by Bec McMaster
“Will not have it?”
“Will not,” he said sternly.
The breath came out of her in a rush.
So. Not as unaffected as she claimed.
He brushed the backs of his fingers down her cheek. “Let me, Alex. Let me love every inch of you. Let me worship you and show you what it can be like between a man and a woman.”
Closing her eyes, she slowly nodded.
Gideon kissed her. Soft, gentle kisses that stoked and stirred. He sensed the moment she began to kiss him back, surrendering to her fate.
Pressing her back against the door, he trailed his lips down her throat. Her breasts lifted as she inhaled, her hazel eyes glittering with suppressed need as he worked his way down her body. Finally he was kneeling on one knee at her feet, his hands sliding beneath her green skirts. Looking up, he slowly slid his hands up her stockinged calves.
Alexandra shivered.
But she did not look away.
Every inch of her looked regal, but there was a sense of vulnerability about her. A woman daring to pursue passion for the first time. Lifting her foot, he braced it on his thigh. Her skirts tumbled over the pair of them as his hands began their slow caress.
“What are you doing?” Her voice rose.
“Kneeling as supplicant,” he told her. “So I can worship my queen.”
“Gideon!” she gasped.
“The first time I saw you, I could not look away,” he whispered, toying with the silk ribbon of her garters. He tugged one loose. “You were the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. You stared the prince consort in the eye in the middle of court and told him to damn his blood taxes. They were not going to rise.”
Alexandra’s lips parted. “They did rise.”
“Slowly,” he whispered. “But I never forgot your defiance. I looked at you, and for the first time in my life I knew there was hope for the realm.”
Pressing a kiss to the inside of her knee, he breathed in the scent of her.
“You inspired me,” he admitted. “You were so brave. And I spent years wishing I had half your bravery.”
Capturing her thighs, he pushed them apart. A tremor ran through her, but as their eyes met, he realized it wasn’t one of fear, but of desire.
He kissed his way up her thighs, encouraged by the way she threw her head back. The rasp of her breath filled his ears, and he deliberately dragged his stubbled cheek across her inner thighs.
“Gideon.” Her fingers tangled in his hair. “Gideon, what are you doing to me? Oh. Oh.”
He rubbed his face against her drawers, his tongue finding the seam. The silk was wet with her musk, and she cried out as he parted the seam of her drawers and found the secret heart of her. Curling his palms under her ass, he tugged her toward his mouth, and then plunged his tongue inside her.
“Oh!” Her cry rent the air, and he caught a glimpse of her flushed cheeks and startled eyes. “Gideon! What are you—?”
Enough. Enough talk. Enough protest.
He kissed her wetly, driving his tongue into the slick heat of her body as she cried out again. Fingers curled in his hair, shocked cries filling the antechamber.
The musky taste of her body was exquisite. But the quiver of her thighs—the uncontrolled clenching of her fingers—almost undid him.
This was Alexandra laid bare, all her guarded trappings stolen from her, as she was forced to surrender to him.
This was his queen, the woman he loved, and damn him for a fool, but if he never had the chance to touch her again, he’d ensure that both of their memories were branded with every second of this encounter.
She came with a cry, her body wilting against the door. “What have you done to me?”
Wiping his mouth, he pushed to his feet and swept her into his arms. “I have barely begun.”
Chapter Twelve
Kincaid pushed open the door to the mechanical jewelers, glancing up to check that this was the right address. “Think there’s anyone here?”
Charlie followed on his heels, coughing under his breath at the dust that had been dislodged. “Shopkeepers rarely leave their wares unattended. And if they do, then they’re not long in business. Judging from the dust on these shelves, this fellow’s been around since the time of my great-grandfather.”
Shelves lined the shop, filled with all manner of mechanical trinkets. A feathered parrot watched them from a cage, an automaton’s head stared glassily at him as Kincaid bent low to peruse the shelves, and several metal gauntlets lay covered with dust. He flexed his metal hand, staring at the gauntlets. “He’s a mech,” he said, judging the work. “Ironmonger enclaves, by the look of it.”
“A mech creating jewelry?”
“I don’t think he does the cutting of the gems.” Kincaid looked around. “No, this fellow’s the one who created that beacon, and most likely those gyrfalcons.”
Movement shifted.
“What’s that?” Charlie seemed jumpier than a cat in a factory full of mousetraps.
Metal clanked on metal, and Kincaid relaxed as he heard the familiar sound of pistons moving mechanical joints. “It’s a servant drone.”
But what emerged from behind the shelves was not merely a drone, but the upper body of a mechanical man, welded to the bottom half of a spider. A bowler hat was welded to the creature’s head, and someone had put a coat and tie on him, but there was no disguising the long spars of the spider’s leg.
Even Kincaid’s eyebrows hit his hairline.
“What the hell is that?” Charlie asked.
“I ain’t ever seen the like.”
The drone’s mouth fell open. “Welcome to MacGregor’s House of Curiosities. Mr. MacGregor will be with you shortly.”
“I think it’s the reason the door is unlocked and yet the owner is unafraid any of his wares’ll go missing.” Quite frankly, Kincaid couldn’t take his eyes off the creature. He’d seen automatons programmed to respond to a series of set questions, but this thing actually appeared to be staring at him.
Both of them remained frozen.
“Do you think it can hear us?” Charlie hissed.
“Please take a seat,” the drone replied. “Mr. MacGregor will be with you shortly.”
Indeed, Kincaid could just make out footsteps climbing the old stairs in the back of the shop. “Mr. MacGregor?”
A pair of googly eyes emerged, surrounded by a cap of wiry hair. “Aye,” the fellow said, pushing his expanding goggles up on top of his head. “What you want?” He eyed them from top to toe. “You ain’t here to shop. I’ve paid me licenses, I have. Just last month.”
“We’re not regulators, Mr. MacGregor,” Charlie said, holding out a hand. “We’re investigators.”
“Nighthawks, eh?” MacGregor stomped behind his counter, pulling a flask out from beneath it and taking a mouthful. “What you want? I ain’t got nothin’ to hide.”
For a man with nothing to hide, he was certainly acting a little unhappy to see them, though Kincaid didn’t correct the Nighthawk presumption.
He pulled the wreckage of the scarab beacon out of his coat pocket. Half of it was melted into slag, but the rest was very clearly the ass end of the jewel, with half its wires hanging out.
“We’d like to ask you a few questions about this little thing. And just how one of your devices ended up in a room where the queen was nearly killed.”
“Your Majesty.”
The words echoed through the portrait hall. Alexandra stilled. She’d been hoping to find her apartments and have a private cup of tea. Everywhere she looked these days, there was someone hounding her for attention.
“Prince Ivan,” she said, turning around slowly. Her ladies-in-waiting caught her eye, and she dismissed them with a nod. “What a pleasure.”
“You are well?” he demanded, striding toward her. “The Duke of Malloryn said someone tried to kill you. And they used my brooch to do it!”
“I am fine,” she told him. He always seemed so emotional, and she was growing a
little weary of placating him. “We were lucky that the Duke of Malloryn was in the room with me and was able to defend me.”
He knelt at her feet. “I did not know, Your Majesty. I thought it was just a brooch. Just a gift. I did not realize I was being played for a fool.”
“Have you remembered who directed you to that particular jeweler?”
The prince looked up, a stricken cast to his face. “As I tell your duke, no. She was just another lady at court. I pay them little attention.”
He paid them enough attention, she had noticed, though she did not doubt the truth of his words. He wasn’t the sort of man to focus on a lady’s face when he was speaking to her.
“Please tell me you forgive me,” he begged, capturing her hand.
“Of course I forgive you,” she replied smoothly, wishing he would stand up. She was not given to such emotional displays.
He obeyed, surging to his feet with an alacrity that startled her, and took her hand. “I would never strike such a blow against you. I am here as an envoy from Russia, and I would never place my country’s fate in such jeopardy. Nor would I dare risk a hair on your head.”
“Of course not.”
He pressed her hand to her face. “I take presumptions again, but I’ve barely been able to sleep or think since I heard the news. I would hate for you to think me guilty, after all we’ve shared.”
“Prince Ivan—"
He kissed her.
Alexandra stilled, but it was not as immediately disgusting as she’d originally feared. Though certainly not as sweet as Gideon’s kisses.
She didn’t know what to do. Prince Ivan was clearly interested in pursuing an alliance. And ties to Russia could prove beneficial. There was a wealth of trade treaties to explore.
And no other prince or duke here for the exhibition had pursued her with as much fervor. Though his presence didn’t make her heart flutter, she felt he could have been managed. A parade of mistresses through his bed would keep him distracted whilst she ruled the realm, and they would only occasionally have reason to come together.
This alliance could be good for Britain.
Ivan’s kiss deepened, as if he’d expected her to push him away immediately.
She set her hands to his chest, intending to do just that.
Footsteps slowed, and a shocked gasp echoed through the parlor just as Alexandra sought to escape Ivan’s tongue. She pushed away from Prince Ivan in a flurry, only to find her lover standing in the doorway.
The shock on Gideon’s face scalded her.
“Gideon—”
He swiftly masked the heavy emotion she’d seen. “My apologies. I was not aware there was anyone in this wing.” Bowing his head, he stepped away from her, and she hated the way he would not meet her eyes. “I shall leave you to… to it.”
“Gideon.” She started after him, but he was practically fleeing down the hallway, his long legs eating up the rugs and his coattails flaring behind him.
Her hand lowered as she noted the hunched way he held his shoulders. She’d hurt him. He knew she was being courted by another man, her future offered to another, but it was one thing to know it, quite another to see it.
She felt ill.
What was she going to do? Prince Ivan had clearly displayed his intentions. Russia would be a good match for her empire.
But every inch of her heart demanded she chase Sir Gideon and try to explain.
“I think perhaps that now he will know I am not merely a friend to the queen.” Prince Ivan wore a satisfied smile as he stepped beside her, placing a hand on the small of her back and rubbing there.
She wanted to scream.
Chapter Thirteen
The queen stared into space as she lounged in her bath.
What was she going to do? Prince Ivan had displayed his intentions quite clearly, and Gideon— Gods, Gideon. She couldn’t help seeing his face again, as he came across another man kissing her. She hadn’t seen him since, no matter how much she’d searched for him. It made her feel ill.
Water suddenly cascaded over her head and shoulders.
Alexandra sputtered, and hauled herself upright. “Are you trying to drown me?”
Mina rested her bottom on the edge of the bath, lowering the jug. “I was washing your hair. It’s not my fault you’re distracted. I warned you. Twice.”
Alexandra subsided with a thin press of her lips. “You voted for me to take a husband, so technically, it is your fault. What did you expect?”
“You’ve blithely ignored all your suitors,” Mina replied, handing Alexandra a washcloth. “And yet you’re clearly mooning after someone. I will confess, I’ve never quite seen you like this.”
“I’m not mooning after anyone,” Alexandra snarled.
Mina arched a brow which said, quite clearly, what she thought of that statement. “I thought we kept no secrets from each other?”
“That was before you cast me to the devil.”
“I thought you’d forgiven me for my vote?”
Alexandra looked away. It wasn’t Mina’s fault that the day’s events had happened as they had. Guilt festered within her, and though she knew she was lashing out unfairly, she couldn’t quite bring herself to apologize.
Mina knelt beside the tub, taking Alexandra’s hand between hers. “Who is it that causes you such consternation?”
She sighed and collapsed back against the bath. “Prince Ivan was virtually down on one knee today.” She pressed a hand to her lips, feeling again that lackluster kiss and wishing she could replace it with Gideon’s. “As ruling monarch, I must be the one to officially ask for his hand, but I know what his answer will be.”
“Prince Ivan?” Mina said noncommittally.
“He is a blue blood,” she pointed out.
“What does it matter whether your future husband is a blue blood? A human would be acceptable.”
Alexandra’s heart skipped a beat.
“The Echelon would be up in arms. A human consort poses a risk, when I am a human queen. I need to choose someone whom the majority of London will accept. There’s been so much unrest. Too much blood and tears. My people deserve peace and prosperity.”
“Choosing a human consort isn’t going to ignite a war,” Mina countered. “And we will all understand why you wouldn’t wish for another blue blood in your bed.”
Alexandra stirred her legs through the water.
She felt almost breathless. Was it true?
“Do you truly think the Echelon would accept a human consort?”
“There are ways to manage them,” Mina replied. “Set Malloryn upon the few rabble-rousers that remain.”
“Malloryn? Good grief. I cannot risk alienating them. They’re already terrified of him. And we’ve barely recovered from Lord Balfour’s coup attempt. The peace is so tenuous.”
She didn’t dare do anything to risk it.
“Then let your council deal with it,” Mina insisted. “That’s what we are there for. To support you. There are many Great Houses who have lost their entire bloodline in the coup attempt. Estates stand empty and titles languish. There’s nothing a blue blood aristocrat likes more than the opportunity to improve their standing. Gift a few estates that the crown holds in escrow. Knight a handful of loyal blue bloods. Dangle a duchy in front of some of the others… but only if they behave.”
Could it be possible?
She’d been staring war in the face for so long that it had frozen her. The human and blue blood conflict had been so ingrained in the past few years that she’d felt as though she walked a narrow tightrope between them.
“The commoners would love a human consort,” she said slowly. “And if I can manage the Echelon, it… it may be possible.”
“Though not the Duke of Alba’s brother,” Mina teased. “Not if he cannot understand you.”
“No? That sounds like the perfect husband to me. As long as we can conceive an heir, it doesn’t matter whether I can speak to him or not. The more interests he
has outside marriage, the better. This won’t be a love match.”
The words sounded almost by rote, but she couldn’t help thinking of Gideon. Her heart quickened, and she hoped Mina didn’t hear. Dearest friend or not, she couldn’t betray her growing feelings toward him. Not just yet. It still felt so new, and so… tenuous.
After all, he’d told her to her face that he did not desire to be her consort. Even if the Echelon could accept it, would he deny her?
There was a leaden pit in the hollow of her abdomen.
Mina stroked a finger along her jaw. “All jests aside, may I suggest you marry the man who’s been leaving these marks on your throat.”
Alexandra slapped a hand to the skin there. Surely not.
Mina laughed as she pushed to her feet. “I thought so. Marry the one kissing you in private corners. You’ll never regret it.”
Morning dawned. The skies were bleak and gray, matching his mood.
Gideon scraped a weary hand over his jawline as he examined the room. Most of his trunks were packed and only a few items lay strewn across the bed. With a snap of his fingers he could summon a carriage and be on his way to Haver Hall, where he could retreat to lick his wounds.
It felt like cowardice to flee the city—parliament would be in session soon, and he was still head of the Humans First party—but he didn’t think he could spend another minute in Kensington, knowing she was only mere feet away.
And knowing that another man would be stealing kisses in dark hallways.
I just need a few days away from her. A few days to accept her loss.
Except even at Haver Hall, there would be ghosts to haunt him.
The chess board where he and Alexandra had spent many an afternoon, while they waited for Malloryn to defeat Balfour. The gray mare that the queen had become quite partial to. The garden where they’d walked and talked for hours.
And the stone folly where he’d kissed her and been rebuffed.
“Curse her.” He turned and reached for the letter she’d sent several hours ago, even though he knew its contents by heart.