“I want you,” she said.
“I told you so,” he said. “But you must natter on about temporary insanity and—”
“Stop talking,” she said. She grasped the lapels of his coat. “I have tasks for you to perform.”
She slid her hand down to the front of his trousers. His rod, already in readiness, sprang to rigid attention.
She smiled the siren’s smile up at him.
He grasped her waist and lifted her up and brought her wicked mouth level with his own. He kissed her, not delicately or seductively, but hotly. She grasped his shoulders and thrust her tongue against his, and the taste of her raced through him, more potent than any intoxicant.
She wriggled upward, her breasts rubbing his chest, and wrapped her legs about his waist. He staggered backward until he came against something solid. He braced himself there while his hands worked through layers of dress and petticoats and clasped her bottom, clad in the thin knitted silk of her drawers.
Still they kissed, deep, demanding kisses that turned him hot then cold then hot again. No enchantress’s brew could be so potent as her passion. She made him mad and reckless and glad to be so.
She worked his neckcloth loose, and undid the shirt buttons and slid her hand inside over his skin, and laid it over his heart, his desperately pumping heart.
She slid her hand lower, over his belly, to the waistband of his trousers, and he was helpless, holding her up, while she pulled the trouser buttons from their buttonholes and brought her hand down over his drawers to his swollen, throbbing cock.
He groaned against her mouth and she broke the kiss.
“Now,” she said. “I can’t wait. Now. Let me down.”
He wanted now, too, and he let her down, let her torture him with a slow easing down over his length.
She pushed him back, toward the bed, and he went, laughing and hot and addled, and fell onto it. She yanked up her skirts, untied her drawers, and let them fall to the floor. She stepped out of them and over them and climbed up onto him.
She tugged his trousers and drawers down to his knees.
He lifted his head and gazed down at himself. It was most undignified. His membrum virile stood up proudly, unconcerned with dignity. “My boots,” he said, laughing. “May I not at least—”
“Keep still,” she said, and straddled him. “Leave this to me.”
He never left anything to women—even this—but she was different and he couldn’t think and didn’t want to think.
Then her soft hand was curling round his rod, sliding up and down, and he thought he would die and knew he’d never last. “You will kill me, Bathsheba,” he said.
“You are killing me,” she said. She pushed herself onto his aching cock, surrounding him with hot, moist flesh . . . and muscles, wicked muscles, pressing against him.
He cried out something, not words but some mad, animal sound. She lifted herself, then pushed down again. She moved slowly at first, sending waves of voluptuous pleasure coursing through him. By degrees the rhythm built, faster, more ferocious.
He watched her beautiful face while she made his body hers. He saw her hunger, the mirror of his own, and her joy, unlike anything he’d ever known before. Harder and faster she rode him, and the joy was in his veins and pumping through his heart. She rode him, wild now, and he was a runaway, racing with her he knew not where and cared not where. They raced to the edge of the world and beyond, and soared for a while, free and joy-filled, then floated down and into sleep.
When he woke in the morning, she was gone.
So, he soon discovered, were his purse and his clothes.
Chapter 14
Throgmorton, Sunday 7 October
BATHSHEBA COULD GUESS WHAT THE BUTLER was thinking.
The name Wingate would not be unfamiliar to him.
The elderly Earl of Mandeville, lord of these domains and head of the DeLucey family, was on speaking terms—although just barely—with the Earl of Fosbury, Jack’s father.
A reasonable person could hardly hold the good DeLuceys responsible for what the dreadful ones did. However, Lord Fosbury had never been reasonable where his favorite son—whom he’d indulged to a shocking degree, and who in repayment had broken his heart—was concerned. In his opinion, Lord Mandeville should have prevented the marriage and arranged for Bathsheba to be taken somewhere far beyond Jack’s reach.
In Lord Mandeville’s opinion, Lord Fosbury was incapable of controlling his son.
Relations between the two families, therefore, were frosty.
Nonetheless, they were on speaking terms, which meant the butler dare not turn away any lady named Wingate . . . even though she had arrived on horseback, with neither maid nor groom in attendance.
Bathsheba might have made up a lie about an accident or some such, but she was aware that members of the upper orders did not explain themselves to anybody, especially servants.
She merely regarded the butler with the same bored-to-death expression she’d seen on Rathbourne’s face at times. She had learnt from her governess how to make that face. Rathbourne, however, had raised it to a form of high art.
Thinking of him caused her a twinge, which she ruthlessly crushed.
“Lord Mandeville is not at home,” the butler said.
“Lord Northwick, then,” she said. Northwick was the earl’s eldest son.
“Lord Northwick is not at home,” the butler said.
“I see,” she said. “Must I name each of the family members by turn, and do you mean to keep me standing upon the step throughout the exercise?”
That made him blink. He begged her pardon. He ushered her inside.
“My business is urgent,” she said crisply. “Are the family all at church, or is there a responsible adult at home to whom I might speak?”
“I shall ascertain whether anyone is at home, madam,” he said.
He led her into a large antechamber and left.
She had paced it for a few minutes when she heard footsteps. She halted and donned Rathbourne’s expression once again.
A young man hurried into the room. He was but a few inches taller than she and much younger—in his early twenties, she guessed. He was good-looking and well dressed, although it was clear he’d put on those fine clothes in great haste. He must have risen very recently. He—or his servant—had neglected to brush his thick brown hair. His eyes were the same intense blue as Olivia’s.
“Mrs. Wingate?” he said. “I am Peter DeLucey. I saw you ride up th
e drive. I do apologize for keeping you. Urgent business, Keble said. I hope . . .” He trailed off, his gaze going from her to something behind her right shoulder.
She glanced that way. Then she turned more fully and studied it: a full-length portrait of a naval officer in the style of wig popular early in the previous century. He could have been her father. In a black wig, he might have been
her.
“That can’t be Great-Grandpapa Edmund,” she said. “They burnt all his portraits, I was told.”
When she looked back, the young man was dragging his hand through his hair. “I say,” he said.
“I am Bathsheba Wingate,” she said.
None of the ancestors about her fell out of their frames, and the ceiling did not crash to the floor, which did not open up to admit Beelzebub, who did not try to drag Mr. DeLucey back down into the inferno with him.
But Peter DeLucey looked as though all these things had happened.
Then, “I say,” he managed to get out.
She silenced him with a wave of her hand. “Alas, we have no time for family reminiscences,” she said. “My wicked daughter has run away with Lord Atherton’s heir and sole offspring. She has entangled him in a harebrained scheme to unearth Edmund DeLucey’s treasure, which she believes is buried at the base of Throgmorton’s mausoleum.”
“T-treasure,” he said. “Mauso—”
“I have been chasing them since Friday afternoon,” she cut in impatiently, “but the brats have eluded me. Throgmorton is a large property. There is no predicting how or where they will get in. Once they get in, they will have numerous places to hide.”
“I say,” he said. “I can hardly take it in. Your daughter has eloped with Atherton’s son?”
“He is thirteen,” she said impatiently. “Olivia is twelve. It is not an elopement. They are children. Do attend. I have a plan for catching them, but I must have your help.”
At that moment, she heard from without the clatter of hooves and carriage wheels.
Bathsheba caught her breath. It could not be Rathbourne. He would not find her for hours, if ever. She had made sure of that—and that he’d hate her if and when he did find her.