‘She’s where you’ll never find her,’ Will hissed with a show of defiance, but when he felt the cold steel of the barrel press against his chest, fear overrode his brief show of bravery. ‘All right,’ he growled. ‘She’s here—upstairs.’
Without relinquishing his position, Stephen ordered Fergus to fetch the constables and to tell them that Lord Fitzwaring required their urgent assistance in Maiden Yard.
It was with reluctance that Fergus left to do his bidding, for he would dearly have liked to stay and dole out his own kind of punishment on Will Kelly.
Unable to wait another second, Delphine immediately began to climb the narrow flight of stairs, lit by the occasional candle in sconces on the crumbling walls, pausing at the top to look around. Meticulously she went from room to room, each occupied by an unsavoury assortment of scantily clad women who made Will Kelly his fortune. Just when she was beginning to despair of finding Maisie, she spied her in the last cold and filthy room. The girl lay on a bed, her face to the wall. Her body was hunched, her knees drawn up to her chin. She looked so small and vulnerable.
‘Maisie?’
The child turned her head, distraught and terrified. On seeing Delphine she uttered a cry and scrambled off the bed, flying into her arms and clinging desperately to her.
‘You found me,’ she wept, as Delphine held her trembling young body close. ‘Please don’t let him get me.’
‘He won’t—I promise.’ Holding Maisie at arm’s length, Delphine bent and looked close into her eyes. ‘Maisie, tell me—did he—hurt you?’
She shook her head. ‘No, but I was frightened.’
Delphine gathered her close, a sense of relief overwhelming her. ‘Oh, bless you. Thank goodness we found you. Now come along—I shall take you home.’
Together they descended the stairs. Stephen still had Will Kelly pinned to the wall, frightened to move, for he knew from the look in Fitzwaring’s eyes that he wouldn’t hesitate to shoot him if he tried to make a run for it.
‘How is Maisie? Did he hurt her?’ Stephen asked quickly, his face darkening. ‘Because if he did…’
‘No, she is merely shaken,’ Delphine replied, standing aside when Fergus entered the house accompanied by two constables.
With relief Stephen handed over his prisoner, explaining as they fastened the manacles to his wrists that his crime was the kidnapping of a juvenile and the possible murder of her mother.
When the constables had led Will Kelly away, Stephen took Delphine’s hand and kissed it, then bent forwards and kissed her cheek. ‘I am very proud of you, Delphine. Most women would have had hysterics at the thought of entering a district such as this.’
‘That wouldn’t have done any of us any good. I was just so afraid Will Kelly might have harmed her.’ Delphine looked at Fergus. ‘Thank you, Fergus. Thank goodness the constables weren’t long in coming.’
‘I didn’t have to look very far. With any luck they’ll lock him up for a long time. He’ll not be troubling Maisie again. Will Kelly will harm no more young girls.’ He looked at Maisie huddled against Delphine. ‘Young Maisie?’ he asked anxiously.
‘Apart from being terrified out of her wits, she’s unharmed. Thank God we found her in time.’
‘That’s all right, then,’ he said gruffly, more relieved than he was letting on. ‘I’d best be getting back to Mrs Cox’s. There’ll be the devil to pay when she finds I’ve deserted my post.’
‘I’m sure when you explain where you’ve been she’ll go easy on you, Fergus. Mrs Cox always had a soft spot for Meg. She wouldn’t wish harm on her daughter any more than you would.’
After thanking Fergus and pressing some money into his palm, Stephen led Delphine and Maisie back to the waiting carriage. Delphine sat quietly in the corner on their return journey to Mayfair. Holding Maisie in her arms, she stared out of the window, her gaze unfocused. Stephen could see she was tired. There were shadows beneath her eyes and her exquisite face was pale. After attending the Chevington ball and anticipating a wonderful night of lovemaking ahead of them, they had been thrown into a nightmare.
They had spoken of nothing but Maisie and rescuing her from Will Kelly’s evil clutches, but Delphine seemed to have become softer in her distress for the young girl. He admired her compassion—how she was willing to put her own feelings aside and stand loyally and protectively next to those who needed her. He also admired her independence of spirit and intelligence, and he adored the vulnerability and softness within her. She was the embodiment of everything he liked in a woman—she was feminine without being vapid or helpless, proud without being haughty, assertive without being aggressive—and he had fallen hopelessly in love with her.
* * *
Not a trace of light penetrated the heavy velvet curtains in the master bedroom as the two people within removed each other’s clothes. Slowly, expertly, Stephen unfastened Delphine’s gown, freeing her arms from the sleeves, and he pulled the bodice slowly down over her hips. She kicked off her shoes before stepping out of it. Removing the rest of their clothes, they became entangled in their haste to get between the snowy-white sheets. Having removed her filmy underclothes, Delphine tumbled on to the bed, gazing up at her husband who stood tall and naked. He slowly perused her curving form, soft skin pale and lustrous in the gentle light.
Bending on one knee upon the edge of the mattress, Stephen leaned across the bed, bracing an arm on either side of her, admiring her attractive features and softly parted lips, but the temptation to do more than look proved stronger than his power to resist.
Gazing up at him, Delphine raised her hand and stroked the black curls from his face. Her eyes were drawn to his mouth. She wanted him so badly. Threading slender fingers through the short, raven strands at his nape, she drew his head down to hers, kissing his mouth softly, before moving on to caress his cheeks, her lips as light as a butterfly’s wings, before returning to his mouth.
Following her lead, Stephen’s mouth responded by kissing her back, moving on down her creamy throat; soon he was savouring the sweetness of a delicately hued breast. Moaning softly, Delphine arched her back to receive the best of his attention. He gave it eagerly, his fingers continuing their fervent dedication until she was all but writhing beneath his tender assault.
‘Please, Stephen,’ she begged with an agonised groan, running her hands down his muscled back as warmth glowed and spread through her body. ‘I don’t think I can stand much more. I think I’m going to faint.’
Pressing her down flat upon the bed, he leaned above her and looked down into eyes that had grown luminous with desire. ‘Would you really have me stop now?’ he murmured, stroking from her breast to her belly, moving down between her legs.
‘Don’t you dare,’ she whispered, the scent of his cologne drifting through her senses. She gazed at him with something like awe, and she knew that she loved him, knew that she had dreamed of this moment and couldn’t believe it was finally here after two long years.
She lay quivering beneath his touch until she could stand it no longer and pulled his face down to hers to kiss him again, their mouths and tongues joining in an avaricious search. It was as if her body had been made for this, had been shaped and created specifically for the giving and receiving of this pleasure.
With their arms entwined, they rolled to one side, their bodies bathed in a dim, red-gold glow. Delphine’s hair spilled all over him like a waterfall. She ran her fingers over the taut muscles of his belly, making him moan low in the back of his throat. He reached out with both hands to stroke her hips, her back. Sliding out of his grasp, she bent to scatter hungry kisses across his chest, biting, licking, brushing her lips against the soft hairs that formed a denser line leading down from his navel to his groin. With a soft groan, he took her head and pulled her closer. She could feel his heart beating fast against hers, then he
rolled her over like a pebble on the shore, so that he was above her once more, lying between her legs, but holding back so she almost cried out for him to enter her as his maleness awakened that part of her that was most sensitive to stimulation.
Chuckling softly at her mounting impatience, Stephen yielded to her urgings and pressed fully home, causing her breath to catch in the onrushing waves of pleasure that almost swamped her. It was sweet, sweet torment, delirium and bliss, a torture that must end in sanity or shatter. She held him to her, flesh filling flesh, his strong and firm, hers soft as velvet, she clutching, clinging, her body arching to meet him, to bring him closer still until the oblivion of ecstasy claimed them both. Their skin was warm, moist with perspiration, hair damp, breathing deep, then they slept.
In the night there was more loving, not as frenzied, but lethargic, leisurely. Arms and legs entwined, they slept again.
* * *
In the morning when a thin pale light filtered into the room, they smiled at each other. Delphine felt him grow hard and she shifted beneath him; then there was more splendid love, joyous, beautiful love.
Later, steam clouding the bathing chamber, where a long copper bathtub dominated the room and was spacious enough to comfortably accommodate them both, Delphine lounged back contentedly against her husband’s chest as he lathered the tempting terrain of her body with scented soap, marvelling at how pale and lustrous her skin looked in comparison to his.
‘You seem distracted, my love,’ he said, bending his head to nibble the fleshy lobe of her ear, thinking her a fetching sight with her hair piled on her head, a few loose curls dropping coyly to her shoulders, her body sleek and glistening with droplets of scented water.
Delphine’s eyes were cast down to his assets, those same assets with which he had afforded her so much pleasure throughout the night. ‘I fear you are right, Stephen,’ she replied, laughing lightly, turning her head and pecking his grinning lips. ‘I fear I shall suffer from such a distraction whenever you are near. I sincerely hope you don’t expose yourself before other women as casually as you do with me.’
‘What you see is yours alone,’ he assured her, carefully avoiding any mention of past involvements. ‘I always assumed a certain degree of experience was needed for lovemaking to be at its best—now I find in that I was wrong. I have never tasted joy so sweet as that which you have given me.’
‘You are not alone.’ She smiled, turning her head and gazing at him with love. ‘I regret having wasted so much time.’
‘You beseeched me not to touch you, remember? Because of the circumstances that forced you into marriage, you played the avenging angel and I had to abide by your wishes and stand by helplessly whilst you feasted on my heart. You swung your hips and smiled and tossed your head to tease my eyes from their sockets and were so damned tempting I nearly took you by force a thousand times.’
She laid her cheek against his shoulder and ran her fingers idly through the damp hair on his chest. ‘It had nothing to do with what happened in London, Stephen. I laid that to rest when you were in Spain.’
He looked puzzled. ‘Then perhaps you’d care to enlighten me, for your insistence upon celibacy escapes me at present.’
‘The night we were together in the Blue Boar aroused feelings in me that I didn’t know how to deal with.’
‘What kind of feelings?’
‘Wanton feelings. I found them shocking. After that I could not trust myself around you and that desire, rather than anger, was at the root of my resistance. And—I thought you were in love with another woman—a woman you were close to in Spain. You told me you despised the ideals romantics call love. I felt that not only must I love, but I must be loved equally in return.’ She sighed. ‘I became trapped by my own nature. You see, I could not bear to lose you.’
The smile faded from Stephen’s face and Delphine felt his body tense against hers. Each word she had spoken was like a knife thrust into his heart. With her eyes cast down, she looked dejected, like a child. When he spoke his voice was gentle.
‘You do me a grave injustice, Delphine, to imply that I would love another woman when you are my wife. There is no other woman—but when I first went to Spain I did possess those ideals you spoke of. I met a girl—a Spanish girl called Maria. I knew her father and visited their house. He was not a well man; he worried for his daughter’s future, and thrust us together. She was beautiful and appeared shy and innocent. I thought I loved her. I proposed to her. Respecting her innocence, I never laid a hand on her, but on the eve of our wedding I discovered she was pregnant with another man’s child—a man who was married to another, a man she told me she would continue to take to her bed after we were married. I left her then, but later I was set upon by a group of thugs and beaten senseless. I can still hear Maria laughing as they left me for dead. Some of my friends found me and I recovered. Perhaps now you know why I lost faith in that which you call love.’
All the colour had left Delphine’s face. When she spoke, her voice was heavy with sadness. ‘Stephen, why did you not tell me this at the beginning? I understand your cynicism, but it has nothing to do with us.’
‘I realise that now. At the time I was shocked to realise how close I had come to losing control and I vowed that my emotions would never again be engaged by a woman. I wanted none of their treachery and deceit.’
‘But I am not Maria.’
‘No, indeed, and I thank God for it. You are nothing like her. I love you to distraction, Delphine. Your belief in my duplicity, however, explains a great deal—for one thing, your behaviour at the Saracen’s Head that day.’ He spoke quietly. ‘I think it mattered very much to you.’
She raised her head and turned slightly to meet his gaze, her breasts glistening with droplets of water. ‘It did. How I wish now that I had not let my pride keep you away.’
He lifted a brow. ‘What made you suspect there was someone else?’
‘From something Mr Oakley told me when first we met, I knew you had a woman in Spain—that she was there to tend you when you were wounded in Salamanca. And then when you came back and all the correspondence from Spain kept coming, you were often distracted and preoccupied—and when you were ill—when you were delirious—you talked of your love for a woman—a woman called Angelet. It was plain she meant a great deal to you—that you loved her.’
He frowned thoughtfully. ‘Angelet? I know no woman by that name. If I was as delirious as you say and I spoke of loving a woman, then that woman was you, Delphine. Angelet is the Cornish name for angel. I always referred to you as my angel. I am astonished that you could so easily believe in me loving another, although it does explain why you once accused me of being a hypocrite, when I said that, had I not come back from Spain, you would have moved on and married someone else.’
‘I would never have done that.’
‘Maybe not, but there would have been no reason for you to remain at Tamara had I been killed in action. The letters that keep coming are about military matters—I may be discharged, but there are still issues to be dealt with, hence my visit to Woolwich when we arrived in London. And the woman who assisted Oakley in tending me in Salamanca was a good woman, but she was fat, homely and a grandmother of ten.’
Delphine’s heart began to beat with such joy it quite alarmed her. He had said that there was no one else, that she was the woman he loved. It was just too incredible for words.
‘How foolish I have been. I see that now. It was because I loved you so much—there were times when I couldn’t bear it.’
‘I’m sorry, my darling. If I appeared distracted it was because of what I had seen.’
‘Tell me,’ she urged gently. ‘Tell me what it was that made you want to leave the army.’
‘In truth, my love, I don’t know when that bleak realisation came over me, but when I left you and returned to m
y regiment, things were never the same. I missed you and I resented the army for keeping me from you. It was at Badajoz when my disillusionment reached its zenith. We lost a thousand men in January at Ciudad Rodrigo, and after that we marched on Badajoz. We lost over five thousand men. That was when everything became too real, when I was brought into personal contact with some of the simple facts of life, of how brave and gallant men can become infected with madness and behave with sickening savagery.
‘The French troops were treated honourably as prisoners, but where the local population was concerned, the very same people we had come to liberate were beaten, raped, killed and robbed. After that I knew it was over for me. It was only later, when you wrote and told me of the birth of Lowenna, that I noted she was born on the very day of that battle.’
Tears misted Delphine’s eyes. Listening to him speaking quietly of his torment, she had felt his pain. There was little she could say to comfort him. The memories he carried were heavy for him to bear, but she hoped that with the passing of time they would fade.
‘I did not wish to press you to tell me about Spain. I did not want to disturb the delicate balance between us—that seemed more important than any questions I might want answered. But I wanted to know. Why did you not tell me when I asked you about it that day we rode to the Saracen’s Head?’
‘I drew back from such confidences. I wished neither to burden you nor to reveal myself as a man suddenly disappointed in his chosen career.’
‘I am sorry. Knowing how important the army has always been to you, I realise how hard that must have been. It would seem we have both been foolish.’
Placing a finger beneath her chin, he turned her head to face him, his dark-blue eyes aglow. ‘Indeed we have. I see our marriage was full of misunderstandings,’ he murmured. ‘You had the mistaken idea that there was another woman in my life and my desire for you had lessened—and I was sure you couldn’t bear my touch, that you’d fight me if I tried to have you. It’s strange how our minds have played against us. We should have followed our instincts.’ He bent his head and kissed her shoulder. ‘But it is over and time for a new beginning. Are you happy, my love?’
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