One Night With a Spy (12 page)

Marcus watched her go. Perhaps he ought to have pressed his advantage and forced her to submit to the hunger he'd read in her eyes. Perhaps he ought to have urged her harder, persuaded her more passionately—

Perhaps you should have conked her on the head and dragged her off by the hair! That would have accomplished precisely nothing.

The goal was not to merely get into her knickers. He needed to gain her confidence, to cajole her into betraying herself by telling him how she truly became the Fox's apprentice.

Maybe she went swimming naked in the lake with him. It certainly worked with you.

If his rigid, throbbing erection was any clue, then yes. Yet, he was seducing the seducer. He was bound to get scorched by a bit of heat along the way. He could bear it. After all, it wasn't as though there were any real attachment.

He waited for the cold water of the lake to ease his tension. A splash behind him caused him to turn automatically, defensive instincts always to the fore.

She was half out of the water, bent forward wringing out her hair. Diamonds of water dripped from her nipples, making his blood leave his brain with such force it dizzied him. His cock swelled, harder than ever. He sank lower, keeping only half his face above water, watching her. Damn. This lake wasn't nearly cold enough to make a dent in his iron hardness.

She swung her hair back over her shoulders, arching back to shake it out, jutting her breasts high. She was so lovely, so luxuriously rounded, so athletically lithe. She turned away, walking from the water, lifting her knees high as she waded. His heart beat faster. Her bottom swayed, luring him, baiting him…

She bent to retrieve her dress from the bank—

Marcus convulsed as his ejaculation erupted. He gasped harshly, clenching his eyes shut to stop it, but it was too late. She'd brought him there without so much as the touch of his own hand, just by looking at her.

"Are you unwell, sir?" she called from the bank.

"Um-hmm." He hadn't done that. It wasn't possible. Never in his life—

Well, there was that pretty housemaid he'd been obsessed with when he was twelve, but not since his boyhood!

"Do you need assistance?"

God, even her voice from the distance of the bank made him ache, though by all rights he deserved a grace period of at least an hour after a release as powerful as that!

"I'm fine, my lady," he gasped. "I merely… stepped on a sharp rock." He opened one eye carefully, but she was fully dressed now, the overlarge maid's dress hiding her luminous, exquisite flesh.

Yes, well, get out of the water, you lout. Are you waiting for another orgasm?

She turned her back as he approached. "I must have dropped the other piece of toweling," she said apologetically. "You may use mine."

Rub woman-scented toweling all over his naked, wet, aching flesh? Was she trying to kill him?

He threw the worn shirt and breeches on his wet body and grabbed his boots. "I should return to the inn." He started up the path. Perhaps if he didn't look directly at her, he could erase one of the most unbearably embarrassing, delicious episodes of his male existence.

"Don't be silly." She caught up to him easily. "It is far too late. You'll stay at Barrowby tonight."

Oh, she most definitely had Marcus-murder on her evil female mind. He opened his mouth to decline her invitation on the grounds that it might incinerate him.

You're on a mission. You should accept and stay the night.

She tossed him an amused glance. "You can sleep with the Igbys."

"Thank you, my lady," he heard himself say, before he'd come to any real decision. "I appreciate your hospitality."

She grinned up at him. "It is the least I can do." That saucy tip to her lips startled him once again. What secrets lay beneath that elegant exterior?

Lush, curving, delectable
—

Damn. He was going to die from permanent lack of blood flowing to his brain.

Something ahead caught her attention. "Igby? Igby, what is wrong?" She picked up her skirts to run forward, leaving him behind to contemplate his certain demise by perpetual arousal.

Ah, but what a way to go.

Then the alarm in her voice penetrated the fog of his lust. Marcus broke into a run.

Julia stood speaking to an Igby at the door of the kitchens. "Are you sure there's no one in the house now?"

Marcus halted. "Someone was in the house?"

Igby nodded, his freckled face pale. "The 'ole place is done up, sir!"

"Are you sure there's no one still in the house?"

Julia shot him a sour glance. Marcus realized he'd just repeated her own
question. Right. This was Barrowby, not Ravencliff. He was only a guest. A friend—ah, no. An
observer
.

He stood back, willing himself to release his desire to take control of the
situation. Then again, Lady Barrowby seemed more than up to the job herself.

She immediately sent teams of staff through the house armed with knives and sharp tools. Marcus had to admire her restraint, for he himself would have been at the head of the first team, despite the danger.

Still, she twitched irritably at his side as she waited. "Blast it," she muttered. "If someone hurts one of my people—"

Finally, Beppo gave them a wave from an upper-story window and they entered.

Julia stepped through the kitchens, gazing about her. Meg should be there chopping up something tasty for dinner. Instead, there were pots congealing on the stove and no meal in sight.

She made for the front hall, hoping to find that it was all some Igby-type exaggeration.

The wreckage extended all the way down the hall, from the stairs to the front door. Every room in the main area of the house had been quite thoroughly and professionally—and vindictively—tossed. It took one to know one, after all.

The servants were milling about, hands filled with debris, their expression aghast. Beppo saw her first. He held up the pieces of Aldus's favorite rare porcelain vase.

"My. lady, what could this mean?"

Julia knew precisely what it meant. Someone—and who else could it be but the Royal Three?—someone wanted her to know she was being investigated. Aldus had warned her that they would not roll over easily and it seemed he'd been quite correct.

She folded her arms defiantly. If the Cobra, Lion, and Falcon thought she was the sort to quail at a rain of shite on her property and a bit of broken pottery, they obviously had no idea who they were dealing with.

She smiled through her fury to reassure the staff. "This means nothing. There was nothing of value in these rooms." Thank heaven Aldus had taught her how to keep all the affairs of the Four in her head and not on paper. "It is a mess and an annoyance and that is all. Igby, Igby, and Igby, bring some canvas sacks to gather the rubbish into. Pickles, you and I will see what can be repaired. Meg, do see to your pots, dear. I think our supper is burning…"

The staff rushed to work, thankful for direction and her calm assurance. Julia smiled and shrugged off the import of it all, while inside she was fuming.

Damn the Three. Of course, she probably would have approved such action herself had the positions been reversed, but once she was confirmed in her seat, she certainly hoped they didn't plan to ask her for any favors for the first year or so. Or twenty.

Mr. Blythe-Goodman stood at her side, like a wall she could lean upon. It was very good of him not to spring into manly officiousness. The last thing she needed right now was an interfering man.

Something else occurred to her that lightened her mood considerably. If nothing else, she knew that Mr. Blythe-Goodman was innocent of this invasion.

She just wished she could be so sure of her fiancé.

«
^
»

Our mounts thunder side by side, my white mare, his dark stallion galloping as one horse. The freedom and wildness of the gallop infects me, heating my blood, sensitizing the place between my thighs. I ride astride with my legs wrapped about my mare's bare back, as does my lover on his mount. I lean down and urge more speed from her, laughing over my shoulder as she and I leave our lovers in our wind.

I believe I have won, until a black nose enters my side vision. I cry out for more speed but it is too late now. A long arm reaches about my waist and pulls me from her back, letting her free of my weight. She wins the race without me, for I am wrapped in my lover's arms, lying across his lap, his stallion slowing to a swinging walk.

"You lose," my lover whispers into my hair with a laugh.

I twine my arms about his neck. "I win." I kiss him hard and wet and openmouthed, our tongues battling for yet more supremacy. I am strong, he is stronger. I am intelligent, he is also. He is my equal in all things and every battle ends in victory and delight for us both. My true match in all things
…

The kiss heats us both after the stimulating race and our bodies deny the confines of our clothing. My hat is lost, the jacket of my habit disappears, his cravat flutters away on the breeze as the stallion carries us on… Soon my lover's chest is bare beneath my hands and my gown is rucked up to my hips as he lifts me to sit backward, astride his lap. I can feel his erection pressing hard to my damp center, only the wool of his trousers between us. The rocking motion of the stallion's walk brings me to orgasm as I ride both the man and the stallion, my breasts bared to the open air as I cry out in my release.

"Can you feel how much I want you?" His voice is husky with need. I have been selfish, taking my pleasure first. He prefers it that way. Now I reach between us as he holds me securely and guides the stallion. I free my lover's thickened rod and wrap my hands about him, letting the rocking rhythm set the pace for my pleasurable torture.

He moans and drops his head to my shoulder. I move my fingers and he shudders tightly, unable to stop me. "Shall you be my stallion to ride, then?" I release him and wrap my hands over his bare shoulders, using him to steady myself as I mount his cock and impale myself with its hard length. He gives a harsh shout of ecstasy as I take him deep into my tight, wet heat. I use the strength in my thighs to raise and lower myself in counterpoint to the horse's walk, clutching my own stallion's bare shoulders as I ride him until we both burst into flames.

Julia woke and stretched luxuriously for a moment before opening her eyes. She felt the efforts of the day before in the ache in her shoulders, but nothing could quench the joyous mood she felt bubbling up from within.

Of course, the evening before had been a disaster. The damage to the house was going to take days to repair and she wasn't any too sure they would ever get the smell out of the yard… but she felt truly marvelous nonetheless.

He'd held her hand last evening when he'd said good night. He'd taken her fingers in his hand and wrapped his big warm ones around them and just held gently, letting her hand rest in his for a long moment.

It was better than a kiss. Oh, very well, not better, especially not better than that hungry embrace in the garden—but it was something else altogether. It was caring and reassuring and it made her feel as though she could depend upon him to understand absolutely everything…

Which was girlish silliness and impossible to boot. She was going to have to make him leave as soon as possible, for she could not afford any more moments of temptation like the lake… or the garden… or that long silent moment of communion outside her bedchamber door late after the servants had rightfully gone to their rest…

She smiled and extended her toes into the cooler portion of the covers. Her room was so warm—

Her room was never warm when she rose. She never slept past five on the clock, and it took an hour for the fire to truly banish the chill.

She opened her eyes to see daylight pouring into the room through the opened draperies, a fire popping merrily in the hearth, and a real breakfast awaiting her on the side table, steaming gently from beneath the polished silver covers.

"It's about time you had a proper lady's rising," Pickles said as she exited Julia's dressing room with a gown over her arm. "Although it's still only nine."

"Nine?" Julia sat up. "I slept until nine?" She started to push back the covers. "Oh, dear. There's so much to be done!"

"And them that's paid to is doin' it. You let that silly ropewalker earn his butler's name for once. Him and Mr. Blythe-Goodman's got the lads buildin' privy sheds that'll outlast us all."

"Truly?" Julia settled back uneasily against the pillows as Pickles laid the tray across her lap. A leisurely breakfast? She wasn't accustomed to such an existence… but the food smelled lovely and the fire crackled so brightly and the steaming tea—

Julia drew back sharply. "Pickles, the tea smells like privy water."

The maid blinked. "What a thing to say! I brewed it myself, from the kitchen spout—" She leaned forward and sniffed. Then she paled. "Oh, my lady—"

"The well."

For the second morning in a row, Julia ran from her room half-dressed. She met Beppo coming up the stairs, wringing his hands worriedly.

"I don't know how it happened, my lady. We kept all the waste well away from the cistern—"

"I think I know how." She ought to have foreseen it. An iron lock on the cistern cover would have saved so much effort, but then they simply would have come at her from another direction. Julia pressed her fingertips to her eyes. "How bad is it?"

Beppo shrugged helplessly. "The well must be bailed and let fill fresh, at least twice. Even then, we'll be straining every cupful for a month at least—"

Julia's knees went weak. She sat down on the stair abruptly. Barrowby was huge, with an excess of staff to support because she couldn't bear to turn her friends away. How were all those people to do without water for so long?

Her hair fell forward as she dropped her head to her knees. Absently, she realized it still carried the fresh green scent of the lake.

Her head shot up. "Could we strain lake water now, while we cleanse the well?"