Callie looked at his proffered arm and felt the strangest sense of connection. It was something that had been so terribly absent from her life all along. Placing her hand on his arm, she willed away the tremors that overtook her and allowed him to lead her into the church. Winn waited for her at the altar. Effie stood close by, as did Lord Highcliff. The children were there, as well, having been corralled into behaving by Mrs. Marler who had likely bribed them with the promise of cake.
In all, the ceremony was impossibly brief. They recited the words as the vicar instructed them. They bowed their heads, prayed when told to do so, and simply followed instructions the man knew by rote. At the end of it, they signed the church register and then it was all done. Callie looked up at Winn, at her husband. How could such a momentous event be over so quickly?
“There’s a lovely wedding breakfast prepared at the house,” Mrs. Marler said and the children all bustled out with her. Highcliff escorted Effie and Averston followed them.
Alone in the church, Winn took her hands. “It’s a bit anticlimactic, isn’t it?”
Callie smiled. “I don’t think it’s that. I think… I was honestly too nervous to take it all in. I’m not even certain what we said to one another just now.”
Winn laughed. “I’ll remind you later. Are you ready to go to your new home? To our home?”
And with those simple words, the reality of it settled in on her entirely. Tears threatened, but they were happy tears. Callie simply felt overwhelmed by the joy she felt in that moment. “I am.” She placed her hand in his and let him lead her from the church, ready to embark on a life together.
*
The return trip to the house on Piccadilly was a boisterous one. There was much laughter in the crowded coach. Highcliff had produced a bottle of champagne and glasses. The cork released with a loud pop that had them all giggling and then he poured the bubbling liquid, spilling as much on the upholstery as he got into the glasses that he passed around. “I only brought four,” he said, passing the last one off to Averston. “That means I drink from the bottle.”
“Not for the first time,” Effie quipped primly.
“It certainly is not,” Highcliff agreed.
Winn noted that the pair seemed to have achieved an unsteady truce despite their recent discord. There was still a noticeable coolness in their interactions, however. It wasn’t the temper of the day before. This was something far worse. Still, they were both putting on pleasant faces and attempting to be festive. Averston was stiff, his presence a complete surprise, but not an unwelcome one. He hoped, for Calliope’s sake, that she might come to have some sort of relationship with someone she shared blood with.
When they arrived, the smaller carriage bearing the housekeeper and the children had already unloaded and she was bustling the children into the house. The servants were lined up in the entryway, happily cheering as they entered. In the dining room, the wedding breakfast, complete with a cake far too massive for such a small party, had been laid out.
The children were shrieking with glee and William’s eyes had glazed over the moment he saw the cake. They’d grabbed Callie’s arm and dragged her into the dining room, pointing to every treat with absolute delight.
“Don’t worry. They’re all going back to the Darrow School with me.”
Winn turned to Effie who’d snuck up beside him. “Pardon?”
“My wedding gift to you,” she said with a smile. “I’m taking the children with me and they will be returned to you safe, sound and hopefully better behaved by tomorrow.”
Winn uttered a silent prayer of thanks. “Miss Darrow, were I not a married man, I would kiss you for that.”
“Save your kisses for your bride. Now, eat quickly and make your escape.”
With that, Winn made for the dining room and let the festivities begin while anticipating their ending and the wondrous things that would follow.
Making his way to Callie, he pried her hand from William’s. “If you want a piece of cake, you’ll need to let her go so she might actually cut it.”
“No cake. Not yet,” Callie replied. “You’ve eaten nothing of any substance and I won’t have you all getting ill.” To Winn she added, “You help Charlotte with hers. Claudia, William and I will prepare plates for them and for us.”
Winn watched her go, leading the older children. He felt a tug on his hand and looked down at little Charlotte. As always, his heart melted a bit when he did so. Leaning down, he hoisted her up into his arms. “Let’s get you some breakfast, shall we?”
“Will you and Aunt Calliope have babies now?” she asked.
His heart thundered in his chest. “At some point, I’m certain we shall.”
“Will you still love us if you do?” The question was voiced softly and then her thumb popped immediately into her mouth.
Winn felt his chest tighten. Gently, he pulled her hand away from her mouth and pressed a kiss to her cheek. “Charlotte, my sweet, I can promise you that Calliope and I will always love you… just as we will always love William and Claudia. The three of you brought us together, after all.”
Charlotte laid her head on his shoulder. “I love you, Uncle Winn.”
Holding the little girl close, Winn looked around the room and realized just how full his life had become. It was chaotic, certainly. But the alternative was something he’d never wish to return to. How alone he’d been, without ever realizing it!
Callie approached him then, carrying two plates while William and Claudia each held their own. “What are you thinking so pensively about?”
“That a little chaos is a small price to pay for this much happiness. Now, let me feed this child before she starts chewing on the furniture,” he said, prompting a giggle from Charlotte. Impulsively, Winn leaned forward and kissed Callie softly on the lips.
“What was that for?” she asked.
“Because I can. Prepare yourself, Wife. I mean to do that every opportunity I get,” he warned.
“Kissing is disgusting!” William said, making a face from the table where he’d already dug into his breakfast.
Highcliff clapped the boy on the shoulder. “I’ll be expecting a revised opinion in a few years.”
Laughter was still bubbling around the room as they were all seated around the table together. It was the first opportunity he’d had to ask her about the most curious part of the day thus far. “Averston?”
Callie glanced over at him, all wide-eyed innocence. “What?”
“Do not say what as if you aren’t perfectly aware it was unexpected. Did you ask him to come?”
She ducked her head. “No, I didn’t. It was rather a surprise for me, as well. But I think it was a nice gesture, don’t you?”
“That depends on what will come of it, I suppose.”
And she smiled once more, beaming at him in a way that literally stopped his heart. “Family, of course.”
He continued to stare at her, simply swept away by how beautiful she was and by how much he simply adored her. Even as the laughter and low hum of conversation filled the room as everyone enjoyed their meal and the celebration of a newly formed family, Winn felt as if they were the only people in the world.
*
The dowager duchess finished the last letter and placed it on the table. They weren’t sentimental goodbyes. She certainly didn’t believe in such things. Instead, they were written in the same vein with which she might have conversed with the recipients. Some were snide. Some were belittling. Others still were bossy and manipulative. Those letters represented the last opportunity for her to manage people as she had been doing throughout her life.
Getting to her feet, she draped her shawl about her shoulders and rang for the maid. When the servant entered, not her own lady’s maid as Gerald had decided that the woman could not be trusted, but a maid from his own household, she glowered at the girl. “See that those go out in today’s post. I’m going out into the garden.”
The maid bobbed a curtsy. “Yes, your grace.”
Gerald had left Highcliff’s vial of poison in her room lest she change her mind and make use of it. But that was the coward’s way out. She’d not lie in a bed, covered in her own vomit when she died. No. She’d die with the same decisiveness and violence with which she had lived. Rather than going down the stairs, she climbed upwards to the next level.
There was a long gallery that looked down onto the ornate marble floor of the entryway. It was lined with the portraits of family members past, those who’d acquitted themselves with honor and duty and a few who had done nothing worthy of the family name other than to die and spare it more indignity. Walking along that narrow hall, she glanced at each portrait as she passed it, until she reached the portrait of her late husband. She’d never loved him, but she’d certainly seen his worth. It was why she’d consented to the match, after all. Being a slightly well-heeled duchess was much preferred to being the wife of even the wealthiest merchant, after all.
Turning away from the portrait, she looked over the railing to the foyer below. From that point, a height of at least three stories, and with her age and blasted infirmities, there was little doubt the fall would kill her. Placing her hands on the banister, she leaned out. A fraction of an inch more, leaning out further and further by the second, until she finally felt the pull of it, the slight dizziness that took her, and then she let herself fall, tumbling over the wooden banister. She never uttered a sound. But the servants shrieked as she hit the floor. There was but a split second of awareness, a brief flash of pain and then nothing. Blackness drew in around her as all the sounds seemed to blur into a distant hum that grew fainter until it, too, was simply gone.
Chapter Twenty-Three
It was still early, not quite noon, but Effie and the children were gone. Highcliff and Averston had left as well. The servants had all but vanished, it seemed. Looking around the room, Callie realized that she and Winn were entirely alone.
“Oh,” Callie said in surprise. “Well, it certainly cleared out very quickly, didn’t it?”
“I think everyone is very discreetly giving us the opportunity to retire upstairs without being observed,” Winn offered with a wicked grin.
“Oh… you mean now? During the day?” She was both scandalized and intrigued at the notion.
Winn’s lips turned up at the corners as he bit back a smile. “It was the middle of the morning when I had you in my bed yesterday, before we were… interrupted.”
Callie felt a blush stealing over her cheeks, one that was not entirely from embarrassment. “So it was. I found it was all so much easier when I didn’t have time to think about it… and feel awkward and uncertain… and, well, a bit ignorant.”
“You’re not awkward. You are graceful and beautiful. Everything about you is perfect,” he said, stepping closer to her. In a voice pitched low, slightly rougher than his normal voice and yet strangely seductive, he added, “You may be uncertain but that, and your ignorance which has hampered you not at all thus far, can be rectified easily enough. Come upstairs with me, Callie, away from any prying eyes. Let me hold you again and kiss you… until neither one of us can think at all.”
Callie felt the breath rush out of her. “You say such wicked things.”
“If you give me half a chance, I’ll do wicked things, as well. And I promise you, Callie, you’ll love every bit of it. Take my hand,” he urged.
She simply didn’t have the will to resist him, nor did she particularly have the desire to do so. Placing her hand in his, Callie let him lead her to the expansive staircase and then up the stairs to the suite of rooms they would now share. Before she could even enter the room, he’d lifted her in his arms and was carrying her over the threshold. “What are you doing?”
“It’s tradition.” he replied.
“You’re going to hurt yourself!”
His eyebrows furrowed as he glowered at her. “Are you suggesting, Lady Montgomery, that I am too old or perhaps infirmed to do my duties as a bridegroom?”
“I’m suggesting that you were wounded yesterday morning and I don’t wish to see you exacerbate your injuries,” she answered primly.
“Ah,” he said, crossing the room with long, sure strides until they stood beside the bed. There, he dropped her so unceremoniously that she bounced on the soft surface, a surprised laugh escaping her.
“That was hardly romantic!” she protested as she sat up to give him a mock glare.
“Perhaps not. But was it fun?” he teased.
“Maybe,” Callie admitted, her lips pursing as she tried to not grin.
Winn reached for her feet, removing her slippers and tossing them over his shoulders. One struck the door, the other landed atop a table, sending items scattering. And he never even glanced in their direction. His gaze remained focused on her, and while a smile played about his lips, there was no mistaking that he was quite serious and that his focus on her was intense and unbreakable. Then he was shrugging out of his coat, his waistcoat and cravat following. She’d seen him in less, of course. Only the day before, she’d seen him shirtless. There had been ample opportunity for her to reflect on it, to conjure in her mind’s eye the image of him with his firm muscles and sun-darkened skin, along with the dark hair that curled over his chest and narrowed to a thin line as it bisected his abdomen. Recalling that now, along with the incredible sensation of having his body pressed to hers, of his hot kisses as they’d feathered over her neck, she found herself impatient with her own clothing. She felt constricted, restrained by the many layers she wore.
As if he’d read her thoughts, he placed one knee on the bed, levering himself onto it so that he was seated behind her. She could feel the heat of his fingers brushing against her skin as he deftly released the buttons at the back of her gown. When the buttons were freed, the garment fell loose about her shoulders, but he didn’t remove it from her. Instead, he slipped his hands inside the silk and began kneading her neck and shoulders. And wherever his hands traveled, his lips followed. Long, soothing strokes of his firm hands to soothe and soft, feathery kisses to seduce.
Callie could do nothing but give herself over to those sensations, her head lolling to one side, baring her neck to him. Then his mouth was there, trailing kisses along that tender flesh that were not at all feathery. They were hot, open-mouthed, punctuated with nips of his teeth and the sensual glide of his tongue over her skin until a breathless moan shuddered from her parted lips.
By the time he had finished, she was utterly boneless, her body limp against his and her head resting against his shoulder as she struggled for some sense of self-control and restraint. “I’m not entirely certain but I think I might be a wanton.”
He pressed a soft kiss against the skin just below her ear. “A man can hope,” he said, his soft laughter fluttering against her ear.
Callie shivered against him. It was instinct more than anything that had her turning her head, seeking his lips with her own. The kiss was, for lack of a better word, incendiary. She clung to him, even as his arms enfolded her completely. Pressed into the warmth of his body, into the firmness and strength of him, she felt sheltered and protected, cared or in ways that she never had. And even when he shifted them so that she was laid back on the bed and he was stretched out next to her, all without breaking the kiss, she found herself clinging to him. Her arms wound about his neck of their own volition. There was no conscious thought at all. Layers of clothing simply vanished. She was lying beneath him, clad only in her shift and stays, her petticoats and gown having long since been discarded. It was then that doubt reared its head once more.
“You’re remarkably skilled at removing women’s clothing,” she remarked breathlessly as he placed a
series of tender kisses along her collarbone.
He lifted his head and met her questioning gaze. “Calliope?”
“Yes?”
“Stop talking. We’ve no distractions or interruptions this time. There are no hellion children to come barging in the door. Let us enjoy it while we can.” He punctuated that statement by pressing a kiss to the arc of her collarbone that left her shivering.
Callie’s hands had slipped inside the open neck of his shirt. She was startled by how hot his skin felt, how smooth it was over the firmness of the muscles that rippled beneath her touch. And then there was the tantalizing contrast of the crisp hair that adorned his chest. The contradicting sensations fascinated her. “You could remove your shirt… that was certainly sufficient inducement yesterday.”
“Are you trying to seduce me, Lady Montgomery?” he asked with a grin, but he was shrugging out of his shirt, tugging it over his head. It hadn’t even landed in a heap on the floor when he tugged the straps of her stays from her shoulders and, within seconds, that garment was sailing to the floor as well.
Callie had no time to think, no time to even survey what was surely masculine perfection. His lips descended on hers once more as his hands drifted over her body, his fingertips brushing her skin through the thin layer of her chemise. Those touches, the drag of the fabric over sensitive flesh, were both soothing and impossibly arousing at the same time. But none of that compared to the moment that his hand cupped her breast, his fingers gently kneading the soft mound even as his thumb brushed over the taut peak. A gasp escaped her and she shivered against him.
Then his mouth was there, his lips closing over that hardened bud of her nipple. While his touch was gentle, her response to it was anything but. She felt as if her entire body had been consumed by heat. It exploded within her, leaving her heart pounding and her blood racing in her veins as she arched against him, helpless to do anything but surrender.
*
Winn struggled for some semblance of control, for some hidden reserve of control. He wasn’t brutish enough to give in to his own pleasure without seeing to hers first. But the sweet abandon with which she responded was more temptation than any man could stand. With every inch of her skin that was bared to him, his need rose, hot and insistent. Stroking his hands over her silken limbs and the softness of her breasts, he savored every shudder and moan from her. Each soft gasp, every time she shivered and arched against him, was precious to him.
What Happens in Piccadilly Page 24