The Pirate Next Door

by Jennifer Ashley

  “Is that not customary?”

  Good lord, customary for what? Against the wall, hmm. There was not much wall space in his cabin.

  “Alexandra, if you want me—” He slid his hands to her hips beneath her dress, lifted her again, and started walking with her toward the line of windows behind the desk “—to take you—” He leaned her back against a wooden slat between the panes, holding his arm between her spine and the hard panel “—against the wall—” He swiftly unbuttoned his breeches and let his very annoyed hardness spill out. “Then my love, I will oblige.”

  She breathed, “Good.”

  He lifted her hips to him. She was open and wet, ready. At long last, he slid his very impatient erection straight into her.

  Now this—This—He closed his eyes and drew a ragged breath. He belonged there. God, yes.

  She kissed his lips. The kiss was clumsy, her breathing unsteady. He answered with a fierce kiss of his own. “Love,” he whispered. “Love.”

  Desire tingled through his body, racing like pins and needles up and down his limbs. Fire curled behind his eyes. She was hot and wet and slippery and yet so tight. She was warm and welcoming and he never wanted to leave.

  She whispered incoherently, her lips leaving his to play on his cheekbone, his ear. She lowered her head and nipped his neck. The tiny pain made his arousal jerk and throb. He pressed harder into her, beginning a slow rhythm that his hips knew without instruction. Gently, inexorably, he loved her, faster now, faster.

  His climax was coming. He felt it build, felt the clawing darkness seeking release. No, not yet. Not here. Not now.

  He lifted her from him, though his erection wept and sobbed at the sudden loss of warmth. He swept her into his arms and laid her back on the bunk, almost falling on top of her in his haste. Her tangling hair swept a wide arc on the blankets. He pressed her against the mattress and nudged her knees a part.

  “Are we not finished?” she gasped.

  Finished? Was she mad?

  “Not yet, sweetheart. Very soon. I promise, with all my heart.”

  He slid into her, heat and desire and need wrapping itself about him like a warm blanket. She put a shaking hand on his shoulder. “I do not like it—in a bed.”

  Interesting. Apart of his mind filed that away for examination later.

  He pinned her wrists above her head and began to love her again. His arousal applauded him. This was more like it.

  Her face twisted in desire, her eyes dark and heavy. A red curl straggled across her cheek. “Grayson,” she whispered.

  “Yes, sweetheart?”

  She flexed her fingers but did not try to pull away from his weight on her wrists. “Grayson.”

  “Alexandra.” The name rolled from his tongue as if it belonged there. “Love.”

  And then he came. Darkness swallowed him and he let it. The instant before his release was complete, he snaked himself out of her and let the blanket take his seed.

  She drew a long breath, and her hand came up to weakly stroke his hair. “Oh,” she murmured. “That was not so bad.”

  As if from far away, Alexandra felt cool, still air on her skin. She heard his deep even breathing as he lay, half on and half off her, felt hot bands around her wrists where his hands still pressed her.

  A spider spun a web from the underside of beams above, lazily descending a fraction of an inch at a time from an invisible thread. Exhaustion laced her inside and out, and astonishment, and a trembling that began in her belly and would not stop. If she cried, what would he do? Become disgusted, tell her to go? Would he make her row herself back to London alone? She bit her lip and willed the tears to remain hidden.

  He released her wrists and kissed her neck. “Mmm.”

  The thong that bound his hair had come undone, and his sun-streaked locks tumbled down. She trickled her fingers through the rough silk of it.

  He raised up to look at her. His lazy smile made her heart speed again. “Not so bad, did you say?”

  “No.”

  His eyes were full of laughter. The anger that had ruled him earlier had fled for now. “I am happy I pleased you, my lady.”

  She smoothed a lock of hair from his brow. “No, my lord, you are pleased with yourself.”

  He laughed softly, shaking the mattress. “I damn well am pleased with myself. I am in bed with the most beautiful next-door neighbor a man could want.”

  “You think me beautiful?” she asked wistfully.

  “I never lie about a woman’s beauty.”

  She traced the crooked bump on his nose. “What do you lie about, my lord?”

  “An amazing number of things. What do you lie about?”

  “Nothing.” She shook her head against the pillow. “I am very bad at lying, so I try not to practice it.”

  He gave her a lazy grin. “Practice makes you better.” He kissed her skin just beneath the point of the diamond necklace. He touched the jewels. “One of your husband’s gifts?”

  “Yes.” She really did not want to talk about Theo. In fact, in this past week Theo had receded like a half-forgotten dream. His barbed wit, his complete disregard of her wishes, and his blatant infidelity, all the pain and embarrassment they had caused her, had drifted away like mist before a stiff sea wind. A new viscount had moved in next door, and suddenly, everything was different.

  He flipped a dangling jewel. “It’s hideous.”

  Anyone with eyes could see that. “It was the best of the lot.” She paused. “Are you going to steal it?”

  He half-laughed. “What?”

  “I thought it was traditional. That is what pirates do.”

  “Who told you I was a pirate?”

  “Are you not?”

  His hand drifted from the necklace down to rest, warm, on her bared belly. “I am a viscount. With a daughter.”

  “That is what Lady Featherstone said.”

  He blinked. “Lady Featherstone?”

  “She said it was unlikely a pirate would have a daughter.”

  He nodded sagely. “She is wise.”

  “You have not answered my question.”

  A crease formed between his brows. “Which question?” he asked cautiously.

  “Will you steal my necklace?”

  He squeezed his eyes shut and then opened them again. They were blue and dancing. “Why do you want me to?”

  “As a memento of the occasion.”

  He chuckled. “As if the occasion will not be seared into my memory for all eternity.”

  “Oh,” she said, pleased.

  He smoothed his hand over her stomach, his gold signet ring cool on her skin. He traced a line over her abdomen, which she knew followed one of the marks left by her pregnancy. “What happened?” he asked softly.

  “Nothing happened, my lord. I bore a child. He died.”

  He did not answer. He leaned down and pressed a long kiss to her belly. Her tongue suddenly loosened. “His name was Jeremy Mark Brenden Alastair. He lived for one afternoon.”

  Grayson kissed another scar that her gowns hid to all the world except herself, her maid, and now, the viscount next door.

  Her emotions were wrung raw, stretched and pulled until she could no longer call upon her habitual control to contain them. A tear leaked from her eye. After a moment another followed. She pressed her hand to her hot cheeks and shook silently.

  He drew her to him, cradling her, comforting. “Shh.”

  She wept on, unable to apologize, unable to stop. She had cried for her son the first day, but had been forced to dry her tears ever after. Theo had not wanted to discuss it; indeed, he seemed to have forgotten all about it by the next week. Alexandra had held in her emotions, gotten on with her life. It spilled out now, the grief, the empty pain, the futile days of going on when she had wanted to die herself.

  The viscount’s touch tumbled her hair. “Shh.”

  She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “Forgive me.”

  “Better to cry than to bottle
it in. Leave it, and it festers. And then it never goes away.”

  The pain in his eyes told her that something burned inside him as well, an old grief that he had not been able to release. She rubbed her face against his shirt, amazed she had found someone who actually understood. Even Lady Featherstone, as kind as she’d been, had not been able to offer the comfort she’d needed. She’d found it now with a pirate who had abducted her to his ship to ravish her.

  She sniffled. “Are we going somewhere on this boat?”

  “Ship,” he corrected. “And no.”

  “I thought maybe we would go to France.”

  “No, I am not leaving England again. I am here to stay.”

  She touched his face. His chin was all sandpapery again. Theo Alastair would have gone into shock. “I have never left England.”

  His brows quirked. “No?”

  “My sphere is very small. London and Kent. Your sphere is large.” She smiled. “The entire world.”

  “Not anymore.” He flicked her a look she could not decipher. “Not anymore.”

  He kissed her, as if wanting to halt the discussion before he was forced to explain himself. She decided she did not mind. His tongue lazily circled hers, warm and slow, as if they had all night. Which they did, in a sense. Alexandra was far too tired to climb down the sides of ships and row in little boats back toward London and the West End.

  The door burst open. Alexandra jumped. Her teeth scraped Grayson’s tongue.

  “Ongh!” he said.

  “Sir!” Thumping footsteps hastened inside. “McDaniels has arrived. He has news—oh.” A young man with sandy blond hair stopped and stared, eyes round. “Sorry, sir. Uh—I’ll just be outside. With McDaniels. And his news.”

  Clearing his throat, his face cherry red, the blond man scuttled back through the door and closed it behind him.

  “Damn.” Grayson sat up, pushing his hair back. The hard, annoyed expression had returned, driving away his smiles. “I won’t be but a minute, love.”

  Alexandra nodded, finding nothing inside her for speech. Grayson swung his legs off the bed and stood. He took a step; then his breeches pooled around his boots, and he fell forward, a surprised look on his face. He caught himself on the desk just in time.

  Alexandra’s hand flew to her mouth. Her laughter came out a choked cough.

  Grayson snarled something, leaned over, and grabbed his breeches. His backside and hips were pale, she noted, in contrast to his tanned legs. He pulled his pants up and fastened the fly.

  “Go ahead and laugh, sweetheart.” He shot her an amused smile. “I like it when you laugh.” He reached the door, blew her a kiss, and ducked out.

  Outside, Mr. McDaniels, Grayson’s third officer, waited with Priestly. The man greeted him with a huge grin. “Sorry to interrupt, sir.” His r’s rolled.

  Priestly, who’d made the untimely dash into the cabin, still blushed under the lantern light. “Sorry, sir,” he mumbled.

  Grayson shot him a severe look. “When you observe me carry a beautiful woman into my cabin, Priestly, don’t be so surprised when you find me inside with my pants down.” He turned to McDaniels. “What have you got for me?”

  McDaniels inclined his had. “Your French king, sir. He did get aboard a ship. Least as far as I can reckon.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  At last, Grayson thought. At long, bloody last. “Tell me.”

  McDaniels complied. “The Frenchie king lives off in the countryside in a house loaned to him. He pretends it’s a little Versailles and they swagger and bow just like they were still in France, except everyone is pretty strained in the pocket.”

  Grayson nodded impatiently. He knew this. He’d met a few French émigrés through the Duke of St. Clair. They lived meagerly in small houses, or rooms in houses, in the streets between Portman and Cavendish Squares, but pride forced them to behave, as did their king, as if they still had vast wealth, enormous power, and contingents of servants.

  “Well, sir,” McDaniels went on. “Some of the Frenchies here in London go regular to visit their king, like the Bourbon princes and the Duc de Berri.” He pronounced it “Dook dee Berry.” “But some of the others, just the normal ladies and gentlemen, and those who have had to earn their own keep, they got to feeling forgotten. So they asked the Frenchie king to travel to London. I hear that it was hard for the king to arrange the visit—politics with our government or some such. I don’t know much about that sort of thing.”

  Grayson nodded. “So he wanted to assure his populace in London that he still loved them.”

  “Seems like. Came in a carriage with guards and everything.”

  The émigrés Grayson had met were tired people who by this time had given up ever seeing their beloved France again. The canny ones realized that even if they did return, they would find their country vastly changed, and not the France they had fled.

  “So who did the king visit?” Grayson asked. “Did you talk to them?”

  “He went to two houses near Marylebone Street. In one, some ladies and their maids occupy themselves making straw hats. In the other, some valet or other has set up a shop selling French trinkets and such for the families who managed to get goods out of France. So the king visits these two houses, and then suddenly climbs back into his carriage and says that’s all, he’s going home. The other Frenchies were annoyed. They were going to make it a big holiday, have the families come out and see the true king, give him gifts, make speeches, and so on. But off he goes.”

  Grayson frowned. “Is that all?”

  “No, indeed, sir.” McDaniels gave him a white-toothed grin. “I talked to all the servants, stood them drinks and so on. You know, some Frenchie wine isn’t all that bad, in the right pub. Even met a fellow who can set you up with the best brandy, sans customs.” He tapped the side of his nose. “If you want it.”

  “Kings first, McDaniels. Brandy later.”

  “Sorry, sir. Anyway, here’s an interesting thing. Everyone saw the king go into the second house, but no one really saw him come out. I mean, sir, they saw a fat man in a blue cape, all bundled up, hustling back into the carriage. Why was he all bundled up when the sun was shining hot that day? my fellow wondered. So, the carriages left and that was that.”

  Grayson’s pulse beat faster. “Where are these houses?”

  “I can show you. Now my fine fellow in the pub, who lives in the house the other side of the one that sells trinkets, says that early the next morning, the proprietor of this shop gets into a hired hack and goes out. He wonders a bit where he got the ready for the carriage, but didn’t think much about it. But later that evening, when he had cause to be down near the river, he sees him again. This time getting out of a boat with a man he’s never seen.”

  Grayson rubbed his upper lip. “Did he get into the carriage alone?”

  “My fellow could not say. He saw only the proprietor, but it was early morning and dark.”

  “That may mean nothing.”

  “Yes, but I made inquiries up and down the river. Seems he did get into a boat with two large fellows, and when he came back, there was only one. So where did the other fellow go, eh?”

  Grayson’s blood beat faster. At last, something to get hold of. “Your source is reliable?”

  “Sources. Many of them cheeky.” McDaniels grinned. “But I put it all together, like.”

  Grayson nodded. “Good work, McDaniels. Keep an eye on the shop. I want to pay it a visit myself.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He turned over possibilities. “I also want to speak to Madame d’Lorenz. She’s always been the expert at what truly is happening in the upper-class French circles. Peel her away from Ardmore; I want to see her alone.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What do we do now, sir?” Priestly looked expectant. Grayson hid a sigh. His life had suddenly become filled with errands, each one a nuisance. His vision of spending a few days in his cabin locked in Alexandra’s arms receded before the Admiralty
business.

  “Now?” he mused. “Right now I need to talk to Jacobs. To plan how we are going to find that annoying Frenchman in a river full of ships.” He eyed Priestly. “I want you and a handful of crew to stay here and look after Mrs. Alastair. She is not to leave. Give her anything she wants, anything at all, but not a boat to get to shore. Understand?”

  Priestly clearly did not, but he nodded.

  “Good. McDaniels, you will come with me and show me where those houses are.” He hesitated. “But there’s something I need to do first.”

  He turned back to his cabin. Behind that door, which the breeze had blown slightly ajar, lay a beautiful, enticing woman, the woman of his dreams. He would have to leave her behind to travel across cold London with an overly jocular, somewhat smelly pirate crew. Life was not fair.

  Behind him, Priestly snickered to McDaniels. “How long do you think it will take him, sir? Two minutes?”

  “Don’t know, lad. Maybe three. He’s still fairly robust.”

  “Should we wager?”

  Grayson swung back to them. “I assure you gentlemen, if I planned to do what is in your lewd thoughts, it would be hours. Hours. And when this stupid business is finished, I promise you, it will be days.”

  “Yes, sir,” they both said together. The smirks remained.

  He turned his back and entered the cabin. Alexandra had burrowed beneath the blankets on the bunk. He shut the door firmly on his men and crossed to her. Her breathing was too swift for sleep, and when he bent down to kiss her, she opened her eyes and responded.

  “I have to go for a while, love,” he whispered as the kiss ended. “I will return as soon as I can. If you want anything while I’m gone, anything in the world, ask Priestly to get it for you. I’ll flog him if he does not. I promise.”

  “Anything?” she said sleepily.

  “Anything, love.” Except a ride home, he added silently. She would be safe from Ardmore here. They were in the middle of the Thames; the only way to them was over water. If Ardmore or his men tried to storm the Majesty, Ardmore would have a fight to the death on his hands.

  He kissed her again, deep and long, savoring her. His arousal, slightly sated now, reminded him how good it had felt to have her squeezing him tight. He ruthlessly tamped down the thought. He ended the kiss, his lips clinging to hers until the last moment.