Something About Emmaline (19 page)

She rolled in his grasp and glanced over her shoulder, a hot eager light in her eyes. “If you please.”

“Very much so,” he told her, tugging at the soaked laces and finally getting them free. Her gown came over her head, and then her shift.

There was a look in a practiced woman’s eye when she first disrobes before a man. Alex had seen it with his mistresses and with a few other conquests, one that said that he was a lucky man to see such a sight.

But there was no such light in Emmaline’s eyes. This was not a woman used to disrobing before a man, for everything about her was suddenly shy and hesitant.

Almost as if she feared he would be disappointed in what he found.

“Emmaline,” he whispered as he nuzzled her neck, his teeth grazing her earlobe. “I know not where to start, for you are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever beheld.”

She shook her head, as if she didn’t believe his words.

So he let his body, his touch prove him true.

His mouth sought out one of her breasts, taking the rosy nipple with his lips and drawing it into his mouth, where he could lave over the pebbled peaks until she gasped.

“Your breasts are perfection,” he murmured, now seeking out the other one, and giving it the same delicious inspection.

She writhed and rocked beneath him, her fingers clutching at his shoulders and holding him in place.

“Oh, Sedgwick,” she whispered.

Even as he continued to explore and nuzzle, kiss and suckle her, his fingers were busy exploring her thighs.

Her skin, so soft and rich, was its own reward. His fingers grazed over the downy curls at her apex, and she gasped in response.

And when he did it again, teasing and parting a path toward a greater prize, she moaned, lusty and eager.

As he suspected, Emmaline was not a woman who took her pleasure with anything but complete abandon.

And so he explored a little further, gently unfolding the petals of flesh with gentle strokes, finding his way to the hot and wet center of her desire.

His finger slid over her, once, then twice, her hips rocking with his movements.

Even as she matched his cadence, he paused and then slid a finger inside her.

“Sedgwick,” she groaned, her legs falling open to him, even as her hips rose to meet him.

He covered her mouth in a deep, hungry kiss, his tongue moving over hers, even as his fingers danced and teased her.

His own body felt so alive, so hard with need. He couldn’t think of anything but filling her, uniting his fevered length with her tight and ready channel.

Alex drew back from a kiss and caught his breath, and in that instant her scent enticed him, drew him closer, and he left her lips to seek other forms of pleasure. His mouth trailed down her shoulders, stealing hot greedy laps from her breasts, then moving down past the flat plain of her stomach, until they nuzzled at her very sex. When he looked up at her, she was staring down at him, her eyes wild with desire, her mouth open as her breath came in ragged sighs.

“Whatever are you doing?” she gasped.

“This,” he said, letting his tongue trace a new course over her nether lips.

“Oh, no,” she gasped. “That’s…that’s…”

“Delicious?” he offered, tasting her again, this time taking her into his mouth and letting his tongue wash over her.

Her hips shuddered and he caught hold of them, holding her to him as he continued to draw her toward an unforgettable, undeniable release.

Emmaline wondered at her own audacity. She was naked on a grassy knoll with a man she barely knew.

Though right now that hardly seemed true, for he appeared to know every secret her body possessed and a few she would never have guessed at.

His lips had been teasing passion at her mouth, sweet torment on her breasts, but what he was doing to her…
there
…was unholy.

It was as if he’d discovered the very center of her desires and meant to pull them from her until she discovered her release.

Oh, she knew what a man could do to a woman, tempt her into believing with his kiss, with promises of pleasures unbidden.

But there were no promises in what Sedgwick was doing to her. Only his masterful intent.

And so when his tongue passed over her again, she felt her body tense with need, her breath still in her throat, for fear even the movement to take another breath would break this magic he was conjuring.

Emmaline’s hips arched and wrenched as he drew yet another deep kiss from her sex, and this time it sent shuddering threads through her, portents of what was about to come.

Her hands fisted into his shirt, clung to him, and she gave herself up to his kiss, until her body tightened to the point that it had no other thing to do but burst free, rocking her into a world of pleasure.

“Ah, ah, oh,” she managed to gasp, her hips rolling on an endless ocean of rapture. “Sedgwick,” she whispered, as the surging waves began to give way to tender ripples.

He laughed and placed a trail of kisses from her thighs back up to her lips. “Don’t you think it is time you called me by my given name?”

She let out a contented sigh. “Alexander.”

“Still think I’m dull?”

She laughed and kissed him. “Anything but. What devilment was that?”

“Only the beginning,” he vowed.

She had to admit that perhaps there was something to Sedgwick’s honorable reputation. When he had promised her that her pleasures were only the beginning, he was a man of his word.

They made love in the bower, Sedgwick bringing her back to the brink of her release before he entered her, slowly and tenderly, stroking her fires to a heated pitch until her hips rose and pitched feverishly to meet his thrusts. Her climax had taken her by surprise, wild and tumultuous, shared as it was by his own release, which left him gasping and spent over her.

They’d lain tangled together, entwined as one, while the aftershocks and tremors continued to course through their bodies, leaving them adrift in a passionate storm.

If Emmaline thought he was finished then, she was surprised to find that Sedgwick was far from spent.

He cradled her in his arms, his fingers teasing the wild tendrils of her damp hair. “Emmaline?”

“Yes?” she said dreamily, her own attention caught by the dark triangle of hair on his chest. Her fingers toyed and pulled at the strands.

“Have you…do you…?”

She glanced up at him, for she knew exactly what he was asking. Though it wouldn’t be a question a man would ask of someone, say, like Miss Mabberly or Lady Diana Fordham, it was one asked of a woman like her. One who lived outside respectable society. One who wasn’t a virgin when she’d tumbled into his embrace.

She wasn’t insulted, only struck by his hesitancy in asking and his need to know. “No, Sedgwick. I don’t. I haven’t done this…well, in a long time.”

He nodded and went back to toying with a strand of her hair.

However, Emmaline knew her answer wasn’t fair. And Sedgwick too much of a gentleman to pry. Not that it mattered—her answer, that is—but it mattered to her to tell him. So that he wouldn’t think too ill of her.

“There was someone once,” she said. “I loved him and I thought he loved me.” She glanced away, for she didn’t like to look back, made it a rule not to dwell in the shadows of the past. “But until today, there was no one else.”

And there wouldn’t be another, she had to imagine. How could she ruin such a perfect memory? “I’ve always thought it was a matter of trust to take a man into my bed…or picnic blanket.”

He said nothing for a great while, until he managed to ask in a quiet, steady voice, “And you trust me?”

The question held more weight than she dared consider. Gads, how had it come to this?

“Yes,” she said, stunned by her own confession. Held tightly in her heart was one thing, but saying it aloud…She glanced up at him, into those slate-green eyes, and felt all her fears slip away. “I suppose I do.”

The baron nodded, and then tugged her back into his arms, where she trusted him once again.

The hours passed, but only too soon it was time to depart. Sedgwick and Emmaline had tugged their sodden clothes back on and trooped hand in hand up to the house. Mrs. Calliwick greeted them at the door, her eyes at first wide with horror at the sight of them. Then she’d broken into a cackling laugh.

“My lord, you might claim to be Sedgwick, but you’ve got a healthy measure of Clifton blood in you, you do.” She’d hustled them inside, where they found a hot bath set
up for them in one of the bedrooms and a change of clothes laid out.

“Do you think she…?” Emmaline asked, wondering if their secret bower was really as hidden as Sedgwick had vowed.

“No, she couldn’t have,” he told her, stripping off his wet clothes and getting into the bath. “But considering she’s served the Cliftons for three generations, I imagine she finds such afternoon amusements to be quite commonplace.”

They laughed and then he caught her by the hand and pulled her into the tub with him. They kissed and touched and washed each other. And before they dressed themselves, they took advantage of the Clifton hospitality one more time.

By the time they were back in the phaeton traveling home, long shadows lined the road. Emmaline cozied up against Sedgwick, her hand wound around his elbow.

She had no desire to return to London. She wanted this afternoon to continue forever. Not to let the reality of life intrude on her happy interlude.

But it did in a way she couldn’t have expected.

At the crossroads, a woman with a passel of children at her skirts was hustling them like an old hen across the road. They pulled to a stop and waited for the carriage to pass.

The kids were clean and tidy, but it was obvious from their patched clothing and drawn faces that life was not so easy for the large family.

“Come along,” the woman called to her children, waving her hands at them. “This fine gentleman and his lady have better things to do than wait for the likes of you sluggards.”

It was then that Emmaline noticed what the lady held clenched in her hands.

Her bonnet. The one Sedgwick had tossed in the river.

She nudged Sedgwick and nodded toward it. His eyes widened and then he laughed.

At the same time, the youngest child, a boy of about four, broke free and ran back to stare at the horses.

“William, you’re keeping the gentleman and his lady from their journey,” she called out. “And yer brothers and sisters from their supper. What there is of it.” The woman put on a brave face and pulled the youngster out of their way.

Emmaline glanced away, not wanting to count the children and determine just how hungry they would be by nightfall. Not after she’d spent the afternoon surrounded by all that wealth could afford. She’d lived her entire life bouncing between the disparities of English society. Sometimes she lived with pockets plump and ample, and other times not knowing how she was going to pay for even a tin of tea.

“Madam,” Sedgwick called out after the lady. “A moment, please.” He rose in his seat and handed the reins to Emmaline. Before she knew it, he’d climbed down and had tugged their still-laden basket out from the tiger’s seat. “Would you do me the favor of lightening our load? The horses are tired, and we still have some miles to go.” He held out the bounty to her.

The woman gaped, then recovered quickly, taking the offered feast. When she felt the full weight of it, her eyes filled with tears. “Lawks, milord. You’ll make us all fat as kings. I am very much beholden. For the children, that is.”

He nodded and got back in.

Tears stung at Emmaline’s eyes as well. He’d made his
offer with grace and kindness, without embarrassing the poor woman as to her lowly lot.

As he took the reins, the entire family waved at them. The woman called after them, “It’s me lucky day, it is. I found this here fine bonnet just floatin’ along in the river, and now a feast for me family. ’Tis my lucky day, it is.”

“Mine as well, madam. Mine as well,” he said, looking not at her, but at the woman beside him.

E
ven now, two days later, while running some errands for Malvina, Emmaline found herself warmed and confused by Sedgwick’s odd confession.

My lucky day.

She didn’t know whether it was just a passing compliment or a heartfelt confession. Whatever it was, he had continued to show his regard for her in a thousand ways.

That night, after the picnic, they’d come home, ignoring the inquiries as to their strange clothing, Hubert’s protests for time and all the other questions—their eyes only for each other. They’d gone upstairs and fallen onto the great bed, a tangle of limbs and heedless desire.

They’d made love two, three times, the exact number even Emmaline couldn’t remember, for the passion he elicited from her, the blinding arousal he drew from her with his touch, his lips, his kiss, left her senseless.

The next day had been no different. For she would turn
around to find him watching her as she supervised the work or met with the tradesmen, and then with a tilt of his lips, a glittering sultry glance, he’d lure her upstairs and again they would fall into each other’s arms, heedless of the talk their besotted behavior was generating amongst the servants.

And when she had awakened this morning, the bedchamber had been filled with bouquets of yellow roses. The scent had been intoxicating, her appreciation unbounded as she’d thanked him well into midmorning…

They never once spoke of the future, of what was to come of all this at the end of their agreement. But then again, she had no desire to consider that day—not when there were ten more days and delirious nights before she would have to leave.

Thus lost in thought, she stepped off the curb on Bond Street nearly into the path of an oncoming carriage.

It pulled to a stop before her, her eyes level with the crest emblazoned on the side.

She hadn’t memorized
Debrett’s
for nothing, for she immediately recognized the herald before her. The Duke of Setchfield. She’d met his heir, the Marquis of Templeton, at the Oxley’s supper party.

She glanced up at the open carriage—mostly out of curiosity to see the duke most of society regarded with an unholy terror, only to find the carriage empty.

Then she looked up at the driver’s seat and her mouth fell open.

“You!” Her lips snapped shut and she juggled her packages back up into her arms. How could this be? He was supposed to be dead. And since he wasn’t, what the devil was
he
doing driving about in the Duke of Setchfield’s carriage for all to see him?

“Good to see you as well, Button.”

Emmaline frowned. “Don’t call me that.” She looked left, then right, trying to determine which direction would be the best in which to flee. Yet when she started to walk away, the demmed fellow clucked the reins and followed her.

“Get in, Button. I need to have a talk with ye.”

“I will not,” she shot at him, then spun on one heel and headed in the opposite direction.

When she glanced over her shoulder, she realized he was not going to be deterred. And, worse, he was still a dab hand with cattle and had the unwieldy carriage quickly turned around, despite the thick traffic in the busy thoroughfare.

He rolled up beside her as she waited at the corner to cross the street. “Get in, Button, or I’ll tell me master, Templeton, exactly who you are.”

His master? She’d never known Elton to ever call any man master. And of course he would have to pick the Marquis of Templeton—why, the disclosure of her identity to the breezy and gossipy fellow smacked of blackmail. Oh, bother, it
was
blackmail.

Well, at least she could find some measure of comfort that some things never changed.

“Come on with ye,” he told her.

She pursed her lips, then nodded. To her surprise, Elton started to get down to help her in like a proper driver, but she waved her hand at him. “Don’t bother. I’ve come this far without your assistance, I daresay I can continue so.” She flung open the door herself, tossing her packages onto the seat behind Elton.

Hiking up her hem, she climbed in. Once she was seated,
he glanced over his shoulder at her. “Hanover Square, milady?”

He knew where she was living? Oh, this was worse than she could imagine. Then she realized he was still looking for her confirmation, so she nodded. No point in denying the truth to the likes of him.

“Hanover Square it is,” he said, tipping his hat to her.

She crossed her arms over her chest and looked to one side.

He picked up the reins and very quickly had the carriage rolling into traffic. Emmaline cursed the fact that she’d taken a hackney earlier. But Sedgwick had taken the phaeton and Hubert the carriage, so she’d had no choice but do her shopping for Malvina with a hired conveyance.

At least she hadn’t brought along one of the maids or Thomas—she could imagine what Sedgwick’s servants would make of the fact that she knew the Marquis of Templeton’s driver.

They drove in silence for some time before he spoke again.

“How’ve you been?”

“Well enough.” Really, he wanted the truth? She’d been shot. Slept in the cold on more than one night. Survived for the most part by her wits and skill at cards, and he was making conversation as if she’d just spent the last month on holiday in Brighton.

“I tried to find you,” he said. The words were softly spoken.

She flinched.
Liar.
“Well, it seems you have, though I might point out it is six years too late.”

“Aye.” He sounded none too pleased.

“I’m not giving you any money,” she told him.

“I don’t recall asking for any.”

Not yet.
“What are you doing here?”

“I could ask the same of you—posing as some toff’s wife. Lady Sedgwick, you say.” Again the disapproval in his voice pricked her nerves.

So he knew of that as well. She needn’t ask how—he must have spied her leaving Lady Oxley’s. If she hadn’t been so distracted that night, she might have noticed him as well.

Sedgwick. She blamed him. He’d distracted her from her job. Distracting her in ways she could never have imagined. What she needed to do was disavow this illicit affair, leave him, keep her eye on what was at stake.

“Whatever are you about, Button?” Elton asked, breaking into her reverie.

“If you must know, I’m here to gain a stake. And you needn’t be overly concerned, I’ll be well and gone soon enough.”

“A stake? Harrumph. Your mother nor your granddame would approve of how ye’re doing it.”

“Since old Mam was the one who taught me the finer points of piquet, I think she’d approve quite handily.”

“Piquet?” he sputtered. “You don’t mean to go to Westley’s challenge, do you?”

She turned her head and stared at the passing shops and homes, deliberately ignoring his question.

“That fellow cheats—”

“That hardly matters,” she shot back. “So do I, and you always said I was the best there is. I would think you, of all people, would approve of lightening the pockets of a nobleman.”

He spat over the side of the carriage. “You’ll lose your last rag and then where will you be?”

Rather than continue this subject, she changed it. “How is it that you aren’t dead? I heard you’d been hanged.”

And more’s the pity they didn’t finish the job,
she wanted to add.

He snorted. “I can tell you mourned me, miss. Right and proper, I suppose?”

She bit her lips. She hadn’t. And it was to her shame.

“If you are of a mind to care, I was given a chance to make a better life for myself—me master, he saw to a reprieve. I’ve a King’s pardon, I do.”

A royal pardon for him?
Emmaline shook her head. Utter nonsense.

“Now, don’t be lookin’ like that. It’s the truth. Himself, that is, me master saw to it. Saved me from the scaffold and set me free.”

Emmaline stared at him. He wasn’t free, he was mad. “You want me to believe that the Marquis of Templeton, that foolish tulip, plucked you away from the gallows and got you a pardon? A royal pardon?” She laughed. “I fear, Dah, you’ve lost your touch.”

“So I’m your dah now. About time you remembered that fact,” he said, sounding none too happy about her disbelief. “I would think you’d be happy to find that I’d cheated old Mr. Grim.”

“Well, I suppose it is a comfort to know that Mother and I aren’t the only ones you cheated.”

He turned around and continued driving in silence. It was a few blocks before he spoke again, though he didn’t turn
around. “Button, I’ve gone straight since then. Facing a noose has a way of changing a man.”

“Yes, and my name
is
Emmaline Denford.”

“It’s not like that,” he told her. “I help the marquis. He relies on me.”

“With what? His shopping? I met the man. He cares for nothing but the cut of his coat and his next quip.”

“There is more to the man than those things—”

“So says the man who’s lightened more purses than Dick Turpin.”

“I don’t do that anymore.” Elton gave the reins a firm shake.

“Cats don’t change their stripes,” she said.

“Leave yer grandmother’s sayings out of this. I’m a different man. And I mean to see you out of this devil’s bargain you’ve got yourself into. Masquerading as a lady. You’ll be the one at the end of a rope iffin you ain’t careful.”

“You stay out of my affairs.”

“Whether you like it or not, I’m your dah, and I mean to see right by you. What would yer mother say if she could see you like this? She had high hopes for you. Claimed you’d be a right and proper lady one day.”

A real lady, indeed! The daughter of a highwayman and a…

“Mother wasn’t—” Emmaline’s words stumbled to a halt and turned her head away so he wouldn’t see the tears threatening to spill down her cheeks. Like her often absent highwayman father, her mother, though present in body, hadn’t always been right in spirit—her mind wandering amongst the glitter of the
ton
as if she’d lived there all her life. And when she came to her senses and saw the true na
ture of her life, her grief replaced her madness. “She’s gone now, and I don’t like to speak ill of her.”

A long silence passed before Elton spoke again. “I did come back,” he said softly. “I heard she was sick and I came back as soon as I could.”

“If you say.”

“It was a nice marker you put up for her.”

She looked up at this. He had come back, though not soon enough, and obviously well after her mother had died, for there hadn’t been a stone there for many years, not until Emmaline had finally won enough one winter to see her mother’s grave marked with a proper headstone.

For fear he might make more of these unsettling revelations, she asked, “How is Grandmother?”

He snorted. “Alive. Asks after you, regular-like. Well, more like bedevils me about you.” He glanced over his shoulder. “She blames me for how you turned out.”

She chuckled and almost felt sorry for Elton. His mother was a harridan of the first order, but really, it had been Old Mam, as she was known in some circles, who’d taught her to play piquet and parmiel. And how to ensure that Emmaline won nearly every hand she played through means no more respectable than the old girl herself.

They rode in silence, and finally Emmaline decided to end this charade of a reunion. “What do you really want, Dah?”

“To see you safely out of here. I can talk to his nibs. See that he finds you a position somewhere—a respectable one.”

Emmaline rose up and caught the latch on the door. “I swear I will jump out of this carriage right this second if you dare—”

“Sit down, Button,” he said, clucking at the horses so they picked up a bit of speed. “You always were a hotheaded one. I’ll not mention ye to Templeton if that’s what ye want. But I’ll be watching ye to make sure no harm befalls ye.”

“I am in no chance of harm.” Not from Sedgwick—though that wasn’t entirely true. Her heart was at great folly—but there wasn’t anything anyone could do about that.

“Oh, your baron is a right enough bloke. It’s those Denfords I don’t trust.”

The Denfords?
Emmaline shook her head. “Hubert and Lady Lilith are an annoyance, nothing more.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure.”

There was something about his statement that gave her pause. “What do you know of the Denfords?”

“Been watching them, I have. And I don’t like what I’ve seen.”

“They haven’t any money, if that is what you are looking for. They depend on Sedgwick for their support.”

“Will you listen to me, Button? I’m not looking for a mark, I’m looking after you.”

She crossed her arms over her chest and let out a suspicious “harrumph.”

There had never been a day in her life when her father hadn’t been looking for his next mark. She’d learned her trade in his footsteps, made a living out of the lessons she’d gained at an early age from him.

“You are as stubborn as yer mother was, but you’ve got a right smart head on your shoulders, so you’ll listen to me. That Hubert Denford is up to no good. Been skulking about the docks for the last few days. Down there right now. He’s
after something and he’s demmed anxious about getting his hands on it.”

Against her better judgment, she slanted him a glance in his direction. “What has that got to do with me?”

“Don’t know, but the man is being cagey. He’s a danger, Button, mark my words. He’s got treachery on his mind, he does.”

Oh, that does it,
Emmaline thought. Hubert Denford, a danger? Certainly he was a sneaky fellow, but clever and treacherous were not words she’d ever associate with Sedgwick’s dull cousin.

Elton wasn’t done with his outlandish theories, for he continued by saying, “Me master said you riled up Lady Oxley. That her daughter was about ready to scratch yer eyes out.” He laughed a bit, as if he expected nothing less from her. “The marquis thought you were a bonny one, he did. Told me straightaway, ‘Elton,’ he says, ‘Elton, that was the finest evening I’ve ever spent at Lady Oxley’s. That scrappy Lady Sedgwick put the old hen in her place.’” Elton smiled at her. “He called you ‘scrappy,’ he did. And coming from me master, those are high words of praise.”