To Love a Lord: A Victorian Romance Collection

by Tanya Anne Crosby

  Did he think her silly?

  The intensity of his gaze set her heart to pounding once again.

  “I do know something for sure now,” he told her, and Sophie caught her breath, afraid that her secrets had all been revealed in the depth of her eyes.

  What did he know?

  It was said that the eyes were the mirrors to the soul and if that were indeed true, then Sophie’s heart was an open book. Her father had always told her that he could tell what she was thinking simply by the look in her eyes.

  Whether that was true or not, her father certainly seemed to read all.

  She was almost afraid to ask, and mentally braced herself for whatever revelation Jack had had. “What?”

  He smiled at her, and his green eyes glistened like the clearest emeralds, full of good humor. “You don’t snore,” he said with certainty.

  For an instant, the unexpected acknowledgment surprised her.

  As far as Sophie was concerned it had never been in question. But she realized he was trying to make her smile and she did manage to appease him.

  The cad.

  “You are absolutely insufferable!” she told him, trying to keep from laughing.

  “You are not the first woman to tell me that,” he assured her, quite obviously unrepentant. “And it’s not even the first time you’ve accused me of it.”

  “Yes, well I assure you, it is always true!”

  “Yah?” His eyes fairly twinkled with mirth, spoiling the effect of his complaint. “Well, you’re no party yourself, Mizz Vanderwahl!”

  Sophie tilted him a knowing glance. “If I didn’t know better, Mr. MacAuley, I would say you were trying to pick a fight with me.”

  Like a child who had been caught with his hands in the proverbial cookie jar, he grinned at her, looking in that instant far too boyish and endearing. “Maybe you don’t know better?” he suggested, egging her on. His brow arched.

  Sophie had to laugh at his confrontational expression. “I think you must have been a rotten little boy!” she told him, and wished she’d known him then.

  “To the core,” he allowed.

  “I don’t doubt it!” Sophie agreed heartily. She wondered at how Jack’s provocations made her find strength in herself and bolstered her spirits.

  They shared a moment’s ease together, and then he glanced down at his hand. “Take it easy on that, will you?”

  “Oh!” Sophie started, and let go of his hand.

  “I’ll make you a deal...” he bargained with her.

  She dropped the cloth into the basin and waited to hear his suggestion.

  “You make sure you keep out of trouble the rest of the trip, and I promise you can make our first breakfast when we get off this boat.”

  Sophie smiled in answer, delighted that he was willing to give her another chance. And then her breath caught. He was really very handsome... especially when he wasn’t scowling at her. She could look into his eyes forever.

  “Deal?”

  “Deal,” she agreed.

  “You have only a week left. Think you can manage it?”

  He was playing with her, she realized. “Of course!” she exclaimed, pretending offense.

  “Starting now,” he apprised.

  She threw her arms around his neck as much in gratitude as to make him stop. “Hush,” she demanded of him, and looked up into his smiling face. She kissed him quickly on the lips when he tried to speak again, and whispered, “Thank you!”

  He quieted at once, his smile vanishing, and she realized suddenly what she had done.

  Her heartbeat quickened.

  She tried to disengage herself but his arm went about her waist, preventing it.

  “Don’t,” he whispered, beseeching her, and Sophie could suddenly feel his heart beating against her breast as he pulled her against him ... or maybe it was only her own heart beating. She couldn’t tell.

  The breath left her as he tilted his head to kiss her once more.

  “Sophia,” he whispered hoarsely, as though she should stop him.

  She didn’t want to.

  His eyes closed, and her heart leapt as his lips fitted perfectly over hers.

  His mouth was wonderful and Sophie had never wanted anything more...

  She opened to him, anticipating his tongue with bated breath. At the brush of it against her lips, soft and warm and sweet, she offered her own without protest, without hesitation... with total abandon.

  Jack had never tasted anything sweeter.

  No lips had ever trembled so beautifully.

  No tongue had ever felt so much like heaven.

  No embrace had ever been so welcome.

  He wanted something he knew he could never have, but he was willing to take whatever she would give him. She might not be in love with Penn, but she was still another man’s fiancée. Whatever piece of her she gifted to him would be gone soon enough. He didn’t feel guilty for taking his share. Jack wasn’t so honorable a man that he could walk away clean from the only woman who had ever made his heart beat so hard that it hurt to breathe... who could make him smile, make him feel like he’d never felt before.

  He pulled away to look into her face, wanting to see her. Her cheeks were flushed with color, her eyes dark golden, dazed with passion. He could take whatever he wanted of her this moment and she would give it without protest; he knew that instinctively.

  And he desperately wanted to taste her.

  He could pleasure her, and satisfy himself ... and she would remain virtually untouched...

  Or he could walk away and wonder for the rest of his life.

  The choice was his, he knew.

  He chose to stay.

  “Sophia,’ he whispered, and bent to kiss her throat. Her head lolled to one side, and her scent tempted him beyond reason, aroused him. His body tightened, hardened. He opened his mouth over her throat and nipped her gently, and she moaned softly in delirious pleasure. He was filled with intense satisfaction at the beautiful sound of her passion. “I want you,” he told her, and meant it fiercely.

  A slow burn seeped through him at his baser thoughts, and he met her gaze, wanting her to see every move he made... while he was making it. If she wanted him to stop, she would just need to say the word, and he would.

  He kissed her throat once more, biting it softly, and then kissed her breast over her clothes. When she didn’t stop him, he closed a palm over one breast and molded his hand to the tantalizing softness, craving the feel of her bare skin on his lips.

  She cried out, soft whimpers.

  Sophie closed her eyes and let her head fall back, helpless, to let him do his will.

  Her body wasn’t her own.

  He knew where she ached, and knew how to touch her, and she couldn’t have stopped him even if she’d thought to.

  But she didn’t.

  She had wanted this all her life and just hadn’t known it... or him.

  He was kissing her so wantonly... biting so softly... as though she were his coveted feast...

  He knelt before her suddenly, clasping her to him, and she gasped in shock as his lips touched her bosom... then his hands, and her breath left her in a rush as he dipped a kiss between the valley of her breasts, letting his tongue slide down where no man had ever kissed her before.

  Sophie was deliciously scandalized.

  Her skin prickled with pleasure and she lifted her hand to his head, urging him to give her more. She knew instinctively that he could... that he would, and she wanted it with every fiber of her being.

  His lips skimmed her breasts, kissing and gently nipping, and Sophie’s heart somersaulted against her ribs. She was vaguely aware that he lifted the hem of her dress, his fingers lightly caressing her calf. He continued to lift it... as he kissed her belly... moved down to her thigh ... His tongue caressed her inner thigh, and Sophie swallowed the objection that came to her lips.

  Her heart hammered fiercely.

  His fingers skimmed the curls at the juncture of her
thighs and she gasped in shock that was too laced with bliss to speak out in protest. Instinctively, clinging to a shred of modesty, she pressed her legs together, though not entirely to stop him. It only managed to intensify the feeling ... and trap his hand between her legs.

  He wiggled his finger, brushing her most delicate spot.

  “Oh my!” she exclaimed, and felt her eyes cross with a pleasure so keen it was almost pain. She leaned back on the desk then, bracing herself with trembling arms, lest she faint. The room went dim, and she was aware only of the man nestled so intimately between her thighs.

  He peered up at her, his green eyes burning with something like... hunger.

  “Spread your legs for me, Sophia.”

  Sophie’s heart jolted at the request. But she was powerless to deny him. His gaze demanded it and she wanted to give him everything he wanted ... anything he wanted. She swallowed any protest she might have uttered.

  Her legs trembled as she obeyed and he rewarded her with the most wickedly pleased smile Sophie had ever beheld. It made her belly flutter with anticipation.

  “That’s it, flower,” he encouraged her. “Open for me.”

  He teased her ... there ... and Sophie’s breath caught at the intensity of sensation that exploded everywhere he touched.

  “Jack!” she cried out, and sought his gaze.

  His eyes glittered like jewels. He didn’t stop. He continued without mercy, his fingers dancing magically, eliciting the most delicious sensations she had ever felt in all her life.

  “Oh my!” she said again, and thought she would die. “Jack!” she hissed, and it might have been a protest but her body arched toward him, urging him on. Her legs spread of their own accord, opening to him like a blossom to the sun.

  Her head fell backward, and her breath faltered as he lifted her skirts higher.

  And then she felt something so delightfully sinful that she wanted to cry out in ecstasy. His mouth replaced his fingers... his tongue moving over her with such slow precision that Sophie thought her heart would stop completely. His tongue danced where his fingers had, teasing her. And then he suckled her, and Sophie couldn’t bear it any longer. Unable to speak, she cried out for mercy.

  She fell backward as a finger slipped within her body, gently, caressing until she was oblivious. And then something suddenly burst within her, and she cried out with a joy so intense that she could scarcely contain it.

  She heard his answering gasp and felt his ardor as he continued to devour her.

  Her own cry of release played like an echo in her ear. As she lay there on his desk, Sophie was aware of only two things... no, three...

  One, she had never felt so cherished in all her life. Though she knew it was an illusion, an afterglow from the intensity of her pleasure.

  Two, she seemed to have given him something he’d desperately wanted, because he was kissing her sweetly still and didn’t seem to want to stop.

  And three... she seemed to have his quill embedded in her spine ... but be damned if she cared if it skewered her completely through.

  At the instant, she was floating on clouds.

  Chapter 21

  Jack sat at his desk, trying to make sense of the words jumbled before him.

  He was reading through reports that had been made by colleagues... accounts that had been lambasted and tossed away as inconsequential or erroneous simply because they did not comply with the accepted theory of human evolution.

  He was trying to read them but he could scarcely concentrate over the sounds coming from the other half of the room.

  Sophia was preparing for bed.

  But he didn’t feel the least bit tired.

  In fact, he could barely sit at his desk; he was so tense. He couldn’t stop remembering the taste of her... the feel of her sweet shudders as he’d brought her body to climax.

  His own body was in dire need of relief... relief only she could give him.

  His vision blurred and his concentration was reduced to nil.

  She was washing.

  He could hear her too clearly; buttons being unfastened, the rustle of falling garments, water splashing...

  She was painfully quiet otherwise.

  He tried to concentrate on his work, forcing his attention on the papers before him.

  It was his contention that the Mayan civilization, to have evolved to its final state of technological advancement, must have had ample time for said evolution...

  Water splashed behind the curtain.

  Where was she washing?

  Images taunted him—soft dark curls—he craved the taste of her all over again. Swallowing, he closed his eyes for a moment, and, when he reopened them he tried harder to focus ...

  It was difficult to believe that, as the present theory would have it, a Mesoamerican civilization could have developed to such a degree as had the Maya if man had migrated to the continent as late as only ten thousand years ago.

  Sweet... she was sweet.

  He blinked away the powerful image of her lying back on his desk... and ignored the evidence of his arousal.

  Sophie’s presence was driving him absolutely insane.

  What was she doing? Her silence was maddening.

  Should he speak to her? Tell her good night? Why the hell was he suddenly behaving as though he were some kid with his first crush? She was a Vanderwahl, sure enough, but those beautiful legs had not too long ago been wrapped around his neck, while her soft passionate cries had filled his ears.

  Annoyed with himself, he refocused his thoughts, tapping his fingers impatiently on the desk.

  The Mayan accomplishments left Jack incredulous. They had developed knowledge never obtained by comparable civilizations. Their system of mathematics could express sums in the millions, and they had understood the concept of the quantity of zero a thousand years before anyone else. Among their many other accomplishments, they’d developed a calendar accurate for four hundred million years, and their measure of the year was only a small fraction off target from the actual. An infant society, so to speak, would not have had the necessary time to advance to that point—at least not without outside influence.

  Those had been the seeds Penn had run away with... literally.

  Having worked closely with Jack, Penn had presented to the board Jack’s precise body of thought, except that he hadn’t truly understood the gist of Jack’s theory. It was Penn’s contention that because the Mayan civilization never seemed to move beyond the Stone Age—never employing the wheel for any sensible purpose, or developing a phonetic alphabet—the Maya must have been handed their knowledge by sources outside their own culture.

  Having had access to Jack’s reports, Penn had shot down Jack’s theory point by point before the board, twisting his own arguments against him in the name of religion, to such a degree that Jack found it an insult to his intelligence and a crippling blow to progress. As it was, it wouldn’t have been easy to convince them of the validity of his own theories, but after Harlan had finished with them, they hadn’t even been inclined to hear him out.

  Even though Jack had proof to offer.

  The reports he had in front of him by trusted colleagues gave evidence that strongly implied anatomically modern man had inhabited the continent from a far earlier date. That led Jack to believe it more likely that the Maya had indeed developed on their own. But with that theory, he had committed a professional sin: He had dared to question the standard institution.

  It seemed incredible to Jack that evidence such as this, given by respected researchers, could be dismissed in favor of that given by someone like Penn. Though Penn’s evidence was minimal, relying almost primarily on religious parallelisms, it was he who had received the grants for continued research, and Jack who had been left to flounder.

  Jack believed it was because Penn’s research not merely supported the accepted theory of evolution, but favored religious doctrine. And it galled him, not that Penn’s theories were given credence—all evidence should
be considered—but that Penn’s theories and those like his were the only ones given any credit at all.

  Jack sure as hell didn’t mind being wrong.

  In fact, he’d proven himself out of countless theories. But he damned well didn’t like being told he was wrong even before he’d set out to do his job—by men who considered themselves the ruling elite.

  The curtain opened abruptly.

  Sophie stood there, dressed in her tattered nightgown, and somehow still managed to look regal.

  Despite his mood, the sight of her brought a smile to his lips.

  Sophie smiled back at him.

  He was leaning wearily on his desk, chin in hand, staring at his papers with that provoked look he usually reserved for her.

  “What is it you’re studying?” she asked him, resisting the urge to go and peek over his shoulder. He didn’t seem to appreciate her interest in his work, but her curiosity was addling her. She just couldn’t help herself.

  “Work,” he said simply. He continued to smile at her, and Sophie’s cheeks heated.

  He’d been far more receptive to her since their encounter that afternoon—a positive change—but Sophie couldn’t quite enjoy it. She didn’t like this sudden shyness that had come over her in his presence. She couldn’t even seem to glance his way without blushing, and the more care he took to put her at ease, the more embarrassed she became.

  Jack MacAuley had seen far more of her than any man had a right to, and her behavior had been abominable. Her thoughts were muddled. Something so beautiful couldn’t possibly have been wrong... and yet she was technically still engaged to Harlan... at least until she faced him. She hadn’t any right to indulge in such unseemly behavior with anyone at all.

  And yet, though her cheeks burned, she couldn’t find true regret for what she’d done.

  The very sight of Jack made her heart catch.

  He set down his papers, giving her his full attention.

  Sophie smiled shyly at him and approached the desk under the pretense of looking at Harlan’s picture. Lifting it up, she smiled contentedly at her own handiwork, then set the picture down, tapping it thoughtfully before she glanced back at Jack.