Violet shook her head, regret in her eyes. “My mother and I have a performance tomorrow.”
“The day after, then. I’ll come steal you away again. Though we’ll have to go by train all the way—I don’t think Monsieur Dupuis will let me near another balloon anytime soon.”
“Can we truly? You’re not lying to please me?”
“Of course not.” Daniel put on his best shocked voice, learned from the pile of nannies the Mackenzies employed. “I’d give up everything to whisk you away again, this time to repose at our leisure. I’m sure the innkeeper and his wife would be pleased to see Mr. and Mrs. Mackenzie back again.”
Violet’s eyes flickered, but she snuggled her head into his shoulder. “What will we do there?”
“All kinds of things, my Violet. Anything you want. Maybe I’ll show you just how many different ways a man can make a woman feel pleasure.”
“You would want to do that? I mean, I thought that men only sought . . .” Violet trailed off, as though unsure how to finish.
“Their own pleasure?” Daniel asked. “You’ve lived among Sassenachs too long. If a Scotsman tried to use a woman only for his pleasure, he’d get clouted about the head. Come to think of it, you clout pretty well yourself.”
“I said I was—”
Daniel pressed his fingers to her lips. “I was teasing. Not one more word about it.” He was glad to see, though, a sparkle of spiritedness return to her eyes. “I pushed you too fast and assumed you were hungry for the touch of Daniel Mackenzie. Never thought you’d try to kill me so hard, but I know now I frightened you.”
She nodded. “You did. I didn’t know what I was doing.”
“Are you still frightened of me? It’s all right if you are. I’m a terrifying man.”
Violet’s smile came. “Absolutely horrifying.”
“Good.” Daniel nuzzled her hair. “Because I’d like to keep on kissing you. This place has finally warmed, and I’m not ready for the city streets yet. Now, admit it, that was pleasure you were feeling, wasn’t it? Deep down, belly-clenching, blood-heating pleasure.”
She nodded. “I thought I was drowning.”
“You’re supposed to feel like that. As though your mooring has been ripped away, and you’re floundering in the water, not knowing if you’ll ever come up again. And not sure you want to.”
Violet nodded again, her hair moving on his shoulder. “Yes. Exactly like that.”
“You owe me a shilling.”
Another sparkle. “So, you were only after money, were you?”
Daniel pressed his hand to his heart, which was pounding. “You love to wound me, don’t you? I’m a master of pleasure. I’d give it for the fun of it, and damn the wager. But you’re not getting out of it that easily. I intend to collect.”
“Oh, do you? You’d rob a poor, defenseless Romany woman?”
Daniel liked how easily she fell into teasing with him. “You’re a fraud, Violet . . . whatever your name is.”
Violet only smiled again, keeping her secrets secret.
Daniel pulled her closer, sliding his hands around the black canvas bodice, which he itched to unlace. To hell with secrets, her past and his, pain and heartbreak. He had Violet with him tonight, hidden from the world. Here, Violet belonged to Daniel and he to her.
When he kissed her, Violet’s lips readily opened to him. They shared the warm, intimate kisses of lovers. Daniel had softened something inside her, broken a small chink in her wall. He’d break down the whole bloody thing if he had to.
Their lips moved together, mouths seeking and giving. Violet’s hand on his knee warmed him through the kilt.
When that hand slipped to land on Daniel’s aching, hard-as-a-rock cock, his entire world stopped.
Chapter 19
Daniel made himself go completely still. Violet was gazing at him in fear again, her hand frozen in place.
He knew any move might scare her away, undoing all the work they’d done here tonight. No matter how intensely Daniel wanted Violet, he had to leave what happened up to her.
“You do as you like.” Daniel smoothed a wisp of tangled hair from her face. “Just as you like.”
Violet kept her hand in place, neither exploring him nor pulling away. Indecision and terror chased each other through her eyes, but Daniel remained still. He was an expert on patience—horses needed patience, so did machines. Years with each had taught him much.
Violet kept her focus on his face, trying to read him as she always did. Her brow puckered as once again, she couldn’t.
Daniel wanted to tell her she couldn’t read him because he was open all the way down. Daniel didn’t have secrets—the only time he kept secrets was when truth would hurt someone. Otherwise, the depths of him were the same as his surface. Violet could look all she wanted, but she’d see only Daniel. He had nothing to hide.
Violet’s hand tightened around him through the kilt, her eyes stilling as she did so. Daniel swallowed a groan.
“I don’t know what to do,” she whispered.
“You won’t have to do very much for very long.”
Her look told him she wasn’t sure what Daniel meant. The man who’d stolen her innocence had taken still more—Violet’s trust, her curiosity, her ability to simply be with a man. Daniel would make him pay when he found him, and Daniel would find him.
Violet moved her hand again. Daniel groaned and gently took her wrist. “Wait, darlin’.” He drew out the pin at his waistband and pulled his kilt the rest of the way off, then settled the plaid over both of them, wrapping them in a blanket of wool.
“Now then. Explore as you like.”
Violet’s lips parted, but resolution joined the fear in her eyes. Slowly she slid her hand down Daniel’s torso, under the plaid.
When her fingertips brushed his cock, she drew a sharp breath and jerked her hand away. But she didn’t give up. Violet reached out again, another quick touch, then another, as a person might do when worried an object would give an electric shock. Each touch lasted a little longer than the last, until finally Violet let her fingers rest fully on him.
This had to be the hardest thing Daniel had ever done—keeping himself motionless, letting Violet find the courage to continue on her own. She had to do it, or she’d be forever uncertain.
Daniel saw Violet’s panic flare again, but she drew a deep breath and mastered it. Hesitantly, she closed her fingers all the way around him.
Daniel let out a faint groan. He stretched his arms across the sofa’s back, fists clenched, and closed his eyes.
Violet rested against his shoulder, her fingers moving a little. “When I do this, does it make you feel exactly the way you made me feel?”
Daniel swallowed another noise of desperation. “I’ve not made a scientific study of it, but yes, I think it does.”
“Oh.”
“Oh is a good way of putting it. Vi, you’re killing me.”
She stilled. “Shall I stop?” The question sounded innocent, but he heard her strength returning behind it.
“No!” Daniel struggled for control. “If you have pity on me, no. Please. Don’t make me beg.”
Too late, Daniel was already begging. He opened his eyes to find Violet regarding him in fascination. She watched him the same way she had on the balloon when he’d tinkered with the engine.
Now, if they could be doing this in the balloon . . .
God, why did he have to think of that? Daniel’s imagination put them soaring high above the winter fields. Only this time, his kilt lay on the bottom of the basket, and Violet was smiling at him, her hands full of him. A little later, she’d slip to her knees.
“Oh, Lord.” Daniel snaked his hand under the plaid, wrapped it around Violet’s, and guided her down him in one stroke. “Like that,” he said, voice broken. “Like that, lass.”
Violet froze again when Daniel took his hand away, and he prayed he hadn’t frightened her. He was about to pass out and fall off the sofa anyway, though, so it really didn’t matter if she stopped.
Violet took a breath, laid her head again on Daniel’s shoulder, tightened her hand around his hardness, and stroked as he’d shown her.
Daniel shook down to his boots. The sweet friction made everything within him loosen. Her quick slides, clumsy at first, became smoother as Violet gained confidence.
A new world opened for him. Daniel was no stranger to bodily pleasure, but the way Violet had warmed and trapped his heart made for a very different experience.
Desire clamped his body until ordinary sensations were gone. The musty scent of the room, the heat from the fire that made the space close, and the hum of activity on the street far away—all dissipated. Daniel was aware only of Violet, of holding her warmth against him and the beauty of her touch.
His climax came before he was ready. Daniel shoved the startled Violet away, grabbed his handkerchief, clamped it around himself, and lost his seed into it. His hips pumped, wanting to drive into Violet, not his somewhat unsatisfactory hand. But Daniel wouldn’t hurt her for the world.
He slung his arm around Violet and pulled her to him. The kiss that followed was frenzied and desperate. Daniel’s blood burned, as though some drug raced through his veins. He needed Violet, needed everything about her.
She kissed him back as fiercely. Strong, proud Violet.
By the time Daniel had spent his seed, they were curled together on the narrow confines of the sofa. Violet lay against Daniel, and he stroked her hair, kissing it, their silence saying more than Daniel could shout.
Violet lay against Daniel’s side in the warmth and quiet of the room, breathing in peace. She liked that Daniel didn’t want to talk. She could bask quietly in his warmth as he ran a slow hand through her hair. Whenever he bent down to kiss her, the kiss was soft but holding the remnants of passion.
I think I’m falling in love with you, Daniel. The words whispered through her. No, it’s too late. I’ve already fallen.
Violet needed to soak up this moment, this happiness, to save for forever. She had so few good moments in her life that she stored each as she would a precious jewel.
The peace of Daniel’s cluttered room was shattered by a sturdy knock at the door.
Daniel grunted and snatched up the kilt that covered them both. He gently moved Violet’s feet aside, then rolled to stand up, wrapping the kilt around him as he moved to the door.
“Bloody neighbors,” he said. “Probably coming to borrow something so they can have a look at the lovely lady I’ve brought home. Don’t worry, I’ll send them away.”
The knock sounded again. “Daniel,” came a woman’s voice, quiet but determined. “I know you’re in there.”
Violet’s happiness sloughed away like wet sand. She leaned down and plucked her drawers from the floor, standing up to pull them on, her skirts falling to hide her bare legs.
“Perfect,” Daniel grumbled. “Not what I need to make my night complete. I hope she didn’t bring the shrimp with her.”
What that meant, Violet had no idea, but Daniel seemed perfectly sanguine to open the door to one of his mistresses.
His body blocked the doorway as Daniel peered out. “Yes?”
“Do let me in, Danny. It’s freezing out here. I know you brought the fortune-teller with you, so if you are both decent, I need to come in. I’m not so easily shocked as all that.”
Daniel glanced back at Violet to see that she was dressed—barring her stockings and shoes, which Violet hastily kicked under the sofa. He gave Violet an apologetic look and pulled the door wide, admitting the wind, and the woman.
The lady wasn’t a courtesan. Worse. She was his stepmother.
“Hello, dear,” Lady Cameron Mackenzie said as Daniel closed the door and leaned back against it. “I’m Ainsley Mackenzie. You’re Violet?” Ainsley strode across the room, her hand outstretched. “Your maid is searching frantically for you. She’s in the coach.”
“Oh . . .” Violet began, but Ainsley broke through.
“I thought it no coincidence Daniel disappeared from the soiree at the same time the comtesse lost track of her fortune-teller. I had to bully the coachman mercilessly until he confessed he brought you both here.” Her smile shone out. “I adore a good fortune-teller. Have you got the true gift, or is it just for fun?”
Ainsley held Violet’s hand firmly, looking straight at her. Violet’s quick assessment—which she couldn’t stop herself making—showed her a woman confident and content, but one who hadn’t always been so. Ainsley had a darkness in her eyes that spoke of loss. She also carried worry that she would lose again. The fear was buried deep, but present.
“Where’s Gavina?” Daniel asked warily.
“At the hotel, sleeping—in theory. More likely, she is ruthlessly questioning Cameron about the evening and everything we did at the comtesse’s. I knew Gavina would want to tear into your work here if I brought her. Not to mention ask repeatedly why you are here alone with Miss Violet, and why Violet’s hair is down and her shoes off.”
Violet self-consciously pulled her bare feet under her skirts. “You say Mary is looking for me?”
“Yes, quite desperately. I wouldn’t have interrupted for the world, but she seemed terribly worried. Which is how I guessed you weren’t a courtesan, in spite of Daniel spiriting you away for an assignation. A courtesan’s maid would discreetly stay away, no matter what the situation. I hope I don’t offend you, my dear.”
“Stepmama . . .” Daniel began.
“Never mind, Danny. Dress yourself, Violet, and I’ll take you to the coach. I’ll wait for you in here if you don’t mind. It’s much warmer.”
Ainsley, wife of a duke’s brother and former lady-in-waiting to Queen Victoria, plopped herself on the window seat and took an absorbing interest in one of Daniel’s drawings.
Daniel fetched Violet’s stockings and shoes from under the sofa, then sat down next to her, warming her as she pulled on stockings and garters. Daniel had to help relace her boots—Violet’s fingers were shaking so much she couldn’t do them up herself.
Most of Daniel’s shirt buttons had gone flying when Violet had torn into him, so he had to make do with securely buttoning his waistcoat and arranging his frock coat to cover himself. Ainsley stood up when they were ready, setting aside the line drawing she’d been studying.
Violet glanced at the drawing as Lady Cameron put it down. Neat lines showed a cross section of some machine, with labels, letters, and numbers. Violet was pretty sure part of the machine had wings.
“What are you building here?” Violet asked in curiosity.
“Just jotting down ideas.” Daniel fetched his greatcoat and wrapped it around Violet.
Ainsley smiled. “Our Danny’s a bit of a genius, but I’m afraid no one but Ian really understands what he comes up with.”
“I’ve told you, it’s all perfectly simple, Stepmama.”
“If you’re an engineer. Which I am not. Shall we go?”
Daniel slid his arm around Violet as they walked back down the stairs and moved swiftly through the wind and passages to the main street. Daniel betrayed no shame that he’d been caught by his stepmother dallying with Violet. He walked along without comment and handed both ladies into the coach as though he’d been escorting them to a respectable night out at the opera.
Mary waited inside the carriage, her eyes round. She wouldn’t say why she’d been chasing after Violet—in fact she said nothing at all.
Daniel took the seat next to his stepmother, and the two of them began a lively conversation as the coach turned for the main streets. Daniel talked with Lady Cameron in a relaxed manner, teasing her as much as she teased him.
Violet thought of the story he’d told her of
the lonely little boy who’d hoped that one of the women his father brought home might stay and be his mother. Daniel might not have found a mother, but he’d discovered a comrade in Ainsley, a lady he obviously respected and admired. And loved. Lady Cameron had filled the space in Daniel that had been empty. The pair had a warm, strong relationship that Violet envied.
The coach stopped at Violet’s boardinghouse all too soon. Daniel jumped down and handed out first Mary, then Violet. Mary thanked Daniel politely then ran ahead into the house, opened the door, and waited for Violet.
Violet’s time with Daniel was over. She unwrapped the greatcoat he’d lent her and handed it to him, feeling herself lose part of him as she did so.
Daniel gave her a smile that spoke of the sensuality of the evening and touched her cheek. Violet clutched the warmth of it to herself like a cloak.
“Don’t kiss her in front of her respectable boardinghouse, for heaven’s sake,” Lady Cameron said from the coach. “You’ll ruin the girl.”
Daniel’s eyes filled with laughter. He stuck out his hand, shook Violet’s, and executed a bow. “Until tomorrow, my lady.”
Violet didn’t want to let him go. Daniel had opened a new world for her tonight, and she wasn’t ready to leave it.
Daniel released her hand, and she realized she’d been clinging to it. “Go on, now,” he said in a gentle voice.
Violet swallowed, managed a “Good night,” and turned to follow Mary into the house.
She tried to linger in the doorway so she could watch Daniel swing into the coach and roll off into the night, but Mary closed the door behind Violet, cutting off her view.
“I never knew he was so rich,” Mary said. She started up the stairs, and Violet ascended slowly behind her. “Looks like he’s taken with you, miss. If you keep him on a string, you’ll be the making of us all.”
Keep him on a string. After the beautiful night Violet had just lived, the phrase sounded vulgar and coarse.
“There’s no question of me keeping him on a string.” Violet had to let Mary unlock and open the door to their rooms, because she knew she’d never manage keys tonight. “When we leave Marseille, I’ll likely never see him again.” And that would leave a large hole in her heart.
Wicked Deeds of Daniel Mackenzie Page 22