Lady in Blue (25 page)

They had fun together. Now and again he’d get caught up describing one of his interests, and she loved teasing him when he waxed eloquent about canals and locomotives and his particular fascination with the possibility of flying machines. He was looking forward to escorting her to a balloon ascent, fully intent on persuading her to go aloft with him. It would be magic, soaring to the skies with Clare. He could hardly wait.

Only in bed, it all crumbled. Only there, he had to face the truth that she did not desire him, was not passionate for him. And that where it most mattered, he had given her nothing. This night was worse than most, for she’d not allowed him a chance to try. He’d scarcely touched her. She had kissed him, caressed him, but not once had he felt the dampness of her welcome or stroked her to even the beginnings of pleasure.

His fingers combed through her soft hair, and he felt her stir in her sleep. Well, he’d always wanted her this way, limp and yielding, open to him. And after the two bouts of wild sexual release, surely now he had enough control of his own body to bend her to his will. He had come here tonight sworn to feel her convulse with pleasure, and damned if he’d let that promise vanish in the lassitude that threatened to overwhelm him.

He rolled over until he was on top of her, his elbows planted at her sides, and watched her eyes open sleepily.

“Bryn?”

“Oh, yes, Clare.” Lowering his head, he kissed her for a long time, resting his weight on one arm as he stroked her with his right hand, reaching under the soft gown to her breasts. “Don’t move until I tell you, or unless you can’t help it. I want to touch you, and kiss you, and make love to you for a very long time.”

He felt her nails dig, briefly, into his back, and then her hands relaxed as his tongue slid between her lips. Her mouth was musky with sleep, and he licked every part of it with moist and luxurious deliberation. I want you, he thought. I want your heart, the soul of you, the essence of you. Cradling her face with one hand, the other teasing at her nipple, he was vaguely aware she had begun to shift under the pressure of his body.

“Be still,” he murmured, lifting his head for a swift breath of air. “This is for me.” For you, he amended silently. If she sensed it, he would lose her. And this time he wanted to bring her to climax, devil take the reason why. Once she had experienced the same unutterable ecstasy she gave to him, there would be no turning back for her, as there was none for him. It was the surest, safest way to keep her with him. Above all else, keeping Clare was the goal.

His hand stroked the smooth lines of her leg, and his lips nibbled tiny kisses down her throat, over her shoulder, and finally to her breasts. The rough threads of lace on her gown were unimaginably intoxicating against his chin. Unhurried, he rolled his head against the soft mounds, seeking the exquisitely pebbled nipples.

Gratified, he heard a low moan deep in her throat and sucked harder, drawing more of her into his mouth. With ease, his fingers snapped one delicate satin ribbon until her breast was freed, and he laved it with his tongue between tiny bites that set her arching against him.

He wanted to touch her everywhere at once, before any part of her could escape. He tented her with his long body, the wide bow of his shoulders pressing her to the bed, his hands at once slow and anxious at her sides and smooth flanks, encompassing her with male flesh and bone, long hard fingers reaching for every curve and crevice.

There was no place she could go, no way she could evade him. He moved first to the breasts lifted to him and then to her mouth for another long, demanding kiss, while his hands molded her soft behind.

She reached for him, to pull him closer, but he pressed her arms against the bed. “Let me,” he ordered, all too aware what her touch could do to him. His fingers moved to the light hair between her thighs, damp with his seed. With exquisite deliberation, he thrust a long finger into the warm, swollen lips between her legs, feeling the thick wetness there, wondering if any of it was her welcome, the fountain of her desire, or only the remnants of his own passion.

Perhaps he would know, if he tasted it. Easing himself down her body, he nestled between her thighs. She gasped, and her fingers tangled in his hair.

“Hold me,” he said, “but don’t stop me.” Lifting her knees, he lapped gently at the unimaginably sweet softness. Him or her, it was all one now as his tongue found the hard nub of feminine joy and sucked at it while his finger slid inside her. Slick and warm and tight, her flesh closed around him even as her knees closed around his neck. With every swirl of his tongue she jerked against him, and he sent another finger into her and then a third, plunging rhythmically while he sucked her into the vortex that threatened to claim them both.

His own body twisted against the bed, his penis impossibly hard again and demanding its own release. Surging over her in one swift motion, he raised her legs over his shoulders and plunged inside, thrilling to the cry she could not contain just before his tongue flamed inside her mouth.

She was with him now, her hips flailing against the sheets, her arms curved at his armpits and her fingers clutching at his scalp, drawing him in and pulling him onward, the way he’d dreamed it could be.

And then she was gone.

In less than a flicker of an eyelash, Clare detached herself from the body that still writhed beneath him, sucking him into its depths like dry earth absorbed water. Dispassionate and passive, she slipped away, unsatisfied.

Deliberately.

With an oath, he flung himself off the bed, looking back at her from bleary eyes. She lay there, thighs spread and glistening, arms limp on the counterpane. She might as well have been on the moon for all her awareness of him.

“Damn you,” he swore, groping in the dimness for his breeches. “Damn you to hell for this.”

As if that got her attention when all else had failed, she sat up on her heels, the lascivious gown drooping over one bared breast where he’d torn the strap away, her hair tangled around her face. Mutely, she gazed at him in confusion.

Stuffing his legs in his pants, he grabbed for his boots and pulled them on. “This won’t do, Clare!” he shouted. “What the devil are you trying to prove? That none of it is happening? That you can come out of this the virgin you were going in?”

He snatched his shirt from the carpet. “You owe me, lady.” Missing the top button, he fastened the rest unevenly. “I might as well fuck a pillow.”

He picked up his coat and stalked to the door, swinging around to jab a hard finger in her direction. “Get one thing straight, Clare. You are a whore, bought and paid for. A whore gives her buyer anything he wants. We both know you are holding back on me, and it isn’t good enough. You cheat both of us. Refusing to feel doesn’t change what you are. It just makes you bad at it.”

She blinked once, gazing at him with wide, frightened eyes. Her mouth opened slightly, as if she wanted to say something, and then closed again. She wrapped her arms across her breasts.

Bryn stared at her for a last moment and slammed the door behind him.

He slammed the downstairs door, too, and stumbled into the wet streets muttering to himself, with no idea where he was going.

SOMETIME LATER, in a place he didn’t recognize, he heard the shrill sound of drunken laughter and wandered inside. A gaming hell, he thought.

The air was heavy with smoke. Benumbed, he found himself seated at a green baize table with a full bottle of brandy at his elbow and cards in his hands. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a wad of banknotes folded into a gold clip.

The other faces at the table seemed very young. Adolescent fools, he thought, wondering what game they were playing. A pudgy boy with a round face introduced himself, but Bryn didn’t hear his name. A thin boy was seated across from him. Ignoring the glass, he swigged brandy straight from the bottle. He dealt when it was his turn, played a card from time to time, stuffed money in his pockets when the pile in front of him grew large.

He bought drinks for the house. He bought another bottle of brandy for himself. He saw Clare, kneeling on the bed, looking at him, confused and frightened.

After a while, he saw nothing at all.

At the sudden roar,
Bryn shot upright and looked around in confusion. Wherever he was, the place was overrun by a pack of screaming hyenas.

When he shook his head to clear it, a brigade of cavalry charged through his skull. What had hit him? He buried his face in his hands, feeling whiskers. One side of his face was wet. He glanced down at the trestle table and the pool of ale where his cheek had been.

The crowd surged forward, intent on whatever was going on in the center of the room. He could see nothing but backs and shoulders, all male, and smoke wreathing the amber light streaming from lanterns suspended overhead. The place looked as if it might once have been a stable. It smelled of animals.

He wondered if he were asleep. Having a nightmare. But the pain in his head was excruciatingly real, and the din was beyond imagining.

Groaning, he tried to stand and felt his knees give way. Falling back onto the narrow bench, he nearly toppled over and grabbed the table with both hands. God, he was thirsty. He lifted a few empty mugs and found one with an inch of warm flat ale, which he quickly swallowed.

An image flickered in his mind—his hand wrapped around a bottle . . . cards—and then it was gone. For a moment, he thought he saw feathers hanging in the smoky air. A high-pitched shriek, like a death cry, split the air and the crowd erupted into a frenzy. Bryn shut his eyes and plastered his hands over his ears.

When he looked up, a wad of money hung in front of his nose. He looked past it to a wrinkled shirtsleeve, a limp, untied cravat, and a chubby face that seemed vaguely familiar.

“Called it again, your lordship. Damned if I can figure how you done it. Didn’t think you was awake above half.”

“Who the hell are you?” Bryn’s tongue was furry and felt too large for his mouth.

“Ha. That’s a good one.” The man, barely that, dropped the notes onto the table. “Cleaned me out, and now you don’t know my name.” He slumped on the bench across from Bryn, his round chin fuzzed with a youthful beard, grinning widely.

“No, I don’t. Where am I, and how in blazes did I get here?”

Another youngster joined them at the table, swigging heartily from a pewter mug.

“Give me that,” Bryn ordered. Somewhat to his surprise, the boy handed it over immediately, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Bad stuff, m’lord,” he warned the earl, “but don’t ‘spect anybody knows the difference by now.”

It was wet, and Bryn swallowed it greedily.

“Wants to know where he is,” the pudgy boy informed his friend with a laugh. “Cool as you please, like he ain’t just called five of the last six fights. M’uncle was like that. Said when gentlemen leave the table, you can’t tell which of ’em won or lost.”

“What fights?” Just in time, Bryn remembered not to shake his head.

The fat boy laughed uproariously, “Hear that?”

His friend looked worried. “I don’t think he knows, Will.”

Bryn regarded him with appreciation. “That’s right. I don’t.”

Leaning forward, the boy studied him for a moment. “Er, do you know who you are, m’lord?”

“Of course I do,” he thundered, regretting it immediately. His head swam.

Will dug one elbow into his friend’s ribs and tapped his forehead with a meaningful finger. “Caradoc,” he whispered loudly. “Father ran mad, y’know.”

In a flash, Bryn was on his feet with one fist clutching the boy’s cravat in a stranglehold, dragging him across the table until the two of them were nose to nose. “You,” he said chillingly, “have just made a bad mistake.”

The round face seemed to swell.

“My lord!” Dimly, Bryn felt the skinny boy behind him pounding at his shoulders. “Let him go!”

With a last hard twist at the boy’s neckcloth, Bryn released his hold. “Outside, both of you,” he said, trying to stay on his feet as the surge of rage dissipated, leaving him weaker than before. When he felt an arm supporting his elbow, he leaned on it with gratitude.

They came out of the overheated stable into a cool night blazing with stars. Across the courtyard stood a ramshackle inn, the doors open to a crowded hall and a taproom overflowing with noise and laughter. Curricles, coaches, and gigs were lined up outside a long narrow building. The new stable, he guessed.

This could not be London.

Cubes of baled hay were stacked by the door, and he collapsed onto one with a sigh. The two young men stood before him, looking worried. “I am not mad,” he told them, enunciating every word. “But I think I must have taken a blow to my head. Will one of you kindly tell me where we are and how I got here?”

The thin boy nodded wisely. “I expect it happened last night,” he said, snaring a cube of hay and settling across from the earl. “Looked none too good when you came into the Lucky Bones, m’lord. Maybe something hit you in the street. Were you robbed?”

“Couldn’t have been,” piped Will. “Had a wad of notes on him, even before he won all my money.”

“Just tell me what happened,” Bryn said through clenched teeth. “I remember going into a hell, and playing cards.” And drinking. He had heard of men drinking themselves to oblivion, and the devil knew he’d wanted to forget. The last clear image he recalled was Clare, kneeling in the center of the tumbled bed, her long hair draped around her shoulders, her eyes wide with pain.

Breathing hard, he stared at the brilliant sky, dimly aware of the youngsters chattering about a mill and cockfights and wenches. Apparently, they’d had a rousing good time. Ah, Clare, he thought, his eyes burning.

With effort, he wrenched his attention to the boys. “I came here with you?”

“Friday night,” the thin boy said in the patient tones of one addressing a slowtop. “You, Will, and me rode out in Lambert’s coach. Got rooms upstairs.” He pointed to the inn. “One for you and one for the rest of us. Taking turns, we are. Lambert’s up there now, with Dolly. Or Polly. Whatever her name is.”

Will pulled out his watch and tried to make out the time. “I’m next, at three o’clock. Got the little redhead lined up, if I can find her.”

“Damn and blast!” Bryn mauled his hair with a shaking hand. Had he, somewhere in a fog of brandy, tumbled a tavern whore? He couldn’t bring himself to ask.

“You want her?” squawked Will, looking miserable. “She won’t give me a toss on credit if you’ve changed your mind. All over you this afternoon she was, after the mill. Saw you win at odds, I expect. The girls know which ones to go for. Couldn’t believe m’luck when you turned her down.”

Wildly relieved, Bryn summoned a tight smile. “She’s all yours, and the money to pay her with, if you’ll help me get out of here. How far is London?”

“About twenty miles,” put in the thin boy. “But you won’t find anybody going back tonight.”

Bryn struggled to his feet. “Oh, but I will. You say we came in Lambert’s coach?” He had absolutely no recollection of anyone named Lambert, or the journey, or the mill, or the cockfights. “Get him. This party’s over.”

“M’lord,” the thin boy said urgently, “we can’t get him right now. If you know what I mean.”

Bryn fixed him with an icy aristocratic stare. “Take me to Lambert, right now. If you know what I mean.”

Minutes later, Morley Brackon and Will Fletcher stood behind the earl in the narrow hallway, waiting for Lambert to answer repeated poundings on the door. They heard muffled oaths, and the door cracked open. Lambert, a pillow clutched to his naked loins, peered blearily at them. Bryn saw a light-haired girl kneeling on the bed, a sheet pulled over her breasts, regarding them with startled eyes. Like Clare, tousled from lovemaking, mute and frightened. His heart thudded in his chest.

“Thing is, Lamby,” said Fletcher, when Bryn was silent, “his lordship here wants to go home. Needs the coach, y’see.”

Obviously, Lambert did not see at all. Sputtering, he dropped the pillow and bumped his head on the doorjamb when he bent over to pick it up. Behind him, the girl laughed shrilly, and the ugly sound shattered the image of Clare that had taken possession of Bryn’s senses.

“I’ll buy the damned coach!” he declared, reaching into his pockets. They were crammed with notes and guineas, and he dropped the lot of them on the floor. “This on account.”

Lambert gazed bleakly at the small fortune cast at his feet. “Glad to sell you the coach,” he stammered. “Wish I could. But it ain’t mine. Belongs to m’father. He don’t know I took it out, and he’s like to have m’hide when I bring it home. Wouldn’t care to tell him I sold the thing.”

The earl, beginning to sober up, recalled that he knew someone named Lambert. Not this boy but a stiff, cold man about fifty years old. Crandall Lambert, Lord Finchburton. “The marquess’s whelp, are you?”

Wincing, the youngster nodded.

“I know your father. And I expect when he learns I had sudden need to borrow a coach, and his son was kind enough to lend me one, he’ll pat you on the back for it. I’ll give him a good story, Lambert, if you have the coach readied for me within the hour.”

The boy looked first at the determined jaw of the earl, then at the money on the floor, and then, longingly, over his shoulder at the girl.

“Bloody hell, you idiot,” Bryn snapped, “make your way home the best you can. All of you. Just get me a vehicle and some horses and a driver. Will, where’s my room?”

It was three hours before the driver was found and deemed sober enough to manage the horses. Bryn took Will with him to his room, dredged a history of the long weekend he’d spent in the company of three boys nearly half his age, and then dozed for a while.

The night sky was graying to dawn when he was finally shut inside the carriage with a loaf of stale bread to settle his stomach and two jars of cool water, which he drank within the first half hour. The Black Sheep, out of the way of the main post roads, made its way by hosting weekend entertainments for youngsters hot on the town. When he was their age, Bryn reflected grimly, he had been too busy scrambling an education and making money to indulge himself.

Now, he knew what he’d missed. He wasn’t sorry.

Three times he was forced to pound on the ceiling with his fist to stop the coach while he retched into the hedgerows lining the road. He’d never before drunk enough to shoot the cat, let alone passed an entire day and the better part of two nights in a mindless haze.

From what Will told him, he seemed to have functioned pretty well, at least to the point of winning bets placed on Scarface George to beat Hamfisted Harry, not to mention assorted chickens he’d favored to tear other chickens to shreds with metal claws. He’d never seen a cockfight before. Nor had he now, he thought, with a sour grin that hurt. His lips were dry, swollen, and cracked, and his head felt like a knife thrower’s target, new blades piercing it with every jolt of the carriage.

He deserved it all. He deserved worse. No punishment in this life could match up to his crimes and to the guilt pounding at him.

Perhaps the boy was right—he had run mad. Only madness could account for the way he’d acted, the derisive words he’d thrown at Clare. He had savaged her.

And lost her. She would be gone by now, and he still did not know her real name or where she’d come from. She wouldn’t want him to look for her, although he would, nor be glad if he found her. Which he would, eventually. Maybe she’d give him time to apologize before she slammed the door in his face.

Damned fool. Stupid, selfish, arrogant fool.

He knew she would not be there, but he directed the driver to Clouds with a misbegotten compulsion to face the scene of his crimes. The Sunday morning streets were oddly quiet. Here and there, desultory street peddlers wandered with trays of muffins and raspberries, pork pies and nosegays. A few children were out early, rolling hoops in the small parks that studded the neighborhood.

He knew the minute he entered the house that it was empty. His footsteps echoed in the hall as he stumbled upstairs to the bedchamber. The door was open, and the bed neatly made up. Clare’s dressing table was bare, except for the silver-backed brush and mirror he’d given her and one yellow full-blown rose in a narrow vase.

He leaned his shoulders against the wall, arms clutched around his waist. One glance in the mirror confirmed that he looked almost worse than he felt. His eyes were red-rimmed and bloodshot, he’d two days’ growth of dark beard on his face, and his clothes were bedraggled and stained with wine and ale and God knew what else.

Deliberately, he forced himself to cross the room and stare at his image. He needed to see what he was . . . what he’d become . . . and commit the picture to memory. A stranger stared back at him. Bryn suspected the real Earl of Caradoc was there in the mirror, his sins etched in the lines on his face and the guilt in his eyes.

This was the man Clare had seen. She recognized what he was from the first, before the things inside him became visible. Of course she had left him. Right now, he could scarcely believe she’d stayed with him as long as she had.

A tiny sound, like scratching, caught his attention. From the window, he thought, although it was closed and the curtains half drawn. Seeing nothing, he sighed and turned back toward the hall. Lambert’s coach waited in the street, and there was no reason to stay in this place. Tomorrow he’d put Clouds up for sale. Never again would he bring a woman here.

At the door, he shot one last glance over his shoulder at the bed, remembering Clare as she’d looked the last time he saw her. His eyes blurred.

Then something moved from behind the curtains onto the window seat, and he gazed directly into the round yellow eyes of a hostile cat. Attila bared two long fangs.

Bryn stared at him for a long time.

The cat stared back. And then, purposefully, he rolled over, lifted a black-and-white rear leg into the air, and licked himself.