by Marie Force
Simon shrugged. “I know a lot of things.” The veiled threat was clear: push me on this, and I’ll start to pick at where exactly you’ve been for the last three days.
Anthony retreated—for the moment.
Simon had no doubt Anthony would interrogate the staff at the first opportunity. Blotting his mouth and placing the linen napkin on the table, Simon rose. “I must be off.”
“To where?”
In truth, Simon had nowhere to be until three and had planned to wile away the time at home this morning. But now that his father had returned, he preferred to be anywhere else. “I’m meeting Enderly at White’s.”
“Very well, but if I find you are keeping things from me—”
Simon told himself to keep walking, to not engage, but the temptation was far too great. He turned. “You’ll do what exactly?”
“I expect your loyalty. You are my son, after all.”
“And Derek is my cousin and best friend. I won’t stand idly by and watch you bring him harm or dishonor.”
“You dishonor me by suggesting I’m capable of either.”
Simon eyed him shrewdly. “Do I?”
The tendons in his father’s neck bulged, a sign of his growing fury. In the past, Simon would’ve run for his life at the first sign of those bulging tendons. That was then.
“Your impertinence knows no bounds,” Anthony said, snarling.
“Nor does your ambition. Tread lightly, Father. I’ll be watching you. Derek may not have asked to be the duke, but he won’t stand by and watch you take from him that which is rightfully his.”
“If he doesn’t soon marry, I won’t have to take anything.”
Simon decided to give his father the last word, because frankly, he’d grown bored by the tedious conversation. Hopefully by now Derek’s title was safe and out of Anthony’s reach. His father would find out soon enough that he’d been denied his fondest desire once again. A knot of fear lodged in Simon’s chest. What would happen then?
Chapter Fourteen
Derek allowed himself seven days and seven nights of total bliss. He’d decided that on the first day of their second week of marriage, he would tell her the truth and then bear the consequences. In the meantime, he devoted every minute of that first week to her.
Once they were back at the cottage, the search for her grandmother’s key framed their days. They spent several hours each morning investigating a new area of the glade, working until the heat of the day forced them inside for a midday meal followed by a leisurely afternoon in bed. They took Hercules and Sunny on long rides, returning to the glade in the early evenings during which they worked until dark.
On the seventh day, rather than take their midday meal at the cottage, they raided the icebox that Mrs. Langingham kept well provisioned and took a picnic to the small lake near the dig site.
“I’m so hot,” Catherine said as they spread a plaid blanket under a tree. She’d worked as hard as he had on the dig, and more than once he’d encouraged her to rest. He worried incessantly about her fever returning, but she’d dismissed his concerns and continued to work by his side.
“I can cool you off,” Derek said, hugging her from behind.
“I’m all sweaty!” She attempted to wiggle out of his embrace. “I must smell terrible!”
He kissed his way up the damp skin on her neck to roll her earlobe between his teeth. “You smell delicious.”
She leaned back against his chest. “I’m so easily enchanted by you,” she sighed. “I need to start making you work a little harder to earn my favor.”
“Don’t,” he whispered, reveling in the tremor his words sent rippling through her body. “I like you just as you are.” His hands coasted over her belly to cup her breasts. He pinched her nipples between his fingers, drawing a gasp from her. While one hand continued to stimulate her breasts, his other hand got busy unbuttoning her simple day dress. Only when he nudged the dress from her shoulders did Catherine become aware of what he’d done.
“Jack! We can’t! Not out here.”
“Yes, we can.” He’d directed his staff to keep everyone away from this corner of the estate until further notice from him. “There’s no one around for many miles, except for Hercules and Sunny, and they won’t tell anyone.”
She clutched the dress to her chest. “You can’t know there’s no one else about.”
“I do know it.” Moving around so he was in front of her, he eased the dress from her clutches and let it fall to her waist. He continued to release the buttons until it landed in a pool around her feet.
Catherine’s fair skin flushed with color that only fueled his desire for her. “We can’t,” she said again, more softly this time.
“I promise no one will disturb us.” Watching the excited rise and fall of her chest through the thin lawn of her chemise, Derek tugged off his boots and removed his clothes.
She licked her lips at the sight of his aroused body.
“Take off your chemise,” he said, his voice rough and hoarse.
“I can’t.” She crossed her arms demurely over her chest.
That she could still be shy after the many intimacies they’d shared over the last week amused him. Reaching for her hands, he drew them down. “Take it off.”
Her hands trembled as she reached for the hem and did as he asked. When he scooped her up into his arms, she released a surprised squeal. “Relax, my sweet, I’ve got you.”
“We’ll cause a scandal traipsing through the woods in our all-together.”
“No one will ever know.” He pressed a kiss to her soft lips. “It’ll be our secret.”
She tightened her arms around his neck and held on as he walked them to the lake. “Wait! Where are we—”
He strode to the end of the short dock and, still holding her in his arms, jumped into the water.
They emerged sputtering and laughing. “You’re not hot anymore,” he said.
She splashed water into his face. “I can’t believe you did that!”
Derek retaliated by reaching for her waist and dunking her.
Once again, she resurfaced sputtering. “That, my love,” she said as she pushed sopping strands of hair from her face, “was a declaration of war.”
Swimming swiftly away from her, he called over his shoulder, “Catch me if you can.” Derek knew he shouldn’t have been surprised to feel her hand clamp around his ankle. She’d shown herself to be his equal in more ways than one over the last week.
A clamp of a different kind closed around his heart, stealing the breath from his lungs when he imagined how tomorrow might go. But he couldn’t delay the inevitable for another day, if for no other reason than his uncle would soon appear at Westwood Hall, hoping to make a claim on the dukedom. Derek would need to be there to disabuse him of his lofty ambitions.
Slowing his strokes, Derek let Catherine catch up to him. Hand in hand, they floated on the surface in contented silence for many minutes before Derek let his legs fall to the marshy bottom. He drew her into his arms and sighed with completion when she wrapped her arms and legs around him. Tipping his head, he found her mouth and feasted on her sweetness. “I love you,” he said between kisses. “I love you so much. I have no idea how I survived before I found you.”
“And I love you. Just as much.” She clung to him, returning his kisses with the ardor he’d come to expect and crave from her.
“I have a confession to make,” he said.
Drawing back from him, she met his gaze. “And what is that?”
“Today is my birthday.”
She gasped. “I had no idea! Why didn’t you tell me before now?”
“Birthdays are just another day.”
“Since your parents died, you mean,” she said, her expression grave. She cut him to the quick with her astute summary. It was all he could do to offer the briefest of nods. “Well, birthdays will no longer be just another day,” she declared. “They will be celebrated. How old are you today?”
“Thirty,” he said with a sheepish grin.
Again, she gasped. “Well, we must have a party!”
Laughing, he said, “And whom shall we invite to this party?”
“Do we need anyone else?”
“No.” He shook his head and bent to kiss the drops of water off her lush lips. “We don’t need anyone else.” Pressing his tongue into her welcoming mouth, he guided his cock to the sweet warmth of her entrance and brought her down on him. The combination of the cool water and her heated channel took his breath away. He released a tortured groan. “God, that’s incredible.”
“Surely, you’ve done this before,” she said against his ear.
“No. Never.”
“Oh, finally! Something we’re doing for the first time together.”
He grimaced at the reminder that there’d been other women. “There will be many, many things we do together for the first time.” As he spoke, he walked them to the far side of the lake where a rock formation extended into the water. One of the larger boulders formed a ramp.
“Where are we going?” She squeezed him with her internal muscles, drawing another tortured groan from Derek.
“You’ll see,” he somehow managed to say. Withdrawing from her, he turned her and arranged her so the top half of her body was facedown on the flat, sun-warmed stone. “Does the heat feel good against your body?”
“Mmm,” she said, squirming.
Derek moved behind her and smoothed his hands over her back, his lips following the same path down her spine. He worshipped her plump buttocks, until she fairly launched off the stone. Under the water, his fingers slid into her slick channel. After seven days of intense lovemaking, he could tell she was close to an explosive release. He replaced his fingers with his cock, sliding into her in one swift stroke.
Catherine cried out from the impact and gripped the edges of the stone as he pumped into her.
He reached around to where they were joined, found the hardened nub of her desire and rolled it between his fingers.
“Oh, oh, Jack!” she cried out as she shattered.
As he joined her in exquisite release, Derek would’ve sold his soul to the devil himself to hear her cry out his real name in her moment of ecstasy. It was the only thing he really wanted for his birthday, and the one thing he couldn’t have.
* * *
Simon wondered if it were possible for a man to go mad from an overabundance of desire. Surely a body couldn’t withstand this amount of yearning for long without suffering some sort of ill effect. As he strolled through the park with Lady Madeleine, everything about her held him captive to her overwhelming allure.
He couldn’t help but notice, however, that she lacked her usual verve and vitality today. In fact, she hadn’t said much of anything, which was rare indeed. Could she be losing interest in him? The thought struck a note of fear in Simon. She couldn’t. He wouldn’t survive it.
“Are you well today, my lady?”
The question seemed to startle her. “Why do you ask?”
“You’re awfully quiet. Is something troubling you?”
“Tell him,” her maid hissed from behind them.
Madeleine sent her a foul look. “Quiet.”
The maid scowled.
“Now my curiosity is impossibly piqued,” Simon said, stopping to look at Madeleine, then her maid and back to Madeleine.
“You tell him, my lady, or I will,” the impertinent maid said.
“Very well.” Madeleine’s face flushed as she struggled to find the words. “It’s my sister. She ran off a while back to get away from the viscount our father insisted she marry.”
Playing dumb, Simon hung on her every word. “This lord,” he said, “he is . . .”
“Vile! Absolutely horrible!”
“Why in the world would your father make such a match?”
“We aren’t sure, exactly. We think perhaps it involved a wager of some sort.” Her pretty lips curled with displeasure at the notion.
With every fiber of his being, Simon wanted to kiss those pretty lips. “That’s unfortunate,” he said, deliberately understating the obvious. “There’s been no word from your sister?”
Distressed, Madeleine shook her head. “Not in weeks, and I miss her terribly. I just hope that nothing untoward has happened to her.”
“Do you suspect that’s possible?”
“She’s extremely resourceful, but she’s all alone.”
Simon reached for her hand. “How can I help?”
“Tell him,” the maid growled. Madeleine sent her yet another withering look. “Her absence has caused a bit of a problem for me.”
“How so?”
“If Catherine doesn’t come home to marry the viscount, I’ll have to.”
Simon’s world tilted on its axis. “That can’t happen! You’re going to marry me!”
“Am I?” Madeleine asked with a shy smile.
“Of course, you are.”
“Not if my father and the viscount have anything to say about it.”
Simon’s mind raced with ideas and scenarios and schemes. “Your sister ran away to avoid marrying the man,” Simon said slowly. “You will do the same.”
“See what I’m telling you,” the maid said, poking at Madeleine. To Simon, she said, “I told her you’d know what to do.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Evangeline,” Simon said with a charming smile. “Now would you mind giving us just a minute or two alone to discuss the particulars?”
“Yes, sir.” With a pointed look at her mistress, the maid scurried off to a nearby bench—out of earshot, but close enough that she could still keep an eye on her charge.
“Thank you,” Madeleine said. “She’s been driving me mad.”
“She’s looking out for you.”
“Yes.”
“So.”
“So.”
Simon took a good look around at the mostly deserted park. The unusually warm day had kept the crowds inside. Seeing that they were mostly alone, he dared to trail an ungloved finger over her rosy cheek.
Madeleine gasped. “Simon.”
“Yes, my love?”
She looked up at him, her heart in her eyes. “Am I your love?”
“Oh, yes. You are my dearest love.” In a brazen move, he cupped her cheek, discovering her skin was as soft and silken as it appeared. “I knew the moment I first saw you that you would change my life forever. Will you do me the great honor of being my wife?”
She hesitated for a moment, long enough to stop his heart. What would he do if she said no?
He cleared the fear from his throat. “Lady Madeleine?”
“May I ask you one question before I give you my answer?”
“Certainly.”
“If I hadn’t told you about the viscount, would you still have asked me to marry you?”
Simon pondered that for a second and decided to go with the truth. “Maybe not today but soon. I’d been waiting for the right opportunity to present itself.” He glanced at the maid. “I was hoping for a moment alone in which to declare myself.” Reaching for Madeleine’s gloved hands, he added, “I have no title, but I also have no obligations to anyone other than myself. I’m wealthy in my own right, so you’ll never want for anything. We can travel the world if that is your wish or never leave our home. There is nothing I wouldn’t do to make you happy, nothing I wouldn’t give to have you as my wife.”
Tears shimmered in her beautiful eyes. “And children?”
“As many as you want. I am your humble servant.”
She surprised him when she threw herself into his arms. “Yes,” she whispered. “Yes, yes, yes.”
Overwhelmed with relief and gratitude as well as the miraculous sensation of having her soft curves pressed against him, Simon closed his eyes tight against the rush of emotion. “We must act quickly,” he said as he reluctantly released her and stepped back from her bewitching scent. “I want you to go home and feign illness. Pack only what you n
eed for a couple of days for yourself and Evangeline. I’ll meet you at the servant’s entrance at midnight.”
“Tonight?” she squeaked.
He nodded. “We can’t risk your safety by giving your father and the viscount time to scheme. We must get you out of there immediately.” Her expression was one of fear and reticence. “Do you trust me, Madeleine?”
“Oh, yes, Simon. I do. I trust you.”
“Then do as I say and meet me at midnight.” He brought her hand to his lips. “I’ll take care of you.”
She released a deep, shuddering breath. “I’ll be there.”
“There is something else I must tell you.”
“What?” she asked, her eyes wide with alarm, as if she worried he might take it all back.
“I know where your sister is.”
* * *
On the evening of his nephew’s thirtieth birthday, an elated Lord Anthony returned to the family’s home in Mayfair to prepare for the journey to Essex to finally claim what was rightfully his. Derek had never returned to town to choose a wife and was in default of the family’s primogeniture. The former duke had been very clear about his expectations for future generations of heirs, and Derek had failed to live up to those expectations.
Not that Anthony was surprised. His nephew had always been a loner and would continue along that lonely path as he handed over his title to the uncle who’d done everything for him and had never been given the credit he rightfully deserved.
Now Anthony would finally get everything he deserved. He was filled with anticipation and plans, the first of which was to end the ridiculous investments his nephew continued to make in frivolous projects, squandering money that could be spent on far better things. A flying machine? Anthony laughed at the sheer madness of it.
After a knock on the door, his valet, James, entered the bedchamber. “My lord, you’ve returned. It is nice to see you.”
“Likewise.”
“My lord . . .”
A sense of foreboding had Anthony turning to look at the man who’d been by his side through it all, the most loyal person in Anthony’s life. “What is it, James?”