Goddess of the Hunt (42 page)

He cupped her face in his hands, and her lips trembled under his.

“I’m going to kiss you here,” he murmured above her mouth. He slid his lips over to her ear, letting his breath caress her earlobe. “And here,” he whispered, nuzzling into her hair. Angling her head back, he buried his face in the sweet curve of her neck. “And here.” He rubbed his rough jaw against the delicate skin of her throat, thrilling to her little gasp.

Then he pulled away and looked down at her face. Until her eyes

fluttered open in a sweep of dark lashes that he felt brush against every inch of his skin.

“I am going to kiss you from the crown of your head, all the way down to the tips of your toes. And then I’m going to kiss my way back up your body and stop about halfway”—she shivered in his arms and he locked his thighs around her hips—“and I am going to kiss and kiss and
kiss
you until you are crying out my name.”

“So,” he said, standing up. He lifted her into his arms in one swift motion. “If you—my wife, my heart, my love—have anything else to say, I suggest you say it now.” He carried her over to the fire, sinking down with her into the nest of furs and blankets. “Because for the next several minutes, I intend to keep your lips pleasantly occupied, and after that—after that, I promise you, you will forget.”

She wrapped her arms around him, pulling him close. “Just one question,” she breathed, as his hand slid beneath silk to curve around her breast.

“What would that be?”

Her tongue flickered against his ear. “When do I get to kiss
you?”

Several hours and countless kisses later, morning dawned, quiet and bright. Lucy rolled onto her elbow and smoothed the hair from her husband’s brow as he stared up at the ceiling.

“What are you thinking about?” she asked, settling her chin on his chest.

chest.

He folded his arm around her. “I am thinking that I could stay here with you forever.” She smiled and planted a kiss on his collarbone.

“But,” he continued, stroking her hair, “I’m thinking that if we don’t get back to the Abbey soon, someone is going to come find us.” He rolled over to face her and dropped a gentle kiss on her lips. “Why?

What are you thinking about?”

She wound a lock of hair around her finger. “I’m thinking about Albert.”

He grimaced. “Him again?”

“You should give him work,” she said, trailing her finger across his chest. “Then he wouldn’t be skulking about the woods at night.”

“Give him work?” Jeremy snorted. “Like hell I will.”

She frowned. “That’s what Albert said, too. I don’t understand why it’s such a preposterous idea. He needs work; surely you have something he can do. It seems perfectly logical to me.”

“Lucy, he’s been poaching from the estate. He hurt you.” He kissed the objection from her lips. “Intentionally or no, he hurt you. It would be hard enough to forgive him that. I can’t reward him for it.”

“Don’t you see? It’s not about rewarding Albert’s wrongs. It’s about righting your father’s.”

With a sigh, he rolled back to face the ceiling. “I don’t think so, Lucy.

”

“Are you sure?” She ran her hand over his chest, flicking his nipple with her fingernail. “I can be very persuasive when I wish to be.” She traced the same path with her tongue, and he groaned. “What do traced the same path with her tongue, and he groaned. “What do you think now?” she asked saucily.

“I think—” He rolled to face her again and wrapped one arm around her, crushing her close. “I think you said you like me better when I’m not thinking.”

He kissed her deeply, running his hand down her back to squeeze her bottom. She sighed as he lifted her leg and hooked it over his hips, pulling her tight against his arousal. Even after a night of blissful passion, Lucy’s body responded with surprising urgency.

She rocked her hips, sliding over his hard length on a slick sheen of moisture. Exquisite pleasure rushed through her.

She reached between them, angled her hips, and guided him into her moist, aching heat. Slowly, slowly. Just an inch. Then two.

Stretching out the pleasure by infinitesimal degrees. Jeremy’s hand tightened over her hip. With a low moan, he thrust into her, hard.

“Oh,” she cried, breaking the kiss.

“God, Lucy. I’m sorry.” His expression went from desire to distress in an instant. “Did I hurt you?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” She pulled away slightly, then rocked against him again. “I liked it. Where did you get this notion, that you have to be gentle with me? I’m still the same Lucy. I’m still the sturdy little chit who can outride and outshoot you. I won’t break.”

He kissed her neck, laughing softly. “You can’t outride me.”

“Oh, now that sounded suspiciously like a dare.” She rolled him onto his back and straddled him, sinking onto him with a sigh.

“Who’s outriding you now, hmm?” She straightened her spine and tossed her hair over her back. His gaze fell to her jutting breasts.

With a fierce growl, he grabbed her hips and thrust upward.

With a fierce growl, he grabbed her hips and thrust upward.

She gasped. “That’s it!”

He thrust into her again. “You like that, do you?”

“No. I mean, yes.” He thrust again. “Oh, yes,” she sighed. She put her hands flat on his chest and leaned over him, her hair cascading around them like a tent. “I mean, that’s it. That’s why you married me. Because I won’t break.”

He stared up at her in puzzlement.

She countered his bewildered frown with a defiant smile. “You told Henry, you told yourself—you wanted to keep me safe. And that
was
a lie. Because deep down, you knew I wouldn’t need saving at all.

Not from this place, not from these people—and certainly not from you.” She planted her index finger in the center of his chest. “I can take you. All of you. Everything you have inside, everything you are.

You can do your worst, and you can give me your best. And I won’t break.”

“You won’t break.”

“I won’t. And you knew it the first time we kissed.”

He laughed. Laughed so deep in his chest, she felt his joy rumble through her whole body. It felt heavenly.

“Not the first time,” he said. “Definitely not the first time.” He slid his hands up her arms, pulling her down for a kiss. “Perhaps the third.”

It was a long, muddy walk back up to the Abbey. Lucy’s slippers only made it halfway. After that, Jeremy carried her.

As the prospect of the Abbey loomed closer, Lucy looked on it with new eyes. The façade of the rambling stone building caught the morning sun and came alive with brilliance. For the first time, she thought it resembled a structure built to praise God.

For the first time, it looked like home.

“Jeremy, stop.”

His arms tightened around her. “What is it? Are you uncomfortable?

Don’t demand to be put down. I’ll not allow you to walk barefoot through the—”

She silenced him with a smile. “I don’t want you to put me down.”

She looked around her slowly, taking in the sunlit Abbey and craggy bluffs, then craning her neck to survey the frost-tinged woods behind them. “It’s just so beautiful.”

She looked up to meet Jeremy’s puzzled gaze. “I’ll go to London with you if that’s what you want. You’re my husband, and if you want to reside in Town—or Scotland or Egypt, for that matter—I’ll follow you.” She paused, allowing the silence to underscore the import of her words. It wasn’t an everyday occurrence, for Lucy, pledging to follow a man’s lead to the ends of the earth. Or to Scotland. “But I hope our home will always be here. I love this place.”

“This
place? Lucy, we could live anywhere you wish. Travel the world, if you like. Of all the homes I could give you, you tell me this is the home you want?”

She nodded.

“For God’s sake, why?”

“Because this is the home you need.” She smoothed a lock of hair from his brow. “You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t love it, too. Lord from his brow. “You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t love it, too. Lord knows, you could have left it in the care of a steward and never looked back. Jeremy, we can make Corbinsdale a home again … fill it with light and laughter.” She dropped her gaze, then snuck a glance at him through lowered lashes. “And children.”

He winced. “Children? Here?” He looked over his shoulder toward the woods. “Lucy, how can I even think it? This is a horrible place for children.”

“It’s not a horrible place at all. It’s a good place.” She put her hand on his cheek and waited for his eyes to meet hers. “It’s a good place,” she repeated. “It’s also rough and wild and intractable, but that’s why I love it. It’s
us.”

“Us.”
He blinked away a glimmer of emotion. “Do you know, I love hearing you say that word.”

He bent his head to hers, and for several moments Lucy could not have said anything. Even when he broke the kiss, all words had vacated her mind, save one. “Jeremy,” she sighed.

“And that—” he dropped another light kiss on her lips—“is the word I adore hearing most of all.” He shifted her weight in his arms and resumed walking toward the manor. “Thank God you stopped calling me by that infernal nickname.”

“I did stop calling you ‘Jemmy,’ didn’t I? How curious. I don’t even recall when that happened.”

“Don’t you? I do.”

The dark note in his voice reverberated through her body, and desire echoed back. Lucy formed an immediate suspicion of which occasion that might have been. But then she realized something else. She gasped. “Thomas called you Jemmy, didn’t he? That’s else. She gasped. “Thomas called you Jemmy, didn’t he? That’s why you could never abide it.”

His silence—and a brief hitch in his stride—served as confirmation.

Lucy laid her head against his shoulder. “Oh, dear. Why didn’t you ever tell me?”

Again, he said nothing. But she needed no response. Of course, he
had
told her, scores of times, not to call him that. He scarcely could have explained why. She shut her eyes and burrowed into his shoulder, feeling acutely every example of her insolence over eight years.

“I’m so sorry. You were always so rigid, so proper—I couldn’t resist needling you. I never meant to … to stab you in the heart.”

He chuckled. “That’s a bit dramatic. Don’t apologize. You couldn’t have known. If it makes you feel better, for the most part, you
were
simply annoying.” She gave his arm a playful swat, and he squeezed her tight. “But I suppose, in a way … you never allowed me to forget him. I wasn’t always glad of that.” He paused. “But now I am.”

“Does that mean we can stay here at Corbinsdale?”

“It means …” He sighed heavily. His boots echoed over the cobbled stone entryway as they approached the Abbey’s thick wooden door.

“Lucy, I don’t …”

His voice trailed off as they entered the foyer and a throng of wide-eyed servants rushed to greet them. From the back of the horde emerged a most familiar, yet most unexpected figure.

“Henry?” they exclaimed in unison.

Jeremy slowly lowered Lucy to the floor. With one sweeping glare, he cleared the room of servants. She had to admit, that Look had its uses.

She clutched Jeremy’s coat around her body. Henry approached her slowly. He took in her disheveled state, eyeing her from tangled hair to bare toes. “My God,” he said, his voice shaking with rage.

“What has he done to you?”

He turned his burning gaze on Jeremy. “I’ll kill you. I warned you before, and now I’ll kill you. And—” His nostrils flared. “I’m going to enjoy it.” Henry started toward him, his hands in fists.

Lucy threw herself in her brother’s path. “Henry, no! You don’t understand.”

Henry glared over her shoulder at Jeremy. “You said you’d take care of her, you bastard!” He gestured toward Lucy’s tattered clothing. “Just look at her! She’s a disaster.”

Lucy clenched her jaw and let the words bounce off her pride. “I had a little accident. You know how clumsy I am. Just a little mishap in the woods, that’s all. Jeremy—” She swallowed. “Jeremy came to my rescue. You should thank him.” She looked over her shoulder at her husband. “I should thank him.”

“I’ll thank him to go to hell.” Henry glanced down at her bare legs.

“What the devil were you doing in the woods half-naked?”

She shut her eyes. “Henry—”

Jeremy interjected, “She’s cold, Henry. I’ll be glad to explain everything. But let us go wash and dress, and then we’ll sit down to breakfast and discuss this like civilized people.”

“Civilized people? You call this civilized?” He advanced on Jeremy, backing Lucy up between them. “If you think I’m allowing my sister to spend another minute in this house, you’re mad. I’m taking her back to Waltham Manor, where she belongs.”

“You can’t just take her,” Jeremy said, his voice growing rough with anger. “She belongs here. She’s my wife.”

Henry’s eyes narrowed. “Not if I kill you, she isn’t. Then she’s your widow.”

They lurched toward each other. Lucy put out her hands, one on either man’s chest, bracing her outstretched arms to hold them apart.

“Stop it, both of you! No one is killing anyone. This is absurd.” She turned to her brother. “Henry, why are you here?”