Once Upon a Kiss (Book Club Belles Society) (6 page)

Plainly she waited for a response. So he gave her the best he could manage. “I see.”

Sometimes, when he was in danger of being overtaken by nerves in the presence of a troubling female, it was easiest to settle for those two small words. At least he was in no danger of faltering over them.

But this seemed to incense her further. She breathed harder now, ready to burst with indignation. Since she’d discarded her pelisse in his orchard, she wore only her ripped frock, made from thin material. Probably too thin for the time of year. Although it was sewn in a modest design, the mist-dampened cloth clung to her shape and drew his gaze to parts of her that he should not notice. Parts he’d seen before and haplessly admired, despite the impropriety and the sudden shock of having them land on his head just as he tried to get to sleep.

Darius struggled to halt the twitch at one corner of his mouth, and after a few moments it was successfully stilled, his countenance under control again. She was fascinating, really, if one had a morbid interest in forward young women of indeterminate age and with too much to say for themselves.

“What are you thinking now?” she demanded, pert.

“Can’t you tell? I thought you knew everything.”

“Your face has transformed to stone. Deliberately hiding your thoughts.”

He paused, took a breath, and then said, “I am thinking that you are a young lady who doesn’t want to face her future. Part of you would rather be a child forever and have no responsibilities, no adult concerns. That for you, life is always a game.”

She stared.

He added, “And that I very nearly did not recognize you with your clothes on.”

Finally, a rosy bloom darkened her cheeks.

“You did ask,” he reminded her briskly.

She was silent at last.

Darius unfolded his arms and drummed his fingers slowly on the table. Just as he pondered, once again, her reasons for remaining there to quarrel with him, she slowly began a retreat, inching toward the open door.

“I bid you good eve, then,” she chirped, ignoring his comment about recognizing her. “I’m late for the Book Society meeting.” With a sharp, upward tip of the chin, she added, “They’ll be expecting me.”

His lip quirked. “You mean there are places where you are wanted and people who want you? I’m surprised you delay here with me then.”

“Are you always such a pompous know-all?”

He sat looking at her with a strained countenance, his lips pressed tight.

The rarely experienced sense of having perhaps gone too far caused her to flinch, but she had become too comfortable while arguing with him. She had momentarily forgotten herself, Cathy would say. Or, at least, she had forgotten her manners. But he was not in the least polite to her, so why should she care? He’d already let it be known, when they met in Bath, what little he thought of her looks, and now he disparaged her character equally.

Although close to escape, Justina hesitated, her gaze drawn to his strong, square-tipped fingers tapping out a rhythm on the wooden table. She had been wrong about his hands. They were browned by sun and a little weathered, just rough enough to catch her attention. Despite his haughty manners, they were not the hands of a dandy. Suddenly she blurted, “May I have the fruit, then, for Mrs. Dockley? She grows none of her own anymore.”

She couldn’t think why she chanced her luck, but the need to do so was too much for her to manage. There was no one there to stop her, of course; no gentle word from Catherine to correct her.

“I thought you wouldn’t mind me taking some, since you’re leaving tomorrow anyway.” How could she leave without fruit after all this? “You don’t want it,” she reminded him. “Sir Mortimer Grubbins can’t eat it all or he’ll get a bellyache. So it’ll be left to waste, won’t it? If no one claims it.”

“I see,” he muttered. If she was not mistaken, he was looking at her gown as if he could see directly through it. Then he lowered his lashes, hiding behind them. His jaw hardened as he tightened his lips, apparently resolved to say nothing more. A little drop of moisture hovered from a lock of hair on the left side of his brow, and she watched until it gathered enough weight to drop to his cheek.

Justina swallowed. “If you don’t mind, then…”

He pushed back his chair, scraping its narrow legs across the stone floor, and then he stood, leaning his broad knuckles on the table by the lantern. He looked at her for what felt like a million years. Or ten minutes at least.

Finally he conceded, “You may take what you can carry.” In haste to be rid of her, it seemed, he gave in. She could barely believe that victory was hers.

Justina bobbed a curtsy, aware it was too late and not in the least elegant. Poor Catherine would despair. “Thank you, sir.”

He simply shook his head and looked away, deep in thoughts. Dark ones, too, by the look of it.

A shiver lapped over her as if a window had blown open and let in a cold draft. She hadn’t realized, until then, that his eyes held a peculiar kind of heat that, despite her damp clothes, kept her warm when he looked at her.

How strange that they should meet again after the first horror. Fate, it seemed, had given her a chance to apologize for what happened in Bath. If she didn’t do something, would she regret it forever? He seemed lonely suddenly, standing in that quiet kitchen, half his face in shadow.

He didn’t smile and his words came out begrudgingly, as if rationed, just like old Phineas Hawke. No doubt this fellow would end his days the same way, unloved and alone. She knew there was no woman in his life. How could there be? A woman would have tied his cravat in a more fashionable bow. A woman would make him grow his curl out a little to soften his profile and give her something in which to tangle her fingers. A woman’s love would surely have caused a few laughter lines in his stern face.

Making another hasty decision, Justina walked to where he stood, rose up on tiptoe, and kissed him. “God speed,” she whispered with her usual flare for the dramatic. Her lips skimmed the bristles of his cheek just above his high collar.

He turned to look at her. His eyes, dark and angry, tore into her face.

Oh, why had she done that? This man was a stranger, fierce, stern, and disapproving. He had done naught but insult her, yet she’d kissed him. As if, somewhere inside, she thought she might improve his opinion of her. Impulsive fool! What on earth induced her to do it?

Mischief, of course. She never could calm those impulses. There was always a temptation to see how much she might get away with.

Suddenly his hands were on her waist. He lifted her off her feet for the second time. In that dreadful moment she thought he would toss her across the room; he seemed furious enough. But instead he lowered her again until her lips met his.

For balance, she placed her hands on his wide shoulders. Her breasts were tight against his upper chest, her head bent and tilted, her toes dangling in the air. The beat of her heart became so hard and fast that it turned into one long, loud flutter in her ears.

His lips, cold and hard, pressed hers apart in a kiss that left Justina breathless, her wits powerless. When she felt his tongue move shockingly over hers, searching inside her, she wondered if he sought there for more of her crimes. The heat of his body invaded the pores of her skin and then her bones, melting them until she was an appalling mess of a woman and only his hands around her waist kept her from seeping out of her stays like cider from a leaky barrel. She heard a low sound from deep inside him and it seemed to express everything she too felt at that moment—the surprise, wonder, delight, confusion. And desire. White hot, those flames consumed her body, devoured her, and then brought her back to life again in a new way.

Slowly, inch by inch, breath by breath, he lowered her down the length of his frame, until her toes touched stone again. There were parts of him that were just as hard as that flagged floor under her feet, and Justina suffered a burst of yearning that she feared would cause her to spend even longer writing her confessional tales that night.

His large hands spread against her spine and swept upward, pressing her even closer, her breasts crushed against him, aching suddenly. A warm heaviness took control of her body. An intense throbbing had begun between her thighs. This was far, far worse than Maiden’s Palsy.

He swept his tongue around hers and then finally withdrew the kiss. But his hands kept her tightly imprisoned against him.

Now on her own two feet again, she looked up at him. “Why…?” Further words got stuck halfway out of her throat and lodged there painfully.

“Payment for the fruit, of course,” he replied gruffly, his fingertips moving down her back, briefly tracing the curve of her bottom. He cleared his throat. “Fetch your pears. I’ll unlock the gate.”

But as she moved to leave, he suddenly tightened his hands on her again and pulled her back. Justina grabbed his upper sleeves, her fingers not nearly long enough to encompass even one third of the hard muscle beneath, and this time when he bent his head, she lifted slightly on her toes. Enough to meet him partway.

Oh, she wanted more. Much more. It was terrible. It was delightful. It was every forbidden thing, wrapped up in temptation, topped with a bow of opportunity.

A wicked inner voice whispered,
He’s leaving the village
.
No
one
need
ever
know
.

Again she felt the hard ridge inside his breeches, pushing against her belly through their clothing. His fingers spread over the cheeks of her bottom, cupping the flesh and holding her indecently, greedily. His lips feasted upon hers, his tongue thrusting like a sword to claim her mouth once more. As if he had not done so to his own satisfaction the first time.

He smelled of spice and sweat and earth. The heat of his muscles surrounded her, seemed to enclose her on all sides, and she was, for those breathless few moments, entirely his prisoner, a weak woman of the sort she’d always heartily disdained. But she did not mind it. Heaven help her, but she did not mind being his prisoner then.

His hand came up and closed over her left breast, the palm so hot she feared it would melt the material of her gown. That touch, firm and possessive, made Justina suddenly very conscious of her breathing, of her heart thumping away beneath her chemise and his hand. Her nipple tightened, responding instantly to that caress. Every pore of her skin was awakened to the strangeness of a man’s intimate touch.

The wet tip of his tongue brushed the side of her neck and she caught her breath in a shuddering gasp.

Abruptly his lips left her again. His hands followed. The fingers that had touched her breast now swept up and back through his hair. He looked down at her, his eyes dazed.

Neither spoke.

For once she was at a loss for words. It took all she had just to keep breathing.

Finally Justina forced her feet to move away from him and back out into the orchard. The mist still hung heavy between the trees, deadening sound, so that all she heard was the reckless thump of her heart. The moisture in the air surrounded her, but that was no longer the only warm dampness she experienced. He had melted parts of her.

Once she had filled the sack made out of her pelisse, she found her way to the gate where he waited.

Fingers tightly gripping her hard-won prize, she looked up and prepared to say her thanks again. She even intended to wish him a safe journey back to London.

But then he grumbled down at her, “Now be gone, woman. I have things to do here, and you’ve kept me from them long enough.”

Justina was relieved to find her frown again, for it came much easier than a smile while her lips were still afire and throbbing. “Such arrogance.”

“Such insolence.”

She hurried through the gate before he might try any further ravishment of her person. Before she might let him.

***

Darius barely had time to recover his wits before another figure appeared at the gate through which she’d vanished. This one was slower on its feet, but no quieter.

“Well, here’s a fine how d’you do!” she exclaimed when she saw him standing there holding the bars. “If I’d known you were coming, young sir, I would have been here to air out the linens and light a fire.” Materializing fully through the mist, she pushed her way by and hobbled toward the house, leaving him to follow. “I just heard you were here by chance, from the landlord at the Pig in a Poke. You should have sent word, Master Hawke!” Waddling through the open kitchen door, she tossed a large sack of potatoes onto the table, followed by two dead rabbits. “
Why
, says I, when Mr. Bridges tells me you came up here,
that
young
man
can’t stay up in that cold, empty house all alone. With no food put by!
”

Everyone seemed to think he shouldn’t want to be alone. When it was the one and only thing he wanted. Was every soul in this rotten village out to annoy the spit out of him?

“I am not Master Hawke,” he exclaimed crossly. “The name is Wainwright. Darius Wainwright. I am Mr. Hawke’s great-nephew. And you are?”

“Mrs. Birch, o’ course!” She pulled an apron over her brown frock. “Cook and housekeeper to old Hawke. The only one that stayed. The others couldn’t put up with his temper.”

Darius scratched his head, still deeply absorbed in pondering the curious woman who had just left his presence. “I can manage perfectly well without household staff. I am only staying until tomorrow.”

But the newcomer didn’t seem to listen to him any more than his last unwanted visitor had. “I’ll have my niece Martha come up and tend your laundry on Monday.” She carried a large pot to the water pump in the scullery. “You should keep that door closed, young sir, or the fog will come right into the house. I’ll make a nice rabbit stew for your supper. Then you’ll feel better.”

He wasn’t aware of being ill, but perhaps he was. Could be the reason he’d acted in such an unusual way just now. Fortunately that kiss hadn’t been observed.

The housekeeper carried the pot of water back out to the fire. “What was Justina Penny doing in here?”

“Penny?”

“Dr. Penny’s youngest daughter, from down in the village. I’d steer well clear of that troublesome miss, if I were you.”

Dr. Penny’s daughter.
Yes, that was the name.

He groaned, briefly closing his eyes again.

It was her. Not that he’d needed the proof of her name. But now he could not even pretend he didn’t remember her. Dr. Penny, the miscreant’s father, had sent a written apology to Darius after the incident in the Upper Rooms and also sealed with it some shilling coins for a new waistcoat to replace the one she ruined.

“She said she was on her way to a Book Society meeting,” he snapped.
Could
one
believe
anything
from
her
lips?

“Aye. The Book Club Belles, so they’ve been called. I don’t know what the world is coming to these days, with young girls reading stories instead of good, honest sermons. I don’t hold with it and never did. I’d rather have a coven o’ witches in the village than a book society to addle the minds of our young girls. And I hear they’ve got their hands on a romance! Of all things! Five impressionable young girls, left to indulge in wicked exercise of that nature for their minds. No good can come of it, to be sure.”

Darius slowly shook his head.

“They need to be married. That’ll knock the romance out of them quick enough,” Mrs. Birch added. “It’s the only way to keep some out of trouble. A husband is a sure way to rid a girl of romantic inclinations.”

He straightened his shoulders. That young woman had better not come over his wall again. Although he would not be around to worry about it, would he?

Raising unsteady fingers to the knot of his cravat he was relieved, but slightly surprised, to find it still neatly tied.

“Perhaps you can enlighten me, Mrs….Birch, to the supposed existence of a ghost by the name of Nellie Pickles.”