Mad About the Major (13 page)

This time she didn't flee. “I suppose I am.” She tipped her chin up, defiantly. And perhaps, offering.

He grinned and took her hand, his fingers warm around hers. How was it that when they touched, when he held her, she felt nothing but wonder?

“I'll make an exception this time,” he told her, leading her from the dining room. “But don't get any ideas that you can start renegotiating the rest of our agreement.”

“I would hardly—­”

“Yes, you would,” he said, laughing. “Now come along, my almost-­thief, and I will show you the house you propose not to rob.”

“What if I change my idea and decide I want to steal something?”

“I'm counting on it,” he teased as they entered a grand foyer.

She looked around the oval entryway. Outside, a gaslight illuminated the street; the soft glow stole inside, shining a narrow path for them. “I don't recall you saying whose house this was.”

“I didn't,” he replied as he walked over to the footman's closet by the door and took out a flint. He struck a light to one of the candles. He held the light aloft and she could see the foyer rose all the way up to the roof, the stairs winding around in a dizzy circle. “I doubt you would have been here, for it has been leased for years by a disagreeable old fellow.” He led her to the stairs. “The owner only recently took up residence.”

“But you seem to know . . .”

He paused for a moment. “I've stayed here before. When I've come to London.”

“Oh,” she murmured, glancing at the paintings lining the walls that rose above, but found no clues—­only unfamiliar faces. Handsome devils, much like Kingsley, with strong features and a rakish gleam to their eyes, but nothing that gave her any indication as to who the mysterious owner might be.

Yet Kingsley knew. Was on such intimate terms with the family that he stayed with them.

She glanced again at the row of portraits and wished she could rattle the answers out of one of them—­for certainly the man leading the way couldn't be counted upon to be very forthcoming.

Then again, neither was she.

Well, there was that, she conceded.

They had climbed the stairs to the first floor and came to a small room in the back. Kingsley strolled in and glanced around, then made his way to a cabinet not far from the fireplace. He opened it and pulled out a bottle. “A toast to the end of our adventures?”

Arabella shook her head. The last thing she needed were spirits clouding her judgment.

Nor did she want the adventures to end.

But they must
, she told herself.
They must
.

Kingsley, meanwhile, had merely shrugged and poured himself a measure.

“I see you aren't opposed to stealing,” she remarked, prowling about the room. She didn't know what she was looking for, but hoped to find something that might point her in the right direction.

Help her choose her path at the crossroads she was certain now loomed before her.

“Stealing? Hardly. It is just a drink.” He chuckled. “Nothing more than any good host would offer.” He winked at her and then tossed back his purloined brandy.

“Wicked devil,” she scolded as she looked over the shelves—­a mixture of books—­travelogues, histories, tomes on philosophy, and a spattering of novels. Even a few volumes of poetry. Mixed in were the usual vases and small statues that suggested the owner was someone who knew how to balance beauty and art. “But I see why you are friends with our mysterious host.”

“How is that?”

“He shares your love of travel and art.”

“How do you know the owner is a man? Might a woman live here?”

A woman? A flare of jealousy unlike anything she'd ever known rattled through her. Yet once she glanced around the very masculine room, those dreadful green notes abated quickly. “Hardly. If this house belongs to a woman, then this room is missing a pianoforte and a settee by the window.”

He looked around and smiled slowly. “Is that what you would add?”

“Not the pianoforte—­I cannot play a note. But I would put a better chair by that window.” She pointed to the one in the back of the room. “It seems an excellent spot for reading. And I'm correct, aren't I? There isn't a woman here.”

They both knew what she was asking.

“No. There isn't a woman. Just another crabbed old bachelor.”

“Truly?” Arabella paused, a French volume catching her eye. She almost smiled for she knew the small, narrow book well. That tome, whose title, loosely translated read
The School of Venus
, had been a scandalous forbidden treasure at Miss Emery's. Brought to those proper and hallowed halls by none other than Thalia Langley, the wild, headstrong daughter of the very notorious Lord Langley.

Thalia's copy had been passed around in the dark of night until it had become dog-­eared and worn.

Of course, Arabella had read it. Twice.

Glancing over her shoulder, she looked the major up and down, and wondered if he had ever read it. Ever done any of the beguiling acts described there in such . . . detail.

Details that now came back to Arabella, leaving her wondering what it would be like to take him, that very manly part of him, in her hand and watch him . . .

Oh, what had the book said? Ah, yes.
Grow. Harden. Take root.

She pressed her lips together and hoped her cheeks weren't flaming with mortification.

“Whatever have you found over there?” he asked, coming to her side.

Arabella tried to move in front of the book, so he wouldn't see what had gained her attention, but it was too late.

“Your crabbed bachelor has an eye for French fiction,” she said, moving away as Kingsley plucked the book from the shelf.

He looked up from the title and grinned at her.

Suddenly the room seemed all too small, all too confining and she backed out into the shadows of the hall. She considered her choices, and something about the door across the way beckoned her.

And so she opened it.

“That book is definitely not fiction,” he was saying as he followed her out into the hall.

Arabella, who had been surveying the room before her, turned and looked at the major. Saw him as she imagined she would never see him again. As unexplored. A mystery.

Her heart's desire.

For she'd opened a door she had no wish to close.

B
irdie stood silhouetted in the doorway, and the only other thing he could see in the shadows beyond was a large bed.

His bed, to be exact.

Which wasn't much of a surprise since this was his house.

He hadn't lied to her when he said he'd stayed here a time or two, or that he'd been at a supper party the other night.

And truth of it had weighed on him as she'd followed up the stairs, chattering away about the paintings, tossing questions at him in hopes of discovering something about him.

All the while, he hadn't been able to stop wondering what it would be like to hear her voice every day, across the dining table, calling for him when he came home, or in the morning, as the first bit of light came crawling into his bedchamber.

Her voice, her eyes, her touch, lighting his day. Every day.

It was a notion that sent his blood racing. Left him cold with fear.

Impossible
, his better senses raged.

His parents had higher plans for him, a much loftier bride than some chit in a milkmaid costume who'd caught his eye at the Setchfield ball—­
the Setchfield ball, of all places
, he could hear his father casting back at him with nothing but disdain.

Nor would the fact that he'd plucked her from the streets like a waif do anything to win his parents' approval.

Yet his heart, oh, bother his heart. It sang a different song. Pushed across the narrow gulf of a hallway that separated them by a need he could no longer resist, he caught Birdie in his arms and carried her toward his bed.

 

C
HAPTER 10

T
he air left Arabella's lungs even as her feet rose from the floor, swept as she was into Kingsley's arms.

Not that she would have protested. Not when his lips caught hers and he kissed her—­hard and swift. His tongue teasing, prompting, demanding entrance, and willingly, she opened herself to him.

She'd had only a second to survey her surroundings before he'd taken hold of her—­the chamber half hidden beneath Holland covers and the bed made up and ready for the next occupant.

“Whose room is this?” she managed to ask when Kingsley's lips moved from hers to explore the nape of her neck.

She didn't know why, but it mattered.

“Mine,” he said, taking much the same sort of furtive glance about as she had. “The room is mine.”

“Yours? But I thought—­”

He pulled back a bit, one hand cradling her chin. “I told you, minx. I have use of the house. I slept here just last night, if you must know.”

Just last night
.

Her gaze flitted to the large bed behind her. The rich coverlet that offered warmth. The wide, deep mattress.

Then she looked back at him.

From the light in his eyes, the hunger in his kiss, Arabella knew sleeping was the furthest thing from Kingsley's mind.

He leaned in and kissed her, this time gently, coaxing her to join him.

Join him in his bed.

Yet warnings clamored from what seemed like another lifetime. From far away.

If things become irreversible. . .

But things already were, Arabella realized. She'd never be able to walk away from Kingsley—­not without knowing . . . this.

However would she live the rest of her days wondering what might have happened?

Not when she knew what she wanted.

She wanted him to touch her as he had at the Setchfield ball. She wanted him to devour her as he'd promised that night. She wanted to feel as she had in the bower—­her body thrumming alive, and Kingsley hard against her.

As he was right now.

“Birdie, I—­”

She stopped him with a kiss of her own, rising up on her tiptoes, bringing her body up against his, her hips undulating against his groin, against
him
.

That, that long hard length of him, straining against the front of his breeches, left her shivering. Longing, as the book of Venus had promised, for him to fill her, stroke her, tease her until . . .

Oh, until. . .

That was the temptation that called to her.

Until. . .

That single word held a clarion note she couldn't resist.

“I want—­” he whispered in her ear, as his hand curled under her breast, his thumb rubbing at her nipple. His other hand cupped her bottom and pulled her close, so she rode up and down against him.

Her mouth opened and he kissed her—­it was a moment of such deep need—­his tongue tracing over hers, his fingers bringing her nipple to a sensitive point, and her very core, that private place—­private no more as it seemed to find a way to come alive each time her hips swayed toward him.

Want
. Yes, she wanted him as well.

And the devil knew it, for his hand caught hold of her skirt and pulled it up, his fingers sliding right to that quivering, aching spot.

At first she panicked a bit—­she'd never been touched so, but he grinned at her, and kissed her again, kissed her deeply, until a soft, anxious mew of pleasure slipped from her, and then he touched her yet again.

This time, Arabella's legs opened to him, just as her lips had, welcoming him, and he began to tease her open.

When he slid over her, she gasped as he found the perfect spot.

And just as he'd promised a sennight earlier at the ball, he began to devour her.

She gasped for air as his fingers teased her, round and round he circled her, sliding his finger inside her, until she was wet and trembling—­barely able to remember her name.

Oh, but she knew his.

“Kingsley,” she gasped, even as he pulled his hand away and shrugged off his coat.

She reached for him, teetering and lost without him holding her.

Catching hold of his waistcoat, she focused on the solid masculine, and worst of all, still clad wall before her. Oh, that would never do—­him with his clothes on.

A madness came over her.

And so she plucked the buttons before her open, pulling his waistcoat free, then tugging his shirt from his breeches and pulling it up and over his head until he was bare-­chested before her.

Arabella drew a steadying breath, for while she'd seen men stripped to their waists before, she hadn't seen anything quite like Kingsley.

He was so very masculine—­proportioned like one of Elgin's marbles—­with broad, strong planes and hard lines. He was just so very hard—­and yet when he held her, when he touched her, she felt something quite opposite.

A dangerous gentleness capable of coaxing her, leading her down a tempting path.

Oh, and she was so very tempted. Filled with desire.

She hadn't even noticed that while he'd been touching her, bringing her close, he'd also managed to undo the buttons down the back of her gown.

“You're much better at that,” she teased as her gown fell to the floor.

“I prefer the undoing part.” Apparently with good reason.

His head dipped down and his lips caught hold of her nipple. This time it was his tongue that teased her, suckling her, and again she was tossed into a tempest.

“Ah, yes, the undoing is the best part,” he told her as he moved to her other breast, working the same wet, hot magic on that side.

Ah, yes. Undone was best
, Arabella wanted to tell him, as his hands, his lips explored her.

And then she knew he was gaining an advantage.

“Let me see how this undoing works,” she whispered, reaching out and slipping the first button free from his breeches, the back of her hand sliding over him.

All the way down.

He stilled, his mouth opening to say something, yet no words came out, his dark gaze locked on hers. Then he grinned, ever so slightly, as if to dare her to do it again.

And so she did.

The second button opened and then the third, and she watched his face, his gaze narrow as his world teased into just that—­her touch, her hold on him.

Oh, yes, so this undoing could work both ways, and in that knowledge, Arabella came into her own. That boldness that made her a Tremont sang through her blood.

Beneath her fingers, his breeches strained, and when she undid the final button, slowly, deliberately, using both hands and taking advantage of his captivity to tease him terribly, suddenly he was free, and she caught hold of him, marveling at his length, the feel of him.

Silken smooth. And hard. And throbbing, much as she was.

She didn't realize it, but she'd been holding her breath, waiting for this. When she could hold him, tease him as he'd done her. Running her hand down him and then back up, marveling as he threw back his head and made a noise that was both a growl and triumphant.

Her thumb rolled over the round full tip, a bead of moisture welling up, and she used it to slide over him, her touch now slick and hot.

As she stroked him, what she hadn't expected was how it would tease her. He was holding her close, whispering in her ear, and leaving a trail of hot eager kisses on the nape of her neck, yet all she could think of was the ache between her legs.

The ache only he could ease.

“Kingsley, I want—­” Her lashes fluttered as the words failed her. “Please,” she finally managed.

She didn't need to ask again. He eased her back onto the bed, grinning as she sank into the mattress.

And when he followed, climbing atop her, she opened herself to him.

Yet as she curled up and into his embrace, she sensed a hesitation about him.

Having spent the last sennight imagining just this, Kingsley naked, over her, filling her, Arabella wasn't willing to wait any longer.

“Kingsley,” she whispered. “You promised.”

K
ingsley looked down at the beauty in his bed and had only one thought, to make her his.

Forever
.

His tempestuous, beautiful, willful Birdie. His always.

As he climbed in, covering her body with his, he knew he'd never been so hard, so full of need.

Her touch had been so innocent to begin with, but it hadn't taken her long to become bold.

Bold was one thing, but innocent?

Good God, what the hell was he doing?

He was about to climb out of the bed, but her hand curved around his cheek.

“Kingsley, you promised.” She smiled up at him, a sensuous, tempting curve to her lips.

Yes, he had. But not like she thought. The promise he was making as his hand caught hold of her rounded bottom, and lifted her to him, was the sort he'd explain in the morning.

The rest of their lives, but right now even as her legs opened to him, one curling around his hip, he knew only one thing.

Birdie.

She stretched and coiled to be closer to him, and he eased himself into her tight, hot channel.

“This might hurt,” he told her as he entered her. “But only for a moment.” And then he kissed her again, deeply, thoroughly as he had before, until she was once again writhing against him, mewing with pleasure, and it was then he pushed past the barrier he'd met and made her his.

H
urt? Arabella had barely registered the word as Kingsley's lips once again claimed her. His kiss, still tasting of the brandy he'd had in the other room, was as intoxicating as the liquor itself. His tongue teasing her much as she realized he would tease her with his manhood, for she could feel him beginning to fill her, her body opening to him, stretching.

It was nearly too much for her, but then he was inside her, with a thrust that broke past her innocence.

For a moment, Arabella found herself wrenched back into the world, but Kingsley caught hold of her, easing in and out of her, kissing her, teasing her, thrusting again, and this time, there was no pain.

Far from it.

Those tendrils, born of his touch, his kiss, uncoiled within her, drawing her closer to him.

He continued to fill her, whispering words meant only for her, his kiss growing more hungry, more urgent, and she knew why—­for she felt the same haphazard pull upward.

She followed, her fingers clinging to his shoulders, holding on to him, and when he gave one hard, frantic thrust, gasping out her name, “Birdie!” she found herself wrested along with him, a wicked, magical wave leading her to her release. It was as if all the coils and tangles that had bound them together suddenly let go and she was adrift with him, languid and free all at once.

“Oh, yes,” she agreed. “Yes, Kingsley.”

And he rolled to one side, bringing her with him, and they held each other as the unruly waves continued to toss them, safe in each other's arms.

A
rabella found herself nestled in a warm cocoon when she awoke sometime later. It wasn't the strange place, or the fact that she was curled up next to an entirely naked man that startled her—­on the contrary, the naked man part made her suddenly restless and . . . hungry.

But there was something else that brought her back to her surroundings.

A softly whistled tune, a sweet romantic song that had called her from her sultry dreams.

She rolled toward the source, and even in the meager light, she could see the amusement on Kingsley's face as he continued to call to her, luring her awake.

“Teach me,” she said, her fingers softly tracing the O his lips were making.

“Full of demands, aren't you, minx?”

“I am,” she told him, cocking her head slightly.

“Changing the terms of our agreement yet again?”

“I am,” she told him. “I haven't heard any complaints as to my last amendment.”

“And you never will,” he laughed, curling her back into his embrace.

“Teach me to whistle,” she repeated.

“As you wish. Purse up your lips like this—­” His lips puckered up and she followed suit.

But he just stared at her.

“Well? Am I doing it wrong?” she asked.

“No, but it's hard to remember what we were doing with your lips all ripe for kissing.”

She swatted him on the shoulder.

Then she remembered.

If you must know, I was shot in the shoulder.

She scrambled to sit up. “Oh, heavens! I am so sorry. Is that where you were injured?”

He shook his head. “No. The other side. But I might note that you have the right hook of a French bullet.”

While he reached up to rub the spot she'd contacted, Arabella's gaze flew to the other shoulder, her fingers following until they came to the puckered scars.

“It's all done and healed, sweetling,” he told her. “I was lucky.”

“I suppose,” she said. “It must have been—­”

“It was war. And it's well and over,” he told her. “Though now I face my greatest challenge.”

She sat back. “What is that?”

“Teaching you to whistle.”

Now it was her turn to laugh.

“Just pucker your lips like this—­”

Arabella did as he instructed.

“And put your tongue up on the roof of your mouth and blow.”

She did as he said, but all that came out was a wet, sputtering noise that hardly resembled the sweet notes that had called her awake.

Kingsley laughed at her attempt—­that is, after he wiped his now damp face.

“What is so funny?” she demanded, pursing her lips again and forcing a sound out that in no way resembled the merry tune the milkmaid made so effortlessly.

“You,” he told her as his hand curled around her chin and raised it up so she was looking right at him.