Once Upon a Maiden Lane

  He merely smiled at her, his lips sensuously curved, and she felt warmth invade her chest at his look. She was conscious suddenly of how close they sat. His arm brushed against hers when he moved, and as the carriage turned a corner she gently rocked against his shoulder.

  She inhaled. “And you? Did you have a pet as a child?”

  “Yes, several,” he replied. “Dogs and cats. Now I’ve got two hounds—Mole and Timberline.”

  “Mole?”

  “His ears are very soft,” he said a tad defensively.

  “Oh.” She fought not to laugh. “I should like to meet them both.”

  “And you shall,” he said.

  “Good.” She inhaled. “And now I think it’s my turn for a question. Did you ever kiss my sister?”

  Henry wanted to look at Mary at her question, but the London street had become crowded, and he dared not glance away from their course.

  He frowned. He could lie, but that wouldn’t be the best way to start a marriage.

  Besides, he didn’t want to lie to her.

  “Yes, I kissed Lady Joanna,” he said.

  There was a short silence from her, and he fought not to fill it with excuses: He’d been engaged to be married to Lady Joanna for over two decades. It was ridiculous to never even test what it would be like to embrace his future wife.

  But in the end he simply said, “It wasn’t the same as when I kissed you.”

  She knit her brow at that. “What do you mean?”

  “I’m quite fond of Lady Joanna,” he said slowly. “I grew up with her, after all. But my regard for her is brotherly. When I kissed her I felt the same as if I’d kissed Becca or Kate: affectionate. Not passionate.”

  Out of the corner of his eye he could see her clench her hands together in her lap. “And that’s not what you feel for me?”

  “No.” He shook his head. “What I feel for you is very far from brotherly.”

  He could’ve gone on to tell her that he wanted to kiss her again. To take her mouth with his and feel her heat rise. To find out if her breasts were as lush as they looked under her stays. To dip his head to her neck and inhale her scent until it seeped into his bones, a memory never to be forgotten.

  But her lady’s maid rode just behind them in the carriage. The maid was probably discreet, but when he told Mary all those things, he wanted to be alone with her with no one to overhear.

  So he cleared his throat instead. “And have you kissed any other man but me?”

  “No,” she said. “But a few have tried to kiss me.”

  If the road hadn’t been so crowded, he’d have whipped his head around to stare at her.

  “A…few.” His fingers tightened on the reins. “How many is a few?”

  Her voice sounded amused when she answered, “Well, Mr. Makepeace kissed me on the cheek when I left the home, but I don’t think that’s exactly what you mean.”

  He began to relax.

  “And when I was sixteen the fishmonger’s boy tried to corner me by the back door.”

  That made him stiffen.

  “Actually he tried again on two more occasions,” she said thoughtfully—and to his growing alarm. “But then he quit coming around. When I was nineteen there was a very brash footman. Tall and blond and with green eyes. His name was Sam and he used to give me posies and hair ribbons, though I didn’t encourage him. I think he would’ve courted me as well, but I’m afraid I found him rather…simple.” She sounded apologetic. “I couldn’t bear the thought of marrying a man who had never read a book and looked at me in awe when I asked him his views on the prime minister.” She sighed. “He eventually married one of the scullery maids and went to another situation where he could be the butler. I never regretted turning him away.”

  He glanced at her quickly as a belated thought occurred. “Then you weren’t walking out with any man when I found you at Adams and Sons?”

  “Would it matter?”

  “Yes, it would,” he said as they turned into Hyde Park. “I shouldn’t like the thought that I’d taken you from a man you were interested in.”

  “And yet you would anyway?” she asked quietly.

  He frowned. “The marriage contract says I must marry you whatever your feelings.”

  “What about your feelings?” she asked intently. “What would you feel if you’d known I was walking out with a footman or butcher’s boy?”

  “I’d take you as wife in any case,” he said flatly, hoping his blunt answer didn’t horrify her. “I wouldn’t like causing you sorrow, but I wouldn’t revoke my claim to you—even if you’d had a prior romance.”

  “I see,” she murmured, and for the life of him he couldn’t tell what she thought.

  He turned the horses toward Rotten Row, passing under the canopy of several mature oak trees.

  “Have you—?” he had begun when a bang! exploded nearby.

  Henry just had time to think gunshot, and then his team bolted.

  “Hold on!” Henry grappled with the reins, the leather sawing into his gloved fingers as he struggled to keep hold of them. If he lost the reins he’d never get the horses back under control.

  The right mare swerved, taking them off the packed earth track and into the grass. The left carriage wheels hit something, and the whole contraption tipped to the right. For a moment Henry thought it was all over.

  Then the carriage righted itself with a jolt. They were headed straight toward one of the new ornamental ponds.

  Henry pulled on the reins, carefully and with constant pressure, urging the horses to run to the right of the pond.

  The pond flashed by. The horses slowed.

  Henry brought them to a shuddering halt.

  He set the brake on the carriage and tied off the reins before turning to Mary. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes.” Her eyes were wide, and she still clutched the carriage side and seat, but she was remarkably composed.

  A gentleman on horseback came cantering over, followed by another. The first man, who was wearing riding boots and a red jacket, leaned over and caught the bridle of Henry’s right horse. “I say, that was quite a trip you took there. Everyone satisfactory?”

  “I think so, thank you, sir,” Henry replied. “Mr. Coplin, isn’t it?”

  “Indeed, my lord,” Coplin replied.

  “My lady.” The lady’s maid’s voice was shaking.

  Henry turned to reassure the girl and saw that her left arm was soaked in blood.

  “Lane!” Mary scrambled to her knees on the carriage seat. She pulled off the fichu she had around her neck and pressed the flimsy cloth to the maid’s arm.

  Lane sucked in her breath, her face white.

  “Good Lord.” The gentleman behind Coplin—Henry thought his name was Berkley—nudged his horse around back of the carriage and leaned over to look at Lane. He frowned. “Girl’s been shot.”

  “What bloody fool shot a gun in Hyde Park?” Coplin’s voice was outraged. “Could’ve hit either you or the lady, Blackwell. Your maid’s lucky the shot didn’t hit her head or heart.”

  Henry fought to keep his face neutral as he passed his handkerchief back to Berkley. “Indeed, sir, I concur.”

  Berkley tied the handkerchief around the maid’s arm, making Lane moan in pain.

  “Thank you,” Henry said to the man before turning to Coplin. “Thank you both.”

  Coplin shook his head. “I’m only sorry we had to help you, Blackwell.” He bowed and tipped his hat to Mary. “Glad the lady is unhurt.”

  Henry nodded to the gentlemen. “Indeed. I thank you again, and now I’ll be off. I need to bring Lane and my lady home and call the doctor for the poor girl.”

  He clucked to his horses, tired now from their mad gallop, and turned toward the road leading out of Hyde Park.

  He kept watch as he did so, though.

  One near miss with a gunshot was plausible.

  Two suggested an assassination attempt.

  Someone was trying to kill his
Mary.

  Chapter Nine

  The land prince was much taken with Clio and asked her where she came from and what her name was. But because Clio had no voice she could not answer. The prince was disappointed, but still he brought her inside the castle gates and made her a maidservant.

  As for Triton, he was put to work shoveling out the stables.…

  —From The Curious Mermaid

  Mary worried her lip with her teeth as the Angrove House butler led Lane to the kitchens. The lady’s maid was being brave, but she was trembling, and Mary worried for her.

  “Come, my lady,” Lord Blackwell said next to her. “Let us adjourn to the sitting room for some tea.”

  “What?” She looked around and saw that he was watching her with a concerned expression on his face.

  It struck her again how different this man was from her first impression of him. She’d thought him a feckless aristocrat—one of the men more interested in their own beauty and the diamonds on their shoe buckles than with the people around them. She’d made a hasty—and ridiculously biased—judgment about him based on her own history with handsome gentlemen. But the viscount wasn’t like them at all.

  He truly cared about her—and about her maid, Lane. He’d immediately called for a doctor for poor Lane when they’d returned, and seen that the butler had taken the lady’s maid in hand when they were in the house.

  “Mary?” he queried, his brows now drawn together. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes.” She shook her head and ventured a wobbly smile. “I’m sorry, I was gathering wool.”

  Her smile must not have been very convincing, for the frown didn’t leave his face. “I’m sure this afternoon has been a terrible shock. Come. Tea will restore us.”

  He gently tucked her hand into his elbow and led her up the stairs.

  The gunshot had been a shock, and seeing Lane with blood all over her arm had been most distressing, but that hadn’t been Mary’s main worry.

  This was the second gunshot aimed at them in two days.

  She couldn’t help but think that Lord Blackwell had an enemy.

  She shivered at the thought as they entered the sitting room.

  Mary waited until the viscount showed her to a settee before saying, “You’re your father’s heir, aren’t you?”

  He gave her an odd look as he sat down in a chair to her right. “Yes, of course.”

  She inhaled, but really there was no delicate way to ask the question. “If you died, who would inherit the earldom?”

  Lord Blackwell’s eyes widened, but before he could reply, the sitting room door opened to admit two maids bearing tea.

  For a moment both she and the viscount were quiet as the maids laid out the tea—they’d brought some lovely little custard tarts as well—and then they left.

  “My cousin, Richard,” Lord Blackwell replied as soon as the door was closed again. “But he wouldn’t do what you’re thinking.”

  “What am I thinking?” Mary asked neutrally as she poured the tea.

  “That he’s the one shooting,” the viscount said flatly. “Richard is a bit of an ass, but he wouldn’t try and kill me. Besides, he’s a terrible shot.”

  “Assassins can be hired,” she replied as she handed him his dish of tea.

  His eyebrows winged up. “Good Lord. How are you aware of that?”

  “I did grow up in St Giles.” She sat back with her own tea.

  “Point,” he said and took a sip. “But I doubt that it’s me they’re trying to shoot.”

  “My lord—”

  He waved a hand irritably. “Please. Call me Henry. You’re my fiancée now. Not to mention that I’ve kissed you.”

  She hesitated with her hand hovering over the plate of tarts and darted a quick look at his face. Had he been one of the boys at the orphanage, she would’ve called his expression mulish.

  She chose a tart and placed it on a delicate china plate. “Very well, Henry, though I must point out that the kiss was quite fleeting.”

  “It was, wasn’t it?” he said, his voice deeper.

  “One might even conclude that it doesn’t count as a kiss at all,” she mused. She lowered her eyelashes demurely as she bit into the tart, waiting breathlessly for his response.

  There was a moment of silence during which all she heard was the pounding of her pulse.

  Then Henry set his teacup firmly on the table, rose, and moved to the settee next to Mary. He took her teacup and plate out of her unresisting hands, placed them aside, and drew her into his arms.

  He kissed her.

  He took possession of her lips without any sort of hesitation, parting them and running his tongue along the inner edge of her bottom lip.

  Mary stifled a moan as pleasure burst through her body.

  She’d wondered if what she’d felt with that first kiss might just be an oddity. Something that couldn’t be replicated.

  But it hadn’t.

  It was he—Henry.

  He slid his tongue into her mouth, moving forcefully even as he angled his face against hers, his arms pulling her close against his chest.

  She felt taken. Captured. As if he commanded her at the moment.

  As if he could do anything to her.

  His hand was at the back of her neck, and he bit gently on her bottom lip before letting it go.

  When next he thrust his tongue inside her she suckled it—and this time she couldn’t stifle her groan.

  She’d never thought a kiss could be so erotic. Could engender such urgency in her.

  She wanted to spread apart her legs. Wanted to invite him to touch her wherever he might want.

  The mere thought made her hot.

  Then suddenly she was thrust back against the settee and he left her.

  She blinked at him, now sitting in the chair.

  “Someone’s at the door,” he hissed.

  She just had time to straighten before the door to the sitting room opened and Lady Angrove and Jo came in, followed by a man wearing the bobbed wig and black dress of a vicar and a large, pink-cheeked woman.

  “My dears,” Lady Angrove said, hurrying over to Mary and Henry. “I’ve just been informed that Lane was shot whilst you were out riding! I don’t know what London is coming to with these young gentlemen taking to drink at all hours of the day. Why just last month, Mrs. Tremble-Bull saw a trio of drunken youths staggering down the street right in front of her house on Grosvenor Square and it was one in the afternoon.” Lady Angrove took a deep breath. “But I do hope you are unhurt, Cecilia?”

  “I’m quite fine,” Mary replied. Thank goodness the older woman was so loquacious. It had given her a bit of time to compose herself. She daren’t glance Henry’s way, for she knew she’d blush horribly if she did.

  She could still taste him on her tongue.

  “Thank the Lord for that!” exclaimed Lady Angrove as Jo took a seat right beside Mary.

  The other girl leaned toward her and whispered, “Oh, I’m so glad that you and the viscount are getting along!”

  Mary glanced at her, knowing full well that a blush was negating any sort of protest she might make. As she met her sister’s laughing brown eyes, Mary had the most ridiculous urge to giggle.

  She was suddenly very glad that she had a sister—and that her sister was Jo.

  The other girl took her hand as if she knew what Mary was thinking and squeezed companionably.

  Henry, who had stood at their entrance, gestured to the tea. “Won’t you have some tea, my lady? I’m told it is a wonderful restorer.”

  “Oh, thank you.” The countess crossed to the door. “I’ll send for more.”

  But the gentleman in the bobbed wig was frowning now. “Were you closeted alone with my cousin, sirrah? This is disgraceful!”

  Henry turned to look at the gentleman so rudely accusing him of nefarious deeds with his fiancée. The man was at least sixty, with bandy legs, a weathered, reddened face, and a disapproving expression.

  Henry l
ifted an eyebrow. “And you are?”

  “Cousin Lancelot,” Lady Angrove sighed, turning from the door where she’d ordered tea from a footman. “My lord, this is my cousin Lancelot Fitzgerald and his wife, Lillian. My cousin is a vicar in a small parish outside Cambridge. Cousin Lancelot, this is Lord Henry Blackwell, the heir to the Earl of Keating—and Cecilia’s fiancé.”

  The older man huffed, seemingly not at all impressed with Henry’s pedigree. “Yes, well, that’s as may be, but they aren’t married yet.” He drew himself up importantly. “My lord, it is the husband who must see to the wife’s spiritual welfare, and I hardly think to begin in such a scandalous way—”

  “Yes, yes, Cousin,” Lady Angrove interrupted hastily as she took a seat near her daughters. “But I think we should sit down before the tea becomes cold.”

  Henry sat again without comment as Lady Angrove turned to say something to her daughters. Fitzgerald was a boorish ass, but he did have a point.

  Henry had most definitely been behaving scandalously with Mary not seconds before the others had entered. He should be ashamed, but he couldn’t find it within himself to feel so. She’d responded so easily—so freely—to him. Even now he fancied he could smell her: a delicate violet scent. He’d nearly forgotten himself in ravishing her mouth, his blood heating, his cock stirring. If he hadn’t heard Lady Angrove’s voice in the hall outside, the others would’ve walked into a most scandalous scene.

  He darted a glance at Mary. She was sitting calmly, her hands folded in her lap, paying rapt attention to her mother. No one would guess, looking at her, that only moments before she’d been panting into his mouth.

  The thought made his loins tighten, and he casually flipped the skirt of his coat over his lap.

  “But, my dear, you have a curl coming down,” Lady Angrove was saying. She reached to pin a lock of Mary’s hair over her ear. “It must be from all the excitement in the park. I do think…” Her voice died away, and for a moment she stared at her daughter’s ear. Then Lady Angrove smiled and lifted her hands away. “There. As good as new.”