How To Please a Pirate (20 page)

Nothing would banish Gabriel Drake’s form and
face from her mind.

Bloody pirate,
she thought crossly.
He’d not only stolen her maidenhead, he’d stolen her ability to
sleep as well.

No, that was not quite fair. She’d willingly
surrendered her virginity to him. Then her innocence fled away
completely in their wild night of passion. If she was brutally
honest, she admitted she wasn’t forced into any of it. In fact,
she’d all but seduced him the second time.

But he rose each morning looking as if he’d
slept the sleep of the just and she grew more haggard by the day.
Truly, there was no justice in the world.

Perhaps it was the nightly round of drinking
Gabriel and Mr. Meriwether still indulged in that allowed him to
rest. She often heard them, singing their heathen pirate songs and
laughing at ribald jokes. Once, she’d crept out onto the landing
and listened, shocked to her curled toes at some of the lyrics, but
as soon as she heard his booted tread on the stairs, she’d scurried
back to the safety of her chamber.

Jacquelyn had done a bit of rearranging in
there to guard against future trysts. She’d had Timothy move her
heavy armoire so it was in front of the spot where the secret panel
opened into the passageway. She thought she’d heard Gabriel’s
muffled curse behind the wall one night as he tried in vain to
force the door open.

But only once.

Bother the man.
She rolled over onto
her back, tugging at her nightshift. The blasted thing kept riding
up to bunch at her waist, leaving her legs and crotch to brush
against the bed linens. Her body started its nightly mutinous
complaint, the dull ache that kept her from sleep. She rubbed
herself with the heel of her hand before she even realized she was
doing it. Shocked, she pulled her hand away.

No, I will not turn into a spineless
wanton.

She threw back the coverlet and swung her
legs out of bed. Jacquelyn began pacing.

A league or two around the room should do
the trick.

She wondered afresh if this was how her
mother started down the slippery path to becoming a courtesan. Had
there been a man who so ignited a fire in her, Isabella had been
powerless to contain it?

“But I am not my mother,” she mumbled as she
shrugged on a robe over her nightshift.
Good Lord! Now he has me
talking to myself!

Who could say what other lows the man might
reduce her to?

Isabella always maintained that her life as a
woman of pleasure was a merry one, filled with endless parties and
frivolity and song. But all Jacquelyn knew was that once her
mother’s protector abandoned her, Jacquelyn was summarily evicted
from her posh school and forced to make her own way in the world.
Her mother’s lover provided a pension for Isabella, but it wasn’t
sufficient to keep a “bird of paradise” in the style to which she
was accustomed
and
support her grown daughter.

Mother has always been weak
, Jacquelyn
decided with a grim nod. Just as firmly, she decided she would not
be.

Her body might clamor for more of the
delights Gabriel Drake could bestow, but her will determined that
she would not jeopardize the estate for the sake of her own
pleasure.

Now if she could only be certain her will was
stronger than her body.

She had to see Gabriel suitably wed. Anything
that distracted him from that purpose had to be discarded.

Even if it was her.

A knock at her door stopped her mid-stride.
She lit the candle at her bedside and padded to the door.

“Who is it?”

“Me.”

Gabriel—confound the man—Drake
. She
sighed. Had she somehow summoned him with all her muttering and
pacing? Perhaps the man was like a stallion, who could catch wind
of the mare in season one paddock over.

She threw the bolt and opened the door only
enough to glare out at him through the narrow slit.

“What are you doing here?” she hissed through
the crack. “Someone may see you.”

“Then you’d better let me in quickly before
they do.”

Blast the man, he made sense. Propriety would
not be served by engaging in a whispered argument in public, so she
stepped back and let the door fall open.

He entered without a sound, but Jacquelyn
regretted allowing him in already. He seemed to fill the room, not
just with his muscular frame, but with his unique masculine scent
as well—a fresh mix of clean male skin with the barest hint of a
sea breeze. Jacquelyn threw the bolt behind him, hardly daring to
breathe.

“Thank you for letting me in,” he said
softly. “You didn’t have to, you know. It’s not as if I’d force
you.”

No need, since her body was already his
willing ally. Wasn’t this how Lucifer wormed his way into the
Garden? With silver-tongued persuasion and a reasonable tone?

“What do you want?” she asked, then wished
she’d bitten her tongue in two. The bold look of desire on his face
was answer without need of words. She cinched the sash at her waist
and folded her arms across her chest.

She willed him to see the ‘go away’ stamped
on her face. Surely there was no way the man could know how he made
her insides caper about.

“You’re not sleeping,” he said.

“How can I when you come banging at my door
in the dead of night?”

“Even before that.” He looked around the room
and nodded grimly when he saw she had strategically moved the
armoire. “Everyday, you look less like yourself.”

She drew herself up to her full height, which
admittedly wasn’t much. “My apologies if my appearance distresses
you, my lord.”

“I didn’t mean it like that,” he said. “I’ve
been worried about you.”

Not too worried to stop dancing attendance on
the women who came to tea and hoped to stay as his wife. There had
been a veritable parade of eligible girls in and out of the solar
each day since the night of the ball.

Jacquelyn could discern no favorite among
them yet. Gabriel was equally polite and charming to them all, even
the unfortunate Lady Harlowe, but he did take Elisheba Thatcher
riding when she asked to see more of the estate.

Grasping little witch
, Jacquelyn
almost blurted out before she caught herself. She shoved the
unworthy thought aside.

“I trust my service to this estate by day has
been sufficient,” she said icily. “My nocturnal habits are none of
your affair.”

“I suspect they are precisely my affair.
Our
affair.”

He leaned on one of the stout posts at the
end of her bed and looked askance at her.

She couldn’t deny it. Her involvement with
this pirate had robbed her of all peace. At least he didn’t try to
force himself on her. But she feared he wouldn’t have to. At the
rumbling sound of his voice, something dark flared to life in her
belly.

“Why are you . . . what brings you to . . .”
She stopped. There was no way to ask a question to which she
already knew the answer.

He was here for her.

She swallowed hard. Blood roared in her ears.
He wasn’t married yet, not even betrothed. If she bedded him again,
no one would suffer betrayal. It wasn’t as if she were his
light-o-love. In fact, no words of promise had passed between them,
but just looking at him, her body grew tender and achy in all her
secret places.

Didn’t she deserve some happiness, even if it
was only temporary? Men did it all the time, separating the needs
of their body from other demands on them without a second thought.
Why couldn’t a woman take pleasure where she pleased? Who would be
hurt if she took her ease with this completely willing man?

She would, she realized.

When it ended—and it must end, there was no
question about that, for once Gabriel married, Jacquelyn would not
defraud the future mistress of Dragon Caern in her own home—she
would be the one bereft.

“My lord—”

“Gabriel,” he corrected softly as he moved to
shorten the distance between them.

“Gabriel.” His name passed her lips fervent
as a whispered prayer.

He advanced on her steadily, but she seemed
to have misplaced the will to move. When his hands found her waist
and tugged her close, she went without protest. Was there anything
finer than the broad hard planes of his body and his even harder
cock pressed tight against her?

Self-respect
, a small voice said in
the back of her mind. It was hard to hear over the throb in her
groin. She felt herself softening, melting like a spring snow.
Couldn’t she just bed him and not let her heart get in the way?

When he bent to take her lips, she turned her
head. It gave her physical pain to do so.

“Please,” she whispered, forcing the word
out. “I . . . I can’t.”

“You’re angry with me over the way I’ve let
Meri discipline and train my nieces,” he guessed.

“No, it’s not that.” She tried to pull away,
but he wouldn’t lessen his grip. “You were right. They did need a
firmer hand. The girls are much better behaved and happier since
Mr. Meriwether put them to useful occupation for part of the
day.”

“Then what is it?” He looked down at her with
something like hurt in his dark eyes. “You don’t want me?”

“Lord, no, that’s not it.” She sagged against
him, every ounce of her body screaming at her. “Believe me when I
tell you I do want you.”

It wouldn’t take much for her to throw
herself on the bed, spread her thighs and beg him to take her. In
fact, if she let herself remember any more of the way his mouth
claimed her sensitive flesh, she’d be pulling him down with
her.

Instead, she pushed against his shoulders and
thank heaven, he released her.

“I just . . . can’t,” she said.

Please God, may he not demand any
more
. She could give no more explanation and she didn’t think
she could stand up to a determined seduction.

He turned from her and stood still. Mastering
himself, she realized. The thought of his need sent a fresh
answering ache pounding through her secret folds. When he faced her
again, she read resignation on his features.

“Well, then,” he said. “I doubt sleep will
come for either of us soon.”

She nodded her head in agreement.

“Then we need action,” he said as he crossed
to the armoire and shoved it away from the secret passage. The huge
piece grated over the floor.

“No, no, someone will hear you,” she
said.

“And they’ll think Mistress Wren is
rearranging her furniture when she ought to be sleeping.” His grin
was contagious. “But in fact, you’ll be exploring the keep with me.
We went up last time. This time, I propose we take the passages
down. Are you game, Lyn?”

He pried open the hidden doorway.

She looked back at the rumpled linens in her
bed. If she lay down, she’d only be bunching them further. Besides,
he looked so hopeful, she didn’t have the heart to tell him no
again. “I suppose you’re right. Very well. I’ll come.”

Maybe a vigorous tramp up and down the keep
through the serpentine passages would settle the twitch between her
legs. She picked up her candlestick and followed him through the
hole in the wall.

Light from her candle danced along the uneven
outer walls. As she and Gabriel descended, the passageway widened
so that in some places, they were able to walk side by side.

“That opening leads to the library,” Gabriel
said when they passed one of the secret doors. He raised his candle
to show her the faint outline in the wall. “Rupert and I managed to
escape our tutor more than once this way.”

“Do you know where all the doorways
lead?”

“No, not even when I was a child,” he said.
“There are so many doors, Rupert and I didn’t have time to find
them all. Besides, it’s not as if we could explore them openly.
Once we knew of their existence, we searched each room for signs of
an opening—a scuff on the floor here, a nick on the wainscoting
there—but we had to be cautious. If anyone else found out about
them, the game would have been up. It was a great secret between my
brother and me.”

She heard both the smile and the sorrow in
his voice.

“You must have been good friends as well as
brothers,” she said, wondering for the first time what her life
would have been like if she’d had a sibling. Of course, she’d never
wish Isabella on anyone else. ‘La Belle Wren’ wasn’t cut out to be
anyone’s mother.

Passing the library meant they’d reached a
less inhabited part of the Caern. They’d traveled far enough
downward, she doubted any of the chambers they passed were
occupied. It was safe to speak normally.

“It must have been nice, having a
brother.”

“It was. Sometimes, we fought like tigers,
but most of the time Rupert was a fine partner in crime,” Gabriel
said. “He was the elder, of course, but I usually ended up leading
whenever there was skullduggery afoot.”

“You weren’t joking when you said the pirate
was always there inside you, waiting to come out,” she said with a
laugh.

He stopped and put a hand on her shoulder to
make her turn to look at him.

“The pirate is still here, Lyn.” His dark
eyes were hooded. “You’ve dressed me as a lord and presented me to
the world as a gentleman. I’ll play the part, since you seem to
want it, but beneath the velvet frockcoat and Brussels lace, you of
all people know what I really am.”

Her mouth went dry. She knew him all right.
Deeply. Intimately. The man was an admitted scoundrel.

And still she wanted him. His body called to
hers in the hot, silent language of lovers. It was all she could do
not to answer.

She had to turn the conversation to safer
ground.

“I can well believe you led your brother into
trouble, then.” She stepped away from him and continued down the
corridor.