Netherby Halls (28 page)

Percy dodged a blow, threw a strong left hook, and
sent his attacker down the stairs on his butt. Percy clambered to
get to him and knocked him out by slamming his head into the
decking.

“Bloody hell, bucko, damn good job!” declared the
marquis, who had at that moment shoved a brute into the wall but
caught a left hook for his trouble. “I don’t have the time for
this,” he told the bloke and hit him over the head with his pistol
to watch him collapse to the decking.

The marquis laughed briefly and with Percy at his
back hurried down the stairs to the companionway below.

The marquis kicked in the door, and then he and Percy
stood a moment in astonishment. A man in a turban was curled up in
a corner with his hands out as though to ward off a blow. Tom
Wheeler was neatly trussed up and gagged, as was Bianca.

Sassy stood glaring at them, her cheek red and
bruised from the slap she had received, her gown torn, but her
spirits high. She turned and eyed both Percy and the marquis. “Be
careful, or you shall find yourselves in the same predicament!” she
announced fiercely.

The marquis and Percy exchanged glances before they
burst out laughing. The marquis was so overtaken with relief that
he bent over his knees and laughed some more.

~
Twenty-three ~

AT LENGTH, and after saying he had brought the
authorities, the marquis was allowed to approach Sassy. He touched
her bruised cheek gently and said, “My love, they have hurt you.”
He looked towards Wheeler, and his voice was a harsh sound. “I will
cut out their hearts for this.”

“No. You have hurt me—how could you have thought such
a thing of me?”

He silenced her by scooping her into his arms and
whispering, “Don’t you see? Did you not do the same?”

He didn’t wait for an answer as his kisses covered
her face, her eyes, her ears, and finally her mouth.

Percy cleared his throat as loudly as he could. When
the marquis finally looked his way, Percy gestured with his head
and eyes at the yeoman who had already started gathering the men
involved, including the captain, and taking them above.

Mr. Dobbs arrived on the scene and saw to it that
Wheeler, Abdul, and even Bianca were put in chains and carted off.
The captain was detained for further questioning.

“I don’t understand,” Sassy said to the marquis after
she was allowed to catch her breath.

“I know, my sweet love. I gave you rather a difficult
time back at my lodgings. I am a cad and can only hope you will
forgive me. You see, I am a member of the Select Committee in
Parliament. Word came to us through various sources that Bristol
was being used as a white slave port. Nothing was done at first,
until Colonel Saunders, a personal friend of mine, came to me about
his daughter. She was a tutor at Netherby and went missing.
Apparently, she’d stumbled upon the business they were conducting
at Netherby. She told him only briefly that matters were grave,
illegal, and immoral, and then she vanished.”

“Oh, Justin, she is dead. I heard them speak about
her and Beth. They sold Beth to the awful turbaned man for his
emir, and they said she was dead,” Sassy cried.

“Yes, I know, but they didn’t kill her. She killed
herself when they sent her to Tangiers. We received her locket and
an anonymous letter from someone she had befriended there.”

“And James Bankes, he was a part of it all, wasn’t
he?”

“He has temporarily escaped capture, but we believe
we will find him. Now, let me get you away from here. I will have
to take you back to Netherby temporarily.”

“Yes, of course. What of the other teachers? I don’t
think they really knew what was going on.”

“No, we have no reason to believe that they were
involved in any way, but they must have turned a blind eye.” He
sighed.

“The girls will need me until Lady Devine can find a
replacement for Sallstone. And I think I can manage that job.”

“I am afraid you cannot. You will be busy with quite
another as the Lady of Dartmour, if you will do me the honor of
marrying me.”

“I am a white witch,” she said ominously. “Is that
what you want?”

“I am a warlock with powers that sometimes border on
the Dark. Will you still take me as your husband?”

It did not take an incantation or magic ring to
predict her answer.

~
Epilogue ~

HE STOOD NAKED with his manhood swollen with need as
it throbbed and danced before her openly lustful gaze.

She spread her hands over the silken gray sheets and
pulled them off herself to display her own nakedness to him.

“Sassy … I can’t get enough … Will I ever
get enough of you?” he whispered as he reached for and touched her
nipple.

“I hope not, my husband.” She took his hand and put
it to her lips. Then she placed it back on her breast and reveled
in his groan of pleasure.

He climbed onto the bed and straddled her, using his
hands and knees to enclose her. He bent with ease to first kiss her
mouth. She loved the taste of his tongue, like honey, she had told
him. She loved the scent of him, musky and masculine with a hint of
pine.

His kisses traveled over her face, down to the hollow
of her neck; he held both her breasts in his large hands and licked
at her nipples before he traveled further to her belly. And then
with one knee, he parted her legs wide to receive his tongue at the
cleft between her thighs.

She moaned as he worked her, and she bucked with
pleasure, calling out his name as his finger joined his tongue and
he shoved it deep inside. He vibrated her at just the right spot
with his other hand, and the rocket explosion of relief made her
entire body shudder with sweet pleasure.

“Justin … oh … yes,” she said as he took
his rod and placed it at her sweet sugar box and asked her if she
wanted him.

“This … do you want this now … are you
ready, sweetlife?”

“Yes, now—give it to me now!”

And he did, as he had so many times since their
wedding day the month before. Later, after they had explored new
positions and new ways to please one another, Sassy sighed and
said, “This is real magic, Justin.”

He kissed her nose. “There is no magic that comes
close.”

“Do you think Percy and Sophy are as happy? I cannot
think anyone could be as happy as we are.”

“Everyone finds their own level of happiness, but
what you and I have … oh my Sassy, oh my …” he said
before grabbing hold of her between her thighs once more.

~ End ~

After the Storm (unedited)

~ Prologue ~

THE WIND, NO longer warm from the rays of the sun,
bit at her face, causing her to blink. Long, chestnut-colored hair
whipped around her slender neck and her lashes. She put one
ungloved, delicate hand up and brushed the thick strands away from
her face as she stopped her determined steps.

Desolate eyes stared at the tall oak—
their
oak.
They had carved their initials there when they had a
future, when they had hope.

“Johnny,” she whispered. “Oh my Johnny.” Finality
infiltrated her tone and resignation the slope of her shoulders.
Anguish tempered by time swept through her body as she dropped to
her knees, heedless of the damp grass.

A year had passed—one entire year since the Duchess
of Richmond’s ball, since the last time she had kissed his lips,
saw his face—one year since Waterloo.

She felt a sick sensation take over when she tried to
recall his face, that wondrous, boyishly handsome face, as he stood
before her that awful night.

They went, all of them, almost merrily to Waterloo.
Even then—with those dreadful drums beating throughout
Brussels—even then, they looked as though they were off to a
parade.

Jenny remembered the sound of those drums, calling
their men to arms. The officers attending the Duchess of Richmond’s
ball left hurriedly, some actually going off to battle in their
ball attire, and Johnny, her Johnny had been among them.

Exploding cannons—the sound filled the atmosphere, as
the Beau Monde breathlessly awaited the outcome. So many of her
friends, so many of the English gentry, were there in Brussels that
spring.

Napoleon had escaped, gathered his army, and begun to
march. The Duke of Wellington, their hero, went off to meet him.
The English believed that Wellington would win the encounter with
the Frenchman and were there to witness it.

No one had anticipated the amount of blood it would
take to fulfill their expectation. Thus it happened on June 18,
1815, that Wellington met Boney at Waterloo, and her John was lost
forever.

Jenny thought that she could no longer cry and was
surprised at the tear that made its way down her cheek. Mac had
been there. He had lived, and while she searched for John, he found
her.

Lieutenant William McMillan had taken hold of her
shoulders, and when she saw his distorted features she backed up
from him, screaming. She wasn’t sure anymore what she had
screamed.

“Jen, Johnny’s last words to me were of you. He said
he loves you and that you have to move on…”

She closed her eyes now. She had come to their tree
to say good-bye, but could she? She didn’t feel ready. “Haunt me,
Johnny, come to me as a ghost,” she hugged herself and prayed,
“Stay with me forever.”

Her father and aunt had hurried her home to Devon,
and even for their sakes it had been so very difficult not to fall
into a decline. For weeks all she wanted to do was go to sleep and
not wake up.

Her father had coaxed her outside by telling her the
horses she loved needed attention. And that had worked to get her
out a bit. Slowly, albeit listlessly, she began to eat, talk, walk,
but she felt as though all joy in life had been snatched away.

She got to her feet and touched the tree before
turning towards home. She loved the quiet solitude of her beloved
Devon landscape. It was like a tonic that soothed her. Johnny was
never quite at home in the country. He was too restless.

She crossed the open field with slow, long strides
and felt the overgrown grass brush against the thin material of her
stockings at her ankles and calves. The day had been touched with
scudding clouds, and they hovered with the tease of rain.

It was still mid-afternoon, and yet, because of the
overcast sky, it appeared later. Jenny’s gaze swept upwards, and
she made the decision to take the shortcut across Farmer Cubbins’
field. She reached the roadside fence, picked up her skirts,
climbed nimbly up, sat on the aged wood stocks, and then pushed
herself forward onto the country dirt road.

She had been so engrossed with getting her skirts
past the splintered rail and her feet over the ditch that lined the
road that she hadn’t noticed the rider coming around the bend.

Her sudden descent onto the road caused the horse to
rear and champ at his bit. This startled Jenny, and before she knew
what had happened, she had released a screech, stepped forcefully
backward, and landed herself in the very ditch she had tried to
avoid.

Hungry
Moon—Quicksilver

~ Prelude ~

There are more things in heaven and earth,
Horatio,

Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

—William Shakespeare,
Hamlet

1575, Scottish Highlands, where many honored their
clans and chose to follow the old ways

Quinn MacValdane had a great deal of weight on his
shoulders, but those shoulders were huge and certainly capable of
carrying the burden. The weight, however, was unlike any other he
had ever lifted, and he was tired of constantly having to deal with
it. He just wasn’t ready to get married!

He was more than six months away from turning thirty
and tired of the nagging as his birthday drew closer. He had to get
out and away from it!

Mayhap he just needed a tussle with the pretty tavern
wench, Sarah, to loosen up his nerves? Och but he liked her full
breasts. The notion of her naked body under him made him smile, and
he felt his dick spring up, ready for action.

A crackle of twigs made him look around and hold his
lantern up.

He had heard the rumors but had shrugged them off. He
wasn’t concerned—why should he be?

He was a sorcerer with supreme powers and had naught
to fear from the beast.

Thus, he proceeded into the woods to take the
shortcut to the town tavern. He grinned and hummed to himself, much
like a boy at the thought of a few drinks with his friends and then
a bit of fun with Sarah. She was a lovely, full-bodied
woman …

He heard something again.

His hearing had always been extraordinary, and it
told him now that something moved stealthily through the woods at
his back and was eating up distance between them.

Once again, he held up his lantern and looked
around—not afraid, but wary, very wary, for he knew that something
evil was at his back.

He touched the silver-tipped sword that was tucked at
his belt. If something rabid was out there, it was time to put an
end to it! And, bloody damn, he was just the man to do it. He would
enact his shield, protect himself from getting bitten, and finish
the beast once and for all. The shield would protect him from the
dangers of a rabid bite.