Some Like It Wild (11 page)

P
amela opened her mouth but Connor’s hand was there, warm and firm against the parted softness of her lips, stifling any sound she might have made.

He leaned close to her ear, the silky rasp of his voice raising gooseflesh on her arms. “Don’t scream, lass, or you’ll bring the whole house down on our heads.”

Given that a notorious highwayman was sitting on the edge of her bed with his hand over her mouth, it occurred to her that screaming just might be the wisest course of action.

But when he slowly withdrew his hand, she only whispered furiously, “What do you think you’re doing?”

His dimple made a devilish appearance. “Sneaking into my betrothed’s bedchamber to steal a good-night kiss?”

He was dressed as he had been at their first meeting—all in black, one with the shadows. His hair was loose, its unruly tendrils framing his face. He still smelled like fresh pine and wood smoke. She could not help but wonder if he still tasted like whisky and danger.

She propped herself up on her elbows, shaking her hair out of her eyes. “How did you get in here?”

“Through the window.”

She followed the direction of his gaze, her mouth falling open in surprise. The window that had been safely secured only minutes ago was now standing ajar, inviting in a cool night breeze and any scoundrel or rogue who happened to be passing by.

She snapped her mouth shut and returned her wary gaze to his face. She couldn’t afford to forget that he was a thief any more than she could afford to forget that he was a man accustomed to taking what he wanted, consequences be damned.

“Did you ever think of using more conventional means—like the
door
?”

He scowled. “Where’s the challenge in that? Besides, it would hardly do for some footman or maid to catch me sneaking into my fiancée’s room in the dead of night. We have to think about your reputation.”

“Oh, I’m sure you already have everyone thinking about my reputation. My reputation as a man-hunting, gold-digging little strumpet who’s set her greedy cap on snaring a duke.” Remembering that
Sophie was slumbering in the next room, she lowered her voice to a hissed whisper. “What on earth possessed you to tell them you were betrothed to the penniless daughter of an actress?”

“Ah, but you forget, lass—you’re not penniless anymore. That reward would make quite a handsome dowry.”

“As if I would squander it just for the privilege of marrying you!”

He gently cupped her cheek in his hand, tracing the plump curve of her bottom lip with the callused pad of his thumb. “I could have told them we were already wed. Then you’d be sharing my bed on this night.”

“Oh, I might be sharing your bedchamber, sir, but never your bed.”

As Connor gazed down into Pamela’s upturned face, her defiant words were belied by the shimmer of uncertainty in her eyes, the inviting way her lips parted ever so slightly beneath the coaxing pressure of his thumb. In that moment he could barely remember his paltry excuse for coming here, could almost believe he really was an overeager groom desperate to sample his bride’s charms. There wasn’t a man alive who would condemn him for that—not when Pamela lay rumpled and warm beneath his hand, her eyes snapping with amber sparks and her unbound hair cascading like mahogany silk down her back.

He wanted nothing more than to bear her back against the softness of the mattress with the hard length of his body. To bury his face in the sweet-
smelling silk of her hair and fill his hands with the ripe sweetness of her breasts. To ease up her nightdress, coax her creamy thighs apart and take her like a thief in the night. To slip away while she was still aching for his touch, leaving her to wake in the morning and wonder if it had all been some extraordinary dream.

But Connor had learned long ago that whatever he stole now, he would have to pay for later. And as he gazed down into Pamela’s wary eyes, he was afraid the price for one night in her arms might be more than his heart was willing to pay.

He reluctantly lowered his hand, telling himself he must have imagined the flicker of disappointment in her eyes. “You’re the one who warned me I’d still be a wanted man in London. What better way to ward off all those eager young women than to let them believe I’m already taken? Then we can focus all our efforts on finding your mother’s killer.”

“And once we do? What then?”

He shrugged. “You can break my heart. Beg off our engagement and leave me a wasted shell of a man ruined for any other woman.”

She lowered her lashes, uttering a soft laugh. “As if anyone would ever believe a woman like me would refuse a man like you.”

He tilted her chin up with one finger. “Well, in that case…”

Then he did what he’d been aching to do from the moment he’d slipped into her chamber. From the moment her sister had interrupted them on that
cold, rocky road in Scotland. He twined his hand through the silky coils of her hair and touched his lips to hers.

Pamela shuddered as a tide of yearning, unexpected and powerful, swept through her. This time there was no Sophie to save her from her own folly with a well-timed blow from a parasol. There were only the two of them and the coaxing sweetness of his mouth against hers.

She couldn’t have said how she ended up flat on her back beneath him. One minute she was still propped up on her elbows, the next her arms were twined around his neck, her fingers tangled in the coarse silk of his hair. He was a shadow covering her, blocking out the moonlight as he pressed her deep into the softness of the mattress with the long, hard length of his body.

His mouth slanted over hers again and again, deepening his kiss with each pass until she welcomed the smoldering velvet of his tongue into her mouth. He tasted even better than she remembered—smoky and sweet and intoxicating. She moaned against his lips, no longer able to resist tracing the edge of his chipped tooth with her tongue.

That single shy motion dragged a ragged groan from his throat. “Och, lass, what are you tryin’ to do? Drive me wild?”

When his mouth descended on hers again, she knew she had succeeded without even trying. His kisses were no longer tender and coaxing but fierce and hungry, demanding a response she was only
too eager to give. He possessed her mouth like a born thief, stealing her breath, her heart, her will to resist him.

She didn’t even protest when he eased her nightdress off her shoulder so he could press his lips to the delicate wing of her collarbone, taste the pulse throbbing beneath the gossamer skin of her throat. His teeth tugged at her earlobe, sending a dark shiver of delight pulsing between her thighs.

His mouth caught her moan, feeding it back to her with a ferocious tenderness that left her limp with yearning. Made it even easier for his knee to nudge those thighs apart so he could settle his weight between them. He rocked against her, his kiss mimicking the motion with each rhythmic thrust of his tongue, until those shivers of delight began to multiply into something even more extraordinary and far more dangerous. She heard herself sob his name in a voice that didn’t even sound like her own.

Despite everything that had passed between them, it was still a shock when his hand dipped into the bodice of her nightdress and closed over her breast, bringing them flesh to flesh for the first time. He filled his palm with the fullness of her breast and gently squeezed, then brushed the callused pad of his thumb over the rigid bud of her nipple, sending a fresh throb of desire deep into her womb.

Shame began to war with Pamela’s pleasure as she realized the worn folds of her nightdress and
the thin buckskin of his trousers were all that separated her from ruin. Had her mother once surrendered to such a magnificent man, never knowing that he wouldn’t just be the first, but the first of many?

Pamela’s dismay began to swell into panic. Her hand closed around Connor’s wrist, but she might as well have been tugging at a tree stump. “Please, Connor, no! Please don’t!”

Connor was so drunk with desire that it took him a dazed moment to realize Pamela’s hand was seeking to drag his fingers away from the softness of her breast instead of urging them closer. That she was no longer begging him to continue, but to stop.

He slowly lifted his head to gaze down at her, both of them going so still that the only sound in the room was the harsh rasp of their breathing.

With his hand still cupped around the glorious fullness of her breast and his groin aching in the cradle of her thighs, he wasn’t in any mood to play fair. “You promised me all the willing women I cared to woo.”

She drew in a shuddering breath. “Is that what you’re doing? Are you wooing me, Mr. Kincaid?”

Her words cut him to the quick. Only seconds ago she had moaned his Christian name as if he had the power to satisfy her every desire. “If you must know,
Miss Darby
, I’m not in the habit of wooing women.”

A heartbreaking little laugh escaped her. “Of course you’re not. They probably woo you.”

“That’s not what I meant. I’m in the habit of paying for them.”

Pamela’s eyes widened, her beautiful, well-kissed mouth forming a soundless “Oh.”

Although he made an earnest effort, he was still too aroused to keep the rough edge from his voice. “What do you want from me, lass? Flowers? Tender words? Promises I won’t be able to keep?”

He would give her all that and more if she would just let him slip her nightdress over her head so she could be naked beneath him. So he could be inside of her. Hell, in that moment he’d have promised her the dukedom itself had it been his to give.

When she finally spoke, her words were little more than a whisper. “I want you to go.”

Even as she uttered the words, Pamela wished she could take them back, wished she didn’t have to see the icy mask settle over his face, leaving it as beautiful and merciless as it had been the first time she’d glimpsed it in the moonlight.

He was up and off of her in a heartbeat, leaving her shivering in the cool night air. She sat up in the bed and raked her tumbled hair out of her eyes, wishing desperately for the courage to call him back.

He turned at the window, a shadow framed by moonlight. “If I were the real marquess, could I command you to let me stay?”

Pamela hugged one knee to her chest, finding it a poor substitute for the warmth of his body. “If you were the real marquess, you wouldn’t want to stay. You’d have no need of a woman like me.”

Although she would have thought it impossible, his voice deepened even further. “Oh, I have need of you.”

Then he was gone, leaving her to collapse on the mattress, her lips still yearning for his kiss, her body still aching for his touch.

W
hen Connor awoke the next morning, it hardly improved the ragged edges of his temper to hear a cheerful song come floating out of the adjoining dressing room:

Connor sat up with a groan, casting his blankets aside. Golden sunlight poured through the row of sash windows on the far wall, searing his bleary eyes. A morning breeze perfumed with the intoxicating scent of apple blossoms drifted through the broken window pane.

He’d tossed and turned for half the night after his visit to Pamela’s bedchamber, his body aching with its undiminished need for her. He didn’t know what made him the bigger fool—sneaking into her bedchamber like the common thief he was or letting her convince him to steal away empty-handed.

When he had finally dozed off, his fitful sleep had been haunted by images of Pamela reaching for him, her eyes misty with longing, her lips moist and tender from his kisses. Those enticing dreams were just as quickly replaced by shadowy nightmares where her desperate hands sought to shove him away. Where he ignored her frightened eyes and hoarse pleas and roughly took his pleasure in every manner imaginable without giving a single thought to hers.

When dawn had finally arrived, he had fallen into a sleep as dark and dreamless as death. Which made it doubly hard to awaken to such a merry sound.

He rolled out of the bed, stretching and yawning like a great cat. He slipped on his trousers and padded into the dressing room to find Brodie splashing about in a long copper tub. Tendrils of steam wafted from the water as Brodie reached around to scrub his back with a long-handled brush, still humming beneath his breath.

Connor cleared his throat.

Brodie swung around to beam at him, lacking the good grace to look guilty. “And a good morn to ye, lad! I hope ye don’t mind, but as yer valet, I took the liberty o’ ringin’ for yer bath.”

“My
bath?” Connor repeated pointedly.

Brodie dropped the brush in the water and rubbed a ball of soap beneath his hairy underarm, lathering enthusiastically. “Aye, and you’ll be welcome to it, as soon as I’m done.”

As Brodie ducked his entire head beneath the water to rinse the soap from his braids, Connor eyed the layer of scum on its surface and briefly considered holding him under until the bubbles stopped surfacing. But he couldn’t figure out where he would hide the body.

He was gazing thoughtfully at the window seat, trying to judge its width and length, when Brodie reappeared, shaking water from his eyes like a wet spaniel.

Connor sniffed, noticing the succulent aroma of bacon hanging in the air for the first time. His stomach rumbled. Last night at supper he had discovered it was nearly impossible for a man to fill his belly when forced to use a tiny fork for every bite.

It didn’t take him long to spot the tray resting on Brodie’s cot—the tray stacked with empty china plates. Gazing at the scattered crumbs, he sighed. “I see you also took the liberty of ringing for my breakfast.”

“Aye, and I must say it was quite tasty! Though
the rasher of bacon was a wee bit overdone. I thought I might have a chat with the cook today.” Brodie waggled his copper eyebrows at him. “I hear she’s not married and might be in the market for a husband.”

“I hear she weighs fifteen stone and can twist a chicken’s head off with her bare hands.”

Brodie’s grin turned into a leer. “I always did love a lass with a strong grip.”

Connor clenched and unclenched his fists, fighting the urge to demonstrate the impressive strength of his own grip by fastening his hands around his friend’s throat and squeezing the life out of him.

Before Connor had time to avert his eyes, Brodie rose from the bath. The sight of his hairy, dripping body displayed in all of its naked glory effectively spoiled Connor’s appetite. The serpent tattooed on Brodie’s massive deltoid seemed to be winking at him.

“Would ye mind handin’ me that towel, laddie?”

“Oh, not at all,” Connor replied, snatching up the linen bath sheet draped over a nearby stool and tossing it directly over Brodie’s head. “Is there anything else I can do you for you while I’m here? Polish your boots? Starch your shirt? Braid your back hair?”

Brodie tugged the towel off his head and rubbed it over the curling hair that furred his massive chest. “Well, now that ye mention it, I could use some help trimmin’ me toenails before they send up yer tailor. The puir fellow’s already been waitin’
for an hour, but this one toenail has been rubbin’ against the top o’ me boot for—”

Connor would never learn how long the pesky toenail had been plaguing Brodie because at that precise moment he grabbed Brodie’s arm and hauled him right out of the tub. He dragged him across the bedchamber with Brodie sputtering, swearing and dripping all the way. Connor threw open the door, shoved him into the corridor, then slammed the door in his ruddy face.

As Connor leaned against the door, blockading it with his body, he heard a maidservant’s shrill scream and a loud crash, followed by Brodie’s jovial, “Why, hullo there, lass! Would ye like to see my snake dance?”

Connor shook his head, hoping for the poor maidservant’s sake that Brodie was talking about the serpent tattooed on his upper arm.

“Now don’t go runnin’ away like that, lass! I do believe I’m goin’ to need a bigger towel!”

Connor quickly discovered that one of the benefits of being a marquess was that you were allowed—and perhaps even encouraged—to keep people waiting. He rang for a fresh bath and breakfast before informing a footman to send up the tailor.

He also discovered that having his bath and breakfast pilfered by the most shamelessly incompetent valet in all of England was the least of the indignities he would be forced to endure that day. The tailor spent hours poking and prodding him and showing him bolt after bolt of fabric, all of
which looked identical to him. While the man chattered on and on about the benefits of nankeen over merino—names like Byron and Beau Brummel tripping from his nimble tongue—his assistant climbed all over Connor with a measuring tape, cooing in admiration over the breadth of his shoulders and the circumference of his forearms.

When the assistant dropped to one knee at Connor’s feet and pressed the tape to his inner thigh, rolling his eyes in near ecstasy, Connor decided he’d had quite enough of being jabbed with pins and groped by strangers for one day.

Gripping both the tailor and his assistant by their high starched collars, he ushered them toward the door.

“But, my lord,” the tailor protested in dismay, his skinny arms filled with bolts of cloth, “how are we to carry on? We haven’t even decided between the superfine and the kerseymere yet!”

“Surprise me,” Connor snapped. “Or better yet—I’ll take them all. Just send the bill to the du—to my father.”

Pleasure suffused the tailor’s long face. “Oh, yes, my lord! It would be my great honor to—”

Connor slammed the door in both their faces, cutting off their fawning bows in mid-motion.

He was still slumped against the door, savoring a precious moment of peace, when a footman’s brisk voice informed him that the hatter had arrived.

It turned out the tailor was only the first in a long parade of London merchants eager to use their wares to transform him into an elegant gentleman
worthy of his title. Connor was forced to look at so many different incarnations of the beaver hat he decided it would almost be easier to wear an actual beaver on his head. The hatter was followed by a haberdasher with a dizzying array of handkerchiefs, stockings and ivory-handled walking sticks, a stationer with reams of expensive parchment and vellum, and a jeweler with a gleaming display of crested rings and silver snuff boxes.

By the time another footman arrived to inform Connor that his fencing master was waiting for him in the ballroom, he was more than ready to run someone through with a sword, preferably himself.

Eagerly excusing himself from the crestfallen young man appointed to help him pick out the perfect toothpick case, he hurried down the stairs, thinking a little swordplay might be the very thing to soothe his temper.

“Bloody hell, man, you don’t honestly expect me to fight with that thing, do you?”

As that familiar roar reached Pamela’s ears, she froze in the middle of the deserted corridor, cocking her head to listen.

“I might be able to darn my stockings with it, but it’s not good for much else. Unless, of course, you’d like me to shove it up your arrogant—”

As that threat met with a virulent outpouring in fluent French, Pamela lifted the hem of her gown and took off at a dead run, following the clash of those raised voices. She didn’t have to lift her
hem much since it was already four inches too short. Having exhausted her own supply of suitable frocks, she’d been reduced to commandeering Sophie’s favorite morning gown—an act that had left her sister weeping piteously into her pillow and muttering unkind remarks about strained seams and overstuffed sausages.

Remarks which seemed only fitting with the bodice stays of the gown digging deep into Pamela’s ribcage, making each step a misery. By the time she flung open the tall double doors at the end of the corridor, she was gasping for breath and dangerously close to swooning—a condition that was only aggravated by the sight that greeted her.

Connor stood at the center of the cavernous ballroom, facing a slender, effete Frenchman who had a long, thin sword in his hand and a murderous gleam in his eye. The man was still spewing out a torrent of French, most of it, mercifully, incomprehensible to Pamela’s untrained ears.

Connor might have been unarmed, but he still towered over the sputtering Frenchman by half a foot. He was dressed as simply as a highwayman posing as a gentleman could be—in black trousers and a white lawn shirt with full sleeves and flared cuffs. He wore no waistcoat and his cravat was knotted in a simple loop at his throat. A black satin queue secured his gleaming hair at the nape.

It should have been illegal for a man to look so good without even trying, Pamela thought, biting her lip in consternation. Or at least immoral.

The enraged fencing master spotted her first. He
spread his arms in a dramatic appeal, the waxed ends of his thin black mustache quivering with indignation. “Do you hear the words of this barbarian, mam’selle? He dares to insult the size of my sword!”

As he brandished the long, thin blade of the delicate epee at her, Pamela had to choke back a snort of laughter. It wasn’t that difficult to imagine Connor darning his stockings with it.

“That
is not a sword.” Glowering at them both, Connor marched over to the wall and swept down one of the massive broadswords displayed next to an empty suit of armor. He strode back to the fencing master, wielding the enormous blade with one hand. “
This
is a sword!”

“Ha!” the Frenchman barked, dismissing the weapon with a flick of his hand. “Only if one has no skill! No grace! No honor! That blade is fit only for digging your grave after a French foil pierces your cowardly heart.”

“Oh, really?” Connor took a step forward, the menacing gesture wiping the sneer right off the Frenchman’s face. “Then perhaps you’d like to match your blade against mine and we’ll just see whose grave we’ll be digging come sunset.”

As the fencing master lowered his sword and went skittering backward in alarm, Pamela boldly stepped between the two men.

She flattened her palm against Connor’s chest, giving him a beseeching look. “Now, darling, you know I faint at the mere mention of blood, much less its sight. There’s really no need for
such posturing. I’m sure that everyone, including Monsieur…” She gave the fencing master a questioning look.

“Chevalier,” the Frenchman offered with a toss of his head and a sulky flare of his nostrils.

“I’m sure that everyone, including Monsieur Chevalier, would agree that your blade is superior.” She drew even closer to Connor, lowering her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “As well as
much
larger.”

Connor gazed down at her, his scowl slowly melting to an expression that was even more dangerous. At least to her.

He covered her small hand with his, binding them together so she could feel every powerful beat of his heart beneath the thin lawn of his shirt. “If you’re so convinced my blade is
superior
, lass, then why don’t you give me the chance to prove it?”

In that moment the fencing master was forgotten. The two of them might have been all alone in the ballroom, engaged in their own private dance. A dance he had started last night, but she had not had the courage to finish.

She drew in a shaky breath rich with his scent, which now included the enticing aroma of bayberry soap. “As Monsieur Chevalier has just reminded us, one careless blow can destroy even the most steadfast of hearts.”

“But just how cowardly is the heart that won’t even risk that blow?”

Before Pamela could respond to the blatant challenge in Connor’s eyes, the temperamental fencing
master blew out a disgusted “Pfft!” and sheathed his sword in the scabbard at his belt. “It’s obvious my talents are being wasted here. Please give the duke my regrets.” He tossed Connor one last sneer. “And my condolences.”

Snatching up the rest of his equipment, he went storming toward the French windows along the west wall of the ballroom that had been propped open to welcome in the afternoon sunshine and balmy spring breezes. Only then did Pamela realize they’d never been truly alone. They’d had an audience all along.

Crispin was lounging against the wall between two windows, lazily swishing the graceful epee in his hand back and forth. As the fencing master marched past him and disappeared into the garden, he ducked his head and offered Connor a sly grin. “Hello, cuz. You seem to have lost your fencing partner. Mind if I step in?”