Enslaved (14 page)

Isabel slipped back into her seat. When the dessert cart was presented, she decided to save worrying about her waistline for another day and ordered the lemon tart
and
the chocolate mousse. Settling in to savor the sweets, it occurred to her that if she couldn’t have her happiness in the form of Gavin Carmichael, at the very least she could share her misery.

Delilah du Lac, or Daisy Lake, showgirl or actress, whatever else the woman was, she was a poacher, a thief.

The bitch deserved whatever mischief came her way.

Gavin thought Daisy unnaturally quiet on the carriage ride home. They’d started the evening in such high spirits, but with Isabel’s arrival the tempo of their celebration had taken a decided downturn. Wondering what might have passed between the two women, he asked Daisy if anything was the matter not once but several times. Each time, she answered with a tight-lipped “no” and a shake of her head. Finally she’d turned way from him to stare out the window though the darkened streets didn’t afford much in the way of a view.

Once inside his flat, however, it was a different story entirely. They barely crossed the threshold when Daisy slammed her reticule down atop the marble-topped hallway table, so hard Gavin was amazed the impact didn’t send glass beads flying.

“What the devil was that about?” he asked, reaching for her wrapper.

Pulling away, she yanked it off herself. “What the devil, indeed? You and Miss Pinch-Face seem to be on mighty chummy terms. When I excused myself to go to the ladies', I’d half a mind to find my own way back here, not that I flatter myself you would have noticed.”

“Daisy, you’re being absurd. Isabel and I have known each other for ages. Her father and my grandfather have gone grouse hunting together in Scotland every year for the past twenty-odd.”

She answered with a huff. “Someone has gone hunting all right, only her quarry isn’t any game bird—unless you count a certain blue-eyed peacock.”

That got his attention. “If you’re implying what I think you are, you really are being absurd.”

“Am I now? Pity you weren’t standing before one of those many full-length mirrors so you might have seen how you preened. And she fawned all over you, the perfect peahen.”

For a moment Gavin could only stare at her. Could it be Daisy was jealous of Isabel Duncan? She certainly sounded so. Isabel was a passably pretty girl though she’d never particularly appealed to him. Certainly she couldn’t come close to matching Daisy’s flamboyant good looks. If there was a rivalry afoot, and it seemed as there was, it couldn’t be over appearances. It must be over … him.

The realization struck him like the proverbial thunderbolt from above, and he had to make a conscious effort to tamp down his sudden soaring sense of satisfaction. These past weeks he’d been working to make her see him as someone more than a mentor she felt obliged to repay with soulless sex, and all it had taken to turn the tide was another woman showing interest in him. Jealousy, it was such a sublimely simple yet tried-and-true tactic, why hadn’t he thought of it before? For the first time in their acquaintance, he would have been most happy to walk up to Isabel Duncan and plant a smacking kiss on her thin, pallid lips.

Deciding to let her stew a while longer, he said, “What do you mean?”

“That milksop debutante has set her cap for you, as if you didn’t know.”

He forced a shrug and asked, “And what if she has? Unlike certain persons, Isabel is most certainly a marrying woman.”

That took her aback, he could tell. She opened her mouth as if to answer and then clamped it closed again.

“Quiet now, are we? You’ve as good as told me you’re not the sort of woman who willingly links her future to that of any man for long, certainly not for life. We all haven’t the luxury of living so footloose and fancy free, you know. Being a free spirit is all well and good for you actors, but for a barrister, bachelorhood beyond a certain age is a definite liability.”

“Gavin, what are you saying?”

He couldn’t be sure, there was only the light from the gas wall sconces to rely upon, but he thought he caught her bottom lip trembling. “Only that I’m coming on thirty. At some point, I’ll have to give serious thought to settling down.”

She arched a brow. “At some point or soon?”

He shrugged. “That all depends on circumstances, I suppose.”

Arms crossed, she tapped a foot on the floor. “Don’t be coy, Gavin. Do you mean to wed that whey-faced bitch or don’t you?”

“If not Isabel, then I suppose I shall wed someone like her. Will you mind terribly?”

For once no glib reply or saucy retort rolled off her tongue. In the dim light of the single tabletop lamp, her eyes looked unusually bright.

She shook her head. “I’m tired. I’ve drunk too much champagne and my head aches. I’m going to bed.” She turned to go to the hallway leading to her room.

“Daisy, wait.” He came up behind her, covering the tops of her shoulders with his hands. How small she felt, how fragile. He leaned close, his cheek brushing against the softness of her hair. “You’ve not answered my question. Would you mind if I married?” When she was silent still, he turned her slowly about. Lifting her chin on the edge of his hand, he saw the tears streaking her cheeks and felt his heart lift with hope. “Daisy, what’s this? Why tears on what was to be such a happy night?” He reached out and caught a fat droplet on the pad of his thumb.

“Marry who the devil you want and may you both be damned!” She tore away from him.

He bounded after her. “Daisy!” A few weeks before, he would have been mortified to think his manservant might have overheard them, but now he couldn’t find it in himself to give a damn.

He caught up with her at her bedroom door before she could slam it in his face. Tears sparkling on her lashes like snowflakes and body aquiver, she rounded on him. “Yes, yes I’ll mind. I’ll mind terribly. Seeing you walk down a church aisle, or anywhere else for that matter, will tear at my heart, but because we’re friends, I’ll find a way to smile and bear it. There, you’ve won your precious confession and made me cry. Happy now?”

He shook his head, feeling as if his heart were overflowing with tenderness. “Not so happy. I don’t want to be the cause of your tears, Daisy. I want to be the cause of your smiles. Dearest Daisy, I want to make you smile, to make you happy. Won’t you give me leave to try?”

“Come, woo me, woo me, for now I am in a
holiday humour and like enough to consent.”
—W
ILLIAM
S
HAKESPEARE
, Rosalind,
As You Like It

B
ehind the closed bedroom door, Gavin and Daisy stood facing each other by the bed, their clothes a collective pool at their feet.

Daisy had undressed many a man, but she’d never had a lover who came close to matching Gavin’s male beauty. His waist was narrow, his buttocks tight, and his legs long and well-muscled. For a night, this night, he belonged entirely to her.

His gaze ran over her and she felt the touch of those blue eyes like a physical caress. “You’re beautiful.”

She stared up into his eyes. “You make me feel beautiful. You always have.”

He touched her cheek with gentle fingers. “Your powder and paint, you washed them off after your audition, didn’t you?”

Removing the cosmetics had been a calculated act on her part, a small test of her courage. Cosmetics were one more prop in the ongoing charade, a mask, a concealing cocoon. She wanted to come to Gavin fresh, new—clean. If only her past might be so easily scoured away.

His gaze brushed over her breasts. He looked back up at her, a sort of awe shining from his eyes. “May I touch you there?”

If any other man had asked such a question, she would have laughed outright. Touching each other intimately was, after all, the entire point of going to bed. But this was Gavin, dear, sweet, honorable Gavin. And knowing what he was,
who
he was, she understood he wasn’t asking permission to touch her body so much as her soul.

She couldn’t give him her soul any more than she could give him her virginity—impossible to give what she no longer possessed. But for one night, this night, she could give him what he most wanted. She could banish Delilah du Lac to the wings and call Daisy Lake to front and center stage. For one night she would be the sweet, unspoiled girl who lived on in his memory. She could give him that much at least, precious little when she owed him so very much more.

Instead of answering with a laugh or cheeky retort, she looked into his beautiful, solemn eyes and for once spoke from her heart instead of her head. “If you don’t touch me, I think I’ll die,” she whispered because suddenly it felt as if they were, if not exactly in a church, some other sacred place.

“Don’t speak of dying when we’ve so much to live for.”

His hands were cold if not exactly shaking. When he touched her nipples with his thumbs, they budded on contact. She shivered, and he started to pull away.

She caught at his hand, holding it to her. “No, don’t. Please. I like it. I want you to.”
I want you.

Bolder now, he bent his head and lapped at her nipples, then drew one tight bud into his mouth and suckled, the pull of his mouth bringing the ache between her thighs to crescendo.

“Oh, Gavin.” Arching against him, she slid her hands into his hair, the blue-black waves as soft as she remembered.

They fell back on the bed, Gavin coming down on top of her. She wrapped her legs about his waist, loving the rock hard feel of him pressing against her belly. “I’m not a virgin, you know.” She said it with a smile but she felt, if not exactly sad, a little wistful.

She’d lost her virginity at the age of fourteen to a Parisian stagehand with a head of tousled black curls and blue eyes that reminded her of Gavin’s. Since then, she’d amassed quite a repertoire of sexual tricks, positions and acts calculated to not only seduce but enslave. Before the night was over, she fully intended to use every one of them to make, if not love, than at the very least magic.

“I didn’t think you were.” He slid his hand over her hip as if learning the landscape of her body, the feel and shape of her.

“You don’t mind about me having … having been with other men?” She shifted on her bottom and spread her steepled legs wider, a silent signal for him to touch and taste her wherever he wished.

He shook his head. “Delilah du Lac’s lovers are said to number a legion. I shouldn’t like to think I’m competing with an entire legion.” When she didn’t reply, he added, “But nor would I necessarily want to be your first, the one to hurt you.” His stroking hand moved to the inside of her thigh, his palm warm now and his touch sure and knowing.

“You wouldn’t have hurt me. You would have been gentle with me just as you always were, as you are now.” Indeed, no lover before had ever touched her with such tenderness, such … reverence.

“You deserve to be shown only gentleness.”

He bent his head and trailed kisses over her neck, her breasts, and her belly. Coming to her thighs, he kissed the tops and then the insides and then slid a hand between, finding her with his fingers.

“You’re so beautiful there, so beautiful and wet.” He spread her inner lips and covered her with his mouth, sending pleasure rippling through her. Lifting his head, he said, “Show me how to touch you. It’s important,” he added when she still didn’t answer.

She opened her eyes and met his stark gaze. Holding it, she reached down and touched her clitoris. “There. I want you to stroke and kiss and suckle me just there.” She circled the hard nubbin, her finger slipping in slickness.

His head disappeared between her thighs. He teased her with the tip of his tongue, striking the sensitive spot again and again, the warm tingling in her lower belly and sex building to a hot, rhythmic ache.

The orgasm hit her fast, hard, furious. When she stopped shaking and opened her eyes, she found Gavin braced over her, watching her face. “I can’t wait any longer.”

She moved her head back and forth on the pillow. “Don’t wait. I don’t want you to wait. I want you now.”

His maleness slid down her belly. He was long and hard, thick and beautifully shaped. She felt the pressure of him against her belly, and the liquid ache of her body’s rapidly rising response.

He rose above her, a hand braced on either side of her head. “God help me, Daisy, I want you so much.”

“I want you, too, Gavin. She raised herself up on her forearms and lifted her buttocks off the mattress to meet him.

He entered her in a single thrust. Daisy clenched her legs about his waist, hips lifting to meet him stroke for stroke, milking his member with her inner muscles.

His blue eyes flashed open. “Oh, God, Daisy.” A final thrust brought him to climax. Body shaking, he collapsed atop her. Stroking his sweat-filmed back and running her hands along his sinewy sides, Daisy allowed she’d never felt quite so content in all her days.

So this is what it means to be perfectly, blissfully happy,
she thought and then ruined it in the next breath by wondering how soon it would be snatched away.

Sleep, when it finally came, did so in snatches. Even slumbering, they reached for each other, legs twining, bottoms bumping, mouths meeting. Around dawn, Gavin awoke to Daisy’s slender hand grasping his cock. Gently disengaging her fingers, he eased her onto her back and braced himself atop her. She let out a little moan and spread her legs for him, arching her back in silent supplication though her eyes were still closed. She was still more asleep than awake and yet as wholly aware of him as he was of her, he was certain of it.

Reaching down between them, he dipped a finger into her slickness and brought the digit to his lips, savoring her smell, her taste, her tightness, every remarkable sensation.

“So wet, so sweet.”

A taste of her wasn’t nearly enough to satisfy—why settle for a nibble when he might have the whole feast? He slid down the length of her until his head was level with her thighs. Spreading her open with his fingers, he bent his head to her sex and ran his tongue from the hood of her clitoris to her slit, a slow, velvet sweep.

Her eyes flashed open, a blaze of green foxfire that warmed his soul and all the rest of him. “Yes, Gavin, oh, yes.”

She smelled and tasted like new spring grass, damp with dew and succulently tender. He licked her again, laving her clitoris with the tip of his tongue. Shifting her hips, she reached down and ran urgent fingers through his hair, pulling him closer still.

“Don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”

“Oh, sweetheart, stopping is the very last thing on my mind.” Indeed, now he knew what she liked, how to please her, he couldn’t fathom wanting to do anything but.

He positioned himself over her and slid into her in one sweet, slow thrust that set her body quivering like a bowstring. She gripped her legs tight about his waist, a sweet vise from which he had no thought or need to escape. A few more thrusts had her coming, the rhythmic throbbing of her inner muscles bringing him to the brink. Even in the throes of it, he remembered his duty and withdrew. The final contraction hit him deep, hard. He squeezed his eyes shut and spilled his seed onto the sheet.

“God, Daisy!”

He collapsed onto his side, the cool press of the covers a welcome balm to his flushed flesh.

“Gavin, are you all right?” Daisy rested her hand on his shoulder.

He opened his eyes and turned over to look at her, hair splayed over the pillow and cheeks wearing the faintest trace of a flush, the loveliest of sights. “I’d say I’m a great deal better than all right, but then I just finished making love with Daisy Lake, the most sublime woman in the world.”

He’d never known it was possible to feel this wholly, perfectly happy. He wished he might stop time long enough to bottle this moment, a perfect, golden memory he might take out over the years and relive at will.

If only life worked that way.

“Sublime, am I? I don’t know about that, but I’m glad you like me, warts and all.” Her tone was teasing but, in the dim light, he caught her studying him.

Hearing the open question in her voice, he hastened to reassure her. “I don’t see any warts, only these—kisses from the moon.” He ran the knuckles of one hand down the smattering of small, pale white scars on her flat and otherwise perfect abdomen, glad she wasn’t entirely flawless. The small blemishes reminded him she was human, after all.

He felt her stiffen and stilled his hand. Gaze searching her face, he asked, “What is it, sweetheart?”

She shrugged, but the clouds in her eyes told him she was hiding something. “I suppose I’m like a cat. I don’t much care for having my stomach stroked.”

“Sorry.” He drew his hand away, wondering what bad experience she might have had and whether or not she would ever trust him enough to tell him about it.

She sent him a quick, tense smile and reached for his retreating hand, laying it atop her mons. “All my other parts are fair game, however.”

He smiled though something in her manner had shifted, setting him on his guard. Stroking her, he said, “So I’ve discovered. I’d be surprised to learn you harbored a single shy bone in the whole of that beautiful body of yours.” In point, he was finding he loved how open and free she was, how entirely unfettered by inhibitions or false feelings both in and out of bed. Mere weeks ago he’d thought to if not bend her will, at least bring her about to a more conventional way of behaving, but now the prospect of altering anything about her struck him as the height of arrogance.

He laid a staying hand over one creamy shoulder. “By the by, I’ve no intention of marrying Isabel Duncan.” He leaned over and ran his lips along the curve of her neck. “I far prefer this,
you,
just as you are.”

She tilted her head back, leaning into him. “I’ll never be that sort of woman, a proper English lady.”

Gavin brushed his mouth over her ear. Pleased when she shivered, he slid an arm about her waist, drawing her back against him, and whispered, “I don’t want a proper English lady. I want you just as you are.”

She shifted to face him. “How can I be sure of that?”

“If anyone should be feeling unsure, I rather say it’s me. If you’ll recall, I was the one with the cold hands—and feet.”

That softened her. “Oh, Gavin.” She brought his palm to her lips. “Cold or warm, shaking or steady, yours are the hands I want touching me.”

It was the closest to an admission of caring she’d come so far. Moved, Gavin kissed the tip of her nose. “I’m glad to hear you say so because you’re the only woman I can imagine touching this way.”

Her smile fell, her eyes taking on that icy glaze he hoped their lovemaking might have thawed. “You oughtn’t to say such things.”

She tried turning away again, but he caught her cheek in his hand. “The bald truth is you’ve ruined me for other women, Miss Lake. Ruined me entirely, and I’m very much afraid the damage you’ve wrought is irreparable. However shall I punish you?” He took his time, pretending to consider, giving her a chance to warm to the game. “Ah, yes, I could always lash these lovely slender wrists of yours to the bedposts, I suppose. Of course, if I did that, I would be deprived of your hands. And you have very talented hands, my darling, very clever fingers. Have you ever considered playing the piano?”

She looked up at him and laughed, the ice melting from her eyes, leaving them once again warm and glowing, and he knew that for the time at least he’d won her back from the darkness, back to him. “I’d rather play you, Mr. Carmichael. Your instrument may be in want of a bit of fine tuning, but all in all it’s
coming
along quite nicely.”