Have You Any Rogues? (8 page)

Crispin making love to her. Inside her, filling her, claiming her until she was just like this—panting for want of what she knew not.

From the moment he’d tugged her into his arms, she’d melted, surrendered any bit of good sense she possessed to discover if her years of secret, torrid dreams were true.

Hen quickly discovered dreams were ethereal and hardly made of the muscled, solid strength that surrounded her, possessed her, commanded her—especially when he touched her, teased her so.

And yes, she couldn’t help herself, she pleaded with him.

Make me yours.
She realized she no longer cared about ruin, or scandal, or marriage. Listening to his story, she would have sworn he’d risked everything for this moment, this dangerous chance.

How could she deny him now, when it was a desire they shared?

Ever so much.

Even now, she had the sense he was seeking something deeper than just passion. Something they’d lost that early dawn when she’d tried so desperately to be with him—and failed.

“Please, Crispin,” she whispered, running her hands across the front of his breeches, letting her fingers slide along the length of him.

He was hard and long beneath her touch, and she shivered with anticipation, catching his bottom lip with her teeth and nipping at him as she opened the buttons that held him back from her.

One by one, until he was freed and his solid length thrust into her eager grasp.

She glanced around them, trying to see where this could be done, how they could manage this,
now,
this very moment.

Crispin, she discovered, was as impatient as she, and he hitched her leg around his hip, pinned her to the door and found his way to her opening, thrusting inside her, leaving her gasping for air.

He filled her, quickly, hard and fast, and Henrietta would have let out a loud, eager moan if he hadn’t covered her mouth with his.

Thus they were joined—precariously, Crispin thrusting into her, sliding over her sex, leaving her gasping, while his tongue teased and taunted her.

Henrietta had never imagined this . . . this wild, hungry dance. The solid door behind her, the hard, ravenous man covering her, filling her, claiming her.

Again and again, he thrust into her, and Henrietta grew more and more breathless. Her need rising, her desires leaving her coiling tighter and tighter, closer to him, closer to the reward that beckoned her.

“You are mine, Henrietta Seldon,” he told her, promised her, binding her with his words and then with his body, as he thrust hard and sure into her and sent her willingly into the bliss that had been awaiting them for far too long.

A taste of heaven that she’d never known.

C
rispin carried Henrietta to the low wide settee in the corner, cradling her in his arms and settling them both in the velvet cushions.

Mine.

He’d meant it.

Henrietta’s eyes were half closed and she had a lazy, happy smile on her lips. “I didn’t realize it could be like
that
.”

“You didn’t know?” he asked, realizing what she was saying.

She nuzzled closer to him. “You did that to me. Thank you ever so much.” She made a sound like a cat purring for more.

Crispin grinned and was ready to oblige her, feeling ridiculously proud that he’d been the one to take her over the edge, put that contented look of bliss on her face.

Her hand cupped his chin. “If you hadn’t gone to France, we might have been doing this for years now,” she chided with a grin.

“Yes, yes. I know. My Aunt Damaris reminds me of my folly any occasion she can work it into the conversation. Which is nearly constantly.”

Henrietta didn’t blame the old girl. “When I heard that Bonaparte had ordered arrests—” She looked away.

“You thought me lost,” he realized.

She nodded. “After the peace accord ended, I waited a year, thinking you couldn’t have been caught. Arrested. I did everything I could to put off my parents, delay a betrothal that had been in the works since the day I was born. Gave every missish, petulant excuse I could devise to keep from marrying Astbury because I had no word of what had happened to you.” Henrietta sighed and looked away.

“What changed?” he asked.

“I couldn’t live with the not knowing. I’d become utterly desperate . . . that is until I saw your cousin, Philomena, at a soirée.”

“Oh, you wicked girl,” he laughed, knowing exactly what Henrietta had done. “Poor Cousin Phi.”

“Yes, well, it is common knowledge that she’s rather nearsighted—”

“So you resorted to subterfuge.” He shook his head.

“The Foreign Office would have been quite impressed,” she told him, smiling smugly. “I came over to where she was standing—”

“With all the other wallflowers—” he guessed.

She shrugged. “Yes.”

“And
you
posed as one of them?”

The idea of Henrietta Seldon blending into the spinsters and forgotten souls of the walls was hilarious. It was like a lioness standing amidst a field of mice.

Henrietta sniffed at his doubts. “As I said, the Foreign Office would have found it a most convincing effort.”

“Not so when the object of your deception can’t see past her nose.”

Henrietta scrambled to sit up from where she’d been nested in his arms. “I needed news of you. Would you rather I knocked on your Aunt Damaris’s door and demanded an accounting of your whereabouts?”

Crispin sputtered. “You would have stopped her heart.”

Now it was Henrietta’s turn to laugh. “I’ll make sure to never mention that to my Aunt Zillah—she’d come calling before the day was out.”

“They do despise each other, don’t they?”

“That’s an understatement,” Henrietta agreed as she curled back into his embrace.

They both laughed a bit, for the two old girls hated each other with a vehemence that bordered on the unholy, and they would do everything in their power to keep Henrietta and Crispin apart if they ever suspected there was even a hint of affection between the pair.

He shook his head and didn’t want to consider Aunt Damaris’s opinions. Not now. “Yes, well, so you came up to my poor blind cousin and did what?”

“I acted as if we were old friends and asked how her cousin fared in France.” Henrietta turned away, for the words still rang in her ears.

I fear we have little hope of ever seeing him again.

Henrietta drew an unsteady breath. “That’s what she said,” she told him, her voice wistful. “I thought you lost.”

“Never. Not when I had you in my heart. You were my star. My siren calling me home each night,” he told her, kissing her lightly on the forehead, his lips eagerly moving down to capture hers again.

They kissed, their bodies stirring anew, until outside in the hallway, the sound of voices stopped them both cold.

“I will find where my nephew has gone, and I will find him now!” This was followed with a grand
huff
. “It is imperative I stop him before he goes mad.”

“Oh, good God! Aunt Damaris!” Crispin said like an oath, righting them both as he got to his feet and immediately set to work straightening his clothes.

Henrietta followed suit. “What if she—”

Crispin put a finger to his lips to silence her, for neither of them truly wanted to face
that
scene. Henrietta quickly set to work hiding the evidence of her dishabille.

“He went down that hall not long ago, madam,” one of the footmen intoned.

“Find him!” the lady ordered. “He’s in terrible danger.”

From behind him, Henrietta whispered in his ear, “Am I dangerous?”

“Utterly,” he replied, turning around and taking her into his arms for one last moment. “You’ve stolen my heart.”

As Aunt Damaris’s determined footsteps rang louder, Crispin looked around the small room for some place to hide Hen, but there was nowhere, save the dark gardens beyond.

Apologetically, he nodded toward the set of French doors. “Do you mind?”

She laughed quietly. “What? And escape your aunt’s wrath? I’d walk through hell merrily rather than face that old—” She snapped her lips shut, then clapped her hand over her mouth as if she needed added insurance not to finish that sentence.

Not that Crispin didn’t know exactly what she had been about to say. “Yes, I know.
Old dragon
. We call her that as well—but only behind her back and only if one is well north of the Scottish borders.” He kissed Henrietta once more, then prodded her out the doors. “I’ll come to your rooms later.”

Henrietta’s eyes sparked, and she blew him a kiss before quickly melding into the night.

B
y the time the door to the salon swung open, Crispin had already settled himself in a chair by the fireplace.

“Whatever are you doing?” Aunt Damaris demanded.

“Aunt, I never thought of you as one to pry into a gentleman’s business.”

“Where is she?” Damaris came barging into the room, searching about, even in the corners.

“Who?” Crispin asked.

“You know who,” she shot back as she looked suspiciously at the garden doors.

“Hardly. Especially if I have to ask. Twice.”

“Don’t be coy with me, boy. I’ve known you since you squalled your first. I saw how you looked at her. A Seldon, Crispin! A Seldon.”

“A Seldon? Truly? And me without a pistol at the ready.” He rose from where he’d been sitting and nodded for her to take the grand chair.

There was nothing Aunt Damaris loved more than a good throne from which to scold.

“Don’t jest with me,” she said, moving to the chair, since her search had been fruitless. “This is most serious, Crispin. What that upstart little
cit
was thinking seating you next to the likes of her—”

“You mean Lady Knapton?”

“No! Lady Astbury—who, but a few Seasons back, was Lady Henrietta Seldon.”

“No,” he gasped in mock horror. “Then it is a good thing I found her incredibly dull-witted. But then again, all the Seldons are an ill-bred lot, aren’t they?”

“It didn’t look like you were bored to me.”

“I was merely being polite.” He settled into the other chair and stuck his long legs out in front of him, as if settling in for a good coze.

Aunt Damaris snorted. “You were intoxicated by that Jezebel.”

“I hardly think Lady Astbury qualifies as a—”

“A Jezebel, I say. And you were flirting with her. She unfortunately possesses all the beguiling airs her Aunt Zillah used to prance about town—and look at her. Lady Zillah Seldon has never married, but oh, the houses she’s gained over the years, and not in the proper way.” The lady’s brows rose. “Her niece is no different.”

Yes, he got her point. But that was Lady Zillah, not Henrietta.

Yet his aunt wasn’t done. “Oh, Crispin, what did those wretched Frogs do to you that would make you forget the basic tenants of being a Dale. And you,
the
Dale.”

“I assure you, Aunt Damaris, that any hint of interest I might have showed Lady Astbury was naught but a momentary lapse in judgment. A trifle, a meaningless dalliance over dinner—”

“Just make sure it stays that way. Another few courses and she would have had you spellbound with her Seldon wiles. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten what happened to Ruston Dale? He was never quite right after he was seduced by that witch Yolande Seldon. He had to be restrained.”

“I do believe that had more to do with the fact that he was prone to fits.”

“Harrumph
!” Aunt Damaris deplored being contradicted. Or thwarted. Still, she adjusted her course ever-so-slightly. “You have your lineage to consider. Your duty.”

Translated, his aunt’s words were clear: As the Dale of Langdale, he was obligated to ensure the family line.

And not with a Seldon.

Yet when he looked at Henrietta Seldon, he saw everything he wanted in his viscountess. A lady of beauty and wit. Noble and intelligent.

She’d grace his life, his house, his heart, with a fiery passion, one he’d spent the last few years of imprisonment and deprivation promising himself he’d gain once he was freed.

If anything, that hope, that tiny spark, had carried him through the years of captivity.

But given the look of abject horror on his aunt’s face, he knew he needed to placate her. “Lady Astbury is a widow. Certainly not the sort I’d consider for marriage.” He glanced down at his nails as if bored beyond distraction by this entire conversation.

“I would hope not,” Aunt Damaris said, then she smiled at him, a faint, weary tip of her lips. “I worried so for you, my boy. What would come of all of us if we’d lost you? And if you were to—”

She stopped short of saying the words.

If you were to marry one of them—

“You shall not lose me, dear one,” he said, taking her hand and laying a gentle, gallant kiss on her fingers. “Now off to bed with you. Why Cousin Prudence hasn’t seen you to bed hours ago, I don’t know.”

“I’m not a child to be coddled or bullied,” she shot back.

“Be that as it may, if Prudence won’t take care of you, I’ll replace her with Philomena-”

“Enough!” Damaris protested, for they both knew that as nearsighted as Phi was, she wasn’t as malleable as Prudence Dale, Phi having inherited an excessively stubborn streak from her non-Dale mother. “I’ll go, but only on the condition that you swear, Crispin—”

“Swear what, Auntie?”

She wagged a finger under his nose. “That you stay away from that dreadful woman.”

Crispin laughed. “Do you doubt that I would? Aunt Damaris, I would think that at your age, you would know that a gentleman will flirt, he might even have improper dalliances, but when it comes to marriage, family is first.”

“You have a duty and obligation to marry,” she reminded him yet again as she went to the door.

“Auntie, this I swear: While I will only marry for love, my duty to you and the family will always remain of the utmost importance.”

I
mproper dalliance . . .

Henrietta had heard enough and turned from the garden windows, moving quickly along the side of the house.