The Gamekeeper's Lady (22 page)

Bringing all of his skill into play as never before, the urge to take her, to drive into her, to lose himself in lust, grew ever stronger. Her body called to him as no woman’s had ever done. Her gaze, so full of trust and something he couldn’t name, tore at his will. Shook him to the very depths.

Left him primal.

His woman.

The words pounded hot in his veins, setting a rhythm that rode him hard. And still he circled his hips, fighting every instinct with the last atom of his will.

Her eyes widened in shock. Her expression tightened. ‘What are you doing to me?’ she moaned.

She was almost there. Thank God.

He bared his teeth. ‘Bringing you more pleasure,’ he panted. Making her his. Binding them together.

The thought sent him over the edge of reason.

He drove into her.

She lifted her hips. He pounded into her body. Her inner walls tightened around his shaft, drawing him deeper. He thrust harder. Faster. Nothing existed but the feral force of their mating.

And then he exploded.

He lost himself in the pure blinding bliss that seemed to go on and on. He shuddered and managed to roll to one side before he collapsed.

Never did he recall such a powerful joining.

Or so much loss of control.

He opened his eyes and looked at her. Had she also reached her climax? God. Why didn’t he know?

But the expression on her face was pure satiation. Relieved, he let his eyes close on a groan.

‘Thank you,’ she murmured. ‘That was lovely.’

He heaved himself up on one elbow, kissed her eyelids, her cheekbone, the corner of her mouth. ‘You were wonderful. Sleep now.’

He tucked his arm beneath her head and drew her close. She lay still in his arms, her breathing slowing. She snuggled closer.

‘R-Robert?’

‘Mmm…’

‘I love you.’

Blood roared in his head and a pounding shook his chest. It was as if a fissure had cracked in a wall and bricks were crashing down. Those same words hovered on his tongue.

He stiffened against them. Kept them behind his teeth. She was too young, too innocent. And he too unworthy. Cast out by his peers. Even if he believed in love, and he wasn’t sure he did, he was not the man for her.

Frederica turned her face away.

Damnation. He’d hesitated too long. Left it too late to say something teasing, the kind of thing he said to all his lovers.
How lucky I am.
Or,
You are the sweetest woman I know.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said instead.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said.

But there was heartbreak in her voice. He reached out, then let his hand fall away. What she thought of as love was merely the afterglow. When the fire cooled she’d move on. Or he would.

It was the way it worked.

He just wished that the thought of it didn’t make him feel physically ill. Or wish he was wrong.

But the glow was still there, bright and enticing. If only he believed it would last. It never did.

But he could stay until it dimmed. Until they tired of each other. He could find work in Italy just as easily as he could find employment in England, could he not? Mother could no doubt be persuaded to use her influence to help him find a position at the consulate in Florence. He could support them both while Frederica painted until her heart was content.

Until the glow faded. It might take a while. Longer than most. They would laze in the heat, travel around the country looking at paintings and ancient monuments. Now the war with the French was over, there were lots of places he longed to see. Perhaps they could even go to Paris. Why not? He had nothing keeping him in England. And until she found someone more worthy of her love, he could keep her safe.

He leant over her and kissed her cheek. ‘Let us see what tomorrow brings.’

With a muffler covering the lower half of his face, Robert peered around the corner. Everything was set. While he couldn’t see her, he knew Frederica and John were standing in the shadows of an alley a few yards from Bliss’s front door. When the hue and cry started, John would whisk her in. Robert was escorting the disguised maid because Lullington would know him despite the drunken stagger he planned to affect.

A fussy-looking lawyer in his wig and gown bustled up the street. A skinny, shabbily dressed clerk with red-and-yellow-striped stockings scurried along behind him, his arms loaded with tomes, his floppy hat falling over his eyes. A trickle of recognition played at the fringes of Robert’s memory. He shook his head. Legal types had been coming and going to the various solicitors’ offices all morning. He must have seen this pair before. They headed straight for Bliss’s door.

‘Damn,’ Robert said. He hadn’t reckoned on strangers being in the office when Frederica entered.

‘Oooh,’ moaned Betty behind him. ‘I think maybe this is a bad idea. What if they arrests me?’

‘Ten shillings,’ Robert said, doubling her price.

‘How much longer does we have to wait?’

Robert turned back and gave her the quick once over. With her rather ridiculous coal-scuttle bonnet and a dress obviously far too big, she looked like a woman in disguise.

The panic in her blue eyes said if they didn’t go now, she was going to balk no matter how much money he offered.

Robert put one arm around her waist, and grabbed her hand. ‘Remember, follow whatever I do. And when I say run, you run back the way we came.’

They staggered into the street and wove among the lawyers and city gentlemen. A loiterer leaned on Bliss’s office wall. He straightened. He’d seen Betty. Another, on the other side of the street, headed for the curb. The traffic would slow him, but it wouldn’t take him long to cross to their side.

‘Are you ready?’ Robert whispered, aware of the violent tremble of Betty’s hand. His heart picked up speed. His muscles tensed, ready to run. ‘Keep walking. Just a little bit farther.’

There. Stepping out of the alley, Frederica.

Robert frowned. What the hell was she doing? With a dark cloak and a hood pulled up over her head shielding her face, she looked more suspicious than he and Betty did. She was supposed to be wearing a blonde wig and trotting along as if she was simply out shopping, not looking as if she was a spy for the French.

And where the hell was John?

The man on the other side of the street spotted her.

Robert quickened his pace. Something had gone wrong. He had to get to her before they did. She must have lost her nerve and decided to cover her face.

‘Now,’ he said to Betty. ‘Run.’

With the shriek she’d practised in the inn, she turned and fled with the first man Robert had seen racing after her.

The second man had his gaze fixed on Frederica.

Robert started to run towards her.

A brewer’s dray lumbered on to the street. Its driver, with Snively beside him, sped along the street. The diversion.

But was it too late? Robert pushed himself to greater efforts. The gap between him and Frederica closed. Too slowly. The other man would get to her first. He lengthened his stride. Put his head down, bunching his fists, pumping his arms. He dodged an elderly couple with a curse.

A third man appeared between Frederica and Bliss’s front door, his arms outstretched ready to catch her.

A barrel bounced off the cart, and then another. Before many seconds passed, beer was running in the gutters and every man, woman and child on the street turned to gape.

Everyone except Robert and Frederica, and the man blocking her path.

Robert hit him at a run. Knocked him to the ground. Robert grabbed Frederica’s hand and dragged her along.

‘Stop, thief,’ someone yelled.

Bastards.

‘Run,’ he said to Frederica. He looked over his shoulder. Lullington had dodged the fallen man, Wynchwood was puffing along the pavement behind him. Robert smiled grimly. Too late.

He pulled open the door and thrust Frederica inside. A quick glance at the lock. No damn key.

The outer office was empty. Another door led into the inner sanctum where Bliss no doubt hid himself away. The lawyer and his clerk must have gone inside. Damn it all.

He thrust Frederica ahead of him. ‘Through there.’

Behind them the outer door opened. ‘Robert Deveril,’ a voice rang out in stentorian tones, ‘I arrest you in the name of the law for theft and kidnapping.’

‘Go on,’ he urged Frederica and whirled around, pulling his pistol from his pocket.

Frederica stopped short.

‘Don’t wait for me,’ Robert yelled.

He levelled his pistol at the first man through the door and cocked it. Lullington, followed by Wynchwood, pushed their way in.

‘Stand back, all of you,’ Robert growled. ‘This lady has legitimate business with Mr Bliss.’

‘The game is up, Deveril,’ Lullington said, a triumphant light in his blue eyes.

Robert curled his lip. ‘Not yet it isn’t.’

‘Don’t make it any worse for yourself, lad,’ the runner said.

‘Arrest him at once,’ Wynchwood cried, his face red and dripping with sweat, one hand clutching his heaving chest. ‘She is my niece. Don’t let her get away.’

Out of the corner of his eye, Robert saw Frederica preparing to throw off her hood. Lullington was staring at her in a very odd manner.

‘Through that door,’ he said. ‘I’ll hold them off here.’

‘Jump him,’ the runner said.

‘Which one of you
gentlemen
is accusing my son of theft?’

Robert’s jaw dropped at the sound of the familiar voice and his head whipped around. He looked into the face
of…‘Mother?’

‘May I not visit my lawyer in privacy without all this hullaballoo?’ she said. ‘I’ll have your heads, sirrahs.’

The Bow Street runner faltered in the face of her regal rage.

‘Your Grace!’ Lullington choked out. He made a leg. ‘I beg your pardon. I thought—’

‘I know what you thought. I sent for Lady Caldwell after I spoke with Lord Radthorn earlier this morning. While I laud your attempts to help a lady in distress, I do not approve of your methods. Pig’s blood indeed.’

Robert gaped at her.

Lullington made a choking sound.

‘What is going on here?’ Wynchwood said, still game. ‘Arrest him, I say.’

Robert closed his eyes briefly. The lawyer and his clerk. They had to be John and Frederica. That’s why they’d seemed so damned familiar. They were already inside with Bliss. ‘Good God, Mother. If Father caught wind of this—’

Wynchwood pushed the runner forwards. ‘That man abducted my niece. I demand—’

‘Who is this fat flawn, Robert?’ the duchess said in a voice as cold as ice. ‘I am certainly no niece of his.’ She sniffed. ‘Nor would I admit any relationship to such an ill-mannered fellow.’

Lullington’s face showed grim amusement. ‘Capotted, by Gad. Your Grace, allow me to introduce Lord Wynchwood. Her Grace the Duchess of Stantford. Robert Deveril’s mother.’

Wynchwood snatched the wig from his head and threw it down. ‘What has the duchess to do with the kidnapping of my niece?’

Lullington curled his lip. ‘Where is she, Robert?’

‘Actually,’ her Grace said, ‘I can answer that question, my lord. She is no doubt speaking with Mr Bliss.’ She smiled serenely. ‘Robert, do tell this gentleman of the law to go away. I find it quite tiresome with so many people crowding this room.’

Robert raised his brows at the gentleman in question, who was mopping his florid brow with a very large handkerchief.

‘Beg your pardon, your Grace,’ the runner said. He abased himself and backed out of the door in a swirl of chill air from the outside.

‘Get back here,’ Wynchwood howled. ‘Do your duty. Arrest this man.’

Her Grace drew herself up to her full height. ‘Are you accusing my son of stealing silver plate, or was it a string of emeralds, Lord Wynchwood?’ Her astonishment was palpable.

Wynchwood looked to Lullington for support.

‘He didn’t,’ Lullington said. ‘We were simply trying to stop Miss Bracewell from reaching this office. A hue and cry seemed the only way.’

Snively chose that moment to stomp into the office. ‘Waste of good beer that. I knew it would never work.’

He stopped short and stared at the duchess. ‘Where’s Miss Bracewell?’

Her Grace nodded to the closed door. ‘In there.’

‘Congratulations, your Grace,’ Lullington drawled, his lisp no longer in evidence. ‘You have us all at
point non plus.’

‘That was certainly my intention.’ A gleam of mischief shone in her eyes.

Robert wanted to shake her. ‘I’ll murder John for involving you in this.’

She cast him a haughty look. ‘Your manners have not improved in your absence, my dearest Robert.’

Robert felt like a boy again beneath that searing glance. ‘I’m sorry, Mama, but you could have been badly hurt.’

‘By this pack of lily-livered fools? I think not.’

‘Thank you, your Grace,’ Lullington said.

‘Oh, do stop it, Lullington. I knew you when you wore short coats.’

Robert grinned as Lullington flushed. His mother was a force to be reckoned with and stronger men than Lullington had been ploughed down by her will.

‘As for you, Robert,’ her Grace continued, ‘you should have been the one to bring Miss Bracewell to me. Not John.’

Dash it. When would she realise he was banished?

A footman in ducal livery entered the office. ‘Ah, Frompton,’ her Grace said, ‘your timing is excellent.

Your arm, if you please. I have had enough adventure for today. It is time I went home. Robert, you will visit me tomorrow afternoon. Without fail.’ She swept out.

The men looked at each other, Wynchwood on the verge of apoplexy, Snively wary, Lullington picking at a fleck of lint on his coat and a glint of wry amusement in his usually cold eyes.

The door to the inner office opened. They all turned to watch. Frederica minus her wig, looking decidedly rakish in breeches and striped stockings, sauntered out. Radthorn, now out of his disguise, hovered behind her along with a bewigged and gowned man. The real lawyer. Clutching a rolled document.

Robert looked at Frederica’s face. She didn’t look too upset. In fact, she looked almost gleeful.