He took another swig from the bottle. “Tell me about these imaginary, cutlass wielding corsairs. Miss—?”
“My name is America Jones.”
He set an elbow on the chair back and cupped his chin. He had a wary way of studying her, as if she were some kind of curiosity. “Are you incapable of answering questions in a truthful manner? Again, Miss—?”
She set her jaw and glared. “America.”
“Is the name of a continent, or two. I can never remember if there are two continents designated north and south, or one continent designated south and north. Which is it?”
Why did he play the Mad Hatter? Leaning far back off the chair, he had to catch himself. The grog appeared to be having an effect. “And there is a new country, the United States of America.”
Even with her arms tied down, she still managed a shrug. “It is my name, sir. America Síne Jones, and I have learned to live with it these twenty-ought years.”
“I believe I may call you by your middle name.” His mouth twitched. “Sin–ay. I do so admire the first syllable.”
Her gaze narrowed to a quizzical squint. “Is your mind always in the gutter, Mr.—?”
“Black.” Liquid sable eyes flecked with gold drank in every inch of her. “Only when I am interested, Miss Jones.”
“And are you interested?”
“I once enjoyed a meal at the Langham Hotel, which I thought about repeating for weeks afterward.”
“Is that what I am to you? A supper?”
He lowered his chin. “A banquet, my tempting dark dove.” Hooded ebony eyes crinkled at the sides. He enjoyed taunting her.
Captivated for a moment, she mentally slapped herself. “I would love to stay and chat, really I would, but I must be on my way.” She flashed the faintest of smiles. “Now that we are introduced, certainly you can release me from bondage?”
“One more thing, Miss Jones. If you would kindly explain about the pirates?” He tilted his head. “Your eyes are most extraordinary. Almost feline.”
What an exasperating man! While he swigged from the bottle, she tugged again on her bindings. “Why do you insist on torturing me?”
She pressed her lips together and chewed the inside of her bottom lip. A force of habit when vexed beyond endurance. Well, she supposed two could play this silly, annoying interrogation game. “Are your parents still living, Mr. Black?”
He sat up and blinked. “Mother died of a virulent meningitis years ago. My father teaches advanced mathematics at Trinity College.” He ran a hand through thick waves of dark brown hair. “He might as well be dead. We don’t get on.”
“I could not tell you if my mother is alive or dead. I’ve not been home to Louisiana in many years. Buried my father four short months ago. Charles Gardiner Jones.” She leaned forward purposefully. “A decent and honest merchant trader. Acquaintances said he couldn’t face his business failure—that he died of drink. People who knew him well told a very different story. My father’s heart was broken by his lying, scheming business partner.”
When her eyes threatened to tear, she lifted her chin. “After his funeral I vowed to bring Yanky Willem to justice.”
“And how goes this pursuit?”
She frowned. “Not as well as I’d hoped. Last night Willem caught me rifling through a year’s worth of cargo manifests.”
He arched a brow. “Searching for—?”
“Proof of piracy, Mr. Black.”
He smiled that maddening grin of his. “I knew if I was patient, we might actually get round to the original subject of my query—the filthy pirates.”
“Chased me from the Docklands all the way down the Strand.” She laid her head back against the padded chair and absently counted the cracks in the ceiling. “When you stepped into the sharp edge of my blade, I was clean out of bullets.”
“Bullets? And where, pray tell, is your pistol?”
Now it was her turn to grin. “Untie me, and—”
“I think not, Miss Jones.” From behind protective rungs, Mr. Black stepped over the seat of his chair and ventured closer.
“Shall we search together?” In a blur of movement he threw her skirt up over her knees and wedged himself tightly in-between her spread legs. The man moved like a panther.
“Sorry, no chance to knee me in the groin.” He moved his hands under her skirt and over her legs. Even as she fumed, her stomach fluttered.
He slowly worked his way higher. “Did you reach your satisfaction last night?”
She gasped for a breath. “What satisfaction, sir?”
His fingers slipped underneath satin garters, skimming the tops of her hose. “Ah, a dainty derringer, very ladylike.” He placed the weapon in the lap of her gathered skirt and cocked his head to one side. “When we coupled, brief as it was, did you experience arousal, Miss Jones?”
“Surely not from that large wanker of yours routing me out.” She avoided eye contact. “Perhaps, there was some pleasure. Briefly.”
A hand remained under her skirt and stroked the inside of her thigh. “I’m curious. Have you ever been satisfied from intercourse? Since there have been one or two before me—”
“One.” She bit out. “And I don’t find any of it very pleasurable. Satisfied, Mr. Black?”
“What if I told you that I could make it very pleasurable for you?” The man’s free hand undid a few more of her blouse buttons. And he purposely swept a finger along the lace edge of her camisole. “No corset?”
A grim sort of grin tugged at her lips. “I hate them. A woman can hardly breathe.”
He looked up from her cleavage. “Shall I make you a promise, Sin-ay? I will untie you after you allow me to pleasure you.”
She chortled with laughter. “I’d rather take another wager.”
Coffee eyes deepened to black. “This is not a wager; it is inevitable. You will be satisfied, and then you will be free to leave. I consider this a matter of—”
“You are arrogant and conceited Mr. Black. Why should I indulge you?” But he was also outrageous and appealing. And, she quite wondered if the pleasure he imagined possible, was ... possible.
Phaeton picked up the pale grey ribbon of her chemise and pulled. Two satin brown nipples invited him to taste. He suckled one until she moaned and her belly shivered.
“Miss Jones, have I been a very bad boy?”
A sensuous pout of a frown caused a painful ache in his manly parts.
“You are playing some kind of game with me?”
“We are playing a game together.” He unbuttoned his trousers, but stopped short of exposing himself. He spread out his hands as though he was about to reveal a masterpiece. “May I?”
She bit her lower lip. “All right, Mr. Black. You may remove that beastly tosser. But you must not stroke it.”
He did as he was told, and became fully erect. “Since I cannot pleasure myself, may I touch”—his hand moved over the top of her skirt, pressing the fabric between her legs—“here?”
Eyelashes fluttered over exotic eyes. They were more grey than green.
“No touching.” Those grey-greens fractured into dark emeralds. “Not until you express your regret for last night.”
Smart, wicked little strumpet. Phaeton worked hard to suppress his amusement. “I am so sorry to have neglected your satisfaction, mademoiselle.”
America said nothing, but moved her knees farther apart.
He reached under her skirt, and worked fingertips over hose and garters. He stopped just short of her feminine triangle. The inside of her thighs were like taut velvet, yet jiggly in all the right places.
His penis jerked, and he longed to toss up her skirts for a look. But he would wait until she squirmed, nay, ordered him to do it.
Softly circling smooth inner thighs, his hands brushed by moist curls. “May I?”
“I’m afraid you will have to apologize again. This time you will ask for my pardon with sincerity.” Those almond-shaped eyes narrowed. “Only then will yo
u be allowed to touch my cunny.”
Phaeton pressed his lips together. His passion now elevated dangerously close to peak arousal. “My dear Miss Jones. I beg you to forgive my angry phallus, which I do now fully admit took advantage of your plight.” His fingers slipped easily into heavenly warmth and copious wetness. And this young lovely had never known the glories of intercourse? He would make sure to remedy that.
Grazing her face with his mouth, he pressed his lips to the tip of her nose. His tongue found the sensitive underside of her upper lip. “And yet—you did ask for it at knife point,” he taunted.
Her eyes glared even as she gasped for air.
He easily found the rapidly burgeoning nub to her pleasure and circled. Her head fell back onto the soft padding of the chair as her sighs and moans urged him onward. Those lovely breasts, fully exposed, nipples taught, pointed at the ceiling.
“As I am nearly always up for it ...” He stroked with his thumb, guiding one, then two fingers into her sheath. She answered him with a tremble in her legs.
A push of her skirt got him a peek at dark curls and glistening pink folds. A deep groan rose from his chest. “I do implore you to say yes and allow me the comfort of your sheath.” He might die from this hellish prick tease. A game of his own making, which he now regretted.
Abruptly, he discontinued both his apologies and ministrations. After a sad look at his bobbing prick, he pleaded with her. “Might you grant me some relief, dear lady? May I press onward?”
“You may put it in, but only an inch.” She marked the spot with her gaze. “Just to the end of the knob.” He sucked air between his teeth. Clever puss, this one.
Capturing her legs, one arm under each of her knees, he tilted her bottom up to receive him and pressed in by an inch. “One more?”
Her lashes lowered over dark eyes. “Then no more.”
Slowly he pressed inward, his thumb circling her pleasure. He added fingers to tickle and tap and flutter over the nub, coaxing the sensitive rosebud to swell and run wet with juice.
“Yes.” She moaned and thrust her hips upward. “Don’t stop.”
He thrust deeper, circled faster. A dozen hard pumps, and she cried, “Yes.” And again. “Yes.” A strong wave of orgasmic ecstasy reached out and entered his body. The very sensation of her pleasure sent him into loud, growling release.
As his shattered world pieced itself together, he pondered the effect her arousal had exerted on his own. Phaeton raised his head from her shoulder. “ ’Tis a fair thing to lie between a maid’s legs.” He returned his head to her chest and nuzzled a plump mound.
“I recognize the bard’s words. Hamlet to Ophelia?”
“Yes, my dear.”
“On long voyages, when my father owned just one ship, he would read to me every night from the plays or sonnets.” His lips brushed over a nipple, causing a tremor. “What you did just then—the effect you had upon me. How exactly did you accomplish that, Mr. Black?”
He jerked upright and loosed the knot binding her arm. “Do not fall in love with me, Miss Jones.”
He chafed her wrist between his hands to encourage circulation. “And please do not come knocking at all hours of the day and night requesting my services.”
She snorted. “You are safe with me, for I do not believe in such affection. Men take love for granted; they do not prize it.”
He unleashed her other hand. “You claim to be a woman with no heart?”
“A girl gives away the secrets of her heart, and a man is off down the lane for a toss up the neighbor’s skirt.” She rubbed her own wrist this time.
“Phaeton.” The voice and footsteps came from the landing. “Might I ask you to sit with Lizzie for a spell?”
He bolted out of the chair and yanked up his pants. “Mrs. Parker, an unexpected but welcome visit.”
Madam paused at the base of the stairs. The scene in his flat received an amused once over. “So sorry, Phaeton, it appears I have interrupted—”
“I was just on my way out, Ma’am.” Miss Jones pulled her chemise over bouncing breasts and retied the ribbon. He tried to help with the buttons, but she slapped his hand away. With a curt nod, she straightened her skirts and headed for the stairs.
“Esmeralda.” He offered a chair. “I’ll just be a minute.”
He launched himself upward, two steps at a time, and ran down the hall. An elderly gentleman chased after a giggling harlot in chemise and pantaloons. “Miss Jones.”
She confronted him in the entryway leading out to the street. “What is this place?”
“Mrs. Parker’s is a—”
“Bordello? Hooch house? Out with it, Mr. Black.” Her hands fisted on her hips. “And what sort of role do you play here?”
Without waiting for an answer she turned and descended to the street. Oddly enough he followed after mumbling protests. “I don’t play any sort of—do you think I work there? I assure you I do not.”
“Perhaps you service the residents as an avocation of sorts?”
He grabbed her elbow. “Miss Jones, I work for—” Damn the woman, he was actually flummoxed. “I am only a tenant.”
She pivoted on her heel. “Good day, Mr. Black.” The flounce of her ruffled overskirt bounced along to the rhythm of her gait and the sway of her hips.
“Good-bye, Miss Jones.”
Phaeton sprinkled the remaining garlic along the window ledge. “Would someone please explain to me how these tuberous bits of flora might ward off the chimera I chased after last evening?”
Lizzie sat up in bed, sipping hot bouillon from a cup. “Please tell me more about the creatures you encountered, Mr. Black.”
“Why would I unduly frighten you, Lizzie?” Phaeton sank down on the edge of the mattress and examined her carefully. “Besides, I now strongly suspect those phantasmagorical events were a ruse. Meant to distract me while a truly vicious killer stalked after you.”
The dear girl set cup to saucer. “She was quite beautiful. Pale and delicate, with lovely mesmerizing eyes.”
“So, you have begun to remember.”
She fingered the bandage wrapped around her throat and swallowed hard. “Will I become one, Mr. Black?”
“A lady of darkness. A nosferatu?” Phaeton lounged on his elbows. “According to the rules as stated forth in the Feast of Blood, Varney the Vampire was able to turn Clara Crofton only by draining her blood completely.” His head rolled back on his shoulders as he studied the ceiling. “And I believe there needs to be an exchange of blood.” He reached over and chuffed her chin. “You, on the other hand, have rosy cheeks. Far from the pale countenance of the undead, Miss Randall.”
She smiled the first bright smile of the afternoon.
Esmeralda poked her head in the door. “Phaeton? Mr. Skimpole is here.”
Unlike his spindly name, a rather good-sized chap entered the room with his cap in his hand. “Mr. Black.”
“Mr. Skimpole.” He stood up and approached the newly hired man. “Straight away, the wardrobe will need to be moved over here, against the window. And while I am gone this evening, you will station yourself against the door to this room and refuse any and all persons entry with the exception of either Mrs. Parker or myself.”
Lizzie wrinkled her brow. “You are leaving me, sir?”
“I have been invited to the opening of Aida, and I never refuse an opera. I promise to check in on you later tonight.” He leaned over and kissed her cheek.
Chapter Four
PHAETON CLOSED HIS EYES and held onto the last strains of the aria for one last glorious moment. Applause broke out in the opera house as he exhaled.
Someone tapped on his knee. “Glad you could make it.” Zander Farrell’s low voice barely registered. “I’m off in search of refreshment.” He looked up in time to see Zander exit the box along with a handful of his in-laws.
Sophrinia Farrell turned and smiled. “Mr. Black, come keep me company.”
He took a seat in the front and angled hi
s chair to facilitate conversation.
“Are you enjoying the opera thus far?”
“Very much.” Phaeton adjusted his waistcoat and lounged against gilt chair rails. Zander’s lovely wife always brought out the devil in him. “I find nothing more restorative to my soul than good music or good sex.”
A smile tugged at the ends of Mrs. Farrell’s extraordinary mouth. A bit wide, with plump lips, dear God, a man could lose control of himself.
She sighed. “Alas, our brave young couple is soon captured and entombed alive. I find the poignancy nearly unbearable—to lie in your lover’s arms forever.”
“If one is to be sealed away in a dark vault, I do recommend finding a companion one can tolerate for eternity.”
Sophie chuckled softly. Her hand stroked a swollen belly. She was expectant again. He had not known that. This would be their second child in less than two years.
“Last night, my husband returned home inebriated on absinthe. Don’t bother to apologize, Mr. Black, for I have quite forgiven you.” While her gaze remained on the audience below, she leaned closer. “After we retired for the evening, Zander became so ... imaginative.” She flashed silver eyes, full of mischief.
He always enjoyed these flirtations with her. A woman of quality who amused him. So few did. “You never fail to delight me, Sophie. I believe I might consider marriage, if I could ever find a young lady as beautiful, intelligent, and as ...”
“Wanton?”
“Lusty, perhaps?”
Her laughter wafted into the air, musical as the evening itself.
Sophie swept a hand over her rounded girth. “Heavenly Aida was most inspiring, don’t you think?”
“Yes, lovely.”
“Zander sang the very aria to me our first night together.”
“So, it becomes clear there was never a chance for me. I can’t manage a decent note.”
She patted her midriff. “I am much too big to be out and about in public, but I could not bear to miss this performance. Zander helped to secret the bulk of me into the theatre hidden under a large cape.”
Phaeton could not stem his fascination. Mesmerized by the perfectly shaped globe hidden beneath the delicate shirred skirt, he reached out. She took his hand and placed it on her belly.
The Seduction of Phaeton Black Page 3