by Mia Marlowe
“What?”
“You heard me,” she said. “Anyone with eyes can see that you and Gabriel are involved, having an affaire du Coeur, playing hide the sausage, whatever you like to call it.”
Jacquelyn was glad she’d abandoned her tea. She’d have choked on it by now.
The baroness sighed. “He’s a fine figure of a man, Gabriel Drake. I can’t fault you for succumbing to him.”
Jacquelyn rose shakily to her feet. After catching them in the armory, Father Eustace might suspect their relationship had grown, but he’d not say a word to anyone. If Lady Curtmantle knew, who else had noticed the irresistible attraction between her and Gabriel?
“Sit down, my dear. We are not finished. Now, it is no shocking thing for a man in Gabriel’s position to keep a mistress,” Lady Curtmantle went on. “But it really is more than society can bear for him to keep one under the very roof he intends for his bride. Have you decided how you’ll handle things once he weds?”
The baroness took a delicate sip of her tea. Her pointed tongue laved her top lip as she lowered her cup, like a cat licking cream from its whiskers.
Jacquelyn sank back onto the settee. She moved her mouth, but no sound would come out.
“No discrete love-nest in your future? Well, then,” she said. “I see I shall have to take matters into my own hands then.”
“Whatever do you mean?” Jacquelyn sputtered.
“A word in the right ear, my dear.” She arched a powdered brow. “If you intend to remain here after Gabriel weds, I shall find it incumbent upon myself to apprise his future bride of the true nature of your relationship to Baron Drake. Don’t think for a moment your presence will be tolerated beyond the wedding vows.”
Lady Curtmantle cocked her head. “My husband keeps his mistress in Bath. I’ve no objection to him having one, you see, but I’ve no great need to see the doxy every day, either. No doubt the future baroness of Dragon Caern will hold a similar view.” She took another sip from her cup. “Excellent tea, this.”
“Why are you involving yourself—”
“—in your affairs?” the baroness finished for her. “Because, as I told you, I care about Gabriel’s happiness. No man can please two women if they reside under the same roof, not even a veritable stallion like your Gabriel. Honestly, now. I find mistresses seldom consider any but their own wishes, but think of his position for once. For all that he’s a pirate, Gabriel Drake does not possess a heart of stone. He’s a man of deep feeling. After all, he drove himself to the sea over me once.” She preened, patting her wig. “He’s dreadfully single-minded in matters of the heart. Do you suppose he’ll be likely to find contentment with the mother of his children with you down the hall?”
Jacquelyn felt as though she’d been punched in the gut. Gabriel had said something very near to Lady Curtmantle’s remark more than once.
The baroness was right, damn her eyes.
When she allowed herself to think of Gabriel’s impending marriage, all Jacquelyn considered was how she’d bear the fact that he’d take another woman to wife. She’d never considered how difficult it might be for Gabriel.
And now with her belly threatening to grow, Jacquelyn’s position was impossible.
“I have to leave,” she said woodenly.
Lady Curtmantle nodded sagely. “I knew you were a reasonable sort. You may actually care for the man, after all. Where will you go?”
Jacquelyn sat still as stone for a moment. There was really no help for it. She had no other option. “My mother lives in London.”
“London! How lovely for you,” Lady Curtmantle said as if Jacquelyn were going off on holiday. “I’ve heard of your mother, the infamous Isabella Wren. Still a celebrated woman of pleasure, is she not? No doubt with her connections among the demimonde, she’ll help you find a suitable position in no time.”
The baroness’s lips twitched in a smirk.
“I will not become a courtesan,” Jacquelyn said firmly, narrowing her eyes at her unwelcome guest.
Lady Curtmantle’s brows lifted in amusement. “Oh, my dear. Such resolve is too little too late. Whether you will it or no, you are already a member of the Cyprian corps.” The baroness lifted her teacup in a mock toast. “Just a singularly ill-paid one.”
Chapter 26
Once night fell, Jacquelyn couldn’t bear to wait for Gabriel to come to her. For one thing, she didn’t want him to spy the trunk she’d packed and start asking questions. She’d already told Timothy that she’d be leaving with the gig an hour before dawn. The stable lad was to have her mare hitched to the small, two-wheeled vehicle and come to haul her luggage down for her before anyone else stirred. If anyone inquired, Timothy was to say Jacquelyn was off to Bath to inspect a new shipment of silks that had recently arrived. The girls would need new dresses for their uncle’s wedding, after all.
Of course, Lady Curtmantle knew Jacquelyn’s true destination. She’d cursed herself a dozen times for letting her plans slip through her lips. But she doubted the baroness would tell Gabriel where she was headed, not when Lady Curtmantle so obviously approved her actions.
As caustic as Lady Curtmantle was, Jacquelyn decided the woman had actually done her a favor. Her snide cuts forced Jacquelyn to evaluate her position in the cold hard light of logic instead of the haze of passion. After weeks of deliberate indecision, Jacquelyn knew what she must do.
She’d kissed the girls goodnight as usual, complaining of an eyelash in her eye when Daisy noticed the unshed tears threatening to spill over her lids. She loved them fiercely, but she had to leave them for their own good.
She just didn’t have the strength of will to leave without seeing Gabriel once more.
As soon as the Caern settled into gentle quiet, she lit a candle and slipped into the secret passageway. Had she really thought she could somehow continue with their secret trysts once a new Lady Drake was installed?
Evidently her body had been doing the thinking. And still was. Already, her whole being thrummed in anticipation of his strong arms about her, his mouth searching out her secrets, his hard shaft pounding between her thighs. The moist warmth of arousal pooled in her groin.
Oh, God! What will I do without him? Jacquelyn nearly sobbed in despair. She stopped walking for a moment and closed her eyes, willing herself to shove aside all thought of the morrow. If she had only this one night, let her have it.
All of it.
She turned a corner in the narrow space and almost ran headlong into him. Gabriel gathered her into an embrace and a kiss that nearly stole her soul. It certainly made her drop the candle.
He stooped and pinched off the wick with a rumbling chuckle. They were plunged into total darkness, but as long as Gabriel held her, Jacquelyn decided she wouldn’t care if she was cast into perdition itself.
“I can think of better ways to set the place ablaze. Oh, Lyn, the day’s been so long,” he breathed into her ear as his hands roamed her curves. “I’ve had the taste of you in my mouth all day, but it’s never enough. Come, love. Let us take our fill.”
She sagged against him and he led her back to his chamber.
Let me not think, she pleaded silently. For this last time, let me only feel.
She didn’t let him speak after he pushed the opening closed behind them. She hurled herself toward him, pressing feverish kisses to his neck and down his bare chest. The salty sweetness of his skin made her soft palate ache. She nipped his taut brown nipple and reveled in his low groan. Her hands found the drop front of his breeches and plunged in to claim his enraged cock.
He was so warm.
A single pearl of fluid formed at his tip and she bent to take him into her mouth.
“Lyn,” he chanted her name softly as she knelt to pull his breeches past his heavily muscled calves. “You drive a man beyond reason. If you keep that up, I . . . I fear I cannot be as gentle as I want to be with you.”
She straightened and looked him in the eye. “Don’t be gentle.”
Gabriel had warned her the first time they met that there was a beast in every man, but she hadn’t believed it. She had no doubts now.
In rutting glory, there was no finer specimen than the beast who now bent her over and slammed himself into her. He rode her savagely. He bruised her inner thighs with his thrusts, drew blood when he claimed her flesh with his lovebites, and marked her body and soul with his total possession.
Somewhere amid the madness she thought she heard a voice that sounded like hers. It kept saying the same thing over and over.
“Harder. For God’s sake, harder.”
* * *
Much later, Jacquelyn lay beneath him, fighting to draw a breath. His body still trembled with spent passion, but he raised himself on his elbows to look down at her.
“Lyn, I’m sorry for using so—“
She pressed her fingertips to his lips. “I wanted you to, just like that.
Every joint ached and she suspected she’d be sore for a week, but she needed him to take her fiercely, to ravish her. She couldn’t have born tenderness.
But now she pulled his head down to her breasts. He nuzzled and tugged at her nipples for a moment before he laid his rough cheek in the hollow between them. His warm breath slid over her charged skin, sending a final burst of longing racing through her veins.
In the years to come, this was how she’d remember him, lying between her breasts, his body heavy on hers, their raging need finally stilled. Only a quiet yearning left to shudder in the wake of their fire.
* * *
“Gabriel?”
“Hmm?” His body jerked and she realized he’d drifted into light sleep.
“Have you decided which one?”
“Which one what?” his voice was rough and slurred.
“Which woman you’ll wed?”
“Oh.” He drew a heavy sigh and rolled off her. “I’m thinking Lady Harlowe.”
“You’re joking.” The lady came with a hefty dowry, but to call her plain would have been high praise.
“No, I’m serious.” He propped himself on one elbow and looked down at her. “She is the daughter of a viscount, after all.”
“I didn’t think that sort of thing mattered to you.”
“It doesn’t.” He traced circles around her areola. When her nipple rose into a stiff peak, he lowered his mouth and gave it a nip. “I thought Lady Harlowe would be the easiest choice for you.”
“For me?” Jacquelyn pressed her palm against her breast to still the ache he’d started.
He flopped back on the bolsters and covered his eyes with his muscular forearm. “Well, for one thing, you’d never have to wonder if I sought her bed for anything other than an heir. I thought Lady Harlowe might keep things simple between you and me.”
Now Jacquelyn raised herself to look at him. “How do you mean?”
“The woman I wed may have my name, my house and lands,” Gabriel said as he cupped her cheek. “But you have me.”
It was the nearest he’d ever come to a declaration of love. And just when Jacquelyn needed to hear it least.
She couldn’t bear to look at him, so she snugged herself next to him and lay her head on his shoulder.
“I think,” she said, willing her voice to stay even, “that you should choose Elisheba Thatcher.”
Pretty and vivacious, young Miss Thatcher was Gabriel’s best chance at someone who could bring him both the heir Dragon Caern needed and a woman he wouldn’t mind making one with in the least. In time, who knew? It might even grow into a love match.
Gabriel said nothing. Jacquelyn could barely stand to breathe.
“Did you hear me?” she finally asked.
“Aye, I heard you,” he said testily. “But can we please talk about it tomorrow? I don’t mind losing sleep when you keep me awake rutting you blind. Talking me to death is another thing altogether.”
He pulled her close again and she let him. She needed to feel him next to her, to feel his tense muscles go slack in relaxation.
Once his breathing fell into the steady rhythm that told her he slept, she rose from his side and disappeared into the secret passage, hand covering her mouth to stifle her sobs.
Chapter 27
“Yes, my lady, I’m quite sure,” Catherine Curtmantle’s abigail said for the third time.
Her name was Jane, but Catherine didn’t use it often. She referred to her servant as ‘girl’ or ‘you there.’ Usually Catherine found the girl’s biddable ignorance irritating, but Jane had her uses. Gathering up juicy tidbits of gossip from surrounding estates without being clever enough to guess at her mistress’s need for the information was foremost on Jane’s very short list of accomplishments.
“Mrs. Beadle was very keen on that point,” Jane said with a hopeful expression. In an effort to please her mistress, the girl had been known to tell only what she thought Catherine wanted to hear. But Catherine had a heavy hand, so she’d only done it once. “Mistress Wren has taken herself to Bath, so Mrs. B says, to buy some new silks for the little misses.” Jane sighed. “Silk be ever such a lovely fabric, ain’t it?”
“Never mind that. What else did Mrs. Beadle say about Mistress Wren?”
“She’s expected back any day now. In fact,” Jane’s face brightened as she recalled more of her conversation with Dragon Caern’s housekeeper, “Lord Drake is restless as a penned stallion, Mrs. B says, and may take himself to Bath to see did she have trouble if she don’t return soon. Oh, and Mrs. Beadle thanks you kindly for the rosemary. She was nearly out and—”
“Keep to the point, girl,” Catherine cut in. “When did she say Lord Drake might leave?”
Jane’s cornflower blue eyes slid up and to the right. “I don’t recollect her naming a day in particular. She just said soon.”
“And Lord Drake hasn’t settled on any of the young ladies he’s been courting?” Catherine asked. “No proposition of marriage to any of them?”
“No, and don’t that beat all?” Jane’s eyes went round as a fledgling owl. “Seems he won’t even pay court to them hardly without Mistress Wren to arrange matters. Makes a body wonder, don’t it? Mrs. Beadle says it don’t hardly make sense for Mistress Wren to run all over creation for dresses for a wedding what ain’t even certain yet. ‘Course it’s not for the likes o’ me to question what turns about in his lordship’s mind, but—”
“Certainly not! In fact, there’s little enough room in that small brainpan of yours for your own thoughts. Don’t even attempt to understand your betters, girl,” she said, looking down her nose at her abigail. “That will be all.”
Catherine waved her away and turned her attention back to the thick ledger book. Hugh had understated their income again by a substantial amount. Yet another thing she’d have to handle.
“Oh, you there,” she called Jane back before the girl had time to scuttle away. “Find Lord Curtmantle and tell him I wish to see him immediately.”
At any other time, the sorry condition of their financial affairs would have sent Catherine into a tizzy, but she felt confident that positive changes were in the Curtmantle’s immediate future. Still it wouldn’t hurt to let Hugh think she was stewing over them. She didn’t look up when she heard his booted tread on the threshold of her morning room.
“What is it—oh, Catherine, not again. What did I tell you about troubling your head over such things?”
“It seems to me that someone needs to trouble over them,” she said primly. “However, our ledgers are not what I wish to discuss with you. Did you send that note to Cecil Oddbody as I told you?”
“Yes, but I still don’t see why he’d need to keep an eye on an aging whore’s house.”
“Isabella Wren is not a whore. She’s a courtesan,” Catherine said. “Not that someone with your lack of discernment would know the difference. Any woman can spread her legs, but few can dazzle a man outside the boudoir as well. But be that as it may, it’s not Isabella Wren we are concerned with. It’s Gabriel Drake. I happen to know th
at he will be on La Belle Wren’s doorstep within days.”
“In London?” Hugh threw himself into a side chair and hooked a booted foot over the opposite knee. “Drake’s not so daft as that. You know what Oddbody said about that. If Gabriel Drake sets foot within the city limits, he’ll be fitted with a hemp necktie before he knows it. London is a death sentence to him.”
“Nevertheless,” Catherine said. “He will be there, mark my words. Now, you need to ride immediately to Oddbody’s side so you can be there when the arrest is made. You bungled the last assignment he gave you. We certainly don’t need that little worm to think he’s accomplished this all by himself. If you are there when Gabriel hangs, Mr. Oddbody will be hard put to deny you your due. I’ll order your horse saddled and provisioned. You leave within the hour.”
Hugh’s lip curled in displeasure. “I can’t leave now. Linley’s due tomorrow for our annual sport. The game is thick this season and a magnificent stag has been sighted near our southern border.”
“Viscount Linley is coming?” She all but purred, thinking of the lamb’s bladder condom still in her reticule. “Don’t trouble yourself about him. I believe I can keep his lordship entertained until your return.”
* * *
After a week on the road, Jacquelyn finally saw the spires of London ahead. She was satisfied her ruse had worked. Even if Gabriel became suspicious that her trip to Bath was taking too long, he’d be heading the wrong way if he went looking for her.
In time, he’d come to see this was for the best.
Her head might reason so, but her heart still rebelled. She lifted her chin. What was it her mother had said once? Like most of her mother’s sayings, it had made little sense at the time, but now her words came back to Jacquelyn with crystalline clarity.
A heart is something which might be ignored long enough for it to cease to matter.