Читать книгу Regency High Society Vol 7: A Reputable Rake / The Heart's Wager / The Venetian's Mistress / The Gambler's Heart - Diane Gaston - Страница 20

Mrs Rice hurried to the door of theArgyle Rooms as the burly man staggered in from the street. ‘Who was that?’ she demanded.

‘Cyprian Sloane,’ the man’s friend said. ‘But you do not wish an altercation with him. He’s a dangerous man.’

‘Heard he’s gone respectable,’ another man said.

Mrs Rice cared nothing about that. ‘What does he have to do with those girls?’

‘The Sirens?’ the same man asked. ‘I would not wish to find out.’

Cyprian Sloane, Mrs Rice thought. Finally a clue as to who had stolen her girls. She’d send Trigg to discover his location. Signalling for her cloak, she hurried out of the building and made her way back to her glove shop, smiling at this lucky break. She’d get her girls back now, for certain.

And she’d make certain they would be punished for daring to leave.

When the coach stopped in front of Sloane’s house, Morgana feared he would send her home. She did not want to leave his arms, not even for an instant.

‘Come in with me,’ he said.

She smiled in delight. He wrapped her domino around her and led her to the door.

‘I told the servants not to stay up for me.’ Sloane fumbled for the door key.

He opened the door and brought her inside, gathering her into his arms for a long, breathtaking kiss. She’d shed her gloves in the carriage and now pressed her bare palms to his cheeks, gazing into his eyes in the dim light of the candles left burning in the hall.

‘Are you certain about this, Morgana? I will take you home at once if you are not.’ His voice rasped with need, but also with restraint.

She looked directly into his eyes. ‘I am entirely certain, Sloane. I want this more than anything I have ever desired.’

His smile flashed white in the near darkness, but it just as quickly disappeared again into a frown. ‘You could conceive a child.’

Secretly she thought that would be the most marvellous thing in the world. To have Sloane’s child growing inside her. To feel his baby suckling at her breast. ‘It is unlikely,’ she said instead. ‘Besides, Madame Bisou taught us how to prevent it.’

But she would take no steps to avoid pregnancy. She might even pray for it to happen.

He stared at her a long time, then whisked her into his arms and carried her up the stairs, as if she were some petite miss weighing no more than half a dozen stone. She nestled her face against his neck and tasted the skin, now rough with a growth of beard. He carried her into his bedchamber and kicked the door shut behind him. A lamp burned in the room, and a small fire in the fireplace warded off the chill of the night. He marched directly to the bed and placed her upon it. As she flung her domino on to the floor, he tore his off and shrugged out of his coat. She kneeled on the bed and reached up to unbutton his waistcoat. He went very still as she did so. She wanted nothing more than to laugh with joy.

Amazing herself with her boldness, yet proud at the same time, she pulled his shirt from where it was tucked into his breeches and reached underneath it to pull it over his head. His bare chest glistened in the lamplight, and Morgana paused, her breath momentarily forced from her lungs at the definition of his muscles, the peppering of dark hair on his chest. Just when she thought her eyes could take in no more, he unbuttoned and removed his breeches and drawers, and for the first time in her life her eyes feasted upon the body of a naked man.

What a glorious, exciting sight. She let her gaze drop to that most private male part of him and her pulse raced so fast she thought she would explode. He was large and erect, exactly the way the courtesan instructors intimated would bring delight. She lifted her eyes to his, her mouth open.

His gaze burned down on her. ‘Your turn,’ he said, climbing on to the bed and reaching around her to the buttons on the back of her dress. He handled the unfastening of her dress with surprisingly gentle hands, but having him so close and so bare was enough to drive her into a frenzy she did not understand. Once her buttons were free, he lifted the dress over her head and tossed it aside. She felt her breasts suddenly straining against her corset. ‘Turn around,’ he said and he untied her laces quickly so she was soon free of its constraint. Nothing was left between them except her shift. His hands were hot against her skin as he reached under the thin fabric and slid it off, inch by tantalising inch.

She gasped as he threw her shift aside and it fluttered to the floor. It was his turn for his eyes to feast upon her, and she felt his gaze as acutely as she’d just felt his hands.

‘Oh, Sloane,’ she breathed, her voice as thin as air. She trembled in need for him, a need she did not entirely understand, but one she was both frightened of and eager to slake.

He gently eased her down on the bed, kneeling over her. His fingers skimmed her flesh, causing her to feel she might come apart when he touched her breasts ever so lightly.

His eyes were reverent when he cupped her face and stared at her. ‘Beautiful,’ he murmured.

She rose up and placed her lips on his, winding her arms around his neck and burying her fingers in his thick, dark hair. Finally she felt his naked chest press against her, but still the need was not satisfied. Her heart pounded faster.

Nothing had ever felt as right as this. She’d never felt before as if she were in the right place at the right time and belonged there. Tears stung her eyes. How could finally feeling she was no longer alone make her realise the ache of loneliness she’d lived with her whole life? And would return to again?

While his lips continued to feast on hers, his hand cupped her breast and squeezed, sending a shaft of pleasure through her. She writhed beneath him and his male organ pressed against her, increasing the thrill. This was lovely, but not enough. She wanted more of him. She wanted all of him.

He broke off the kiss and stared down at her again, from her face to her breasts to her abdomen to the thatch of hair between her legs. He filled his hands with her breasts, rubbing her nipples against his palms. A strangled cry escaped her lips. His hands travelled lower and lower, until one hand slipped between her legs. Common sense told her to clamp them closed, but other senses had taken over. She opened herself to him.

‘I need to touch you,’ he whispered. ‘It will lessen the pain for you.’

‘You will not hurt me, Sloane.’ She gasped as he fingered the most private part of her, feeling joyous that it was Sloane’s fingers entering her, feeling eager for his body to join hers.

The sensations became more and more intense, stronger than she could have ever conceived. ‘Sloane!’ she cried.

‘Am I hurting you?’ He withdrew his hand, but she grabbed it, placing it back to where she ached with a new sort of need.

‘No,’ he said, rising over her instead.

Her legs parted and she felt him pressing against her, felt him enter her and begin to fill her. ‘Morgana,’ he rasped as he thrust into her.

The pain was sharp, but she rode it out without uttering a sound. She did not want anything to make him stop, not now, when she was so close to… to something she did not yet understand. ‘Please, do not stop, Sloane,’ she murmured.

‘Morgana,’ he repeated.

Slowly he moved inside her, in and out. It felt like heaven, like nothing she would have imagined. She rejoiced that Sloane created these sensations in her. She would never desire another man to do so. Only Sloane, even if for only this one night.

Her body responded to him, moving with him, the rhythm as intoxicating as the sensations it created. Inside, her need increased. She’d not known it was possible to desire something with such intensity and she still did not know what it was she desired.

His thrusts increased, harder and faster, and she matched him stroke for stroke. Harder. Faster as both the need and the pleasure grew.

Suddenly she felt as if she’d come apart in shining sparks, as bright and jubilant as the illuminations at Vauxhall. She cried out in joy and clung to him and he convulsed inside her, his gasps filling her ears. She held on to him tighter while wave after wave of pleasure washed over her.

Finally they collapsed in one heap against the bed linens. He was heavy upon her, but it felt glorious. He began to kiss her again. Her forehead, her temple, her nose, lips, neck. He rolled off of her, but continued to hold her in his arms.

Morgana seemed to have liquid where her bones ought to be, and he tasted of her with such relish as to have her suspect she’d perhaps turned to syrup. He, in contrast, was as firm to the touch as if he’d been sculpted, except there was nothing of cold stone about him. His skin was warm and smooth with a sheen of perspiration that bespoke of the energy of their lovemaking.

He was planting light kisses on the ticklish skin of her stomach. She played with his hair.

‘Can it happen again?’ she asked, her voice coming out light and breathy.

He peered at her, dark sultry eyes gazing from between her naked breasts. His slow grin grew, and suddenly she provided her own answer to the question. Her body told her it would happen again.

He answered her. ‘I am counting on it.’

A gasp escaped her lips and she dug her fingers into his shoulders. He rose above her, the wicked smile still on his face, ‘Do you want me, Morgana?’

‘You know I want you, Sloane.’ She tried to return the smile, but he mounted her once more and gently pushed inside her. Their initial joining had been at an eager pace, but this time he moved with a languorous leisure.

‘Are you teasing me, Sloane?’ she whispered when his ear came near her lips.

He moved back and forth before he answered, grabbing a taste of her ear as he did so. ‘I’m loving you, Morgana.’

If his body created sensations so deep inside her she could not even imagine them, then his words touched something even deeper. She was joined to him. She was not alone.

Tears briefly stung her eyes before she allowed herself to feel the elation of it. His lovemaking was a glorious gift she would never, ever forget.

Morgana let herself be carried along thrill by repeated thrill. This culmination was different than the first, reached in unison with him, a quieter, stronger pleasure that rolled through her, making her unsure where she ended and he began.

He eased himself off of her and nestled her against him.

‘Can it happen again?’ she murmured.

She felt his voice rumble in his chest. ‘Not without making you sore. Sleep now, Morgana.’

She was determined to stay awake and savour every second of being with him. To hear the rhythm of his breathing. To feel his warm skin against her cheek. To inhale his scent, a mix of manliness and spice.

But soon enough she did what he commanded. She fell deeply into a satisfying, restful sleep.

Sloane barely heard the scratching at his door. He opened one eye. Morning had come much too soon but, now reluctantly awake, the soft, sensual woman nestled against him roused his senses as well.

The scratching continued.

Had Elliot not seen fit to train these servants when to give their employer privacy? Sloane gazed at Morgana so peacefully asleep and carefully eased away from her. She sighed and he froze, fearing he’d awoken her, but she rolled to her other side and curled up, looking like an innocent child.

He slipped out of bed and searched for something to wrap around himself. He grabbed his shirt, tying it on his hips like a loincloth as he padded to the door in his bare feet. He opened the door a crack and peeked at who dared interrupt him at this time.

‘Elliot!’ He almost forgot to whisper. The young man was fully dressed and looking very upset. Sloane stepped out into the hall, closing the bedchamber door behind him.

‘What the devil are you doing, Elliot?’ he said. Elliot held a paper in his hand and a worried frown on his face. ‘I beg your pardon, Sloane, but there is an urgent message for you.’

‘An urgent message?’ Sloane reached for the paper. ‘From whom?’

‘Your nephew, sir. The man who delivered the missive was instructed to see that it was placed in your hands immediately.’

Sloane broke the seal with his thumb.

The letter read,

Dear Uncle,

It is imperative you come immediately. I have learned that Grandfather and my father are planning to ruin your marriage plans to Lady Hannah by spreading a rumour of an affair between you and Miss Hart. They are composing an item for the newspapers at this very moment. Needless to say I am appalled at their behaviour. Come quickly. They will not listen to me.

Your nephew, D.S.

Morgana. By God, what irony. It would not be her courtesan school that would ruin her, but the incredible bad luck of having him move next door to her. Did his father know she had spent the night in his bed? Did he stoop to sending spies to watch the house?

Elliot gazed at him intently. ‘Is there anything I might do to assist?’

Sloane glanced up at him. ‘No—yes. Have my horse saddled immediately. I must get dressed.’

Elliot nodded and hurried off without once questioning what news the letter contained. An estimable young man. A man to count upon.

Sloane hurried back in the bedchamber and began rummaging around for clothes. The difficulty with having a valet was that he did not have any notion where things were put. He gave up on clothes and decided to shave instead. If he showed up at the Earl’s residence unshaven, it would merely make an unnecessary distraction. He intended to go looking like a gentleman.

There was a pitcher of water, some soap and his razor on the chest with the mirror, and he made quick work of the job. As he returned to rummaging for clothes, he closed the door of the wardrobe with a bang. The rustle of bed linens made him twist around.

Morgana sat up, holding the blanket across her lovely naked breasts. ‘Sloane?’

‘I am here, Morgana.’

She smiled when she located him in the room, a smile soft with sleep and gratification. ‘Good morning.’

He took three long steps to reach her side, put one knee on the bed and took her face in his hands, giving her a kiss with the sort of promise he had no time to fulfil. She flung her arms around his neck and tried to pull him down on top of her. His arousal came swiftly, hard and insistent. What would a few minutes hurt?

He obliged her, covering her with kisses, rubbing his hands over her smooth creamy skin. He felt like laughing out loud, an odd impulse in the midst of this crisis, but he did not care. She made him feel joyous. As if he deserved all the passion she had so innocently and wholeheartedly bestowed upon him.

He took her quickly, entering her with a force that made her gasp, but not with pain this time. His Morgana never did anything by halves. She joined his fierce pace, making intoxicating mewing sounds as her need escalated. When coupled with her like this, Sloane felt nothing like a gentleman, but everything like a man. So fast they reached the pinnacle. Together they plunged into an ecstasy of pleasure. Sloane’s landing brought him collapsing on her now damp skin.

‘Ah, Morgana, I was too rough. I am sorry.’ Surely he must have hurt her.

She reached up and caressed his cheek. ‘Not too rough,’ she murmured, making him want to take her again, right here, right now.

But he remembered his nephew’s letter. ‘I must go.’ He climbed off the bed and started to dress. ‘Do you wish me to see you home? Or you may stay in my bed as long as you like.’

She glanced towards the daylight streaming through the window. ‘I suppose I ought to go home. I cannot imagine what they will think.’

He came back to her and swiped his hand through the disarray of her hair. ‘They will think you spent the night in my bed.’

She gave a wan smile. ‘Yes, I suppose that is so.’

He stared at her, wanting her all over again, wanting to hold her spirit, so untamed and unafraid, inside him. She was the woman created for him. He had no doubt of that now.

As he pulled on a pair of trousers, he watched her climb off the bed and search the floor for her clothes. She donned her shift and positioned her corset. He walked over to tie it. When he finished he put his hands on her shoulders and leaned her against him.

He wanted more mornings like this, with lovemaking and easy talk between them, casual touching, ordinary life. She turned and smiled at him, picking up the neckcloth that he’d found folded in a drawer. She put it around his neck and tied it.

‘Morgana, I have been summoned to my father’s house.’

She looked up into his eyes. ‘He sent for you?’

‘No,’ he admitted, the despicable plan of his father filling him with anger and pain. ‘My nephew warned me.’

Her expression turned questioning.

He slid his hands down her arms, clasping her fingers. ‘Morgana, my father intends to ruin me by sending out a tale that you and I are lovers.’

Her fingers flexed tightly in his. ‘They have seen me come here?’

‘I do not know. It would not be beneath my father’s scruples to hire someone to do such a thing.’ He looked directly into her eyes. ‘I will convince him to remain quiet, but he is bent on seeing me disgraced. It will all come to naught, however, if you marry me.’

She went very still, the pupils of her eyes growing large. ‘What about Hannah?’

‘I have not offered for Hannah—’ he began.

She interrupted him. ‘She was to be your means of gaining respectability.’

‘Hang respectability. You and I will do very well together.’

Morgana slowly pulled her fingers from his grasp and took a step back. She looked at him long and hard, loving him enough to give him whatever he desired.

What he desired was respectability. He’d worked diligently to earn it, and now his father was about to snatch it away again. Through her. If the Earl was so bent on ruining Sloane he would have the house watched, how long before her secrets were known to the man? Even marriage could not erase the scandal of a wife who trained women to be courtesans.

She took a deep breath, like a dying person gasping for one last breath. ‘But I do not wish to marry you, Sloane.’

He flinched. It was almost imperceptible, but she caught it. ‘You… do not wish to marry me?’

Morgana made herself smile, trying to remember how Harriette Wilson looked when she turned on her charm. ‘Oh, no. I thought I told you I did not.’

His brows dropped and his voice became very low. ‘After last night, do you expect me to believe you would not desire the marriage bed?’

It was Morgana’s turn to flinch. She only hoped she hid it as effectively as he. To belong to Sloane, to make love to him, until death parted them was everything she desired. It was why she’d begged him for this past night. He must not pay by giving up everything he desired, merely because he had obliged her.

Morgana’s mind whirled with ways to convince him that she did not want him, though her soul ached for him even now. ‘Oh, I desire the lovemaking.’ She aped the light flirtatious voice of Miss Wilson. ‘Thank you so much for showing me that I would enjoy it. It quite informs me that I should like that part of a courtesan’s life.’

‘Morgana,’ he cried in a fierce groan.

She fluttered her eyelashes and went about collecting her dress. ‘Now do not lecture me, please do not.’ She put the dress on over her head and placed her back to him so he could fasten the buttons. ‘My mind is quite made up.’

‘You will not marry me?’ Another man might make this sound like a plea, but in Sloane’s voice it sounded like a pirate about to attack. He fastened her buttons with lightning speed.

She made her voice light. ‘Do not be absurd. You’ve no wish to marry me! Goodness! To think you would propose out of some obligation. You need not play the gentleman with me, Sloane.’

Her words wounded him. She saw it in his eyes. For a moment she wished he would strike her. The pain might distract from the wrenching ache inside her. But she knew he was too much a true gentleman to do so.

She picked up her stockings and balled them in her hands, putting her bare feet into her dancing slippers. He shrugged into his coat and ran a brush through his hair. Morgana put hers in a quick plait.

‘I will see you to the back entrance of your house. If we are careful, no one outside will notice you.’

It was a gentlemanly thing to do. He could have just opened the door and pushed her out.

‘Thank you,’ she said, failing to maintain her bright-sounding speech.

He did not appear to notice. He opened the bedchamber door and walked her down the stairs. She managed to put one foot in front of the other, although all she truly wanted to do was sink into a puddle of despair. On a table in the hall was her gold domino, folded neatly. He put it around her shoulders and pulled the hood up over her head. His touch was like a smithy’s tongs hot from the forge.

When they walked out of the door and through the gap in the garden wall, they did not speak. The silence spread through her like some wasting disease.

She had given him the means of retaining his hard-won respectability. She had given him a clear path to offer for a respectable wife—her cousin. But she’d hurt him. Not with her refusal of marriage. A man soon got over such a blow to pride. No, she’d treated him as if he were not a gentleman. That made her no better than his father. And it made her feel sick inside.

The door to her house was unlocked. He opened it for her and she stepped inside. She turned quickly to bid him goodbye, but he had already withdrawn. He did not look back.

The man wore a vendor’s apparel and carried a sack of brushes on his shoulder. He’d wandered around Culross Street since dawn, finally discovering a way to slip through the mews to a shrouded place where he could spy on Cyprian Sloane’s townhouse. Instinct told him to watch the back of the house. Instinct, and lack of success witnessing anything of consequence from the front.

It was too bad he could not watch the house next to Sloane’s where he’d briefly spied the pretty girls through the window. Sloane’s place was as quiet as a church cemetery.

Just as he was about to leave, Sloane’s door opened. There was the man himself, a woman with him. He walked her over to the other house and she entered it.

What an arrangement, thought the man with envy. Some men have all the luck.

Morgana paused when reaching the door to the library. It was open a crack, and she could hear the girls’ voices and the reedy laughter of her grandmother, who undoubtedly found everything to be very lovely. Oh, to have her grandmother’s forgetfulness, to live in a present that was perpetually lovely. How much easier life would be. How much less painful.

The voices were not sounding happy, however. Katy’s shrill tones rose above the others. ‘We need Miss Hart! She will know what to do.’

Morgana glanced down at her hand, still holding her stockings. She stuffed them into a pocket inside her domino and stuffed her numbing despair along with them.

She opened the door. ‘I am here.’

Katy leapt up from her chair. ‘Gracious, Miss Hart!’ She looked her up and down. ‘Did you have a nice night?’

Lucy and Rose stared at her, and Miss Moore, seated near her grandmother, gave her a kind, knowing smile.

It felt as if someone had ripped off all her clothes in a public square, but she realised it was not making love to Sloane that made her feel exposed. It was the ache in her heart.

She tried for a vague smile. ‘A lady does not speak of such matters, Katy.’

Katy laughed. ‘Harriette Wilson had no trouble speaking about it.’

Morgana gave her a candid look. ‘But Miss Wilson is not a lady.’

Was it too late to convince them that they could be ladies? Oh, not ladies of the ton, perhaps, but respectable women who deserved men who loved them and who would never walk away?

Lucy stood up. Her face looked drawn. ‘Miss Hart, we must tell you about Mary.’

If something had happened to Mary while she was making love to Sloane. ‘What of Mary?’

‘It is nothing bad,’ assured Rose.

Lucy gave an imploring glance to Miss Moore.

Miss Moore beamed at Morgana. ‘It seems our Mary has run off to Gretna Green with Mr Duprey.’

‘That cowhanded sapskull…’ Katy shook her head ‘… how could she?’

Tears sprang to Morgana’s eyes. She walked over to Miss Moore. ‘Is it really so?’

Miss Moore handed her a letter. Mary wrote that she was sorry to disappoint Morgana, but Mr Duprey had proposed to her at the masquerade, promising to save her from such unpleasantness and give her a good home. He did not have a big fortune, she added, but Mary looked forward to making little economies to make his life pleasant. The letter then went on for a whole page, heaping praises upon Mr Duprey.

When Morgana finished she clasped the letter to her chest.

‘That slow-top could have purchased a special license here in London.’ Katy shook her head in disgust.

‘Gretna Green is romantic, is it not, Miss Hart?’ Rose directed her beautiful green eyes on Morgana. ‘It is good that she marries, is it not?’

Morgana smiled through her tears. ‘It is wonderful for her!’ She would miss the shy, gentle girl. Her loss was Mr Duprey’s gain—and Mary’s salvation.

Morgana thought of Sloane. ‘It is wonderful for her,’ she repeated. ‘Well done, Mary.’