Seducing the Beast (15 page)

Glancing over at the cliffs, she saw Gregory’s cottage on the edge, an idyllic spot overlooking the right side of the bay, opposite the hill on which their haven perched. Like their temporary residence, it was formed of cob walls, with a deep thatch roof invaded by thick moss in a subtle blend of browns and greens, but their cottage was exposed to the sea breezes. Gregory’s was surrounded by bushes and flowers, on the verge of overgrowth. Fortunately, the hedges and plants sheltering his cottage from the wind also hid the rock pool from his view.

“This is your scheme is it?” he asked, coming up behind her.

“I know nothing of schemes. I’m merely a victim of fate.”

Suddenly, he put his hands on her, under the water, holding her against his taut body. She swallowed a quick mewl of surprise, for he’d unlaced his breeches and now she felt his arousal; only her thin, wet shift came between them. He whispered in her ear. “Anybody might see through this piece of flotsam.”

“There’s no one here in this bay.”

“No one except me.”

“Does it bother
you
?”

He moved against her, his hard manhood stroking her soft curves and the cleft between. “This is what it does to me.” He was showing off again.

How could she think of sensible matters like “later” or “consequences”?

“I want you,” she said. “I want to learn all there is to know.” It came out with the same brutal honesty that had so often caused her trouble. She simply couldn’t stop it.

* * * *

Another gentle wave lapped against them, pushing her body against his, and it was the last straw. He had not got this out of his system yesterday, as he’d hoped. His fingers wrenched impatiently at the laces of her bodice, and he spun the temptress around to face him. “Why me?” he demanded. “Do I pay for my sins now?”

“Yes,” she replied, sliding her hands under his wet shirt, “I’m here to cleanse you, body and soul.” Her eyes were bright, full of wit. Yes, he thought, almost angry, she was pleased with her little game.

“Wait!” He laid his hands over hers, the wet linen shirt between them. “You know who I am. Tell me again. Tell me.”

“Griff, of course. The earl’s indentured servant and lackey.” She grinned. “And yes I know you have nothing to offer me. I know you make no promises for the future. I won’t ask you for anything else--”

He kissed her, drinking the breath out of her. Through the dampened shift, his palm cupped her warm, round breast, his thumb gently caressing an eagerly thrusting peak. “How can I refuse?” he groaned, arguing again with his distracted conscience. “Anything you want, I feel inclined to give you in this moment, woman.”

“Can you meet my demands?” She chuckled playfully.

“What is it you want from me then?”

“This of course! You.”

“This is all you want?” He was incredulous.

Under the water, she stroked his length, rousing him further still. “What more could any woman want?” she whispered.

Blood pulsed rapidly from his heart to his cock. He ground his teeth, letting her explore for as long as he could. She seemed intrigued by his length and breadth, how it reacted to her hand, taking on a life of its own. Now her fingers closed around his width and tugged upward again, squeezing. He groaned,a deep, hollow sound. The sea water lapped around his waist, the swell stroking his thighs. Grabbing her under the arms, he pulled her close, trapping that questing hand between them. Then he lifted her, bent his head, and pressed his voracious lips to her nipple. At the sound of her cries, the savage desire mounted. Oh yes, he would play this game with her, but there would only be one victor. Cradling her to his wet, slick body, he dove down into the water, taking her with him.

They lay across the fleece spread before the fire, and he curled her into his arms, her head on his shoulder. Slowly, painstakingly, he combed his long fingers through her wet hair, gently separating the tangles. She grew sleepy, her limbs pleasantly exhausted, the way it used to be when she was a child, play-weary after a long day in the summer sun. Lying together in the firelight, they listened to rain drumming against the thatch of their little haven. Their clothes--or what was left of them in her case--were stretched out across the chairs to dry, dripping rain and saltwater onto the flagstones.

For one of the few times in her life, she didn’t care to talk. When he shifted, easing her back to the fleece, she complained at the loss of his firm chest and wide, warm shoulder.

Regarding her carefully, his weight propped up on one elbow, he began, “Woman, I…”

Pressing a finger to his lips, fearing he would lecture her, as he’d done before, she said simply, “I wanted you.” It was uncomplicated, in her eyes.

He looked away for a moment, then back down at her. His nostrils flared slightly. “I’m not certain I should approve of you. I don’t understand this.”

She answered with a relaxed sigh, “You try to make sense of a matter for which there is no explanation.”

“I’m a contemplative man. I need sense in my life. I need order and answers.”

“Some things have no answers. Have you never before acted purely on instinct?”

That idea was scandalous apparently. “No!”

“When I know what I want, why waste time?” She wriggled back into his embrace. “I might never have another opportunity.”

“Indeed.” He drew his fingers across her brow, brushing back another lock of damp hair. “And is this how you were raised? To take what you want, without heed to propriety and consequences?”

“My single-minded, independent ways have served you well. I heard no complaints in the rock pool,” she reminded him with a smile.

“Yes, yes,” he mumbled. “I have no complaint.” His fingers stroked the side of her breast. “I’m fortunate you never acted on this lust for some other man, before me.” His eyelids lowered and a muted, sulky anger pulled on the corners of his mouth. “Clearly no sense of decorum would have stopped you. Your lusty wandering eye might just as easily have landed on anyone.” His hand settled over her breast, his palm brushing the nipple which, yet again, rose instantly. “It takes very little for you to be aroused.”

She corrected him. “It takes very little for
you
to arouse me.” When his hand continued its slow, meandering journey down her body, she squirmed under his stern gaze, wanting to dispel his serious mood. “Am I solely to blame for this temptation?”

His reply was matter-of-fact. “Yes. I was undone the very moment you flashed those tear-stung blue eyes with beguiling innocence, while offering your bosom to me with the subtlety of a sixpenny whore.”

She protested this description, while he teased her with his fingertips, tracing patterns along her inner thighs.

“I assumed these were the cunning, much-practiced arts employed by the infamous Lady Shelton to snare her prey. Warned of her notoriety in that regard, I was prepared to resist her.”

“Your powers of resistance failed.”

“On the contrary,” he said, “I would not succumb to her, as I did to you.”

“Liar.” She sat up, rolling him over on his back. “Only four days after we met, you trapped Lady Shelton up against the door, preparing to show her she could forget Gabriel Mallory.”

“It was you I had against the door, not her.” He slid his arms around her waist, trying to wrestle her over, but she clamped her legs around his hips and would not surrender.

“You didn’t know that.”

“I was consumed with lust, ’tis true. You tempt me beyond endurance. You’re an artful hussy, whoever you are.” Flat on his back he gave up fighting her. Instead, his heavy hands settled on her hips, holding her astride his body. Already he was erect again, much to her delight. “Limpet,” he groaned, catching his breath. “From drought to flood you have brought me.” He reached up, threading his fingers through her hair, tugging her down. “From famine,” he said, arching up, their lips meeting mid-way, “to feast.”

She looked down at the man stretched out beneath her, the gentle valleys and hills of his rugged, sun-browned torso gleaming in the firelight. “I’m glad
you
rescued me from the river,” she said, feeling it more certainly than ever.

Some mysterious flint within her, she concluded, must have rubbed against the same within him, for the heat of the fire they produced melted the gold nuggets in his eyes and now they dripped, molten, over his lashes. “No more than I,” he replied with a grunt of satisfaction. “Fortune smiled on me that day.”

* * * *

For the next few days the sun shone, and they went down to the bay as the tide came in. They waded together in the sea, splashing one another and falling in the waves. She wore her shift with his jerkin belted over it, at his stern insistence, however, none of his concern for modesty lasted long, once they made their way to that rock pool.

Guilt might have invaded his thoughts, if not for his certainty that she knew who he was, knew exactly what she did. Oh, she was beguiling, a delicious sweetmeat, and he would make the most of her talents. It couldn’t last forever, of course. He would find out what she was truly after and who’d put her up to it, then he would dole out the punishments.

When they ate luncheon on the sands, he pointed out to her the things he’d seen daily in childhood--the strange shape of the rocks at the mouth of the bay, where the tide’s relentless wash had carved faces in the ancient stone. He described his first fishing lesson with Gregory, who’d also taught him to swim in the bay. He told her how Sally had said he would find a mermaid one day, and how, as a boy, he’d stood on the rocks, waiting, watching, always disappointed.

“Then you found me,” she said proudly.

“Yesss.” Never before had he opened up like this to anyone, but she drank in every detail he gave her. Lying on her front, heels in the air, she listened avidly to his stories while telling him none of her own, he realized grimly.

“Gregory won’t come down to talk to you today?” she asked.

“He has business at the manor. He expects the earl any day now.”

Her eyes widened. “The earl comes so soon?”

“He has a right to come home surely.” He lay back, resting his elbows in the sand and laughed. “You’ve gone white as salt.”

“When the earl comes, our time will be over. We will be separated.”

If he didn’t know better, he would swear she meant it, that she truly thought she spoke of another man. Artful hussy. His gaze traveled over her slowly, admiring her unconventional, improper state of undress. Good thing he’d told Gregory to order her some new clothes.

“I suppose the end must come eventually,” he said carefully.

She nodded, tracing patterns in the sand with a fingertip. “Yet so soon,” she murmured.

He smiled slowly.

* * * *

With his teeth shining in the sun and a light dusting of golden sand across his face and chest, Madolyn thought him suddenly despicably beautiful, a demigod before her. How odd that she’d thought him ugly before. “I hope the earl will listen to my case for Nathaniel.”

He snorted. “I’ve never encountered such a convincing minx. You must get anything you want, when you set your mind to it. If anyone ever could change his mind, you would.”

“Even him?”

“Your powers of persuasion, limpet, are extraordinary. I know to my own cost.”

She liked it when he flicked a smile at her, as if he couldn’t help himself, his eyes studying her as they would a winning hand of cards.

“Let’s go back to the cottage,” she said.

He tipped his head to one side, his expression quizzical.

“Now,” she commanded. “I need you.”

He leapt to his feet, gathering up the remnants of their picnic and whistling a tune, apparently unconcerned with the impending arrival of his lord and master, but vastly amused by her eagerness to get him indoors.

She had no willpower to resist him. He knew it and duly tormented her. She had discovered an insatiable appetite for more than marchpane tarts.

At breakfast, when he reached for her hand, urging her down into his lap, she protested, “That old trick!”

But she went to him because he was irresistible. It was, she thought, a good thing this affair couldn’t last forever, because they would exhaust one another. To her surprise, however, he had no ulterior motive in mind, when he pulled her into his lap. He merely held her there, continuing his breakfast and their conversation. Charmed, she fell quiet, listening to him talk, watching him eat. No one in the world, she mused, could summon her presence quite the way he did. He still thought her disobedient and difficult. If only he knew how much sweeter she was to him than anyone else. She stared at his profile, wanting to keep it safe in her memory forever.

He stopped chewing. “Were you listening to a word I said?”

Smiling, she leaned in to kiss his cheek and he caught his breath in surprise. He lowered his gaze, hiding suddenly and shy. She kissed his eyelids too, whispering that his lap was the most comfortable seat ever and she was sorry she’d once insulted it.

He laughed, in that distant way a person might when they seldom knew tenderness. “You go too far, wench.”

Wrinkling her nose, she thought what a funny man he was, but folk were seldom grateful for her help and his reluctance didn’t dissuade her in the slightest.

One afternoon, Griff was busy with his horse, so she went out to pick new flowers for the table. Lost in the beauty of the countryside, she was unaware how much time had passed until he came looking for her, galloping up the hill in too much haste even to saddle his horse.

He drew the horse to a sharp halt before her. “Where the devil have you been?” he demanded furiously.

Looking up, eyes shielded from the bright sun with one hand, she calmly surveyed the angry barbarian. “I came out to pick flowers.” She showed the colorful bunch in her other hand. “What could be wrong with that?”

“I didn’t know where you went,” he said through gritted teeth, breathing hard, sunlight shimmering across his chest and shoulders. He’d spared no time to put on a shirt when he’d chased after her intent on recapture. “Anything might have happened to you, wandering off like that.”