“I’m not feeling terribly well, no. Would you mind if we left now? I’m sure Thom won’t care, and if you’re done speaking with your friend—”
“We will leave at once,” he said soothingly and went to collect Thom. Plum used the few minutes to say good-bye to her hostess, keeping a wary eye out for Charles. She wouldn’t put it past him to confront Harry, although she suspected he would not be happy with a mere scene in public. She had experience with Charles—he was a coward at heart, and would not wish to risk giving Harry the opportunity to call him out.
“If only I knew what he wanted of me,” Plum said softly, then dismissed that thought as Harry and Thom came up to her. She was certain Charles would make his desires known to her by one means or another. He was never one to disregard his desires.
***
“Plum?”
“Hmm?” Plum absently checked the leather cuff that bound Harry’s left hand to the massive ebony headboard. What would Charles want from her?
“You seem to be distracted.”
“Am I?” How was she to keep Harry from finding out about Charles until she could take care of the situation?
“Yes, you are. Distinctly distracted. In fact, I sense that you are disturbed about something. Are you?”
“Am I what?” She slid across his body to secure his other wrist. How Charles knew she was Vyvyan La Blue was no surprise—they had made it a game to name all of their connubial calisthenics; no doubt he remembered that—but what would he do with that knowledge?
“Disturbed.”
“No, not particularly. Why do you ask?” Perhaps he just wanted to gloat over his knowledge? Perhaps he just wanted to revel in the power he must feel in knowing her secret?
“Well, for one, we were supposed to be doing Gladiator and the Shy Dove tonight, and yet you seem to be bent upon Gallant Knight at a Blind Maiden’s Mercy.”
No, that wasn’t like Charles; he didn’t enjoy hoarding secrets, he enjoyed profiting from such knowledge. No doubt he thought to profit from hers. A toe nudged her calf. She looked down, somewhat startled to find her husband spread out naked before her, tied to his bed with the fur-lined leather cuffs he had given her just two weeks before. “I thought you were going to be the gladiator tonight? Why are you bound?”
He frowned. “You are distressed about something. What is it, Plum? Did someone say something to you at the ball?”
She couldn’t look at his eyes while she lied to him. Her gaze dropped to his chest, then stayed there awhile as she enjoyed the scenery. “No, no one said anything. I just feel a bit…”
“Neglected,” Harry said, nodding his head. “I understand completely. It’s my fault, but I was thinking of you, Plum. I knew you were tired from the travel, and since we had little privacy in the inns, I felt our nightly exercises would be best curtailed until we arrived. Therefore, as the fault is mine, so must the solution be. Climb on.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Climb onto me. Onto my…er…you’ll feel better afterward, I promise.”
Plum thought of pointing out that that would never be in dispute, but decided instead to humor him. Clearly he was worried about her—as a dutiful and loving wife, it was her responsibility to ease his worries as best she could. “Well, as long as we’re doing Blind Maiden and Knight, we might as well do it properly.”
She blew out the candles so they were in the dark, the faintest sliver of moonlight showing silvery blue through a gap in the curtains. Enjoying the experience of relying solely on touch, Plum slid her fingers up Harry’s chest, reveling in the way his breathing hitched as she stroked a path up the warm hills and valleys of his chest. Her hands slid higher until both palms framed the long planes of his face. Her fingers teased his short little side-whiskers, then traced downward along the strength of his jaw until they met together on his gently squared chin. She bent her head and lightly brushed her lips against him, a fleeting kiss that promised much, and which was so sweet she had to repeat the action. Harry’s mouth opened in invitation beneath hers, allowing her to tease the entrance to his mouth with her tongue. She captured his bottom lip between hers and bit gently, his resulting moan coursing through her, igniting fires deep in her center.
Of their own volition, her fingers slid up his head, plucking off his spectacles before returning to comb through his close-cropped hair, her head dipping again to his, this time allowing her tongue to enter the warmth within. He lay strangely passive, allowing her to stroke his tongue, to tease his mouth into reacting, but when he did it was as if he had set her afire. A groan of pure pleasure rose in her throat as his tongue swept into her mouth, demanding that she match his passion, firing her to greater heights.
The leather straps creaked as Harry tried to reach for her, but could not. Plum pulled her mouth from his, having forgotten for a moment that she was supposed to be comforting him.
“Do you want me to unbind you?”
“Yes.”
She nuzzled his neck, sliding away from him as she said. “I’m sorry, but I’m not feeling terribly merciful at the moment. Perhaps later?”
“Plum! Come back here!”
“Yes, my lord?” Blindly, Plum slipped out of her dressing gown, smiling in the dark. She knew Harry was hot and hard—he always was whenever they were in bed together, bless him—but he really should know better than to think she’d leave him in that unpleasant state.
“Come back here. I…er…you intend to finish what you’ve started?”
“I do?” With one hand on the bottom of the bed, she padded softly around to the other side.
“Yes, you do,” Harry said sternly. She smiled again. How adorable he was. “You are suffering from the trauma of attending a ball after a prolonged absence. If I do not affect a cure for your condition, it will return and leave you helpless come other such engagements. Therefore, you will straddle yourself across my thighs, and seat yourself upon me. Now!”
“Such a thoughtful husband you are,” Plum said as she climbed into the bed. Linens rustled provocatively beneath him as she stretched out a hand, finding the hard muscle of his thigh. “Thinking only of me.”
“I am the very best of husbands. There are none better than me,” Harry answered, sounding oddly as if the words were coming from between grinding teeth.
“That goes without saying, Harry.”
“Plum?”
“Yes, my dearest?”
“If you do not wrap your long, luscious thighs around my hips in the next ten seconds, I will die. Do you understand?”
“I think so.” Plum stroked a path up his thigh to where the texture of the light down covering his legs changed to a denser hair. She closed her fingers over him, tracing the long, velvety length of his arousal.
“St. Peter’s cods,” Harry groaned, thrusting his hips upward in her gently stroking fingers. “This is for your own good, wife: GET ON ME NOW!”
Harry’s voice was coming out raspy and hoarse, his breath fast and rough. Plum chuckled a little to herself over the fact that her breath was just as ragged as his.
“I am ever the dutiful wife,” she said as she swung her leg over his, positioning herself so the silky tip of him bumped against the skin of her inner thighs. Then she adjusted herself and felt his heat at her entrance, pulling from her an answering heat that started deep inside her and spread through her soul. “And as you seem to think this will help me…”
Their groans of pleasure were spontaneously given as Plum sank slowly down on him, but her husband’s pleasure fed hers, spiraling her on that delicious journey she had learned could take her to heaven and back. She felt a brief moment of power when she remembered that one of the joys of the Blind Maiden was that she could set her own pace; no insistent hands would grip her hips and hurry her into a tempo that would send them heedlessly toward paradise. Instead she rose and fell upon him slowly, ignoring
her husband’s throaty pleas to cease tormenting him and ease his torture.
“You said this was for my benefit,” she pointed out as she tried a little swivel to the side. Harry bucked beneath her, his hips rising as a harsh moan was torn from him. “I’m simply trying to maximize the cure.”
“You’re trying to kill me,” Harry accused, panting, his entire body shaking beneath her. Plum tried an interesting little circular motion as she sank down on the hardness that pierced her to her core, her eyes closed despite the darkness, feeling every nuance of him sliding deep within her.
“I can feel your heart beating,” she said dreamily, leaning forward to kiss him. “You’re so hot within me, Harry, we must be burning up. I love the feel of you, I love the feeling of you entering me, piercing me, and joining with me. It makes me feel as if I’m part of you.”
“You are part of me,” Harry answered, his tongue and lips teasing her mouth until she opened and let him in. “You’re the best part of me. I could never be whole without you. You are my wife, my lover, mother to my children, my heart. I couldn’t exist without you.”
Plum squeezed her eyes tight against the tears that threatened to spill out at his words, and kissed him with every ounce of passion she possessed. Their souls were joined, entwined as they were both lifted toward the pinnacle of pleasure, her mouth plundering his as he plundered hers, both straining to incite the other to greater heights of passion. Plum moved urgently against Harry, kissing him frantically as the wonderful power within her uncoiled and filled her with joy and love that overflowed her being and spread to him, bonding her to him, merging the two beings into one, blinding her to all but the strength of his love.
She sobbed out her love as he shifted beneath her, spilling his seed against her thigh as he shouted her name, the two of them caught in a maelstrom that receded slowly, leaving Plum drained and boneless, resting on her husband as she attempted to catch her breath, trying to understand the power of the experience she had been given, wanting but unable to put into words what it meant to her, what he meant to her, how very much he had enriched her life, giving her something more valuable than all the riches in the world.
Instead she tipped her head back and kissed him on his jaw, whispering, “I love you, husband.”
“There, you see?” Harry gasped, his chest heaving beneath her. “I told you that you would feel better afterward.”
Plum bit his chin.
Twelve
Harry set off for the Home Office the next morning with a song in his heart and slight leather burns on his wrists. All was right in his world—the sun was shining, the children hadn’t done anything worse than soap up the banisters in order to conduct banister races down the main stairs, and he had left Plum lying exhausted in his bed, her raven hair tangled and spread out around her, a smile on her face as she slept. He whistled a jaunty little tune as his carriage bowled along the streets of London, making a mental note to remind Plum that the choice of tonight’s activities was his, and Gladiator’s Revenge was most definitely in the cards. He much looked forward to wielding his sword in a manner that was sure to keep her captivated.
“Lord Rosse?” A slight young man with suitably deprecatory tones bowed and murmured Harry’s name as he handed over his hat and gloves to a Home Office flunky. “Lord Briceland is waiting for you. If you will come this way.”
Harry was escorted into a small office at the back of Whitehall. The tall, thin man with a wispy blond mustache who was seated behind an immaculate desk rose as he entered, holding out a pale hand. “Lord Rosse, what a pleasure it is to meet you at last. I’ve heard so much about you from the PM and others, I feel as if I know you.”
Harry greeted the new head of the Home Office and took the offered seat. “I take it you’ve read my report?”
“With great interest, yes,” Briceland said, leaning back in his chair. “I must tell you, I find it difficult to believe that you willingly allowed yourself to be used to prove Sir William’s guilt. What the PM must have been thinking…but it’s not my place to question either his or your actions. The plan proved fruitful, and you did acquire the proof needed to charge Sir William with treason.”
“Just so. About your information—as you will have read in my report, I can find no proof that Sir William was working with anyone but the anarchists who were later hanged. I checked and double-checked my notes with the various informants and Runners employed by me at the time, and no word of another individual was ever breathed. As far as I can find, Sir William was alone in his perfidy—at least as far as individuals in the Home Office went.”
Lord Briceland offered Harry a cigar. He shook his head, desirous of ending the interview as soon as could be managed. He had a wife to smother with attention, not to mention five hellion children who were at that moment quite probably up to some nefarious plan or another.
“I understand your reticence to believe that there was another individual involved, but I believe that not to be the case. I called you to London because the PM assures me that there is no one better to sniff out the truth than you.” Briceland pulled open a drawer, extracting a limp, stained, much-battered piece of parchment. He handed it to Harry. “What you see is a letter that was sent to us anonymously. As you might notice, it is dated some fifteen years ago.”
Harry glanced at the letter, his eyebrows rising at the date. “It was written the day before Sir William took his own life.”
“Yes,” Briceland said. “Please read it. I assure you it concerns you enough to justify calling you to town when you must be wishing to be with your new wife and family.”
The letter was not addressed to anyone, although it was signed “Bill.” This will find you after I am dead, the letter read. Do not despair of my death; I always knew the price of freedom would be a high one. All I ask is that you avenge my death, seek my murderer, and strike at him as surely as he has struck me. I do not lightly ask this of you, for I am certain Rosse has a friend in Addington, and the PM is stalwart where his friends are concerned, but I have faith that in this you will not fail me. Harry looked up. “Interesting. Your informant gave you no clue as to who it was addressed to, or how he gained possession of it?”
“No information whatsoever. It was sent as you see it with no accompanying note. You can see my reason for concern; the letter contains an obvious threat to your life.”
Harry handed the letter back with a slight smile. He liked the new head of the Home Office, but never again would he put himself in a position where his life could be destroyed by treachery—not now, when there were so many other people dear to him. Until he had proof of the identity of the man believed to be behind the attacks, he would disregard Briceland’s concern about the threats against him. “One that is fifteen years old, yes. I believe it’s safe to assume that whomever the letter was sent to decided not to act on Sir William’s urging.”
Briceland leaned forward to take it, a frown between his brows. “Regardless, the fact that the letter should come to light now indicates that the grudge against you by this unknown person might well still pose a threat to you.”
“I hardly think so,” Harry said as he got to his feet. “But if it will make you easier, I will do a little investigating as to who Sir William’s friends were. I doubt if many of them are left, but it can’t hurt to check.”
The two men shook hands, Briceland accompanying Harry to the door. “Rosse, a word of caution, if I may. Do not take this threat lightly because it is of long standing. I understand that you lost a governess to a house fire recently.”
Harry smiled. “A tragic event, I agree, but one due to a faulty flue and not the hand of Sir William reaching fifteen years beyond the grave.”
“Have caution,” Briceland repeated. “You might be surprised to learn just how far-reaching Sir William’s influence was.”
***
Plum rose from where she had been clutching the cl
osestool, shakily wiping her face with a damp cloth. This was the fourth morning she’d woken feeling extremely ill, and although the other days could be excused by the less-than-wholesome food they’d eaten at inns on the way to London, she was no fool. She had been carefully keeping track, and although her monthlies were never of the terribly reliable variety, the fact that she’d missed two, plus the morning indispositions, confirmed her hopes and desires and dreams…only, sweet St. Genevieve, how was she to tell Harry? Not only had the man insisted that he would not give her a child—only spilling his seed in her twice in the two months of their marriage—but just the night before, when they arrived in town after four days of travel with the children, he was growling very detailed threats about locking them up in a garret until it was time to return home.
Perhaps now was not the time to inform him there was another child on the way. She only hoped she would be able to keep her extreme joy and happiness at finding herself with child dimmed to a level he would not find suspicious.
Another wave of nausea overtook her. She lunged for the closestool, just barely making it before her stomach relieved itself.
“I’m joyous and extremely happy,” she told herself between retches. “I just can’t let anyone know that yet.”
Somehow, she thought as she heaved over the porcelain bowl, she doubted if that would be too difficult. Besides, she had other things to occupy her mind, one item in particular—Charles. What his intentions were and how she was to keep him from telling everyone what he knew were uppermost in her mind, but selected secondary considerations such as how to shield Harry so he wouldn’t hear of Charles’s return from the watery grave also filled her thoughts.
“Are we ready for our morning excursion?” she asked as she—joyously, and with much happiness—clutched the banister while descending to the main hall. Particular care was needed around stairs, as one never knew when the children might decide to arrange for a concealed trap. Harry was becoming very adept at avoiding the traps as he clattered down the stairs, leaping gracefully over steps made slippery with grease, but with the precious burden she knew herself to be carrying, she would have to be particularly careful.
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