Stephanie Laurens - A Lady of His Own

“There are ways and means.” Gervase grinned. “He’d believe a priest, wouldn’t he? I do quite a good impersonation—how about as a clerical scholar come to study the priest holes of the district? Give a minor social event, get the suspects together, and let me expound on my fascinating studies.”

Charles stared at him, then smiled and saluted him with his glass. “That would work.”

The clock chimed eleven. Penny glanced at Nicholas. He was wilting again. She caught Charles’s eyes.

He nodded almost imperceptibly, stood, and stretched. “We can develop our approach tomorrow, after you’ve viewed the hiding place itself.”

They all got to their feet. Penny led the way upstairs, paused at the stair head to bid them all good night, then sailed—alone—down the corridor to her room.

Charles joined her ten minutes later, entering the room a mere minute after Ellie had left. Seated at her dressing table brushing out her hair, Penny glanced at him in the mirror, a warning on her lips, simultaneously realized how silly any such warning would be. Given the state of her bed every morning for the past week, Ellie would long ago have realized she was no longer spending her nights alone.

The thought sent a small, self-seductive shiver through her. She studied Charles’s face as he walked farther into the room, shrugging off his coat, then starting to unknot his cravat; from his expression, he was already formulating, rejecting, and developing elements of a possible plan.

Refocusing on her reflection, she fell to more vigorously brushing her hair while she considered, absorbed, how relieved she felt now Jack and Gervase were there. She knew beyond question that Charles would stand between her, Nicholas, and everyone else who was innocent, and the murderer, like a human shield protecting them. It wasn’t that she’d thought, not even entertained the thought, that he’d fail.

But he was no longer facing the murderer alone.

Gervase had said he and Jack were grateful for the opportunity to leave London. She in turn was grateful they’d come.

Rising, she snuffed the candles in the dressing table sconces, leaving the candle on the table beside the bed to cast a soft glow. She’d donned a long white nightgown, purely on Ellie’s account. Charles, in shirtsleeves and breeches, sat on the bed to ease off his boots. Drifting to the open window, she leaned against the frame and looked out at the courtyard, a sea of moon-washed shadows. “Jack and Gervase are members of your club, aren’t they?”

When Charles didn’t immediately reply, she glanced back to see him standing, barefoot, stripping off his shirt. She sensed his hesitation, and softly laughed. “You needn’t think you’re giving anything away. It’s rather obvious—you’re all very much alike.”

“Alike?” He tossed the shirt over a chair, slowly walked toward her. “How?”

She watched him draw near, considered the excitement that licked down her nerves, that slowly tightened them. “There’s a scent of danger about each of you. Beneath your glossy veneer, you’re all dangerous men.”

He halted before her, studied her face. “I’m not dangerous to you.”

She reserved judgment on that; she let her lips curve, her brows quirk teasingly. “It’s rather…fascinating.”

He stepped closer, backing her against the window frame. “I’m not sure I approve of your being fascinated by them.”

Latent jealousy roughened his drawl. She laughed, relaxing against the wood at her back, sliding her arms around his neck. She looked into his dark eyes, black as the midnight sky. “I’m hardly likely to exchange your attentions for theirs.”

He looked down at her; in a flash of insight, she realized he was sure of her, that he knew he no longer needed to ask, but could be his true self, that he could demand and be certain of her response. His gaze lowered to her lips; one palm cruised the side of her waist and made her shiver.

His dangerousness hung in the air, shimmered, alive, around them. “Perhaps,” he murmured, his voice deep and low, “I ought to convince you.”

She licked her lips, felt her pulse accelerate, her body respond. “Perhaps,” she replied, locking her gaze on his lips, “you should.”

He didn’t wait for further encouragement; his hands gripped her waist, his lips covered hers, and the danger closed in.

She gave herself up to it, caught her breath when he ravaged her mouth, then stepped into her, trapping her against the wall beside the window. Excitement flared and raced down her veins. The hard wall was cool, her skin screened only by the fine fabric of her nightgown, no real protection. Not from the elements, not from his hands. They roughly searched as if learning her anew, as if he’d never had her naked beneath him before.

His lips and tongue commanded, held her senses captive, riveted on the dizzyingly potent threat he represented. Even though she knew it wasn’t real, that it was perception, not reality, her senses remained mesmerized, tensing, reacting, as if it were. As if she truly were his prey, and he was dangerous, as unrestrained and sexually powerful as she knew he had it in him to be.

Shivers of anticipation coursed her spine. She was dimly aware he’d pushed a hand between them, unfastening her nightgown, then he raised that hand and pushed the gown off her left shoulder, baring her breast.

He broke from the kiss and looked down, with deliberation cupped the lightly swollen mound, smiled as her flesh firmed. He closed his hand, then with his fingers caressed, slowly drawing sensation to the peak before closing his fingertips about it.

Head back against the wall, she sucked in a tight breath, tried to steady her whirling head. Watched his face as he possessed, for it was definitely that, a claiming. “Did you ever imagine…make up stories…?” Her voice was a breathless thread, but he heard.

After a moment, he consented to reply, “My youthful fantasies ran more to pirates and the sirens they captured. Who then captured them.”

His gaze flicked briefly to her face, then returned to her breast, now aching and tight. He shifted, pressing down the other side of her gown, transferring his attentions to her other breast. His face, chiseled and hard, looked unbearably male, unbearably beautiful in the moonlight.

She licked her lips. “Those sirens…what were they like?”

He glanced again at her face, then reached up and caught her wrist, lifted her limp hand from his shoulder, drew it down, and pressed her palm, closed her hand, about his erection.

She heard the sharp intake of his breath, sensed the sudden leaping tension as she boldly obeyed and caressed him.

From beneath heavy lids, eyes gleaming, he watched her, shifting his hips, thrusting languidly into her hand. “Strange to tell, those sirens were like you.”

He bent his head and found her lips, teased, taunted, while his hands ministered to her breasts, fracturing her senses.

She drew back, gasped weakly, “Like me?”

Beneath her hand, his erection felt like iron—heavy, hard, and rigid.

“They looked like you.” Releasing her breasts, he framed her face, tipped it up, searched her face, her eyes, then bent his head and took her mouth in a searing kiss that abruptly plunged them back into dangerous waters. Into the dark, swirling promise of what might be.

Into the realm where fantasy and reality wove one into the other and back again.

His hands drifted from her face, gripped her hips; he shifted into her, pressing her to the wall, impressing his hard, flagrantly masculine body on hers. Insinuating one hard thigh between hers, he lifted her until she rode the steely muscle, potent threat and promise combined.

Brusquely, he pulled back from the kiss, murmured against her lips, “Like you, they were always wild.”