Bronwyn Scott (4 page)

Chapter 7

Lucia’s hands trembled as they skimmed her body. This was the point of no return, the point where desire had entrapped not only Ronan but her as well. She’d become a victim of her own strategy.

The wicked game they played had stopped being simply that at some murky point she could not place; perhaps it had been when he’d told her of Jonathon’s betrayal and she’d seen the hurt flare in his eyes—the hurt of a friend, not the anger of a double-crossed spymaster. Perhaps it had been when he’d recounted Jonathon’s last confession and without being told she’d noted all that his actions in those moments implied, how his thoughts and choices had been to protect others. Even his choice of dance partner had been done with an eye to insurance. He had not known there would be trouble that night, but any time information was moved, there was risk, and he’d planned for it by choosing the indomitable Sarah Caldwell, knowing she’d step in if need demanded it. In the telling of those tales, Ronan St. Simon, unassailable, unattainable English spymaster, had become human and therein laid the danger to her.

She wanted
him
. She wanted that man who so selflessly put others first, who fought for right with his body and his mind in the face of great odds, and who looked at her as if she could be the sum of his world. She didn’t deserve such a man and here he was, offering himself to her in exchange for her trust and one small envelope.

Her trust was no small thing to give. Lucia sat in her chair, legs spread wide, hand on her mons, her own need demanding compensation in the wake of having provided pleasure for another. Had this been how Jonathon felt with Marcus? Tormented by the conundrum of how to want without trusting? Quite obviously Jonathon had decided the two could not coexist exclusive of the other. He’d paid for his decision with his life. Now she was faced with the same choice. Could she have Ronan without surrendering her trust? It was far easier to surrender one’s body.

She touched herself, slipping a finger inside her slick folds, Ronan’s bold gaze spurring her on. Her own immediate pleasure would not take long to achieve.

“I can make it better for you.” Ronan’s silken tones purred. “You should not have to settle for mediocre pleasure.” He held up his hands in victory before bending down to untie the cords at his legs.

“How? When?” Lucia stammered in amazement.

“Don’t worry, just moments ago.” Ronan rose, rubbing his wrists, only slightly unsteady on his legs after the vodka and ropes. “Your knots are good.”

Lucia bristled.
Good?
The word was practically an insult. She was a master with knots and he’d reduced her art to child’s play.

Ronan laughed at her chagrin. “Really, your knots are great. I couldn’t have freed myself any sooner even if I’d wanted to, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

Lucia stood, giving up on her own satisfaction, her body sensitive and aching with the need for physical completion. She’d not meant to torture herself when she’d started this game.

“That’s not what I’m thinking, Ronan,” she said huskily, moving toward him. She twined her arms about his neck, feeling the unfettered press of his muscles against her own nakedness. She kissed him softly on the side of the mouth, her hands working free the rest of his hair from the band that held it back. “I’m wondering if I can have you and still maintain an objective measure of doubt.” She let his hair sift through her fingers and felt his body harden against hers. Sweet Mother Mary, his appetites were as insatiable as her own. Any other man would have been a shadow of his former self by now, but not Ronan.

He nipped at her throat with a rough kiss. “Why don’t we find out?” He waltzed her backward in a naked dance to the fainting couch in the corner of the parlor, making it clear he would not be dominated any longer. Indeed, he had only allowed her the illusion of dominance earlier. Suffering subjugation went against his true nature. That true nature was on display right now, every unclad, feral inch of it, seething with virility and power.

The backs of her legs met with the couch and she went down, Ronan over her, his length stretched above her, his hair falling forward. He was all conquering warrior now. He seized her arms, pulling them above her head, shackled in his iron grip, as he took her mouth in a hard kiss. His body settled between her thighs. She was ready for him, wrapping her legs tight around his waist. Subjugation was no more in her nature than it was his. He would find she would be an equal match for his passions, aroused by his rough seduction, not dominated by it.

His mouth took her breasts one by one, laving each nipple until she arched against him, her body begging for more.

Only then did he spear her, driving into her hard and fast. She let herself cry out, knowing that her need was about to be most ably satisfied. She gripped him with her legs, feeling the masculine power of him, the thrusting of his hips in response to the urgent appeals of her body, her own hips rising and falling in rhythm with his. This was ecstasy uncloaked and she screamed her knowledge of that truth out loud. She was caught up in a wave of raw pleasure, Ronan her only anchor before she crashed. His own cries mingled with hers. She was not alone in this surging madness, and she knew in some small sentient part of her mind that these moments had changed her. She’d given herself to Ronan; in these few minutes he’d held her body and soul and she’d held nothing back. She would never be the same, could never be the same, and that change might cost her everything.

Chapter 8

Lucia awoke to the brightness of sunlight streaming through her bedroom window and startled.
Her bedroom?
She’d been in the front parlor with Ronan locked inside her. Ronan! She flung an arm out to feel for his presence and found cold sheets. That brought her upright.

Was he merely up? Was he gone? Was he roaming the house unsupervised? The latter sent a tremor of fear through her. The envelope! Had she been duped at the last? Lucia swung her feet over the side of the bed and grabbed the robe she kept draped over a nearby chair. Thrusting her arms through the silky fabric, she strode to the window. The garden lay directly below her bedroom, empty and silent in the late-morning sun. She breathed a relieved sigh. The envelope was safe.

The door to her room opened and she turned at the sound. Ronan stood there, tray laden with breakfast in hand. The sight of food brought a rumble to her stomach. She had not eaten since luncheon yesterday, but she was hard-pressed to remember such mundane needs when all of her attention was focused on Ronan.

If lamplight had enhanced his features, daylight positively favored them. Or maybe it was the state of half dress. His ruined shirt was open to the waist, where it was tucked into his tight-fitted trousers. His dark hair hung loose about his shoulders and stubble lined his jaw, giving him the look of a swashbuckling pirate or a highwayman just home from a night of prize taking. Oh, to be that wife. Her imagination fired and her core warmed in familiar prelude to full-blown desire.

“Good morning.” Ronan flashed her a stomach-fluttering smile and settled the tray on the table by the window.

“Good morning,” Lucia managed to get out, her overactive imagination still firing images. She should say something, do something. Ronan began setting out the dishes and she belatedly reclaimed her manners. “Let me help you.”

“There is no need.” Ronan removed the last of the dish covers and swept his hand in a gallant flourish toward the table filled with the summer’s first strawberries, toasted bread, pots of jam and crème fraîche, tea and sausages. “Come and eat, breakfast is served.”

He held out a chair for her and she played along, settling into it like a regal queen. “Thank you.”

Ronan took the seat across from her, his eyes a burning topaz as they took her in. Too late she remembered her robe, silky and thin—it was likely transparent in the morning light. “Would you like me to change?” she offered as she poured tea for them both.

“Heavens, no.” Ronan bit into his toast with a grin. There was almost a boyish charm to him, the hard edge of the professional spymaster he’d exuded last night retracted. A word came to mind: fun. This morning Ronan St. Simon seemed
fun.
It was hardly a word she would have associated with him in Vienna five years ago. There’d been nothing fun about him then. Handsome and daring, certainly, but not fun.

“It’s not every day a man gets to eat breakfast across from such a tantalizing view.”

“Nor I either.” Lucia sipped her tea and caught his gaze over the rim of her cup, well aware that the robe gaped open, affording him more than a glimpse of her breasts, bare and aroused beneath the fabric.

Ronan reached for his own teacup. “Is that how it is then? You are not in the custom of taking lovers?”

The question caught her off guard. She’d not been ready for their conversation to take a personal turn. Last night had been about information, business, at least for a while. When it had turned personal, conversation hadn’t been involved. Lucia set down her teacup. “I am not, as you say, in the custom of taking a lover.” It had been quite some time since she’d taken one for real and not for rumor. She added softly, “My attentions are not currently engaged elsewhere.”

Something primal flickered in Ronan’s eyes, indicating the question had been difficult for him to ask. Was that jealousy she saw? Possessiveness? Perhaps even victory? Did he want more from her than the envelope, or was this another game to convince her otherwise?

Ronan leaned across the table and held a berry up to her lips. She bit, making a show of licking the juice with her tongue, knowing that he watched her with the keenest of interest.

He held up another berry. “Have you ever played the game where everything you say has to end with the phrase
in bed
?” There was
that
side of him again, the side that was fun.

“No, I haven’t played
in bed
.” Lucia gave a coy smile at the irony and they laughed together. Based on last night, it would seem unlikely there was little she hadn’t done in bed, but that wasn’t entirely true. Suddenly it mattered to her that he knew it.

“Ronan.” She cocked her head to one side and gave him a considering look. “Do you think because I am rather bold with my passions that I am something of a light skirt
in bed
?”

He chuckled, a warm, intimate sound. “I think you’re very good
in bed
.”

It wasn’t a direct answer, but the game was amusing. She saw its purpose. The humor of it made difficult conversation easier. How odd it seemed that they would need such a device between them; they who spoke and acted so boldly in other ways were now a bit cowed when it came to the more personal.

Lucia hesitated. “I may have pleasured men in various ways.” She didn’t need to say more. He would know the scope contained in that one word,
pleasured
. The courts of Vienna were full of infinite variations of decadent entertainments. They were easy places for the Marcus Troys of the world to appease their assorted palates of appetites. “But I have not had that many lovers in bed.” She looked down at the last of her toast, afraid to meet his eyes, afraid to reveal too much. If he suspected she might feel something for him, how might he use that? Would he respect the knowledge she’d given him? Would he understand not everything they’d done last night had only been business, another strategy in a sordid world?

“Then I am doubly honored.” Ronan’s voice had become a hoarse whisper.

“In bed,” she prompted softly. She nudged his groin with her bare toe under the table, feeling the hard presence of his erection. “I think what you meant to say was that you are doubly honored
in bed
.”

“Do you know what else I like in bed?” Ronan shifted sensually against her foot, like a big jungle cat arching. “Breakfast.”

It was a provocative invitation wrapped in a single word. If she’d harbored any thought that Ronan St. Simon would be decent by day and naughty by night, those thoughts became dust.

“Is that so?” She rose, picking up a pot of crème fraîche, and crooked her finger, beckoning. “I think we can oblige, in bed.”

Chapter 9

Instinctively, Ronan knew this next joining would be slow and intimate, resembling something far different than the hot, competitive couplings that had defined last night. This morning there would be talk between them and with luck, that talk would lead to a dilettante’s pleasure at the end. But such a conclusion was not assured. All he could be certain of was an end. Danger was nearing with every passing hour and he was no closer to his goal. He grabbed up the tray and followed her. They were going to need more than crème fraîche if he was to convince her that his feelings were as genuine as his need for the envelope.

Ronan stripped off his shirt and trousers and stretched out beside her on the bed. He took the crème pot from her and set it with the other things on the tray. He knew what Lucia meant to do with it, but he was in charge now and the roles were about to be reversed. He would be the seducer.

“I was a little surprised to wake up in my bed.” Lucia propped herself up on one arm, facing him. Her robe gaped, showing off a firm, round globe, her dark hair hanging unbound over one shoulder.

Definitely an Aspara
, Ronan thought. He’d been in a perpetual state of hardness since he’d arrived. “I carried you up.”
Tucked you in and slid in beside you right after I slid my knife under the pillow.
Not because he didn’t trust her, but because he hadn’t been entirely truthful about why he’d come. He hoped he wouldn’t have to be.

“How did you know which room was mine?” She smiled and fed him a strawberry from her hand.

How could he not know? “Your favorite color is blue and you despise fussiness. It stood to reason you’d want some place private, away from work, thus a room at the back of the house.” There were other things he could add:
this room smelled like you
,
looked like you.
It had a view of the garden you used to talk about wanting so much.
But any sign of desperation would be like blood in the water.

He reached out a hand and stroked her hair, pushing it behind an ear. “You’re beautiful. It’s good to see you again, to know you’re safe. Are you happy here in Bath?” Would she give this up? Was it merely a temporary adventure in a line of adventures? She’d not been a woman happy in one spot for long when he’d known her in Europe. He could not imagine Bath, of all places, had the capacity to hold her. If he could not wrest that envelope from her and lead the danger away, she might not have a choice.

Lucia gave an elegant half shrug and favored him with a soft smile. “Are you a mind reader now too, Ronan?”

“Just your mind.” He popped a sausage in her mouth, reveling in the feel of her tongue licking the juices off his fingers.

“I have a buyer for the establishment,” Lucia confessed. “I haven’t told anyone yet, but I think I might take the offer. I’ve been here a long time and the allure is waning.”

“Where would you go?” He fed her another sausage.

“That’s just it. I don’t know. Maybe that’s why I haven’t left yet. What about you? What do you do now?”

Now that the game’s over
, was what she meant. He had to answer carefully, give nothing away that might indicate he’d omitted a few important details last night. The game wasn’t precisely over. It had just shifted fronts.

“I’ve been helping Jonathon’s family and I have my own interests to oversee.” That was true, all of it. But his interests weren’t exactly the gentleman farmer type.

Ronan toyed with her hair, reveling in the little gesture and the ability to do something so casually intimate after years of denial. To be here with her like this was a dream unlooked for, one he didn’t want to wake up from, but realities waited on the other side. “You weren’t shocked about Jonathon last night? Not the betrayal part, the other part.”

Lucia laughed, her mouth wide with a smile that made her look both beatific and wicked. “I suspected he had varied tastes. He was the only man I’d ever met who wanted to dance with me without looking down my bodice.”

“What?” Ronan feigned shocked innocence. “Men looked down your bodice?”

She swatted at him. “You know, the old two-second rule? If you only look for two seconds, a woman won’t catch you? Well, I caught plenty of them. The Austrians were the worst.”

“Probably because two seconds isn’t nearly long enough to do your bosom justice,” Ronan teased.

“I even caught you, once or twice,” she scolded. Of course he’d looked. He was male, after all, and no one could resist Lucia. Her very presence made any gathering more vibrant, more alive.

Ronan smiled. “Like I said, two seconds isn’t nearly long enough. In fact, it still isn’t.” He took her in a swift movement, rolling her onto her back, her errant robe coming open as she laughed at his audacity, but she made no move to cover herself. He grabbed her arms in one hand and slid her sash free with the other.

“Oh, no!” Lucia laughed and wiggled beneath him in a halfhearted struggle as she divined his intentions.

“Oh, yes, turnabout is fair play.” Ronan lashed her hands to the headboard with the silk tie. He waggled his dark brows in fun, coming up over her and bracketing her with his hands. A wave of longing surged through him. He wanted this forever, wanted Lucia in his bed, laughing up at him as if they hadn’t a care in the world.

The latter was impossible. For a man like him, there would always be a care in the world that demanded his attention. But the former? Well, that was tantalizingly possible. What if he asked? Would she come away with him? These moments were heady indeed and he intended to enjoy them. They were the calm before the storm, a storm only he knew was about to break.

Ronan made a show of checking the tie, reaching over her and tugging on it with one hand. “I’ve got you right where I want you. Now I can feast my eyes.”

* * *

“Close your eyes,” Ronan whispered, his hand sweeping gently down her face, closing her eyes for her to ensure his order was followed. She did as he requested, but her body tensed in response to the absence of sight.

“Ah, an old habit,” Ronan said, lightly kissing her mouth. He tasted sweet, the remnants of strawberries on his tongue as he ran across her lips. “You were always so very good about engaging your other senses when one was deprived.” He ran a soothing hand down the length of her, coming to rest, warm and comforting, on her belly. “You can relax, Lucia. No harm will come while you’re with me.” His touch, his voice, both mesmerizing and hypnotic in their own ways.

It occurred to her that he must have felt this way last night, bound and deprived of his strength. Yet he’d allowed himself to be at her mercy. He was asking her now implicitly to give him that same trust. If she would not permit it, she had only to open her eyes.

Suddenly it became extraordinarily important that she succeed in this, that she not open her eyes. So much more than a romp in bed was at stake. If she opened her eyes, something of great value would be irrevocably shattered. Everything depended on trusting Ronan. Everything always had. It was a shocking realization to note that one thing had not changed. Lucia willed her body to let go, to let the hypnotic stroke of his hands, the intimate rhythm of his voice free her.

Feast
was a most apt word, she discovered, only they were feasting more than eyes. This was a banquet for the senses and not just for him, for her as well. “See me in your mind, Lucia.” He spoke in a low murmur, commanding in soft tones. “Visualize what I am doing to you.” And she did.

In her mind, she saw Ronan’s fingers tracing delicate circles of crème fraîche around her breasts, of his long index finger drawing a slow creamy trail down the center of her to her belly, where his dark head bent over her, his hair seducing her skin where it trailed over her body while his mouth placed a ripe berry in the shallow pool of her navel. Her body arched to him, aching to be taken, so vivid were her imaginings and the potency of his touch, but Ronan was not done with his banquet of decadence.

He came back to her breast with his mouth this time and began to lick, his tongue an instrument of pleasure on her skin, lapping and laving by turn, his teeth nipping gently at the tender flesh while her core began a slow, intense burn deep inside.

He reached the berry, his breath feathery and warm against her skin as his teeth sank into the fruit. He took it in two bites, his tongue lapping up the tiny drop of juice left behind with a subtle, wicked flick. But that was simply a prelude to more wicked pleasures.

His mouth moved lower to her core and she instinctively tugged at her bonds, desperately wanting her hands to stop him. “Ronan, please, no.” Her words formed a barely coherent protest. He looked up the length of her to meet her gaze with his burning eyes.

“I’ve never.” She summoned the meager argument. She’d not realized she was so far gone, so tightly wrapped up in the desire he’d stoked to make a decent argument. Would he hear the rest of the message? That she’d never allowed a man this particular intimate privilege? That she’d always believed this act, when perpetrated upon
her
, would leave her too vulnerable? Would strip away all control? She’d seen it happen to too many men, too many times. Although the prospect of Ronan’s mouth on her promised untold delights, she feared it was a luxury she could not afford, especially after all she’d given away last night. Her defenses were already well and thoroughly breached.

She felt the mattress shift as he raised his head. She wanted to open her eyes, to beg him not to, but she did not dare. Something akin to a pillar of salt awaited her if she did.

Ronan’s voice was quiet, encouraging but not relenting. This was a man who retreated from nothing. “Then let me be the one who introduces you. It should be with someone you trust completely, Lucia. It should be with me.”

His hands were at the vee of her thighs, gently restraining her legs. She could imagine him lowering his head to her, then his breath was warm against her and every sensation became very real. He parted her folds, his tongue at her secret pearl, flicking and teasing, exquisitely tormenting until she was thrashing wildly, almost beyond his ability to contain her, the headboard banging the wall in her efforts to find release. And then he shifted.

She could feel him coming, rising over her, his big body, strong and warm, taking up residence between her thighs, his hands taking his weight on either side of her head. It was all the warning she had before she felt his thrust deep inside her, her body flowing around him, welcoming him, holding him. Whatever misgivings her mind had, her body knew he belonged here with her.

She bucked hard, feeling his own release surging and near before she screamed, loud and lusty, the pleasure too intense to be contained. That was when chaos broke loose. Ronan heard it first: the sound of a knock on her bedroom door and a timid but determined voice.

“Mrs. Booth?” Mary! She’d forgotten about Mary, who dutifully came in at noon every day to clean and cook, although the girls were all off on holidays. She could, unfortunately, imagine how it had all sounded to Mary downstairs: headboards banging, her scream. Mary must have thought a great battle raged up here.

“Holy hell!” Ronan came off her in a fluid motion, his long arm snaking beneath the pillow as he rolled, coming up with a...a knife? What was he doing with a knife in
her
bedroom? Ronan hit the floor in a fighter’s crouch, his backside to her, and all thoughts of Mary and knives fled, every ounce of her attention riveted on the white scars covering his back. She felt physically ill. It wasn’t the sight that sickened her; all battles had their scars. It was the knowledge that someone had done this to him, and quite deliberately too.

Ronan sent Mary off for the day with a curt dismissal through the door. He turned to face Lucia, grabbing up his shirt and sliding it to cover the evidence, but it was too late. She could feel the guilt reddening her face, as if she’d spied something she shouldn’t have seen. But why should she feel guilty? Why would he hide such a thing from her? Surely it wasn’t just to protect her from the sight.

In tacit silence, Ronan reached above her and slit the bonds. She sat up, giving them both a moment to gather their thoughts. Ronan put the knife down, but her eyes followed his gesture. There were only a few reasons any man slept with a knife under his pillow, fewer reasons when that man was Ronan St. Simon.

A cold pit formed in her stomach. Between the knife and the scars on his back, one thing was clear. Ronan hadn’t told her the truth.