My Darling Gunslinger (23 page)

And Ty lost what little reason he’d managed to maintain, kissing her hard and wet and rough. He strode across the parlor, kicked open the bedroom door and stormed inside. Tumbling Charlotte onto the bed, he came down over her, never breaking the kiss that held them tethered together, the kiss that spoke the words he didn’t know.

Charlotte’s lithe form slithered and undulated beneath him, hips rising to brush cool cotton against his straining shaft, back arching to press peaked nipples against his chest.

Sweeping a hand down her back, he lifted her tight to him, glorying in the moan that traveled from her lips to his. Desperate to join their bodies, to plant his aching cock in her tight heat, he ripped her drawers down, shifting and wrestling the fragile fabric from her legs. No sooner did he have her free of the last stitch of clothing separating them, then she wrapped her legs around his flanks and lunged up, hips twisting and seeking.

Ty gave her what she sought, dragging his shaft down over her folds and notching the head at the opening to her body. With a single stroke he thrust hard and deep, seating himself firmly within the snug portal.

And Charlotte came apart, bucking and writhing beneath him, her inner muscles clenching and pulsating, wringing a growl from deep in his throat.

Her climax pushed Ty over the precipice and he fell into a violent release. Pleasure bordering on pain lashed him as he withdrew and thrust deep once more, spending his seed in a rush so powerful he tore his lips from hers and roared with satisfaction, with fulfillment and gratification.

It took long minutes, hours, hell maybe days to come fully back to himself, and when he did, Ty opened his eyes to discover his wife looking up at him, her eyelids at half-mast and her lips trembling around a soft smile. The coil atop her head had come loose, two long fraying braids curling on the pillow. He gathered one golden rope and wrapped it around his hand like a lifeline that might save him from losing his way in unchartered waters.

Cradled between Charlotte’s thighs, still buried deep within her body, he gently rocked against her, slow and leisurely. Her hands journeyed down his back, caressing him with only her fingertips, the touch as light and easy as his thrusts.

He had the oddest sensation this moment, this single sliver of time would define him for the remainder of his life. And he wanted it to last forever. He wanted to stay sheltered in her body, to crawl inside and burrow into her heart so she could never shake him loose.

Charlotte’s lips twitched and her eyes sparkled with amusement and Ty found himself grinning for no reason he could name.

“Me, I like to start with my hat,” she mimicked on a bubble of merriment. “What a load of sweltering, steaming bovine excrement.”

Ty barked out a laugh that sounded rusty to his ears.

“You would no more wager your hat on the first hand than I would waltz naked through Buckingham Palace.” Laughter erupted from her smiling lips and shook her slender form beneath him as she curled one leg languidly over his hip, anchoring him to her.

In the hour that followed, the boy who’d been taught his letter’s in a brothel learned proper ladies knew all sorts of five and six syllable words that when whispered in crisp, foreign tones sounded as wicked as any whore’s naughty babble.

The man who’d spent more than a year haunted by a figment of his imagination discovered if he kept the flesh and blood woman poised on the sharp edge between arousal and fulfillment, she lost her composure and every last bit of propriety when he acquiesced to her demands for release.

The lonely gunslinger who’d never had a home, a woman to belong to him or a reason to smile, learned laughter made lovemaking that much sweeter.

Keep your gun close, your words few, and your wits about you.

Cyrus Culpepper

The River Thames had its own distinct aroma, an odor as heavy and dense as fog, clinging to one’s garments and coating one’s nostrils and throat.

“Ew, it stinks,” Sebastian said with a child’s knack for stating the obvious in the simplest of terms.

Charlotte offered her son a square of linen she’d soaked in lavender water, though she was finding that, rather than mask the stench, the floral scent only added to the unpleasant miasma swirling in the air as the
SS Oceanic
made port in London.

“I’ve smelled worse.” Ty came up alongside mother and son at the ship’s railing. His gaze swept over the stevedores hurrying to offload the ship’s cargo, before moving on to the crowd packed into a cordoned-off corner of the docks. Men, women and children jostled one another in an attempt to get a good look at the young lord and the scandalous countess.

“Me, too,” Sebastian replied, handing the handkerchief back to his mother. “I fell in a pigsty once, and I’ll be damned if it didn’t stink worse.”

“Sebastian Grenville,” Charlotte hissed, looking about to determine if anyone was near enough to hear him.

“Sorry, Mother.” Sebastian turned big blue eyes up at her with a fair imitation of contrition.

Ty’s lips twitched and his gaze shifted, lifting to the buildings packed tight, wedged together until they hung over the streets, blocking the light and capturing the bouquet of the Thames, keeping it mostly confined to the waterfront.

Charlotte’s husband looked dark and menacing dressed all in black but for a white linen shirt and cravat. His jacket was open and fluttering along his hips, the pearl handles of his revolvers flashing in the summer sunlight.

Magnus had wanted the tailor in New York to dress Ty up in scarlet waistcoats and paisley neck cloths, top hats and high-heeled patent-leather shoes. The gruff Scotsman had argued quite strenuously, in fact.

Ty had only shrugged and left the decision as to his attire in his wife’s hands.

In the end, Charlotte had capitulated to the Scotsman’s grumbling only so far as to order a proper suit of court attire for the eventual summons to Windsor Castle. The rest of his new wardrobe consisted of simple, almost severe garments of gray and black which proclaimed him a dangerous man.

Charlotte knew with unquestionable certainty it would be a deadly miscalculation to dress Ty up as a dandy in fancy fabrics and bright colors.

Just as she’d known the dark angel lounging on a hitching post in Mystic, Montana was not lying in wait for Sebastian.

A dandy, no matter how tall and broad-shouldered and undeniably dangerous, was a man with whom Frederick was familiar, a man within his realm of experience.

Frederick was a creature of habit. He thrived on the familiar, craved consistency, needed the comfort of the customary as a fish needed water.

He was also a coward. He feared the unknown, the alien and strange, the unexpected and unpredictable, for such things wrought confusion and indecision and loss of control.

And Frederick without full control of everything and everyone around him was a man unhinged, unbalanced and off-kilter, suspicious and paranoid, jumping at shifting shadows, spooking at innocuous noises.

Charlotte wanted Frederick Grenville debilitated with confusion. She wanted him out of control and out of his mind, listing left then right, unsure where to turn, who to trust, uncertain whether a threat existed, and if it did, where and when it would attack.

Tyler Morgan, whoreson and dark angel, solitary hunter and deadly gunman, husband and lover, protector and guardian, was the looming threat.

Charlotte looked at the threat who was her husband, not surprised to see dark crescents beneath his gray eyes and lines bracketing his mouth. He hadn’t slept much the night before. Instead he’d tossed and turned, murmuring in his sleep before curling around her, pulling her back to his chest and pressing his lips to her nape.

She knew he was worried. For Sebastian, for her, perhaps even for himself.

As she’d rolled over to face him and snuggled up to his chest just before dawn, it had occurred to her it might be the first time he’d experienced worry for himself. But even his self-directed concern was based on the fear that if something should happen to him, Charlotte and Sebastian would be unprotected.

Charlotte was well-acquainted with that particular vicious cycle of anxiety and terror. She’d been on intimate terms with it for seven long years, nearly eight now. Since the morning her husband’s brother had offered his arm to escort her down the curving marble staircase of Lockhart Manor, only to give her an almost gentle nudge.

If something should happen to her, who would protect Sebastian? Who would put him before all else, always and forever?

“Mama, there’s men with cameras down there.” Sebastian’s words, excited and rushed, brought Charlotte back to the moment.

“Newspaper men come to report on your arrival,” she replied. “Do you see all those people waving? They’ve come to meet your ship, to welcome you to England.”

“Come on, lad. Hop up here and let them get a good gander at the returning hero.” Magnus hefted Sebastian onto a crate and wrapped one beefy arm around him. “Look important and stand as still as you can so’s the photographers can capture your likeness.”

“How do they know who I am?” Sebastian asked.

“Ach, they know a lord when they see one,” the Scotsman replied.

He was proven correct when a dozen cameras on sturdy tripods were aimed their way and the crowd roared in approval.

While the old man and the young lord preened for the cameras and Akeem hung back far enough to be little more than a blur in their lenses, Charlotte laid a hand on Ty’s arm. “Allow me to straighten your cravat, Mr. Morgan.”

Ty dutifully turned to face her, his ever-present hat casting a shadow diagonally across his face. “Has my neck cloth gone askew?”

“Looked it up did you?” Charlotte fussed with his perfectly tied cravat simply for a reason to touch him, to stand close enough to feel the warmth of his body.

“A man ought to know what he’s being punished for when he makes a muck of his wife’s coiffure.”

A flash of carbon flickered at the corner of her eye just as Ty rested one hand on her waist, his thumb curling down over her hipbone.

Charlotte smiled even as her breath hitched in mingled pleasure at the casual touch and bittersweet knowledge their time safely hidden away from prying eyes was at an end.

From this point forward they would be watched and judged, their every word and deed fodder for gossip.

How long before the old, cruel rumors initiated by Frederick Grenville reached Ty’s ears? Not long, considering the old gossip had been perpetuated by the same reporters and scandalmongers Charlotte was depending upon to see their plans come to fruition now.

“I’ll keep you safe.” The words were a pledge, a promise and a vow.

“I’d prefer you keep Sebastian safe,” she answered with a tug to his lapels.

“I can’t watch over you in London and your son wherever it is you’ve decided to send him.”

She wasn’t truly surprised he’d divined her plans to send Sebastian far away from what would unfold in the coming weeks.

“The queen will desire to meet Sebastian, so I’ve no choice but to keep him in London until we are invited to Winsor Castle.” Charlotte rose to her toes and Ty curled his back to bring his ear to her lips, his warmth surrounding her, his scent, soap and pine and man, penetrating the smell of the river. “But as soon as that particular obligation has been met, he and Akeem and Magnus will take ship for Norway with Ethel and Ken.”

“You go nowhere without me.” Ty’s breath feathered along her jaw. “See no one without me.”

“I’ve no desire to leave your side.” The fact the words were a prevarication in no way lessened their truth.

“So long as we understand each other,” he said, brushing his lips along her temple.

“Look, Mama!”

Charlotte looked to where Sebastian pointed on the docks. A black carriage led by four perfectly matched grays rolled to a stop amid the hustle and bustle, two footmen in scarlet and gold livery hopping to the ground. Painted on the door of the conveyance was a garland of wheat bisected by two bloody, crossed swords.

“That’s the Westlockhart crest,” Sebastian whispered.

“Agricolae et Milites,” Charlotte murmured. “Farmers and Soldiers.”

“Bastard’s likely sitting within,” Magnus groused.

“Puffing on his pipe and polluting the interior with the saccharine stench of his personal blend of tobacco.” Charlotte tucked one hand into the crook of Ty’s arm and curled the other around Sebastian’s narrow shoulders while Magnus and Akeem took up positions at his back.

They might have been posing for the cameramen positioned on the dock, carbon flashes exploding. In truth they were allowing the man who would never become Earl of Westlockhart to get a good look at them.

“Luggage’s been off-loaded and a hack hired.” Ken Chang came up beside Ty, Ethel peering over his shoulder, pale gaze fixed on the luxurious carriage waiting on the dock.

“Sebastian, you stay close to us,” Charlotte cautioned as Ty’s hand came up to cover her fingers on his arm.

“Akeem and me’ll be right beside him,” Magnus assured her. “And Ethel and Ken at his back.”

Drawing in a deep breath to steady her rioting nerves, Charlotte gave a decisive nod and as one their party began to move toward the gangplank that would take them from the safety of the ship to the danger on the dock.

As if the devil himself had purposely timed his emergence from the bowels of hell to coincide with Sebastian’s first step onto English soil, Frederick Grenville alighted from the carriage the moment the boy and his mother and guardians reached the end of the gangplank.

Charlotte did not allow herself to hesitate, to show even a moment’s weakness as her former husband’s brother started across the dozen or so yards separating them. She could feel Ty’s gaze on her but did not take her eyes from the demon making his way gracefully toward her. Dropping Ty’s arm, she lifted her chin at a regal angle and stepped forward to greet the devil with a shallow curtsy.

Frederick reached for her hand and bowed over it, his golden hair lifting on the breeze and his lips twisting in a parody of a smile as he met her gaze and held it.

Charlotte had forgotten how like George he appeared upon first glance. He had his brother’s height and long, lean physique. The blue eyes were the same, as were the pale skin, square chin and long, narrow nose.

It was only upon closer study one saw the differences between the brothers. George had been forever smiling, teeth flashing and dimple winking. Even at twenty-four he’d had lines feathering out from the corners of his eyes, evidence of his ability to look about him and find amusement in humanity’s foibles.

For all he was now thirty years old, six years older than his brother had been upon his death, Frederick possessed not a single line or wrinkle upon his smoothly shaven face. Arrogance rather than laughter shown from his eyes, as if he looked out at the world around him and knew himself to be above it all.

“Countess Westlockhart, welcome home.” Her former brother by marriage spoke with the crisp tones of the aristocracy, his voice hollow and devoid of warmth as he looked beyond her. “And this young man is apparently your son.”

Refusing to allow him the discourtesy of both his skepticism and his refusal to acknowledge his nephew’s title, Charlotte motioned Sebastian to her side. “Please allow me to present Lord Sebastian George Siegfried Pendergrass Grenville, Earl of Westlockhart. Sebastian this is Mr. Grenville, your father’s younger brother.”

A dull wash of color swept over Frederick’s jaw and cheeks, his lips pinching tight at the reminder he was nothing more than a second son.

“At your service, Mr. Grenville,” Sebastian greeted with a nod that somehow managed to convey both noble hauteur and boyish charm. “It is a pleasure to meet my father’s brother.”

Frederick’s gaze drifted over Sebastian from his blond curls to his shiny patent-leather slippers before flickering beyond to the wall of warrior-servants at his back. He dismissed the lot of them with a sneer before his gaze moved to Ty and halted.

Charlotte watched from the corner of her eye as her husband stepped up beside her, one hand lifting to the small of her back, the other pushing open his coat to caress the revolver at his hip.

The two men, one as slender and pale as the other was solid and dark, eyed one another critically and a heavy silence descended over the group while all around them the voices of the watching crowd and the dockworkers blended into a dull roar of sound.

“Have you brought along a cowpoke?” Frederick finally asked with a snicker as he cast his gaze Charlotte’s way once more. “Isn’t that what the Americans call servants who spend their time herding cattle?”

“Mr. Morgan is not a servant,” Charlotte replied with a smile as she stepped to the side until she was close enough to Ty to feel his warmth and catch his scent. “Mr. Morgan owns a ranch, a ten thousand acre estate for all intents and purposes. He is also my husband.”