Temptation & Twilight

“I will not burn you,” Sutherland said with disgust. “Barbaric thought. I’ll sew you up good and tight and hope for the best.”

“Much more expedient with the poker. Use it.”

Sutherland ignored him as usual. And unable to provoke a fight to give himself something to fix upon other than the pain, Iain thought of pleasure. His thoughts drifted back to the hours before—at the Sumners’, when he had clutched Elizabeth’s voluptuous curves to his hard body.

A man could make a meal out of her. He certainly wanted to. An image took hold, and he barely felt the straight needle prick him, diving under skin and tissue, grabbing more flesh before being pulled tight, tugging the ragged edges of his wound together.

Closing his eyes, he thought of Elizabeth, her long, sable hair unbound, spilling in velvet waves upon a glistening mahogany dining table. Naked, pale, full curves outlined against shining veneer, beneath the delicate glow of a chandelier. She was surrounded by wine goblets and tiered plates of grapes and strawberries.

He sat at the end of the table, sipping a dark merlot, studying the landscape of her body, the way it arched and curved before him. He would wait—would make her wait—as he watched her. He would talk to her, suggest wicked, lascivious things he wanted to watch her do. She would respond to his voice, would be helpless to stop the movement of her body along the table. Her lips would move and part, her breasts … He groaned, not in pain, but pleasure, as he thought of the way her breasts would bounce and sway. He’d have her on her knees, palms planted on the table as she crawled to him, amidst rolling grapes spilling from overturned silver dishes, and streaming rivulets of red wine snaking from toppled goblets. He would watch her, unable to take his gaze off her breasts, the turgid nipples, the way her shining hair moulded to the sway of her full, rounded hips.

“Lower” he would command, and she would respond, as she had once responded so beautifully to his voiced commands. In this fantasy, it was no less true. Lower … And she would raise her hips, lower her breasts till they just scraped the table with their pointed tips. He’d watch the red wine cover her nipples as she crawled, and the wine drip from them.

Licking his dry lips, Iain watched his fantasy play out in his heated mind, the drops of crimson wine slipping from elongated nipples, the slow, seductive crawl on her knees to him, the feel of his cock, so hard, so throbbing, released from his trousers, his hand fisting it…. Then the movement of his body, the lowering of his head, his lips beneath her breast—so close, waiting for the next drop of wine to slip effortlessly onto his tongue. Her sigh when he drew her into his mouth and suckled, as he pleasured himself … He could come just imagining it.

“I believe, my lord, that we are all finished.”

Reluctantly, Alynwick pulled himself from the fantasy to see his shoulder bandaged in white cloth. One glance down the length of his body to his tented kilt made him close his eyes with a groan.

“Whatever you were thinking about, my lord,” Sutherland said knowingly, “it worked. You didn’t flinch once.”

TWO HOURS LATER, Alynwick sat in a large chair before the Duke of Sussex, with yet another tent in his kilt as he thought of the images that had flowed through his vivid, fevered imaginings while Sutherland worked over him.

How easy it was to conjure the image of a fair Elizabeth, naked, crawling toward him, red wine staining her body. In his mind he had been seated like a sultan before a harem girl, studying her—his possession. He loved to watch, and there was no woman he found more fascinating than Elizabeth York, with her exterior of innocence, and the eagerness of a harlot. He’d once watched her in the grass, watched the undulations of her body beneath his roving hand as he made her come with slow, knowing caresses and whispered words that were far too indecent for any well-bred young lady’s ears.

She had been younger then, less full than she was now. She’d been beautiful to his eyes, but now … Now he’d give what remained of his soul to see her body, all full, voluptuous curves and soft planes, with secret places for his hand to touch, his lips to caress. He’d had only a glimpse of it last evening, and he wanted more. So much more. To say he was hungry for her was an amusing understatement. He was starved for her.

He groaned, wiped his palm along his unshaved face. He was damn hard, sitting before Sussex while thinking lurid thoughts of the duke’s sister. He really was an unrepentant rake to debase the innocent sister of his friend with his lascivious dreams and erotic wishes.

“What’s with you?” Black demanded of the silent duke. “Are you ill?”

For the first time, Iain took in Sussex’s haggard appearance, and felt some measure of pleasure. His Grace looked nearly as worn as he did this morning.

When he and Black had barged into Sussex’s study not more than ten minutes before, they had roused the duke from his sleep on the couch. Sussex had nothing to grumble about; he had not been shot in the shoulder. It was then that Alynwick recalled he had some unfinished business with his friend.

“What the devil d’ye think ye were doing, fobbing me off at Grantham Field?” he asked indignantly, his anger getting the better of him and allowing him to slip into his brogue. “Ye were supposed ta be me second!”

“No,” Sussex growled impatiently, “one of us was supposed to be your second, and because you showed up at the Sumners’ musicale drunk and itching for a fight, I had to bodily remove you from said musicale. Ergo, I was not able to perform as your second, since I wanted to shoot you my goddamn self!”

“I wasna drunk,” Alynwick grumbled, wishing he could forget about the scene he’d created at the Sumners’. “Itchin’ fer a fight, aye, but no’ drunk.”

“Careful,” Black said with some amusement, “your cultured English accent is giving way to your heathen Highland one.”

Black was hardly helping. And the bastard seemed to be taking an extraordinary amount of enjoyment out of it all. Iain rarely allowed himself to fall victim to his brogue. All the more evidence that something was ruling him, and it was not the coldhearted calculations he was notorious for.

Sussex’s steel-grey eyes settled on him once more. “Surely you did not believe that it was the thing to do to be your second after the stir you caused at the Sumners’? Everyone saw what happened, and how I had to remove your arm from Sheldon’s throat!”

“Get at yer point, ye windbag,” he snapped, hating the earl’s name being mentioned. Iain had purposely tried to forget that Elizabeth had been in that room hanging on to the arm of another man. And by the looks of things, bloody well enjoying herself.

“My point, you infuriating brute, is this. We are not supposed to be friends, or even acquaintances, in the eyes of the polite world. We’re to pretend that our own private circles do not cross, so no one will suspect that we are acquainted—in ways we have all vowed never to reveal. And then you stroll in and force my hand, making my sister the object of ridicule and gossip, and you wonder why I didn’t come and perform as your second? The reason, you Highland ninny, is simple—because no one would believe it! No one would think it plausible that we were out for a pint, met up and I just merrily agreed to travel at dawn to some godforsaken farmer’s field to aid you in putting a bullet hole in someone, when not four hours before you were importuning my sister and nearly killing the Earl of Sheldon!”

Black’s gaze volleyed between them, then he groaned as the truth of Sussex’s revelations sank in. “Alynwick, you didn’t. Good God, you did, didn’t you?”

Iain was not chastised, and more to the point, he was ready to fight again. “You didn’t force me away from anything,” he sneered. “I allowed you to tear me off that piece of trash.”

“And how do you know anything about Sheldon,” Sussex growled, “when your face is constantly gazing into the bottom of a whisky decanter?”

Iain lunged over the desk, ready to tear his friend apart, but Black caught him by the coat and hauled him back. “None of that, now,” he grunted as he tossed Alynwick into the chair. “Stay!” he shouted, pointing at Iain as if he were a biddable canine when he tried to stand up again.

“I’m no’ a bloody mongrel to heed yer commands.”

“Really?” Black straightened his waistcoat and resumed his seat. “You look like something that’s been roaming the street for weeks. Where did you go after I left you in Sutherland’s care?”

He’d gone to find Lady Larabie, that’s where. But he’d been too deep in thought to do anything but regale the lady with the gossip of his fight with her husband. Contrary to Larabie’s boasts, the man had not returned home to deal with his wife, but instead made his way to his club in St. James’s. That had left the lady free to dally, but dallying had been the last thing on Iain’s mind. In a strange mood, he had sought out Georgiana for something else entirely. Comfort perhaps. Solace. She’d provided nothing of the sort—only petulance that he did not seem inclined to pleasure her. He was literally sickened by it, sitting in her overly ornate little parlor fending off her roving hands, when all he really wanted was to lay his head in her lap and feel her feminine fingers run through his hair while he pretended he was with Elizabeth. But it had all been to no avail. The lady was not capable of solace, and he had left, disgusted with himself for desiring such a thing. Iain Sinclair did not need anything from anyone—most especially sanctuary in a woman’s arms.

With a sigh, he answered, “You doona want t’ know where I was.”

“By the stench of you, I think I already do.”

Iain sent Black a glare, aware that he appeared debauched. But he wasn’t. He was restless, mindless. There was a sickness ruling his thoughts, and if he had the courage to look through the darkness inside him, he’d be able to name the illness. He was heartsick, his soul crying out for the one remedy that could cure his illness. Elizabeth.

But she did not want him, or the love that he could no longer deny.

Sliding deeper into the chair, Iain allowed his hands to riffle through his hair. He wanted his bed, the cool, crisp sheets, and he wanted the images of Elizabeth burning his brain. In his fantasies he could have anything. Even Elizabeth back again.

“Good God, Alynwick, what the devil were you thinking, coming to the Sumners’ and stirring up that scene?” Sussex continued, his considerable arrogance pricked. “It’ll be in all the gossip rags this morning, and we don’t need that kind of exposure. Damn you!”

Sulking, Iain stared out the window, thinking of last night and the scene that had greeted him. A smiling—glowing—Elizabeth standing beside a man who was looking down upon her with far too much interest. “A provocation, I believe.” He was under control now, his brogue banished. “I was never good at resisting taunts.”

“Taunts?” Black asked quizzically as he looked from Alynwick to Sussex. The duke shrugged.

“I told you,” Alynwick growled with quiet menace, “to leave her out of this.”

“We’re afraid, old boy, that neither of us understands a damned thing coming out of your mouth,” Black drawled.

“Yes, whom are you referring to, and what was this taunt?”

“Elizabeth!” Iain said it with such a snarl that Sussex sat back in his chair. “Damn you both, don’t you know the trouble she can get into? It could make matters worse for us. She has no place in this affair. She should be at home, beneath a wool blanket, sitting by the fire, where nothing and no one can touch her!”

Black and Sussex stared at one another, confusion written all over their expressions, but Iain didn’t give a damn. So be it if they discovered that he was unable to think of anything other than Elizabeth this morning.

“Dear me,” said a sweetly feminine voice from the doorway. “All this roaring and fighting has awakened the entire house.”

Iain stiffened at the sound, but kept his gaze focused on the grey streaks of daylight breaking through the rain clouds. He was not yet ready to see her, to feel the onslaught of emotions when he looked into her lovely and haunting grey eyes.

“Elizabeth, do come in,” Sussex ordered.

“I’ll be on my way, then,” Iain muttered, while he rose.

“Really, Alynwick, don’t be so childish. Do you think I am naive? I know exactly what you think of me, my infirmity and my limited skill in aiding your cause. You don’t have to go slinking off because I’ve overheard you talking about me.”

It was like a knife to his heart. He never wanted to hurt her. Never again. “My apolo—”

“I don’t require that, either,” she said. “Because it’s a lie. You aren’t sorry. It’s what you feel. Don’t bother to deny it.”

“You have no idea what I fe—”

With a slight wave of her hand, she effectively cut him dead, and he knew the expression on his face was one of shock and outrage.

“Do carry on,” Elizabeth ordered. “I only came for a cup of tea. Mrs. Hammond claims to have brought you a tray, and I don’t want to wait for another tray to be sent up.”

Black did the honours pouring, and Iain watched as his friend carefully passed her the cup and saucer. Her morning gown, a crème-colored silk-and-lace confection with long, fluttering sleeves, was at once prim and proper, yet so damn enticing. It made him want to slowly pull the tie of her wrapper loose to discover what wicked thing she wore beneath.

“Now, then, keep it down, if you please, or the servants will be privy to everything. I heard two maids giggling as I approached the study. No doubt they were spying. As an aside, Lucy and I will be meeting today. It’s likely she’ll come here, so I hope the three of you will make yourselves scarce, because I plan on quizzing her about matters.”

“What matters?” Iain demanded. He hated how Sussex allowed her take to part in any Brethren discussions. It wasn’t safe.

“That, my lord, is none of your concern. Seek your own clues to this case, and I will seek mine. Now, then, come along, Rosie,” she said regally. And obeying her ladyship, Elizabeth’s spaniel nudged her in the right direction, away from anything that might impede her regal exit.

“Damned female,” Iain grunted bitterly. “A curse and a pox on headstrong women who won’t be led by a man.”

“I daresay you’ll have half the women of London sporting pox marks and curses, Alynwick.”

Iain scowled at Black, but continued to watch as Elizabeth disappeared through the door. The thought of her being hurt while trying to aid them in the search for Orpheus sent fear through him. Iain Sinclair, Marquis of Alynwick, feared nothing—except losing Elizabeth. Even though she did not belong to him, and likely never would, Iain took comfort in the fact that he could see her, listen to her, stand back and quietly watch her, and think of the impossible—all the things he would do and say to her if she was his to possess. If he couldn’t see her, if she were taken and no longer a part of his world, he wouldn’t survive. His stolen looks and dreams of her sustained him.

No, Elizabeth must not be allowed to be part of this mystery that surrounded them. The danger was too real, and the thought of losing her much too painful. But before he could speak his mind, and protest her involvement, Black interjected.

“Now, then, gentlemen, if you please,” the earl murmured as he sat in the chair opposite Sussex’s desk, sipping at his tea as though he were a damned prince. “The task of the duel is done, the objective reached and our mission can commence,” he said smoothly. “I acted as second, performed a credible act, and now it is all water under the bridge.”

“Oh, go to hell, Black,” Alynwick muttered as he sank farther into the matching chair. “You’re being a self-righteous bastard, and I’d love to shove my fist into that smug face of yers.”

Black’s black brows rose over the rim of his teacup, and Sussex groaned, closing his eyes.

“Be that as it may, we need to go forward from here. What is our next move? Sussex, have you learned any more about the coins, or Orpheus?”

“As a matter of fact I have, just last night—”

“Your pardon, Your Grace,” his butler said from the doorway.

“What is it now?” Sussex groaned, sending the butler, Hastings, scurrying behind the wooden panel, only to peer around it.

“You have a caller.”

“What?”

“A caller. A visitor,” Hastings clarified.

“Now? At this hour?”

“Your Grace?” the butler discreetly cleared his throat. “Shall I send her on her way?”

Before Sussex could answer, a flurry in emerald-green velvet trimmed in black satin swam through the door, causing Sussex’s butler to grow white with horror.

“And what is the meaning of this?”

Iain watched as Lucy Ashton stormed into the room, cornering Sussex in his domain.

“I do not,” she spat, “respond to this sort of blackmail. Oh, good day, Lord Black, Lord Alynwick.” She dropped a quick but polite curtsey, then turned once more to face Sussex, before either of them had a chance to rise from his chair. Iain watched her slamming a folded piece of paper on the desk, wondering where her ire sprang from.

“You, Your Grace, may offer me an explanation.”

Sussex waved his hand, silently telling them to bugger off, but Iain was not inclined to honour his wishes. At the duke’s lethal glare, he and Black reluctantly started to leave.

They were strolling across the study when Mrs. Hammond, the Sussex housekeeper, screamed with such a bloodcurdling howl that they all went running into the hall.

“Your Grace,” Mrs. Hammond shouted. “Oh, good God in heaven! Your Grace! You must come!”

They found the plump housekeeper, her white linen cap askew, running breathlessly down the hall from the kitchen, her arms flailing.

“What is it, Mrs. Hammond?” Sussex enquired, catching the woman by the shoulders.

“There now, lass,” Iain murmured. “Take a deep breath and tell us. It canna be as bad as all this.”

The housekeeper’s brown eyes were wild with fear. Shaking her head, she looked from Iain to the duke. “It can, your lordships. It can be worse. Oh,” she cried into her apron. “It’s over there, Your Grace, at the door to the kitchen gardens. A dead body—oh, I shall never recover!”

CHAPTER FIVE

SUSSEX WAS FIRST TO REACH the kitchen, with Iain hard on his heels. Alynwick had the very unsettling image of Elizabeth lying crumpled in the back garden, her body twisted in an unnatural position. It made him want to run to find her, to knock Sussex out of the way out of fear and desperation. Iain’s throat was dry, his breathing ragged, and in his mind he frantically called her name. Beth …!

The garden door was open wide, and a wheelbarrow heaped with dried leaves and twigs sat on the flagstone path.

“What is the meaning of this?” Sussex growled, his boots ringing shrilly as he ran. When he reached the barrow he stopped, frozen. Blue satin spilled from it, rippling in the early morning wind. Iain closed his eyes and whispered a prayer of gratitude. It was not Elizabeth.

Sussex brushed the leaves away, and the face of a woman was revealed, pasty white and bruised, and unfortunately, dead. “Anastasia,” he whispered.

Iain heard Lucy gasp behind him. Saw over his shoulder that Elizabeth, still wearing her morning gown and wrapper, was hastily making her way down the hall with her pregnant spaniel waddling beside her, guiding her mistress away from a rosewood table. On top was an enormous bouquet of hothouse flowers and a silver salver filled with correspondence that sat precariously near the corner of the table, where it might catch on Elizabeth’s sleeve. Stepping back, Iain went to her and took her arm none too gently. He was trembling, still thinking of the vision of her lying dead on the flagstones. Her damnable independent streak would be the ruin of her, not to mention the ruination of his sanity. “Unhand me, Alynwick!”

“How did you know it was me?” he asked incredulously, unnerved, and more than curious about how she was able to discern it was him from all the others present.

“I can smell you, if you must know!”

Something primal and visceral ran through him as the intimacy of her words hit him. “You know my scent?”

He hadn’t meant for his voice to be almost a growl, nor had he meant to pull her roughly to a stop. But now that he had her, her elbows cupped in his palms, her lace wrapper smashed up against his chest, he wasn’t going to apologize.

Looking down at her upturned face, he saw surprise and wariness in her gaze. How long it had been since he’d allowed himself to look deeply into her eyes? They were perfect, a stormy grey, the black pupils large, the left one a bit larger than the right. A lush sweep of curved black lashes blinked slowly. He could see himself reflected in her eyes, and selfishly was relieved that she could not see his lovelorn expression—the hope that something more than animosity might grow between them.

“How do I smell?” he asked, his voice quiet and a bit hoarse. She softened, yielding the slightest fraction, and he bit his lip at the way her breasts pressed against him. Resisted the urge to wrap his arm around her waist and slip his free hand beneath her wrapper to cup her, to pull at her nipple, preparing to draw it into his mouth.

“Like the woods,” she said, her voice not at all steady and sure, “at twilight. Musky, earthy, with the taste of cedar and the crispness of night.”

Twilight had always been her favourite time of the day. When she had started losing her sight, the glare of the sun had always diminished her vision. But come night, and the dark blues, grays and mauves of evening, Elizabeth saw everything clearer, sharper. He had purposely made love to her for the first time at twilight so that she might see everything he did to her.

It had been in the woods, on the Sinclair plaid, that he had taken her. Had watched the night fall upon her naked body, which glowed pure and innocent beneath the silvery moonlight and his large hands. How he wanted that back—to have her once again beneath him!

Frowning, she tried to pull away, but he held her tight.

“Stay.” One word, said with the hope of a man struggling to hold on.

“No.”

She pulled away, but he reached for her again, forced her to accept his arm. As they walked out into the early morning sun, he took in the scene, described what he saw to Elizabeth, who suddenly seemed to be holding on to him, not the other way around.

“Good God, a woman? Dead?” she gasped.

“Yes,” he whispered. Sussex was speaking.

“Who is it? Good Lord, how did she come to be here, in our kitchen garden?” Elizabeth demanded.

“Shh, let’s listen,” Iain whispered. “Your brother is investigating the body now. I see recognition in his eyes. Sussex,” he called out. “Who the devil is she?”

The duke didn’t answer.

“She’s still warm,” Lucy whispered beside them, and Iain watched as she crossed herself, shuddering. “And look.” Lucy pulled a folded letter from the woman’s lax fingers. Iain read the missive over Sussex’s shoulder, then reached for Elizabeth, unconsciously wrapping a protective arm around her waist.

It might have been the redhead. We crossed paths, but I thought I’d give you one final warning. Send another spy to my club, and the redhead will suffer a fate far more painful than this one.

It could very well have been Elizabeth, Iain thought, and despite her resistance, he lifted her into his arms and carried her back into the house, for fear the madman might be still lurking in the garden, might see her and fix his murdering gaze upon her. This had gone too far. It was much too dangerous for her to be allowed out of sight. She needed protecting.

“You will not aid Sussex anymore in our search for Orpheus, do you understand?” Iain demanded as he carried her deeper into the house, away from the horrible crime on the kitchen step.