by Connie Mason
Almost decent, Moira thought as she stared at his bare chest. He had wrapped himself in a blanket, all right, draping it loosely around his loins. So much for her dignity. “You wanted to talk,” she reminded him. “What can you say here that you couldn’t say at the church?”
He took her hand, pulling her down onto the bed beside her. “I didn’t want any interruptions. The church is too public a place for what I have to say.”
Moira found it difficult to think with Jack sitting next to her. He smelled delicious, a manly scent that was uniquely his. It reminded her of something dark, musky and irresistible. The urge to touch his lips, his shoulders, the thick thatch of hair covering his chest was so compelling that she had to curl her fingers into fists to keep from reaching out to him. When she realized what she felt must be reflected in her eyes, she quickly lowered her gaze.
“What is it you wanted to say?”
“It’s not so much what I wanted to say as what I wanted to do,” Jack said, grasping her chin and tilting it upward, forcing her to look into his eyes. What she saw sent liquid heat spilling into her loins. His silver eyes were glazed with passion, his face stark with hunger. “I want you, Moira. Let me love you.”
“You’re being unfair,” Moira charged. “You know I can’t resist you. I wouldn’t be in this predicament if I could. I left you for your own good.”
“How can you claim that leaving me was good for me?” Jack argued. “Don’t you think I know my own mind?”
“Marrying me would cause a scandal.”
“I’ve been involved in scandals before and survived.”
“You’ve never been a duke before.”
“Lord knows I never aspired to the title. Be honest, Moira. Would you have married me if I was plain Black Jack Graystoke?”
Moira paused for the space of a heartbeat. “Aye, but you’re not just plain Black Jack. If you were, you’d be married to Lady Victoria. You couldn’t have married an Irish commoner either way.” Her logic defied him, so he adroitly changed the subject.
“Where is your locket?”
Moira looked askance at him. “In the pocket of my dress. Why?”
Jack rose, retrieved the locket and settled back down beside her. “Open it,” he said, handing it to her.
With shaking hands, Moira sprung the clasp, revealing the picture inside. “There, are you satisfied?”
“Who is the man in the painting?”
Moira inhaled sharply and let her breath out slowly. “No one of importance to you.”
“But someone of importance to you, I’ll wager.”
“Mother told me it was a painting of her father. Mind you there is no one alive to substantiate her claim, but she believed it to be so. It belonged to her own mother, who died giving birth to her.”
“Who gave your mother the locket and told her about it?”
“The nuns who raised her. According to Mother Superior, my grandmother’s family disowned her when she became pregnant. Supposedly the father of her child was an English soldier of noble birth who was quartered in Ireland during a rebellion. Obviously my grandfather, if the story is true, abandoned my grandmother. But I can’t see what difference any of this makes to our situation.”
“It makes all the difference in the world if the man in the painting is your grandfather.”
“You know who it is?” Excitement colored her words and pinkened her cheeks.
“I think so. Have you ever heard of the powerful Earl of Pembroke?”
Moira shook her head. “Is my grandfather distantly related to this great earl?” It didn’t matter to Moira if her grandfather was a shirttail relative as long as the mystery of the locket was solved.
“Your grandfather is the earl. Your mother was the daughter of the future Earl of Pembroke. In time he inherited the title, married, had a son and lost him. He now lives in seclusion in the country.”
“How do you know all this?” Moira asked suspiciously.
“Sleuthing, my love. I gave the locket to Spence and asked him to investigate, never suspecting its importance. His father was the one who finally identified the man in the miniature.”
“Are you sure? Absolutely, irrevocably sure?”
“Reasonably sure,” Jack hedged. “The first thing we’ll do upon our return to London is seek an audience with Lord Pembroke. He’s the only one who can verify the story.”
Moira’s face fell. “I’m not taking anything for granted.”
“It’s almost a certainty, love. Now will you marry me and give our child a name? The blood flowing through your veins is bluer even than mine.”
“You’re not making this up, are you?”
Jack shook his head, exasperated beyond endurance. What a contrary female. But that was but a part of her that made her so endearing. “Would I lie to you about something as important as one’s lineage?”
Moira searched his face, seeking the truth. “No, I don’t believe you would. I’ll marry you after I’ve spoken with Lord Pembroke.”
Jack grasped her shoulders and gave her a gentle shake. “Do you love me, Moira? At one time I believed you did. But your staunch resistance makes me wonder if I was mistaken.”
The moment of truth had arrived. Moira knew it as surely as she knew the sun rose in the east and set in the west. She could deny it no longer. She joyously, happily, exuberantly loved Jack Graystoke. Even if Lord Pembroke turned out to be a case of mistaken identity, she could not deny her child its rightful father.
“I love you, Jack Graystoke. I love you beyond time or reason.”
Jack blinked in surprise, unable to believe his ears. He’d always believed she loved him, but getting her to admit it had been more of a chore than he’d expected. And to think he’d almost given up on her. If not for a meddling ghost, he would have lost Moira forever. For that matter, he would never have found Moira in the beginning if not for Lady Amelia.
“I said I’d never ask you to marry me again, yet here I am, brought to my knees before you. I tried to tell myself I didn’t love you, even tried bedding other women, but that didn’t work, either. You’ve banished the old Black Jack Graystoke, and in his place you see a reformed man. Lady Amelia must be supremely satisfied.
“I love you, Moira O’Toole. I knew it the instant I realized I couldn’t marry Victoria, even though it meant going to debtor’s prison and watching Graystoke Manor fall down around my ears. You’re the only woman I want, Moira. We’ll be married before we leave Ireland. I can’t wait to make you my duchess.”
Moira opened her mouth to protest, then closed it. She’d put more obstacles in Jack’s path than any man should have to hurdle in a lifetime. When he reached out and removed the blanket from around her shoulders, she had no desire to stop him. The room was warm, almost too warm, but Moira hardly noticed as Jack unwound the blanket from his loins. Never, she thought, gazing at him, had she seen a more beautifully made man. His size didn’t worry her, for she’d adjusted quickly to the thickness of his sex that now swelled with his need for her. His strength and hunger for her both gratified and pleased her.
He took her into his arms, and she felt him against her hip, hard and solid and immense.
“I’ve waited a long time and come a long way to make you mine again,” he whispered into her ear.
He took her mouth in a fiercely possessive kiss that healed her heart and fed her soul. Moira nearly swooned with delight. His kiss was everything she remembered, everything she could ever want, and more. Oh, God, so much more.
Chapter Twenty
Jack deepened the kiss, his mouth fierce and demanding. He was consuming her and at the same time creating a shattering hunger within her. His lips moved on hers, seeking a response that matched his own. Her lips parted beneath his, and he thrust his tongue into her mouth, exploring it with unleashed passion. The tantalizing taste and scent of him titillated her senses. She felt him stir restively against her hip and thrilled at her power to move him. Her tongue began a tentative dance with
his as his large hand cupped one breast gently. Her nipple grew hard and throbbing as he took the swollen bud between his fingers and caressed it tenderly. Moira cried out in sweet surrender, wanting more of the sublime pleasure.
He bore her down onto the bed and buried his face between her breasts. She moaned and cradled the heat of his mouth to her flesh as he licked her nipples with the velvet roughness of his tongue. Then he drew her nipple into the wet, warm cavern of his mouth, suckling her with exquisite tenderness. The scrape of his stubbly chin against her smooth skin heightened her pleasure as his mouth blazed a path of fire across her sensitive skin. She became like quicksilver in his hands, hot and eager. Like warm liquid being poured over her, his mouth flowed sweetly over her flesh while his hands moved hot and insistent over her body.
As he slid slowly downward, tracing silky, wet patterns over her skin, Moira panted with anticipation of his next move. He gently nudged her knees apart and settled between them, pausing briefly to give her a small smile of stark sexual hunger before lowering his head into the damp, musky warmth of her loins. Moira stiffened and cried out as he parted the delicate pink folds with his tongue, seeking a greater intimacy.
Jack pressed a muffled groan into the juncture of her thighs as her sweetness flowed into his mouth, hot and sharp and arousing. Her body spasmed with pleasure. He could feel the tension building inside her as her fingers curled around his shoulders and her legs began to tremble. She arched violently into the sliding pressure of his finger inside her and the wet lash of his tongue, straining against their deft stroking as she melted around the slow deep caresses.
Her cries grew frantic as she clung to him, moving against the thrust of his fingers and the sweet exploration of his tongue. Jack pressed another groan into her musky warmth, his control slipping dangerously. The taste, the scent of her drove him wild to thrust himself into her and stroke himself to rapture. Suddenly her body stiffened and she writhed against him. Keeping his fingers buried deep inside her drenching heat, he raised up to watch her, to hold her as she climaxed violently. His mouth covered hers, swallowing her cries, his strokes continuing until her tremors subsided.
Then, with a mindlessness fueled by fierce need and long-denied hunger, he flexed his hips and thrust into the lush folds of her body. In all his life, Jack couldn’t recall ever being so aroused. Pleasure had become pain, then unbearable agony as he stroked inside her, moving in and out deeply, frantically. His hands were on her buttocks, kneading, caressing, bringing her up to meet his bold penetration, arousing her anew. She arched upward, fever, madness and need driving her to an unbearable pitch, meeting his thrusts with frenzied, gasping cries.
He drove again and again, his face starkly beautiful in its intensity. Sheer, splendid glory washed over her as waves of sensation rolled through her body. Each jerk of her hips took him deeper and deeper into the core of her, fitting her as if he were made for her alone, throbbing against the walls of her sensitive interior. Tiny explosions burst inside her, thunderous and magnificent, like a tidal wave of pleasure sweeping through her.
“I love you, Moira,” Jack cried as he drove into her one last time and shattered into a million brilliant pieces. “You’re mine!”
Moira reacted with ancient feminine instinct, clasping him tightly and drawing him deeper and deeper until her body thrummed and vibrated with excruciating pleasure. Then, incredibly, she was launched into space, floating there weightless, immersed in perfect harmony as brilliant lights burst around her and her blood sang in her veins. A trembling sigh left her lips as the exquisite contractions tapered away.
Jack felt himself softening, but he was reluctant to leave the liquid warmth of her sheath. He wanted to stay this way forever, in her, over her, surrounding her. If he lived forever, he’d never have enough of her. When he slipped from her body, he rolled to his side, pulling her into his arms. He was numb and dazed and splendidly content.
“Now tell me we don’t belong together,” Jack said, daring her to deny what they had just experienced together. It had been a wild coming together—one billowing sensation after another, like thunderclouds swirling around them.
“It would be a lie,” Moira whispered on a trembling sigh. “I could never deny you, Jack. I love you too much.”
“Thank God,” Jack replied happily. “I’ve come too far to be turned down again. I want our child to have his rightful name. We’ll be married before we return to England. You deserve to have your family around you when we speak our vows. Lady Amelia must be absolutely gloating,” he murmured as he turned her against him and pressed his lips to hers.
His lips abandoned hers to glide over the slope of her bare breast, capturing the peak of a flushed nipple. His hands ran the length of her body, seeking out each sensitive point, leaving her trembling with renewed passion. “I want you again, sweetheart, but only if you’re not too exhausted.” The scent of spent passion clinging to her was headier than fragrant perfume and a hundred times more arousing.
How could she ever be too exhausted for this magnificent man? Moira wondered. “You’re wicked, Black Jack,” she whispered as she pulled his lips down to hers, answering his need with a need of her own. “Don’t ever change.”
“Never, sweetheart. You’re my passion, my life, my love.”
Their loving was slow and leisurely, the rapture so intense Moira felt her soul leave her body. When Moira returned to herself, Jack was lying beside her, resting on his elbow and smiling down at her. “I want to keep that look on your face forever.”
Moira blushed. “You’re incorrigible.”
“Aye. But I think I’ve worn you out. Sleep, love. I’ve arrangements to see to. I’ll awaken you in plenty of time for our wedding.”
Jack kissed her forehead and uncoiled his long length from the bed. Moira watched from beneath lowered lids as he pulled on his clothes. Her gaze charted the incredible width of his shoulders, his slim waist, his narrow hips, then continued down the supple length of his thighs, calves and ankles. When he bent to retrieve his trousers, she admired the taut, hard globes of his buttocks and rippling tendons of his muscular thighs. Sensing her scrutiny, Jack turned and gave her a cocky grin.
“Keep looking at me like that and we’ll never leave this room.”
Moira smiled sleepily. “I didn’t realize I was staring. You’re beautiful,” she said shyly.
Jack flushed with pleasure. But when he tried to formulate a suitable reply, he wasn’t surprised to find that Moira had dropped off to sleep. Dressing quietly, he left the room and spoke at length to the innkeeper. The man appeared more than a little surprised at Jack’s request but consented without comment when Jack produced enough to pay for what he wanted.
Father Sian was agreeable to performing a wedding. More than willing, truth be known. His faith didn’t condone premarital intimacy, and he was anxious to right a wrong. A child made it even more imperative that the mother and father be united in holy matrimony. Jack named four o’clock that afternoon as the hour for the ceremony, then asked directions to the O’Toole farm.
Jack cursed the infernal rain as he rode the muddy lane to the O’Toole farm. He was more than grateful when he spied smoke rising from a chimney and the outline of a house at the end of the lane. The cottage was in desperate need of a coat of whitewash and looked dingier than it really was in the misty grayness of the day. Jack reached the gate, bent to unlatch it and rode into the yard. He saw the curtains at the front window flutter as he dismounted, and then the door burst open before he reached it.
Kevin’s jaw jutted out belligerently as he blocked the front door. “Where is my sister, milord? What have you done with her?”
“Moira is safe and dry in my room at the inn. I’m sure you’ll agree ’tis neither healthy nor wise to drag her out in this kind of weather, especially in her delicate condition. May I come in?”
Kevin wavered uncertainly. Katie glared at him and shoved him aside. “Please come in, milord, where it’s warm and dry. I’m su
re we can sit and talk without animosity.”
Kevin moved aside with marked reluctance as Jack stepped through the door. He looked around curiously. Sparsely furnished but scrupulously clean and neat, the house was warm and inviting, telling Jack without words that the occupants were bound together by love. Jack smiled at the children as they crowded around him, their eyes wide with curiosity. They smiled back shyly before Katie shooed them into the kitchen.
“Sit down, milord,” Kate invited. “Kevin and I are both anxious to hear about Moira.”
“Please, call me Jack. As I said before, Moira is fine. I left her sleeping. I’m here to invite you to a wedding.”
Kevin bristled angrily. “What did you do to Moira to convince her to wed you?”
Jack faced him squarely. “Did you think I’d harm her? My God, man, I love Moira. It’s taken me months to convince her to marry me.”
“Your pardon, Lord Jack. ’Tis just that Moira was against marrying you,” Katie intervened when she saw Kevin rousing himself for a nasty confrontation.
Jack grinned cheekily. “I’m a very convincing chap when I set my mind to something.”
“Obviously,” Kevin said dryly. “You seduced my innocent sister.”
Jack did not deny it. “Someday I’ll tell you how I met Moira. The danger she faced wasn’t from me. But there isn’t time now to go into details. Our wedding is set for four o’clock. Moira and I would be pleased to have you and Katie stand as witnesses.”
It was apparent Kevin wasn’t convinced that Jack was the right man for his sister. “What will your fancy friends say about you taking a Irish peasant to wife?”
“I don’t give a damn. It’s no one’s business whom I marry. Besides, you can’t be unaware that you and your sister may have noble blood flowing through your veins.”
Kevin’s attention sharpened. “What do you know of that? Such belief may be naught but the fancy of a woman who wished it were so. Our mother had no real proof that her father was a titled gentleman.”