He kissed her ear lest she argue, then took her lobe between his teeth and pulled gently. “You understand how one goes—how two go—about conceiving a baronial heir?”
“I do.” Even in two syllables, he could hear the caution in her tone. Her understanding was theoretical, at best, while her trust in him, at least in these moments, was real.
Sebastian teased his index finger up the crease of her sex. “You understand that we’ll copulate, my cock inside you, my seed spent in your body?”
“Mmm.” She moved against his hand, which was answer enough. Sebastian repeated the caress but pressed close enough to find dampness. His cock was rioting behind his falls, pushing snugly against her backside, and clamoring for him to discard boots, breeches, and common sense.
Which would not do. His immediate objective was not to anticipate their vows, but to ensure those vows were taken. He petted her curls, smoothed his fingers against her skin, then went exploring again.
“Close your eyes, Milly. Focus on where I’m touching you.”
When she’d complied, Sebastian closed his eyes too, the better to picture the terrain his hand was learning. Soft, pink folds, damp flesh, and a delicate bud…there.
He worked her gently, slicked his fingers over that bud repeatedly, until the dampness grew, and Milly’s breathing deepened. She was waiting, but the tenor of her stillness, the way she eased each breath carefully in and out, suggested she didn’t know what she waited for.
Fortunately for his nerves, she didn’t have to wait long. Milly’s body knew, even if the rest of her did not. Her hips started a slow rocking in rhythm with his caresses, she nuzzled at his shirtsleeve where her cheek rested against his biceps, and then she was pressing against his fingers, a soft, sighing moan keening past her lips.
“Sebastian… Oh, Sebastian.”
He withdrew his hand as she went boneless against him, his cheek pressed to her hair. No woman had called him by his real, true name in an intimate moment.
He’d been Robert, Girard, Colonel, St. Clair, and most often no name in particular, but never Sebastian. While Milly drowsed in the sunshine against him, Sebastian unfastened his falls and extricated his cock from his clothes. The scent of herbs, brisk, complex, and pleasant, was stronger, perhaps because the sun hit the old cutting table, perhaps because he’d brought pleasure to the woman he was going to marry.
He tucked his cock between her legs, not coupling, but enfolded by her heat. She scooted back against him, as if she understood what he was about, and brought his hand up to fill his palm with her breast.
“I am remiss,” he whispered, planting a kiss on her nape. “I did not pleasure your breasts.” She closed her fingers around his, and though her corset posed a damnable impediment, the table was hard beneath them, and dust motes danced thick on the sunshine, Sebastian found both pleasure and relief.
As a soft, sweet release rose up and shuddered through him, tension lurking in all manner of places in his mind and body ebbed, contentment beckoned, and gratitude welled up.
He would live long enough to give Milly a wedding night she’d never forget, and hopefully, never regret—provided, of course, she did not leave him first.
***
A scent wound among the fragrance of herbs of Provence, an earthy, not exactly sweet scent. Milly lay in the sunshine—this was what it meant to bask, she suspected—and conjectured that she smelled the scent of coupling.
“Knee up, my dear.” Sebastian stroked a warm hand over her bare bottom, finishing the caress with a brisk pat. Someday, Milly would pat his bottom with exactly the same blend of affection and possessiveness.
“Knee up?”
He showed her, and Milly had to be grateful she was facing away from the dratted man as he pressed a handkerchief against her privy parts, then positioned her hand over the handkerchief.
“I apologize for the mess, but anything might happen before an engaged couple can get to the altar.”
Milly pushed her skirts down, the handkerchief pressed between her legs. “Are you apologizing for more than the mess, Sebastian?”
She posed the question carefully, because in the wake of such—such!—unimaginable pleasure, came emotions neither tidy nor convenient. Milly fought her skirts into submission and rolled to her back, the better to wade into battle with her intended.
He was on his side, propped on his elbow, his hair disheveled, his marvelous green eyes guarded. “Do I need to apologize for more?”
“Yes, I rather think you do.” She tidied his hair as best she could, mostly for the pleasure of touching him.
The light in his eyes went from guarded to shuttered. “Apologize, why?”
“I am not particularly literate, but I’m of age, you know. A biology lecture wasn’t necessary, though you might have warned me about that other. Not well done of you to ambush your own fiancée that way.” Somebody might have warned her, anybody, though she would not have believed them.
He cradled Milly’s cheek against his palm. “That other? That pleasure, that closeness, that sharing of intimacies?”
She treasured his touch, which bore a whiff of herbs, musk, and…donkey?
“That bodily surprise. It discommodes one.”
He leaned closer. “Does it make one inclined to take marriage vows instead of hare off to Yorkshire?”
The inconvenient, untidy sentiments rose higher. Milly shifted, wrapping her arms around her fiancé and pulling his head down to the breasts he’d neglected.
“I wrote those letters in case you changed your mind, Sebastian. In case you came to your senses, which I fully expected you to do. You won’t, will you? Please say you won’t. I could not bear to remain near you, knowing you don’t care for—”
His tongue swiped up her cleavage, and then his voice rumbled against her heart. “Your letters gave me a start, madam. I can’t go racketing about, chasing every fiancée who takes a notion to tour the West Riding. A man has obligations to see to, herbs to raise, an aunt to supervise.”
And a donkey to spoil. Milly kissed his temple, having the curious conviction that he’d have come after her at a dead gallop if she’d been on the northbound stage out of King’s Cross.
“You might have tried discussing matters with me, sir. I can be reasoned with, even if you do neglect my breasts.”
His shoulders moved. Milly took a moment to grasp that she’d made him laugh, and then she was laughing too. There on the hard table, amid the dust, sunshine, and scents of old herbs and new love, they laughed together.
***
Dear Acorn was a man with problems, and like every man with problems Henri had had the tedious honor to know, an application of spirits provoked a recitation of those problems.
“Frieda says I should have the blasted chit declared incompetent, but that’s the perishing problem.”
Henri moved the bottle closer to Upton’s elbow. “Madame Frieda offers her opinion too freely?” Frieda, whose poor husband had not been permitted conjugal comfort since Wellington had shipped out for Spain.
“Damned right she does.” Upton glanced around the taproom, likely to ensure nobody had overheard his domestic treason. Henri had appropriated that uniquely English vantage point, the snug. This cozy corner of the common put Henri in mind of the confessional of his boyfriend, though now, Henri assumed the role of confessor.
“If the young lady is not well in the head, then could your Frieda’s plan have merit?”
“It could not.” A long, slow burp followed this pronouncement, one of those masculine vulgarities that was nearly melodic and the pride and joy of boys under the age of fifteen when in one another’s company. “Milly makes up in memory what she lacks in letters. She can recite the entire New Testament from memory, like a monkey…like a monk.”
He enunciated the last word carefully, suggesting Frieda also begrudged her spo
use strong spirits in any quantity.
“Even dumb animals can be taught tricks,” Henri observed mildly.
“Milly ain’t dumb,” Upton countered, his head swiveling as a buxom barmaid sashayed by. “The house ran ever so much better when we had the keeping of her. The help did their jobs, the place was clean, the meals decent, the children…”
He took another swallow of brandy that any fool would know had been watered.
“You miss your young cousin, and you are worried for her. Your devotion does you credit.”
Upton shifted his considerable bulk on his chair, his hand disappearing under the table in a manner Henri would not dwell on when he sat less than three feet away.
“I miss her, right you are. Vincent has stopped asking about her, though.”
Henri was drinking ale, the better to endure Upton’s presence with a clear head.
“You say the ungrateful girl has gone into service?” She wasn’t a girl. The sparrow was small and plain, but she wasn’t a girl.
“Service, of all the queer notions. Vincent was ready to offer for her—he did offer, in a manner of speaking—and she upped and went for a companion. The Traitor Baron’s old auntie employs her now, and I’ll never get my money.”
Henri’s grasp of English law was tenuous, but he failed to see how a mother’s funds left in trust to her daughter were any property of the daughter’s cousin. He tut-tutted the way his old auntie would have.
“This must be very trying, and after you sheltered the girl for years and saw to her every need.”
“For five years, anyway, though Grandfather left a sum for her needs. We spared her no expense, of course, and that meant little dowry was left from Grandpapa’s funds, but who’d want a chit that ain’t rigged up right in the brainbox?”
The girl had lived in a poorly ventilated garret on crusts of stale bread, wearing mended clothing. Henri would have bet the same old auntie’s last bottle of cognac on it.
“A man with low expectations would take on such a woman, of course, or a saint would. Have a bit more brandy. It’s rare to find an Englishman who’ll pass the time with a visiting Belgian.”
The same auntie would have slapped Henri stoutly for lying about his nationality. Henri would have slapped her back, and had on more than one occasion.
“Fine stuff, this,” Upton said, smacking his lips. “Helps a man forget his troubles.”
He passed gas, the sound muted by his own sitting bulk, then sighed with contentment, while Henri allowed a pang of sympathy for the sparrow who’d left her cousin’s tender care.
“You might consider watching the baron’s aunt’s comings and goings,” Henri suggested, “get a sense of what the old woman does with herself. If she’s exposing your cousin to untoward influences, then the young lady might thank you for rescuing her.”
“Milly has manners. She’s good about the please-and-thank-you business. Not like Frieda.”
Poor Frieda, who’d whelped three little acorns for her mighty, flatulent oak.
“You must finish this bottle for me,” Henri said, rising as a sulfurous stench came wafting to his nose amid the inn’s perfume of fish, beer, onions, and humanity. “I’ll tell the proprietor that you are to be served at my expense, and I’m sure if you keep an eye on the aunt, you will soon find compelling reasons to retrieve your cousin. Frieda cannot begrudge you this endeavor, and Vincent will thank you for it as well.”
He shrugged into his coat, though the afternoon was warm. “I will look forward to hearing the details of your reconnaissance efforts when we meet next week.”
Upton blinked up at him. “Next week?”
“Same time, same day, at this very table. I’ll see the sights until then, and you can tell me what I’ve missed in this great city of yours. Acorn, it has been a pleasure.”
Henri bowed smartly, smiled like a whore spotting a half-drunken mark, and put his hat on his head.
“That’s Alcorn, not acorn.”
“I do apologize. English is a sophisticated language, and you must excuse my errors. Through conversation with tolerant gentlemen such as yourself, I hope to improve.”
Alcorn looked dazed by that spate of words. Henri left him with the dregs of the bottle, watching the barmaids, and looking like a fat, old hound so far gone with the rheumatism he would not venture far from the hearth even to piss.
Alcorn was a suffering animal in need of a charitable trip to the woods, though first, Henri would earn the tacit thanks of at least two governments, and dispose of the damned Traitor Baron.
Eleven
Sebastian’s bride was not radiant, she was worried.
“You’ll sign your name as legibly as any woman on her wedding day, Millicent. Stop fretting.” He’d meant this as a reassurance, but his comment apparently fell short of its mark.
Their nuptials would transpire in the morning, God willing, and then seven days of marital bliss would commence—for Milly at least.
She paused mid-stab at her embroidery. “I’m not concerned about writing my name.”
Sebastian’s instincts begged to differ. She wasn’t worried about the wedding night; yesterday’s frolic in the drying shed had reassured him of that.
“You’re anxious over something. I can see it here.” He scooted to the edge of his reading chair and drew a finger between her brows. “You must learn to share your burdens with me, baroness.”
She jerked the needle through the fabric. “I’m not your baroness yet.”
Something struck him about the way she hunched closer to her hoop, the way her cat, cuddled beside her on the sofa, did not purr.
“You are worried your odious cousin will attempt to interfere with the ceremony.”
She put the hoop down and scooped the feline onto her lap. Immediately, the beast began rumbling.
“Alcorn can be very determined. Frieda is the more devious of the two, though. She’s had to be.”
“Sympathy with the enemy is never convenient, Milly, and seldom well-advised, though often unavoidable. I’ve not put a notice in the newspapers, you know.”
Her hand paused mid-stroke over the cat’s fur. “You haven’t?”
“Most people don’t. I have enemies, and they are not above hurting me through you. The more time I have before word of our marriage is generally known, the less likelihood that threat will reach you.”
“But Lady Flynn and Lady—”
“Are keeping their powder dry in anticipation of the announcement. When one has played whist as long as Aunt has, one develops a store of ammunition for use in emergencies.”
Milly resumed caressing her beast while Sebastian gave her time to put together some of the puzzle pieces: Lady Flynn had been indiscreet at some point in the past. Milly did not need to know that the indiscretion had involved a Russian diplomat who’d shared the occasional bottle with the professor.
“Both of them? Lady Flynn and Lady Covington?”
“Aunt holds a few of Lady Covington’s markers, so to speak.” Whist being occasionally played for imprudent stakes.
“They seem like such nice women.”
She sounded so forlorn, Sebastian shifted to take a place beside her on the sofa, his arm around her shoulders. The moment was sweet, domestic, and laced with sorrow, because a lifetime of such evenings with his wife would be denied him.
He kissed her temple.
“They are nice women. They will deal with each other civilly, and I daresay, the ladies will call upon you to admire your ring and congratulate you on your married state.”
Outside, darkness settled over the city like a soft summer quilt, and a heavy wagon jingled past, putting Sebastian in mind of MacHugh’s gift of time. A week would not be enough, but then, neither would a lifetime.
“I feel guilty for not notifying my only relations that I’m marrying, Sebastian
. They are my family.”
“Sometimes, my dear, the kindest thing you can do is leave your family in ignorance.” Soon enough she’d be widowed, if not thanks to MacHugh, then thanks to whoever next stepped from the shadows, intent on ending Sebastian’s life. Time enough to deal with her family then.
She let her head rest on his shoulder. “You were with the solicitors for quite a while.”
“I am to be married tomorrow, which creates a substantial change in my situation. When we come back from St. Clair Manor, you will take your turn with the solicitors too. You will be not only my wife, but also my baroness.”
And she would need to sign many documents in that capacity. Would she think of Sebastian each time she made her signature?
“I would rather be your friend, sir.”
Between a pat to the cat’s head and a delicate yawn, she had put her finger on the greatest sorrow of their situation, one Sebastian could spare her for the present: She did, indeed, have the potential to be his friend. He would not be marrying her otherwise. In the course of walks through lavender-scented fields, quiet evenings before the fire, and quieter nights of loving, Sebastian might well have found the courage to share with her every shadow on his soul, every regret and hope.
“You’re falling asleep, madam. This is no compliment to your fiancé’s company.”
“It’s a compliment to how comfortable I am in his arms. Is there something about this wedding you’re not telling me, Sebastian?”
“Yes.” This time he followed up his kiss to her temple with a nuzzle to her hair. “You’ll be a wealthy woman, eventually. You must plan for your loving family to try to exploit that, and maneuver accordingly.”
She was silent, perhaps falling asleep. The weight of her against his side was dear and comforting. “I thought the barony was impoverished.”
“The barony struggled badly, but Aunt held matters together. Lately, things have gone much better, in part because I have connections on the Continent for anything I wish to dispose of there. Then too, I had some personal wealth, which my uncle and then his solicitors managed for me. Because I was stuck in France, I was unaware of those funds until after the hostilities were over.”
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