The Lodestone (8 page)

In order to get the key from the drawer where it was kept, Cleome had to cross to where Drake was now standing. He knew she was afraid of him and he wanted to put her at ease.

“Then, please,” he spoke more gently. “Allow me to hold the lamp for you while you fetch the key.”

**

Cleome had no choice but to follow his bidding, if she was to get him out of her room and into his own. Warily, she walked to where he stood leaning against her dressing table and allowed him to take the heavy lamp. She opened the drawer and felt inside and as her hand closed around the large key, Drake leaned closer to her.

“I wish there were some way for me to convey my regret over this night’s events.” He whispered the words against her cheek, his voice like a sweet caress. It sent a shiver racing through her like a prayer of promise.

Suddenly, she felt dizzy and she had to grasp the edge of the dressing table for support. She sensed he implied something other than apology, but instead of prompting anger, it aroused within her a peculiar feeling that was not at all disagreeable. She couldn’t think of anything to say. Her knees buckled and as threatening tides of blackness encroached, she sat down on the edge of the bed.

“I beg your pardon,” she managed at last, afraid he would interpret her action as an invitation. “This has been a great shock to me after all.” To her relief, he made no attempt to join her on the bed. Instead, he stood beside her, a look of concern on his handsome face.

“Are you all right now?” he inquired gently.

“Yes. I believe . . . I am fully recovered. It has been a long and terrible day.”

Slowly she rose, and placing the key in her apron pocket, she attempted to take the lamp from him once more. He held it firmly, however, and led her out onto the landing. She did feel better; indeed, his solicitude indicated that perhaps the situation was not entirely hopeless. When she reached the door at the end of the long hallway, she inserted the key into the fixture and tried to turn it. She couldn’t remember the last time anyone had used the door, and the lock stubbornly resisted. Finally, Drake gave the lamp to her and moved her aside.

“If you will allow me, mademoiselle,” he said. He turned the key and the lock gave under his strength.

She led him to his room, opened the door and stood aside so that he could enter. The strong scent of pine soap assailed her nostrils and although every trace of his bath had long since been removed, the heady aroma of soap combined with the sweet smell of the pipe he had smoked earlier made Cleome feel as if she were entering a place of mysterious, forbidden delights.

“Good night, Mr. Stoneham,” she said quickly and fled back to the safety of her own room.

**

When Cleome had gone, Drake stared at the closed door for a moment; then he pulled the armchair close to the window and sat down wearily, looking out at the cloud-filled sky. Morning would be breaking soon and he would have much business to attend. He needed sleep but felt more inclined to review the situation in which he now found himself. Winning the Eagle’s Head Inn had solved one of his problems. He need search no further for a house in which to spend the next few months, but he distinctly did not feel good about it. He poured another glass of brandy, remembering with brief contempt the forward serving maid—Fanny her name was—who had brought it up before dinner.

It was not his habit to take away a man’s livelihood. It was one thing to take money from the rich and idle, but quite another to ruin a working man. Drake hadn’t wanted the innkeeper to join the game; it made him uncomfortable to wager with the class from which he himself had sprung. When Desmond sat down with them, all Drake wanted was the amazing colt, Epitome—nothing more. Wealth he could gain in plenty from Lord Easton and his grand friends. He had neither needed nor desired Desmond’s money or little square of land.

The man was a fool—worse than a fool, Drake thought. But then, that was what gambling did to some otherwise worthy men. Lured not by the promise of wealth, but seduced instead by chance, and the belief that gambling would somehow prove their manhood, they fell into impossible debt. William Desmond was a fool to risk his ability to support his family. Not only did he have an invalid daughter or daughter-in-law, he had a treasure in Cleome.

Drake pulled the bell cord, not knowing if there would be a servant still awake to hear it; but he wanted another bottle of brandy. He was still thinking of Cleome’s small waist and blue eyes when Fanny, clad only in her night rail, tapped on his door and opened it, without being bidden, to step inside.

She curtsied and with a smile she intended to be seductive, she asked, “Somethin’ I can do for ‘e, sir?”

“Bring me another bottle,” he said gruffly, and she scurried away. He emptied the last of the brandy into his glass, wondering how best to manage the situation with Cleome. He wanted her; he burned for her, and he’d never known a feeling like it.

There was substance to her. She was nothing like the women he had known in France or Italy, nor any of the ridiculous society women he’d met since coming back to England, including Lady Easton. Cleome was innocent, he was sure of that; but she had spirit, and she had courage. She reminded him of someone, some ghost from his past, but he couldn’t place who it was.

Earlier, when she’d sunk weakly to the edge of her little bed, he’d wanted to put his arms around her and cover her lovely mouth with kisses; and he knew then that he had no intention of turning her out of her home. He wanted her here, where he could see her often, where he would have the opportunity to win her forgiveness, and her favors, before she gave herself to some young idiot like Garnett Easton.

So she would stay. And if William Desmond was part of the bargain, so be it. Drake was beginning to see winning the Eagle’s Head as most providential for Cleome as well as for himself. If her grandfather had so little respect for his property and so little affection for his family that he would risk everything in a game of chance, then Cleome and her mother needed someone to protect them. He would let the old man sweat it out through the night—what was left of it—in order to teach him a lesson. In the morning, Drake would ask him to stay on for board and wages and continue to run the inn. Everything could remain as it was and perhaps in time, he would even allow Desmond to win back part of his estate. With Drake’s aptitude as a dealer, that could be arranged.

He emptied his pipe on the grate of the cold fireplace and cursed his unnatural ability that others called luck. It was not luck. It was some freak of nature that had made him come to certain realizations when scarcely more than a child. In the infamous Temple Bar section of London, watching rooks and whores cheat the bored gentlemen from the fashionable West End, he’d learned to compute the odds in various games of chance that required a quick mind to work out the math. Rich gentlemen were easy prey for it wasn’t an exercise of the brain they were after, but the thrill of uncertainty. Understanding odds was simply beyond their grasp.

As a child, Drake had watched the games on his way to the docks every morning to bumaree fish, and on his way home from school as well—until the shrew who’d been married to his father decided school was a waste of time for a fishmonger’s bastard. He could read and he could do his sums. And that, she proclaimed, was all the education he needed. That had been the straw that had broken a back already scarred from her beatings. He had run away when but a lad of fourteen, scarcely a month after his father died. Drake was a big youth, and no one questioned his age when he’d signed on with the army.

His soldier’s pay wasn’t much, but he was able to establish a small bank for himself; and he discovered early that he had the proper temperament to make a professional gambler. Accessing the skill of his opponents was easy, and he had infinite patience and the common sense never to bet on anything if the odds were against him. This ability, called luck, had enabled him to amass a considerable purse; and when the war was over, he had plunged into the reckless, sensual salons of Paris. By then, he was a man; and in France, he had further improved his skills in many delightful areas.

Owning what was to be the largest, most opulent gaming house in London had opened a doorway into society for him even if his pedigree did not. Entry into that exclusive circle was crucial, for it guaranteed him more profit for his club and more contacts for his shipping business. It would be considerably nicer conquering that decadent world with the beautiful Cleome at his side.

He drained his glass and wondered what was keeping the confounded maid. Suddenly he was overcome with exhaustion. He’d hardly slept since he’d left his flat in Monte Carlo, and the insatiable Lady Easton had kept him awake most of the night before. Any refreshment gleaned from the brief afternoon nap had been cancelled out by the accursed cribbage game, and he couldn’t keep his eyes open. Without bothering to undress, he stumbled to his bed and collapsed.

**

He didn’t hear the door open, nor did he stir when Fanny slipped inside and silently placed the bottle of brandy on the table.

“’Ere now, sir,” she scolded softly as she approached the bed. “Ye cannot get a decent night’s rest with yer boots on.”

She was not particularly gentle when she pulled his boots off; and when he made no protest, she was encouraged to continue. Getting his breeches off was impossible, for he was such a big man; so she had to content herself with merely undoing his lacings. She was gratified to see that he was big indeed—everywhere. She wrapped her long, thin fingers around his manhood and was delighted to see it triple in size and go rigid in her hand.
Ah,
she breathed.
He was magnificent
. She shivered with anticipation and her mouth actually watered. And not just for this unexpected treat—but for all the bounty that would be hers when she was his favorite. From the moment she’d heard about the cribbage game—and Young Sam had wasted no time telling the other servants what Lord Easton and his friends were talking about as they departed—Fanny meant to establish herself in the new master’s affections, as Jacqueline had done with the old.

Nor was it a duty Fanny would mind in the least, for not only would she pleasure him. From the looks of him, she’d get her pleasure, too. And besides, it was her turn to lie in a featherbed of ease.

**

Drake had never seen anything so beautiful. Cleome was riding Epitome across the landscape in the distance, with the sun behind her. As he stood in a field of flowers, watching her, she turned her horse and rode directly towards him. He could feel himself go hard as he waited for her, and when she slid gracefully from the horse’s back and walked to him, he realized that she was naked. Her long auburn hair glinted in the sunlight and bounced against her smooth, white shoulders and then snaked downward to caress the creamy mounds of her breasts. The shield of her sex was the same glorious auburn color as the hair on her head, and she was holding her arms out to him, beckoning.

She smiled into his eyes, her lips parting in invitation. When he reached for her, she slid down between his legs. He was surprised to realize that his own clothes had vanished, and even more surprised when she took him into her warm, wet mouth. Moving her tongue around him like lightning, she was bringing him quickly—too quickly—to the brink of madness. . .

Drake woke with a start, just as his climax took him. As she moved her head away and finished him off with her hand, he opened his eyes to see that it wasn’t Cleome at all. He had been dreaming, and now he was throbbing, spilling his seed over the skeletal hand of the scrawny serving maid he’d sent for the brandy. In spite of his release, he felt sick. She pushed her stringy, whey-colored hair away from her face and smiled at him.

“’Ow’d ye like that, then?” she asked with smug satisfaction. “And I know many more ways to please ye, sir. Just let me get this gown off and I’ll warm yer bed like it’s never been warmed afore.”

“No,” he choked out. “Thank you. That will not be necessary.”

Her disappointment showed in her hurt surprise, but he didn’t care. He was angry to be pulled out of his dream, angry that it was she who’d caressed him so intimately, and not her mistress.

“Come now, sir,” she coaxed. “Would ‘e deny me my own pleasure, after the service I just gave? Come on, then; give me my due. And afterwards, ye can take me any way ye want to, sir. Any way at all.”

“Dammit, woman! Are you deaf? I did not invite you to my bed, nor do I want you here.” He rose and turned away from her, pulling his breeches closed and tying the laces again. “Here,” he said, reaching into his saddlebag and withdrawing a gold sovereign. “Take this and go—and stay out of my room from now on, if you want to keep your post here. We’ll speak of this no more.”

She glared at him, shaking with fury, but she knew better than to rebuke him. “I was only offerin’ a bit o’ comfort,” she whined. “Seemed to me you liked it right fine a moment ago—”

“Get out!” he commanded, his voice deadly quiet, and she scurried to the door. As she closed it behind herself, he opened the other bottle of brandy. This time, he didn’t bother with the glass.

The depths to which a man could sink when too long deprived of gratification of the flesh would never cease to amaze him.

**

Cleome tried to resist the worry that compounded in her mind moment by moment, but sleep would not take her. She knew it must be faced. A gambling debt was legal and binding. Granda would have to turn everything over to Mr. Stoneham at once. There was nowhere for Cleome, her mother and her grandfather to go, and nothing for them to do except take to the road and hope for the best. She knew of no relatives and she doubted Granda’s friends would offer lodging to an old man, a sickly woman and an illegitimate girl. Her grandfather had never done anything but run the Eagle’s Head, for he had inherited it from his father, who’d gotten it from
his
father. It wasn’t likely he could find enough work to house, feed and clothe himself and Cleome and provide for her mother’s needs, small though they were. But Drake Stoneham did not seem completely without compassion.