"Nay, my lord, not mad. I won't believe it! You listen too much to rumor—"
"But I killed her."
"No!"
"Aye, I did it. I remember doing it." Roughly catching my face in his ringers, his mouth hovering over mine, he said, "I learned she was spreading herself beneath other men, making me a laughingstock among my peers. I remember striking her—" He squeezed his eyes closed as pain washed over his features. Then his lashes fluttered and he looked at me again. "She's not the only one, I'm told. There was Maggie . . ."
I touched my fingers to his lips, hushing him, but he turned away, left the bed, and moved toward the fire. He stood before the hearth, his face downturned, allowing the orange glow to silhouette his troubled features. "I have no right," he said so softly I barely heard him, "no right to even think of touching you. I would only hurt you, like I have everyone else."
Leaving the bed, I moved unsteadily up behind him. Touch me, I longed to say. Instead I only lifted my hand and smoothed it up his rigid spine to his shoulder. His head fell back so his soft, shadowed hair brushed my fingers. "God," he whispered, "you make me forget all that."
The fire crackled and hissed.
Then he turned very slowly to face me. There was desperation in the depths of his eyes, in the bunching of his jaw, the slant of his mouth. Then his fingers closed around my throat and slid up my neck, where his thumb pressed into my chin, lifting my face toward his. His throat rumbled with a hoarse groan before he admitted, "I want to kiss you."
"I want to be kissed," I confessed, feeling no hesitation, though he looked as wild and powerful in that instant as the roiling fog that had consumed the earth and sky outside the house. I repeated, "I want to be kissed, my lord ... by you."
For a moment neither of us moved, then his hands came up and cupped my face, slid into my hair, and clenched. His dark head lowered over mine and he growled, "Then God help you."
It was, in that instant, as if my body left the earth. For as his mouth possessed me with an overpowering fierceness and hunger, I wrapped my arms around his neck and pressed my body against his. Adrift on a rush of desire as I had never before experienced, I opened my mouth under his, groaned as he slanted his mouth in one direction over mine, then another. His hands ran over me, urgently then gently, dancing hot and cold against my flushed, sensitive flesh, making me gasp and tremble with anticipation. So long I had waited, I had dreamed . . .
He kissed me until the breath became painful in my throat, until I was driven to plunge my hands beneath his shirt and press my fingers into his damp, hot skin. I rediscovered the supple firmness of his flesh, the iron hardness of his shoulder muscles that flexed with each movement. And at last, when he finally tore his mouth from mine, I buried my face against his chest where his shirt was unbuttoned and inhaled the musky scent of him until passion rose like driving wind in my mind.
"Please. Oh please . . ."
I said the words aloud, not meaning to, not even realizing I had until he took my face again in his hands and turned it up to his. I thought with a faint despair that he would turn me out, perhaps scorn me for my wanton needs, my desire to please him. But the words formed by his smiling mouth were simply: "I want you."
Then he lifted me in his arms and carried me to the bed.
The air was colder there, the room darker. Yet as he laid me into the downturned covers and lowered his body onto mine, I knew only the satisfaction of finally attaining what was mine, what should have been mine two years before.
A soft cry of desire escaped me as Nicholas buried his mouth against my throat, my shoulder, and moved up again to my ear. The material of my shift was a frail barrier to his exploring hands as he eased the material over my shoulders, his fingers gently caressing my breasts until they throbbed and ached under his touch. There was no reality in that moment beyond the two of us, and I caught my breath when his warm tongue curled intimately around my breast, until my body arched up to his mouth and the desire to give myself to him completely consumed me.
The touch of his chest against my breasts sent a burning wave of need through me and I gasped. Often I had dreamt of his holding me again, as he had that one time before, but those were merely fantasies. I seemed to soar with a wondrous pleasure that was only enhanced by his movements against me, his crushing me to him so fiercely I could hardly breathe.
When finally he pulled away, his eyes were dark with questions. To assure him I curled my arms around him, pressed my hands flat against his shoulders, and molded my legs over his. I made a soft moan of pleasure as his hand ran down and up my thigh, slowly, slowly, his fingers warm as they caressed, explored, until the sweet torture grew and I feared I would drown in it.
He moved to his knees, and I watched as his long fingers expertly flicked open the buttons of his shirt, slowly released his breeches, and peeled them down his hips. He looked magnificent to my admiring eye. His legs spread wide between my thighs, he kneeled over me, his eyes roving over my breasts and down, down until his intimate perusal brought a different sort of fire to my skin. Once I had hidden myself from him but not now. I knew he loved me; whether he realized it himself yet I could not guess. But I saw it in the sudden glow of his eyes; I felt it in the tender touch of his hands.
Then desire eclipsed all, demanded an insistent response. Reaching out, I took him in my hands, worshipping the hot, hard flesh that had driven me beyond boundaries once. I loved him with my hands, my lips, in all the ways I had fantasized those many lonely months when I had only a memory to guide me. I heard him groan and felt him shiver. And when his fingers twisted into my hair and pulled my head back sharply, I became breathless with the raw, savage desire I saw in his face.
Sinking back on the bed, I watched the candlelight play over his features, saw the slow ripple of his flesh and sinew as he leaned over me. His form blocked the dim, dancing light and cast cool shadows over my fevered skin. With his mouth set in a tight, determined line, he shifted my legs, and I felt that part of him touch me, throbbing, straining with passion and heat. But still he held back, his eyes on mine, his lips brushing mine until I whimpered and clawed his hips.
I lost my breath. My heart beat rapidly beneath his palm and my skin grew flush and moist with wanting.
He kissed me again, invading my mouth with his tongue, swirling it inside me and plunging rhythmically until I cried aloud for mercy and gasped for breath. And all the while he pressed the length of his body against mine, his chest to my breast, his stomach to mine . . . his hips moving sensuously upon mine so the hard rise of his desire scored my damp, tender flesh with heat. When he pulled away I trembled with longing.
"I have to know," came his soft, urgent words in my ear, "only because I don't want to hurt you. I have to make certain . . . have there been others, love?"
I replied without blinking, remembering the first time he'd asked me that question. My answer then had been different. "There has been only one man in my -life, my lord."
His eyes met mine in surprise and some disappointment. "Did you love him?" he asked.
"I loved him more than my own life," I answered. I saw him swallow and, lifting my hand, I laid it gently upon his face. "But no more than I love you." Sliding my hips fully beneath him, I finished, "My lord."
Naked he rose up over me, his dark, penetrating eyes locked on mine. The fire beyond us caused his skin to glow: wet and gold and . . . intoxicating. I wanted to drink it in. His head lowered and his lips brushed my breasts. I closed my eyes, buried my hands in his hair as he bent to take each nipple in his mouth, first the right, then the left, his tongue worrying each straining, aching rosy peak into a hard bud of desire. And the throbbing started, the delicious pulsing that beat through my body and centered deep and low in my groin. I turned liquid inside, burning with desire, melting with need, but though my body arched and lifted in invitation, though I called—nay, wept—his name, he held back, tantalizing me with his mouth and hands until my blood coursed like fire in my veins and I bec
ame frenzied with white-hot rapture. When I thought I could take it no longer, he entwined his fingers with mine, rocked slightly forward on his knees, and in one slow, exquisite motion sank into me. His head fell back; his hands flexed, griping mine painfully. I didn't care, for I knew how he felt: as if he would explode inside, as if he wanted to cry. I did cry.
When he noticed, a look of fear crossed his features. I felt him stiffen. "I'm happy" was all I said. Then I lifted my arms and legs up around him to prove how happy I was.
He moved inside me again with a sigh of relief, at first hesitant, then confident, then finally with such urgency I could do nothing but respond in the same way. The glory grew and he was mine, all mine, in heart and mind and soul. / will never let him go again! I wept to myself as the pressure mounted, dragging me upward on sensation, my body seeking, demanding, straining toward fulfillment. I clutched his sweat-glazed shoulders that moved forward and back with each thrust of his hips against mine. I felt it growing inside him as well. I knew it in the animal growls he made in his throat, in the violence that seized his body until he rode me with such ferocity the room seemed to spin into a blur around us.
It happened for us both in that instant, as it should, as it had in the past, lifting us beyond the sublime, the infinite. With a sob of passion he twisted his fingers in my hair and went still, as did I, feeling our bodies I throb as one.
Several moments passed before we relaxed, yet he didn't leave me. I wouldn't let him. I held him to me like a child with a treasured toy, selfish, full of love in id joy that no one could ever take from me again. I frit his heart pound against mine, felt the sweet stirring of his breath against my temple. The slick, warm tip of his tongue brushed my ear as he moistened his lips, then the words came, deep and sleepy and disbelieving.
"I don't understand . . . how one day I am nothing but blackness and hopelessness. Then you come alone and I feel . . ."
I turned my head slightly and looked up into his glowing eyes. "And you feel, my lord?"
"Saved." He closed his eyes. "God, I adore you."
Chapter 13
I sat before the fire with Kevin in my lap rocking him gently, smiling down into his cherubic face. I sang him a lullaby about puppies and lambs and butterflies. I told him the story of Cendrillon, of the beautiful young woman who met her handsome prince at a gala hall and swept him off his feet. I realized the babe could not understand me, but it didn't matter. This was my fairy tale, and it was coming true.
Looking up, I met my lover's eyes. Propped on his elbow, he watched me somewhat cautiously, searching my face the best he could through the gray shadows of early morning. There was an intenseness about his eyes that disturbed me, a tightness about his mouth that made me wonder if he regretted our lovemaking throughout the night.
"Good morning," I told him.
The response was a moment in coming. Then he smiled. "Yes, it is. I can't recall a finer one."
"I hope I didn't disturb you. When Kevin awoke I brought him here before Bea could take him. You don't mind ... . ?"
"No."
"I've been singing him lullabies."
"I heard."
"Me seemed fascinated."
"I suspect no one has ever sung him one."
"But that's terribly sad! My mother often sang to me."
"He doesn't have a mother."
My eyes misted as I looked down on my son's face.
"Ariel."
I forced my gaze back to my lord's, afraid the tears clouding my vision would spill down my cheeks and give away my emotions. Wyndham's dark hair spilled over his forehead nearly to his eyes, and his lids were slightly heavy. He watched me unblinking, his face set like stone. Then his lips parted, and he spoke with utmost equanimity.
"Marry me, Miss Rushdon."
I blinked and the tears fell. I hugged Kevin more tightly to my breast. "It is not necessary, sir, to—"
"Necessary? Is that what you think? That because of last night—"
"Is it not?"
He sank back to his pillow and stared at the ceiling. "Aye," he finally said, his voice weary. "Perhaps. Yes, dammit, because of last night, and all the mornings I awoke thinking of you and wishing . . . despite this numbing pain in my head the thought of you remains. God, even in my nightmares your face comes back to haunt me. When I think of you the pain goes and nothing else matters. Not the madness. Not anything. Is that selfish of me, Miss Rushdon? Rushdon. Even the name brings turmoil to my head, and heart. The sound has grown more powerful to me every day until I find myself penning 'Rushdon' on paper over and over again and staring at it as if it holds some deep and mysterious secret that I cannot quite fathom."
Coming up again on his elbow, he looked me in the eye. "Do you know how long I looked for a sitter?
Weeks, months. I interviewed woman after woman, hoping to find the one who matched the haunting image in my mind of the perfect woman. I turned them each away, until you. And I knew the moment I saw you that you would be the one to help me. Come here, Miss Rushdon."
I did so, still holding Kevin in my arms. Nicholas pulled me down on the bed beside him, brushed his son's cheek with his finger before looking again to me. "I have never hurt him. Whatever madness or sickness or cruelty that forces me to become what I become is not strong enough to make me harm what I love most." He lifted his hand to my face, cupped my cheek in his palm, and brushed away a lingering tear with his finger. "I would never lift a hand against you. Come live with me, Ariel. Share with me your sweetness. Comfort me in my madness and I will cherish you for as long as I live."
I had never loved him more than I did in that moment, for never had he spoken to me in so gentle a (one. Never had he looked at me with so fond an eye. I felt glad beyond mortal boundaries, and my smile told him so.
"Well?" he said, and the tender glint in his eye flashed with sudden passion and impatience. "Will you nit there and smile and keep me in suspense? Answer me Miss Rushdon—Ariel—and be quick about it
"Or what, my lord?"
"Or I might be forced to press that beautiful body down into this bed and make love to it again."
"Then it would behove me, sir, to hold my tongue awhile longer, I think." As his eyes widened in pleasure, I laughed and leapt from the bed. Backing toward the hearth and pressing Kevin's head to my shoulder, I told him eagerly, "Aye, Lord Malham, I will marry you, but on one condition." "Name it."
"That we are wed in secrecy. That no servant, or your brother or sister be informed of the marriage until after we are banded and the vows are spoken."
He appeared thoughtful, then with a grin he kicked the counterpane from his hips and came off the bed. "Agreed," he replied.
I saw Nicholas very little the next five days. Remote as he often was, he rarely left his room, calling me only once to the studio where., for some six hours, he attempted to paint my likeness. In the end he only smashed the portrait against the wall and bellowed for me to leave the room, for I was driving him totally "confused." I then began to worry that he had forgotten our pledge. He had made no mention again about marrying me.
On the sixth day I returned to my room, having spent the afternoon with Adrienne, tutoring, or attempting to tutor her in French. Since I knew little to nothing about the language it was not an easy feat. For hours we sat in the Great Hall while she recited phrases from her reader; I think she believed she would convince me to attend her on her voyage to France.
Entering my room, I stopped. Piled high on my bed and dresser and stacked on the floor were dozens of bolts of material: velvets, satins, silks, in every color imaginable. Draped over the back of my only chair were yards of lace and ribbons.
"I like the emerald velvet," came the voice behind me. "It will go beautifully with your eyes." I spun. Nicholas, his hands in his pockets, grinned with one corner of his mouth and said, "We will be married Tuesday next at Burnsall. I have found a vicar there who will perform the ceremony without posting banns. Mind you, he'll have a new chapel for his eff
orts . . . I lave you some witness who might attend you in this rather secretive, momentous occasion, my dear?"
"Aye." I could hardly speak.
"Will that give you time to stitch up something suitable?" Raking my dress with his eyes, he frowned with distaste and added, "God, I hate that dress you're wearing."
I lifted my chin in response.
He turned and walked casually down the hall. I heard him say, "Saucy wench." Then laughing to myself, I closed my bedroom door, hugged myself in happiness, and thought Tuesday next seemed a lifetime away
I set to the task of forming me a creation of green velvet to wear on my wedding day. I had all that I needed: scissors, thread, pins and needles. Wyndham had forgotten nothing. He was better, I thought. There had been color on his cheeks and a twinkle in his eyes. I worked through the afternoon, sketching the dress, I hen cutting it out. By dusk the floor was scattered with yards of emerald velvet and a satin lining of a slightly darker color. Tired and hungry, I put my sewing aside, locked my bedroom door behind me, and started for the kitchen.
As I passed Trevor's office quarters I noticed a light burning beneath his door. Since Trevor had traveled to York five days before and was not due back until tomorrow I was curious. I walked quietly over and peeked in.
Adrienne, with her back to me, searched Trevor's bodies and phials, holding one up to the light, then another as she attempted to read the inscription on the label. Beside her on the table was an open book.
Then, as if suddenly sensing my presence, she slowly turned to face me. Her eyes widened at first, then she relaxed. "Dear God, I thought at first that you were Trevor. Ariel, dear, you must stop walking about so quietly."
"I’m sorry.
"No matter” Relaxing somewhat, she threw a casual look about the stuffy quarters, centering her eyes on the dingy yellow skeleton suspended by ropes from the ceiling. A noticeable shudder passed through her. "I don't blame my brother for taking a holiday. This is such a depressing place."
"There are worse," I said. "I'm certain Bedlam would make this room seem as pleasant as a holiday in York." When Adrienne made no response, I walked farther into the room. "Forgive my speculating," I said, "but I sense Trevor's purpose in going to York was not strictly for holiday."
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