In Love With a Wicked Man (24 page)

“Oh, Edward, I don’t think—”

“Yes,
don’t
think,” he murmured against her skin. “Just lie back, and let me prove wicked men do have their advantages.”

She wanted to scold him; to tell him she loved him, and that there was nothing wicked about him. But the light, teasing touch of his tongue was beyond wicked. Beyond decadent. Yes, it was enslavement, or something perilously near it. For this, a woman might lose her moral compass entirely . . .

“Edward,” she whispered. “Oh. Oh, God. That is . . .”

“Oh, Kate,” he murmured teasingly. “Are you feeling enslaved?”

“
Yes.
”

She swallowed hard and tried to nod, both hands curled into the sheets now. The feeling had grown so intense she feared she might never return to herself. But the words choked in her throat, her head tipping back as she gasped and gasped again.

He stroked once more, a tiny, teasing lap of his tongue, and then she was lost to the pleasure, caught up in the throbbing intensity of it. As if he’d somehow severed her connection to the physical. Sent her shooting like a star in a streak of white light into a place where there was only him.

Only Edward. Only perfect bliss. The beauty of it washed over her. Drew her down into his warmth and cast her up again, sobbing. When she returned to herself, he held her in his arms, one heavy leg thrown over hers, surrounding her with his warmth and scent.

He smelled of soap and sweat and of her. His face was buried against her neck, his lips set lightly to her pulse point. “Kate, love,” he murmured. “You are beautiful. Don’t ever—
ever
—say you’re not.”

She relaxed into the mattress, content in that moment. It was as if nothing beyond this room existed, as if time had stopped. And she
was
beautiful. She felt it. She saw it through his hot, hooded gaze as clearly as she knew her love for him.

After a time, he levered up onto one elbow, heat kindling in his eyes—a heat that was for her and her alone, she was utterly certain.

Kate wrapped her arms around his neck, and rose up to kiss him. “Let me pleasure you,” she whispered against his ear. “Show me how. I am, after all, your slave now.”

He gave a low, wicked chuckle. “Ah, a baroness in servitude!” he said. Then he set both hands to her waist, and rolled onto his back, lifting her astride him. “On top with you, then.”

Kate landed on a suppressed shriek, her hands splayed atop the wide wall of his chest. He urged her knees apart, into a position as wicked as it was decadent.

“There,” he said, a roguish grin curving his mouth. “A man likes his sex slave to know her place—and you look especially fetching in that one.”

Kate felt her face heat, but she pushed herself up uncertainly, and set one knee on the opposite side of his hip so that she fully straddled him. “Like this?”

“
Umm
.” Edward slipped his left hand between them, slicking one finger through the wetness between her legs, and the grin faded to something far more serious.

“Oh, Kate,” he whispered. “Oh, my love, you madden me.” Edward’s right hand was weighing her breast in his palm as his thumb lightly stroked her nipple. “Yes,
perfect
,” he whispered, “except for one small detail.”

“Yes?”

“Rise up a little,” he murmured.

“L-like this . . . ?”

“Yes, on your knees.” He slipped the hard, velvety weight of his erection through her wetness. “Oh, God,” he choked. “
Just
like that. Just like that, Kate.” He pushed himself a little inside her, and squeezed his eyes shut on a deep moan.

It was remarkable. And deeply erotic. His hands were at her waist, his thumbs dark against the pale flesh of her belly as he held her still to his slight motion. He moaned again, his grip slackening. Kate moved experimentally, and he pushed deeper, filling her and stretching her.

“
Ummm
,” he said again, lower still.

“Oh, my. That is . . . remarkable.” Empowered, Kate set her hands on his wide shoulders and rose up, then slid all the way down this time, impaling herself.

“Good God,” he choked. “Kate—
oh
!”

She lifted again and met his first, powerful thrust. The time for talking was over; they were beyond it. He set a rhythm, lifting her at the waist though he hardly needed to; Kate thrilled to the power of each stroke.

She could feel his entire length drawing at her flesh, delicious and utterly carnal. Leaning forward, she bent her head to his and kissed him as he had kissed her, thrusting inside to plumb the depths of his mouth. The heat ratcheted up instantly, Edward’s arms coming around her, clasping her to him as he drove himself up and into her.

Kate felt as if she had burst into an inferno of desire. She thrust her tongue as he thrust inside her, reveling in his hunger. Savoring the power until she sensed his release near. Lifting herself up again, she set her hands to his chest, her gaze locked to his. His breath was sawing in and out of his chest, a faint sheen of sweat across his forehead.

Then Edward’s belly drew taut as a bow, and she felt that sweet, elusive sensation edge near yet again. It seemed impossible, yet she yearned for it. Over and over he drove inside her, edging her nearer that sweet cliff. And then she was lost to his strokes, as if the light and heat and bone-deep yearning had fused them into one physical presence.

“Come to me, love,” she dimly heard him plead. Then she lost herself to the throbbing pleasure.

They came together in a glorious shattering of light, and Kate felt herself spin away again, utterly one with him as they plunged into that sweet, carnal bliss. So caught up in the ecstasy, she scarcely realized he had drawn from her at that last, perfect instant.

The light and pleasure faded slowly, and Kate savored it. When she returned to the real world, she was tucked against Edward’s side, not entirely clear how she’d got there. He had snared his cravat from the bed, and only then did Kate grasp that he’d spent himself upon his thigh.

She was still grappling with her feelings about that when he hurled the cravat into the gloom, and pulled her harder against him. She cut her eyes toward his fine legs.

“You were being careful,” she murmured, letting her lashes fall shut. “Thank you.”

“I have to be careful.” His breath was still roughened, his fingers of one hand tangled in her hair as he held her to him. “Because, Kate, I care for you. And nothing could alter the fact that what just happened was utterly . . .”

“Amazing?” she supplied hopefully.

He laughed, a deep, rasping sound. “Why is it words fail me with you?” he said. “It was not amazing, love. It was
disconcertingly
amazing.”

“Edward,” she murmured, sliding her lips down his damp throat. “Oh, sometimes I think . . .”

He kissed her atop the head. “Think what, sweet?”

“That I could fall in love with you,” she blurted, “or that perhaps I already have.”

Beside her, he went perfectly still, and Kate knew at once she had spoken too plainly. Worse, she’d said something he could never reciprocate. Her heart was already sinking a little when he made a soft sound of dismay.

“Ah, Kate,” he said, rolling onto one elbow to look at her through his heavy-lidded green eyes. “It won’t do. You know it won’t.”

“I know,” she whispered.

His gaze softened tenderly in the firelight. “Yes, you love me in this moment,” he said, placing his wide, comforting hand over her heart. “You love what I do to you. And I’m gratified. But tomorrow you’ll realize it’s not at all the same thing.”

“You seem very certain,” she said.

He dragged a hand around the dark stubble of yesterday’s beard. Then he spoke very slowly, as if carefully considering his words.

“Sometimes, Kate, women think they must love a man to enjoy his body,” he finally said. “Don’t fall into that trap, I beg you. We are good together, you and I. Better than I would ever have dreamt possible. But don’t let yourself love me, Kate. Just . . . don’t. Take your fill of me, and move on with your life.”

She gave a faint shrug, knowing there was no point arguing. Knowing, as surely as she breathed, that she had already fallen. And in the end, she would be no happier about it than he.

“You were once in love,” she murmured. “Weren’t you? You were betrothed.”

“Kate, it’s complicated,” he said. “And ugly. May we leave it at that?”

“Of course,” she whispered, turning to look at the dying fire.

He drew a deep breath and held it a moment. “The truth is, Kate,” he said, “I don’t know if I was in love. I was besotted, certainly, and hotheaded. But I was young—just eighteen, and still under my father’s thumb. And Maria was younger, too young to know what she wanted. I see that now.”

“But her family disapproved, you said.”

His gaze shuttered. “Her parents were not pleased to discover our friendship, or who my father was,” he said, “but it scarcely mattered; they had already arranged a marriage to a neighbor.”

“Why?” Kate tucked closer. “What made him so worthy?”

“He had loaned Maria’s father money,” said Edward, “with their farm standing as collateral. He had no way to replay it, and Maria was his only child. So it was agreed this neighbor would marry Maria. In that way, the entire estate would pass to him upon her father’s death.”

“And Maria—had she agreed to this?”

Edward hesitated. “She said she had not.”

“So she held fast against her father, I hope?”

“For a time, certainly.”

“You do not know?”

He shook his head. “I left England,” he said. “There was a fire in London—my father’s gaming hell burnt. I didn’t set it, but I damned sure walked out with what little cash I could save, along with his account books and enough incriminating evidence to hang him. Then I leveraged it, and forced Hedge into retirement, you might say. I put his cash into an annuity which I controlled, and purchased myself a lieutenancy in the Sixty-first Foot, then went out to Ceylon to make something of myself.”

“And did you?”

“I did well enough, and advanced quickly,” he said, “and I made some investments here and there. But I realize now it was a futile effort. I didn’t quite grasp the size of Maria’s father’s debt to his neighbor. In my naiveté, I thought I merely needed to make myself respectable. But no mere army officer could ever hope to pay off a debt of that magnitude.”

“Poor Maria,” said Kate.

“She was confused, and desperately unhappy.” Edward hesitated. “I think, Kate, that’s what drew me into the whole, miserable mess. I look back now, older and wiser, and I think I just wanted to be someone’s white knight. I was young enough then to believe such things existed.”

“And now you don’t?”

He laughed hollowly. “Oh, Kate, I have not believed in white knights or fairy tales or the overarching goodness of mankind in going on two decades,” he said. “I see human nature for what it truly is—plagued by the deadly sins, and venal in the bargain.”

“Your world is dark, Edward,” said Kate softly, “and hard.”

“I would beg you to remember that,” he answered, “when you’re tempted to fancy yourself in love with me.”

“Yes, I believe I shall shut that notion right out of my head,” she said a little flatly.

“Kate,” he chided. He leaned over to kiss the tip of her nose. “I’m sorry. You’re neither dark nor hard.”

“I wish I were harder,” she said, and meant it. “Well,
c’est la vie
, as Aurélie would say.”

“Your mother is not entirely wrong in her philosophy.” He kissed her nose again. “Shall I go, Kate? Shall I leave you to rest?”

She sighed, feeling oddly fractious. “No, not yet,” she said, glancing at the clock. “Tomorrow is Sunday; there will be no shooting. Have you any plans?”

“Anstruther and I mean to ride over to Heatherfields,” he replied. “He’s to give me a tour, and point out the worst of it.”

“Heatherfields’ decay frustrates him,” she said, then hesitated. “He mentioned to me tonight that you mean the property as an investment. That you will never live in it?”

He shook his head almost imperceptibly. “No,” he said vaguely. “I will never live there.”

Kate had not realized until that moment how much his answer had meant to her. For a moment, she was a little ashamed.

Had she really toyed with the notion of continuing an illicit romance? And how had she meant to go about it? Simply send around for her gig and go trotting off to Heatherfields when lust struck?

Inwardly, Kate sighed at her own artlessness.

A long silence fell over the room, and for a time they simply lay in each other’s arms. The languor remained, and that delicious feeling of having been well loved and sated. But the intimacy had been pierced, and the ordinary world had again intruded.

It was as if he read her thoughts.

“Tomorrow, Kate,” he murmured, “perhaps I should move upstairs. With the other gentlemen. That is, if I mean to stay on.”

“
Umm
,” she said against his chest.

“It . . . might be easier,” he said, his lips brushing her temple. “Easier than knowing that, every night I remain here, you lie but a few steps away. Less tempting. Less complicated.”

“Perhaps you’re right,” she said softly.

But Kate knew that nothing, after this, was going to be less complicated. Because she was doubly in love with Edward. And no woman could love such a man, and expect her life to be less complicated.

CHAPTER 12

In Which Aurélie Seizes the Reins

I
t was a novel experience to get up at one’s usual hour of seven o’clock, only to find Aurélie Wentworth had risen betimes. But when Kate entered the breakfast room a quarter hour later, there sat the worthy lady in all her morning glory, the pug snoring riotously in her lap, and the Comte de Macey waiting on her hand and foot from the sideboard.

The room was otherwise empty save for Nancy, who rolled her eyes and tilted her head in her mother’s direction.

“Good heavens,” said Kate, hitching on the threshold. “I am like to fall dead from shock.”

“Dead from lack of sleep, more like,” murmured Aurélie without lifting her gaze from her newspaper. “Why,
mon chou
, do you speak as if I am some specter risen from the netherworld?”

“Really, Aurélie,” Kate muttered, going straight to the teapot. “Have you even
been
to bed?”

“
Mais oui
,” she said, giving the paper a straightening snap. “For today I wished to rise early. Great plans are afoot.”

“That sounds ominous.” Kate lifted the lid from the chafing dish to behold a steaming pile of eggs. “You always have plans afoot. But they never require that you rise before noon.”

“
Oui
, this is true,” said Aurélie agreeably. “But today is different. Today I mean to go to morning services. And tomorrow I mean to take Nancy shopping. All must be properly planned.”

But the bit about shopping flew over Nancy’s head. “To church?” She roused at the opposite end of the table. “Why? Mamma, what are you up to?”

“
Non, non.
” Her mother wagged a finger. “Not in front of
le comte
.”

“
Mon Dieu
, Aurélie,” said de Macey, bending over to warm her coffee, “I have known you long enough—and well enough—to have noticed that you have children.”

“Oh, have you indeed?” Aurélie smacked him playfully with her newspaper. “Well! Perhaps I go to church to confess my sins, de Macey? Indeed, you may have some knowledge of them.”

“Not in some years, my pet,” he replied absently, “not in some years. Much as it pains me.”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Kate muttered.

“Coffee?” asked de Macey, lifting the pot.

“No, thank you. I’m having tea.” Kate sat adjacent to her mother. “What are you up to, Aurélie? I hope you do not mean to embarrass Richard.”

For once Aurélie looked genuinely hurt. “
Moi, mon chou?
” she said, pressing her hand to her chest. “How can you think it?”

“You do like to tease,” Kate chided. “And another thing, whilst the family is here alone—”

“Thank you, child.” De Macey patted her shoulder and sat back down.

“Yes, I include you,” said Kate tartly, “because I charge you, to some extent, with her supervision. Aurélie must quit flinging her pretty gentleman at Nancy. All she’s doing is upsetting Richard. I saw his face last night every time she danced. And I cannot think Sir Francis has the least interest in her.”

“No, no, not in the least,” de Macey agreed. “Of that I’m quite certain.”

Kate turned to look at him oddly, then gave a dismissive wave. “Yes, whatever,” she said, “but Mamma—
Aurélie
—churns all this up deliberately. And now this business of going to church?”

Aurélie’s pretty lips formed an exaggerated moue. “Perhaps,
mon chou
, I merely wish to be better acquainted with the man who desires to be my . . . er, my—”

“Your daughter’s husband,” said Nancy tightly. “Yes, Mamma, your son-in-law. You
are
going to have one.”

“
Ma foi
, the mother of a priest!” said Aurélie, casting a gaze heavenward. “And then grandchildren! It is not to be thought of just yet. But tell me,
ma fille
, how badly do you wish this marriage,
hmm
?”

“Oh, Aurélie, more than anything!” said Nancy, leaning over her plate.

For once, Aurélie looked uncertain. “
Oui, ma chérie
, but consider carefully what
anything
is,” she replied.

“Anything,” Nancy repeated. “And Mamma, you really needn’t send any more gentlemen to flirt with me. If Uncle Upshaw will not give me permission, Richard and I mean to wait until I’m twenty-one.”

“Ah,
chérie
, you will have wrinkles by then,” said her mother evenly. “He will not want you.”

At that point, the conversation descended into utter foolishness, and a great deal of babbling and gesturing about a shopping trip to Exeter. Aurélie had somehow enlisted Anstruther to drive them. The latter meant to buy a new double-furrow plow that could only be had from a large ironmonger there; the former, a pair of red shoes, her old ones having had the temerity to pinch her toes last night.

Kate didn’t care about her mother’s shoes, though admittedly the plow was a matter of some significance. Nonetheless, she shut the racket out and ate her breakfast, saying nothing more. But matters were not much improved when, half an hour later, Lord Reginald strolled in, wearing a shimmering silk banyan over his waistcoat and looking like a true gentleman of leisure bent upon breakfast with his family.

“Mamma is going to church today,” said Nancy a little triumphantly. “What do you make of that, Reggie?”

Reggie turned from the sideboard, and arched one satanic black eyebrow. “Heavens, Aurélie, are pigs flying?” he asked. “Or does Filou require absolution for all that curried crab he filched last night?”

Kate jerked to her feet. “I’ve a letter to write before services,” she lied. “And the carriages to order. Just the five of us, is it?”

“Not I,” demurred de Macey.

“And no one else means to get up, I daresay,” said Nancy, covering a yawn. “So just us four.”

Her mother lifted a faintly teasing gaze to Kate’s. “Actually,
mon chou
,” she said, “Mr. Quartermaine has already risen, dined, and gone down to Anstruther’s office.”

Reggie gave a sharp laugh. “Oh, that one won’t darken a church door,” he said. “Depend upon it.”

Aurélie snapped over the page of her paper. “Actually, I believe he means to,” she said. “Katherine, I trust you’ve no objection?”

“Why, nothing would please me more,” she said, smiling at Reggie as she slid past.

As it happened, her mother was right. Edward strode up St. Michael’s north aisle just behind Anstruther, not two minutes before the church doors were closed. To Kate’s delight, he hesitated by the empty spot Nancy had vacated moments earlier in order to join Richard’s mother, whose sister was visiting from Staplegrove. Having laid her prayer book there, Kate was rewarded by Edward’s muted smile when she snatched it up again.

He sat down, his wide shoulders filling the space in a way Nancy’s had not. And though he looked straight ahead without so much as brushing her arm with his, his warmth and his presence comforted Kate.

He was attired today in the tall black boots he’d worn the day of his accident, and looked almost dangerously handsome. Throughout the service, she had to resist the impulse to sneak surreptitious looks at his striking profile, and to wallow in her recollections of the previous night. Her mother was right; there had been very little sleep involved.

Her face flushing with sudden heat, she opened her prayer book to the wrong place, scarcely aware until Edward reached over and flipped back the page. Mortified, Kate snapped it shut again, and forced her gaze toward the altar.

Richard spoke as eloquently as ever, seeming little cowed by Aurélie’s presence. After communion, everyone filed out into the churchyard, then scattered into random knots to pontificate upon that holy trinity of every little English village: the harvest, the weather, and the latest gossip.

Kate turned toward Edward, smiling genially. “Good morning, Mr. Quartermaine,” she said, catching her toe on a clump of grass. “Heavens, this ground is uneven.”

“Lady d’Allenay.” Crooking one eyebrow, he offered his arm.

“Oh, thank you!” she said, taking it. “An inspiring sermon, wasn’t it?” Then she dropped her voice to a whisper. “Just keep me away from Reggie,” she begged. “I want to quell the village gossip.”

He cut an odd glance down at her. “I rather doubt you’ll quell any gossip by hanging upon
my
arm,” he murmured, “but you’re welcome to try.”

Kate persuaded herself it was the lesser of two evils. Already Reggie was glowering at her, and she had no wish to encourage him. Having been espied by half her neighbors climbing out of Aurélie’s barouche with him this morning was bad enough.

She looked about the churchyard to see that Nancy was, as usual, cozying up to Richard’s mother. Along with Mrs. Burnham’s sister, they had strolled across the street and now stood before the small rectory, their three heads bent in an intense conversation.

Aurélie had been surrounded by a trio of elderly village tabbies who, though they likely disapproved of her, wished nonetheless to exchange a few words so that they might speak of it later in scandalized whispers.

“Mamma and Nancy are going to be a while,” Kate said. “Walk with me through the churchyard, won’t you?”

“If you wish.” But he didn’t look as if he thought it a good idea.

After moving away from the crowd, they spoke little to each other. Whatever his misgivings, Edward seemed content to stroll sedately together through the grass, now gone brittle with the cold.

Soon they were deep in the shadows alongside the church, winding their way around gravestones. Snippets of conversation carried on the sharp air, though they were by no means out of sight of the congregation.

Kate pulled her cloak tight against the chill, and Edward helped her around the base of a stone that tilted precariously on a tree root. “Is all of your family buried here?” he asked.

“Yes, most,” she said. “Some inside, and some out here.”

“Ah, yes. Here is a Wentworth.” He bent forward to scratch off a bit of lichen. “Harold, I believe it says.”

“Yes, Grandpapa’s ne’er-do-well younger brother.”

He straightened up. “The barony has suffered more than a few of those, I take it?”

“Besides my father and my brother?” said Kate. “Yes, more than our share.”

He laid his hand over hers on his coat sleeve for an instant, patted it, then moved on to a weathered marble obelisk some seven feet high.

“Infantry,” he said admiringly. “Gad, the Fiftieth Foot! This must be someone more worthy than the wastrel Harold.”

“It is a memorial to Grandpapa’s cousin James, for whom Papa was named,” said Kate. “He fell at Vimerio, trying to hold the hill against the French. You were in Ceylon, did you say?”

“Yes, mostly.” Edward circled the obelisk, reading its many inscriptions. “So, a lieutenant colonel, your cousin, and much decorated. The Fiftieth fought bravely at Vimerio. They killed two thousand of the French that day, you know.”

“With only a handful of British lost,” said Kate. “Cousin James was too brave for his own good, it was said.”

“Do you Wentworths always go to one extreme or the other? Either saint or sinner?”

Kate smiled. “Yes,
Nothing by half measures
is practically our motto.”

“Are you quite sure?” Edward winked at her as he circled the monument. “Because I’ve begun to suspect some of the outwardly angelic ones might harbor a secret streak of wickedness.”

“
Hmm
,” she said, lifting one eyebrow.

Then his face sobered, and he made an expansive gesture. “Do you know, Kate, I rather envy you all this.”

“What?” she said. “A churchyard full of dead ancestors?”

He laid his bare, long-fingered hand along the top of the nearest gravestone and leaned into it, his gaze trailing pensively over row upon row of stones. “Yes, actually,” he finally answered. “I envy you the history of it. The fact that you’re rooted to this place with all its lore and legends. To know your people—to know with a certainty to whom you belong—it is a gift, Kate.”

“It is, and that’s why I’m working so hard to preserve Bellecombe.” Kate cut a sidelong look at the winnowing crowd. “What of your family?” she said on impulse. “Do you know where they are buried?”

He hesitated. “The Earl of Oakley’s line hails from the north,” he said. “I’ve never been there, nor met any of them save Aunt Isabel. And my father died in Brighton last year.”

“What was his name?”

“Hedge,” he finally answered. “Alfred Hedge, a bully and a thug and an outright criminal who, so far as I know, sprung fully formed from Satan’s breast. If the man had family, they disowned him.”

“Good Lord,” she murmured. “So I gather you had no siblings.”
And nothing even vaguely akin
, she silently added,
to an ordinary family life.

“Until I was ten I had my half brother Frederick, who is now Duke of Dunthorpe,” he said. “He is two years my senior.”

“Ah.” Kate kicked herself for not thinking her question through. “Have you any contact with him?”

Edward shook his head. “Not since we were parted,” he said. “He was twelve. It was . . . difficult. We had been inseparable.”

Kate’s face fell. “He must have been crushed.”

“He cried,” Edward quietly confessed, “whilst the servants packed my things. And Father—Dunthorpe—stropped him for it.”

“He sounds like a bastard,” muttered Kate.

“No,” said Edward wryly “That would be me. That was, after all, the very point of Dunthorpe’s exercise.”

“Edward, don’t,” said Kate, her gloved hands fisting. “I dislike hearing you disparage yourself.”

“I believe I’m merely stating facts,” he said blandly.

Kate turned to face him, her hands set on her hips beneath her cloak. “Please don’t take this the wrong way,” she said quietly, “but you do not know the facts, Edward. You know only what your mother told Dunthorpe—and told him in anger, mind.”

“You sound like Aunt Isabel,” he said. “Always wishing to believe the best.”

“I do not
wish
to believe anything,” said Kate. “It matters not one whit to me if you’re the butcher’s boy. In fact, I might prefer it. Because one thing is certain: The three parents you did have all put their pride before their duty, and that is despicable.”