The King of Threadneedle Street

by Moriah Densley

  A full-grown man. The boy was gone.

  She curiously ran her fingers along the bulging veins, the cords of sinew and muscle over his arms and neck. His shoulders had grown so broad her hand couldn’t span them front to back, his musculature tight and knotted. He resembled more a blacksmith than a lord.

  “Hmm. How did it turn out?” he mumbled, his eyes still closed.

  Magnificent. Oh, he meant his hair. “Tolerably. You will have to judge for yourself.”

  “I could never visit a barber again, after this.” He likely had no idea the effect his smooth bass voice had on her, lowered and mellow near her ear.

  She shifted her weight to retreat from his lap. “Shall I fetch a mirror?”

  His arms locked her in place. “Later.” His hands traced lazy circles on her back from shoulder to hip. “I haven’t thanked you properly yet.”

  He delved his fingers into her hair and worked her chignon loose, dropping pins onto the floor with ominous little clatters. He arranged her hair over her shoulders then lifted a curl to his lips and closed his eyes to inhale.

  “We are always getting into trouble when we share a chair.” She hardly recognized her own voice, throaty and suggestive.

  “Then why don’t we get into trouble some place else?”

  Without another word he stood holding her, ignoring her startled gasp. He walked back inside, past the sitting room, and set her on his bed. Pinning her with his gaze, he crawled toward her until he held her trapped between his arms. She squeaked, not feeling as bold as she wished.

  He smiled and chuckled, then lay to the side, placing a kiss on her temple. “You are nearly twenty and one,” he said against her hair. “And I have a special license from the Vicar General. Wilhelm and Philip will witness. How would you like to be mistress of Dunsbury?”

  Her heart leapt, and she couldn’t help the stupid grin on her face. How would she like it? Only a dream come true, that is all.

  He tucked a pillow under her head and framed it with his arms, forcing her to look at him. “I am building you a lake. Did you notice the work on the stream on the east side?”

  “Will it have a waterfall?”

  “Oh, yes. And a cave.” He spoke inches from her lips, “Come live in the country with me. Make love to me in this bed and wake every morning in my arms. I like smelling you on my skin all day.”

  Was that a proposal? At his kiss placed strategically under her jaw, Alysia fought the urge to grab him by the hair and fuse his lips to hers. It would be no mystery what would follow. She resisted, wanting to hear him ask. Directly.

  His tongue grazed her neck as he dragged his lips down to her collar. She breathed as though she had climbed the stairs to his tower room only moments ago.

  One of his hands left the pillow and traveled slowly down her neck, until resting on her abdomen. “I can imagine it, Lisa. You, round with my child.” He stroked her tenderly as though she already carried his baby. “Alysia Tilmore, Lady Preston. Do you like it?”

  His lips worked over hers, impatient. “This is where you say yes, Lisa.”

  When she was too slow to answer, he lowered himself on top of her, making her aware of every inch of him. He gripped his fists in her hair to tilt her head back, then kneaded his lips under her jaw until she whimpered.

  “Mmm, Drew. Stop. Wait¯” He bit down over the nerve he’d been teasing, shooting sensation down her spine to curl her toes. The rest of her question turned into an embarrassing moan.

  “Marry me.”

  Trust him, she reminded herself.

  She shut her conscience in a trunk and tossed away the key. She surprised Andrew by kissing him back, hungrily in slow, deep motions. Tracing across his waist with her fingernails made his skin raise tiny bumps. At the small of his back she found a pair of dimples and rubbed her fingers over them, then explored the stark, supple lines across¯

  He gasped and collapsed on top of her, panting. “Lisa, you are not a virgin.”

  “Yes I am, Drew. Lily-white, excepting what you and I…” Her indignant tone was lost in her breathlessness.

  “You do not seem so.”

  “Find out for yourself, then.” She shot him a suggestive smile and slipped a finger under his waistband, slowly tracing his skin from hip to hip. Andrew shuddered with a groan and pushed her into the mattress.

  “Last time¯” He kissed her again. “Was the last time you bait me and escape. You have gone too far this time, woman.” He sat back on his heels and lifted her against his chest like she weighed nothing. Unhooking the back of her dress, his fingers were deliberate and calm but his kisses along her collar frantic. Alysia had a stray thought for the marks he would likely leave there but didn’t care.

  He peeled the dress from her back. “I am still waiting for your consent. One yes will do, Lisa, for what is happening now and for my proposal of marriage.”

  Alysia looked him in the eye, seeing the same wildness she felt. “Yes. Yes forever. You are mine, Andrew.” The thrill of saying those words delighted her to laughter, but it came out sounding sultry. She had not seen him smile like that since he got his first telegraph machine on his seventeenth birthday. He answered with another rowdy kiss.

  It had taken her a quarter hour to dress from inner to outermost layer, but Andrew did the reverse in minutes. He stared — did his cheeks color? — frozen in a kneeling position with her drawers folded in his hands. His gaze raked her from head to toe and back up. A relief he didn’t seem disappointed. He blinked then forced his gaze down to the bed, but only a moment later he glanced again, and a smile spread on his lips. Men had been staring at her bosom since her fifteenth summer, but never Andrew. He made up for years of gentlemanly restraint now, but the expression he wore made her feel beautiful.

  “I don’t mind, Andrew. Look, if you want to.” Good, she managed not to sound giddy. She turned on her side to lie propped on an elbow, liking the way he followed her every movement.

  She couldn’t help chortling at his reddened cheeks. Who was behaving like a virgin now? She reached for his neck to pull him in for a kiss. She meant it to be playful, but she had drawn his bare chest against hers — a thrill of sensation. A tug on the waistband of his trousers meant get these off, and he obeyed, shucking out of them while she pulled the drawstring loose on his drawers.

  The same, yet not the same Andrew she had drawn naked three years ago. He didn’t give her much time to gawk, which she didn’t think was fair, but then he knelt over her, looking rather serious. The anxiety returned in a rush.

  Expecting him to simply get on with the deed showed how little she knew.

  “So beautiful, Lisa. A dream.” He dotted kisses everywhere until she giggled, ticklish. He wanted to play chase-and-catch, then kiss some more.

  She hooked a leg over his hip and pulled him close. Lovely, lying skin to skin with him, a paradox of silk and steel. She realized he had been trying to ease her into feeling comfortable with him. It had worked; the nervousness was gone. A primitive drumming in her pulse reminded her that he was male and she female, and there was really only one thing to do about it.

  The way he kissed over her abdomen and held the small of her back made her feel like the main course for a banquet. She could no longer think through the blazing hunger; it raced in her veins and narrowed her perception. Musky balsam and leather scent on his neck. His skin, slick with a sheen of perspiration. The ragged rhythm of his breath, and hers the same… Her hands roamed greedily over his back, kneading and scratching in frustration.

  Andrew put his lips to her ear. “Eager?”

  “Yes!” She wanted to ask, but wasn’t sure what for. “Please.”

  Impossible to describe the way he moved, or why it was both excruciating and soothing. She mirrored his movements, similar to the way he kissed her with his tongue, like the way he guided her with his thighs when they danced too closely to be polite. She was gratified when he couldn’t keep his groans in his throat either.

  “Pleas
e!” She thumped him on the chest then scratched her nails down, which he seemed to like.

  “Do you know what happens next?”

  “I said I was a virgin, not an ignoramus,” she snapped, but then he coaxed a repentant sigh from her.

  “No need to be temperamental.”

  “Sorry,” she breathed.

  “I think I am more anxious than you. It is one thing to tease, but another to follow through, you know? I have never deflowered anyone before. Oh, but you know that.”

  “I am not anxious now, Drew. Only impatient.”

  “Your birthday is in two weeks, the day of our wedding. Tell me, wife, is there any reason to prevent conception?” He wrapped a hand around her knee and hitched it over his hip.

  “None.” She smiled, imagining the chocolate-eyed little boy who lived in her fantasies, but with the wistfulness replaced by hope.

  He grinned, the boyish lopsided one that stole her breath. “I love you, Lisa.” His fervent kiss accompanied his body lowering onto hers, and she exhaled in satisfaction. His heartbeat over hers, his head in her hands — exquisite.

  Then he didn’t move. She waited, restless…

  The long moments passing while he looked her in the eye seemed to stretch into years. His smile faded into a serious expression, one she knew well. It meant some thought had landed with a crash in his mind and grown barbs.

  “Andrew?” She stretched her spine and squirmed, registering for the first time that he weighed quite a lot. Or perhaps the worry in his expression made her lungs struggle for air.

  Brows furrowed, he reached for the stray strand of hair draped over her shoulder and rubbed it between his fingers.

  “What is it, Drew?”

  “Guilt. Loads of it. I can’t do this. Not like this.”

  “But— Not… Why?”

  “Honor. My conscience. I don’t know what got into me. It’s not as though I am an unruly adolescent.”

  “Right. You are an unruly adult.” Easier to make a joke than confess she didn’t just love him; he’d become her everything. It would be no sacrifice to make her life his; he had already made her happiness his purpose.

  “Sorry, Lisa.” He kissed her temple, rolled aside, then went silent a long while, fidgeting with her hair again.

  Irrational or not, the suspicion that his reticence was in truth a rejection made her feel as though her skin was on fire. She groped the mattress for the sheet then pulled it over her shoulder.

  Aggressive men like Andrew lived for the thrill of conquest. Her mother had made a living on prolonging the mystique and knowing when to break ties before it faded. Alysia should know better than anyone that romance was only worth its weight in gold.

  Though subconsciously, Andrew only wanted her because he couldn’t have her. She had always known that, but perhaps offering herself on a silver platter had finally hit him over the head with his mistake. The only surprise was that the disenchantment came so soon.

  Of course he cared for her, and no doubt he wanted her, but Andrew had always been true to his sense of vision. It’s what made him a millionaire. That same discipline stopped him now from doing what could not be undone — perhaps she should think of it as plucking a lit fuse inches from the bomb.

  The silence meant he didn’t know what to do about all the lovely things he had said to her only minutes ago.

  With her eyes closed, she listened to his even breath. Should she steal his sheet and salvage her pride by leaving the room? She swallowed, resisting the tight ache in her throat signaling tears. He inhaled to speak and she almost cringed, waiting for the words that would well and truly shatter her heart beyond repair—

  “I just had an idea. Let us marry tomorrow. Today. As soon as the Montegues can come. By the time my father gets word of it, you will already be of age.”

  She blinked, silently replaying his words.

  “Please say yes, Lisa. I can wait another day, but not weeks. Go ahead and joke about my loutish carnal appetites, but I truly want to put a ring on your finger and call you Lady Preston.”

  The universe imploded then settled back into orbit while she realized the past few minutes had been all her fears and insecurities riding a runaway horse. Shameful, how quickly she had forgotten her decision to trust him.

  She simply had to rid herself of her Alysia versus the cruel fates attitude. What a mistake it would be to miss her chance with Andrew because she feared the risk. Trust him. She felt lighter with the resolve, and it made room for hope.

  He had no idea she had suffered trauma while he was plotting their wedding; no sense in telling him. Once she was confident in mustering a genuine smile, she said, “Yes, very well,” then burrowed into his chest, afraid of bursting into tears.

  Andrew laughed, sounding half mad, but she understood. Years of pain, longing, humiliation, despair — and now this, the extreme opposite. She could hardly believe it herself.

  Chapter Twenty

  Whereof what’s past is prologue; what to come,

  In your and my discharge.

  The Tempest, William Shakespeare

  Alysia didn’t recall feeling sleepy, but when she woke, sunlight peeked through the west windows. No wonder she had slept the day away; Andrew’s bed seemed to be made of clouds from Saint Peter’s own nursery.

  “Good, you are awake.” She startled at Andrew’s voice. A mess of papers crowded the desk opposite the bed, but he wasn’t there. The mattress dipped as he sat on the edge of the bed flipped the counterpane away. She squeaked and grabbed it back. “There is just enough time for a bath before our guests arrive.”

  She gathered the sheet under her arms and looked around the room for something to use as a robe, not sharing his apparent lack of modesty.

  “Where are you going?”

  “You said you wanted to bathe.”

  “Yes.”

  Inexplicably, Alysia felt herself flush as she comprehended his meaning. It shouldn’t have affected her, considering her behavior earlier that morning, and since she would be married in a matter of hours. Or was that minutes? “You must have a rather large tub, to fit two.”

  “Not really.” He wrestled her onto her back and nibbled a ticklish spot between her ribs and hip.

  She squealed and shouted, “All right, you troll!”

  He gathered her in his arms and carried her through the bedchamber to where a bath was already drawn in the renovated garderobe. He sat her in the steaming water, and she breathed a long Ohh as she saw the view from the rock-framed tower window; a rose garden in full bloom framing the courtyard wall, thick forest and rolling hills beyond.

  “Oh, Andrew,” she breathed. “It’s lovely here.” She twisted her hair into a knot at her nape and glanced around the circular room, renovated to join the solar and garderobe into one large bathing room. The fixtures were modern and luxurious, but he had left the stone unplastered and the original vaulted ceiling beams in place. Rustic, charming — conjuring again the impression of living in a fairy tale.

  Andrew slipped in behind her, spilling water over the edges. She settled and laid her head in the crook of his neck. He dunked a cake of soap in the water then rubbed a thick lather in his hands. She hissed in surprise as she learned it was for her.

  She stole the soap and took her sweet time coating his chest and arms with a thick layer of suds, then lost a wrestling match when he staunchly refused to lift his arms. She pretended to give up, but as soon as he stretched and hung his arms over the edges of the tub, she ducked to tickle the ribs under his arms. His violent shudder and ridiculous boyish chortle confirmed her suspicion — he was ticklish.

  “How is it I never knew this?” she taunted as she trailed her fingertips over his ribs and waist, searching for another ticklish spot. He jumped again as she grazed lower. “Hmm. Interesting,” she cooed, and tried it again.

  “Stop that, woman.” He trapped her wrists and attempted to look stern. “We should be going. The Montegues will arrive soon.”

&nb
sp; “Are we in such a hurry?” she shook her wrists free then slid her hands over his chest.

  “Yes.”

  She dragged her fingers slowly downward. “Truly?”

  He hummed and shut his eyes. “Hmm.” That meant he surrendered.

  She liked him this way; helpless, unaware of the gruff, erotic noises he made and the scandalous oaths he muttered¯

  Abruptly he snapped out of the trance and tucked her against his chest, burying his face in her hair as he panted for breath. “Careful, love.”

  She sighed at the sound of his chocolatey bass voice in her ear. It vibrated every nerve along her spine. She didn’t think she would ever grow immune to the effect.

  “Save your strength for our wedding night.” He grabbed the toweling and rose, hauling them both to their feet.

  She found herself staring at him again, his jaw dusted with his afternoon whiskers, a lock of hair draped rakishly across his forehead, his eyes like obsidian, reflecting the light through the window. Fascinating, the illusion of a metallic sheen to his wet skin, his muscular back in motion as he knelt to dry her with the toweling. He worked his way up, not missing the opportunity to tease her with it, then wrapped it around her shoulders and kissed her forehead.

  “I have never been so happy, Lisa.” He kissed her mouth next, lingering to tug on her bottom lip. “Marry me.”

  “Hmm. Let me think about it.”

  He spanked her on the rear.

  “Oh, all right. If you insist.”

  With Marsden in London on business and Alysia without a maid, they had to fend for themselves. Andrew dressed her with such aptitude, seeming to know all about stays and garters and how to lace a corset. It made her jealous, but she said nothing.

  He fastened the hooks at the back of her dress, and heard her thoughts, apparently. “You are the only woman I have ever fallen asleep with. I like waking with you in my arms. I wish…”