A Man Of Many Talents

by Deborah Simmons

  Abigail watched his graceful strides until he disappeared, then frowned at the gaping hole in front of her. She had not particularly cared for the other secret passage at first, especially after all that business about it being a sewage shaft, but it had never seemed as repulsive as this one.

  According to the gothic novels that were all the rage, the discovery of something like this, even those leading to hideous dungeons and the like, was considered romantic. Abigail had never understood the appeal of the books, however, and she certainly saw nothing appealing in the blackness ahead of her. It looked to her more like the abode of a giant worm, all damp earth and, well, dirty. She wondered if that explained its proximity to the plunge bath.

  Before she could muse upon the place any further, Christian was hurrying back to her, lantern in hand. For a moment she entertained the delightful fantasy that he was rushing to her side for the sake of herself, not some ugly cavity in the ground, but then she dismissed that delusion with a sigh.

  “No one came about, did they?” he asked her, his face bright with expectancy.

  “No.”

  “Good. Now, if you would kindly keep watch, I’ll take a look.” He lifted the lantern and plunged into the darkness as though he were on some great quest.

  Abigail was not as enthusiastic, and she watched him step inside with no little trepidation. The lantern’s glow illuminated a long, narrow passage that resembled drawings she had seen of mine shafts. “Perhaps it is an old mine,” she called out.

  When Christian didn’t answer, she took umbrage. He was getting too far away already. And, of course, she had no intention of letting him go in there alone, so she lifted her skirts and followed, swallowing a rather moldy stench that made her wonder if the bodies of those who had gone before might be, well, ahead of them.

  This wasn’t at all like the other secret passage, which had been finished in stone and plaster. Here, the ground beneath her feet was just that and timbers that braced the earthen roof were the only thing Abigail could see besides dirt. Christian ducked as he moved forward in the low tunnel, but she still worried that he might strike his head or trip or fall. She resisted the urge to tug at his jacket in an effort to make him sink even lower. After all, she wasn’t really supposed to be here.

  “I thought I told you to stay outside,” Christian said, as though reading her thoughts. “What if someone locks us in here? I have no idea where this ends or if there is any other exit.”

  His warning made Abigail shiver, but she refused to leave him. If anything happened to him, she would never forgive herself, for she was the one who had invited him here and badgered him to do something. She would be responsible, and she would not be able to live with herself, especially if she were waiting outside when he might need her.

  They were in the bowels of the earth now, the entrance a faint pinprick of light behind them, and Abigail became concerned about the amount of air. Did miners put shafts into their tunnels? Suddenly she wondered if the reason Bascomb hadn’t rendered payment to his workmen was because it wasn’t built correctly. Airless. Dangerous. With poor supports.

  Abigail knew enough to realize that the bracing timbers were the only thing that stood between the two of them and a ton of dirt, and she had read about cave-ins that had buried miners alive. It was not a fate she was inclined to tempt, not even for the sake of the sale of Sibel Hall or the pursuit of her dream.

  Heart pounding, she was just about to beg Christian to turn around when he suddenly lurched backward with a groan and an oath. The lantern swung wildly, and soil fell from above, dusting her head and shoulders. With a low cry of alarm, Abigail reached for Christian, certain the earth above was crumbling down to crush them.

  “Hurry!” she yelled, pulling him along with her as she raced back toward the light, the blessed air, and the open green spaces that she swore she would never forsake again. Once they were outside, she gulped in deep breaths of relief and gratitude, but one glance at her companion told her all was not well. He had dropped the lantern and was clutching his shoulder.

  “What happened? Are you hurt?” Abigail asked.

  He muttered something about ramming into a joist, and she felt a new rush of concern. “Here, sit down,” she urged, forcing him to lie back against the grassy slope.

  “Yes, Governess,” he murmured, and Abigail wondered if he had struck his head as well. What if he was delirious?

  “Shut the tunnel,” he said through gritted teeth, and Abigail spared a moment’s irritation for his single-mindedness. But she swung the rock face into place before kneeling beside him.

  “Let me see,” she said, lifting his hand away from the injured area. His elegant chocolate-colored jacket was torn, but she couldn’t see beyond that.

  “Let’s get this off you.” She carefully tugged the sleeve from his good arm and then down the injured one and away.

  The edge of his waistcoat at his shoulder was dirty, and there was a bit of blood on the shirt there, so she reached for his waistcoat, intending to remove it as well.

  “I’m all right, really,” Christian said, but his voice held an odd strain to it. Abigail glanced up in concern only to find his eyes upon her, dark and intense.

  Her fingers, poised at the top button on his waistcoat, faltered. Flushing, she tore her gaze from his and put her mind back to her task, but now her hands trembled, and she noticed the hard heat of his chest when her knuckles brushed against it. Her breath came more quickly, and when at last she opened his waistcoat, she felt dizzy at the sight of the linen shirt plastered against his body.

  As if sensing her dazed state, he helped her, sitting up to shrug out of the waistcoat, and Abigail put it aside, trying not to notice how well he filled out his shirt. Belatedly, she remembered her duty and leaned forward to inspect his shoulder. There was blood showing against the white linen, and she took herself to task for letting her mind wander elsewhere.

  To truly inspect the injury, however, she needed to remove the shirt as well, and she sat back on her heels, looking helplessly at where it was tucked into his breeches. She hesitated only a moment, then leaned forward to tug at the linen until it sprang free. Lifting it upward, she carefully removed his good arm from the sleeve, then paused before freeing the injured shoulder. But he helped her again, lifting the shirt over his head and tossing it aside. Then he lay back against the grass, his upper body utterly naked.

  Abigail drew in a breath at the sight of his chest. It was impossible to ignore, so wide and golden and hard with muscle. She had known he was strong, but his arms were laced with muscles. They filled out skin that was smooth and gleaming, as was his chest, except for the two nipples, dark and hard, that made her mouth suddenly dry. With a start Abigail jerked her attention back to his shoulder, where a small amount of blood lingered.

  “I’ll get some water to clean that up. I think there are some towels at the plunge bath.” Then she glanced at his face, expecting his assent, only to stare at him, her pulse pounding.

  The expression he wore was not that of a suffering man, but rather that of a wolf, lean and hungry and casually waiting to devour its prey. And Abigail had no doubt that she was his intended victim. Rising unsteadily to her feet, she realized that she ought to flee to the house and never look back.

  Instead, she headed toward the folly.

  Christian was in agony. It wasn’t his shoulder, which was just bruised a bit and maybe scratched. No, his pain came from farther down. His groin was throbbing so, he wondered how Abigail could have missed the rise in his breeches. Innocent that she was, she probably didn’t know what it meant, or else she would have realized he was not an injured man but a man who, after one brief protest, had surrendered himself to her ministrations with the same duplicity he had shown her in all else.

  He had let her do what she would to him, not because his injury needed tending but because he wanted her to touch him, to remove his clothing, and, oh God, to bathe his shoulder. Christian groaned aloud as he saw her approac
h with a wet cloth. At the sound, she hurried forward, probably under die impression that he was in pain. He was. And he had a feeling it was going to get worse before it got any better.

  He watched as she neared him, an expression of both wariness and determination on her face. When she knelt beside him, he caught a whiff of lilacs and rested his head back against the grass to avoid reaching for her. At the first touch of the cool water against his heated flesh, he shuddered. She washed it tenderly, then paused to examine her work.

  “There’s a long scratch here, but not too deep,” she said. “I think the bleeding has stopped, but perhaps we should bind it.”

  She looked at Christian for confirmation, and he shook his head. Lifting a hand, he closed his fingers over her own, pressing them against his shoulder. The cloth was in the way, but nonetheless he felt her skin against his, warm, gentle, and oh so arousing. She must have seen the desire in his eyes for she stared at him, her pupils huge, her breath coming swift and shallow, her cheeks flushing.

  Then, her gaze never leaving his own, she dipped her head and moved his hand aside to place a kiss against his bruised flesh. It was as though she had applied a spark to tinder. Christian had been waiting too long, holding himself back too tightly, playing the scholar too well, and when her lips touched him, he sounded his need in a near-feral growl. Before she could draw away, he flipped her onto her back and rose above her.

  Thankfully, she made no protest, just watched him with those wide eyes the color of flowers, so Christian leaned down to take her mouth with his own. He had no patience to be gentle, and his fierce need made him thrust his tongue into her mouth in heady exploration, but she met his passion with her own, the lilac-scented passion of the woman she had been and would be again only with him.

  Christian felt both a surge of triumph and a hot swell of possessiveness. Tossing the pins from her hair, he fisted his hands in the heavy mass, holding her head still for his kisses. His heart pounded, his lower body throbbed, and his head swam. He needed more, and he slid a hand over her shoulder, down to her breast, feeling the weight of her, but the stiff material of her gown stood between them, and he tugged at the fastenings, pulling it down over her shoulders, with her shift as well, until her breasts were exposed to his gaze.

  Heavy, round, pale white and tipped with rose, they were more beautiful than he could have ever imagined. Nestled between them on a thin chain was a round piece of jewelry, surely an anomaly on the Governess, but not on his woman. Though she needed no such adornment, Christian liked the location of the golden circlet, his groin throbbing at the exotic decoration. Drawing in a harsh breath, he lifted a hand to trace the edges of the cool gold against hot skin, smooth and creamy.

  His fingers were trembling like a novice’s, Christian realized, but he couldn’t steady them, couldn’t detach himself from the raw excitement that flooded his veins. Cupping her with his palm, he caressed her softness, rubbing and kneading and then lifting the crest up to his lips. Abigail closed her eyes and moaned, low pleasure sounds that urged him on as he suckled first one and then the other. She writhed beneath him in an unwitting movement that only fed his desire, and when his groin brushed against her leg, he felt his restraint spiraling out of control.

  “Christian. Christian.” She whispered his name in that luscious voice of hers, and he lifted his head in answer only to stare, arrested by the picture she made. Flushed rose, she lay against the slope, her eyes dazed with desire, her dark hair spread upon the grass, and her gown pushed down to her waist. He wanted to see all of her, to strip the ugly garment from her and shed his own clothing, to take her in the most important union of his life.

  But before he could move beyond the thought, she lifted her hands to his face and pulled him down for a kiss, moaning into his mouth when his naked chest met her soft breasts. Christian jerked against her instinctively, then wrapping his arms around her, he held her close, drugging himself with long, lush kisses so he couldn’t think about the reality that he was outside, in the open, making love to his hostess, a genteel young woman who had begged for his aid. She was begging for it now, too, he thought wickedly, as she rubbed her nipples against his chest in a movement that fed his desire for another, far more intimate, rhythm.

  “Christian, Christian,” she called out in a breathy whisper that roused his conscience along with his senses. If only she wouldn’t say his name, which had an annoying tendency to call him back to himself. It wasn’t as though he didn’t love to hear it on her lips, but right now it brought a bitter, guilty tang to the proceedings, for the simple reason that her idea of Christian didn’t have one bit to do with the real man.

  She didn’t even know who he was, he thought, the realization cutting through the daze of his ardor. She thought him a ghost router, a scholar, a man who wore spectacles, for God’s sake! And she was succumbing to that man. What happened when she discovered she had made love with a stranger? Christian shuddered and set his teeth against the white-hot lust that had claimed him.

  He had woven his bed of lies and now he could not bear to lie in it. Loosing a harsh breath, Christian broke the kiss. He lifted his head. He removed her hands from about his neck. And he pulled her gown back into place, putting her unresisting arms into their long sleeves and securing the fastenings with gentle thoroughness.

  Then he held her close for a long moment. “I’m sorry,” Christian muttered. “I… lost control of myself.” With a rather embarrassed murmur, she accepted his apology at face value, never imagining his true meaning. He was sorry, all right, sorry for having to stop, sorry for all his lies, sorry for everything.

  Surely he was the sorriest man on earth.

  17

  Christian sat still in a straight-backed chair while Hobbins poured alcohol into his cut with what seemed like inordinate zeal. He flinched. “Do you have to be so coldblooded about it?”

  “The wound must be cleansed,” Hobbins intoned even as he attempted to rub the flesh raw. Christian remained skeptical. After all, his shoulder hadn’t hurt like this when Abigail tended it.

  Abigail. Christian set his teeth against the memory. Flinch? He felt like kicking himself when he thought of what he had given up. Hell, he couldn’t even think about what he had given up without growing painfully hard and throbbing, as if his prick wanted to flog him for his misjudgment.

  “I found your, ahem, spectacles, I presume?” Hobbins said, carefully setting the lenses on a nearby chamber table.

  Christian glanced at the hated accoutrement and frowned, then jerked backward. “Ouch!” he said, pulling away from Hobbins, who appeared to be amputating his arm with a binding cloth. “Take that thing off me.”

  “Very well, my lord,” Hobbins replied.

  “One would think you care more about my clothes than my person,” Christian commented, blowing out a breath in exasperation.

  “My responsibility is to your wardrobe, my lord,” Hobbins replied, gathering up the bottle and the linens.

  Ignoring his valet’s gibe, Christian flexed his arm in relief, then glared at the spectacles, hating the man who wore them until he realized that he’d become jealous of himself, of his own success with them. He hadn’t been wearing them this morning, Christian told himself, trying to take comfort in that fact. Yet there was no denying that every other piece of evidence pointed to his hostess’s preference for that other man, the one who pretended to like books and who reined in his piratical impulses. At least until today.

  “I assume you are endeavoring to entice Miss Parkinson with that bogus accessory?” Hobbins asked in a disdainful voice.

  Christian frowned. He hated when his own valet passed judgment on him. “It was a bit of a lark,” he mumbled. Sort of like his entire visit to Sibel Hall.

  “I see, my lord,” Hobbins said, in a tone that declared he did not. “You were, in effect, mocking someone else’s hopes and dreams.”

  Christian glanced at his valet in startlement. “No,” he said, though he supposed one could view h
is actions in that light, especially if one were his hostess. He scowled. Perhaps he originally had acted out of… a fit of pique, but he had meant to prove a point, that spectacles did not make the man. Unfortunately he was now caught in a coil of his own design, for he had succeeded all too well. He had made his hostess fall for the man she thought him, but not for him.

  Meanwhile, Christian had been taking a bit of a tumble himself. His initial wish for her affections may have been misguided, but now he was deadly earnest about it. Every time he saw her, it seemed as though he discovered some new delight about her, some additional facet to rouse his interest—and his passions. When she confessed that she had never danced, in that soft admission Christian had heard a world of hurt that tore his heart out. He wanted to give her the waltz, to give her everything she had ever missed, everything she had ever wanted.

  But his new persona, indeed, all his lies, stood in the way. What would happen when she found out he was a fraud—no scholar, no wearer of spectacles, not even an expert on ghosts? Christian shuddered. For the first time in his life he felt a twinge of fear, and he didn’t care for it. He couldn’t go on like this, getting himself in deeper and deeper, with no end in sight.

  “Perhaps you should take to your bed and rest from your… injury,” Hobbins suggested in a dry tone that bordered on sarcasm.

  Christian ignored it. “I can’t. Smythe’s messenger is coming today, and I have to meet with him.” He hoped the fellow would have some information that might aid his investigation, which was still proceeding at a snail’s pace. Despite all his discoveries about the house, Christian was no closer to unmasking the specter than the day he had arrived. He scowled.