Lord Stanton's Last Mistress

by Lara Temple

  ‘Haven’t you seen them since?’

  ‘Rarely. I try to avoid all forms of trouble and I really don’t need any reminders of the Sinclair taint.’

  She looked around the clearing, imagining the three boys lost in their imaginary world of bravery and valiant deeds. She found it hard to believe that anyone with a fervent imagination could be truly bad.

  ‘I wonder if they would have had a better chance had they been named Stanton.’

  ‘You don’t believe in inherited evil, then, Miss James?’

  ‘I don’t know. I do find it hard to believe that a whole family is tainted as you said. You certainly aren’t.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I just do.’

  ‘And you are an authority.’

  ‘I do think I am more objective than you on the topic.’

  He laughed and glanced up at the trees.

  ‘I know why I brought you here. You can be as stubborn as these trees. In fact...’ His voice trailed off and the smile faded again. ‘Alby was right. You aren’t really a flower or herb, you’re a sprite.’

  ‘A what?’

  He moved away from her before turning, as if putting space between him and some new and unclassified species that might yet prove dangerous.

  ‘A wood sprite. The locals believe there are beings who guard these woods and live in the trees. They are benevolent and guard over travellers passing through, unless someone fells a tree.’

  ‘And then?’ she prompted.

  ‘Then they own you, or your soul. You trade your soul for the soul of the tree you have taken.’

  ‘It doesn’t sound very benevolent. I don’t think I care for the comparison.’

  He didn’t answer and even though it was cool there, she felt a prickle of perspiration form on her nape. She moved away from the force of his gaze and stopped by the tree stump and another exclamation escaped her. It must have been felled many decades ago, because its edges were softened with age and moss, but the dance of shapes and swirling patterns carved on to the surface of the stump looked more recent, though still softened by time. She traced her fingers over the dips and whorls.

  ‘This is yours as well,’ she said. ‘It is lovely. Do these shapes mean anything?’

  ‘Not really, just idle carvings. I spent a great deal of time here.’ He shrugged and took her hand, drawing her towards the stream. He pulled off his gloves and cupped his hands to drink. She knelt as well and copied him.

  ‘Wait,’ he said, stopping her before her hands touched the silvery surface. ‘You have to make a wish.’

  ‘A wish?’

  ‘The woods are a superstitious place. You are supposed to make a wish before you first drink from the spring.’

  She looked down at the sparks of light dancing along the current. A wish wouldn’t make it true.

  ‘Chrissie! You’re crying. Why?’

  She hadn’t realised and she hadn’t even seen him shift towards her. His fingers were warm and firm against her jaw and cheek as he raised her face and through the film of tears she saw concern in his eyes. His finger brushed over her cheekbone and she felt the friction of dampness there.

  ‘Tell me, Chrissie.’

  ‘It was a happy thought.’ It was only half a lie, but enough to make his mouth curve up slightly.

  ‘You’re a contrary young woman, Chrissie; you sparkle when you’re angry and cry when you’re happy. Tell me what the happy thought was.’

  His voice was hoarse and the unconscious intimacy of her name coursed through her, like a warm breeze filling her sails. It wasn’t fair. She wasn’t strong enough.

  ‘You will think it foolish.’

  ‘Probably not, but even if I do, that is my problem. Tell me.’

  ‘I would like to have a place of my own. Like Mary and Matty have Briar Rose Cottage. With window seats and books. And friends who would visit.’ One friend in particular.

  ‘A cottage. Wouldn’t you miss the excitement of living at a centre of activity?’

  ‘Perhaps. Since this is a fantasy I could have both, couldn’t I?’

  ‘Since this is fantasy you could have anything you want.’

  His words were muffled as he turned away from her, dipping his hands into the water. Then he took her hands, cupped them as if she was a child and dipped them into the stream. The water was icy, it pinched at her skin and then eased as she kept them under the surface, the water shimmering as it rushed over them. She watched his hands raise hers, large and strong.

  ‘Drink.’

  It was so cold it burned her lips and stung her throat. This time she actively held her breath, afraid to release the pure, sweet sensation of being filled, possessed.

  Water. Always changeable, but never losing its essence, immeasurably powerful and both threatening and soothing. Necessary.

  ‘Water.’ The word burst from her, a little too loudly.

  ‘True. What about it?’ He laughed; the tension that had gripped him before faded and he looked joyful again.

  ‘I just realised why Lady Albinia cannot find a plant for you. I might be a wood sprite, but you are water.’

  She shouldn’t have spoken and now she couldn’t, her breath all but disappeared at the flash of animal heat in his eyes before he lowered them.

  When they stood it was just as natural for him to take her hand again, but it was different now. Without gloves, both their hands chilled from the water but warming fast, it was just different. His tale of wood sprites felt real. Perhaps merely by touching that carving on the stump she had unleased their power, she could feel her soul seeping out of her, into him.

  He raised her hand, turning it, and the drops of water ran down, seeping into the fabric of her sleeve. His thumb smoothed the moisture along the base of her wrist, but the chill of the breeze on her damp skin only made the heat of the pulse beneath inescapable. She touched her tongue to her lips, remembering the taste of the water, the taste of his lips.

  His hand tightened on hers.

  ‘Don’t do that.’

  ‘Do what?’ It was only a breath because she knew precisely what she was doing. No, precisely what she wanted. What she had wished for.

  Alex.

  He looked away. ‘We should return. However magical this corner seems, this is still the real world. The King and Princess will wonder what I have done with their handmaiden.’

  ‘The King might employ me, but I belong to no one. If I chose, I could leave at any moment.’

  ‘You could, but you won’t,’ he said dismissively; his voice icier than the water.

  She turned from him, knowing he was probably right. She stood on the edge of the clearing where the sunlight glistened on the grass like scattered coins. She breathed it in; trying to capture it so she could take it with her, but it wasn’t enough. She wanted more. She walked around the edge of the clearing, where the ferns rose high in the shade of the tree trunks, around behind the tumbled boulders and past the stream back to where she began, but she didn’t stop.

  ‘What are you doing? Have you lost something?’ His voice had lost its ice and he sounded curious and a little amused. She shook her head.

  ‘No, I am making a magic circle.’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘Like in the fairy tales. A magic circle.’

  ‘What does it do?’

  ‘It doesn’t do anything, or rather one does things in it.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Whatever one wants. Because what happens inside a magic circle stays in the magic circle. For example, you can discover the future, but once you step outside, you forget.’

  She continued her circuit and he moved into the centre of the clearing by the tree stump and stood with his hands on his hips, watching her, the sun striking gold on his hair and silver in his eyes.

  �
�Convenient. What would you do in your magic circle, Chrissie?’ He lingered on her name and she took a step towards him, and another. His hands fisted as if she was an approaching threat, but there was such heat in his narrowed eyes she couldn’t stop. Two steps from him he reached for her, but she raised her hand and ran the tips of her fingers down his cheek.

  ‘Tomorrow I return to Illiakos with Ari. What I would do in this magic circle is ask you to show me what it is I know can...happen, so I can take that with me. I want to feel it. That is what I would do.’

  She hadn’t thought it through so she was not prepared when he caught her hand against his cheek, holding it there against the warmth of his skin and the prickle of stubble while his other hand grasped her nape, pulling her towards him with a groan that ended shuddering against her lips. She was too shaken to find her balance and she just sagged against him, her hands instinctively grasping his shoulders, her breath a startled gasp against his mouth a second before it closed on hers.

  Their kisses in the conservatory and in his bedroom hadn’t prepared her for this. His lips were burning hers, his tongue sending shivers of need through her, shooting arrows of agony through her breasts and gathering like a fever at a point between her legs that had only been a suspicion until then and now she knew was waiting only for him. Her fingers slid deep under his coat and around his back, fisting in the warm fabric of his shirt as she dragged it up, and the contact with the hard planes and muscles of his back was like a benediction. As she feathered her fingers over the ridges of his muscles she realised with wonder that just as she had remembered her hands, she remembered the texture of his skin from all those years ago. It had never left her.

  He stiffened at her exploration, drawing her against him with a groan. She wanted to feel that almost animal growl again but without the artificial barriers of all the clothes separating them. She wanted them bared, flesh to flesh. He wanted it, too, she could feel it in the way his body surged against her with each caress of her hands along the borders set by his buckskins, in the way his hand was tangling in the limits of her skirt, dragging it up her thigh until he reached the bare flesh above her stocking, his finger splaying on her heated skin, his thumb sliding against the softness of her inner thigh, brushing upwards and sending a sharp flame right through her centre, burning through sense and logic and leaving just need.

  She twisted against him with a yearning mewl and his answer to her cry of need was to ease her down to the grass, his mouth plundering hers as his hands sought and found points of pleasure that made her squirm. Her hands roved over his body in unconscious imitation of the torture he was inflicting, the tension in his limbs contrasting with the gentle touch of his hands. She arched against him as he half-lay on her, bracing his weight on the ground, but anchoring her with his leg as if she might float away like the sprite he had accused her of being.

  ‘Alex.’ She called his name to the forest and the sky. It was right that her fate should be decided here, in the forest clearing. The ferns rose around them like a feathered nest, shivering just as she was, their tips straining towards the faint sunlight spearing through the treetops.

  She wanted more, she wanted to bare him as she was bared, feel every inch of him. Her hands shifted to his abdomen, confined by his shirt. He was as smooth and hard as marble, but as warm as melting wax. She was shaping him or he was shaping her, they were both just coming into being right here, like Adam and Eve, primeval, needing nothing but themselves...

  He groaned against her mouth, his body shuddering against her.

  ‘This is madness.’

  She shook her head. She didn’t care if it was mad. It was as necessary as breathing. She wouldn’t let him become Lord Stanton again. Not yet. She touched his lips, raising herself on her elbow to follow their trail with her lips.

  ‘Don’t think, please, Alex...’

  * * *

  Madness.

  Oh, God, he wanted her. One didn’t die from lust, but it felt like he might. It felt as though he was dying with this need to make her part of him and if she didn’t do something, give him something... She was unleashing a rabid beast of need he had no idea how he would drive back into its cage. He could feel every inch of his body as her destructive hands explored him—the expanse of his back, the resistance of his spine and the taut strain of muscles as he held himself from wreaking havoc, the whole physical order of battle raised to combat his need to plunder what he wanted.

  He traced her lips with his fingers. He had watched them so often, so intently, it was like coming home. Her breath, warm and unsteady, moved over his skin, softening his touch, drawing him on to trace the shadow between her lips. It was like trying to caress a living flame, but he was incapable of stopping. He needed more.

  Her lips shivered, parted, breathed him in and he bent to touch his mouth to hers. He had never felt so acutely before—it was just a brush of flesh on flesh, but he could feel it possess his whole body, like sliding naked over satin sheets.

  ‘Chrissie...’ He groaned and sank his head against the fragrant curve of her neck.

  Her hand tangled in his hair, but he caught it, anchoring it in his to prevent her from doing any more damage. This had to stop. This was the real world. There were no spells, or sprites.

  ‘We have to stop.’

  Her gaze lost its dreamy heat at his words, focusing and filling with the determination he had always felt in her and he didn’t know whether to be terrified or triumphant.

  ‘No.’ She shook her head, her voice fierce. ‘No. I don’t want to stop. I want this. For myself. You owe me! You brought me here. To this place. You shouldn’t have brought me here if you meant to stop!’

  She was right. He couldn’t even blame her for intruding into one of his most private places on Stanton land because he had brought her here with one purpose. He had dreamed of her in the forest, lying in the clearing, though there were no bluebells now and she wasn’t naked, but that snug-fitting riding habit and the dappled gleam of sunlight on her dark hair and lush lower lip was as erotic as any display of bare flesh.

  She was right—he owed her, not just his life but atonement for every cowardly attempt to create distance between himself and this need. He might hate that she didn’t want anything more from him than physical pleasure and release, but he owed her. He would just give her pleasure; a woman like her deserved to know what she was capable of, on her own terms. She wasn’t like Vera.

  Her whimper of pure pleasure the moment he touched his mouth to hers was a seal on his choice. He had no defence he wanted to marshal against her eagerness, her hands sliding through his hair and the warmth of her body pressing towards his, promising everything. His body surged ahead, enveloping her, raging with the foreign need she unleashed in him, going beyond his control before he even knew he was lost.

  It might be madness, but nothing had ever felt so right. There was no one else in the world right now. Nothing hung in the scales. There was only Chrissie. She was where she belonged.

  He didn’t say the words that were pounding through his body: Right here, right now, you are mine. I am yours. There is nothing else.

  He would strip her, body and soul, as he had wanted to strip away those veils six years ago. He wanted her bared of everything that was between them—clothing, rules, convention—leaving her like Venus rising from the green waves in nothing but her mahogany hair tangling over her shoulders, rising and falling against her generous curves. He would anchor his hands in it, hold her there until she opened to him. The image was so powerful, he could feel her hair in his hands as if he had already unwound it.

  His fingers found and slipped away the fastenings of her dress, the laces of her stays, easing away her bodice to reveal the rosy nipples that were already puckered with need, waiting for his touch. He pulled away her chemise to uncover her to the kiss of sunlight filtering through the trees. Bared, she was as magnificent as he had sus
pected and he traced her curves, pulling back on the need to plunder so he could explore, imprint these moments on her memory so she would never forget his touch just as he had never forgotten hers. The dark-rose tips of her breasts gathered under his fingers as she shuddered, her body rising towards his, her lips parted as she watched him. His gaze locked on hers as he bent to touch his mouth to one hardened peak, brushing it gently, hardly more than a breeze. She moaned, her hands shifting and clutching at his hair, whether to pull him away or pull him close didn’t matter because he tugged the tip gently into his mouth, soothing and teasing as she shuddered under him.

  ‘Tell me. Is this what you want, Chrissie?’ His voice was rough, almost an accusation, but she just nodded, her teeth sinking into her lower lip, her leg rising against his, and he obliged her, slipping his hand under her skirts, finding the warm skin above her garter, spreading over it as it burned against his hand and he stopped, battling a wave of lust that surged to his erection, demanding instant action. He had been waiting for this for so long, so long. It was dangerous. She was dangerous.

  But his fear was a distant second to the lust that was raging through him and the need he felt vibrating through her like thunder through the air—inescapable, inevitable. There was no point in doing anything but embracing it.

  ‘Chrissie... Oh, God, I want to see you, all of you. you’re so beautiful.’

  She raised her hands as if to push him away, her withdrawal palpable.

  ‘No, no, I’m not.’

  He caught her hands, pinning them back so that she arched towards him and he bent to taste her offering, his lips tracing gently around the hardened crests of her breasts.

  ‘Yes, you are,’ he murmured against her warm flesh as he approached his goal. ‘Beautiful. I can’t stop looking at you. It’s driving me insane and making me useless. All I want to do is this...’

  Her disbelieving laugh transformed into a gasp as he took her nipple back into his mouth, into a shuddering moan as his tongue and teeth joined the teasing. She might not believe his words, but his erection was evidence she couldn’t deny. Not that she understood what he was telling her yet, but she soon would. He didn’t want to hurry, he wanted to take all the time in the world, but he knew their time was limited.