by Jane Lark
It is more!
And he was so unknown to her, nothing more than a stranger really, yet she felt so close to him emotionally as though she’d known this would happen between them all her life. It felt right.
He reached up and pulled her down.
As she returned his kiss she knew this was no longer her working a craft she’d learnt with other men or him displaying skill, this was them, bound together.
Weeks ago, in the gaming-hell, she’d been afraid of letting go—now she raced towards it with obsession. The only noise she could hear was their breath. She was transfixed by the way he could make her feel, intoxicated. Her fingernails bit into the muscle across his ribs as the brink came in a rush, chasing through her body, a flame dancing and flaring across her already heightened senses as her fingernails dug deeper.
His strong hands took control, holding her fiercely. His movement was urgent as she clung to him, her mouth against his, unable to return his kiss.
A primal cry escaped from deep in his chest and filled her open mouth. Then he was hastily lifting her from him.
She felt a shiver rake his muscle and heat on her stomach as she hugged him.
For a moment he didn’t move just lay still with his eyes closed. But when they opened he smiled and tumbled her backwards onto the bed, humour shining in his gaze before he pressed a kiss on her lips. There was gratitude in it and his hand lay lightly on her hip.
When he rolled onto his back, she pillowed her head on his shoulder and slid her leg over his, letting her hand rest on his midriff.
He drew the sheet across her and wiped her stomach. Then his hand fell on her hair and his fingers sifted through it while his other hand trailed circles on her upper arm. She fell asleep.
Chapter Four
Fully clothed, Edward lifted his weight from where it had rested on the windowsill. He could see her fingers shaking as she secured the buttons at the chest of her pelisse. He moved forward, caught her hands, set them aside and took over the task. She looked up studying his face as he did. He did not meet her gaze.
He hadn’t left her long to dress. He couldn’t bring himself to wake her any earlier. She’d looked so peaceful in sleep, young. Again he wondered at the fact that she was the older of the two of them. Age had not touched her beauty. She could pass for a debutante in her first season.
Season? A sound of humour escaped his throat bringing a question to her gaze.
He shook his head.
She was no debutante. What she was, was a courtesan who’d bluntly refused to speak of her origin. Yet his brain could not equate her with a woman of anything less than reasonable birth. It was in the tone of her voice, her posture. His mind turned to the one thing he knew—her trade was not her choice—then wondered at the cause. An over eager lover who had taken her virtue and not offered marriage?
Who was the family who’d turned its back? Or did she have none? No father, no brothers to protect her. No wonder her beauty had brought her to this.
He couldn’t think of it.
His gloved fingers skimming her cheek, her pale blue eyes met his, so starkly different to the luxurious fall of her ebony hair. He was so moved by her beauty.
She looked saddened by their need to part, but there was no other option. He’d seen what Gainsborough could do to her. He couldn’t let her take risks until he’d worked out what to do. If she’d told him how she’d met Gainsborough it may have helped, but she clearly wasn’t going to make helping her easy. He needed to think.
She turned away from his touch, picked up her hat and re-secured it, then pulled the veil across her face.
“Are you ready?” she asked, turning back.
He nodded, taking a breath, almost afraid to ask the question he longed to in case she refused. “May we meet tomorrow?”
Her expression was uncertain but she nodded none the less, blushing and turning away from him again to collect her gloves.
“Not here though, somewhere else.” She spoke with her back to him, pulling on her gloves and then picking up the muff.
Edward stepped forward, clasping her waist and then pulling her against him so that he could kiss the delicate skin behind her ear. “I could pick you up in a hackney if you wished, if you tell me where to meet you?”
She turned in his arms and pressed one gloved palm to his cheek, a shallow smile touching her lips and happiness warming her eyes again. “I can wait for you on the corner of Jermyn Street at eleven, but you must not be late.”
“I shan’t be.”
Her lips brushed his.
The doorknob rattled and Ellen jerked back and stepped away.
It was undoubtedly another ploy of the landlord’s to play voyeur. “Y’u done yet? Yu’r time’s up!”
Ellen’s chin lifted and he recognised her distaste for clandestine assignations. He didn’t like them either but until he decided how to free her from Gainsborough they could not meet openly.
“We’re leaving!” Edward barked back at the door, taking her elbow as she slid both hands into her muff.
When they left the room the landlord was standing outside, a smirk on his ugly face.
Edward’s fist balled, but Ellen’s fingers closed over it, briefly, before she walked on ahead. He assumed her silent implication said it would do no good. She was right of course.
She must have experienced years of such disparaging looks and cruel comments. In response, he saw the shell she’d developed to shield her through those years draw into place. Her shoulders stiffened, her chin lifted higher and her eyes focused ahead.
He was not sure he could be as strong. Perhaps her greater age did show after all, but never-the-less he was determined to strip her of her armour. The woman he’d fallen for was the one living beneath it.
~
Accepting Edward’s offered hand Ellen stepped up into the carriage. The driver shut the door and Edward immediately reached past her to draw the curtain across the glass and protect them from the visibility of passers-by. Private, obscured from interested eyes on the street, he pulled her close and kissed her. Hunger and longing instantly lit a fire inside her. This was how it had been each day for nearly a week.
Edward’s embrace pressed her back against the squabs and she slid her legs across his lap.
She’d learnt in the days since Gainsborough had left London that her appetite for Edward was insatiable, as was his for her. Laughing, after a few moments, she pushed him away. “You will have me in disarray before we even reach the inn and then what will people think.”
His voice escaped in a guttural tone. “You know damn well they think it anyway so I hardly give it credence.” Her fingers tenderly straightening the knot of his cravat, she then hugged his shoulders and settled her cheek against the capes of his greatcoat, while his arm lay across her back, his hand resting at her waist.
“Millie thinks I have run mad, she found me singing while I bathed this morning.” His forefinger brushed along her nose, then slipped a stray strand of hair from her face and tucked it behind her ear. “I told her, in Wentworth’s hearing, I have made a friend. I said we met in Gunter’s, in Berkeley Square. He knows I trust Millie. He thinks I wouldn’t lie to her. He thinks my days are spent gossiping.” She laughed again, light hearted and carefree.
His finger tilting up her chin, her eyes met his. They were almost black in the shadow of the hackney, the slate blue-grey a narrow rim around his pupils. She could not really tell what expression was on his face until he smiled. “She’s right. You are completely different than you were but five days ago. You have lost your shell, Ellen. There is no weight on your shoulders anymore.”
She smiled too. “Why need I worry about anything when I have you to worry for me?”
A kiss fell on her forehead in response, another touched her nose and then his lips covered hers. Once again she was engrossed in him, her fingers in his hair and slipping up and down his back, while his grasped her breast over her pelisse.
True to form, w
hen the hackney carriage stopped they were jolted from the seat. Gripping his hand, exiting the carriage, she felt her lips stinging from his kisses and saw creases in her skirt. When he let go of her hand, he buttoned his greatcoat, hiding his swollen groin, before combing his fingers through his hair and then straightening the knot of his cravat.
“You look a sight, my Lord,” Ellen whispered in a teasing voice.
Laughter sounding in his throat, he gripped her arm and leaned to her ear, steering her forward. “As do you, you wicked woman. You’re a wanton.” He led her in through the inn’s public bar, “You deliberately entice me.”
She looked up as he guided her on and through another door to the stairs, and whispered back, “But I believe today, my Lord, the fault is all yours. I took control of myself but you must kiss me again.”
“So I am impatient,” he growled, but there was humour still beneath it. “Can you blame me with a beautiful woman beside me in the confines of an enclosed carriage? After all I am a man and not a saint. Madam, thy name is temptation.”
She laughed.
This was how it was between them now, she could barely remember that first day when they’d hardly known what to say. Now their conversation was a continuous play of words, as much as their love making was a mutual game of touch.
He reached around her, opened the door, stood back and gave her a shallow bow. “For today, Madam, I offer you the luxury of only the finest of feather beds.” The room smelt of lavender and clean linen, and a tray stood on a chest at the foot of the bed, bearing plum cake, a steaming pot of chocolate and an un-opened bottle of champagne. It was a lovely room, sunshine streamed in through a wide window and reflected back from the white plaster walls.
She smiled more broadly and turned to face him, her fingers moving to free the buttons of his greatcoat. “Now I know you are a liar, my Lord, you are definitely a saint and not a man at all. It’s beautiful.”
“Ellen, I am very much a man.”
He shrugged off his coat, threw it aside, then hauled her close and kissed her firmly as her fingers pulled the knot of his neckcloth loose. In a moment she broke free, twisting from his grip and tossing his cravat aside, laughing as he chased her. He tried to catch her, but she dodged from his path, placing the bed between them.
Watching her, visibly waiting for her next move, his fingers undid the buttons of his morning coat. Laughing again, Ellen kicked off her slippers one by one and thrust them across the bed in his direction. Then she set one foot onto the bed and, smiling, swept aside her pelisse and started seductively inching up her skirt.
He licked his lips, his smile twisting as he shook his head at her.
Her skirt slid over her knee and then she gripped her stocking, slipped it from her thigh and down her calf before throwing it at him too.
Edward caught it and held it to his nose, his face showing the same appreciation one would for a fine wine.
“You are intolerable, Edward Marlow.” She made a run for the tray of refreshments, but screamed in play as she found herself firmly caught about the waist and thrown gently to the bed. Then his fingers undid the buttons of her pelisse.
“And you Ellen Harding are a tease, and irresistible.” Her pelisse loose, his hand reached into the bodice of her plain yellow, low cut, day dress and freed one breast. Warmth absorbed it.
Ellen pushed him off, still laughing as she climbed from the bed, tucking her breast back within her bodice. “I would like my chocolate first, my Lord, if you please, while it is hot.” She walked away from him and pulled loose the sleeves of her pelisse, then let it slide off behind her, provocatively, as she crossed to the table. A sound of masculine amusement echoed about the room as she reached for a cup, a moment before she felt his fingers undoing several of the highest buttons of her dress. Then he eased it lower and kissed her back.
Glancing at him across her shoulder, lifting the pot of chocolate, she asked, “Do you wish for this, champagne, or plum cake?”
He smiled warmly, but left her and bent to pick up her pelisse, then laid it over the back of a chair. “The only thing I am hungry or thirsty for, my dear, is you.”
“While I, my Lord, am more discerning.”
He approached her again and his arms slipped forward around her waist, holding her close as he kissed her neck. “So am I, Ellen, so am I, and I shall try to make sure you can be for as long as I live, if you will give me the chance.”
For a moment she heard a deep sincerity in his voice, but dismissed the thought as foolish and his words as banter. She wanted nothing to mar the pleasure she’d found with him, not even childish imaginings, their connection had out stripped that. She wanted it now for what it was—an island sanctuary—a private world existing just for them. When she was with him there was nothing else, even her memories of Paul were fading, and her fears for both the present and the future receded. With Edward there was only ever love and security; she felt cherished.
Her arms rested over his at her waist as she leaned her head back to enjoy his embrace for a moment. Then he squeezed her tightly and let go.
“Go on, Ellen, I will leave you be for a moment so you may drink your chocolate and eat cake.”
“There, and now you are a saint and Marie Antoinette.”
Laughing, he sat on the chest and lifted his boot to his knee to work the damn thing from his foot. This was always when he missed his valet. But then what Cooper would think of this affair he dare not even consider. He doubted anyone would understand, yet he didn’t care what they thought.
“Are you sure you don’t want anything?”
“Yes, honestly I ate well enough at breakfast. I truly am only hungry for you.”
“You are a flirt, Edward Marlow.” Her voice rang with the happiness visible in her smile. God, he could not believe the difference in her in just five days. She was no longer hesitant, nor self-conscious. She was a different woman with him and he couldn’t stand to see her ever change back to what she’d been before. And today he had a proposal for her that would mean she never had to.
His lips tilting into a smile, he felt the expression in his heart. “And you, Ellen Harding, are everything a man desires, so how can you blame me for being in need of you.” Her smile broadening with a coquettish air, she sidled close to him as he set his one stocking clad foot to the floor beside the other booted one, then she slotted herself between his legs. His hands resting on her hips, he looked up as she looked down, not daring to pull her to his lap as she gripped her cup of chocolate in one hand and a slice of cake in the other. Her pale blue eyes, her dark hair and the whiteness of her skin awed him. It did each time he saw her. He wondered if they lived together until they were a hundred if her beauty would smite him like this even then. He could never imagine becoming accustomed to it. He thought he would always revere it as a precious thing.
A smile still toying with her lips, she swallowed a mouthful of cake and chocolate. “So why are we celebrating today, my Lord?”
“Edward, if you please, enough of your teasing, Miss. And I have cause to celebrate every day I am with you, Ellen. Why should I not splash out and find you a decent bed and an inn with some standing and good food? We didn’t even receive an odd look as we entered, did you notice?”
She drained her cup and licked the chocolate from her lips, looking gloriously happy and dishevelled. His heart lurched. He took her empty cup from her hand and set it down, then kissed each of her fingertips, before pressing a last gentle kiss into her palm. He curled her fingers about it. “To save for later, Ellen, when you are alone.”
“I am never alone now I have you,” she declared, affection shining in her eyes, saying more than she knew probably, admitting she’d been lonely before he’d filled the void.
Another smile from his heart touched his lips. She was special this woman, he would dare any man in his position to deny it. But then he thought of Gainsborough, again. God, I wish I could keep that man out of my head.
“But I did t
hink we’d agreed to be cautious, this inn is a little—obvious—Edward, what if someone knew one of us?” If she challenged his choice of inn clearly that damn man was in her head too, like a bloody canker which wouldn’t go away.
“It’s only for a day, Ellen. I wanted to give you more than a dirty room in some seedy inn, just for once I did not wish to have to be circumspect. I’ve booked the room under Mr and Mrs Brownlow and for a whole night. No one will ask questions. No one will think it odd.”
Her fingers uncurling, they slid across his cheek, and he rested his head against her delicate embrace.
Her touch felt cool despite the fire already burning in the hearth.
Was it madness to love her so much? To place her happiness above his no matter what?
She fed him her last mouthful of cake, her pale eyes dancing with frivolity and something else as she turned his head up to hers. “I love you, Edward,” she whispered.
Edward felt his heart soar and burst like a fire cracker, while Ellen continued her declaration ignorant of the jubilation she’d engendered.
“I think I am insane to say so. I hardly know you. We have known each other barely a month, and here I am, head over heels in love with you.” Her last words were uttered on a nervous laugh as she bent to cover his lips with hers.
Words forgotten, cupping her nape Edward tumbled back to the bed, pulling her with him, his heart singing with joy.
~
“Ellen.” Edward whispered to her over an hour later, as they reclined naked beneath the covers on the comfortable feather bed.
“Yes,” she sighed contentedly, snuggling against the warmth and comfort of his body, one leg draped across his, one hand splayed on his chest. Glancing up she saw his eyes fix on the white plaster ceiling.
“I don’t know how to explain what I feel for you, but I think I should try. I feel…” He paused, apparently searching for words.
She rose a little, rolled to lay her palm on his chest and rest her chin on top of her hand, while he pulled a second pillow beneath him, and then set his hands behind his head. His gaze met hers. “It is akin to insanity, isn’t it?” He laughed. “That first night,” One hand slid from beneath his head and fell atop her hair, then played with a single lock, twisting it through his fingers. It was a wonderfully tender caress, “ever since it, you’ve been like a drug in my veins. I can’t bear thinking of you with him, Ellen. I don’t want to let you go.” He took a breath. She felt it pull into his lungs, beneath her palm. “I know you are afraid to leave him…”