by Hazel Hunter
He could say nothing. If he spoke, she would know him.
Jennet slapped down the deck. “As you have nothing to say, permit me to offer you some advice, sir. Lying jackals always come to bad ends. If one particular cur, whom I will never forgive, chose to pointlessly beleaguer me, I should kill him dead.”
Greystone watched her rise and march out through the garden doors. Pickering was right, he thought as he stood. He truly was an idiot.
Chapter 8
Jennet stopped at the glass doors at the back of the reception room, and looked out at the terraced gardens. The fury she felt did not want to subside. Indeed, it still swelled in her breast like some internal fire stoked by the outrageous desire she had seen in the straw man’s dark green eyes. The shadowy emerald shade of his gaze had been unmistakable, and brought back an echo of something he had said once to her.
We will have green-eyed children, I expect. May our girls be as bewitching as their mother.
You will change your mind on that, she had told him, when our daughters come of age.
Even after all he had done to ruin her life and trample her heart and destroy her innocence, William Gerard had returned to Renwick—and he still wanted her. She knew she should summon a carriage and go home before she did something she would genuinely regret. She did not wish to join the dismal ranks of the legendary mistresses of Dredthorne and go mad.
Oh, but she could beat that horrid, spiteful swine of a man until his skull cracked, and never lose another moment’s peace over it.
Yanking open the door, Jennet walked out into the cold night air. It made every breath she took too sharp for comfort, but she welcomed the chill. Hopefully it would erase this blazing flush that had crawled up her neck into her face. Quickly she marched down the steps, determined to put as much distance between her and her tormentor as she could until she calmed.
How could he do this to her? She had been finished with him. Done. He had been forgotten entirely.
You came here hoping to see him, her sensibility whispered. Admit it.
Jennet came to the end of the paved pathway sooner than she expected, and stopped to survey her surroundings. Idly she fanned herself as she considered her prospects. She might continue through the fields beyond, for the moon had bathed them in silvery light. The shadowy outlines of a small building to her right suggested it to be a hot house, where she might conceal herself until her temper subsided, and she felt more like herself again. Even now her nape tingled madly, as if he were standing just behind her–
Jennet spun around to see the straw man striding rapidly toward her. She would have to keep up the pretense another moment, it seemed.
“Return to the ball, sir,” she told him, closing her fan with a snap. She felt proud of the haughty indifference in her tone. “I have finished with readings for the night.”
He came too close, and caught her arm when she would have passed around him. First he pulled away her mask, tossing it aside, and then tugged off the sacking shrouding his head. That confirmed her suspicions irrefutably.
Greystone was the straw man.
Jennet took in the measure of her former love. He seemed much older than the young man she had known. New lines bracketed his mouth and rayed out from the corners of his eyes; a small scar divided one of his winged brows. Streaks of silver glinted in the black hair at his temples, making him look more like this father than ever. The beard shadow that blued his jawline appeared quite heavier. His mouth had thinned and grown harder; his eyes had become hooded. He had been everything handsome when he had promised to wed her, but now he looked too big and battered to be William Gerard.
What he looked like was dangerous.
“Miss Reed.”
“Baron Greystone.” Jennet would not curtsey to him even if all of her leg bones snapped, but there was no one to witness her rudeness. “Pray excuse me. My friends will be wondering where I have got to.”
“A moment, please.” His voice had grown softer and deeper over the years, and brushed like silk velvet against her ears. “I wish to speak to you.”
Of course, he did. What he assumed he had was her interest, which she should squash this moment. “We have nothing to say to each other, sir.”
“You need only listen.” He hesitated before he took his hand from her arm. “I apologize, Miss Reed, for leaving you at the church. Please understand that I never intended to do you harm.”
Sorry. He was sorry.
Jennet stared at him. For the life of her she could not imagine why he would say such a thing. The man who had fled Renwick for parts unknown, never to return until tonight, thought he must now express regret to her. The lover who had convinced her to accept his heart before smashing hers so thoroughly, had decided to offer an apology. The cad who left her to face alone their families and friends and neighbors without even an inkling as to why he had fled, felt remorseful. Never mind that he had treated her with such contempt. He imagined these words would be enough to make up for what he had done to her. After all this time.
She had not gone mad. He had.
Almost as if she stood outside herself, Jennet could measure the rage that had been building inside her, which presently rose so quickly it burned through every feeling, every thought, every particle of her being. Once a small, eternal ember of resentment, perhaps, now grew to the like of an inferno. She felt curiously in awe of such scalding, destroying emotion; she would surely burst into flame at any moment. Dimly she heard the clatter of her fan as it dropped from her hand.
She had nothing to say to him, but everything to do.
“Jenny, do not–” was all he got out before he ducked to avoid her fist.
Jennet would have tried to hit him again, but he seized her as he straightened, and dragged her up against him. That he dared have the audacity to put his hands on her and press her to him astounded her. He behaved as if they had remained in love and married and never wished to be parted from each other. As if she belonged to him.
“You will release me, sir,” Jennet told the front of his shirt. “This instant.”
“I knew this to be a mistake.” He sounded as if he were talking to himself now. “I meant to keep my distance. I only thought… You have every right to hate me for what I did.”
“Hate you?” she echoed as she looked up into his evil, beautiful green eyes. “I could kill you.”
Greystone stared down at her as if she were a stranger. “Very nearly you did.”
“I think I should remember if I had tried.” Why could she not wrench herself away from him? He was holding her too tightly. “I wish to return to the ball.” When he kept his hands on her she gritted her teeth. “Let go of me, Liam, or I will scream.”
He did not let her go; indeed, he pressed her closer. Jennet could not bring her arms up to pummel him, so she opened her mouth and drew in a deep breath. In the next moment he covered it with his, muffling her shriek of fury with a kiss so carnal she should have fainted from the shock of being thus treated.
She would swoon later.
The night dissolved around Jennet as she clutched the rough fabric of his shirt, and then worked her hands up into his hair. Whoever had become Greystone no longer held her; this was Liam. The taste of him, the feel of his tongue, the heat of his breath mingling with hers, every part of the embrace hurled her back in time. Through the old silk of her costume she could feel his body hardening against hers, from the swell of his chest to the ridge of his manhood. Welcoming such desire made her own breasts pebble and ache, and her body soften as the onslaught of sensation radiated through her, snuffing out her wrath and replacing it with a need far more urgent.
Now she became his Jenny.
Greystone muttered something as he reached behind her, hefted her up against him and began to stride across the garden path. Jennet clung to him, hands and lips and legs, for she knew if she relinquished his kiss and took her hands from his long, thick mane she would collapse into a heap of ruin, never again to rise. Yes, thi
s surely would end her, but such a glorious way to die.
Seven long, endless, barren years she had yearned for this.
She heard him yank open a door, sending a waft of warmer air over them both. She smelled flowers and greenery as he kicked the same door shut behind him. He swept his arm across something, and things rolled and shattered. He perched her on the cleared surface, and only then wrenched his mouth from hers.
Would he apologize again? If he did, she might truly have to take those gardening shears and stab him in his miserable heart.
Greystone regarded her for a long moment, and then his hands dropped between them. With one he gathered and tugged up her skirts and petticoats while the other busied itself with the front of his breeches. His movements, hurried yet graceful, silently attested to his familiarity with such activities. He meant to do what would be considered worse than abandoning her at the altar.
Fortunately there is no church filled with people to see your disgrace this time.
Jennet ignored the scathing whisper of her sensibility as she watched his eyes. His expression darkened as he exposed her legs, pushing the old silk up around her waist. It bemused her that he would apologize while intent on adding to her ruin— only this did not seem especially intentional.
No, Greystone appeared rather possessed by demons at present.
Knowing he would find no other hindrance beneath her skirts to bar him from having his way with her, Jennet knew the time had come to put an end to this. She must protest, scold him, plead with him, beg him to stop. Perhaps hit him again and bring him to his senses. Something had to at least be said. Why could she say nothing?
There is no more to say, her heart assured her, and everything to do.
In the end her body decided the matter. Jennet saw her hands reaching to help him, and felt the long, hard length of him come into her fingers. All iron swathed in thick satin, his cock swelled even larger as she caressed him. How splendid he was, all man, all wanting her. Nothing felt as good or right as shifting forward and parting her knees wide as she guided him to her slick, throbbing softness. The moment the heavy plum of his crown touched her he went rigid, and she curled her fingers around his shaft.
Greystone took firm hold of Jennet’s throat, almost as if he meant to strangle her, and then slowly pressed into her body with his, his gaze locked with hers.
At first, he seemed too large to occupy such a small space, even with the abundance of wetness with which she engulfed him. A pang of distress tried to part the heavy, dragging craving she suffered, and then became of no consequence. Jennet felt herself stretching around him, her body trembling in response to this wholly unfamiliar possession, but this seemed the way of it. She had never taken a man into herself; of course, there would be newness to the accommodation. Her instincts told her this was where he was meant to be, and nature had fashioned her to accept him there.
Greystone’s jaw tightened as he met resistance, something they both felt, and then it gave way with a brief yet startling, burning pain for Jennet. That soon faded as he pushed deeper, his hips moving in slow steadiness against her inner thighs, until he had joined their sexes entirely. Greystone dropped his hand and buried his face against her neck, his chest heaving as if he had just run to the village and back.
A curious tenderness filled Jennet, making sweeter the ache between her thighs.
Being thus penetrated, Jennet could also feel the beat of his heart ever so faintly inside her now. That pulsing made her clench around him, and she heard him groan against her neck. This pleased her, although she wasn’t certain as to why. Her legs curled around the backs of his, and she braced herself with one hand on the table under her as she reached for his face. When her thumb brushed against the hard line of his mouth, he pressed his tongue against her palm.
Such a luscious thing to do, Jennet thought, her head filling with all manner of unseemly notions. She wished them away from the hot house, alone together in a bed chamber where they might be naked together on a soft bed. There she would ply her mouth on his flesh in a like fashion, from the curve of his lower lip to the arch of his feet and back again. She wanted him to move inside her for hours and hours, and satisfy this infernal craving for his flesh pumping inside her quim. She gasped as he plunged deeper, and the motion set all of her insides to heating and quivering. Again, and again he thrust into her, until she thought she should beg him to stop until she could catch her breath.
Breath lost its urgency as something rose from her belly and engulfed her breasts, her heart, her head. That incandescent bliss consumed her as anger never could, and Jennet surrendered to and triumphed over him, entirely lost, utterly found.
Greystone pressed her face against his shoulder, muffling her cries as he struggled to contain his groans. They rumbled against her breasts as he drove to the deepest realm of her core, and there held himself as his cock jerked and jetted, filling her with his seed. The satiny warm wetness mingled with her own, and when he drew away she nearly begged him to stay inside her, where he alone would ever belong, he alone would ever again be welcomed.
He kept one arm around her as he pressed a handkerchief between her thighs, and Jennet felt a glimmer of renewed arousal to watch him tend to her so gently. He then drew down her skirts, and attended to himself before fastening his breeches and stepping back from her, his eyes glittering with obvious gratification and no small amount of confusion. Carefully he took hold of her waist, and set her down on her feet.
Not a word had they spoken to each other since the kiss, Jennet thought absently. No expressions of affection, nor pledges of fidelity. An offer of marriage, she suspected, would not be forthcoming. He had taken what little she had kept from him, her innocence. He had done that so completely she would never again look upon any man as she once had.
No more to say, and now everything done.
Greystone might have spoken, had she waited and listened. Instead Jennet turned half toward the door, and then swung back, driving her fist directly into his face. This time she connected with his lordship’s countenance, and with gratifying force. The pain for herself also proved significant, but it seemed a fair price for the pleasure of hearing and feeling her knuckles ram against his nose and mouth. He staggered backward and collided with a shelf of seedlings, sending them crashing to the floor.
Should she hit him again? Her hand throbbed painfully, but the rest of her felt magnificent. No, she had dealt with him properly.
Jennet walked out to retrieve her fan and her mask, donning the latter. She smoothed her hair, and shook out her skirts before she walked up to the doors to the reception room, and stepped inside.
Chapter 9
From the windows overlooking the terrace Ruban watched the drama between Greystone and Jennet unfold. It brought back memories of another night recently spent in an old chateau, but not at a ball.
Jean-Pierre and his men had worked for three days on the traitor, who had been seen skulking from an officer’s tent. By the time Ruban arrived the prisoner’s features were no longer recognizable, and he bled from the ears as well as the nose and mouth.
“Without the cipher he could not read the messages,” Ruban said after listening to their reports. “What else did you find on him?”
Jean-Pierre held up a small glass vial filled with a cloudy liquid. “Poison, we think. He tried to drink it after he was captured.”
Such vials had been found on the bodies of other prisoners who had chosen death over torture. It had been whispered that all of them had been allies of the most ruthless, feared killer in France.
“I know you have met with the Raven,” Ruban told the traitor, using a soothing tone. “Tell me his name.”
The lie was one told to every captive in hopes of provoking a reaction, although it had not yet worked. This time the prisoner stiffened, and then looked away.
Being so close to finding the most hunted man in France made Ruban caress the battered face with real affection. “Tell me who he is, and wh
ere I may find him, and I will set you free.”
“You cannot catch him,” the traitor said, his tone taunting. “By now he is home in England.”
“So, he is English.” They had long suspected as much. “Where does he live there? London?” Ruban took out a dagger and showed it to the traitor. “Answer me, or I will make you beg for death—for weeks.”
The prisoner lunged forward, impaling himself on the blade, and gurgled out a laugh before he died.
“Arrest this man’s family, friends, and anyone who has been in his company,” Ruban ordered the men. “By the time I arrive in London, I want to know where the Raven’s home is.”
In the end it had been the traitor’s mistress who had confessed to seeing her lover write a message containing the words Renwick and Raven, which he had later handed off to another man in the streets of Paris. This startling information had been relayed to Ruban three days after the agent returned to England, but in the end the delay had helped more than hindered the search.
Now, had circumstances been slightly different, seeing Baron Greystone kiss and carry off Jennet Reed would have amused Ruban. Instead it proved yet another obstacle.
Still, the situation could be remedied.
Ruban slipped out of the house through the door in the pantry where deliveries were brought in, and donned a matte black wool cloak before entering a tree grove across from the staircase tower. There Jean-Pierre stepped out from behind a wide trunk, his axe tucked into his belt and a pistol in each hand.
“I’ve changed the plan,” Ruban told him. “As soon as the guests and the servants leave for the night, come in through the tower door. I will be waiting in the study.”
“You cannot fool de Raven,” Jean-Pierre pointed out, and gestured at Ruban’s costume. “You stay behind, he know.”