Tish released her hand and threw her arms around her sister. “Thank you!”
Bea pried herself free. “Don’t thank me yet. I want to know—” She broke off at the sound of a polite knock on the open door.
The footman whom Tish had dispatched this morning with her invitations executed a swift bow and held out several notes. The responses. Tish all but leaped to her feet, nearly tripping over her skirts in her haste to retrieve them. She pulled the slips of parchment from Garvey’s outstretched hand and eagerly opened them, registering polite acceptances from Randley and then Hapsborough. But where was the third?
She shot the footman a reproachful look. Had she not told him he was not to return until he had responses from all three gentlemen? “Where is Viscount Langston’s?”
“I am sorry, my lady, but he refused to send a written response.”
“Refused?” Tish frowned in puzzlement. Had she misjudged the viscount’s interest in her? Of the three gentlemen, he was the only one who had never expressly indicated a wish to marry her, but she had thought him cautious and considerate rather than indifferent. She closed her eyes as disappointment welled inside her, threatening to crush her heart.
“Yes, ma’am. He wanted to deliver his answer in person.”
Her eyes flew open. “What?”
At her stunned exclamation, the viscount himself stepped into the room. “In the flesh.”
And oh my, what flesh! Even fully clothed, the man exuded pure, masculine charisma. Broad of shoulder, narrow of hip, and well-turned out of thigh and calf, Nash Langston was carnality personified. It was impossible to look at the man and not at least attempt to picture him in the nude.
Tish tended to do more than attempt.
She had never been the swooning sort, but she felt in danger of making a closer inspection of his highly polished black boots, for all her blood seemed to have deserted her brain in favor of regions further south. In fact, she rather fancied her heart might have migrated down and settled between her legs as well, for that was where her pulse was now lodged.
His effect on her was most disconcerting and not altogether agreeable. He seemed to exert his own gravitational force, rearranging her internal organs and thoroughly disorganizing her normally rational thought processes. It was alarming…and perhaps just a little bit exhilarating.
From some well of composure, Tish managed a deep and graceful curtsy despite her wobbly knees. “Did you misplace your fountain pen when my message arrived, my lord? Or perhaps your tongue?” she asked, surprised to discover she could formulate a response at all, let alone a saucy one.
A low chuckle rumbled in his throat and his tawny brown eyes—such an exotic color, really, like autumn leaves—glittered with amusement. “I assure you I have full command of both my tongue and my pen, and am more than willing to employ them whenever you desire.” He arched an eyebrow meaningfully.
Tish suppressed a half-gasp, half-giggle. Oh, he was wicked! He did not mean pen at all. Nor, it dawned on her, did he mean he would use his tongue to speak. The muscles in her thighs and lower abdomen clenched in an involuntary effort to quell the intensifying ache at the thought of pens and tongues in the way he intended.
He probably intended that, too.
She wished she were clever enough and worldly enough to respond to his flirtation in kind. Instead she settled for tucking the responses from Hapsborough and Randley into a pocket in her skirt and dismissing the footman.
Having got herself into a more brisk and businesslike mood, she returned her attention to the viscount. “You remember my sister, the Countess of Albemarle?”
He nodded. “It is a pleasure to see you again, Lady Albemarle,” he said, executing a gentlemanly bow in Beatrice’s direction. “I trust you are well.”
“I am, thank you,” Beatrice responded, coming to her feet. “I have, however, just recalled a pressing matter I must see to back at Albemarle House. I do hope you will both excuse me.”
Tish stared at her sister in shock. Surely Beatrice didn’t mean to leave now? This wasn’t the plan at all. She wasn’t ready for this yet.
“Yes, of course,” Langston said smoothly. “Do give Albemarle my regards.”
Beatrice’s lips quirked into a wry smile. “You would do better to give them yourself. You are likely to see him sooner than I.” As she walked by Tish, she leaned close and whispered, “You wanted to be alone with him. Enjoy yourself. I would if I were you.”
And then, in a swish of skirts, Beatrice was gone, pulling the door quietly shut behind her.
Chapter Three
Under any other circumstances, Nash would have suspected he was being maneuvered into a compromise. But since he had arrived unannounced and of his own volition—and since he hardly required the inducement of a compromise to offer marriage in the first place—he didn’t know quite what to make of Lady Albemarle’s abrupt departure. More pressing than that, however, was the matter of exactly what game Tish was playing with him and his two unsuspecting rivals.
He took two steps closer to her, and before she could realize what he was about, reached into her pocket and retrieved the two notes she had taken from the footman.
“What are you—?” she began when his hand entered her pocket, then, “I say, give those back. They are private, and you’ve no right to read them.”
Shaking his head, he held the scraps of parchment just out of her reach. She stomped her foot, her blue eyes burning with righteous indignation. Fascinating how eyes the color of a cool crystal lake could appear as hot as a bonfire on Guy Fawkes’s Day, although he was rather more interested in the way her bodice gaped away from her generous bosom as she stretched her arm upward.
He resisted the temptation to slip his free hand inside her dress to test his theory that her breast would be just slightly too large for his palm to encompass, and said, “I never enter a game without knowing the rules and all the players. If you want me to play, you’ll have to tell me precisely what I’m playing for…and with whom.”
A wide-eyed look of alarm skittered across her face before she mastered it. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she bluffed.
“You know precisely what I’m talking about.” He lowered his arm and opened the first of the two notes, which he proceeded to read aloud. “Lady Leticia Blake cordially invites the Earl of Randley to a private picnic luncheon at Albemarle House in Ealing this coming Tuesday afternoon at two o’clock.”
Her expression darkened perceptibly.
“And look,” he continued, opening the second one, “here’s another just like it, addressed to the Duke of Hapsborough for Monday. And fascinatingly enough, I have one in my breast pocket addressed to me, only I am to be feted on Wednesday afternoon. What am I to make of this, my lady?”
“You can make of it whatever you like. I am under no obligation to explain my social engagements to you. You are not my father.”
That drew a pained laugh from him. “God, no.”
She frowned. “Or my husband, either.”
“Yet.”
“You won’t ever be if this is any indication of how you’ll behave when we are married. High-handed, arrogant, self-righteous, insuffera—”
Nash did the only thing a rational, right-thinking man could when confronted with a barrage of unfair, inaccurate, multisyllabic accusations coming from the mouth of a pretty woman. He kissed her.
His intent was merely to interrupt her tirade and regain some control over the situation. In the first instance, the tactic was wholly effective. She didn’t utter another word. In the second, however, it was a complete failure, because it was immediately apparent that maintaining control and kissing her were mutually exclusive enterprises.
The trouble was not that her mouth tasted warm and sweet as buttered toffee nor that her lips were pliant and velvety as rose petals nor even that, after a brief, outraged attempt to push him away, her hands clutched at the lapels of his coat as if to prevent herself from puddling at his fee
t. Those were all things he’d been imagining with great specificity for some time now, and as such, he was prepared for their effect on his libido. He had known his heart would race, his head would swim and his cock would go straight to attention.
No, what threatened to unman him was her response. Her attempts to return his kiss were eager and enthusiastic, to be sure, but also artless, bordering on awkward. Her lips were in one moment too spongy and in the next too stiff. She seemed not to know what to do with her nose, twisting her head this way and that in a graceless attempt to keep it out of the way. And when he coaxed her to open her mouth to admit his tongue, her teeth inadvertently collided with his.
In short, Tish Blake hadn’t the first idea how to kiss. Had likely never been kissed. The insight positively inflamed him.
How had Leticia Blake, by every account the recipient of no less than twenty proposals of marriage, managed to reach twenty-two years of age without one decent, thorough kiss? It was almost inconceivable, and yet the truth was as plain as the nose she could not keep from bumping against his face.
Though, he had to give her credit, she was a damnably quick study. Already, she’d figured out how to achieve that subtle balance between soft and firm lips and how to match the sweep of his tongue with shy, tentative licks of her own. With each thrust of her tongue, each parry of her mouth, arousal roared hotter in his veins and pounded more fiercely in his loins. There was nothing romantic or tender about his desire. It was nothing but pure, raw lust. The coarse, primal need to fuck. To plunder and invade and possess. The portion of his brain that was still functional busied itself conjuring images of throwing her to the floor, pushing her skirts up to her waist and plunging his cock inside her snug, virginal walls until he exorcised the demon riding him.
What stopped him was not a sudden attack of either romantic feeling or conscience, but the dawning comprehension that she was no longer participating in the kiss, but struggling against him. It was then that he realized he had pinned her up against the door and was grinding his erection into the soft cradle of her belly in a crudely salacious overture that would alarm all but the most experienced of females. To a pure innocent like Tish, his behavior must seem nothing short of nasty and brutish.
With an oath, he broke the kiss and backed away from her, raking his fingers through his hair. He could scarcely countenance his own conduct. Christ, he’d behaved like a randy schoolboy on the verge of tupping his first whore, not a gentleman who’d spent the last decade of his life perfecting the art of slowly and thoroughly pleasuring his bed partners before seeking his own release. Not only was his lapse of control inexplicable, but it was downright humiliating. It was as though her inexperience was contagious, and he’d caught a full-blown case of it.
“I’m sorry,” he panted. He stared down at the shiny black toes of his boots. He couldn’t bear to look at her, not because he was embarrassed but because he feared if he did, he would want to repeat the experiment. Just to determine whether he would go over the edge the second time as quickly as he had the first.
“And I am sorry it is not Wednesday,” she said with a weak laugh.
“Wednesday?” he repeated stupidly, risking a glance at her face. Her cheeks were flushed, her lips dark pink and swollen from his none-too-gentle attentions, and her eyes dark as midnight on a moonless night. Aroused. Not frightened at all, as he’d imagined.
If any other woman had looked at him like that, Nash would have had no qualms about pressing his advantage. He would push her back up to that door and finish what he’d started, because there was no question whatsoever that she wanted consummation as badly as he did.
But Tish Blake was not any other woman. And that was one bloody hell of an understatement.
Her mouth flirted with a smile. “If this were Wednesday, I would not have had to stop you.”
Wednesday. The gears in Nash’s brain finally engaged as some of his blood returned from his groin. Wednesday was the day she had invited him to a “private picnic.” The last in a series of three such events. Did she mean…? Shit.
He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her slightly. “What the devil are you planning to do at these picnics of yours, Tish?”
Her eyes widened. Now she did look frightened. She worried her upper lip with her teeth before answering. “I just want to be sure I choose the right man to marry, that is all.”
Fury chased the remaining lust from Nash’s body. “And so…what? You plan to fuck us all to figure it out?”
She jerked out of his grasp, looking suitably horrified. “Of course not! But I cannot possibly be expected to marry the first and only man I have ever kissed.”
“Why not?” Nash demanded. “You enjoyed that kiss—and the rest of it—and you bloody well know it.”
“I did enjoy it, but…I enjoy barberry ice, yet I am not at all sure I like it so very well that I would forgo any other dessert for the rest of my life, particularly if I had never even tried another dessert. Yet that is exactly what I would be doing if I agreed to marry you on the basis of one kiss when I have never even received another.”
Some of his ire melted in the absurdity of the analogy. As if anyone would ever be expected to settle on eating one dessert for the remainder of her days!
“Marriage is a good deal more serious than one’s choice of desserts,” he observed, thinking the argument all but won.
“Precisely my point!” she responded, giving him a brisk jab in the center of the chest with her index finger. “Tell me, my lord, how many women have you kissed before me?”
Nash’s mind went suddenly, terribly blank. The answer, obviously, was a great many. Far more than he could count even if he made the effort, which, of course, he was not going to do because the number was irrelevant. And he’d done a great deal more than kiss the vast majority of them. “I hardly see how that signifies,” he choked out.
“Oh, you don’t, don’t you? Well, I will tell you precisely how it signifies.” Anger radiated from her as she advanced on him, and he took an involuntary step backward to avoid another sharp poke from the finger that pointed at his chest once again. “It is easy for you to decide whom to marry, because you are a man, and for men, choosing a wife is precisely like choosing a dessert. You have plenty of opportunities to sample a wide variety of sweets before you decide to commit to one for the rest of your life. You know not only what you enjoy, but what you are giving up by choosing just one.” She paused in her impassioned speech to take a breath, pressing her gloved hand to her heaving bosom.
Sweets, indeed. Inappropriately Nash imagined taking those lovely breasts into his hand and sucking each raspberry-tipped nipple into his mouth.
“But ladies like me,” she continued, oblivious to the lascivious turn of his thoughts, “we have no such luxury. We are expected to choose our husbands entirely in ignorance, without ever having had so much as a taste of anything but the one dessert we will be eating for the rest of our lives.”
Bloody hell, she’d just had to go to eating as a metaphor, hadn’t she? His mind flashed frankly erotic images in rapid succession. Tish on her back with her legs spread wide, his mouth and tongue devouring her pussy as she writhed beneath him in ecstasy. Tish on her knees in front him, sucking and licking his cock as if it were the most delicious treat she had ever tasted.
He swallowed hard, fighting for equilibrium. “So, you are telling me you want the opportunity to…er…sample Hapsborough and Randley before you decide which of us to marry? Have I got that right?” He really hoped he hadn’t.
Tish crossed her arms over her chest and nodded.
His blood roared in his ears. No, no, and bloody hell no. The very notion was appalling. Impossible.
The determined glint in her eyes told him she did not consider his approval a requirement, however. She would do this with or without his blessing. He could refuse to give it, of course, but as she was under no obligation to honor his wishes. As she’d pointed out earlier, he was not her husband, and he n
ever would be if he gainsaid her on this. It was either accept her outrageous proposition or abdicate his position altogether and allow one of his rivals to marry her.
The hell I will.
She was his; she just didn’t know it yet. If allowing her to engage in a bit of slap and tickle with Hapsborough and Randley would bring her around to his way of seeing things, he could tolerate it. Perhaps he could even turn it all to his advantage.
Nash exhaled the breath he’d not even been aware of holding. “Very well, but only on three conditions.”
Her eyebrows flew up her forehead. She obviously hadn’t been expecting his acquiescence. “Well, I am glad you see it my way. What are your conditions, then?”
“Well, first and foremost, you’re not to fuck with either of them. You know what I mean by that, don’t you?”
Her face turned bright pink. “Of course I do,” she retorted, her voice hot with indication. “And I wouldn’t do that whether ‘twas one of your conditions or not.”
“Good,” he said curtly, “because I will tolerate a great deal for your sake, Tish, but not the possibility that my firstborn child will be some other man’s get.”
She licked her lips and nodded. He did his best to ignore what the gesture did to his libido. The next condition was only going to make matters worse.
“Second, I will hide nearby and keep an eye on each of these encounters.”
“What? Are you mad?”
“Probably,” he admitted ruefully, “but ‘tis the only way I can think of to ensure you adhere to the first condition.”
“Are you saying you do not trust me to keep to my word?” she demanded with an indignant gasp.
“Not at all. I am saying I do not trust either Hapsborough or Randley to abide by rules they do not even know exist. Not only that, but both of them want to marry you. What better way to ensure your consent than to relieve you of your virginity and possibly get you with child?”
“Oh,” she said in a chagrined voice. “I hadn’t thought of that.”
Taking Liberties Page 2