Say Yes to the Duke (15 page)

Anything?

For that matter, how could he mean anything to her?

“Stop thinking.” He caressed her buttocks. “Just feel.”

She gasped in pleasure when he played with her nipple through the muslin of her night
rail with his thumb and then ravished her neck with more kisses.

This was all about pleasure. About taking. Wanting. And
having.

“But why is it so imperative that you have the diary now?” she managed to whisper.

He swung her up into his arms and kissed her hard before she could protest. “Because
I don’t know when I’m going to have another chance to get it. Open that door. I’m
taking you someplace more private.”

Something in her thrilled at the fact that he hadn’t asked her permission before whisking
her away. She pulled open the stall door and craned her neck for one last glimpse
of Esmeralda and the puppies. They were all sleeping peacefully.

“Our coats,” Janice reminded him.

“No one will come by. We’ll get them in a little while.”

A little while. What were they going to do in that little while? She had a suspicion
that whatever it was, she’d like it very much.

“Why do you need
me
to help you?” she murmured in his ear, and enjoyed the steady rocking motion as he
carried her in his arms. “And not someone else?”

“Because you’re the first person I’ve met here whom I can bend to my wishes,” he said.

She bristled. “I resent that.”

He stopped a moment. “Are you sure? I plan to do just that in the tack room.”

Bend me to his wishes?

Heat flooded Janice’s belly at the thought. And then he kissed her again. Against
her better judgment, she wrapped her hands around his neck and kissed him back. He
was a glorious treat of a man when he kissed her—and she forgot about everything else.

But the sensible part of her continued to wage war with the wanton in her.

Coming up for air, she said, “Is trusting a servant in the house out of the question?
You couldn’t ask Cook? Or one of the footmen?”

“I’d have asked Cook or one of the footmen long ago if I’d had something I could use
against them.”

She sighed. “My point is, don’t you have any
friends
to help you?”

“No.”

“That’s not good.”

“It’s not bad, either.”

“Yes, it is.”

“I work well alone.” He grinned, and his teeth were bright white, even in shadow.
“It goes against my nature to get involved with anyone else.”

But here they were—
involved.
“Why didn’t you force one of the other girls who came down the drive to help you?”

“I never learned anything about them other than the fact that they were after the
duke.”

“Wouldn’t that have been enough fodder with which to threaten them? That’s how you
got me to do your bidding, after all.”

He made a lazy perusal of her open neckline. “Are you sure about that?”

“I am not so easily swayed, sir,” she protested. “
This
has nothing to do with
that.
They’re two entirely separate matters, and quite frankly, I don’t know why—”

She tried to wriggle out of his arms, but he held her fast. “Stop thinking,” he said
again, and this time when he kissed her he slid his hand beneath her gown and up her
calf.

She shivered with delight, then felt great disappointment when he stopped.

“I was ready to bend you to my wishes even before you confessed tonight that you were
after the duke,” he said. “Remember? I put the lantern in the window. A ploy you didn’t
care for.”

“True. So you were really calling me over for
this.
Not
that.
”

“I won’t deny that the thought crossed my mind.” He kissed her again, and this time
when he ran his hand up her leg he went all the way to her lacy drawers and fingered
the edge.

More,
she thought.
I want more.

And was appalled at how hungry she was for his touch.

“However”—he pulled back—“I deduced very quickly that you were using this place to
hide out. You wanted to go back to London as much as you wanted a tooth pulled. You’d
have done anything to stay.”

“You’re right, but how did you know? You’re rude. You’re bossy. You’ve all the sensitivity
of a porcupine.”

“Open that door,” he said.

“See?” She reached out and turned a knob, and they walked into a small, dark room.
“You don’t even care that I insulted you.”

“Your insults are like feathers tickling my cheek.” He laughed when he put her down
and walked away. She heard the scratch of a tinderbox. A moment later, the glow from
a small candle made a halo of light around him.

But when he turned she saw no angel but a handsome, strapping man, his face shrouded
in shadow.

She had a sudden thought. “Are you even a groom? Or did you simply take that job to
get here?”

“I’m many things,” he answered cryptically.

He came toward her again, and this time she froze. “Please.” She felt suddenly afraid.
“Don’t.”

“Don’t what?” He took her elbows firmly. “Kiss you again? Bring you pleasure?”

“N-no,” she said. “I mean, yes. It’s too much.
You’re
too much.”

“Not for you.” He took her braid and unraveled it. And then he shook out her hair.

She closed her eyes. “I can’t,” she whispered. “I’m a good girl. I shouldn’t be here
with you. I don’t know what’s come over me.”

“Shush.” He walked her to a bench. “We won’t do anything you don’t want to do.” He
straddled it and patted its surface.

She sat with her hands pressed between her knees and her feet together and felt herself
trembling from relief. But the fear hadn’t left her, either—she was still afraid of
the world she’d begun to explore with Mr. Callahan. It was nothing like the brief
interlude she’d shared with Finn. This world was darker, primal. With the groom, she
was not herself—at least as she knew herself to be. There were depths to her that
she’d never broached.

“Why
did
you wait for me to look for the diary?” she asked. “Why didn’t you ask one of the
other girls?”

“Because I couldn’t trust them to do what I wanted. They could have turned right around
and said something to the duke and got me fired.”

“You knew I wouldn’t.”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“By the way you kissed me.”

“Blast it all. You could have kissed
them.
Did you?”

“No. I wasn’t interested. I don’t do anything I don’t want to do.”

“Another way to say that is, ‘I do what I want.’ An entirely selfish notion.”

“You ought to try it sometime.”

“Huh.” She crossed her arms and looked away from him.

“There’s another reason I didn’t consider any of those women candidates for finding
my mother’s journal.”

“Why?”

“Even if they’d agreed to look, I couldn’t be sure that they wouldn’t accidentally—or
on purpose—reveal themselves. I learned very quickly that you, on the other hand,
are obviously resourceful, clever, and adept at keeping secrets.”

“I know I’m resourceful and clever, but how would you know I’m adept at keeping secrets?”

“Because you hide yourself very well. On the surface, you’re a bit bookish, stubborn,
and wary. But the real you is adventurous, playful. Bold.”

“You can’t learn all that in one day.”

“Oh?” He lifted her hair and planted a kiss on the back of her neck.

Her entire body tingled, and she felt compelled to turn to him. “Just as I can’t know
that you’re an unusual groom. You’re probably like all the others. I’m not thinking
straight. It’s the snow, and the dowager being the Queen. It’s Esmeralda and the puppies,
and Oscar fainting. Oh, and the duke’s been very difficult to read, and Ladies Rose
and Opal gossiping about me, and—and it’s simply been an extremely long day.” She
released a sigh.

“I’ll get your coat,” he said.

She laid a hand on his arm. “Wait.”

He said nothing.

“The two sisters”—she swallowed—“they said a terrible thing.”

“What was it?”

She gave a hiccupping laugh. “That I was ruined by an old beau.” Her eyes watered,
but luckily, he couldn’t see. “It’s awful for a number of reasons.”

“I can see why that would be.” His voice was rumbly, like a comforting roll of thunder
far away, the kind you hear when you’re inside a house, safe and protected.

“So you understand why I’m even more foolish being here with you. Were I found out,”
she said low, “the rumor would be proved true.”

He said nothing, but in the midst of the silence he laid his hand on her cheek. She
leaned into his palm and closed her eyes. Shock at his sweet gesture quickly turned
to longing. It was firm, that hand. Strong and warm.

She reached out and laid her own hand on his muscular thigh and marveled at its perfection—sturdy,
rounded.

And then she turned to kiss his palm.

She felt him suddenly still. She kissed his palm again, and this time she opened her
mouth and swirled her tongue around it, enjoying the salty roughness. His man’s hand
opened something inside her, something enigmatic and untried.

It called to her, whatever it was—a dark, slow beat that began in her veins and worked
itself through her arms and legs, her belly, the tips of her breasts, her mouth, her
cheekbones, her bottom pressed against the bench, and found its home in the nubbin
between her legs.

And still he cradled her face, and she sighed against his hand.

She never wanted to leave this moment.

But she slid into another bit of bliss when his fingers began to work at her temple.
The darkness behind her lids filled with reds and blues while her scalp was invigorated
by the bold raking of his fingers through her hair.

“Mm-m,” she said, her hand still claiming the curve of his thigh.

His fingers were no longer raking. His hand cupped her hair now—petting in that slow,
sure way she’d seen him calm Esmeralda. Her head bobbed ever so slightly with the
on-off pressure.
Don’t stop,
she thought, and mindlessly ran her hand over his thigh, quid pro quo.

It was such a lovely reciprocal activity.

He pulled her head closer and kissed her again. She turned at the waist to face him,
the stretch of muscle and skin a welcome release of the tautness in her abdomen. But
it came swiftly back, that tension, and left through her hands as she clung with one
hand to his shirt and the other kneaded his thigh over and over.

“I don’t want to go,” she whispered against his mouth. “Don’t get my coat. Yet.”

“Straddle the bench with me.” He hooked her left leg—her night rail ballooned softly—and
then she was facing him.

Before she knew what was happening, he grabbed the hem of her night rail and pulled
it up.
Bump
went her bottom. Her breasts were exposed, her arms cold. A flash of white and the
gown was over her head.

She sat with her mouth open.

He stared into her eyes—her equal—and unlaced his shirt.

Inside her lacy drawers, the wanting grew, the beat of that primitive pulse lifting
her nearly off the bench. She couldn’t keep her eyes off his chest. With each loosening
tug, more skin and curling hair were exposed, along with her own raw admiration.

And then there were his shoulders as the shirt came off, and his belly, ridged and
hard.

She could barely breathe.

He tossed the shirt onto the floor with her gown and, without another word, pulled
her close. The touch of his bare hands on the naked arch of her back made her cry
out.

“I’ve got you,” he said into her eyes. “No matter what happens, I’ve got you.”

She believed him.

What came next?

The exquisite pleasure of her breasts crushed against his chest. Their thighs splayed
and touching—her bare skin against his trousers as their tongues clashed. His hand
lazily pushing through the barrier of her drawers and skimming her most tender flesh.
Her moaning. His holding her. Her falling back on the bench while with one hand he
teased that pearl at the center of her being and the other kneaded and played with
her breasts.

The grinding of her bottom into the bench, the arching of her legs in the air, her
heels leaving the ground.

The absolute ache for his fingers to enter her.

The out-of-body experience that brought her to wave after wave of pleasure while his
body curved over hers—

His kissing her while she spoke the new wonder with guttural cries.

Luke pulling her up.

Her seeing the bulge in his trousers as he kissed away one stray tear of utter depletion
from her cheek.

Her night rail that he put over her head and arms and smoothed down her body. The
way he lifted her in his arms again, blew out the candle, and walked her silently
back to Esmeralda’s stall, where the little mother twitched in her sleep in haphazard
time with nearly all her puppies, save one. The forlorn little thing lay a foot away
and backward, facing the two of them—fellow night owls—his eyes sealed tight shut.

Theseus.

“I knew he’d be the first to wander,” Mr. Callahan said proudly.

Janice giggled. “Esmeralda is going to have her hands full tomorrow.”

A moment later, the groom walked the lady to the house under the moonlight.

“I won’t be found out,” she assured him.

“If you are, send me a note. You came out to see the puppies. I’ll tell Oscar to verify
that story. What door will you use?”

“The front.” She felt suddenly shy.

“Of course. Thinking like a future duchess.”

There was no recrimination in his tone. And she had nothing to apologize for. She
was the daughter of a wealthy, influential marquess and would make a suitable wife
for a duke. But her cheeks burned hot all the same.

He turned to go.

“Mr. Callahan—”

“Yes?”

“You never had to coerce me to help with the journal.” She thought about how he’d
bent her on the bench and the lingering pleasure she still felt between her thighs.
“I would have looked for it anyway.”