Mistletoe Mistress

by Nicola Davidson

  Probably a protector, then.

  Sick to his stomach, Arran advanced on the man, his fists clenched. “Jarrow?”

  The visitor inclined his head. “Kyle.”

  “I understand you wish to speak with me about a personal matter. Regarding—”

  “Regarding Rachel. Yes.”

  A shudder passed through Arran, so intense he nearly collapsed onto the marble floor, and he had to brace himself with a hand on the wall. “She…she is alive?”

  Jarrow’s hard stare softened. “Alive and well. Forgive me, Kyle, but you appear entirely out of sorts. When did you last sleep? Or bathe and change your clothes for that matter?”

  “Where is she?” Arran rasped, ignoring the questions. “Where is Rachel? I need to see her. Talk to her. I’ll pay whatever you want.”

  “I’m afraid I can’t allow that, my lord. Not until I know your intentions toward my sister.”

  The word had all the power of a cannonball to the solar plexus. “Sister? But Rachel told me she didn’t have any siblings.”

  “She didn’t know about me until very recently. Or I her. Technically, Rachel is my half-sister, but she is entirely beloved. So, I ask you again, Lord Kyle, what are your intentions? And may I add, I know you shared a bed with her at the inn, and I am ready to run you through for that alone.”

  Arran tilted his head. Jarrow might be smaller and softer than him, but he could only admire that kind of fierce loyalty and protectiveness. Little did he know threats were unnecessary. “My intentions are, Lord Jarrow, to marry your sister and cherish her the rest of our days. I would have told her about my title, and the damned betrothal contract I had to end before we could be together properly, but there was a misunderstanding over a note at the inn, and she disappeared into the fog. So, if you will just tell me where she is, I can call off the search parties. Oh yes, and sleep and bathe and change clothing.”

  “I am here, my lord.”

  Arran sucked in a sharp breath. There she stood, framed in his drawing room doorway.

  Rachel was really here. In his home.

  Safe.

  Safe and beautiful. So damned beautiful and lush…wearing the brown cloak he had purchased for her at the dressmaker’s shop near the inn.

  His vision blurred, forcing him to pinch the bridge of his nose to halt a most unseemly display of emotion. Then his feet were marching toward her, and her heels were clicking on the marble floor as she ran to him with a choked cry and flung herself into his arms.

  “Kitten,” he said hoarsely, struggling to get any further words out past the boulder in his throat at the feel of her wrapped around him at last, right where she belonged. “You’re home.”

  She cuddled close, wetting the linen of his shirt with tears. Unable to bear her distress, he gently wiped them away with his thumbs before kissing her, his lips devouring hers, his tongue demanding entry into her mouth. She surrendered with a carnal moan, rubbing her breasts against his chest in the familiar way that signaled her need to be mastered at once.

  “A-hem.”

  They both stilled and looked guiltily at Jarrow, but Arran refused to let Rachel go. “My lord?”

  The other man looked a little green around the gills, but to be fair, it was his sister being kissed senseless. “As Rachel’s guardian, in regard to propriety…oh do cease and desist, Kyle, that deadly glare is wasted on me…I shan’t insist on separating you until marriage. However, I propose a meeting at my townhouse tomorrow to discuss terms, followed by a prompt visit to the archbishop for a special license. A very prompt visit. I shall return to my Celia now. Good day.”

  Jarrow bowed and left the townhouse, and Arran immediately took the opportunity to kiss his woman senseless again. Rachel’s brother had been correct, separation would be pointless. This would be her home now, and she would reign here as Marchioness of Kyle, and his adored submissive lover in bed.

  “I thought,” he said eventually, his voice so low and gritty with relief it damned near rumbled, “that I might have to duel him to find you. But he insists on a wedding, and a fast one at that.”

  Rachel’s cheeks went pink. “Well, ah…”

  He leaned back a little. “What is it?”

  “It would be better if we married quickly. I, um…missed my bleeding.”

  “You’re with child?” he said, awed and thrilled at the thought.

  “I might be. I cannot bear the scent of meat cooking anymore, and coddled eggs turn my stomach. It is your fault entirely, my lord, coming so hard inside me like you did,” she finished with an impudent grin.

  “I did, didn’t I?” he mused, pure joy sweeping through him like a spring tide.

  “But you should have told me you were really a marquess. And about that contract with Lady Sarah. When I thought you were married and only wanted me for bed sport…”

  “It made you think that history would repeat? Your mother and the previous Lord Jarrow, I take it?”

  “Yes. She died in childbed, and he abandoned me to a foundling hospital. Harry didn’t know he had a sister until he found some papers in his father’s desk. Does that…does that change things for you? That I am illegitimate?” she asked, biting her lip.

  “No. Never. You are not responsible for your father’s actions. Although I must add, it is just as well he is dead. For what he did to you and your mother…”

  Rachel smiled. “He is not important. Not now. Not when I have a brother, and sister-in-law, and a niece or nephew about to be born. And best of all…I have you.”

  “Almost, madam,” he growled. “But first we need to discuss the consequences of your running away from the inn and frightening twenty years from my life.”

  “Consequences?” she repeated, looking up at him with wide, hopeful eyes.

  “Indeed. Stern correction is required. Upstairs.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  The marquess’s bedchamber was by far the most luxurious she’d ever seen in her life. Walls covered in cream silk, surrounded by dark wooden paneling, and woven rugs on the floor so thick and soft her feet sank into them. In one corner sat a large desk, piled high with leather-bound books, papers, and inkpot and quill, in another there was a polished stone fireplace with a healthy golden-red blaze, and two overstuffed chairs and a low card table in front of it. But the enormous four-poster bed dominated the room, intricately carved from what looked like mahogany, and made up with linen so fine it would be like sleeping on water.

  At the present time, Rachel stood naked and bound to the left end post, her legs spread, while Arran teased her bottom and thighs with a new riding crop he’d fetched from a locked armoire in his dressing room. He’d refused to gag her today, saying he wanted to hear every whimper and sigh and moan she made for him. But even as Arran promised heaven, he withheld it. The light tickling of the leather crop as it danced across her skin was a torment when she craved the perfect union of pain and pleasure like he’d shown her at the inn.

  “Harder,” she begged. “Like before. So my backside is holly berry-red!”

  In response his touch lightened further, the end of the crop barely brushing the soaked thatch of curls guarding her mound, and cruelly avoiding her throbbing clitoris entirely. “Oh? You think you deserve to come, do you, kitten?”

  “Y-yes.”

  “I disagree. You left me. Do you know how worried I was, thinking you might have been hurt in the snowstorm?”

  Rachel rested her forehead against the cool, smooth wood of the bedpost. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, and the crop flicked the fleshy curve of her bottom, making her gasp in delight.

  “I’m listening.”

  “I was so happy. We talked and laughed together so easily, and the way you tended to me, spanked me, taught me to take your cock in my mouth and swallow your seed, and later when you bedded me…Oh God, the way it felt when you came deep inside my cunt…ahhh…” she paused on a low cry as leather kissed skin, hard enough to sting. “…I was so sure you wanted to marry me.”
>
  “I do,” he said, teasing her again with another brush of her nether curls. “And will.”

  “But then came that note. And your footman said that everyone was pleased you had found a nice mistress and that a mistress and wife should get along, and if we did everyone would be happy…oh God oh yes…”

  Rachel panted for breath and sank back down onto the rug. That strike had been his firmest yet, forcing her up onto her tiptoes, and causing more spicy juices to trickle down her inner thighs.

  “Unfortunately, Jimmy has the brains of a turnip,” said Arran irritably. “But rather than allowing me to explain, you ran away.”

  “I was devastated. And afraid that I had gotten everything wrong, and you didn’t care for me.”

  “Incorrect,” he snapped, and Rachel shrieked as two stern blows landed on her upper thighs in quick succession.

  “So, I ran. Back to Lady Farringdon’s school. Where I worked. Yes, worked. As a maid. That’s what I’ve done my whole life. Cleaned. Been nobody and nothing. Until I met you, and became Mrs. Elliott, and learned about tenderness, and pleasure and discipline and how it could make me whole…”

  Her voice trailed off, and abruptly she couldn’t speak or think at all, only feel, as the riding crop swished and thwacked again and again on her bottom. Right up on her tiptoes again, Rachel could only sob and cling to the bedpost as the delicious and most welcome pain jolted through her. With each harsh, expert blow, more and more of her soft flesh burned and prickled, cleansing her mind of sorrow and hurt, and freeing her spirit to soar.

  “And so, Rachel?”

  Tears of joy and gratitude and relief rolling down her face, she turned her head and looked up at him. “I love you.”

  A primitive sound tore from Arran’s throat. He stared at her for the longest moment, his gaze so fiercely tender she could scarcely breathe, as he tossed away the crop and tore the buttons on his trousers. Seconds later her bindings were in pieces on the floor, and she sat astride him on the bed, moaning in ecstasy as she sank down onto his engorged cock.

  “Take me, kitten,” he gritted out, holding her tightly as he forced himself deeper into her soaked, greedy cunt. “Take all of me. That’s it. You feel so damned good. So hot and tight and wet.”

  Rachel arched her back, and he captured one taut nipple in his mouth, sucking hard and scraping with his teeth. She cried out, anchoring her hands on his shoulders as a maelstrom of sensation threatened to overwhelm her, rocking against him, desperate for more, desperate for the orgasm just dancing out of her reach. Then his hands moved, one finger shallowly penetrating her back entrance, while the thumb of his other hand pressed hard on her clitoris, and her world exploded in a white-hot flash of pure pleasure. “Arran!”

  “Yes, come for me. All over my cock. Christ, yes,” he groaned, thrusting brutally hard as she writhed against him, the wild pulses of her orgasm continuing on and on, radiating out like a sunburst from her center. And just when the intensity began to dim, he came inside her in harsh, wracking spurts that lasted and lasted, and she screamed as it set her going again.

  Eventually, Arran fell back on the bed, taking her with him. Rachel ripped his shirt in her haste to cuddle against his bare chest, reveling in the scents and sounds of passion, their panting breaths, their frantically beating hearts, the way their slick bodies slid against each other.

  Nothing had ever been so perfect.

  Until he brushed a stray curl away from her face and kissed her. “You are so beautiful,” he said quietly. “Rachel Lindsay, soon to be Lady Kyle. I knew you were special from the moment we met. So bold and wicked. And yet so sweet. But then I learned you were brave and strong. I have never admired anyone the way I admire you. I know you will be a wonderful wife and the most magnificent mother. This little one we made together will know nothing but care and security. Together we’ll make this townhouse a home for our family. However. You are not permitted to run away again. My heart couldn’t take it.”

  She smiled through her tears. “I solemnly promise. Now say it. Tell me you love me back.”

  “Disobedient kitten, issuing an order,” he growled, but his gray eyes were shining.

  “Tell me!”

  His arms tightened around her, warm and protective. “I love you, my mistletoe mistress. And I’ll only love you more tomorrow, when you are my marchioness.”

  “Tomorrow?” she said, startled.

  “That’s right. Life is too precious. We aren’t going to waste a single moment.”

  And they didn’t.

  December 1814

  * * *

  Glaring ferociously at the paper in front of him, Arran tapped his quill against the oak desk in his library. He’d probably used a quart of ink attempting to write this bloody speech on wheat and barley crops alone, but he was determined to be a knowledgeable voice in the House for farmers. So many of the peers who stood up and made decisions on behalf of those who lived beyond London’s outskirts had never set foot in a field, and it irritated him no end. Nor had they thought about how investment in land and improvements in tools would result in greater production and wealth. Some laughed and called him Farmer Kyle behind his back, but he had the ledgers and contented tenants to prove his ideas worked. Yet he needed to get the damned speech written, for he would be testing it on a few of the friends he’d made when half the ton descended on his home later tonight for the festive pre-Christmas ball he and Rachel were hosting. There would be dancing and card games, a feast, and even a small group of wassailers as a nod to their inn, but thankfully he’d managed to dissuade his wife from her plan to include mummers and jugglers. Even the thought of the Prince Regent, Prime Minister, or an Almack’s patroness being knocked unconscious by an ill-directed club was enough to give him palpitations.

  “Are you sure I can’t change your mind about the mummers?”

  Arran glanced up from his speech at Rachel’s wheedling words, and as usual, took a moment to savor the delectable sight of her hip-swaying, breast-bobbing entrance into a room. While his wife now had an extensive and lavish wardrobe that fitted just so, much like their stolen moments at the Queen’s Standard, she continued to amuse, delight and challenge him both in bed and out. At least once a day he congratulated himself on marrying the most perfect woman in England. “Not a chance, kitten. We want to ensure that everyone returns home unmaimed, even the Prince Regent. Your juggling is entirely too unpredictable.”

  “Ha,” said Rachel, perching on the corner of his desk and smoothing her dark green gown. “I can think of no one who requires an accidental club to the head more than the future king.”

  “Be that as it may,” he replied as he put down his quill, utterly distracted by her nearness, “we’ll let someone else take care of that. I’m not sure he has forgiven you yet for beating him soundly at whist the last time he was here. And you know how he holds a grudge. Far more importantly, how is my daughter?”

  “I was about to ask you that exact question.”

  Arran tugged on his abruptly too-tight cravat. “How would I know?”

  Rachel’s lips twitched. “Do not give me that innocent look, husband. I’m well aware that while I was attending the hospital fundraising committee meeting with Celia, you were upstairs ahem offering advice to the vastly experienced nursery maids regarding Cassie’s favorite lullaby. And cloth doll. And how best to rock her to sleep.”

  Well. It was hardly his fault that two-month-old Lady Cassandra Elliott, named for Rachel’s mother and not only the most beautiful baby ever born but already exhibiting signs of genius, preferred his shoulder above all else for her napping spot. And sure, while it might be unfashionable for a father to spend more than a few minutes in the nursery, how else was he to witness those important moments? Such as when she gazed up at him with wide hazel eyes just like her mother’s and cooed what sounded remarkably like an attempt to say Papa?

  “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” he said repressively.

  His marchioness
leaned forward and looked deep into his eyes. “You’ll have to repeat that, sorry. It sounded like cluck cluck cluck.”

  “Beg pardon?”

  “You heard me. Hmmm, or perhaps you didn’t. I mean you are thirty-one now. Positively ancient.”

  Arran leaned back in his chair and tilted his head. “If I didn’t know better, my lady, I might think you were trying to provoke me in the hope of discipline.”

  She batted her long lashes. “Who, me?”

  “Yes, you.”

  “Because it has been entirely too long since I had a spanking or cropping,” she replied with an adorably disgruntled pout. “I am quite recovered from Cassie’s birth. And there is time before we need to start getting dressed for the ball.”

  Arran stifled a groan as his cock began to throb. “Is there, now?”

  “So much time,” she whispered. “And…ah…after the meeting Celia and I found a discreet shop in Piccadilly that sells very naughty things to ladies of quality. I didn’t want to know what she bought for her and Harry, because ugh, but I purchased a few little items.”

  “Items such as?”

  “A blindfold. Some scented oil. And…a small leather dildo that the shop assistant said would be just perfect for my bottom. I thought that sounded quite interesting, having two places filled at once.”

  “So,” he said slowly, taking her hand and rubbing his thumb against the inside of her wrist, his cock now straining against his trousers. “Not only have you been provocative in speech, but also in deeds.”

  Rachel tried to nod sadly, the effect utterly ruined by an eager smile. “I have.”

  “Then I have no choice but to administer a stern spanking.”

  She whimpered. “No choice at all, sir.”

  Unable to stop himself, Arran cupped her cheek and brushed a kiss across her lips. “I love you, Rachel. My marchioness…and my mistletoe mistress.”