A Christmas Ball

by Emily Bryan

  “I do hope that’s you, Valentin,” she said breathlessly. “Or is there another logosh running about the place?”

  Valentin willed his body to become human again. His fingers cracked as they moved from claw to human flesh, his face flattened, his hair grew warm on his head, and his back straightened. He growled, fisting his hands, willing the pain to stop.

  Mary stepped past him to close and latch the window. She jerked the heavy drapes across it, and when she turned, he closed his arms around her.

  “What happened to you?” Mary whispered. “What did you find out there?”

  Not now. He was naked, he hurt, and he needed her. He slanted a kiss across her mouth, tasting the water from the basin on her lips.

  Mary made a resisting noise, but then her arms came around his waist, holding him as tightly as he held her. Valentin unraveled her coiled hair, pulling it loose, burying his hands in it.

  This was why Valentin had returned to Britain, to find Mary, to kiss her, to love her. To persuade her to come home with him. This time, he would not leave without her.

  He spread kisses down her neck to where her breasts swelled from her stays. Mary cradled him against her bosom, fingers furrowing his hair. He tugged the laces of her stays, loosening them enough to spread open the corset with his broad hand.

  Valentin raised his head to kiss her lips again. “Let me love you, Mary.”

  “Yes.” The word was a gasp. “My bedchamber is through there.”

  Valentin was too impatient to seek a bed. He pulled the laces from her stays, then caught her unfettered breasts in his hands. They were full and round, the breasts of a woman, not a girl. He licked between them, loving their scalding heat.

  Mary herself unhooked her skirts and petticoat and pushed them down her hips. Her chemise floated down with them, puddling on the floor. Her stocking-clad calves brushed his legs, but otherwise, she was as bare as he.

  She leaned into him as he brushed his hand up the back of her thigh. “I wish I could be young and beautiful for you,” she said.

  What was she talking about? Valentin turned her around to face her mirror, which put her backside against the swell of his arousal. “You are the most beautiful woman I have ever known. Look at yourself.”

  The mirror reflected them together, her pale body wrapped in his brown limbs. Valentin’s large hand rested on her breast, wisps of her long hair twining his fingers. He slid his hand down her abdomen to the dark tuft between her thighs, smiling when he found it pleasingly damp.

  “Your body is my heaven.” Valentin touched each part of her as he spoke. “Your thighs have strength, your hips are soft, your breasts…” He returned his hand to the heat beneath them. Her nipples were dark, tight points he wanted to suckle. “I love your breasts.”

  Mary traced her lower abdomen, which was softly rounded. “I’ve had a husband and a lover, and I have a grown son.”

  Valentin rolled her nipple between finger and thumb. “Why should these things make you less beautiful?”

  “Because you are young and strong, and…heartbreakingly handsome. You should be with a young woman, one who can give you a family. I’m rather past it.”

  “Past it?” English expressions baffled him.

  “You make me feel like a giddy girl, but I know how old I am.”

  Valentin’s blue gaze caught her brown one in the mirror. “My body wants yours; can you not feel?” He shifted the ridge of his arousal until it slid firmly between her buttocks. “I find you desirable, or I would not ache for you so much.”

  “Lust of the moment is not the same thing.”

  Valentin lifted her in his arms and deposited her on the narrow chaise, his body pressing Mary’s down. Face-to-face, body to body, he hungrily took her in.

  “Is ‘past it’ the English way of saying you have no interest in pleasures of the flesh?” Valentin asked.

  “It is the English way of saying I no longer should have interest in pleasures of the flesh.”

  “Do you mean you take no interest in this?” Valentin slid his hand between her legs. He cupped her, fingers brushing her hot, swollen sex. “Or this?” He slid his first two fingers inside her.

  She gasped, liquid heat pouring over his hand. “No. No interest at all.”

  Valentin eased his fingers from her and raised them to his mouth. Mary’s pupils dilated as she watched him lick them clean.

  Did anything taste better than a woman aroused? Did any woman taste better than Mary? It could not be so. Valentin kissed between her breasts, then down to the indentation of her navel, then at last put his mouth where his fingers had been.

  Bliss. He suckled her, surrounded by her incredible scent. Love you, Mary. Gods, how I love you.

  “Valentin…” She was barely coherent.

  Now. Valentin sat up on the chaise and lifted Mary onto him. He showed her how to wrap her legs around him—just like that—so that he could slide into her warm, pliant body.

  She was tight and beautiful, enveloping him with arms and legs, her breasts like pillows against his chest. Mary made warm noises in her throat, her lips on his forehead, his hair, his brow. Valentin gripped her hips and rocked up into her.

  The beast in him roared. He’d found his mate, the true match to his soul. He would make her understand that they belonged together, that he was never leaving this place without her.

  Mary’s teeth latched on to his earlobe, her wanting turning as furious as his own. The sharp little pain made him move faster, sliding in, in, in. She was his home, his resting place, the woman who could soothe his hurts. She was a lush armful, her long hair tumbling between them and warming him like a blanket.

  “Valentin,” she said in a ragged whisper, “I…”

  He cupped her face in his hands, their bodies moving together. “What?” He willed her to say the words he wanted to hear.

  Mary shook her head, her hair brushing his face. “Love me,” she pleaded. “Just love me.”

  Valentin leaned back, pulling her down harder onto him. He wanted to tell her what he felt, how much he needed her, but his command of English fled him. He said the words in Nvengarian, that he loved her, he wanted her, for now, for always.

  He felt her body shudder. She opened her eyes in surprise, as though she’d never broken in climax before. Valentin feared for a moment that she’d fight it, Mary who loved control.

  Then she laughed. She dropped her head back, her glorious hair tumbling down her back. Her body rocked as she dragged everything from him.

  Valentin’s excitement tipped over the edge. They moved together, gripping, loving, panting, her sheath so tight on him that he couldn’t stop his shout of pleasure.

  She opened her eyes and looked into his, the brown of hers coffee-dark. Valentin wanted her to look at him like that for the rest of his life.

  “Mary…” He spoke a few more words in Nvengarian, then stopped, forcing himself to repeat them in English. “You are mine. Forever. Say it.”

  Mary closed her eyes. She shook her head as she held him, and Valentin gave up, groaning as he released his seed. He collapsed to the cushions with her tangled around him, breathing like a drowning man who at last finds shore.

  Chapter Six

  Mary woke in the morning with Valentin in her bed. She opened her eyes to find herself nose to nose with him, his blue irises wide with that otherness he had.

  Without dismay, Valentin smiled. His face was creased from the pillows, his hair pleasantly rumpled. He was so handsome, warm, and desirable, that Mary tightened in sudden panic.

  “Will it come true, do you think?” he asked softly.

  “Will what come true? What are you talking about?”

  Valentin lifted a curl from her face, his touch gentle but strong. “The legend of the Longest Night. Will the lady I spent it with be with me for the coming year?”

  Mary sat up. “Not if someone finds you in bed with me. I’ll be utterly disgraced.”

  “I locked the door. And what
if they do discover us? Do you care so much what these English people think of you?”

  “Some of the people are Nvengarian. Your people.”

  “Who would not find it surprising that I want to be with you.” Valentin smiled the heart-melting smile that made anything he said sound reasonable. “If you are forced to flee the country, you can always come home with me.”

  “This is no laughing matter.”

  “No? Come home with me anyway, Mary. It is nothing to be ashamed of.”

  “Perhaps not in your world, but it is in mine. I will be the entertainment of the ton—talked about, laughed at. The matron who fell for the young, handsome foreigner with the enticing eyes.”

  A crease appeared between his brows. “Are you so ashamed, then? Of what we did? Of who I am?”

  “No!” Mary’s anger rose—both at the easily shocked English and the altogether too-permissive Nvengarians. She was Scottish, neither one, but she felt pinched between the two worlds. She wondered if her brother, Egan, ever felt like this.

  No, Egan did as he pleased and damned what everyone else thought. Egan had traveled the world, playing the mad Highlander, entertaining everyone he met. Mary had always wished for Egan’s gift of charm. Perhaps then she’d be able to fall into Valentin’s arms and let him take her away from her old life and everything she knew.

  The trouble was, she didn’t hate her old life enough. Her marriage had been a failure, and she was lonely, but she had Dougal, and her family and friends, and her home at Castle Macdonald. There was nothing much better, in her opinion, than the laughter that filled Castle Macdonald to its rafters. Even Sir John and Julia were ties to her childhood, to a friend she’d talked and giggled with; the two of them had once run away to the Edinburgh shops without permission, feeling themselves wicked and daring.

  Mary did not want to fling away the happy parts of her life for Valentin, but neither did she want to sacrifice being with Valentin for them. Valentin seemed to think that waltzing off to the eastern edge of Europe at a moment’s notice was nothing difficult. But Nvengaria was the end of civilization as far as Mary was concerned.

  Valentin was watching her with his intense blue eyes, knowing he hadn’t won. “I’ll not give up, Mary.”

  Before she could answer, he slid his hands around her neck and pulled her down to him. Mary went all too willingly. She let him kiss her, let his body warm hers. She never felt so good as when he touched her. Valentin’s returning smile told him he knew it, drat him.

  Valentin kissed her brow and gently rolled her over into the pillows. Mary wanted to tell him that he really should leave before someone discovered them, but she couldn’t speak as he pressed her down with his warm weight and loved her all over again.

  Valentin descended to the breakfast room much later to find the rest of the household already at table. Even Duke Rudolfo had risen from his bed, one arm in a sling, and was eating buttered toast with his good hand.

  Valentin had made himself leave Mary after their second enjoyment, then stealthily went to his own chamber, to bathe and dress for breakfast. He felt pliant and good, the memory of Mary under him imprinted firmly on his body. He both liked the feeling and knew it would distract him all day, until he could love her again.

  The breakfast room was one of light and glass. The floor-to-ceiling windows that faced the frozen pond let in the weak winter sunlight. A fire in the hearth added to the coziness. Not the best room to sit in, Valentin reflected as he gathered food from the sideboard, if one feared sharpshooters.

  Mary had taken little on her plate, but Julia’s was piled high, as was her father’s. Duchess Mina pushed the remains of her breakfast aside and sipped chocolate from a dainty cup.

  “I still believe the shots were fired at me,” Sir John said, as Valentin seated himself across the table from Mary. Valentin smiled at her, but she kept her gaze on her plate. “I make a great deal of money in the City. Perhaps someone wanted to eliminate my wealth by eliminating me.” Sir John chortled.

  “Oh, Father, do not laugh,” Julia cried. “It frightened me so.”

  Ambassador Rudolfo cleared his throat. “I am not certain, Sir John. I heard the shots and pushed you down to the ice, because you were nearest to me. They must have been firing at me. Nvengarians are notorious for eliminating each other, as you say. Perhaps I have angered a rival.”

  “It is safer these days in Nvengaria,” Duchess Mina pointed out. “Perhaps you should resign your post, Rudolfo, and we will return home, finished with politics.”

  Rudolfo gave her a smile. “No, my dear, I will not run away because of a few bullets. All will be well.”

  “There were two men,” Valentin said.

  Everyone stared at him. Julia and her father stopped chewing, and the duchess peered at him over the rim of her cup. Only Mary would not look at him.

  “I investigated the area last night. Two men stood in the trees, on the rise there.” Valentin pointed out the window to high ground beyond the pond’s icy sheet. “They were gone, but I found evidence of them. They drank whiskey to keep warm and dropped the flask when it was empty. They were English, not Nvengarian.”

  Sir John gaped. “How the devil d’ye know that?”

  Valentin couldn’t very well tell him that his wolf had smelled that they were English. The English had their own peculiar scent, as did Nvengarians.

  “They wore English boots,” he improvised. “The prints are different.” That, at least, was true.

  “That’s clever of you,” Sir John said in an admiring voice. “But how d’ye know it wasn’t Nvengarians in English clothes?”

  The ambassador answered, “Nvengarians don’t like to wear English clothes. And when they assassinate, they stand up and do it. They don’t skulk behind trees and shoot when innocent people are about.”

  “Good heavens, they might have hit me,” Julia said.

  “Is that where you were all night, Valentin?” Duke Rudolfo asked. “Miss Lincolnbury thought you’d been devoured by wolves.” He chuckled, then winced as his shoulder moved.

  “I told her that was nonsense,” Mary said in a firm voice.

  “I was investigating,” Valentin said. “I did not see a wolf.”

  The ambassador gingerly touched his coat where the bandage bulged beneath it. “The butler told me another strange tale this morning. He swore that he saw a monstrous creature prowling outside the house late in the night. It had the face of the devil, he said.”

  Valentin didn’t change expression. “I saw nothing of that, either.”

  The duchess clicked her cup to her saucer. “Do stop pushing at your wound, Rudolfo. You’ll open it again. Wolves and monsters notwithstanding, my English country Christmas must continue. We had to postpone the Yule log and the wassail yesterday, but today, we shall do all this.”

  “Perhaps not the wassail bowl,” Mary said. “We will have to ride on open roads, and the men with the guns might try again.”

  The duchess waved that away. “We will go in a large party with guards and be perfectly well. Rudolfo will stay home, watched over, of course.”

  Mary at last let her gaze meet Valentin’s, her exasperation evident. Valentin gave her a smile, his heartbeat quickening when she gave him a hint of a smile in return.

  Her smallest gesture stirred his blood. Valentin wanted to finish with this business quickly so he could turn his attention to convincing Mary to come home with him. His body heated as he remembered the warmth of her skin against his, her sweet cries as he loved her.

  Valentin wanted to hear those cries for the rest of his life. His smile turned determined, and Mary looked away, unnerved.

  “I am pleased that Baron Valentin stayed behind today,” Duchess Mina said, as she rode next to Mary in the rather stuffy traveling coach.

  Another carriage, bearing Julia and her father and two English servants with the wassail bowl, followed. Four Nvengarian bodyguards rode nearby, but for some reason Mary did not feel protected. Valentin and two m
ore bodyguards had stayed at the house with Duke Rudolfo while Duchess Mina went resolutely on with her wassailing party.

  Mary could not agree that it was good that Valentin had stayed behind; she wanted Valentin beside her, needed him next to her. She’d told him she did not want to leave with him, but her heart knew the lie. Mary craved to stay with him day and night for the rest of her life. Her whole body was loose from their loving this morning, and a warm core burned inside her.

  As the carriages wound through the countryside under clear, white-blue skies, Mary sensed eyes watching them. The eerie feeling made her shiver, and the cold wind buffeting the carriage did not help.

  Duchess Mina leaned toward Mary, her exotic perfume clogging Mary’s nostrils. “I did not like to say so in front of the others, my dear, but I believe it was Valentin himself who fired those shots at my husband.”

  Mary opened her mouth to explain that Valentin couldn’t have—she’d been talking to him at the time, when she remembered that no, she’d been standing in his arms, kissing him. Her face burned, and she quickly looked away.

  “I cannot blame him,” Duchess Mina said. “Poor Valentin has had a difficult life, and he’s never forgiven Rudolfo.”

  Mary turned back, puzzled. “The ambassador? Forgiven him for what?”

  “He did not tell you this? Rudolfo was there, my dear. On the day the Imperial Prince called on poor Sophie.”

  “Was he? Good heavens.” Valentin hadn’t mentioned this, either.

  “Yes, Rudolfo was in the hunting party when it fetched up at Valentin’s estate. Everything was in great disrepair, Rudolfo told me, because years before that, Valentin’s father had done something to offend the Imperial Prince. I never discovered what. Valentin’s father lost all his money and died a broken man.” The duchess shook her head and glanced out at the bare, dead trees that lined the fields.

  “Please tell me what happened.”

  “It is so sad a story, Mrs. Cameron. When they arrived at the house and the Imperial Prince ascertained that Sophie was alone, he sent his men off to pen up the servants and do what they liked. Then the Imperial Prince took Sophie into a bedchamber and locked the door. He made Rudolfo stand guard just outside. Rudolfo did not know what to do. He was sick at heart.”