These Wicked Games

by Sherry Ledington, Lacey Kumanchik, Pamela Bolton-Holifield, Eve Ortega, Courtney Milan, Sara Mangel

  “And what are they?”

  “Your aunt in Dorset has a dog. You have a cat. You have the most adorable nose.” His face lowered, bringing his lips to her cheekbone. Against her skin, he breathed warmly. “And you smell like flowers.”

  Suddenly, he straightened. “Purple flowers! God, woman. Take the drapes back. Take the vases back. Take the carpet back.” He inhaled, likely to continue his tirade, but was interrupted by Grimm’s arrival.

  “My lord.”

  Damien turned to look at the butler. “Yes? And might I say it’s damned odd having people I don’t know skulking about my house?”

  Grimm reddened. “Mr. Crane requests your attention in the library.” He swallowed. “At your convenience.”

  “At my convenience. What rot.” Damien stalked inside, still shaking his head.

  Patience ran to the tea table and lifted the edge of the cloth. “Get out, Arthur! Hurry!”

  Her cousin stood, straightening his coat in obvious affront. “You better believe I’m getting the hell out of here. When he finds out what you’ve done to his library—”

  “Patience!”

  She winced. Arthur laughed. “You didn’t think he’d take kindly to all those cats, did you?”

  Tiger, Tiger Burning Bright…

  BY PAMELA BOLTON-HOLIFIELD

  If a man is not safe in his own home, his wife is probably redecorating!

  A tiger attack, a brush with death by fire, a soul-shattering kiss, and a midnight phaeton ride. Having his wife in town is going to be the death of our hero! If he doesn’t kill her first!

  “I cannot tell you how pleased I am to be a source of amusement to you, Crane,” Damien drawled icily as he looked around what was once his library.

  Jonathan Crane continued to laugh uncontrollably at the travesty of their surroundings. Statues, vases, and even embroidered cushions carried the theme to a point of saturation that screamed of eccentric maiden aunts and horse-faced spinster cousins.

  “Oh do shut up!” Damien snapped irritably, turning to and fro in search of a vista that was not occupied by cats. “I am obviously married to a bedlamite!”

  “A very attractive bedlamite to be sure,” Jonathan observed. “Really, Damien, what sort of man forgets to tell his best friend that his wife is a diamond of the first water?”

  Damien’s eyes narrowed. For some reason his friend’s observation made him…angry, for lack of a better word. Very angry.

  “I will thank you not to make such personal observations about my wife,” he growled.

  “Ah…” Jonathan mused, his tone completely without inflection. “I see.”

  “You see what?”

  “Nothing at all, old man,” Jonathan said as he moved to the window. “I am prone to flights of fancy. Although why I would have such a flight about Snydley is quite beyond me. Dashed odd, that.”

  “Crane, will you kindly shut up!” Damien snapped.

  The sight of his neglected bride had addled his wits. When did Patience become so beautiful, and how dare she do so without telling him? Suddenly he was aware that Crane was staring at him in that way he did when he knew something that Damien did not. Had Damien just said something in his ramblings about Snydley?

  “What did you just say?” Damien asked.

  Jonathan looked at him askance. “Am I permitted to speak now, my lord?”

  “If you wish to delay my murdering you, yes!”

  “Been doing that since we were in short pants, Coulter,” he said dryly.

  “Jonathan!” Damien roared. “What…did…you…say?”

  “Say or see, old man?”

  Damien could only manage an exasperated noise in response.

  “Snydley’s carriage just pulled away from the mews of this house,” Jonathan said casually.

  It was difficult for Damien to discern if the feeling that washed over him was a searing heat or an icy blast. Whatever it was, it produced a very definite response in his friend.

  “I believe I will take my leave. Oh, and Damien?”

  Damien glared expectantly.

  “With a beauty like that, I won’t be the only one making observations. Snydley’s appreciation of beauty is legendary.”

  “Bloody damned hell!”

  Patience jumped as she heard the tremendous crash and consequent stream of profanity coming from Damien’s bedchamber. It sounded as if there was a battle going on in there. She flung open his door and, by the light of the candelabra she held aloft, saw Damien sprawled on the floor across the large tiger skin rug, his foot caught in its mouth. Her laughter caught in her throat when she realized he was not moving.

  “Damien!” she cried as she dropped to her knees beside him. “Damien, are you all right?”

  Patience looked frantically around the room. Her eyes landed on the writing desk by the window. Quickly, she snatched the quill. Touching it to the candelabra, she knelt back down beside her fallen husband, waving the still burning feather beneath his nose, and in the process singeing his hair.

  “Good God, woman, what are you trying to do?” Damien yelled, sitting up and beating his burning hair away from his face. “If you wish to kill me, there are less painful ways to do it!”

  “Kill you!” Patience cried. “I was trying to revive you! You fainted!”

  “I did not faint! I was simply lying here playing dead in case the tiger decided to attack me again.”

  Leaning back on his elbows, Damien watched as Patience took in the scene and tried desperately not to laugh. Her luminescence lit up the room.

  “Oh, Damien, I am sorry,” she said sincerely. “Are you sure you are quite well?”

  She started to get up when he touched his hand to her cheek. When she leaned into his touch, Damien felt his chest tighten. He thought he might die at that simple act of trust.

  “Patience,” he murmured as he bent to touch his lips to hers. He marveled at the softness of her lips and the siren’s call of her innocent response. His hand curved around to cradle the back of her head as he drew her up to him. The temptation to devour her was torture, but the last thing he wanted to do was frighten her with the power of his desire. A power that, frankly, scared him to death. Who was this sprite of a creature to bring the worldly Earl of Coulter to his knees? He was floating along on a cloud of heaven when he opened his mouth and promptly stepped off that cloud.

  “Patience,” he murmured against her lips.

  “Mmm?”

  “What was Snydley doing here today?”

  A bucket of cold water could not have done a better job of cooling her ardor.

  “I have no idea what you are talking about, my lord,” she said, rising to her feet with the dignity of an affronted lady and the face of a guilty child. “What on earth makes you think Arthur was here today?”

  “Arthur?” Damien inquired. “You call him Arthur? I find that very interesting…wife.”

  “Oh really?”

  Her resemblance to the tiger lying at his feet was rather disconcerting.

  “I find it interesting, my lord, that you have finally managed to remember that I am your wife. It only took you three years. Perhaps there is hope that our children will not be complete idiots after all.”

  “If they are as beautiful as their mother, it will not matter.”

  His compliment did not have the desired effect. Patience stood glaring at him for a moment, then stormed from the room, slamming the door hard enough to shake the windows.

  “And if they have her temper, I am in serious trouble.”

  “Can I at least inquire as to why we are dashing about Mayfair in the wee hours of the morning?” Jonathan grumbled, hanging onto the seat of Damien’s phaeton for dear life.

  “We are going to find Snydley.”

  “We have to do it tonight?”

  “You are the one who warned me of his appreciation of beauty.”

  “Why is it no matter what idiotic thing you do I get blamed for it?”

  “She called me an
idiot too.”

  “Who did?”

  “Patience. Well actually, she said our children might not be complete idiots, but—”

  “What children?”

  “The children I am going to have with Patience, Crane, do try to keep up! Here we are.”

  The phaeton had rocked to a halt in front of a completely dark and obviously sleeping town house. Jonathan stared incredulously as Damien dragged him up the steps and proceeded to pound on the door.

  “Is something burning?” he asked over the pounding. “I smell burnt hair.”

  “She did what?” Damien demanded as he downed the second snifter of brandy Snydley handed him.

  “She asked me to pretend to court her,” Snydley said evenly. “Is he always this thick?”

  This last was addressed to a very amused Jonathan.

  “He has had a bad day.”

  “Why on earth would my wife want me to think some other man wanted her?”

  “Frankly, because you did not seem to want her yourself,” the Baron replied from his chair by the fire. “Can’t fathom it myself. Only an idiot would leave a beauty like her languishing in the country.”

  “Yes, well—” Jonathan started, cutting himself off when he saw the look on Damien’s face.

  “She threw me out of my own house!” Damien raged. “How was I to know she wanted to be a proper wife?”

  “Our Patience is many things, but a proper wife will never be one of them!” Snydley laughed.

  “She will be when I get through with her,” Damien growled.

  “And what do you mean by that, Coulter?” Snydley obviously took exception to Damien’s tone. “I never would have agreed to this plan in the first place had I not considered you an honorable man. I have told her she can do better, but she will have none of it. She loves you.”

  Damien looked as if he’d been hit by lightning.

  “She does?” he mused softly with a faraway look. And then his expression changed to one Jonathan was all too familiar with. “Oh, she does, does she?”

  He rose and began to pace the room.

  “What is he doing?” Snydley asked Jonathan quietly.

  “Plotting our doom,” Jonathan replied with a groan. “He’s scheming to get even with her.”

  “That’s bad, isn’t it?”

  “You have no idea. We’ll be lucky if she doesn’t kill us all.”

  “I say, what’s that burning smell, Crane?” Snydley asked.

  “Our goose,” was the solemn reply. “As in thoroughly cooked.”

  Forget Me Not

  BY EVE ORTEGA

  Nothing like a good case of amnesia to wipe the slate clean!

  Damien fakes an injury and succeeds in luring Patience to his bed. He falls asleep in heaven—but wakes up in hell.

  A loud banging at the front door roused Patience in the night. Hers had been a fitful sleep, her dreams a jumble of tigers and thunder and kisses, and she was grateful for an excuse to rise from bed. She wrapped herself in her dressing gown and grabbed a candle. She cautiously ventured into the corridor and made her way toward the source of the insistent pounding.

  Patience watched from the top of the staircase as a footman opened the door. In tumbled a confusion of dripping masculinity. Jonathan and Arthur half dragged, half carried a groggy Damien across the threshold, leaving a trail of mud and rainwater. Jonathan’s foot caught on the fringe of a carpet, and Patience gasped as her husband dropped to the floor with an indecorous thud.

  “Quick, man,” Arthur ordered the manservant. “Send for the doctor. There’s been an accident.”

  The footman blinked.

  “Other than this one that just occurred,” he added. Arthur’s gaze went to Patience at the top of the staircase. He stepped over Damien’s unconscious form and mounted the stairs with purpose. “Patience,” he said in a solemn tone, putting his hands on her shoulders. “You must be brave.”

  “What happened?”

  “We were driving home in the storm when lightning struck a nearby tree. A branch was severed from the trunk and fell squarely on Damien’s head.”

  Down on the foyer floor, Damien blinked and raised his head slightly. He looked into the face of the footman, whose powdered wig listed at a sleepy angle. “Mummy?” he said, before his head fell back and he closed his eyes.

  “I’m afraid he’s rather addled.” Jonathan grabbed one of Damien’s booted feet and hoisted it awkwardly. “We really ought to get him to his bed.”

  With Arthur, Jonathan, the footman, and Patience each taking a limb, they managed to heft Damien up the stairs and down the corridor to his bedchamber. However, a fifth person might have been useful in preventing his head from hitting the doorjamb. A low moan escaped his throat.

  For a feigned injury, this wound was causing Damien no small amount of pain. At least a falling tree branch would have confined its damage to one side of his head. As it were, his skull throbbed in three distinct locations, thanks to the doorjamb, the foyer’s marble floor, and Snydley’s damned brass candlestick. Blast Snydley. “Create a convincing bruise,” he’d said. Once the stabbing pain in his temple subsided, Damien intended to convince Snydley of a few other things.

  But for now he would enjoy the soft touch of feminine hands arranging him on the bed, pulling off his boots and coat, propping his head with downy pillows. Patience’s fingertips whispered over his neck as she loosened his collar. She tenderly smoothed the hair from his brow, and he flinched at the exquisite combination of pain and pleasure.

  “Where am I?” Damien opened his eyes slowly. Patience sat on the side of the bed. Her honey-colored curls were tousled by sleep, and her crimson dressing gown slipped fetchingly off the alabaster skin of her shoulder. It hurt to look at her, she was so achingly beautiful. “Is this heaven? Are you an angel?”

  “It’s me, Damien. Patience.”

  “I’m certainly in no hurry.” He moved his hand slowly across the coverlet until it grazed hers. “We do have all eternity.”

  Crane towered over him from the other side of the bed. “That’s just it, Patience. He doesn’t remember a thing.” He addressed Damien in the loud, simplistic manner reserved for children and senile great-aunts. “This—is—your—house. Patience—is—your—wife.”

  “My house?” Damien blinked and looked innocently about the room. His gaze settled on Patience. “My wife?”

  Snydley took his cue. “Come along, Crane. I think we’d better see about the doctor.” The two headed for the door. “Stay with him, Patience,” he added. “Try to help him remember.”

  Patience nodded. Her luminous blue eyes were brimming with tears. Her bottom lip quivered as she covered his hand with her own. “Oh, Damien.”

  She did love him. Damien’s heart hammered in his chest with a force that rivaled the pounding in his head. He wished nothing more than to start afresh with this beautiful, passionate woman who was his wife. He doubted, however, that any of his charms could erase three years of neglect from her memory. It seemed a far simpler strategy to erase his own.

  “Forgive me.” His voice caught in his throat. “It seems impossible that a man could ever forget such a stunning creature. But I fear I must ask you to refresh my memory. How long have we been married?”

  “Three years.”

  “Have we any children?”

  “No.” She blushed prettily. “Not yet,” she added.

  Damien smiled. “And we live here, in this house, in London?”

  “When we are not in the country.”

  “We have an estate in the country? What do we do there?”

  She paused before answering. “We have picnics by the lake,” she began slowly. “We take our tea on the green. You read me poetry beneath an old willow tree. We go for long rides on horseback and race across the countryside. And you always let me win.” Her sapphire eyes took on an impish gleam. Damien could not help himself. He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it tenderly.

  “And here in town? How
do we spend our days?”

  “We go shopping and buy little things we don’t need. You take me driving in your phaeton, and you drive the horses wild and fast until I am screaming with laughter. In the evening, we attend the theater, the opera, a ball.”

  “I’d wager you love to dance.”

  “I love to dance with you.”

  He tugged her arm gently, pulling her down to lie beside him. He rolled on his side to face her and stroked her soft, golden curls fanned across the pillow.

  “And our nights?” he asked. “How do we spend our nights?”

  She closed her eyes and nestled closer to him. “Here,” she whispered. “In your bed. I hate to sleep alone.”

  He caressed her cheek with his thumb. “We sound very much in love.”

  She swallowed and met his gaze boldly. “I believe we are.”

  He lowered his lips to hers and kissed her gently. She wrapped her arms about his neck, pressing her deliciously soft body to his. He slowly teased her lips apart and tasted her, drinking deeply of her sweetness. She was a powerful elixir, an intoxicating cure. The throbbing pain in his head dissipated, leaving behind luxurious warmth and lassitude. He wanted to sleep forever in these arms, not knowing or caring where dreams ended and reality began.

  “Patience,” he sighed, burying his face in her sweet-scented hair as he drifted into oblivion. “I remember…lavender.”

  Damien awoke to the lovely sensation of someone licking his ear. This plan had worked better than he’d dared to dream. “Patience,” he murmured, reaching out to stroke his wife’s silky…fur? His hand clamped down on a handful of angora, and sharp teeth sank into his earlobe.

  “Patience!”

  “No, Damien, that’s Penelope. I’m Patience. I’m your wife, remember?” She rolled a cart laden with dishes toward the edge of the bed. “How does your head feel this morning?”

  “Why are all these cats in my bed?” His skull was pounding with pain. He counted two, three, four…It hurt his brain to count any higher.