by Julie Kenner
When the prearranged cab arrived at four to pick her up, he wasn’t in it. Nor was he at tea at the hotel or at dinner later. She was beginning to wonder if his working with Stephens was a good idea. After trying for two hours to write a newsy letter to Carson and her staff at home, she decided to go down to the lobby and purchase a newspaper for diversion.
The lobby was quiet, save for the occasional burst of voices from the bar. While the desk clerk made change for her pound note, she was able to see behind the desk that both keys were still hanging on the hook for Jack’s room. He obviously wasn’t back yet. Studying the clock over the desk—half-past ten—she decided to wait for him in the lobby and fetched her shawl. Her excuse was valid; she was concerned about Stephens and wanted a report.
Guests came and went, most dressed in evening finery, more than a few well on the way to intoxication. It was a full hour later when Jack came through the doors of the hotel with his suit coat hanging over one shoulder, carrying his vest and tie. He paused by the night doorman to remove his hat and peel away his coat. His shirtsleeves were rolled up and his hair was a mess. She rose, taking him in, thinking that she’d never seen a more beautiful man.
He spotted her standing by one of the columns, wrapped in a large, soft shawl, and he halted. His face filled with both fatigue and pleasure.
“How did it go?” she asked, approaching him.
“Well, actually. We arranged to have some of the fittings reground and drafted a new layout for the factory floor. Stephens is quite good with machines and processes. He was just too exhausted to think straight.”
“So it’s going to be all right?” She held her breath. His smile burst over her like the first bold rays of a warm spring sun.
“I think he’s going to have a highly profitable operation there.”
“And his health?”
“He dozed between jobs this afternoon. As I was leaving, I sent him home with Rogers for some much-needed sleep. He’ll be right as rain in a couple of days. I’m going back Friday to help him install the equipment.”
“Jack, you’re—that’s wonderful!” Unable to resist the joy flooding through her, she threw both arms around him. Shocked at first, he picked her up and whirled her around, his quiet, deep-chest rumble so rich and welcome that she couldn’t bring herself to remind him where they were. He finally realized it himself and set her on her feet. Since the lobby was deserted, he kept his arms around her for a moment to savor the feeling.
“Look at you.” She stroked the smile-creased plane of his cheek.
“Just don’t inhale. I probably reek.” He winced. “My shirt is full of sweat and oil and sawdust, and these trousers—You don’t want to hear what I crawled through on the factory floor and climbed through in the rafters to work on the electrical wiring.”
“Don’t disillusion me.” She wrinkled her nose. “I think you smell wonderful, even with the—Did you say you worked on electrical wires?”
“I did.”
“Jack! Electricity is dangerous. You could have been killed.”
“Not really. I’ve studied it, experimented in the lab at Cambridge. I just never had a chance to get my hands on a real application until now.”
She lifted his hands, shocked by the scratches and grease on them.
“What would your family say if they could see you?” she said, aware of the broader context, realizing how important the afternoon had been.
“Fortunately—” he grinned “—none of them are within fifty miles. You know, there will soon be a huge market for electrical motors. I talked to Stephens about it and he agreed it would be a prime investment. If I get my hands on some capital…”
He turned her toward the stairs, keeping an arm around her waist as they climbed up them. They fell silent as they neared their rooms and paused in the darkened hallway, both feeling the elemental pull of desire.
“About Stephens.” She took a small but significant step back. It had to be said. “I’m not going to marry him.”
He looked down, shuttering his eyes.
“I guessed as much. Not really your type.”
She saw that familiar twitch in his jaw and braced, expecting a reminder, lecture or out-and-out rebuke. But he didn’t continue or look up.
“Well…” She gave an unsteady laugh. “You know how I like—”
“Muscles. Right.”
“And lots of—”
“Hair. Thick, soft hair.”
His controlled voice gave no hint of how this exasperated him, but at least his hands weren’t clenched into fists.
“So, you don’t have to help Stephens on my account.”
“What makes you think I’m doing it for you?” He glanced up, giving her a flash of the emotion roiling inside him, then looked down again. “It’s a challenge.” Passion crept into every word. “Something I like to do, something I’m damned good at. The professor was right. I haven’t done what I want to do, what I need to do in too damned long.” He took a shuddering breath. “You said it, too. And you were right.”
Her heart began to pound as she absorbed what he was saying, and she felt hope uncoiling in her middle and threading through her. Whole universes of possibility were born in the silence that followed.
“There’s something else you need to do, Jack.” Her mouth dried as she read the moment and knew the time had come.
“What is that?” he said in that same carefully neutral tone.
She swallowed hard.
“Make me yours.”
The words hung in the dark, intimate atmosphere of the hall. For the first time in her adult life, she wanted to run. The suspense was unbearable.
Then he looked up and she said it again…into those molten eyes.
“Make me yours, Jack.”
His gaze sank into hers.
And set her on fire.
His mouth descended on hers, his arms lashed her to him like steel bands and his body—hot and hard against hers—demanded a response.
Heat exploded in her, flinging sparks along her nerves. Every part of her was suddenly alive and hungry. She met his kiss and pulled him into her, deepening the contact, yielding and demanding at the same time.
Somehow they made it to her door and he managed to take her key from her, put it into the lock and turn it—proof of mad mechanical skills if there ever was one. He backed her into the room and closed the door with his foot, since his hands were busy touching her everywhere he could reach.
Her shawl hit the floor and he started on her blouse buttons. She dispensed with his braces, pulled his shirt out, and managed to unbutton his trousers while helping him dispatch her skirt. She had a few skills herself.
Suddenly they were skin to skin, bare arms and shoulders, kissing and swaying wildly, trembling with eagerness. She could barely breathe by the time she stepped out of her petticoats and kicked them away. When she stepped out of her shoes, he lifted his head.
“Leave the shoes,” he muttered against her throat. “I like shoes.”
“And stockings?” she said on a breathy laugh.
“And stockings.”
“What about corsets?”
He pulled back and looked at her breasts with lust so potent that her sex turned liquid. He inserted a finger beneath that rim of pink satin, and with a deft motion, flicked her nipple free. He took that one into his mouth as he freed the other. She squirmed with response and he laughed.
“The corset stays.” He ran his hands over her bound waist and peeled her knickers down, while staring at the nipples peeking over her boning. “You look like a petit four. All smooth white frosting and pink rosettes.” He did what was natural with those velvety rosettes—devoured them.
When her knees buckled, he caught her and bore her back to the bed, never ceasing his attention on her breasts. She welcomed him between her thighs and felt his erection slide into the wet, burning cleft of her flesh. Every motion answered a need she hadn’t realized she possessed. Soon the combination of his mouth
on her breasts and the tantalizing almost of his sex at the opening of hers had brought her to the brink of climax.
“Jack,” she gasped, clasping him with her legs. “Now,
Jack.” Tilting, she urged him inside and moaned with pleasure as he filled and stretched her, pushing deeper, thrusting all the way to her core. As she gripped his shoulders and pulled him still tighter against her, he began to move and give her the pressure and sensation she craved. Soon he was drumming toward climax, calling her name. When he would have withdrawn, she wrapped her legs tighter and forbade it, holding him inside her. Then every barrier of time and place and sensation burst between them.
She heard a groan through the fury of her own pleasure, and couldn’t tell if it was hers or his. Everything seemed to be happening inside her skin; his release somehow complemented and enhanced hers.
He collapsed over her and she felt a hiss of steam run through her blood. The fire was well and truly quenched. For now.
“Elbows,” she said, smiling at the way he still bore part of his weight on his arms. “You are such a gentleman.”
“The least I could do,” he said with a rueful laugh, “considering my appalling eagerness.” He would have shifted to lie beside her, but she held him for a moment longer, giving him an intimate squeeze with her inner muscles that made him jump with surprise.
“You never have to apologize to me for how you like your pleasure, Jack. Fast, slow, on a chair, against a wall, in a carriage…in nightcaps and flannel shirts or masks and transparent silk…say what you desire. I’ll make it happen if I can. I’m yours.”
He brushed a wisp of her hair back and searched her face with wonder.
“You’re unbelievable, Mariah. What am I going to do with you?”
“I have a few suggestions,” she said with a demure smile.
“Which I’ll be pleased to take…when I come back.”
The bed heaved and he was off before his withdrawal registered.
“You’re going?” She sat up feeling rattled and a little disoriented. “Now? Why?”
He picked up his trousers and came back to the bed as he dragged them on. Bending down, he kissed her gently on the lips.
“I’m going to bathe. I’ll be back in fifteen minutes. And then I expect to continue this most enlightening conversation.”
As the door closed behind him, she lay back on the bed, stretched, and smiled. She’d declared herself, more or less. She was his.
But was he hers?
16
MAKE ME YOURS, she’d said. He had. And he was going to again, and there wasn’t a second thought or an ounce of regret in his body.
He stared at his lathered face in the mirror, holding his razor poised. He was grinning like a lovesick fool. She made him feel whole and real; grounded him and set him soaring at the same time. She reminded him of the things he wanted and loved and was good at doing. She had become the voice of his hopes and dreams and desires, not to mention his conscience.
What was he going to do with her?
Whatever he decided, it would be better than doing without her. For once, he was not going to be sensible and abstemious and self-denying. For once he was going to do what his heart told him. He was going to make love to her and enjoy her and figure out the rest when he had to. Later. Much, much later.
Hurrying through a bath and a shave, he put on fresh trousers and shirt and a pair of slippers, then wrapped himself in a dressing gown. When he slipped back into her room, he found she had lit a lamp and donned a thin silk dressing gown. She had let down her hair, then looped it up into a soft mass of curls. At his entry, she turned and paused in front of the lamp, unwittingly creating an erotic silhouette of her half-naked body. She had left the corset and stockings on. He smiled.
“I thought you should see what I got today,” she said, taking him by the hand and pulling him to the stuffed chair by the hearth. “Sit.”
A moment later she pulled a sophisticated little velvet toque from a hatbox against the wall. She donned it and strode back and forth, describing it with clench-jawed hauteur. He enjoyed the mimicry, but appreciated even more the way she forgot to hold her dressing gown together and casually displayed the erotic territory she’d invited him to claim.
Next came a picturebook hat…wide-brimmed, romantic and awash in ribbons and flowers. Her demeanor changed to wide-eyed innocence.
“Please, sir, could you direct me to a reputable boardinghouse? I’m a country girl just come to town, and I don’t know anyone in this big, frightening city.” She fluttered her lashes and made an outrageous moue. He laughed wickedly and grabbed her, pulling her between his knees.
“Just put yourself in my hands, sweetness.” He slipped his hands around her bum cheeks and then ran his fingers through the sensitive muff at the top of her legs. “Uncle Jack will teach you how to get along.”
She giggled softly and shivered. Then she bent to lick his lips with a provocative purr.
“Naughty Uncle Jack.”
She pulled away abruptly, and as he protested, strode to another hat box and pulled out a handsome felt derby and a riding crop. She strutted back and forth, smacking the crop against her palm, staring at him as if she could peel his scruples like a grapefruit.
“Of course, you realize I brook no disobedience from my mounts,” she said with a velvety roughness to her voice. “I ride hard and long and I expect my horses to be in prime condition to give me pleasure. You think you can remember that, stable boy?”
His jaw dropped. His erection crowned. He couldn’t speak, couldn’t take his eyes from the mesmerizing sway of her hips as she stalked closer and used the tip of her crop to lift his chin. When she lowered her mouth to his, he nearly exploded there and then.
It was a hard, possessive kiss that inflamed every nerve in his body.
“Well?” She stared down into his simmering golden eyes.
“Your mount is ready to ride, mistress,” he said, running a hand up her leg and cupping her buttock. “Anytime you want.”
With a smile that was part triumph, part mischief, she slanted a leg across him and slid down astride his lap. Rubbing purposefully against his erection, she groaned with pleasure. Or maybe he did. It was hard to tell.
A moment later she was kissing him with all the hunger she’d just generated in him. And when she came up for air, she was grinning.
“What do you think of my purchases?”
“I think—” he was hoarse with need “—I’m not ever letting you go shopping alone again.”
He gasped as she peeled his trousers aside and slid her hand up and down the length of him. A moment later she slid her slick, swollen flesh up and down him, too. With a growl of appreciation, he pulled her head down to kiss her long and hard. It wasn’t long before they transferred to the bed and the riding continued in earnest. With her on top.
Later, as they lay together in a sea of feathers and felt and silk and flowers, she pushed up onto an elbow to trace his features with her fingers.
“I don’t think you should get your expectations too high about shopping. Very few milliners are open-minded enough to let this sort of thing go on in their shops.”
He laughed. “I would guess so.” He looked at the hats she’d tried on and thought of the personas that came with them. “Which is your favorite?”
She rolled up onto her knees and sat back on her heels. One by one, she picked up the hats, smoothing a flower here and stroking a feather there.
“I like them all,” she said thoughtfully, dragging a feather down his belly. He jolted, grabbed her hand to stop the tickling, then sought her gaze.
“Which one is the true you?” he asked softly.
She thought about that for a moment, her blue eyes darkening.
“None of them, I think. The true me is what you see before you now. No frills. Just me. Bare head. Naked body.” He saw the moment she dropped the last guard to her heart. It took his breath.
“I love you, Jack St. Lawrence
. That’s the real me.”
He was on his knees in a heartbeat, holding her face between his hands, absorbing her words into his very marrow, struggling with and then surrendering to the stubborn, possessive joy in his heart. He couldn’t let clever, adorable, surprising, stubborn, passionate and loving Mariah Eller walk down the aisle and out of his life. He was going to have to be at the end of that church aisle himself. He was going to have to marry her. His heart would refuse to beat ever again if he didn’t.
“That’s a gift more precious than I deserve, Mariah Eller,” he said, refusing to think about the ramifications yet. “But I’ll cherish it for as long as I draw breath. And I pray that someday I’ll be worthy of it.”
CLARIDGE’S lobby had indeed been deserted when Jack walked through the front doors, but the bar was not. A second pair of eyes had caught sight of him the moment he entered.
Baron Marchant was making an early evening of losing at his favorite gaming salon. Bertie had asked him to escort some inebriated Prussians back to their hotel and they had insisted he join them for a drink. He thought it only fitting that he accept; it was his damned money they were spending.
One of the Prussians, sunk deep in his cups, began reciting a maudlin-sounding epic about some heroic battle…in German. Marchant was doing his best to enjoy the brandy in spite of the wretch’s blathering, when he spotted a familiar figure entering the hotel.
St. Lawrence. His spirits lifted. The fellow was something of a stick in usual company, but he would be a vast improvement over this gloomy lot. He rose to intercept Jack, but stopped inside the bar entrance when he heard a woman’s voice say Jack’s name. Moving instinctively to the side of the opening, he blinked and put in his monocle to make her out.
Memory and deduction came together to boot Marchant’s brain.
The widow? St. Lawrence had brought her here? To London? His jaw dropped as the Prince of Wales’s latest conquest threw her arms around Jack, and Jack embraced her and whirled her around like a giddy schoolboy. In the middle of Claridge’s lobby!