To Distraction

  Two hours later, Deverell lay back on Phoebe’s pillows and ruthlessly channeled his thoughts away from the soft, warm, too-tempting female body curled with her back against his side.

  She fitted perfectly, heaven-made for him.

  And his rapacious needs, but that was one of the realizations he was battling to block from his mind. Later would be soon enough to dwell on such matters. Now…now he needed distraction.

  The candles had guttered, plunging the room into a comfortable dark. His eyes had adjusted; it was almost pitch black, but he could make out the furniture, enough to be able to rise, dress, and leave without noise.

  Not that he had any intention of doing so just yet.

  Once again he steered his mind away from the prospect of what might transpire between now and him leaving. Jaw setting, he refocused on other things—any other thing that might fill his mind; he had to at least give her a little more time to recover from what had, even to his jaded senses, been an engagement of significant and quite startling sensual dimensions.

  Dwelling on elements of that engagement wasn’t going to help.

  The only other thing engaging enough to distract him was his wider plans for her, and how they were progressing. All in all, he was pleased, indeed, smugly satisfied. The unexpected chance to learn the secret of the agency wasn’t an opportunity he could have passed up; he’d had to grasp the moment to pressure her into telling him all…not that she had. She had carefully avoided any mention of what had moved her—a well-bred, wealthy young lady of the haut ton—to embark on such an esoteric career.

  His eyes narrowed in the darkness; the reason wasn’t hard to guess. Some bastard—some marauding wolf in gentleman’s clothing—had tried to force her…. He cut off the thought, blocked the mental vision; his reacton to it was too violent and might disturb her, still slumped and slumbering by his side. Regardless, said ravening wolf had clearly not succeeded in raping her; his actions, however, had left scars.

  He would never forget the fear he’d inadvertently triggered, more than once. He’d overcome it, worked his way around it, but that fear had been deeply etched. She was—as he’d known from the first moment of setting eyes on her—a sensual woman. Highly and richly so, the sort of woman made for men like him who could match and fully appreciate them. Yet that fear had blocked her path, had prevented her from enjoying her own nature, from developing and taking pleasure in it as she could and should, from being all she could be…but he was there now.

  Tonight had been fated in more ways than one, a scheduled step in his plan to use her sensual nature to persuade her into matrimony, yet after learning the true nature of her agency and how she ran it, after guessing the connection to her fear—regardless of any plan, he would have made love to Phoebe tonight, compelled to demonstrate that her fear was only a hurdle, not a barrier, that all the pleasures a woman could enjoy could still be hers.

  And on some other level entirely, after the dangers of the night he’d felt driven to capture and possess her, to make her finally, ineradicably, and indisputably his.

  He shifted, seeking a more comfortable position, more in his mind than in the bed. The emotions she evoked in him were not entirely familiar; even the familiar urge to conquer and possess was edged with something deeper, more fundamental and powerful.

  Those new and altered feelings made him uneasy, a trifle wary, but he had his goal before him, and that hadn’t changed. Not in the slightest.

  He wanted Phoebe as his wife, was now beyond determined on that. Beyond committed. And on that path, he was progressing well.

  This evening she had, albeit under duress, accepted him as her protector. An hour ago, entirely willingly, she’d accepted him as her lover. Of the three positions he’d so sapiently named, he had only one more to claim, but wisdom dictated he consolidate his hold on the two he’d claimed tonight before he made a bid for the last.

  He glanced at her. Hair deliciously tousled—as it never otherwise was—she looked like the houri he’d told her she should train to become.

  A niggle intruded, his imperative need to ask her about the man who had harmed her. He would one day, but instinct suggested now was not the time to raise that issue—their intimacy was too new, too fragile.

  So…as there was nothing he could sensibly do to strengthen his position as her protector, wisdom dictated…

  Turning toward her, he raised a hand, set his palm to the curve of her naked shoulder, then slid it slowly down.

  Phoebe came awake to find her body had woken before her, that it was already heated, responding in wanton abandon to caresses so explicit she might have blushed if she hadn’t already been so flushed. So filled with sultry passion.

  Lying on her side, sunk in her bed, with Deverell a hard, hot male wall behind her, she closed her eyes and followed the intimate play of his fingers. Let her senses submerge beneath the tide of sensual longing.

  Felt the tide catch her, felt desire swell and rise.

  She murmured his name. Before she could turn to him, he leaned over her, raising her upper thigh, bending her knee, pressing it to the bed…he slid into her. Slowly, smoothly. Deep.

  Until the hard hot length of him filled her.

  Then he withdrew and pressed in again, stretching her sheath, filling her to the hilt, to the point where she felt he was nudging her heart when he thrust the last inch.

  She heard a gasp as he repeated the slow, deliberate movement, realized that it was hers, that her fingers had tangled in the sheet, clutching spasmodically as he continued to ride her in this different way. Continued to pleasure her deeply, unhurriedly, languidly.

  Over and over. The conflagration within her built, and built, the end approaching much more quickly this time—but then he slowed, eased back, penetrated her less deeply…and the firestorm, denied, retreated, shrank back.

  Hovered. Then he returned to thrust hard and deep; the flames roared and greedily rushed in—only to be denied yet again…and the pleasure grew.

  Burgeoned, filled her, sank to her bones.

  Filled her mind, captured her senses.

  She wanted to give the pleasure back to him, wanted, in an instant of startling clarity, to lavish on him the same sensual delights he was so assiduously giving her. But how?

  His weight held her pinned, his chest to her back, one heavy arm snug over her waist, his hand cradling her breast, long fingers stroking, gently kneading in time with the rhythm of his loving.

  She tried to twist to catch his eye but couldn’t, tried to shift her hips against him, then realized and tightened about him as he pressed deep.

  And was rewarded when he halted, buried deep within her, and hissed in a breath. He held it for an instant, then exhaled and picked up his rhythm again.

  He leaned close; his lips traced the curve of her ear, then his breath brushed over it. “All you have to do is lie there and be ravished.”

  Coming out of the dark behind her, his tone, deep and gravelly, was perfectly gauged to send a shiver down her spine.

  His lips returned to her ear, lightly brushing, then he pressed a kiss to the sensitive skin beneath it, then trailed light kisses down the taut line of her throat. Then he spoke again. “Naked, in the dark of the night, in this bed…you’re mine, remember? My houri, my pleasure slave, to do with as I wish.”

  He eased his shoulders back, released her breast, and sent his hand skating down, over her waist and around to evocatively stroke her bottom. “To possess as I wish. Like this, with your lovely arse to my groin, your body supple, soft and pliant, prone beneath me, helpless to prevent me taking all I want, as I want.”

  Against the pillow, her lips curved. She didn’t think she was entirely helpless….

  Lasciviously, seductively, she squirmed, flagrantly encouraging him to do his worst. To take her more aggressively, more definitely. To ride her more deeply.

  Blatantly challenging him to forget about her pleasure and take his, to slake his lust in her very willing body.
br />   He hissed in another breath. She tightened her inner muscles, simultaneously wriggling…

  He swore. And the dam broke.

  His hand clamped about her hip, ruthlessly held her down as he shifted, adjusted, then did as she wished. Set aside his control and took her without restraint.

  The fire howled through them both, harsh and hot, ravenous and greedy. It burned and consumed, cindered all constraint, left them both gasping, senses reeling, struggling to see, to know, to grasp.

  The pinnacle of pleasure.

  And the consequent bliss.

  The first shattered them, ripped and shredded them, hurling their senses beyond the world.

  The latter fell on them, doused the last flames, enfolded them in the cocooning arms of satiation, and healed them.

  Wracked, exhausted, they lay slumped in the bed, wrapped together, unable to move, the thundering of their hearts one beat in their veins.

  She couldn’t breathe, but she didn’t care. At the last he’d roared her name, and at the last she’d been there, with him, together, in no way apart.

  Hours later, he rose. Phoebe sensed more than felt him leave the bed; she turned and watched as he gathered his clothes in the dark, then started to dress.

  He glanced up, saw she was awake. “It’s nearly dawn—I have to go.”

  She heard the reluctance—real, sincere—in his voice and was inwardly delighted. From him, she felt sure reluctance at this point qualified as a compliment of the highest order.

  Recent events had, she decided, made decorum redundant; she let her gaze roam the planes and bulging muscles of his body, the long lines, the dips and hollows she’d gained a much better sense of, indeed, appreciation of, through the last hours. There was absolutely nothing there she didn’t like.

  Settling back on the pillows, she let her gaze rest on him and let her mind explore the changes the hours had wrought. In her, courtesy of him and his particular brand of loving.

  She wasn’t such an innocent that she didn’t know that the way he approached her, the words he said, the fantasies he created in her mind and fed were deliberate, knowingly gauged to seduce and sensually ensnare her. And she wasn’t such a prude not to acknowledge that he was right, that all those things were not only necessary, needed to ease her past her old fear and into intimacy, but they also heightened and deepened her enjoyment of the act.

  From the first, he had read her very well, and while she wasn’t at all sure she approved of that ability, she couldn’t pretend she didn’t appreciate the outcome.

  Gone was her fear, vanquished—made as redundant as modesty and decorum, at least between them.

  So yes, she felt…blissfully sated all the way to her toes, her body glorious and more alive, more whole, more real, more engaged with the world, and she owed it all to him. Gratitude was what she should have felt, but as her gaze rested on him, she was very aware that it wasn’t simply gratitude that filled her.

  Inwardly, she frowned. She wasn’t sure what she truly felt, only that it went deep and stirred her in ways she hadn’t before encountered.

  He sat on the bed to pull on his boots. She stared at his broad back and wondered.

  She didn’t want him to leave, although she accepted he must. But it was her certainty that she wanted to see him again, to invite him to her bed and her body the next night, and the next, that troubled her.

  Such a fascination—wanton and real, unfettered now they’d indulged to the point of intimacy—wasn’t going to make her life, the decisions she would need to make, any easier. Her simple plan to embark on a liaison, short-lived and soon over, had headed down a track she hadn’t intended…and now he’d learned about the agency and her secret, her “little crusade.”

  The events of the past night had created an upheaval in the landscape of her life. How should she respond?

  As he rose, glanced at her, then came around the bed, she rephrased her question: How was she going to manage him?

  He halted beside the bed and looked down at her. After a moment, he reached out, with the fingers of one hand lightly stroked her cheek. Then he caught her chin, tipped it up, leaned down, and kissed her—gentle and sweet.

  “Take care.” He breathed the words against her lips, then released her and straightened. He hesitated, then said, “I’ll call on you later in the day.”

  With a nod, he turned and silently crossed the room. Even though she was watching, she barely saw the shadow that was him open the door and slip through, then the door closed, and he was gone.

  With a sigh, she sank back and stared up at the dark canopy. There was simply no sense in imagining she might draw back and bring their liaison to a quick end, not before she’d fully explored all the pleasures to which he could introduce her and, even more, learned of all the ways in which she could pleasure him.

  Learning one without the other seemed immensely unwise; if he was going to be able to hold her senses hostage, she wanted to be able to reciprocate. That, to her mind, seemed eminently sensible; she shouldn’t give him—or any man—any unnecessary advantage.

  As matters now stood, every time Deverell came near her, she felt an illicit thrill—an expectation of forbidden, deeply sensual delight. Every time his eyes met hers, every time he touched her, however innocently, she thought of being with him, alone, in his arms.

  Now she would think of having him between her thighs, or behind her, of the indescribable pleasure of him joining with her.

  Of course, he was the only man with whom she could imagine engaging in such activities, so obviously the time for her education in this sphere was here and now.

  With him she had a chance to explore all that fate had left her ignorant of, and there was no way she would turn aside from that. No matter the risk…if she was honest, to her heart. It was that that had stirred when minutes ago she’d stared at him through the dark.

  She pushed the thought away; in attempting anything worthwhile, there was always some risk. Witness the agency.

  Tugging the covers up, she snuggled down. As matters now stood, there was nothing to prevent her from accepting Deverell’s standing offer to fully experience her sensual self, to explore her own nature and come to know and understand the full gamut of all as a woman she could be.

  That was important, as important as all else.

  “And he already knows about the agency.”

  Closing her eyes, she willed herself to sleep; to her surprise, she succeeded.

  Chapter 15

  Late that morning in a town house in fashionable Arlington Street, just around the corner from St. James, Malcolm Sinclair paused outside his guardian’s study. After an instant’s hesitation, he raised a hand and knocked.

  “Come in!” Henry barked from within.

  Opening the door, Malcolm did as he was bid.

  Henry sat behind his massive desk, papers spread before him. An imposing figure with steel gray hair, he was engaged in transcribing a judgment; a downward twitch of one corner of his thin lips was his only acknowledgment of Malcolm’s presence.

  Unperturbed, Malcolm quietly shut the door and crossed the room on silent feet.

  Henry glanced up from beneath beetling brows as Malcolm gracefully sat in the chair facing the desk. He scrutinized Malcolm’s impassive countenance, and as usual could read nothing in it. “Well?” he demanded, his brusque tone giving warning of his ire over having been disturbed.

  Malcolm dutifully reported, “It appears we have a problem.”

  Settling himself elegantly, he observed his guardian’s harsh-featured face and waited with his customary patience. Others sitting in that particular chair would have felt apprehension, certainly a degree of nervousness, but Malcolm had been Henry’s ward from the age of six; he’d grown accustomed to his guardian’s arrogant and contemptuous severity, inured to the effect of his unmitigatingly hard and ruthless presence.

  While Henry believed his was the superior intellect, Malcolm knew better; he, however, saw no reason to corr
ect Henry’s mistake.

  Henry humphed and returned to his writing.

  The scritch-scratch of his pen continued, the dominant sound in the room. Malcolm let his gaze roam, taking in the gleam of wooden stocks, of finely wrought iron and steel, the glint of brass inlays, the sleek, destructive lengths of the numerous pistols mounted on the walls. Henry’s obsession with pistols—for obsession it truly was—never failed to amaze him, a curious insight into the incalculable folly of an otherwise careful man.

  To Malcolm the assembled pistols, valuable antiques and rarities though they were, were merely guns, tools to be used if necessary but otherwise relatively uninteresting objects.

  To Henry they were passion. And desire—definitely desire.

  Indeed, his desire to acquire one of Napoleon’s personal pistols had reduced Henry’s funds to the almost embarrassing. And now with the final end of the war, there were pistols from defeated French marshals coming onto the market. Henry was eager and ever-greedy for funds.

  He finally came to the end of his paragraph. He looked up to dip his nib in the inkpot. “What problem?” He didn’t bother looking at Malcolm.

  “That sweet little governess we were to pick up from Chifley. She’s gone.”

  Henry paused, then lowered his pen, and finally looked at Malcolm. “Gone?”

  Malcolm toyed with the idea of making Henry repeat himself but decided against it. “Indeed. She ran away—or should that be escaped?—last night. According to Chifley it was organized—there were others, including guards, waiting in the alley to help her get away.”

  Henry’s lip curled. “And you believed him? That posturing bantam can’t keep his pants buttoned. Are you sure he didn’t give her a poke and she fled into the night?”

  Malcolm smiled thinly. “In the normal way of things, a likely possibility, I’ll allow. However, in this case, I’m inclined to believe him. Aside from his disgruntled manner—I’d swear the girl had eluded his manly embrace—he’s sporting a bruise on his jaw that certainly didn’t come from the door he told his mother he’d walked into.”