Patrica Rice Page 11

  She could no longer deny the strength of the hands crushing her against the bed, the bare flesh of his muscled arms, and the response of her own body as she arched upward, needing the brush of his chest against hers. His naked chest. Naked! He wore no bed clothes. She had never imagined…

  “You are so beautiful, so soft...”

  The kisses she’d craved tasted sweeter than ever with Michael’s whispered endearments. Blanche daringly invited further exploration as his tongue swept her inner lip. His hand roamed from her shoulder to her breast again, and she gasped. Even though protected by a thin cover of linen, her nipple responded, and she felt the tug straight to her womb.

  “I need to touch you here, and here...” His fingers worked their magic across both her breasts and downward, exploring, arousing.

  The combination of heady kisses, strumming fingers, and the hard, heated body pressed along hers undid her completely. Blanche stroked his chest.

  In response, Michael plunged his tongue between her teeth without the earlier gentleness, but with an urgency that fired Blanche’s blood. He wedged his leg between her knees and hovered over her, his sensitive hands wandering and exploring with a restless desire that matched her own.

  Her breasts swelled beneath his ministrations. Her hips rose and fell, searching out the potent heat of his nakedness. His kisses wandered with his hands, discovering pockets of exquisite pleasure along her jaw and throat.

  “Your hair smells of lemons,” Michael murmured as he ransacked her tresses. Spreading the strands along the pillow, he kissed behind her ear, and Blanche cried out in pleasure and desperation.

  The linen of her shift offered some protection, but she writhed impatiently against the encumbrance. Michael’s knowing fingers unfastened the ribbons of her bodice.

  A draft of cool air blew across her heated skin. She groaned in relief as his fingers slipped beneath the opening, finding the nakedness of her breast. Any doubt dissolved beneath Michael’s gentle explorations of her swollen nipple. The intoxicating touch scorched her. The twin pleasures of mouth and hand pinned her to the bed more surely than his greater weight.

  Her brain must surely have disintegrated because she could do no more than rub her hands up and down his taut arms, caress his shoulders, and submit to the demands of his mouth. When his lips slid away, she whimpered and urged him back.

  Instead, his mouth covered her breast, and she emitted a high, keening cry of joy and surrender. She dug her fingers into his hair, and Michael lifted her other breast and took it equally, swirling his tongue around the tip. The heat forming between her legs had Blanche squirming against the weight of him. She didn’t know if she needed him to move away or closer.

  He shifted to one side, allowing her hips to rise without the interference of his greater weight. Blanche cried out against his departure, then froze as she realized Michael’s hand now rested on her bare thigh.

  His hand stroked higher, touching her between her legs, while he whispered words that both frightened and tantalized. Blanche tried fighting the sensation as her hips rose and fell beneath his caresses, but she was helpless against his insistent stroke. He obliterated all but the pleasure and the need and the urgency. When he moved over her again, spreading her legs wide with his knees, she no longer resisted.

  Not until his male hardness branded its heat against her thigh did she truly panic. She accepted the gentle magic of his hands and fingers. In the haze of mindless lust, she had not considered the full extent of male demands. He’d always abided by her wishes before, never insisting upon his own.

  But she didn’t resist. Her hips arched eagerly upward, seeking solace for the aching void.

  * * *

  Groaning with long-denied desire, Michael accepted her invitation with the same mindless lust in which it was offered. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knew he no longer dreamed. But now that he had the object of those dreams in his arms, years of denial erupted in passion beyond control. With a shout of triumph, he thrust deeply.

  Blanche’s cry of pain pierced Michael’s alcohol-sodden brain, but he’d gone well beyond any ability to heed anything other than attaining this exquisite pleasure. Even as she wept, he thrust and thrust again, pushing past the tense muscles and burying himself deep inside her.

  With a thrill of possession, he cupped the tender weight of soft breasts, exciting her hips to the restless motion of earlier. Michael nearly wept in rapture when her tightness relaxed. With gratitude, he kissed her wet cheek and sank deeper.

  He’d denied himself too long to last more than a few minutes. With the urgency of years of abstinence, he pulled back and thrust again. Blanche’s inner muscles gripped and held him even as her hands pushed ineffectually at his arms in protest. Covering her mouth with his, Michael took one more mind-exploding plunge. With a cry of primeval triumph, he emptied all his hopes and dreams deep within her woman’s body.

  Gently, he kissed away her tears. Alcohol had robbed him of coherent speech, but instinct guided him. Unable to force his long-starved body from the haven it had found, he set about giving her the solace she deserved.

  As Michael’s roving hands once more strayed down her abdomen, Blanche tried summoning the energy to push him away. She felt wounded and shamed at the same time. The bliss-fogged ecstasy of earlier had dissipated. She had given herself to a man who didn’t want her, who had taken her only because she’d made him drunk. Embarrassment stained her as much as the stickiness of his seed against her thigh. His kisses didn’t relieve the deep pulsating pain where he’d penetrated her. She shoved futilely at his muscled chest, but he only adjusted his weight so he didn’t burden her. He kissed her again, then lowered his head to suckle at her breast.

  How quickly desire returned! All too aware of the pressure of Michael’s heavy legs parting hers, she squirmed against him, seeking to evade the source of the heat. Instead, she only succeeded in recognizing the growing length of him inside her. Her aching soreness dissolved in a rush of renewed need.

  Panicking at the ease with which he again bound her, Blanche struggled for her freedom. Michael teased her nipple with his tongue and slid his hand between their hips, seeking and finding another nub to entice. She nearly swooned when he fondled her there, then involuntarily raised her hips to give him access.

  “I’ll take care of you,” he whispered against her ear as he lowered his weight on her again. “You’re mine now, and I’ll treasure you forever. Let me pleasure you, Blanche.”

  Openly weeping, she surrendered. If she heeded her heart and not her head, she could revel in the delight of Michael’s caresses. She knew they would lead her where she wanted to go.

  And they did. Oh, how they did. This time, when he thrust, she accepted him fully, and cried out with joy at the joining. He took her slowly, gently this time, letting her adjust to his intrusion, then sweeping her to the same brink of desire he’d unleashed earlier.

  With a wild cry of happiness, Blanche followed him over the edge, giving herself up to the freedom of weightlessness as they fell into the void together.

  * * *

  “There is a man at the door who is most insistent upon seeing you, my lord,” the butler said with his usual note of disapproval.

  Gavin, Marquess of Effingham, winced over the letter he was writing. He’d rented the Earl of Mellon’s London house for the Season, but he royally wished he didn’t have to rent the servants as well. Since the man wouldn’t disappear even if he continued glaring at the paper beneath his fingers, the marquess gave a cursory acknowledgment of his presence, then sat back to trim his pen. “Who is it, Dickson?”

  “He has no card, my lord. He looks a ruffian, but he insists he’s from Bow Street and he must see you. I believe he referred to your brother.”

  Gavin grinned inwardly at the man’s snide intonation on the word “brother.” The last time Michael had flitted through here, he’d made the silverware disappear from the sideboard and reappear in various places on the butler’s pers
on. Dickson nearly had an apoplexy. Gavin had hoped he’d offer his resignation, but the man knew a comfortable position when he saw one. The Earl of Mellon never used his town home, so the place stayed empty and masterless the better part of the year. Gavin had long ago decided the earl had enough sense to keep Dickson from his country home but had too kind a heart to get rid of the obnoxious boor.

  “Then I suppose you had best show him up, Dickson,” Gavin said, cleaning the pen and returning it to his holder. A Bow Street Runner showing up at his door with word of Michael both angered and worried him. Michael was a grown man. Gavin had long since quit trying to tame him. Now he just prayed daily that his brother wouldn’t get himself hanged. Or murdered.

  The Runner smelled as if he hadn’t indulged in soap in days. Gavin watched an unraveling thread from a buttonhole stretched taut across the man’s ample girth, wondering what kept the entire waistcoat from splitting at the seams or sending buttons flying like missiles through the air.

  “Gatsby, you say your name is?” Gavin inquired, trying to keep his attention on the topic.

  “Mortimer Gatsby, at your service, your lordship,” the man pronounced formally, making a painful bow. A button gave up its grip and popped across the rug.

  “And you have word of my brother?” Gavin had come to accept the stumbling speech of newcomers introduced to his chambers. He didn’t know if his title or his scarred jaw sent their brains into relapse, but he’d learned patience until they recovered their tongues.

  “Not of your brother, my lord,” the man answered crushing his cap in his hands. “He just says as to let you know when I’ve got somethin’ to report. I’ve got somethin’ to report.”

  Gavin prayed for more patience than he possessed, summoned Dickson to bring brandy, and ordered the Runner into a seat. The man nervously dusted off the chair with his filthy handkerchief, as if doing so would keep the chair from contamination. “Your report, sir?” Gavin prompted once the man sipped at his drink.

  “Aye, your lordship. I’ve scouted every house in the alley, and there ain’t no sign of the Irish female, but she knows I’m there. She’s had a brat trailin’ me from mornin’ to sundown when I’m over that ways. Leastwise, I figger it’s her. She sent me a message when I stopped at a tavern there last night. That’s what I’ve come to tell you.”

  Gavin assumed Michael had lost one of his strays and employed this man to find her. That would be an odd thing for any normal person to do, but any normal person wouldn’t go about the countryside picking up strays and finding them homes. Michael’s activities made sense only to Michael.

  “And the message?” he prompted again.

  “She says as to tell your brother not to let the lady near the duke,” the Runner recited with evident pride in his memory.

  “What lady and what duke?” Gavin demanded, not feeling at all entertained by the direction of this conversation.

  The Runner scratched his nearly bald pate. “Well, as to that, I can’t say with certainty, but ain’t it Anglesey’s lady cousin what got her carriage blown to bits?”

  Gavin sighed and tugged at his coat sleeve. Michael had once erroneously assumed the Duke of Anglesey meant to harm his cousin, Lady Blanche. Surely he had not returned to that insane theory again. Anglesey was a product of his proper upbringing: stiff-necked, stubborn, narrow-minded... Gavin didn’t bother completing the list for nowhere in it did it include “murderously inclined.” Honorable gentlemen did not murder female relations no matter how much they might enjoy considering it. No more than Gavin considered murdering Michael, leastwise.

  “I think you had best begin at the beginning, Mr. Gatsby. I seem to be missing a few pertinent facts.”

  The Runner nodded and began a horrifying recital involving exploding carriages, disappearing Irish waifs, a house of known treasonous activities, and ending with the fact that Michael wanted all this dumped on Gavin’s door while Michael took off for parts unknown. Gavin thought murder too easy for his wretched relation by the time the recital concluded.

  But he nodded as the man finished his tale and the brandy at the same time. “Thank you for illuminating the picture, Mr. Gatsby. I trust you will keep me informed of any other activity, and if you should catch this Fiona person, that you will bring her directly to me. My butler will see you adequately recompensed as you leave.”

  The Runner took up his cap and lumbered out. The minute the door closed behind him, Gavin ran his hands through his hair, rang for Dickson, ordered the sum paid for the Runner and that a maid find his wife. He had a notion that Dillian knew more of this than he did.

  Dillian’s dark curls bounced as she dashed into the room within seconds of the Runner’s departure. She’d no doubt been listening at the other door the whole time. Gavin tried scowling at her, but she sat on his chair arm and kissed his scarred cheek. Pleasure shot down his spine every time she did that.

  He curled his arm around her waist. “All right. Tell me what you know of this maze Michael has conjured,” Gavin demanded gruffly.

  She leaned against his shoulder and sighed. “I have no idea, but it involves Blanche. She came here one day with her maid in her own carriage, left the maid and the carriage, and departed out the back way as if eluding someone. She explained that Michael thought it best if she went to Dorset to avoid whoever had blown up her coach. I wanted her to take someone with her, but she assured me she stayed with friends and they would take care of her.”

  “And?” Gavin prompted, knowing he still didn’t possess the whole story.

  Dillian frowned. “Blanche owns a cottage in Dorset, but I don’t believe she keeps any servants there. I’ve known her for years, and not once has she gone to visit. I can’t imagine what friends she might have who live there. Blanche only knows people of society.”

  “And Michael? How is Michael involved?”

  “Well-l-l,” she drew out the word as she seemingly studied the carved wood paneling of the ceiling. “I talked to Marian.”

  Gavin groaned. “If my cousin Marian is involved in this, it is worse than I thought.”

  Dillian nibbled on his ear before whispering into it. “Your cousin is a very nice lady, and she lets Michael run all over her just as you do. He brought Blanche to her after the exploding coach incident. He wanted Blanche to disguise herself and go away. Then he pulled one of his disappearing acts and Blanche became quite enraged.”

  Gavin tugged his wife from her tempting occupation and set her on her feet. “What did Lady Blanche do after my wretch of a brother dumped her on Marian?”

  Dillian grinned. “What any sensible woman would do. She disguised herself and went to Elton Alley after him. That’s where Fiona’s aunt lives.”

  Gavin gave her a look askance. “I’m not going to like the rest of this story, am I?”

  “I haven’t heard from Blanche for a week. No, I don’t think you’ll like the rest of this story.”

  With a curse, Gavin rang for Dickson again. This time, the lady’s damned cousin, the duke, could be in on the escapade. He had no intention of keeping Michael’s secrets to himself if they involved Blanche. He’d seen the pair of them at work a few years ago, and the memory still gave him shudders.

  Between Blanche and Michael, they would have the Tower of London carted off on a barge and London Bridge sold to the French. He wanted someone else to share the responsibility of stopping them. He didn’t much care if he and the duke were at daggers drawn in Parliament. They needed a united front at home.

  And then they needed to find their damned relations and lock them up somewhere until all of them were old and gray.

  Sixteen

  Blanche awakened feeling rested and content and to the odd sensation of something not quite right. Of course, feeling happy was odd enough in itself.

  She delayed opening her eyes, letting the warmth of the bed enfold her. A maid must have stirred the fire. She snuggled deeper into the pillow. The place between her legs ached, but she sought sleep and the pleasant
dreams of the past night.

  She stirred restlessly, and realized her nightshift was not only wrapped about her waist, but open all the way down the front. She glanced down at her bare breasts and flushed. She definitely did not want to wake up. Maybe if she went back to sleep, she’d wake up in her own bed with her nightshift properly fastened and in place.

  But the navy bed curtains pulled closed against the draft didn’t resemble the rose hangings on the bed she’d been given last night. She knew perfectly well she had never lain between the sheets of that other bed. Instead, she had willfully decided to make Michael kiss her.

  Blanche winced at the memory of that decision. She must have been drunk. She would never touch punch again, not after two glasses of wine, anyway.

  Maybe it had been just some cup-shot dream. Her hand swept the bed and found it empty. Maybe Michael had never lain there. He was perfectly capable of letting her sleep it off in his room while he disappeared into the stable. Surely he had the sense to put her aside as he had done since the day they met.

  But she’d plied him with more drink than she’d consumed. He would have been well-addled by the time she’d climbed into his bed. And if the evidence of her body gave any testimony, what she remembered was not a drunken dream. She had done it. She had finally experienced the marriage act. And she had enjoyed it, just as Dillian had said she would if the right man came along. Of course, Michael was scarcely the right man in any other sense of the word, but for this purpose, he was perfect. She wanted to try it again in the bright light of day.

  That gave her pause. If Michael had wanted to couple with her again, he would still be lying at her side. That he had pulled one of his disappearing acts didn’t bode well at all. Panic overcame any remaining shyness. She didn’t want to be left alone in a strange inn days from her home. Hastily fastening the ribbons of her bodice, Blanche leaned across the bed and peeked out the curtains.