Читать книгу The Regency Bestsellers Collection - Bronwyn Scott - Страница 29

Alex woke in the night again—trembling all over, her lips cracked with thirst.

Somehow the episodes came and went in an insidious rhythm, disappearing just long enough that she could almost forget and feel safe, before crashing back with a cruel vengeance. The past had a hold on her, and she’d long given up on breaking free. The best she could do was keep a full glass of water next to her bed. She hastily drained the largest share of it—saving a little bit to wet a cloth and dab the perspiration from her neck.

Dawn had begun its slow creep through the house. She wouldn’t be able to fall asleep again, and her charges wouldn’t wake for a few hours more—she hoped.

Since she was awake, she decided to dress and have a stealthy wander downstairs. Even after all these weeks, there were parts of the house she still hadn’t explored.

Namely, the library.

The room called to her. Any roomful of books called to her, but this particular library wailed like a bevy of sirens.

Maybe—just maybe—somewhere in those shelves was her lost copy of Messier’s Catalogue of Star Clusters and Nebulae. The book he’d absconded with after their collision in Hatchard’s. The one she’d imagined him to have kept tucked in his breast pocket for months, desperately hoping to see her again.

At the memory, she inwardly cringed.

She began her search on the lowest shelf, scanning the full breadth of the bookcase before working her way upward. By the fourth shelf, she was straining on tiptoe to make out the titles. The fifth—and topmost—was hopelessly beyond her reach.

She looked about for a book stair or stepstool, but her search proved fruitless. Undeterred, she pushed an ottoman toward the shelves and climbed atop that.

Much better.

“Good morning.”

Alexandra lost her footing on the ottoman. Her hands closed on the bookshelf. For a moment, she dangled, feet twisting in the air. There was only one option—to let go and drop to the floor. Her body would survive the fall, even if her dignity didn’t. It was only a matter of two feet to the ground.

Go to it, then. The longer you dangle, the more ridiculous you look.

However, in the same instant that she released her grip, the shelf—already groaning with books—caved under the added weight of her body.

She fell to the carpet in a heap. And then a shelf’s worth of books fell atop her.

Alex curled into a ball, tucked her head beneath her crossed arms, and waited for it to be over. She winced as volumes pelted her from above. A few of the weightier tomes landed with a force hard enough to make her yelp.

At last, the blows came to a halt.

She cautiously lifted her head and peered upward. Perhaps the bookcase had vomited up the last of its leather-bound knowledge.

No. It hadn’t. There was one book more. A formidable, encyclopedia-sized volume bound in crimson leather. And as she watched with horror, it slid off the unhinged walnut shelf—plummeting directly toward her head.

Alexandra ducked, squeezed her eyes shut, and braced herself for the worst. However, instead of the skull-crushing thwack of oblivion, she heard only a soft thud.

“Good God. Tell me you’re alive under there.”

“I am,” she said weakly. Though she rather wished she weren’t. As deaths go, it would have been a kind one. There were worse ways to meet one’s demise than being buried alive in literature. Daisy could have named dozens of them.

As she attempted to sit up, Alex found herself aided by a large, strong hand hooked under her upper arm.

Chase.

He cast aside the book he’d caught, and Alex watched it land atop the heap. He must have caught the thing an instant before it bashed in her brains.

It wasn’t an overstatement to say he might have saved her life. At the very least, he’d saved her a splitting headache.

He crouched before her. “Anything broken?”

“I don’t think so.”

He searched her gaze. “What month is it?”

“July.”

“And what day of the week?”

“Wednesday.”

“How many tiny buttons on the back of your frock?”

“I don’t know. Who counts such things?”

He shrugged unrepentantly. “I do.”

“Of course you do.” She tucked a stray wisp of hair behind her ear. “I’m fine, thank you. You merely startled me.”

“I expect so. Chase Reynaud, in a library? Searching for missing estate ledgers, no less? Who wouldn’t topple with surprise.”

“I didn’t mean to say—”

He brushed off her attempt at an apology. “I’ve also been drinking wine and entertaining a great many impure thoughts, so it’s not a complete break with character.” He lowered his voice to a teasing murmur. “If you were looking for the erotic novels, they’re hidden behind the books of sermons.” He nodded toward the opposite side of the library. “Second shelf from the bottom, over there.”

Her cheeks flushed. “I wasn’t looking for those.”

“I wouldn’t think less of you if you were. I read them all the time.”

“I don’t think they’d suit my purposes today. I was searching for new reading material for the girls.” She knelt and began to gather the fallen books.

He joined her in the effort. “Why? I purchased a great many books for the schoolroom, months ago.”

Yes, I know. I was there, in Hatchard’s. You made me drop all my books then, too. I was probably even wearing the same frock.

Alex absorbed the timely reminder. No matter what they were doing in the dark of night, nothing else had changed. They had a temporary physical arrangement. She mustn’t hope for anything more.

“Rosamund’s read all the books ten times over, and Daisy needs something different. Something suited to her interests.”

He stood to have a look at the broken shelf. He teased the splintered wood with his thumbnail. “Rotted through,” he pronounced. “I’ll have to replace the plank.”

“Good. Then I needn’t apologize. Instead, you can thank me for finding your next project.” She drew to her feet. “Look,” she said, flipping through the plates of a human anatomy book. “This would be perfect for Daisy, budding physician that she is.”

“Budding gravedigger, I think you mean.”

“Just look at the detail in these illustrations.” She moved closer, angling her body so that he could peer over her shoulder.

He reached over her arm to turn the page. As he did so, his forearm grazed her shoulder. His breath caressed her ear.

Alex stared at the line drawing of the respiratory system. Perhaps the illustration could help her identify exactly which features of her own anatomy were failing her—because his proximity made it difficult to breathe.

“I took an interest in anatomy as a youth,” he murmured. “Continued my studies all the way through university.”

“Truly?”

“Oh, yes. I found it fascinating. But I did the majority of my learning from life, rather than books.” He took the volume from her hand, closed it, and set it aside. “Do you know, I think it’s time for another lesson.”

With that, he turned her toward him and captured her mouth in a searing kiss. His hands made possessive sweeps, caressing her breasts and thighs and hips. Awakening her body the way dawn woke the earth.

When he lifted his head, his eyes had a devilish gleam. He nudged her backward until her spine met the library shelving.

Then he sank to his knees.

Chase’s skin tightened with anticipation. He’d been waiting for this.

“Chase,” she whispered. “Chase, get up.”

Get up? The hell he would. He was just getting started.

He gathered her skirts with both hands, hiking them high enough that he could dive under. Her frothy petticoats drifted down around him. They smelled of starch and soap, that faint hint of orange-flower water—and the intoxicating feminine musk of her skin. The draped fabric around him was the hushed, sacred temple of a pagan goddess, and he was a supplicant on his knees.

However, the offering he had in mind would be no sacrifice.

He slid his hand down one of her stocking-clad calves, bent her leg at the knee, and hooked it over his shoulder. That accomplished, he reached to grasp her by the hips and tilt her pelvis forward.

There. Now she was open to his view, to his touch. To his kiss.

He nuzzled the slope of her bare thigh, reveling in the satiny texture of her skin against his cheek. Beginning at her garter, he trailed kisses upward in an arrow-straight path to her cleft.

Her thigh tensed.

She squirmed in his grasp. “What are you doing?”

Chase decided demonstration was the most useful answer. He ran his thumb down the seam of her sex, parting her with a gentle touch. Then he leaned into her heat, sweeping his tongue along the sweet, silky furrow.

Her hips jerked, and she kicked him in the kidney. “Chase.” Her hands patted around his back and shoulders, meeting atop his head. She gave him a shake. “Chase. We can’t do this. Not here.”

“Certainly we can.” He wasn’t sure if his words reached her, given that his voice was muffled by her skirts and his mouth had more pleasant tasks at hand than enunciation. He explored the treasure before him with slow, gentle passes of his tongue, giving her time to adjust to the sensation.

She gasped and bucked. “This is so very wrong.”

Beneath her skirts, he grinned. “That’s what makes it so very good.”

“A servant could come by at any moment.”

“Then stop interrupting.”

Her fingers still clutched at his hair, but she ceased struggling.

With that, he returned to his task. He found the swollen bud at the apex of her cleft and fluttered his tongue.

Her breath escaped on an erotic sigh.

That’s it. Surrender to the pleasure. Surrender to me.

He slid his hands to her bottom, clasping tight with both hands and drawing her closer, the better to kiss, lick, suck, nibble. Using her reactions as his guide, he learned the ways to make her sigh, moan, whimper, and dig her fingernails into his scalp.

“Chase.”

Hearing his name from her lips was the most heady triumph of all. It told him he wasn’t an anonymous lover to her, but a man—one with whom she would share her most intimate places and sensations. A man she deemed worthy of her body and her pleasure. Even if he could never be worthy of her heart or her hand, this was enough.

At least, he would tell himself it was enough.

She began to roll her hips, seeking more contact, wanting it faster. A muscle in her thigh quivered. He knew she was close.

Come, he silently willed. Come for me.

A few more flickering pulses of his tongue, and she went over the edge. She came with a series of shuddering whimpers, bracing herself on his head and shoulders. He didn’t let up until her pleasure eased, and even then he couldn’t tear himself away. He pressed his mouth to her inner thigh, sucking and biting until a bruise rose on her tender flesh.

There, now he’d left his mark: Chase Reynaud was here.

Once her breathing slowed and the leg draped over his shoulder went limp, he extricated himself from beneath her skirts and carefully rose to his feet, making sure to support her weight as he did so.

God, she looked beautiful. Throat flushed, chest heaving, her glazed eyes looking up through thick, dark lashes. Her hair had been mussed in the back, from where she’d reeled and rubbed against the shelves. The early-morning light painted her skin with a palette of golds and rosy pinks.

“You,” she sighed, “are terrible.”

“You”—he pressed his lips to her forehead—“are delicious.” He kissed her cheek. “Beautiful.” Then the corner of her lips. “Irresistible.”

He leaned in, hungry for more.

She put her hand to his chest, holding him in place.

He took a step back, then cocked his head and searched her expression. “Is something the matter?”

“No.” She wet her lips. “Not really. It’s only . . .”

“Dropsy.”

Chase wheeled about, searching for the source of this abrupt diagnosis. What?

Rosamund stood in the corridor. “It’s dropsy today,” she repeated. “The funeral is prepared.”

“Right.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Miss Mountbatten and I were just . . .”

“Looking through books,” Alex finished.

“Well, yes.” Rosamund gave them a quizzical look. “That is what one does in a library, isn’t it?”

“Precisely,” Chase declared. “Go on, then. We’ll be up directly.”

Once Rosamund had left, he and Alex exchanged looks of relief.

“That was close,” he said.

“Much too close.”

“I concur.”

“If she’d been three minutes earlier, Chase. Just imagine.”

“No,” he clipped. “I refuse to imagine. You can’t make me.” He stood aside for her to precede him as they left the room.

“You’re right. There’s no use fretting over it now.” She repinned her hair as they went. “Dropsy, really? I thought that was an old person’s disease.”

“Well, you know what they say. Only the wood die young.”

She stopped in the middle of the corridor and burst out laughing. “That,” she wheezed, “was dreadful. Criminally bad.”

“It made you laugh, didn’t it?”

Finally.