by Gina Conkle
Nostrils flaring, his threadbare control snapped. He planted his hands on her ribs and plucked her from sitting sidesaddle on his leg to face him and straddle his legs. The move would undo them both.
She gasped at the sudden change of position. Sitting astride his lap, her body jiggled when his fingers pulled free the front lacing of her stays with more determination than seduction.
All thoughts of where they sat and his good intentions evaporated.
Claire gripped his shoulders, her bodice slackening under his firm intent. She tipped her head, watching his fingers do their best.
“Is this a talent of yours?” she asked saucily. “You unloosed my stays faster than I do on a bad day.”
His gaze shot up briefly from concentrating on her bodice, but he looked down again at his labors, yanking free one more impertinent X of lacing. He didn’t pounce on her almost-freed breasts. Instead, his hands surrounded her body high on her ribs as though he would memorize her shape, treasuring the feel of her.
She stared at his encircling hands, white-blond tresses slipping forward, a frothy waterfall over his hands. His hands moved with agonizing slowness up her flimsy, open bodice. Wool abraded his palms as if to give fair contrast to the pearled skin he was about to touch. His hands stopped at the bottom of her high curves.
Her stare sparkled, meeting his. A message poured from her, an entrancing thread of connection. Claire’s lips parted. His jaw loosened. He wanted to tell her how beautiful she was with flour on her hands, giving him her opinions, how she was the prettiest woman he’d ever seen in her simple dresses, but words became flimsy and insufficient.
Where words failed, touch would not.
His thumbs slipped inside her bodice, the pads brushing the small tips pointing at him. Her breath hissed. Claire’s fingers dug into his shoulders, clamping him as if she feared falling off his lap. He made tender rosettes over her areolas in careful adoration. He cupped her downy-soft flesh, his eyes burning to capture every detail of what she revealed to him in the dark.
The laxness of her lower lip…the slant of her eyelids…the tiny spread of her nostrils…
Claire was unhinged by the shocking touch. Her head fell back, exposing the white column of her throat.
He moved to the edge of the seat, all the better for her to sit flush against him. The action coiled another layer of tension on their oversensitized flesh. His vixen jammed her mons against him, rubbing and searching. Her knees gripped the sides of him the way riders grip a galloping horse. His breath turned ragged at the picture of her riding him thus, and clear thoughts tumbled.
He planted his mouth, hot and open, on her neck. It wasn’t quite a kiss, more insatiable hunger for Claire. His body rattled hard against the squab when her rubbing turned to a desperate grind. His hips followed nature’s rhythm, his aching erection rubbing against her.
If there were noises outside, if his carriage stopped, if London had been invaded, he wouldn’t know for the pounding in his ears and scorching heat in his breeches.
In a flash, his hand went to his placket, loosening a button.
Claire’s body quaked, tremors wracking her torso. She rubbed against his hand slipping between them, stirring up flames with her mewling cries. He knew what she craved…and he groaned, unable to deny her. He angled his knuckles at her damp heat seeping through her drawers, glad for her most secret place to abrade the back of his hand.
“Cy-rus…” Her plea was soft and high.
“I know,” he said, his voice ragged against her skin.
Grace of movement was lost. He fumbled with his placket, springing free one button and then another. With his other hand, he grabbed her hip, trying to stay the wild, bucking ride. Their panting, staccato breaths drummed a muffled noise.
His questing mouth kissed her collarbone on a trail to her nipple, the color of that, desired circle a pale contrast in the dark. She cried out when his lips encircled her petite nipple, and he sucked. He buried his face in her gentle cleavage, kissing and nipping heavenly flesh when his mouth banged something hard and metallic.
He jerked back. The object dropped from her bodice and clattered on the floor.
Claire clamped a hand on her gaping bodice, her breath heavy, meeting his effort for effort. His hair was hot at the back of his neck, same as during his bout.
“What was that?” he asked.
“My key.”
“To your heart?” he teased, his lips brushing the underside of her breast where the metal had rested.
Her hand slipped from his shoulder, pressing his head close to her. “My shop.”
Cornhill. Their destination…a place they’d be at soon.
Her breath skipped as hard as her heart. He kissed her breasts, lingering on one pale side curve. The tip of his tongue tested the smoothness of her skin there. She was perfect, and she needed calming. He needed calming to get a better grip on this rampant, unintended seduction.
He pulled away, gulping down air. They teetered on some edge—one he had to draw them both away from. His fingers stroked her hair and grazed her collarbone, wanting connection of some kind to ease them both. Claire’s sensitized body shook with delicious shivers under his hands, a tantalizing excuse not to stop.
Outside, more establishments with vague dots of lights passed his window…midtown.
“We’ve got to be close to your shop.” He brushed the back of his hand high on her chest, caressing her skin.
His hands banded her ribs, and he set her on the opposite seat. The blanket and her cloak slid to the floor. Claire covered her bodice with a limp hand. Her head and shoulders lolled against the squab, and with her hair flowing to the seat, she made a perfect picture of a temptress in a bawdy house painting.
The carriage jolted to a stop. Men called to each other outside. Slowly, his hearing became attuned to the outside world, his coachman and the attendants. The sound of slogging footsteps through mud approached. Cyrus jerked the curtain shut, light peeking through the sliver of opening at the curtain’s end.
The voice outside called, “Sir, the New Union Coffeehouse.”
“Wait,” he called back, grabbing the door’s handle from the inside just to be sure. He spoke in a hush to Claire. “Your cloak.”
Cold seeped in little by little, the sudden stop dousing him. Both of them were dazed by the flare of passion that had been near out of control. Claire tugged her bodice higher, yanking her laces together to tie a makeshift bow. She fumbled on the floor for her cloak. When she sat up, her bodice gapped loose and low.
She looked nothing of the properly clothed proprietress, but she swept her cloak around her, the dark shape hiding her form. Her nimble fingers tied a quick bow under her chin, and she dropped lower, her hands patting the carriage floor.
“What are you looking for?” he asked.
“My key, my patten…”
He let go of the door to help her, and his hand brushed iron. “I found it.”
He gripped the key in one hand and stuffed the blanket on the seat beside him, closing his waistcoat and placket with a few buttons. He had very nearly turned his carriage into a makeshift bed. The notion made him smile. This was no different than foolish times when, as an eager young man, he’d sought secret places to tup a willing maid.
Claire found her patten and slipped on the outer shoe after a second attempt. Her awkward, fumbling movements had to be born of frustrated flesh. His own body rioted from lack of fulfillment.
Cyrus checked her and took a deep breath. “Ready?”
“Yes.” She gave a shaky nod and lifted her hood.
Her smile, likely meant to reassure him, floundered. She needed soothing. He reached across the short chasm and brushed back her hair. Her lashes fluttered low, her body drooping into his calming touch. When she looked at him again, Claire nodded.
“Open the door,” he or
dered.
His body strained at having to unbend from the seat and step into the cold. From sore muscles to his stiff phallus, discomfort was his. They exited the carriage, walking in a fog no less thick and gray as when they’d left Billingsgate. The heavens swirled their mysteries as stirring as what went on with Claire.
At the shop door, Cyrus winced from the erection raging in his breeches, one part of him resenting the evening’s intrusive end. He was grateful the mist concealed his unruliness; the placket of his breeches bulged fiercely in want of the temptation beside him.
Claire was an enchantress within her dark hood, his fairy-tale maiden looking up at him with sparkling eyes. A white hand reached up and the backs of her fingers caressed his jaw.
“Thank you,” she whispered, glancing at his cheek. “You took a blow for me tonight, even if you didn’t mean to.”
The swelling was high enough to push skin into the lower plane of his vision, a fact that had eluded him in the swelter of sensual groping. He grinned wide, his body sore yet invigorated to his marrow at the light shining from her eyes.
There was something good in being the man, the hero, she needed. He’d take a hundred more blows for her, but he couldn’t resist the sexual thread that bound them together this night.
“There are parts of me that hurt more.” He braced one hand high on the door frame of her shop and looked down at his placket. “Parts only you can soothe.”
Her lips pressed together, fighting the brazen smile bursting forth. Her fingers slid to the cleft in his chin, an indent that seemed to fascinate her.
“You tempt me, Mr. Ryland. You truly do, but…” She glanced at the carriage and her lashes dropped.
Her shop was frequented by some of his servants. The midnight carriage ride was already questionable, but sending the carriage home without him in it would besmirch her in the worst way. Her reputation deserved to be honored.
He squared his shoulders and put her key into the lock. “Then, if I come again, I must arrive as an anonymous caller in a hack.”
She said nothing, brushing close to his arm, smiling quiet encouragement from the edge of her hood. The metal lock sprang free, and he pushed open the door.
Claire stepped past the doorway. He pulled her heavy coin pouch from a pocket inside his coat and handed it to her. The horses snorted their impatience behind him, a good reminder all needed to be abed. Her blue-green eyes flickered with unknown emotions, as though she would say more. She searched his face, and he imagined her wanting to pull him inside and shut the door forever.
In that sweet state of confusion, he did the gallant thing and stretched out his hand.
“Your key,” he said quietly.
Her fingers grazed his palm, and his hand closed in a gentle grip. He bent over her receiving hand, kissed the star-shaped scar, and let go. Before he did something regretful, he shut the New Union’s door.
He stood in the cold, dampness clinging to his face. The lock slid into place and Claire barred her door. On the other side of the door’s window, she hesitated, clutching the key to her chest. Her face through the wavy panes brought to mind an angel etched in stained glass.
Was there longing in her eyes? He wouldn’t know, for she turned and the shop’s darkness swallowed her form. Walking back to his empty carriage, his head hung heavy. He would find his way back to Piccadilly and soak his pained parts in the finest copper tub in his well-appointed room. His hand covered his heart—this part of him hurt worse.
The woman he wanted slept alone by choice in a sparse garret meanly furnished above a coffee shop, a woman content with her life as is…a woman not on the hunt for wealth or position.
He climbed back into his carriage. The attendant shut the door, but Cyrus couldn’t bring himself to knock on the ceiling, signaling time to leave. He waited, keeping a careful eye on the window above the shop until scant light flickered on the other side of the glass. Then he knocked twice on the carriage roof.
Sitting in the dark, he was cold. No fire, no blanket could warm him. A scrap of white pooled on the floor. He picked it up. Claire’s neckerchief, the same one she used for her tender ministrations.
His hand slipped inside his coat, the neckerchief in his grip. The ache in his chest raged. Claire had full grasp of her desired independence. She didn’t need him at all.
Eleven
Wit be my faculty, and pleasure my occupation…
William Congreve, The Way of the World
Temptation was a red damask day gown, strawberry red to be exact.
There’d be no mistaking the luscious shade or the intent of the gown’s purchaser.
Claire clutched a bowl under one arm, voices and the clink of stoneware buzzing beyond her kitchen. Nate had the shop well in hand, leaving her to the sanctity of her kitchen and the blessed relief of baking. Doughy ingredients folded into chaste submission under a wooden spoon, her instrument of choice.
Above stairs the siren’s silk spread across her bed, lace-trimmed elbows and lush skirts daring her to don the decadent fashion.
And then there were those undergarments.
Shot silk drawers shimmered with sensual promise—demure white, no less.
“Humph.” The sound burst through the kitchen’s warmth while her footsteps trod a well-worn path.
“What’s that, miss?” Annie skimmed a paring knife over an apple, her blue eyes cautious from under her mobcap.
Claire stopped her pacing. “Did I say something?”
A long, green curl of apple skin dropped into a bucket.
“You didn’t exactly say anything, but you’ve been beatin’ that dough like it’s your worst enemy.” The freckles around her mouth twitched. “Are you angry?”
Claire set the bowl on the table and sank into a chair. “I’m not angry. It’s…it’s today. I don’t have time for the luncheon.”
She had no predilection for frivolous lady’s luncheons or meetings meant to convince pampered women that trouble existed for others of their sex. But did she have time for Cyrus? Time to fritter away the afternoon in search of melting kisses? Since the carriage ride two nights past, a particular shirtless, bare-knuckle brawler invaded her mind.
Annie denuded another apple, the skin coiling like a thin, green snake.
“Then something’s got you afraid.” Annie said the words as though matters boiled down to a few simple emotions. “But I can’t picture that bein’ you.”
Claire’s hand froze on its journey to the sugar bowl. “Afraid? I’m not afraid of this luncheon. It’s as simple as eating food with other women. What I lack is time.”
“Ahh, then if it’s as simple as you say”—Annie nodded sagely, dropping another naked apple into her bowl—“you won’t be afraid to go upstairs and put on that pretty gown a certain man bought for you, a man who wants you to be comfortable dining with other fine ladies. No one has to know how you got the gown.”
Annie made a “certain man’s” purchase of clothes for Claire sound like a reasonable thing. But the gown above stairs was not the same as a gift of lush strawberries.
Claire’s fingers dipped in the sugar bowl, the fine grain rubbing her skin. She sprinkled the sugar into the glaze meant for the apple turnovers fresh from the oven. Cyrus was meant to have one of these desserts at the luncheon.
“Or is it the man himself that’s got you flustered?” Annie eyed the doughy mass. “’Cause I’ve never seen you give dough such a thrashing.”
She was about to chime in something about the shop being so busy, but a rattle of footsteps shook the stairs and Juliette’s embroidered hems flounced into view.
“Claire,” she called into the kitchen. “You must come up now.”
Juliette bent over the rail, her volume rising on the last word. One hand clutched the rail with the other fanning a dozen hairpins.
“A few more minu
tes. The tarts aren’t wrapped. The turnovers need sugar—”
“I’ll do it,” Annie said. “Go on and have your bath, miss. I can sprinkle sugar just as good as you and wrap the pastries when their ready.” Her russet head tipped toward the shop. “And don’t worry about the shop. Nate and me have a good hand on things.”
Juliette muttered rapid French under her breath as she stormed up the steps, flashing saffron underskirts in her charge. Claire tugged off her mobcap, eyeing the plump, golden turnovers lined up for the luncheon. This would be good for business, but business wasn’t what drove her today.
Cyrus Ryland did. The image of his carved stomach muscles was forever branded in her memory. Her fingers would suddenly touch things, needing something tactile when the fascinating circle of hair around his navel came to mind.
She lived with a curious push-pull over her rough-edged landlord. He fought life hard, not giving up, and he carried familial responsibility on his substantial shoulders, thinking of others over his own wants.
It was his want of her, that was nothing less than dangerous.
She squeezed Annie’s arm. “Thanks.”
“You havin’ a good time’s the best thanks I need. Besides,” the cook said, winking, “I want all the news of what’s what with your Mr. Ryland come Monday.”
She sped upstairs, one corner of her mouth curling in a conspirator’s smile. “He’s not my Mr. Ryland.”
In her room, the tub sat near her fire grate. Stockings, underskirts, and patched drawers hung on clotheslines strung across the room, the common woman’s laundry.
“We must get you out of those clothes and cleaned up.” Juliette’s nose wrinkled prettily. “I cannot have one of my creations smelling of coffee and sugar.”
Her friend played lady’s maid, making quick work of helping her into the bath. She piled Claire’s hair high on her head, speaking under her breath about no time to wash the tresses, tresses Claire was sure smelled of flour and sugar.
“The bath is tepid,” Claire said, hugging herself in cooling water.
Juliette handed over soap and a cloth. “Hot water is for the timely bather.”