“This way,” her mentor said.
Charlie led her to an open panel in the wall: a servant’s passage. The two hastened into the tunnel, closing the door behind them. Charlie spoke as they raced along.
“This will take you to the exit at the back. Hawker’s waiting one block east. Once you get back to the house, dispose of your disguise and go to bed. At once.”
“Why the rush?”
“Because Hadleigh saw you and will no doubt pay you a visit.”
Livy didn’t know if her shiver was one of fear or anticipation. “What should I do?”
“Keep the truth from him however you can.” Charlie shoved open a door, pushing Livy out into the foggy night. In the holes of her mask, Charlie’s grey eyes shone with urgency. “I’ve picked up critical information tonight, and I must stay to learn more. Your assignment is now to protect the secrecy of our mission: the safety of the man you love depends upon it. Now go.”
31
Propelled by grim determination, Ben scaled the tree in Lady Fayne’s garden. As Livy had once described, one of its sturdy branches conveniently extended toward a second-floor window, which had to be her bedchamber. At the windowsill, he reached for the double glass panels; he’d been prepared to break in if need be, but the panels opened smoothly.
The damned chit didn’t even bother to lock her windows on the way out, he thought with simmering rage.
Climbing through the window, he landed in the room, which was faintly lit by a fire in the hearth. He was certain the chamber was unoccupied, for he had no doubt that he’d spotted Livy at the Hellfire Club tonight. In disguise again, in a place more disreputable than the Black Lion Inn and Cremorne Gardens combined. After she’d given him the slip, he’d made an excuse to the Horsemen and headed straight over to Lady Fayne’s.
If Livy had snuck off to go to the club, then she would need to hail a hackney to get back, not the easiest thing on a busy Saturday night in Mayfair. He reckoned she wouldn’t be home for another half hour. When she arrived, he would confront her. He would not let her get away with lying to him…with risking her goddamned neck. Not to mention her virtue.
He couldn’t allow himself to imagine what Livy had been exposed to on her little jaunt through an orgy. If he did, he might plow his fist through the nearest wall.
What was she thinking? he raged. Did she follow me, think it was some kind of lark? Bloody hell, she gave me her word…and I will not be lied to. Even by her.
He strode toward her bed in the far corner. He would wait for her there, he thought with dark satisfaction. She would sneak back in, thinking she’d pulled the wool over his eyes. She’d prance toward her bed and then…
He would catch her red-bloody-handed. There would be no more lies or excuses. Deep in his gut, he’d always suspected that there was something she wasn’t telling him. Yet he’d let his feelings—his love, why not call a spade a spade—sway him. He hadn’t wanted to confront his worst fears: that she was deceiving and manipulating him.
God, he thought with a stab of anguish, it was his marriage all over again.
Approaching the canopy bed, he made out a lump beneath the covers. Pillows no doubt, the oldest damned trick in the book. He stalked over…and froze.
Livy lay there, asleep. Her lashes were dark fans against her cheeks, and an ivory counterpane was pulled up to her neck. She looked like a slumbering angel.
She’s been here the entire time? he thought numbly. I imagined seeing her…she wasn’t at the club? She didn’t lie to me?
Disbelief warring with hope, he reached for the coverlet. As he pulled it down, he dreaded that he would expose a trollop’s black gown. What he found was a chaste white night rail.
Remorse pumped through him. Along with shattering relief.
Bloody hell, I’m an idiot. This is Livy, not Arabella. She would not betray me.
At that moment, Livy opened her eyes. She blinked, as if surfacing from a dream. She stared up at him…and a dazzling smile of welcome lit her eyes. “Ben?”
“Yes,” he said hoarsely.
She sat up. “What are you doing here?”
One look at Ben’s face as he struggled to answer her, and Livy could tell that he hadn’t expected her to be here. That he now felt guilty for suspecting her of being at the club. Of course, that made her feel guilty for her charade. Yet Charlie had said that Ben’s safety depended upon Livy’s concealment of the truth…and Livy would do anything to protect the man she loved.
Livy pushed aside the confusing tangle of thoughts. She would sort things out later. The truly important thing was that Ben was here, and they were together after what had felt like an eternity of separation.
“Whatever the reason, I’m glad you came. I’ve missed you so much, Ben,” she said with heartfelt sincerity.
“Ah, bloody hell.” He framed her jaw with his hands. He was shaking a little, his eyes bruised with shadows, his hair disheveled waves around his face. “Livy, I…I…” He squeezed his eyes shut, as if struggling with himself; when he opened them, need glittered in the blue depths. “It’s been hell without you. God, I’ve missed you.”
He bent his head, and she tipped hers up, their lips meeting in a tender kiss. The taste of him, being in his arms…nothing had ever felt this right—this essential. In a blink, the desperate tensions of the night transformed into another kind of need. He must have felt that way too, for when she parted her lips, he delved in, a feral sound rising from his throat.
They fell onto the bed, melded by their fiery kiss. She threaded her fingers through his rough-silk hair and pressed herself against his hard length, her tongue dancing with his. She tasted a trace of whisky, and while it was not unpleasant, it was strange because the Ben she knew abstained from spirits. It reminded her of his night at the club: the scene with Cherise Foxton came rushing back, billowing the flames of possessiveness. The need to reestablish her claim collided with desire, and it was a combustible combination.
Livy rolled atop Ben, and he let her, the dim light showing the glint of surprise in his gaze. She attacked him with feverish passion. He groaned when she peppered his bristly jaw with kisses and suckled his earlobe, flicking it with her tongue. Tearing off his cravat, she nuzzled the strong, warm column of his throat. His spicy male musk maddened her with wanting. She wanted more of him, but his clothes were in the way.
When she fumbled clumsily with the buttons of his waistcoat, he gave a husky laugh.
“Eager wench, aren’t you?” His eyes smiled up at her.
“I want you,” she whispered. “So badly.”
He tucked a tress behind her ear. “I burn for you, my love. But we mustn’t go too far. Lady Fayne—”
“She is out and will not be home for hours.” This was no lie. “We have all the privacy we need. Please, Ben, I need you.”
Her plea seemed to snap his restraint…and his willingness to let her be in control. He lifted her off him and rose from the bed, stripping off his coat.
“Take off your nightgown,” he ordered.
Her eyes on his, she undid the pearl buttons along the front placket until she could pull the garment over her head. Kneeling on the mattress, bare as the day she was born, she felt pride at the proprietary lust in her lover’s eyes. Her own gaze was equally possessive as she watched him undress. He was the essence of virility, long lines of sculpted muscle and taut hair-dusted skin. When he shed his trousers, a hot, viscous tremor passed through her core. His cock was huge, a thick and heavy truncheon between his thighs.
“See something you want, little one?” he inquired.
She loved the hint of arrogance in his tone. “I want all of you.”
“Then come here, greedy chit.” He crooked a finger at her.
She crawled to the edge of the bed, and he swept her against him. At the contact of skin against skin, they both exhaled as if they’d been holding their breaths, waiting for this moment. For this return to perfection, the way they were meant to be together. Body t
o body and heart to heart. He sank his fingers into her hair, holding her steady as he kissed her. First with tenderness and then with a ferocity that sent pulses of heat through her blood.
She was wet for him, wet with the need to pleasure him.
Ben, being Ben, seemed to understand what she wanted. What she craved. He broke the kiss, and with his big hands curled against her scalp, directed her lips down his body. Swoony with excitement, she worshipped his maleness, kissing the rigid planes of his chest, licking the flat discs of his nipples. Grunting with pleasure, he guided her downward, her tongue tracing the grooves on his taut torso.
The heady male scent of him deepened as she arrived at his manhood. It stood fiercely erect, the dusky tip bobbing with anticipation. Her mouth watered, yet he held her slightly away from him.
“Give me your eyes, sweeting,” he said.
She looked up at him, and the controlled burn in his eyes stole her breath. Desire carved his features in hard, unyielding lines. He looked like a vengeful god, and she wanted to feel his passionate wrath. To feel everything he chose to bestow upon her.
“Why is it that in bed you are obedient,” he murmured, “and outside of it you’re a naughty minx?”
She thought about it. “Actually, I’m quite naughty in bed as well. It’s just that here you instruct me on how to be wicked.”
“A corruptive influence, am I?” The sensual curve of his mouth chased quivers up her spine. “I think it is time for you to have another lesson.”
“Yes, please.”
His lips twitched. “Lie on your back, love. With your head at the edge of the bed.”
She hastened to do as he instructed. From that angle, his cock looked massive in the clasp of his fist, the plump sac below dangling close to her lips. Close enough for her…to kiss.
At the wanton notion, her nipples throbbed, wetness trickling from her center.
“I want to feel your mouth on me here.” He looked down at her. His eyes held a dark yet playful challenge as he positioned his stones even closer to her face. “Is that too wicked for you?”
She answered by pressing her lips to the bulging underside. Ben’s hitched breath told her he liked that. Emboldened, she licked, swirling her tongue against the velvety curve, wanting to give him as much pleasure as she possibly could. Wanting to do everything, feel everything with him.
With her Ben. Her love.
“Bloody hell, that’s sweet,” he said in guttural tones. “Lick me, love. Just like that.”
He was jerking on his shaft as she lapped at his balls and mouthed him gently. When she experimented with suction, he bit out an oath. In the next instant, he was on the bed next to her. He parted her thighs, his head swooping down. The hot, hungry swipe of his tongue made her cry out. He licked her intimate seam, from her pearl to a place so dark and secret that she trembled with forbidden longing.
Awash with need, she was desperate to share the pleasure with him. She reached for his cock, and to her surprise, he shifted one leg so that his knees braced her head. The position was outrageous…and unbearably exciting. Grasping his big shaft, she brought the dripping crown to her lips. She took him in as deep as she could. He responded by parting her folds, stabbing his tongue into her pussy while he strummed her needy bud.
She mewled as he turned her into an instrument of desire. Feeling his masterful strokes while his thickness filled her mouth and throat brought her over the edge. Her spine bowed, and her release cascaded over her in bright, sparkling waves.
Wrenching free of Livy’s generous kiss, Ben reversed direction, lying beside her so that he could watch her face as she came. He knew with absolute certainty that, in all his life, he would never see anything as beautiful as Livy in her climax. The pleasure-daze in her eyes, the flush that spread across her cheeks like a sunrise across the sky…
God, she was incomparable. His fantasy of lust, love, and all the shades of longing in between. Entranced, he stroked her hair and fingered her pussy.
“You are so bloody beautiful,” he murmured.
“So are you, Ben.”
She gazed at him as if he were everything she wanted to see. His chest tight and hot, his cock throbbing, he took her mouth in a deep kiss. To his delight and astonishment, her thighs tightened around his hand, a fresh gush of dew dampening his palm. She was ready for more, and he was the luckiest bastard alive.
He rolled on top of her, positioning his turgid prick against her silken mound. He rubbed against her valley, groaning as her wet lips kissed his shaft. She arched into his thrusts, and their bodies moved in perfect, natural synchrony.
She got wetter and wetter. The slick slide and erotic sounds of her juicy slit turned him inside out with pleasure. Nothing had ever felt this good, and he wasn’t even inside her. He ground his steel-hard base against her pearl, rolling his balls over her swollen folds, bliss sizzling at the base of his spine. Her knees found the notches of his hips. Whimpering, she rubbed her virgin cunny against his thrusting cock, and it was too much, not bloody enough…
“Ben, I need you.” The plea in her eyes mesmerized him. “I want you to come inside me.”
He fought to hold onto his control. “We should wait—”
She canted her hips, and his cockhead suddenly lodged against her entrance. Her wet, pulsing flesh sucked at his sensitive tip. Sweat beaded upon his brow. His muscles bulged with the effort to hold back. To keep from taking what he wanted more than anything.
“I want to be yours. Irrevocably and forever,” she whispered. “Please, sir.”
Holy hell. It was over.
He claimed her with a firm thrust. He pushed past her jolt of resistance, wanting to make her pain as fleeting as possible. An instant later, a welcoming flood of honey bathed his cock. It eased his way into her untried pussy, her snug heat squeezing the breath from his lungs. And the truth from his heart.
“You are mine,” he said raggedly. “I love you, Livy. Always and forever.”
She trembled, the sheen in her eyes undoing his control. He bent his head and kissed her as he began to move his hips. Their joining felt as elemental and inevitable as the changing seasons. He’d finally claimed his Livy, who as a girl had tended to his spirit and as a woman owned him heart, body, and soul. He couldn’t get enough of her, and she lifted her hips to take him deeper. Each plunge felt like absolution, each withdrawal a burning reason to go back.
His restraint decimated, he began to pound into her. Her breathy cries urged him on. Leaning down, he captured her plump nipples between his lips, sucking fiercely as he rammed his way home. Flutters started in her pussy, the contractions milking his cock. She was coming around him, the pleasure almost too much to resist. With his last ounce of willpower, he pulled out and fisted his prick. Two jerks and his climax hit him with the force of an oncoming carriage. Biting back a shout, he shot his seed in luxurious bursts, marking her belly with his pleasure.
Panting, he hung over her. Her love-stunned eyes reflected everything he was feeling. A universe of emotion that no words could convey.
She reached up, sweeping his hair from his damp brow.
“Now that was worth waiting for,” she said tremulously.
“There is no going back. I’ve claimed you now.” He took her jaw in his hand, daring her, or anyone, to deny it. To try to take away the most precious gift he’d ever been given. “You’re all mine.”
A spark of mischief danced in her eyes. The corners of her lips tipped up.
“I will let you in on a secret.” She bent her finger, and he leaned closer to catch her whisper. “I’ve always been yours…and now you’re mine too.”
32
1847, Summer
Livy is 18; Ben is 30
Ben found Livy in the orangery. She sat at the table where they’d spent many pleasurable hours playing games together and appeared absorbed by the wooden tiles she was pushing around. Anagrams were one of her favorite amusements, and he should know. She’d trounced him often enough.
“I thought I might find you here,” he said.
She spun in her chair to face him. “Hadleigh! Goodness, you startled me.”
The truth was, he was a bit startled too…by the changes that had taken place in his little queen. Spending more than a year in seclusion, hitting rock bottom before finally wrestling free of opium’s grip, he had returned to society a changed man. A better man, he hoped.
During that time, Livy had undergone a metamorphosis as well.
She’d shed the cocoon of childhood, hovering somewhere between adolescence and womanhood. Her figure still had a girlish topography, yet her features had blossomed into vivid prettiness. Those exceptional eyes of hers, which regarded the world with that uniquely innocent-yet-wise manner, now seemed more mature. Seeing the changes in her and sensing more to come, he felt an acute pang of loss.
The seasons were changing, and soon she would enter another stage of her life. One where she would meet some lucky young fellow and fall in love. She would become a wife and a mama, her life filled with all the good things a girl like her deserved. For his part, Ben would dance with her at her wedding, see her on special occasions, and perhaps someday dangle her children upon his knee.
But she would never be his little friend again. The one who’d kept him company through the years, who’d written him the letters that had kept him afloat during his darkest times. She would belong to someone else and, slowly but surely, he would take her away from Ben. She would depart from Ben’s life…like everyone he had cared about.
He felt old, stricken by unaccountable grief.
He cleared his throat before speaking. “You disappeared at your own ball.”
“I am surprised you noticed,” she said. “You were busy dancing all night.”
He drew his brows together at the odd edge to her tone. If it had been any other female, he would have thought she sounded jealous. But this was Livy, which meant he must have misheard.
Olivia and the Masked Duke Page 25