He held her to their kiss, tongues tangling, mouths merged.

Held her on his lap, naked and exposed, more vulnerable in the moonlight than she’d ever been.

More his.

All his.

When he finally released her lips and returned his attentions to her breasts, she let her head fall back, eyes closed.

Tensing as he again teased her nipples until they ached, then suckled anew, hard enough to make her fight to swallow a scream.

The next time, she lost the fight.

He was lifting her, working her on him, around him; simultaneously he was feasting at her breasts. She couldn’t take much more stimulation, more of the sensations he was ruthlessly pressing on her, heightened, made infinitely more powerful by their position.

She licked her lips, managed to gasp, “Take me to the bed.”

He didn’t miss a beat. “No. Here. Like this.”

His voice, all she could hear in it, very nearly made her weep.

With joy, with a pleasure that was far beyond the physical.

Need—simple, abiding, far deeper than she’d expected.

Never before had he been like this, never before had he dropped all pretence, every last vestige of sophistication, and allowed her to see so far, so clearly, to see that naked need. To know by her own experience so no lingering doubt could remain what truly drove him.

I love you.

She wanted to say the words. They welled in her chest, pushed up through her throat, but she swallowed them. If she told him that…

She had no wits left with which to think; instinct was her only guide. So she left the words unsaid, sobbed instead as her body started to convulse.

And he slowed.

Thrust harder, deeper, but slower.

So she felt every tiny slither as her senses unraveled, felt every last fraction of her helplessness as she climaxed more powerfully than she ever had before.

Tony raised his head and watched her, her ivory limbs silvered by the moonlight as she came apart in his arms. He drank in the sight, one he’d needed, one the prowling beast inside him had simply had to have.

Sunk to the hilt in her body, bathed in its scalding heat, he set his jaw and relentlessly drove her through the longest, most extended climax he’d ever forced on any woman. The soft strangled cries that fell from her lips were balm to his raging soul; the ripples of her release, the contractions that beckoned, her body helplessly gripping and releasing his erection, soothed that most primitive side of him.

It would be an easy matter to finish with her there, but that wasn’t what he wanted. Tonight he needed more.

He waited until her muscles relaxed, until she was limp, wholly pliant in his arms. Then he lifted her from him, simultaneously stood, and carried her to the bed. He laid her on the coverlet, then stepped back and stripped off his clothes.

Then he joined her.

Propped beside her, he ran a hand down over her back, over the smooth globes of her bottom. Slowly, surely, he roused her again, then positioned her curled over her knees before him. He entered her slowly, eyes closed, savoring every fraction of an inch as her soft, swollen sheath closed about him.

Then he rode her.

Slowly at first, then without restraint.

Until she was sobbing, hair threshing as she struggled for breath, incoherent in her need, totally wild, completely wanton.

She was usually neither; that last rein of restraint she’d not before released had snapped, broken.

He savored every second of her abandonment, of her complete and absolute surrender, listened to her cries as she fell from the peak—then found his own surrender beckoning.

This time he went willingly. He knew, in some dark corner of his mind, just what he’d been doing. Knew it wouldn’t work.

Didn’t care.

He’d had to do it—to show her all there was, to tempt that side of her he didn’t think she realized she possessed. She was a deeply sensual woman, but exploring her sensuality, opening her eyes to its true nature, had only more clearly demonstrated his own weakness, his own vulnerability.

This was one battlefield on which he was helpless. This was one fight in which there was no enemy.

Only surrender.

On a groan, he did, gave her all he was, all he could ever be.

Spent, he collapsed, then gathered her to him. He’d given her far more than his body. He’d lost his soul. And his heart. And perhaps even more.




TWENTY

HE LEFT ALICIA’S SIDE JUST AFTER DAWN, EARLIER THAN recent habit but after last night, he wanted nothing more than to have done with A. C.

After last night…he had even less idea what was wrong between them. Something, yes, but he’d be damned if he had a clue. If he pushed, twelve hours might result in them unmasking A. C., then he would be free to devote himself to the most important endeavor of his life—wooing Alicia, even winning her anew, if that’s what was required.

Frowning, he left his apartments. After last night, he could hardly have missed the fact that she was as he’d hoped, openly, generously, totally his. If that was so, then what else was there? From where did their problem, whatever it was, spring?

Confusion reigned. Reaching Alicia’s door, he determinedly put it from him, turned the knob, and entered.

She was still asleep. He sat on the bed and looked down at her, then gently shook her shoulder.

“Hmm?” She opened her eyes; he notched up her lack of surprise when she focused on him as a minor victory.

“I’m off to hunt down A. C. We’re breakfasting at the club to work out our best approach. We need to learn who owns Ellicot, then proceed from there, but whatever we do—”

“You have to make sure you don’t alert A. C.” She was wide-awake now, studying his face, her gaze earnest but watchful.

He hesitated; he wanted to say something about last night, about them, but didn’t know what, and couldn’t find the words.

“Stay on guard.” Squeezing her hand, he rose. “If we stumble and alert him, I’d expect him to run, but…he’s kept his head until now.”

“We’ll be careful.” She struggled up on her elbows.

“Good.” Backing, he raised a hand in farewell. She was naked beneath the covers, now sliding slowly down; he didn’t trust himself to kiss her, and stop at just a kiss. Last night had left them both with enough to think about.

“I’ll be back this evening, if not before.”

She nodded. “Take care.”

At the door, he glanced back and saw her watching him. He inclined his head, and left.

Closing the door, he turned. David, Harry, and Matthew stood shoulder to shoulder across the corridor staring unblinkingly up at him.

“I was just telling Alicia where I’d be today.”

“Oh.” David considered his reply to their unspoken question, then nodded and turned to the stairs. “Are you going down to breakfast?”

Harry and Matthew swung around and followed.

Drawing a relieved breath, Tony fell in in their wake. “No—I have to go out straightaway.”

Reaching the stairs, David and Harry clattered down.

Matthew stopped and turned to him. “Are you going to marry Alicia?”

Tony looked down into the big eyes fixed innocently on his face. “Yes. Of course.”

The other boys had stopped halfway down to listen; now they whooped joyously, and thundered on down.

Matthew simply smiled. “Good.” He took Tony’s hand and, with simple gravity, accompanied him down the stairs.

Two hours later, Alicia strolled the lawns in the park, alone but for Maggs, tactfully keeping watch from a distance.

All about her was quiet and serene. It was too early for the fashionable throng; a few latecomers were still exercising their horses on Rotten Row, but most riders had already clattered home while the matrons and their daughters had yet to arrive.

The solitude and fresh air were precisely what she craved.

After the door had closed behind Tony, she’d lain in bed for ten minutes before the insistent refrain playing in her brain had prodded her into action. Ringing for Bertha, she’d washed, dressed, and joined Miranda and Adriana in the breakfast parlor.

Miranda and Adriana had been busy organizing their morning’s engagements; she’d excused herself on the grounds of a slight headache and her need for a quiet walk to refresh herself. Accepting her excuse, the other two had left to get ready to visit Lady Carlisle; she’d climbed to the schoolroom and checked on her brothers, then quit the house, Maggs at her heels as per his “master’s orders.”

She’d accepted his escort with equanimity; she’d grown quite fond of the unprepossessing man. Interpreting his orders to watch over her literally, he’d retreated to stand beneath a large tree, now some distance away, leaving her to her thoughts.

Which were what she’d come to the park to confront.

It—her present tack—wasn’t going to work. She’d thought her best way forward was to adhere strictly to her position as Tony’s mistress and not wish for more, to rein in her dreams and accept what she’d been given, what he’d freely offered. But that view was fatally flawed— last night had proved it, had illustrated the truth beyond doubt.

The connection between them, so much more, so much stronger than any mere physical link, was not compatible with, would not remain constrained within, the bounds of the relationship of a nobleman and his mistress. Their connection was a vital thing, a living force in and of itself; it was growing, burgeoning, already demanding more.

Last night, she’d nearly told him she loved him, had had to fight to swallow the words. Some night soon she’d lose that fight. One way or another, the truth would out—in toto, there was more to it, more depths, more aspects than even that powerful fact.

She might already be carrying his child; it was too early to know, yet the possibility existed. In the beginning, she’d assumed he’d know what to do, would take precautions, yet he hadn’t, nor had he expected her to. If she’d been shocked by her wanton behavior last night, her reaction to the idea of bearing Tony’s child had only confirmed how little attention she’d paid her to her latent hopes, aspirations, and dreams. Until now.

In her heart, and now very clearly in her mind, she knew what she wanted. The question facing her was how to get it; leaving matters as they were was, she now accepted, no longer an option.

Drawing in a breath, she lifted her head and looked unseeing at some distant trees. She’d taken serious risks to secure Adriana’s and her brothers’ futures, boldly gambled and won. It was time to act in pursuit of her own future—to realize the dreams she’d never allowed herself to dream but which Tony had brought alive.

She would speak with him. She felt her chin set. Just as soon as A. C. was in custody, she would talk to Tony, explain how she felt about them, about their future. How he would react was the risk, the unknown, yet… she had his declaration of love to lean on, and, indeed, more. Their connection itself; through it she sensed how he felt, his need, even if he didn’t consciously acknowledge it. In time, he would recognize the truth as she had, and reassess as she had, and adjust.

Grimacing, she looked down. She would be gambling that their love truly was as she saw it—a huge risk, yet one she felt compelled to take.

The thud of footsteps approaching over the grass reached her. Looking up, she saw a footman in plain black livery striding purposefully her way.

Glancing to the left, she saw Maggs, leaning against the tree trunk, come alert, but as the footman halted and bowed, Maggs relaxed and resumed his unobtrusive watch.

“For you, ma’am.”

The footman proffered a note. She took it, opened it, read it, and inwardly cursed. Chickens were coming home to roost thick and fast. Sir Freddie Caudel most formally and politely requested an interview.

She looked across the lawn to the black carriage drawn up on the gravel drive. With a sigh, she tucked the note into her reticule. “Very well.”

The footman bowed and escorted her to the carriage. Maggs, closer to the carriage than she, remained where he was, half-obscured by the tree.

Reaching the carriage, the footman opened the door and stood back, clearly expecting her to enter. Puzzled, she looked in, and saw Sir Freddie, dapper and urbanely elegant as usual, sitting inside.

Smiling easily, he half rose and bowed. “My dear, I hope you’ll forgive this unusual approach, but for reasons that will become clear as we talk, I wished to speak with you in the strictest privacy. If you will do me the honor of sharing my carriage, I thought we might roll around the Avenue—it’s quite peaceful at the moment—and conduct our discussion in relative comfort, out of sight of prying eyes.” He smiled, his pale gaze somewhat rueful, gently humorous, and held out his hand. “If you would, my dear?”