Any Wicked Thing (27 page)

She could see he did not plan to make today easy. Two could play that game. “I believe Mrs. Holloway instructed Alice to wash it.”

“Then find another. Take a blanket off your bed. I don't care.”

“You needn't be so rude just because it is your day. If anyone has the right to be rude, it is I.”

“How do you figure that?”

“You—you hit me.”

Sebastian gave a derisive chuckle. “Believe me, if I had wanted to hurt you, you would not be standing here arguing with me. But I have some honor. I've never in my life hurt a woman—unless requested to.”

Frederica's anger bubbled up. “I don't want to hear another word about your other women and all the horrible things you've done to them.”

“I've just said I haven't done anything horrible to them.”

“You could be lying.”

“I never lie.” His lips thinned. “Or invade someone's privacy. Or pretend to be someone I'm not.”

Ah
. So they were still fighting his ten-year-old grievance. She had hoped they'd made some progress away from that. Not that she wanted him now the way she did then. Then she had been a hopeful, heedless child. Today her feelings were somewhat more complicated. Damn him.

“We all wear masks, Your Grace. Some of them are just more transparent than others.”

“And what mask am I wearing, Freddie?”

She cocked her head to really look at him. There was something harder about him today. More ducal, but she wasn't going to say that. “I don't know you anymore. Something happened to you when you left.”

“Something happens to everyone unless they're locked away in a tower.”

“I suppose you mean me. While you were off having your adventures, my life was more mundane; that much is true. I wasn't contemplating tying up lovers. I never even knew—” She blushed, unable to repeat some of the things she'd done with Sebastian.

“You know now.”

She nodded. She did, God help her, only she didn't expect His intervention on this subject.

“Go, Freddie. I haven't got all day.”

She stayed stubbornly rooted to the spot. “But you do. All of it, according to our deal.”

“I want to talk to you about that. But not here. Run along and get something so we can sit down outdoors.”

“You mean lie down.”

“That, too. As you pointed out, it is my day.”

There was no trace of playfulness in his voice. Sebastian had reverted to the man who had come to Goddard Castle a few days ago, distant and chilly. His demeanor would make it easier for her to untangle herself from their affair.

She climbed back up the stairs in search of an old quilt and a proper cloak for the damp of the day. Out of spite, she tied on her battered straw hat, whose brim had not improved since Sebastian tossed it in the lady's garden. She left off her gloves. Wearing cotton ones so often working with old papers and artifacts, she preferred to actually touch things, feel things, when she had a chance.

She wondered if Sebastian would take her hand in his as they crossed the moors. His hands were long and elegant, yet not so smooth they were dainty. He must have done rough work in his time abroad, and seemed prepared to work at Roxbury Park in order to set the estate to rights. This bargain of theirs was holding him up. Perhaps he could be persuaded to simply sell her the castle and leave to get on with his life. Surely he must be tired of her by now.

He was waiting for her at the bottom of the staircase. “It won't work.”

“What?”

“The hat. The dress. I'll have you anyway, as is my right.”

“Why do you even want to?” she blurted. “It's obvious you're still angry.”

He was silent for a long moment. “I don't know. Perhaps I've lost my mind.”

“There is no ‘perhaps' about it,” Frederica said, loud enough for him to hear.

The effect of her words was not what she expected. Sebastian laughed, the echo in the great hall amplifying the low rumble. “It must bore you to be so consistently right, Freddie. I have not been myself ever since I came to this accursed place. Well, it won't be too much longer and I'll be off.”

“I shall look forward to that day.”

“I as well.” He extended an elbow. “Shall we?”

He struggled a bit with the heavy door, and then they were outside in the grassy courtyard. A gust of wind nearly took Frederica's hat.

“Are you sure—?”

“Yes. All your damn servants keep giving me the evil eye. Even the child. What's her name?”

“Alice.” They crossed the lawn to the ruined gatehouse and went through the arch. When they came out, Frederica was certain she'd felt a drop of rain on the back of her neck, but said nothing. A bit of spring rain wouldn't hurt her—she wasn't some silly gothic heroine who'd dance with death just because the hero lured her out in a storm. Sebastian led her from the road over a tussock of grass. “Where are we going?”

“I rode out this way yesterday. After I discovered you going through my things like a ragpicker.”

She was not going to apologize again. “Is it safe? I generally stick to the cart tracks.”

“Safe enough. I promise to try to save you if you get sucked into a bog.”

“How comforting.” Patches of wild daffodils, their bright yellow petals shriveled to translucent beige parchment, sprung up through the rough blades of the field. There was nothing of interest to see but a few stunted trees and a vast assortment of rocks. The mountains were misted over with gray clouds, the sun a pale disk overhead. The bleakness of the landscape was not lost on her, and for the thousandth time she wondered why she was trading the lush, rolling green downs of Dorset for this.

Frederica could have managed for two years at Roxbury Park under Sebastian's guardianship. When Sebastian had arrived at Goddard Castle, he certainly had harbored no desire for her. If she hadn't proposed this mistress business, she doubted he would have thought of it on his own and would have left her at peace in her childhood room. It was her own fault that she had stirred things up between them.

She hadn't been to Roxbury Park once in more than a decade, although Uncle Phillip had made a very limited number of trips south. But his heart was here in his adopted home. As hers must be. It was pointless to imagine life as it might have been.

She was out of breath trying to match Sebastian's long strides. “How much farther?”

He stopped, glancing back at the castle. “Hard to tell.”

“Do you actually have a spot in mind, or are we on a forced march to nowhere, General Wellington?”

“Do you think this little walk compares with what our brave troops went through?”

Her worn half boot slid on the damp grass. “Of course not,” she snapped. “But look at the sky. It doesn't take a genius to know we're in for another deluge.”

“You won't melt in the rain. You'd have to be made of sugar.”

She was not feeling very sweet at the moment. What did it matter where he decided to fuck her? Here was as good a spot as any. She threw the quilt on the ground.

“No. Pick it up.”

“Come on, Sebastian! Whatever you're going to do to me, you can do here as well as one hundred yards ahead.”

“No.” He bent himself to retrieve the blanket and rolled it up under his arm. She watched him walk faster still, his broad shoulders filling out his hacking jacket. He was once again dressed in country attire, but today wore a neckcloth. She was afraid she knew what that meant.

She could not keep up the killing pace. If he wanted her, he'd have to settle for whenever she arrived at their unknown destination. So she trailed after him. Never once did he look behind him to see if she was following.

Sebastian disappeared down a hill. Frederica wondered that his horse had managed the uneven terrain without a stumble. But at least the ground seemed dry, no blanket bog in sight. As she crested the rise, she saw a thin glittering stream twisting below. The slightest of waterfalls splashed musically between the howls of the wind. Had this been a nice day, the sight could almost be called romantic.

Sebastian had spread the blanket near the jumble of rock and lay on his back, his jacket a makeshift pillow under his head. The sky he stared at was leaden and forbidding. Frederica took careful steps down the bank, too nervous to appreciate the unfamiliar scenery. She hovered over him, casting no shadow.

“There you are.”

“My legs are not as long as yours.”

“No, they're not. But they have their uses.”

Frederica stifled the urge to kick him with one of her useful legs. Instead, she sat on the quilt, tucking them beneath her. “This is pretty. I've never walked this way before.”

“I'm not surprised. It's off the beaten path. It would make a nice bathing spot, if one were so inclined.”

Frederica could see herself sitting on the rocks at the center of the stream, the cold water sluicing over her bottom as it fell to the river-bed. There would be no danger—she thought her legs would touch bottom. But today was too cloudy and cool. She'd get wet for sure, but only when the heavens opened, as they were sure to.

“Let's get this over with.”

She startled. She was about to say the very same thing. Coming from him, the words seemed even more cutting.

“Very well. How do you want me today? Naked? Clothed? Face-down? On top?”

Something passed across his face, but was too fleeting for her to analyze it.

“Naked and on top will do very nicely.” He tore off what remained of his clothing, as if a fiend were after him. Her fastenings gave her more trouble, but he was there to help her in the end.

He was erect already, without a kiss, without a touch. Men were such odd creatures. But she was wet, too—had been almost from the moment she saw him this morning. He gripped her hips and centered her over his cock, inching her down slowly. Frederica felt exposed, his eyes everywhere, taking in each roll of skin, each blemish. Sebastian thrust up, and they developed a rhythm that suited them both. She felt a little wild, her hair blowing across her face in the wind, her full breasts bouncing with every move as she straddled his body. Confident that she knew what to do, his hands left her hips and caressed her breasts and belly, sending darts of desire through her body, increasing her tempo.

The first needle of rain fell as she shuddered to orgasm, but Sebastian was not finished. He held her fast as the rain pounded them, oblivious. Her pleasure was quickly eclipsed by the violence of the storm, but it brought him ever closer to his crisis. The rumble of distant thunder caused her to jump, and that was all he needed to tear her off him and spurt his seed into his hand.

He wiped his hand with his cravat. Frederica realized she'd been unbound the entire time and was able to see Sebastian's face as he moved beneath her, his dark brows a slash of concentration, his moss-colored eyes meeting hers. She hadn't looked away, touching his flat copper nipples and crisp dark chest hair as he stroked her breasts. There had been no kisses, but connection nonetheless.

He said nothing as she struggled into her wet clothes and dashed up the hill toward home. Let him stay outside like a madman. Let him get struck by lightning. Fried to a crisp. She'd be rid of him then forever, never see his painfully beautiful face again.

H
e let her go. He couldn't move anyhow. Couldn't find the voice to speak. Sebastian lay like a dead man as the rain skittered across his skin. He should rouse himself and see that she got home safely, but his legs felt like lead weights.

This was to be their last time. But somehow he'd omitted to mention that their bargain was at an end. That she was free of him, and he of her. That the castle in all its dilapidated glory was hers—and his heart was not.

But the storm had prevented this exchange, had given him a reprieve of a sort. For he was not quite ready to give her up. He'd miss the warm weight of her breasts in his hands, her slick seduction of his cock, her lush mouth open with release. He'd watched her every minute this morning, thinking to have a memory to file away, but he could not end it. Not yet. In a day or two or three.

And then he'd ride away without a backward glance. He was almost sure he could.