He wanted to set her on her back, push up her skirt, and take her. A rogue would do that, or an animal. He tried to steady his breath. At her behest, with her assistance, he was attempting to be neither of those things. That was why he sat beside her now, enduring her amateurish attack on his waistcoat and cravat.
The thing he most marveled about, other than Phillipa, was the way she made his past fade away. Three years in Africa, when he’d thought to return to England with no family to cheer his success, when he thought he’d be off again before the end of the year. And all the years before that, when he’d gone from place to place, country to country, lover to lover, with never enough time or inclination to create a lasting bond with any but a select few acquaintances. He’d felt so damned hollow, sometimes. And now, with her, he didn’t.
Drawing the strap of her night rail down to her elbow, he kissed her shoulder up to her throat and around her jaw to her mouth again. She moaned, curving closer to him. When he pulled the other strap down, she slid her arms free to continue undressing him. The gown fell to her waist, and he leaned in to flick his tongue first against one pink nipple, then the other.
Finally, unable to stand it any longer, he pushed her hands away and finished unbuttoning his waistcoat himself. With her eager assistance he yanked it off along with his shirt. His boots and trousers followed. Then he pressed her backward, skimmed his hands from her shoulders past her breasts to her waist, and pulled her night rail off past her waist and down over her feet when she arched her hips for him.
“I want you,” he murmured, parting her knees and dipping down to taste her. She was wet, and from her strangled yelp she wanted this as much as he did.
“Now,” she breathed, grabbing him by the hair and yanking his face back up to hers. “Put that”— and she brushed her fingers against his cock—“inside me. Now.”
“This?” he whispered back, settling over her to rub the tip of his cock against her folds.
She threw back her head. “Yes. Oh, yes.”
He was not about to wait for a second invitation. With another deep kiss he pushed forward, entering her fully. The tight, hot slide was so exquisite that he nearly lost control. Steady, he ordered himself. He wouldn’t allow himself to let go until she did.
The animal in him kept fighting to spill himself inside her, but he clenched his jaw and began a slow rhythm, in and out, in and out. With Phillipa panting beneath him, her eyes shining, he couldn’t imagine anything closer to perfection. Then she wrapped her ankles around his thighs, digging her fingers into his shoulders. God, she felt good.
As her muscles tightened around him, he deepened his stroke, gazing into her eyes, waiting for her to climax. Abruptly she shook, shivering inside and out. “Bennett,” she breathed, clutching him. “Bennett.”
Breathing harder, he increased his pace, pushing himself to the edge. He kissed her as he came, holding himself against her, deep inside, two joined as one. Finally, perfection.
Chapter Sixteen
Exhausted as we were, we pushed on. We were so close to Mbundi’s village that spending another night away was unthinkable. We pushed too hard. The Ngole had no crates to carry, no tents or trinkets to bear, and they caught us at the edge of the river. I didn’t feel it at first. How odd, to look down and see a spear protruding from my side and realize that I was dead. That is what I most remember about it. Surprise.
THE JOURNALS OF CAPTAIN BENNETT WOLFE
And here,” Bennett murmured, trailing a finger along her ribs, “we have the Congo River.”
“Oh, really?” Phillipa held her breath, trying not to giggle at the sensation.
“Mm hm. Ah, but wait.” The trail moved up the outside of her right breast, halting at its peak. “A plateau. And beyond, a deep valley.” He continued his tour across the dip of her breastbone and up the slope of her left breast. “Well, that’s unexpected,” he murmured. “I don’t remember this being here.” Slowly he bent down and closed his lips over her nipple.
“Oh, goodness. Is the expedition over, then?” she managed, as his fingers stroked in a lazy circle around her right breast. “Or are you looking for a route to the ocean?”
He chuckled, the sensation reverberating into her. “I’d planned on heading south.”
She would have enjoyed that, but despite her best efforts to halt time, the night continued to creep toward dawn. Phillipa pushed Bennett off his elbow and onto his back. Large and hard-muscled as he was, he gave in to her fairly easily. She had the distinct feeling that he didn’t give in often, or to just anyone. “What will happen in the morning? When you and Captain Langley meet with the Africa Association?”
Bennett slid an arm around her shoulders, drawing her against him. “We’ll shout at one another, I’ll point out the very close resemblance of the wording of my other books to his, and logically they’ll demand that he produce the journals in which he wrote his original observations. Which he won’t be able to do.”
“So you’ll win.”
“That’s the idea.”
She twisted her head to look up at him. Despite the…satisfaction she felt in his company, his own countenance was far from relaxed. Behind his vibrant green eyes, behind the whispers and secrets of the jungle and all the other exotic places he’d been, he wasn’t as confident as he claimed. “And if they don’t believe you?”
“They will.”
“But if they don’t?” she repeated.
“Then I suppose I’ll have to find employment in Northumbria. Sheep herding, perhaps.”
Phillipa sat up. “You shouldn’t jest.”
He tugged her back down beside him. “I’m not jesting. Without the support of the Africa Association, no one—not a private party, not the East India Company—will sponsor me to lead another expedition even as far as Cambridge.” Slowly he twined his fingers through her hair, the gentle tug and pull sending delighted goose bumps down her arms. “Tell me something, Phillipa. Would you be willing to be a shepherdess?”
For him, she thought she could be a fishmonger. “I like sheep,” she admitted with a slight smile, though at the moment she didn’t feel much like smiling.
Bennett being successful tomorrow would mean, without a doubt, Bennett gone. How was she supposed to wish him well? Being a shepherd, or an ordinary landowner, would undoubtedly make him miserable—but that was exactly the life she’d imagined for herself.
“I suppose,” he said quietly, “that I should wait to propose to you until I know for certain whether I’m a lion or a lamb. Or rather, which one I’ll be chasing after. What do you think about all this?”
Her heart skittered in an unsettling mix of joy and apprehension. “I think I admire you very much, and that if anyone deserved to have his dreams realized, it’s you.”
He chuckled. “So now you’re my dream, are you? You’re very sure of yourself.”
She hadn’t been referring to herself. “I meant—”
Before she could finish, he pulled her into his arms, kissing her until she decided it would be best to kiss him back. He’d said before that he meant to marry her, and the idea had at first seemed mad. Then she’d begun to believe that he meant it, and considering her own reaction to his presence, the realization had been heady and glorious. And now…
And now, she found her own courage being tested. Could she be selfish and marry him and ask him to remain in England? Could she somehow find the wherewithal to join him in his adventures? Or worst of all, could she watch him go while she remained behind?
With a groan she flung her arms around his shoulders, kissing him everywhere she could reach. Whether she could manage any courage or not when the time came, she had no intention of missing this moment. Not for anything.
Bennett chuckled against her mouth, rolling them both so that he lay on top of her, his growing arousal pressed deliciously against her inner thigh. “You are my dream, Phillipa,” he whispered, kissing her again, “and at moments like this I never want to wake.”
“Neither do I,” s
he said feelingly. Here in her bed, with him, everything was perfect.
Their waking circumstances, though, were rather different. As he slid deep inside her, daylight troubles faded away. Moving, shifting in and out, hard and warm and insistent, he made her forget what she’d been worrying over. She forgot everything but how very good it felt to be in Bennett Wolfe’s arms. And that was very good, indeed.
Bennett returned to Howard House as the eastern sky began to lift from black to gray. Inside the stable he brushed down and fed Ares himself. Lucifer knew the bay wasn’t the only one who needed a few moments to cool down. He’d never regretted leaving any house since he’d been nine years old—but leaving Phillipa asleep in her bed, her chestnut hair framing her pretty face, had been one of the most difficult things he’d ever had to do.
Once back inside his borrowed room at Howard House he stripped and lay down, hoping for an hour or two of sleep before the rest of the household awoke. Before he could do more than close his eyes, though, his door began rattling and a distinctive chittering sounded in the hallway beyond.
“Oh, good God.” Rolling to his feet again, he went to the door. “Come on, then,” he muttered, as Kero scampered in, bypassing him in favor of her pile of pillows.
Almost immediately she began emitting her dainty little snore. Bennett blew out his breath and returned to bed. At least one of them would begin the day well rested—though it would likely be best if she didn’t accompany him to Ainsley House. Langley could stand to lose the rest of his ear, but Kero wouldn’t win the argument for him. Logic would see to that.
He sat up again, giving up on sleep. Kero lifted her head to eye him, then sank back into the soft pile once more. Thankfully she’d become much more at ease in Howard House, though she’d first explored every inch of it for predatory birds and snakes. Once she’d deemed it predator-free, and after finding… another sibling, he supposed, in Geoffrey, she’d stopped insisting that he be within view at every second.
At breakfast he made certain Kero ate well, which would leave her less likely to insist on accompanying him to Ainsley House. Before he could track down his cousin and ask whether he’d be amenable to looking after her, Geoffrey strode into the breakfast room. “There she is.” He walked up to scratch her on the chin, while she hummed at him. “I thought she’d gone looking for you this morning, but I didn’t want to go barging about the house.” He leaned on his elbows, stretching across the table toward Bennett. “Father doesn’t like when I go barging about.”
“That’s understandable,” Bennett returned with a short grin. Even if he hadn’t been in an exceptional mood thanks to several hours spent in Phillipa’s bed, he rather liked Geoffrey Howard, young Lord Clarkson. And that was surprising, considering that what little thought he’d spared the lad over the years had been less than charitable. “Would you do me a favor and look after her for a bit this morning?”
“I don’t want my son bitten by that rabid beast,” Fennington stated, as he walked into the room. From his expression he didn’t feel any more affection for his nephew than he did the monkey. After all, he’d provided Bennett with the means to attend the soiree last night. And by now, everyone in London probably knew it.
“She’s not rabid.” Bennett returned his attention to his cousin. “She just ate half a bowl of strawberries, however. You may want to encourage her to take a stroll in the garden in half an hour or so.”
“I’ll be happy to. And I caught some crickets for her.”
“She’ll adore you forever, then.”
Fennington, still looking displeased, selected his own breakfast and sat at the table. “So now you’ve got my son catching insects for a monkey,” he noted.
“I only told him what she ate. The rest was his idea. He’s learning the Latin names of all the insects in the area, if that makes a difference.”
“Not particularly. There isn’t much use for that in the House of Lords.”
“I’m not going to sit in the House of Lords,” Geoffrey contributed. “I’m going to be an explorer, like Bennett. I’m particularly interested in Africa.”
“Well, isn’t that splendid.” The marquis curled his fingers around his fork as though he wanted to stab Bennett in the eye with the utensil. “You are going to sit in the House of Lords, because you are going to be the next Marquis of Fennington. You are not going to Africa, nor are you going to return from there to begin fights with people whose reputation exceeds your own. Now sit down and eat your eggs.”
That was a bit blatant. “After this morning, Fennington,” Bennett said, keeping his tone low and calm, “Langley’s reputation won’t be an issue, because he won’t have one. My purpose last night was not to embarrass you.”
“I wrote—” The marquis stopped. “Geoffrey, I’ve changed my mind. Go walk the monkey now.”
“But I thought you—”
“Now, son.”
Geoffrey sighed heavily, then grinned. “Come along, Kero,” he said, offering his shoulder.
The vervet patted Bennett on the cheek, then scampered up the boy’s arm. “Be good,” Bennett instructed, and the two of them were off.
“As I was saying,” Fennington continued, “I wrote the foreword to Langley’s book. His reputation and mine are intertwined. And I don’t like this.”
Bennett shook his head. “You thought I was dead, did you not?”
“Of course I did. But…I did know that he had possession of your journals. I knew that he would use them in writing his own book. I used his popularity and your reputation because I knew it would be profitable.”
That surprised Bennett. Not that his uncle had gone along willingly with a fraud, but that he would now admit to it. “I suppose if I was dead, I wouldn’t care,” he said after a moment. “And thank you for telling me.”
“Yes, well, you’re welcome.” The marquis drew in a breath. “If it comes to it, I give you permission to inform the Africa Association that I saw your journals, and that Langley said they were yours, given to him on your deathbed.”
For a moment Bennett looked down, making a show of cutting the ham on his plate. “You’re friends with Thrushell.”
“Yes, I am. So don’t say anything if you don’t absolutely have to.”
This was damned odd. A decade ago—hell, a month ago—he would have gone out of his way to cause trouble for Fennington and his brood. Now, though, that urge seemed to have left him. “May I ask you a question?”
“What is it? Why am I trusting to your discretion after the display you put on last night?”
“I’m more interested in why you didn’t want to take me into your household after my mother died.” Bennett clenched his jaw; he didn’t like feeling vulnerable. And however little regard he’d ever claimed to have for this man, Fennington seemed long ago to have acquired the ability to wound him.
“We don’t need to dredge up that nonsense now.”
“Yes, we do.”
With a scowl, Fennington lifted his head and made a sharp gesture at the footman who stood ready to refill their tea. Immediately the servant left the room, closing the door behind himself. “My father—your grandfather—had willed your mother five hundred pounds a year. That amount went to you after she died.”
“I know. As I reckon it, that money is the only reason I didn’t end up in a workhouse.”
The marquis glanced up at him, then returned to contemplating his breakfast. “Five hundred a year, regardless. It didn’t matter if one year the fields flooded at Fennington Park, or if some sort of rot ruined all the wool we took from the sheep another year. Before anyone else earned anything, could put anything into repairs or schooling or taxes, you received five hundred pounds. And so honestly, Bennett, I didn’t want to have anything to do with you.”
“Hm. You would rather have had the blunt, and I would rather have had a family.” Bennett pushed away from the table. “I’ll attempt to be discreet during the meeting.”
“I would hope so.”
So that was it, Bennett reflected as he made his way out to the stable and collected Ares once more. Fennington resented a nine-year-old orphan the income to put himself through school and keep food in his belly. That explained why the marquis had been so eager to profit from the publication of his—or rather, Langley’s—book. How odd, that he’d grown up detesting his relations, while they’d had the very same opinion of him.
Phillipa would call it irony, and point out that if he’d grown up differently, he might have learned to favor cattle over travel. And since travel had ultimately brought him back to London, and to her, he couldn’t dispute that his life had its merits.
From the number of carriages and horses crowded around the large stable yard at Ainsley House, most of the Africa Association had arranged to attend the meeting. Good. The more men who could thereafter attest to Langley’s theft and slander, the better.
“Good morning, Captain Wolfe,” the duke’s butler said, stepping aside to let Bennett into the house. “I’ll show you to the conference room.”
They went upstairs and down a corridor that apparently passed over the top of The Adventurers’ Club below. He wondered briefly how many other members of the Association knew about the sanctuary Sommerset had created. Or what shape this meeting might have taken if it had been Langley rather than himself who’d impressed the duke enough to merit a membership in his private club.
“Wait here, if you please.” The butler left him in the hallway and slipped inside the nearest room.
Sommerset had said ten o’clock, and it was still two minutes before the hour, according to his bat tered pocket watch. Apparently they’d needed to discuss events before the participants arrived. That was well and good, as long as they meant to wait on making a decision until after they’d heard him speak.
The abrupt furor of voices inside the room didn’t sound all that welcoming. If he needed to apologize for his actions at the soiree, then, he would do so—to the Africa Association. Not to Langley. Fleetingly he wondered whether the room had two entrances, one for him to stand behind, and the other for Langley. Sommerset didn’t seem to approve of fisticuffs, though he’d found it rather satisfying, himself.
The Care and Taming of a Rogue Page 21