One Night With a Spy (22 page)

Marcus had his hand on her breast. When had he released her wrist? And why was she lying there, acquiescing to his bald encroachment?

Because it felt too bloody good, that was why. After everything he'd done, she was still melted wax at his touch, still easy takings.

His mouth still teased her neck, sending shivers of need through her. She forced herself to breathe against the weight of him, when all she wanted was to sink with him through the earth forever. "Get off," she demanded weakly.

He released her other hand and slid his down her arm to caress her cheek. "I cannot let you go," he whispered.

"Then stop." Her demand lacked force and she found herself teasing his curly hair through her fingertips.

"I cannot do that, either," he said, and kissed the hollow between her breasts. Her bodice had come awry, she noticed absently as she twined her fingers through his hair to press his mouth lower. His knee had shifted and was now pressing his hard thigh between hers. She writhed against that pressure, pleasuring herself against the muscled length.

"I want—" She stopped, for what did she want? Oh, yes, she wanted his hot mouth on her nipples. She slapped his hand away and tugged at her neckline until her breasts were freed to the chill in the air. Marcus, being an intelligent fellow, took advantage of the situation. She let her head fall back as the shudders of pleasure gripped her. Hot hard hands, clever fingers, hot wet mouth, big muscled body covering and dominating hers…

"I want you."

He moaned against her breast. "I'm here." She felt him reach down to hike her hem above her knees. She slid her own hands down between them to free him from his trousers. The buttons slipped from her shaking hands and she nearly cried. Her need for him went so deep she felt as if she'd never be whole again if he didn't take her right this minute.

He brushed her fumbling hands away and freed himself. She took him greedily in both hands, his hot flesh jerking at her cool touch. He hissed when she wrapped her fingers about him and squeezed. He throbbed larger in response, filling her hands with hot, pulsating male flesh.

Her female flesh responded, turning to molten liquid as she pressed the large head of his erection into herself. He thrust deep, wrapping his hands over her shoulders to keep her still.

Her own hands were trapped between them. It was all she could do to clutch at his coat and gasp as he spread her wide from within. He thrust again, deeper and harder, his own need taking the fore. "I cannot let you go," he gasped. "I cannot!"

She held on tight as he took her with all the broken love in his soul. She knew he had done what he had to do, and that he would continue to put his duty first. He would make love to her on the chill ground, and then he would take her back to the Four and turn her in.

The worst of it was that she didn't care. Marcus was in her arms, and in her body, for the last time. She wasn't going to waste a moment on pride or regret now. She wrapped her arms about him and held on for the tumultuous ride as he slipped and thrust into her wetness.

"I love you." He didn't hear her, for her whisper had been soundless. She pressed her face to his shoulder and whispered it again. "I will always love you."

Her heart ached, but her body trembled with the pleasure of him. She released the pain, released the heartbreak, and only let the pleasure shine through as Marcus's heated thrusts increased. She rode the cresting ecstasy higher, lost in pleasure, her keening cries shameless and animal in the forest air.

Marcus couldn't bear it. He had to devour her, own her, make her his! If he lost this woman, he could not see anything but gray disillusionment and agony for the rest of his life. Unbearable. Unacceptable. She was his.

When she welcomed him into her heated softness, he took her with everything he had in him. Every ache, every lonely hollow ache, every desperate adherence to empty duty, every loss—he gave it all to her, holding nothing back.

When she whispered her love, after everything he'd done to her, after his betrayal and now his crude seduction in the dirt, after he'd ruined her entire world—his heart broke beyond repair. He didn't deserve this amazing, astounding creature.

He took her anyway.

When they were spent and panting on their bed of leaves, Julia turned her face away and wiped at her tears. She did not want him to see her like this, weeping and weak.

Although he'd always seemed to see too much. He'd known within days what her nearest beloveds had not discerned in years. He'd known precisely what she'd wanted and needed—

The intruder on the grounds. The canny seduction. The lake, the horse race, the balcony—even the woods!

She pushed him from her and rolled away, her body racked by deep bitter laughter.

"The diaries! Oh, my God, you read the diaries!"

He hesitated. "Yes."

Her laughter raked her throat. "And I fell for it. What a perfect mark I was. What a perfect, gullible, romantic fool." She viciously rubbed the tears from her face and stood. "You said you had misperceptions about me. You thought it was all real, didn't you?"

He cleared his throat. "They were remarkably detailed, but I eventually realized they were only fantasies."

"Well,
of course
they were fantasies! No man is so understanding, nor so strong and tender as that." She wrapped her arms about herself. "As you have so thoroughly proven today."

"I confess, I wanted to believe they were real," he continued doggedly. "I wanted to think the worst of you, for it's much easier to destroy a wicked woman than a good one."

"And that goes well for you, does it?"

He flinched from her sarcasm. Good.

He stood, adjusting his clothing. "This plan of theirs—ours—I knew nothing of this. It must have been decided before I was confirmed this morning."

She looked up. "Then you can convince them to change it."

He shook his head. "No. It is binding. There is no way through it… but there might be a way around it."

She pushed back her hair. "I'm listening," she said warily.

"Marry me! Wed me at once!" He stepped closer. "If you are my lady, they will have to reconsider your sentence. It will solve everything!"

She closed her eyes, that small hope slipping away. She put a hand to his face and gazed into his eyes. "Now who is being gullible?"

He pressed his hand over hers. "It might work."

"And it might get you hung alongside me." She went up on tiptoe and kissed him softly. Then she spun quickly and kicked high, knocking him flat with a blow to the jaw.

Marcus rolled with the blow, his brain spinning in his skull. He rose to his feet and staggered, then froze as he spotted her.

She stood upright on the rump of his stallion, long reins held neatly in one hand. "Good-bye, Marcus," she called, and gave him an insouciant wave.

She rode away on his startled mount, still standing, a golden-haired goddess in black. He watched her until she was out of sight, but never took a step to stop her.

"Damn," he said faintly. "That was my favorite horse."

«
^
»

With Mum dead and gone, I decided to stay on with Himself and learn what he wants to teach me. How bad could it be? Besides, I can always go back to the fair…

"You're a very fine horse," Julia told her weary mount. "Most horses would have given out long ago."

The stallion flicked an ear backward at her voice and continued his plodding gait down a muddy country lane Julia wasn't sure she was recalling properly.

"I'm sorry about the steeple chasing," she added. "It was important to get far and fast. The Liar's Club was right behind us."

The stallion huffed a disbelieving snort.

"Oh, very well. Not right behind
you
." She straightened wearily in the saddle. Horseback had once been as comfortable as any chair for her, but she'd not ridden so hard and desperately for many years. She would most definitely be feeling the consequences when she woke tomorrow.

The stallion drew in a giant breath, expanding his ribs against the inside of her legs. Julia winced. Her skirts were of necessity rucked up to her knees and her stockings were shredded from their wild cross-country escape. The fact that her skin stung and throbbed beneath the tears didn't bear thinking about just yet.

"We ought to be close now," she told the stallion. "There are always traveling fair folk at the Dunston harvest fair about this time."

The stallion ignored her, since she'd been saying that same thing for the last hour. "No, truly," she assured him. "Oats and hay for you, bangers and mash for me." She sighed. "And perhaps a bit of liniment for my arse."

"Well, now, I think I can 'elp you with that, pretty lady." A figure stepped from the bushes into the last of the evening light to leer at her. "Rubbin' in the liniment, anyways."

Julia halted the stallion quickly and peered at the thickset, bearded man before her. Then her lips tilted. "And won't Petunia have something to say about that, John Wald? She still has that rolling pin of hers, doesn't she?"

The man started, then blinked at her. "Jilly Boots? Is that our skinny little Jilly-girl?" He laughed out loud and threw open his arms.

Julia let him haul her off the stallion, for she doubted she could get down with her stiffened limbs. "Hello, John," she said around his bear hug.

He set her back and took another look at her. "We heard you'd married up, fine lady now and all. Folk still havin' a 'Say' about how you caught yourself a lord. Always meant to go take a look at that man of yours, see if he was treatin' you right."

Then he seemed to see her black gown for what it was. Widow's garb. "Well, now, don't tell me you lost 'im already?"

Julia nodded, not trusting her voice. She'd lost Aldus and Marcus both in less than a fortnight. If there was such a thing as a blacker black, she'd wear it.

"I've lost a great deal, I'm afraid," she said finally. "All I have now is what I'm wearing." She tilted her head at the stallion now cropping grass by the side of the road. "And someone else's horse."

John gazed at the stallion speculatively. "Those are the best kind," he mused. Then he looked back at her. "Then what of the Pickles folk? I heard you gave 'em all monkey suits and salaries. Did you lose them, too?"

She sighed. "Had to knock down and get out of town."

That was all she needed to say. He threw an arm over her shoulders. "They'll be about, then," he said comfortingly. "Come and use our second wagon. Petunia'll be over the moon to see ye." He glanced back at the stallion. "He any good? It's too late to start a new show now, but a trick act would sure bring 'em in next season."

Julia looked at Marcus's stallion blankly. She'd not thought so far ahead. Could she simply turn herself back into Jilly the trick rider? Was such a thing even possible? She wrapped the reins about her hand and clucked the stallion into following her to the campsite ahead, where the colorful wagons of the fair folk were gathered.

It might not be much, but it was more future than she'd had five minutes ago.

Petunia was indeed "over the moon" and eagerly bestowed the second wagon, her best nightgown and she and John's second best set of tin. "I'd give you the good'ns, milady," she said apologetically, "but they're still on the fire."

Julia smiled at the homey sights and smells of campfire cooking and took the battered set of pots and pans. "This is lovely. And please call me Jilly, just as you used to."

Petunia bobbed. "Yes, milady—I mean—" Flustered, Petunia turned her ire on John. "Don't just stand there, you dolt. Lady Barrowby's wantin' a plateful, or I miss my guess!"

Julia shook her head, laughing. "I think I'm too weary to eat. If you'll do me the favor of spending a bit of that pampering on my horse, I'll take my rest now."

Petunia and John watched every moment of her climb into the second wagon. Julia waved and smiled, then closed the narrow door on their overeager hospitality before she could lose her poise. Once alone, she leaned her forehead against the flimsy door and took a deep breath.

"Imagine that!" she heard Petunia exclaim. "We've got a real lady in our wagon!"

"She's still Jilly, though, ain't she?" John sounded doubtful. "She's so fine now…"

This was home, and yet not home. Her family, yet she was so different now. Julia sighed. Perhaps a simple future as Jilly the trick rider was more complicated than she'd thought.

She removed her battered widow's gown and donned the nightdress, which was too short and too wide. The wagon had been hurriedly emptied of John and Petunia's extra belongings and the bench bed had been made up with a faded but clean quilt. Julia stroked it, remembering sleeping beneath a nearly identical one all her childhood.

"I'm back where we started, Mama," she whispered. She dropped her head into her hands. She felt like a pendulum, moving from one extreme to another, her life a pattern of gains and losses.

Had she ever been as low as now?

No, she decided. This was indeed the worst day of her life, for this time she had nothing to carry her on. No husband, no family, no estate, no lover, no work. Her hands and arms and heart had never been so empty.

"Well, tomorrow will surely be a step up, then."

She dropped back onto the quilt, pressing her hands over her eyes. Now that she had stopped moving, it seemed that all the emotions she'd held at bay during this endless day were coming up to ambush her.

Marcus.

She would not cry. She would
not
. She'd taken her leave of him, she'd had her last taste of his love and she'd kept his horse. There was nothing to be gained from tears.

Yet there was no denying that he'd caught her when she'd thought herself clean away. The last thing a man like Marcus wanted do was fail. He could find her again, for he'd wormed his way deep inside her. He
knew
her, in just the way she'd always dreamed of having a lover know her.

Unfortunately, her lover was now her enemy.

Oh, what the hell. Sometimes tears were the only way for a woman to know she could still feel.