Ripe for Pleasure (27 page)

He stepped toward her, and she shook her head, curls swinging about her shoulders as she ripped the ribbon from her hair.
For a moment, she was a Greuze painting—a servant girl in dishabille—then quick fingers tugged loose the ties of her jumps,
and they, too, were discarded where they fell. Her shift was off in one quick motion, and she went from Greuze to Fragonard.

She tossed her shift at him, a heavy cloud in the steam. Leo snatched it out of the air and brought it to his face, inhaling
deeply. If he were as rich as his father, she’d have a new shift every day, and he’d sleep each night with her used one as
a pillowcase, resting his head enveloped in her scent. That was reason enough to find the prince’s damn treasure.

She’d reached the edge of the pool and was busy removing garters and stockings: sturdy cotton ones, not one whit less enticing
than their silk brethren as they rolled down her calf. Desire whipped through him. Battered and bruised, she was still enchanting
enough to steal his wits. His pulse pushed down into his groin. His cock throbbed and stiffened.

Viola slipped into the water like an otter escaping a hunt, not bothering with the steps. Leo ripped his own clothes from
his body, scattering them as he went, a trail leading back to sanity. She watched him from the far end of the pool, his own
personal siren waiting in the mist.

The water verged on too hot, scalding his skin as though he’d walked into the bonfire on Guy Fawkes night. He surfaced beside
Viola, rising into her embrace: arms
and legs twining about him, hair tangled around them both like a net, mouth meeting his in a kiss hotter than the water would
ever be. Her arm slid between them, her hand grasped his engorged cock, and her fingertips teased the folds of his foreskin
near the base.

Leo lifted her away from him, pushed her out of the water, and set her on the lip of the pool. Lord knew his cock was more
than willing to take the shortest route to fulfillment, but what had been haunting his dreams was her taste. He wanted her
panting and sobbing his name as he filled her.

He pushed between her thighs, gripped her hips, and slid her forward until she was perched on the very edge. It was easy to
sink down, to thrust his arms under her thighs, encircle her hips, and tilt her up. Viola rocked back, supporting herself
with her arms, knees wide, one foot on his shoulder, one trailing down his back.

Sweet flesh on his tongue, Leo opened his mouth wide and sucked hard on her inner thigh. She gasped and squirmed, knees falling
just a tad wider. He bit down lightly on the straining tendon that led from thigh to groin, then slid over to delve into her
folds, parting her with his tongue. He fastened his mouth over the sensitive peak at the top of her cleft, pressing his chin
hard against the opening of her body.

She strained, breath hitching, the foot on his shoulder beginning to tremble. Leo slid his tongue inside her, lapped slowly
all the way up her cleft, then renewed his assault on her swollen clitoris.

Her hand smoothed over his head, locked in his hair. Leo smiled to himself, refusing to be dislodged. She
was mumbling, brokenly, words interspersed with gasps. “Vaughn… my lord, oh God… Leo! Leo!”

At last. His name on her lips was as sweet as the taste of her on his. Triumph rippled through him as her whole body trembled.
He pulled her back into the water, filled her with one hard thrust, and held her there while the last ripples of her release
pulsed around him.

Viola clung to him, spine arching, hips circling in a tight little spiral. He trapped her between his body and the wall of
the pool. Waves slid over his shoulders, spilled over the lip of the pool, burst between them like a small geyser. His world
spiraled down to the joining of their bodies, the pulsing embrace, the surging thrusts, the incoherent gasps and cries.

As he came, he lost his footing, dragging her beneath the water as he fell. Her mouth found his, and her hair swirled out
around them. He found the bottom with his feet and stood, arms locked about her.

Heart pounding in his ears, pulsing in his cock, Leo dragged her to the steps and sat down. She propped herself on her knees
and slid back just enough that his cock slipped free. His pulse was slowly returning to his chest where it belonged. She kissed
his neck, just below his ear, with the slightest hint of teeth. “In another week or two, I think I could safely return to
town.”

Leo let his breath out through his teeth.
I,
not we. He should have been expecting this; she’d run for the safety and anonymity of London the last time, too. His hands
slid up her thighs, gripped her hips lightly, thumbs resting on her hip bones. “Or you could stay here.”

She pulled away just enough to look him in the eye,
her hand pressed over his heart, weight bearing down on it. Her perfect brows pinched sharply over her nose.

“Think of it as trying it on for size.” His index fingers circled on her naked skin.

Viola shook her head almost imperceptibly. Her lips parted. Then she caught them between her teeth as though she couldn’t
quite find the words she wanted, or was holding them back. “It’s no use trying on something one can’t afford.” Her head dropped
so that her hair swung between them like a curtain. “In fact, it’s madness to do so. Leave well enough alone. Though perhaps,
being a duke’s son, you don’t know much about wanting what you can’t have, about settling for what you can.”

She tensed, as though for flight. Leo tightened his grip, holding her firmly in place. “If I don’t know by now, by God, you’re
teaching me. This isn’t enough. Not for me. I don’t want a mistress, never have. I don’t want a nursery full of bastards.
I want a wife, Vi.” Her head came up, eyes boring into him. “But you don’t want a husband, do you?”

“The son of a duke—”

“A younger son—”

“—to marry his whore?”

“—with a brother and three nephews between him and the title. I can’t offer you strawberry leaves—”

“What on earth would I want—” She cut herself off as the meaning dawned on her, eyes widening with indignation. “If you think
I’d marry you if you had a title—”

“There’s very little chance of one, just to be clear.” He relaxed his grip, slid one hand around, fingers brushing her cleft.
He spread the other across her lower back. She caught her breath, but didn’t move away. “But we could
make Dyrham our own little Strawberry Hill. Fox and Mrs. Armistead seem happy enough.”

“But not married. Can you imagine the scandal if they did? The great-grandson of Charles II married to a—”

“Stranger things have happened.” Leo slid one finger into her, followed it with a second, and found the still-swollen peak
of her clitoris with his thumb. “Their royal bastardy being established by the king’s penchant for his own French whore, I
see very little for the Foxes and Lennoxes to cavil at when it comes to Mrs. Armistead.”

Her look of outrage gave way to the flush of desire. He curled his fingers, twisted his hand so that his thumb was replaced
by the heel of his hand.

“Cry
pax
and be done with it, sweetheart. It was a clumsy proposal—I’m a fool to have said anything at all just now—and I beg you
to forget it.”

“It’s not the sort of thing one forgets.” Viola angled her hips toward him, holding on to his shoulders for balance.

“Especially if it becomes a recurring theme.” Leo smiled, and her eyes widened, her expression showing a mercurial flash of
outrage before her head dropped back and her thighs began to tremble.

She might not have said yes, but he’d set the idea running through her brain, as unstoppable as a horse without bit or bridle.
Leo slid a third finger in and leaned forward to capture a nipple with his teeth. Viola rose up, back arched, knees gripping
his hips, voice intermingling his name and God’s.

“I know a bribe when I see one.” Viola eyed Leo with distrust.

The flashy chestnut gelding he’d presented to her knocked its hoof against the stall door, demanding attention, much as Leo
did himself. Arrogant beasts, both of them. Beautiful, too, and likely to be just as temperamental, just as difficult to master.

Their tryst in the bathhouse had opened the floodgates. He was once more in her bed, the penitent at the temple, the lover
enshrined, the wooing, would-be husband rampant… and she could sense her defenses crumbling day by day, disappearing with
every kiss, every touch, every look.

Leo smiled, refusing to spar with her. For once, his blue eye looked as mischievous as the green one. He’d not a shadow of
a doubt how his gift would be received. And he was right. The horse was everything she could have hoped for. Viola turned
her back on a still-grinning Leo. The gelding blew out his nose, much as Pen did, and pricked up his ears.

“Yes, that’s my pretty boy.” She found herself crooning nonsense like a moonling. His nose was impossibly soft against her
cupped hands. He lipped her fingers, looking for treats. She heard Leo chuckle as he handed her a lump of sugar. The gelding
ate it greedily, lips searching for more.

Viola reached up to scratch behind his ear, and the horse arched his neck and bent lower, pushing back and waggling his head
in ecstasy. “You’re impossible, my lord.”

Leo’s answering laugh made her roll her eyes.

“Well,” he began with a hint of offense, “the offer of my own noble hand was declined. Laying Dyrham at your
feet doesn’t seem to have done the trick, not even the bathhouse, which you must admit is a strong inducement indeed. I’m
simply stacking the deck a tad more in my favor.”

Viola rested her forehead against the horse’s neck and shut her eyes, letting the scent of horse and hay and dust build a
wall around her. Bit by tiny bit, Leo was tying her to Dyrham. And she was letting him. She wanted to be convinced, wanted
the warning that screamed in her bones silenced once and for all.

She’d ignored it once, and doing so had led to short-lived and nearly unbearable happiness, followed by unimaginable pain
and disillusionment. Opening herself up to such a fate a second time was foolhardy in the extreme.

If she married Lord Leonidas Vaughn, he’d be as trapped as she in the end. Did he have any idea what that meant? If his friends
cut him, if his family disowned him, was he prepared for that?

She certainly hadn’t been.

CHAPTER 30

T
hought this might be of interest.
Leo’s distinctive scrawl slashed across a slip of foolscap tucked into a magazine. Viola spread open the issue of
The Gentleman’s Magazine
that he’d left on the table in the parlor she’d claimed as her own.

Mr. Green’s Comments Upon the Further Refinements of Lord Henry’s Translation of
The Iliad. She dropped the magazine to worry at her thumbnail with her teeth.

The thrill of being truly seen, of being recognized, coursed through her, only to be quickly overborne by the well-ingrained
instinct to prevent such insights. Hiding in plain sight had become second nature. Being dragged out into the light of day
as herself, as Viola rather than Mrs. Whedon, was somehow almost as frightening as being snatched off the street.

That a man might notice her penchant for sapphires, or her taste in hats, or even keep track of how she took her tea was one
thing. It was safely within the bounds of flirtation and seduction. It was expected. Needful even.

That he might delve deep enough to realize that such a topic as this would be of interest set every nerve blazing with alarm.
But then none of Leo’s gifts or insights fell into the mundane: a mongrel dog, the engraved collar, his penchant for knowing
exactly how to tempt her (whether it was into his bed, or merely his home), the horse that must have cost more than most people’s
yearly income.

She believed that in this moment, in this place, this idyll away from the world, he loved her, but how to trust that it would
last? That it was real enough to endure what would come when the scandal sheets were filled with his name and the gossips
got their claws into him?

Was love enough if you didn’t have trust, too? She could hear her heart clamoring that it was, but her ever-logical brain—crammed
to the brim with useless Latin verbiage and sordid Greek plays—refused to agree.