The Wicked Wedding of Miss Ellie Vyne (16 page)

A throaty chuckle ripped out of him. “Very well, madam. Here I come.”

Her beautiful, nimble body yielded to his hard, forcefully driving muscles. Her curves undulated beneath him, so incredibly soft and warm, sheathing him, clinging tight, possessive, demanding.

They melted together in a licentious heat, until they became liquid and swirled around each other. At last.

As the first climax built in shuddering leaps through his body and sweat broke across his back, he thought of the next time. And the next.

James closed his eyes, head back, mind spinning like a child’s top. Aware of her hands on his arms, gripping tight, her body holding him likewise, pulsing around him, slick and hot, he knew she reached her peak at that same moment. It was too soon, and he’d meant to relish this moment, but there was nothing he could do to delay his release. Theirs was a cataclysmic joining, a sensation very like falling from a great height. When he hit ground, she was a featherbed beneath him, molded to his shape, absorbing the fall.

***

Four more nights after this one. It should be enough, she reasoned as she finally felt the real world closing around her again. James Hartley probably never wanted the same woman two nights in a row, let alone five.

Ellie, choked with her own emotions, wondered if he thought now of Sophia—or of some other woman, and compared her to them. He hitched onto his side and removed his heavy, solid weight from her body. The couch was not very wide, a tight fit for two bodies. But her aunt’s furniture was not made for debauchery. It was made for delicate posteriors to perch upon while their owners sipped tea and nibbled crumpets, strawberry jam, and scones. Tonight she was the crumpet James nibbled upon. She ought to be ashamed of herself. Ought.

“Was that satisfactory, Miss Vyne?” he whispered as his fingers stroked her thigh.

“Indeed, Smallwick. Most satisfactory.” No point being coy. She wanted to say it was terrible and he needed to try harder, but even she couldn’t lie this time. “I should go back to bed, before—” She caught her breath and shivered as his palm cupped her breast. Her nipple reacted instantly, and his lips rediscovered that sensitive spot at the side of her neck.

“I’m not done with you yet, my lady notorious.”

“Oh?”

He had a vast amount of stamina and energy. Shocking in a man of seven and thirty.

“If a job’s worth doing, madam, it’s worth doing well. Let me know when you’re ready for me again.”

As it happened, she was ready half an hour later, by which time he’d administered tiny kisses to every part of her body.

“I must have the most devoted manservant in England,” she muttered.

“I have the most irresistible mistress.”

She found she rather liked the sound of that word, whispered on his lips just before he planted yet another kiss to her navel.

Even Ellie Vyne had never been able to deny that he was handsome. Yet tonight, caught in the soft light of the dying parlor fire, looming forth out of the flickering shadows, his beauty took on a new edge. She imagined Vikings once looked like this—the fair coloring, height, and broad shoulders. Especially the savage intensity burning through those blue eyes. This man took no prisoners; he was merciless.

She gently touched her fingertips to the discolored skin around his eye. “What happened?”

“A boxing match.”

As her fingers drifted down his cheek, he turned his face and kissed her palm. “Boxing?” she exclaimed, shocked.

“It’s very good exercise. Helps me”—he lowered his mouth to her wrist and kissed that too—“burn off”—his tongue traveled down her arm—“certain”—and he licked the inner curve of her elbow, making her squirm and giggle—“vital energies.”

So that explained his stamina.
How many rounds could he go?
she wondered wickedly.

He bent his head again and trailed the tip of his tongue between her breasts. Wildfire streaked through her body, just from that one damp touch. She was alive as she’d never been. Each tiny pore on her body had been made love to this evening, and now they were all insatiable, spoiled, clamoring for more. Even the soft brush of hair on his strong thighs, tickling her legs as he slid them apart, threw more coal on her fire. The feel of him, the weight and the scent as well as the sound of his harsh breath, filled her senses, awakened her as nothing ever had. She almost screamed with relief when he finally filled her again, slowly this time, inch by blessed inch. He smothered her muted cries with another kiss, surely bruising her lips with his hunger. James Hartley, gentleman rake, was quite a savage beast when roused.

She tried not to think how he’d honed his skills in bedchambers all over London. Instead, Ellie gave herself up to greedy passion. Her body arched to meet his, and her hands clawed at the muscles of his back as he sweated above her, moaning her name. She wrapped her legs around him and forced James over onto his back. This time she rode him as hard as he rode her.

He pressed his hips upward, and she joined the frenzied motion, quickly falling over the precipice and into blissful oblivion. He pounded the breath out of her, and here it came again—
la
petite
mort
, as the French called it.

Dropping forward, wilting, she buried her face in his red-hot shoulder and let the tremors flow from her body to his.

James, however, had not yet spent again. This time he delayed, holding back to torment her further. Still tingling inside, her core even more sensitive than it was earlier, she felt another quake building. Dear Lord, surely not more! She never knew she had it in her.

Through it all, she was conscious of that door—unlocked—only a few feet from the couch. At any moment they might have been discovered. There would never be enough time to hide what they were up to.

She didn’t care. Tonight she was every bit the wicked creature false rumor painted her.

Her lover licked her breasts, smothering the nipples with playful kisses, sucking and tickling, giving each globe within reach of his hungry mouth an equal share of attention. How obliging. Then he slid his hands over the curve of her bottom, holding her down while he increased his thrusting.

Ellie groaned and spun over the edge. Sweat poured off her.

Her heart was galloping, reckless and happy as a horse let out to play. This climax was quicker, rougher, stronger than the first two. She was hazily aware of her fingernails digging a little too hard into his shoulders, but she had to cling on to something or she might never survive. She’d be washed away on a tidal wave. Even that image struck her as funny, made her want to laugh out loud.

When she glanced downward, his eyes were full of oceanic swirls, tropical shades of blue one never saw on the English coast. He gave two achingly slow thrusts that made her jaw grind, her sheath tighten again around his shaft. When he came for the second time that night, it was hard, wild.

He fell back onto the couch. The thin sheen of sweat coating his body glistened in the firelight. “Is my head still attached?” he rasped.

“Yes.” She collapsed over him, and he wrapped his arms around her. “But still empty inside, I fear, Smallwick. You know this was most unwise, here in my dear aunt’s parlor.”

She felt the chuckle bubbling through his warm chest. “I assumed that was part of the pleasure for you, madam.” He tapped her bottom in a light, playful spank, much gentler than the one she’d given him earlier. “The danger excites you.” He paused, and then his lips brushed the top of her head, kissing her hair. “Isn’t that why you’re here with me? The man you’re not supposed to have?”

How well he knew all her faults.

***

While she drifted into sleep, James slid carefully off the sofa and shrugged into his overcoat. He was thirsty but didn’t want to disturb her. She looked delectable with her lashes fluttering against her flushed cheeks, dark curls tumbled over her naked shoulders, her softly curved arms and long legs sprawled across the tapestry sofa with graceful abandon. He’d begun to realize that she had no idea how beautiful she was. He remembered the first time he saw her all grown up, when she was sixteen and out at her first ball—what a shock it had been to his nerves, and how stupidly he’d reacted.

Suddenly he couldn’t resist waking her after all. He planted a quick kiss on her nose, and she wrinkled it. “I’ll be back momentarily,” he whispered.

“I must return to bed.”

“Not yet. Stay. Don’t you dare move.”

“Smallwick, are you giving your mistress orders?”

“I am. If she defies me, she’ll be punished.”

Ellie smiled drowsily, and he chose to take that as a sign of acquiescence. James tucked the blanket around her, lit a candle from the fireplace, and then crept out to the kitchen at the end of the hall where a brief search revealed the presence of an ale barrel in the larder. For a while he was distracted, too busy thinking about the indecent things he’d just allowed to happen in that cozy parlor. He kept picking up mugs and setting them down, and his gaze wandered stupidly over the shelves of pickle jars and their labels as if they might hold some key into the heart of a certain mystifying wench. Better get back to her. Not wise to leave her unguarded too long, or she might slip away.

But no sooner had he poured two mugs of ale and walked back into the kitchen, than he heard a scratching sound. Mice? He set the full mugs on the kitchen table beside his candle and grabbed a saucepan from a hook on the wall. The scratching stopped and turned into a rattling. It came from the back door.

Frowning, James put the saucepan down, took up his candle, and strode to the door. The iron bolt was shaking. Someone on the other side tried to jostle the handle enough to work it loose. He slid the bolt back and opened the door.

“Yes?” he demanded, candle raised.

A short, square figure stood on the path, a milk churn by his feet, hat in hand. “Oh! I expected Mrs. Cawley.”

James recognized the same portly fellow he’d seen disappearing through this door when they first arrived. “In the middle of the night. sir?”

“It is early morning in actual fact.” The man smiled genially.

Ah, how time flew when one was enjoying oneself.

“Osborne’s the name. I came to deliver Mrs. Cawley’s milk.”

Searching his memory, James recalled the earlier conversation over tea. Osborne must be that local farmer Eliza Cawley had mentioned—a widower with a difficult daughter, sent off to Bath in hopes of getting her married. “You deliver Mrs. Cawley’s milk in person?”

The gentleman’s smile broadened, and plump fingers fidgeted with his hat. “She is a very dear and valued customer.”

“I see. Then you’d better bring it in.” He stepped aside, gesturing with his candle, and the farmer carried his churn into the kitchen to set it carefully on the stone floor.

“You look familiar to me, but I cannot quite place—”

“Smallwick is the name. A servant on loan to Miss Vyne.”

“Ah yes. I heard that Miss Vyne had come to visit her aunt. Unexpectedly. Smallwick, you say? Indeed?” The elderly fellow screwed up his face. “I thought I’d seen you before, but I—” Those small, bright, wandering eyes quickly surveyed the kitchen table and landed on the two mugs of ale.

“I’ll tell Mrs. Cawley you delivered her milk, sir.” James had thought he heard the parlor door click open. Now he feared Ellie might come out to see where he’d got to. Farmer Osborne could, any moment, be a witness to their late-night tryst.

“Ah.” The little man looked again at the two mugs of ale, then at James’s bare legs beneath his coat. “Very good, Smallwick. Do give Mrs. Cawley my regards.”

James glanced out into the hall. “I shall, sir. Good evening.”

“Good
morning
!”

“Yes, that too.”

“You must be a thirsty fellow, Smallwick.”

“What?”

“Two mugs of ale?”

The men eyed each other in the flickering light of the candle. “Yes,” James replied. “I like my ale at night as much as Mrs. Cawley enjoys her milk.”

Pause.

“You say you’re on loan to Miss Vyne, Smallwick. Do you mean to stay long in the country?”

“That, sir, is up to Miss Vyne. But I shan’t disturb your…
deliveries
, Farmer Osborne. I’m generally a sound sleeper. As long as I have my ale to enjoy.”

Finally he got the man out and shut the door. Hmmm. Interesting. He looked at the churn and laughed softly, almost extinguishing his candle flame. Eliza Cawley must drink an awful lot of milk to be such a valued customer that the farmer delivered her order personally. And as far as James was concerned, whatever Farmer Osborne said, it
was
the middle of the night. People up at this hour of the night were generally up to no good. Himself included.

Smirking, he carried the churn into the cold larder.

Ellie rose grumpily for the second day in a row, having achieved no more than a few hours sleep and even those very disturbed. How she wished she could have stayed with James on the sofa! Even when they were cramped for space, his companionship was preferable to that of Lady Mercy who, while a sound sleeper, was active in her dreams, kicking and twisting, wrapping herself in the quilted coverlet and laying diagonally across the narrow bed, taking up maximum space. Come the gray dawn, the girl was snoring into her pillow, stretched out and blissfully sunk into her dreams, while Ellie had lost all hope of the same.

Molly Robbins came up to the room as soon as she heard Ellie moving about, and offered to help unpack her trunk.

“I’m hoping to be a lady’s maid one day, Miss Vyne,” the girl whispered, anxious not to wake Lady Mercy—indeed, they were all glad of the peace for now. “As soon as I’ve sewn up that gentleman’s breeches, I can iron all your things for you, mend holes, and scrub out any stains.”

She remembered Molly as a shy little girl who usually ran behind the other village children, always hiding, afraid of her own shadow. But she’d grown up a few inches into a calm, steady girl. Her long, mousy-brown hair was tied back in a ribbon, and her small face was very grave for one so young. The Robbins family had little in the way of money, and Molly was the youngest of twelve children. She’d been sent out to find work as soon as she was deemed capable by her harried parents. Ellie supposed that would make anyone rather somber.

“Good luck to you then,” she replied, yawning. “You’ll have your hands full tending my clothes.”

The Robbins girl immediately set about unpacking for her, while Ellie finished dressing. It occurred to her as she watched the busy young girl and the one slumbering in the bed, that they were about the same age yet lived very different lives.

“Perhaps today you can show Lady Mercy around the village, Molly,” she suggested. “Otherwise she’ll be under my aunt’s feet all day until her brother comes.”

Molly raised her head, and her dark eyes timidly assessed the unconscious lump on the bed. “But what can I show her, Miss Vyne? I’m sure she’s used to much grander things than we have here in Sydney Dovedale.”

“That is the point entirely, Molly. It is important to discover new things.”

Molly looked doubtful. “I’ll try, Miss Vyne. She’s got awful fancy clothes though, for walking in the country.” She gestured at the smart boots, neatly set by the foot of the bed, toes aligned perfectly, and her lace petticoats laid over the nearby chair, folded neatly. Lady Mercy was well prepared and well shod for a runaway. She’d packed some very fashionable attire for her adventure. “There aren’t many clean places around the village.”

“I daresay a little dirt will do her good.” She’d always thought that about James too.

Ellie stood at the bedchamber window as she combed her hair and looked out on a depressed, leaden sky that hung over her aunt’s cottage as if it might drop to earth at any moment. She felt oddly askew this morning. Her insides danced about like sparks from a bonfire, while on the outside, she tried hard to contain it all and be sensible. She was no longer a silly girl with an easily turned head—
if,
she thought dourly, she ever had been—and she ought to be able to conduct this affair without making a fool of herself. So what if James, her delectably wicked lover, was just below this floor, and she would see him again shortly? Surely they could make eye contact without her melting into complete mush this morning. But she delayed going down, just to make certain she had control of herself.

The village was quiet, very few souls out and about on such a grim day. Across the common, two little girls played with hoops, running them through puddles. A gaggle of geese flew overhead and shattered the peace with their gargled chorus.

Suddenly there was James, in those borrowed, ill-fitting breeches, leaving her aunt’s cottage and walking up the lane. Ellie paused, hairbrush tangled in a particularly stubborn curl.

Where the devil was he going now? She’d warned him to rest his ankle today. He couldn’t possibly walk all the way to Morecroft, and there was no one in Sydney Dovedale he would want to visit.

Except Sophie.

The thought crashed in, like Farmer Osborne’s old bull that chased her one summer all the way across a field and pushed its horns through a wooden fence, trying to reach her. She’d climbed a tree to escape and waited there for an hour before anyone came to her rescue. Now she felt that same fear of being gored on sharp horns, and then the utter helplessness of being stranded. She couldn’t very well run after him like a child, demanding to know where he went. For all her mother was an American, she wouldn’t go running down the lane after a man.

Her heart ached from beating too rapidly, too hard. Had last night meant so little to him that his first thought this morning was of Sophie, his old flame?

“Ooh, Miss Vyne, this is a lovely gown.”

She looked over her shoulder. Molly knelt beside the battered trunk, lifting out an old ball gown. “That thing? I haven’t worn it for years, and it’s quite out of fashion now.” She wondered why she still carried the garment around with her. As far as she remembered, it had a large soup stain on the skirt, the hem was ripped, and many beads were missing around the high waist because she’d caught her sash on a door latch while running away from an overenthusiastic beau.

Molly held the gown up to the soft morning light. “But the muslin is still in good condition, Miss Vyne.”

“If you can make use of it, you may take it.”

“Are you sure, madam?”

She nodded. “You may as well put it to some good. And if there are any other garments you’d like, just take them.”

“I couldn’t, madam.”

“Nonsense. I’m sure there are several too irretrievably damaged to be worn again.” Her sisters always said she was as hard on her gowns as she was on the men who courted her.

As she looked out through the window once more, she spied a tall, angular shape, recognizable at once as her aunt’s indomitable, busybody friend, Mrs. Flick, emerging from her own front door on the corner and heading along the lane in considerable haste. No doubt Mrs. Flick had heard of Ellie’s arrival. Any minute now she would rap her knuckles on the cottage door.

Making a hasty decision, Ellie ran down the stairs, shouted a quick “good morning” to her aunt, who was lighting a fire in the parlor, grabbed her boots and coat, and slipped out through the back door in the kitchen. Although it was still early, she would visit her friend Sophie. Only because the last thing she needed this morning was to face Mrs. Flick’s prying—nothing to do with James or caring where he went. Nothing at all.

The cool breeze was brisk and refreshing, a wonderful change after the mostly unpleasant reek of London air. Taking a few great gulps of it, Ellie walked quickly away from the village and up the muddied, narrow lane to the farm where Sophie lived. There was no sight of James, but he was a fast walker with a long stride. Perhaps he was so eager to see his old love that he ran. That thought made her laugh in hysteria, until she had to stop and catch her breath.

Drops of rain spat upon her bonnet, but not enough to make her turn back despite the considerable distance she had yet to walk. She preferred a drenching than facing Mrs. Flick’s interrogation over breakfast.

Dead, dampened leaves blew across her path, some sticking to her hem. A faint smokiness, carried on the air from a smoldering bonfire out in the fields, ticked her nostrils and made her smile, made her remember seasonal traditions from her youth—bobbing for apples on All Hallow’s Eve, burning her tongue on hot roasted chestnuts, collecting colorful leaves when they fell to the damp grass.

Ellie passed the old stile where she’d once tied one of her younger sisters by her apron strings, pretending the girl was her horse, and forgotten about her for an hour or two. Here, under an oak tree, she once paused to ink a moustache on a sleeping young man’s face. She patted the thick bark as she walked by, greeting the tree like an old friend. For the first time since leaving London, she no longer felt as if she was followed. That slightly threatening sensation, which had hovered over her in varying degrees of intensity for some time, was today lifted from her shoulders. She walked with a lighter step, her arms swinging.

How many times, she pondered, had she run along this well-worn lane to call on Sophie Valentine? Although Ellie was five years younger, the two girls became close thanks to their mischievous curiosity and shared enjoyment of observing people. In many ways, Ellie felt closer to Sophie than to either of her younger sisters, and her summertime stays with Aunt Lizzie were greatly enhanced by Sophie’s company. Until, of course, James Hartley came along and monopolized the other girl’s attention.

There he was. As she turned a bend, his tall figure came into view, his appearance comical in those borrowed breeches, the legs barely long enough to tuck into his riding boots. No sign of his bad ankle this morning, she noted. Probably because he thought he was alone.

Suddenly he turned and glanced back down the lane. Ellie ducked out of sight behind a tree. A moment later, she peeped out and saw him walking onward. Once more she followed, chiding herself for the impulse that made her hide. She quickened her steps. What did she care if he heard her? But when he stopped again and swung around, she took a dive over the nearest hedge and landed with a muffled squawk. This time she lost her bonnet and had to retrieve it from a muddy ditch, under some brambles. By the time she recovered, back on her feet, he’d vanished around another bend. Now extremely disheveled, she hurried along the lane and plucked thorny sticks from her bonnet.

The Kanes’ farm was eventually in view, the flint stone wall and ornate, black iron gates gleaming wet with rain. Forgetting the sense of pride that had made her shy of being seen, she ran up just as he pushed open the rusty old latch.

“You might have told me you were coming to see her,” she gasped, breathless, rain blurring her vision.

He looked puzzled. “You’ve got mud in your hair.”

Only a rake like him, she thought, fury popping like gunpowder, considered nothing amiss with making love to one woman and then, the next morning, rushing off to visit another. Without a solitary explanation. Not that he could have given her one she’d accept. “I suppose you did not want me to know you where you went.”

“I owe you no explanation. Why does it matter to you? I’m just your stud.”

“Exactly! Make a fool of yourself again over her, but I won’t stand around to watch this time.”

“And what
will
you do? Run back to your lover, the count?”

“It’s none of your business where I’d go.”

Towering over her, he suddenly lost his previous composure. “It is very much my business.”

“You question me, but I cannot do the same to you?”

“Damn you, woman!” Of course, whenever he was losing an argument, he resorted to insults.

“I’m supposed to have your undivided attention for these nights. That was our agreement, Hartley.”

“So you shall.”

But in Sophie’s presence, she would be insignificant again. That was always the way of it. Ellie tasted the bitter resentment already and was ashamed. She didn’t want to be the sort of female whose tender heart flinched at every threat of a wound.

The farmhouse door opened, and a young boy dashed out to tear across the yard, an excited, rust-colored spaniel leaping and flopping around his feet.

A woman’s voice called out, “Rafe, you will not go out there in the rain. Bring that dog back inside. You’ll both be covered in mud in no time, and I have no intention of—” Sophie appeared in the open doorway, still scolding the boy. When she looked up and saw them both by the gate, she almost dropped the bowl of batter in her arms.

“Ellie! James? What on earth…?”

The boy stopped out of curiosity and grabbed his dog by the collar.

Ellie was struck instantly by the familiar features of the boy’s face but couldn’t think where she’d seen them before. He couldn’t possibly be Sophie’s child, for she’d been married only two years, and the boy was at least ten, possibly a few years older than that. As far as she knew, the man Sophie married had no previous children, although the boy’s thick black hair was very like his.

“Come inside out of the rain,” Sophie exclaimed. “I wish I had known you were coming. Why did you not write?”

“I did not think of it, I confess. The idea of a Christmas visit to Sydney Dovedale came upon me suddenly, and before I knew it, I was halfway here.” Muddy curls dripped down the back of her neck as her bonnet leaked raindrops. Oddly enough, in that moment of so much greater discomfort, her mind focused on that one sensation.

“Oh, Ellie! You never change.” This was uttered with a gusty sigh as if, perhaps, it was time she did change.

Ellie glanced at James. His expression was guarded, as was Sophie’s.

“Hello, James. You look very well.” Her friend hid her amusement about the breeches much better than Ellie could. Sophie was always better at hiding things—like her thoughts and her feelings.

“And you,” said James. “Your family is in good health?”

“Oh yes. Very.”

Ellie wanted to scream. They were being so very formal, speaking lines like characters in a novel. As if there had never been anything between them.

“Do, please, come in.”

The boy and his dog followed them into the farmhouse, where the warm, delicious scent of baking teased Ellie’s stomach, reminding her that she came out without breakfast. That fact was soon remedied. Sophie, familiar with Ellie’s appetite, insisted she sit at the table by the window, while she made tea and laid out a plate of warm mince pies. Ellie removed her dampened bonnet and slipped off her gloves to eat. She watched her friend potter about the house with a contented efficiency. Marriage, she mused, comparing Sophie to Walter Winthorne, suited some folk better than others. Sophie, of course, was always a beauty.
She
would never be caught rolling about in a ditch, trying to hide.