afterward . . .
He feared he would be haunted by that flash of desolation for some time. He ought to have realized how vulnerable she was beneath her façade of the social rebel. She was all that was free-spirited and capricious, but she was still a lady behind all the rash behavior—a lady who deserved better from him than to be ravaged in a hallway.
Alicia returned to their bedchamber. The room seemed dark and unknown now, treacherous with unfamiliar furnishings. Objects loomed in the shadows and the bed curtains swung menacingly as she brushed by them, the hooks above creaking on their rods.
She felt her way to the hearth to find the box of candles on the mantel but didn’t bother to light one once there. She didn’t want to see Wyndham’s presence about her, to feel his absence in the very existence of his horn hairbrush next to her silver one on the dressing table.
Wrapping her hands over the edge of the finely carved stone, she dropped her forehead to rest on her knuckles.
She’d nearly been very, very foolish.
The rug beneath her bare feet was soft and warm, the glow of the coals against the fabric of her fine-spun gown warming as well. Too warm. The heat of their bodies might have long faded, but she imagined she could still feel the scorching of their sudden, flaring passion.
A mistake, she’d offered, and he’d agreed. She hadn’t wanted him to. She’d hoped he would deny any such thing. She’d hoped he would kiss her softly and walk her upstairs and help her quiet the shimmering reverberations that still rippled through her body. Instead, he’d bowed and walked away, as if they’d shared nothing more than a not-very-enjoyable waltz.
Fortunately she’d kept her head enough to remain lightly unconcerned. Her heart was not subject to girlish fantasies of love everlasting.
He had been—and still was—very arousing to her senses and her animal nature. She’d talked herself into believing that giving in to those stimuli was a good idea.
“So sorry,” she whispered. “My mistake.”
Luckily—she could hardly believe her good fortune—her heart was supremely uninvolved.
Good thing, too, or otherwise she very much feared it would be breaking even now.
Lady Alicia slept much the way she lived—largely, taking up an astonishing amount of the giant bed with far-flung, deliciously rounded limbs. The bedchamber was nearly dark, giving Stanton the privacy to look his fill. Her hair, never much restrained, curled over the pillow like copper on silk, the discipline of her bedtime braid long lost in her restless sleep.
Then it occurred to him that the gown was expensive as well, which meant she’d purchased it with his money. Why had she chosen such provocative nightgowns? He was fairly sure she never expected to share a room. Her dismay earlier had not been feigned . . . at least, he didn’t think so.
For reputation’s sake? A smile crept over his lips as he imagined her in the unmentionables shop, boldly ordering a dozen brazen nightdresses, relishing the gossip that would surely follow.
His smile faded. Why was she so bent on destroying what shreds of virtue she had left? What had her family done to her that made her hate them so? Should he pity or revile her for her estrangement from them?
She’d left him behind again, confused by the mere purchase of a negligee. Damn the woman! Her mercurial nature defied even the most basic reading of her purpose!
The only surely true thing Stanton could say about Lady Alicia Lawrence was that she was never, ever dull.
And that her luxurious body haunted his dreams, both sleeping and waking.
He turned away from that sweet body sprawled invitingly on the great bed and ran a shaking hand over his face.
No.
He’d vowed years ago that no matter how he ached for it, he would never subject another woman to his dark passions. His bleak search for the truth brought out the worst—and the best, apparently—in his lovemaking.
For never was a woman more honest and true than when she writhed in orgasm, insensible with pleasure, raw and open to him. He craved that moment, needed it, grew addicted to it, putting off his own pleasure until women fled his bed from exhaustion and fear of his torturous self-control.
If you can’t read her now, perhaps you could read her then.
Bloody hell.
It might work. Perhaps seducing Alicia to that point would break down the walls of her mysterious resistance to his powers.
Take her. Own her. Send her to that shadowy place with your hands and your mouth, over and over again, until the truth is in her cries and her damp, sweating face and the taste of her secrets is on your tongue.
Stanton turned blind eyes to the fire, his gaze wide and absent as he pictured her in his hands, victim to his search for truth, wet and gasping and trembling in his control.
He wouldn’t let need catch him by surprise again. He would control the moment, the pursuit, the capture.
The climax.
Do it. She’s a wild, succulent creature, more freely passionate than any woman you’ve ever known. Take advantage of her nature, use her sensuality to prevail over her. She’ll be willing, warm clay in your hands. Take her. Make her let you in.
He threw himself down onto his bed for the night, the chair by the fire. It was even less comfortable than it looked, but that was nothing compared to the state of his soul. Mind wrestled with body, logic battled with lust.
Their surroundings didn’t help his struggle. Passion sizzled all about them, digging beneath the walls of his self-control like Normans in the night.
Where Lady Alicia saw freedom, Stanton saw a siege. He could feel his darker nature coming forcefully alert, waking from a decade of frozen sleep. The moans sounding all about them, the rhythmic rattle of bed frames and the muffled, wicked laughter in the halls insinuated into his mind dark, hungry thoughts of plump pale thighs and jutting ruby nipples and slick, wet, hot places that tasted of the sea.
He stared at the ornately plastered ceiling of the bedchamber with aching, unseeing eyes. He could not go out there, yet staying here was endangering him as well. The soft, sweet breathing of a perfectly willing woman whispered rhythmically just across the room.
It was going to be a very long night.
The next morning, Alicia woke suddenly, with the startled feeling that she was being watched.
The room was empty. Lord Wyndham was dressed and gone, the fire had warmed the room, and a covered plate on a tray was emitting tempting steam on a side table.
“Food!” That was always worth getting up for. Alicia slipped from beneath the covers and padded over to the table without bothering with a wrapper. The lifting of the lid rewarded her with eggs and sausage and pretty little toast corners. The small silver jam pot on the side contained nothing more dangerous than a bit of honey. She smiled. Dear Garrett.
Having the breakfast took less time than admiring it had. Alicia busied herself with a freshening wash in the basin. Then she brushed out her hair. Then, out of sheer boredom, she made the bed and fluffed the pillows and removed any sign that Wyndham had slept in the chair.
At last Garrett appeared. Alicia fell on him like a starving hound on a bone. “Thank heaven! It’s been hours.”
Garrett gazed at her doubtfully. “I left you sleeping not a half hour past. What are you so eager for today?”
Wyndham.
Alicia blinked. “Oh, no.”
Garrett smirked. “Didn’t like the answer to that one, did you?”
She sat in the chair as her knees threatened to quit her completely. “I’m perishing to see him. What does that mean?”
Garrett rolled his eyes as he pulled a fetching green woolen day gown from the wardrobe. “It means you’re perishing to see him. What of it? He’s a handsome eyeful. A lady needn’t be ashamed of wanting to rest her eyes on an ornamental bloke like him.”
She sighed. “He is quite attractive. And I haven’t been around many attractive men lately.”
Garrett cleared his throat. She patted his hand. “You know what I mean. Besides, you aren’t attractive. You’re insanely beautiful.”
He nodded matter-of-factly. “Quite right.” Then he helped her into the gown and sat her down on the stool before the dressing table to fix her hair. “Now, are we aiming for coy vixen or are you going all out this morning and aspiring to shameless hussy?”
She squinted at her image in the mirror. “I’d say shameless vixen. Much more appropriate for daytime, don’t you think?”
This resulted in her hair being a rather mussed version of what the other ladies were wearing, with a few long strands pulled loose “as if some man just couldn’t keep his hands off you in the linen closet” and allowed to dangle into her cleavage.
“It’ll drive the gents mad,” Garrett insisted. “They’ll be wishing they could pull it free for you and not daring to be so bold.”
The deceptively demure day gown was anything but, for it was constructed with all the floating bosom that whalebone and buckram could provide her—which was a considerable expanse of plump, ivory skin.
“Oy,” Garrett breathed worshipfully when she was dressed. “It’s almost enough to make a tea leaf turn to women.”
“I wish you would,” Alicia grumbled. “For I’d much rather run away with you than to go back into that writhing brothel downstairs.”
Garrett pinched her arm. “Nonsense. I’m entirely out of your reach anyway.”
“Humility is a virtue, Garrett.”
“So say ugly people.” He fetched her gloves and a lacy lambswool shawl. “Now, remember to lean toward the men and to lean away from the ladies.” He fiddled with a stray lock of hair. “And don’t spend all your time staring wistfully at Wyndham today. You don’t want him to know you prefer him above all others.”
“I don’t stare wistfully at Wyndham!”
“No, you’re right. It’s rather more ravenous than wistful. Either way, ignore him a little at least. He’ll hate it.”
“Oh. All right then.” Dressed and ready to make her appearance, Alicia turned one last circle before Garrett. “Am I properly armed?”
“You’re entirely deadly and you’re decidedly late. Everyone else has been up for hours.”
She whirled at the sound of Wyndham’s rumbling voice. He was standing in t
he doorway of their bedchamber as if he’d been there some while.
Oh, bother. She only hoped he hadn’t been there long enough to hear the “wistful” remark.
“Well, then. I had best be on my way then.” She excused herself quickly, ducking past Wyndham with a nod, fleeing the room and the lingering heat that threatened to melt her away.
Once downstairs, she was told by a footman that the ladies had gathered in the east morning room. She heard them before she found the room, as the gay chatter penetrated past the door with ease.
Her steps slowed. She ought to spend the day with the ladies, as the gentlemen would be pursuing shooting or gaming all day. Custom dictated that she do so.
Then again . . .
She smiled and turned on her heel, nearly running as she made for the front door. Garrett was waiting for her there, her bonnet and coat in his hands.
He smirked. “Took you that long to remember that you never do as you’re told?”
She grabbed up her things and bestowed a quick kiss on Garrett’s sculpted jaw. “Silly me.” She ran for the crisp, chill day as if it would save her life—or at least her sanity.
She knew Cross’s estate fairly well . . . and she could feel Sutherland tugging at her through the wood.
The path was overgrown now, barely visible through the spiderwort and feverfew that had sprung up since last she’d come this way to spy on the extravagant parties given here.
Her parents must be holding a tighter rein on Alberta and Antonia since then, for they had once been known to trail after her, protesting all the way but just as determined to see.
“I’ll just go to the hill, just to see the house,” she told herself. “There is a pretty aspect there.” She started out briskly enough, striding through the brush with her skirts lifted. Then, as the way became more and more the playground of her childhood, she began to slow.
She’d never expected to set foot on Sutherland soil again, yet there was the tree where Alberta had fallen and turned her ankle. Alicia and Antonia had run her errands for weeks, hiding the injury from their mother for fear of being forbidden to climb.