Kasey Michaels (40 page)

Callie would have been packing, if she had any clothing of her own other than the shirt, jacket, and breeches now rolled into balls and tossed in a corner of her bedchamber. As it was, even the gown on her back wasn’t her own. So, instead of slamming cupboards open and closed, and tossing gowns and undergarments willy-nilly into a portmanteau, she was forced to pace the carpet in front of her bed, calling herself several dozen kinds of fool.

“He doesn’t hate you,” Lester said around a mouthful of licorice whip.

“Shut up, Lester,” Callie responded shortly, then dropped to her knees in front of him “Oh, darling, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean that, truly I didn’t.”

“That’s all right, Callie,” Lester told her, patting her head. “It’s not like I’m not used to it. Shut up, Lester. Sit here, Lester. Wear this, Lester. Don’t eat that, Lester.” He pulled a wry face. “Should have listened to that last one, I suppose. My head still aches, as if I’d drunk a dozen bottles of wine. What dreams I had this afternoon, as I lay on my bed! I thought I’d been dragged off by woolly bears, then flown up to the sky by a pair of Peg’s Sorcerers.”

“That’s a pair of winged horses, Lester. You know—Pegasus?” Callie blinked rapidly, beating back tears. “And that’s all my fault as well. Simon has forgiven me a lot, but he won’t forgive me this. You didn’t see him, Lester, before he left with Justyn and the others to take Noel Kinsey off to the guardhouse. He was incensed.”

“Well, I forgive you, Callie,” Lester said. “For all of it. Although it would have been nice if you could have found that nice little doggie. I think he got lost somewhere along the way. Oh, hullo, Simon. You’re all back from turning Filton over to the authorities then? He’ll really be locked up for stealing me? Callie, look. Simon’s here. See? I told you he didn’t hate you.”

Callie clambered to her feet, then turned her back to Simon, walking over to the window that looked out over Portland Place. Her heart was beating so rapidly she could barely breathe. Couldn’t think.

“Yes, Lester,” she heard Simon tell her untactful friend. “Filton’s locked up, and will be for some time, between his crime against you and his mountain of debt. And your father is downstairs, looking for you.”

“He is?” Lester grimaced. “He doesn’t know about the—well, about the
pink
, does he? I don’t think I’d want to see him just now, not if he knows about that.”

“Your secret is safe, Lester,” Simon told him kindly, so that Callie could hear Lester walking toward the door. Deserting her. Leaving her alone, to hear Simon tell her to go away and never darken his door again.

“Thank you, Simon,” Lester said, stopping to shake Simon’s hand. “Thank you so much, for everything. Well, I guess I’ll be off now. I think I’ll search out Roberts before I see m’father, ask him if he’s seen the dog I had with me earlier. He may have, yes?”

“Anything’s possible, Lester,” Simon said kindly.

And then the door closed behind the departing young man. And Callie’s heart dropped to her toes.

“You were very kind to Lester,” she said as the silence in the room threatened to destroy her.

“I like Lester,” Simon said, his voice coming to her from across the expanse of carpet.

“You were kind to Justyn as well.”

“I like Justyn,” Simon told her, his voice sounding closer, nearer.

She didn’t turn around, didn’t dare to turn around, look at him. “And Imogene. Your mother. For all that you tease each other, you love each other, very much.”

“Dear Imogene.” He was closer now. She could almost feel him touching her. “She’s downstairs right now, her stays gone, delighted, she says, that Bertie likes her better upright rather than swooning about like some dieaway miss,” he said, his voice tinged with wry humor. “Yes, she calls him Bertie. And he’s calling her Daisy. Says she reminds him of his favorite cow. Imogene’s flattered, so I didn’t pursue it. Are you all right?”

Callie’s bottom lip began to quiver. She hated that. Really hated that. “You hate me.”

“I love you.”

She shook her head, still refusing to turn around, although the scene outside the window had become an unrecognizable blur as viewed through her tears. “Yes, you love me. But you also hate me. That’s why I have to go away now, back to Sturminster Newton. You hate the way I go on mad starts, act without thinking. You’d choke me within a week, were we to... well, were we to marry.”

“Marry? Now when did anyone ever say anything about the two of us marrying?”

Callie’s eyes grew wide as she drew a deep breath in through her nose, then whirled about, fists clenched, to confront the most maddening, infuriating—“How
dare
you!”

His smile nearly earned him a boxed ear. “Hullo, darling. I was beginning to forget what you looked like. Except for the fact that you haunt my dreams, my every waking moment.”

“You’re impossible, do you know that?
Impossible!
”

“But you love me.”

She grabbed on to his coat lapels and gave him a mighty shake. “Yes.
Yes!
I love you!”

His hands closed over hers, partly because he might have wanted to touch her, partly because he probably thought it prudent to defend himself. “And I love you, Caledonia Johnston. I love you and I’m going to marry you, even if I have to argue with you all night long to get you to agree to the match. Tell me, do you think we’ll spend our entire lives like this?”

Callie pressed her cheek against his chest, her tears running freely now. Tears of happiness, tasting of love. “I’ve learned my lesson these past weeks, Simon. I was a child when I came to London, but I’m a woman now. I’ve got no more time for mischief.”

“Oh, I most seriously doubt that, especially as, at this very moment, actually, I’m planning a little mischief of my own,” Simon said as he lifted her into his arms. A moment later, Callie found herself being slowly lowered to the mattress, safely cradled in his arms, ready and willing to enter his world.

For a long while she kept her eyes, tightly closed—as Simon kissed her, as his hands skimmed over her body, as she accustomed herself to the delicious weight of his lower body against hers.

But her other senses seemed heightened because she could not see, refused to see, was, perhaps, a little afraid to see.

She felt the sleek thickness of his hair as she ran her fingers through it, her skin tingling as she encountered the hot, burning skin of his throat as her sense of touch told her that her mind had somehow commanded that she work loose the studs that held his shirt.

She could smell him, that heady mix of tobacco and good soap and fresh linen.

She could taste him, the salt on his skin as she pressed her lips against his bare chest, the tang of the champagne he had drunk when she raised her mouth once more for his kiss.

She could hear him, as he whispered endearments into her ear, as he soothed her even as he excited her, as he promised to take care of her, never hurt her, always love her. Always, always love her...

She felt the cool of early evening wash over her heated skin as her buttons opened, as her gown and underclothes fell away.

And still she kept her eyes tightly closed, afraid, just this once, to give in to impulse. She was more than content to let Simon take the lead in this, her greatest adventure.

Her head tipped back, her mind awhirl with strange yet wonderful sensations coming to her from her breasts, the pit of her stomach. Callie struggled to understand how anything could be this wonderful and this frightening at the same time. So moving, yet so entirely paralyzing. So longed-for, yet vaguely feared.

It was only when Simon’s hand slipped between her thighs that her eyes shot open, opened wide, and she breathed out, “Simon? Simon, I—”

“Hush, darling,” he whispered from somewhere very close, his voice somehow humble, awed, as if he, too, was experiencing something very new, very wonderful, yet at the same time frightening—a trip into an unknown they both longed for without knowing how it would end. “I’m here, Callie. I’m here. I’ll always be here.”

“Hold me,” she asked, uncaring that she had somehow begun to whimper. She felt so small, lost inside a cavernous universe, whirling round and round, going higher and higher, feeling a warmth growing deep inside her, growing stronger, higher, wider. “Hold me!”

“Forever, darling. Forever,” Simon breathed against her mouth, moving over her more fully as her body turned to liquid, as her muscles dissolved and a sob tore from her throat at the ecstasy that exploded without warning.

And then, while her mind attempted to assimilate her pleasure, Simon rose over her and settled between her legs, entering her with a swiftness that took her breath away on a small, silent protest of pain that was just as swiftly gone.

“I love you, Callie,” he told her as he rested against her, giving her a moment to think, to breathe, before he began to move. Slowly. Gently. Then more quickly. Moving in her, with her, as her body, which certainly knew much more than her mind, responded with a will of its own.

And the pleasure began again. And grew. The excitement. The adventure. All the thrill and verve of life wrapped around them, more exciting than any other adventure. With Simon holding her, with her arms tight around him, with her heart and her life in his hands, they rode to the crest together, and tumbled over the edge.

They lay locked together for long moments before Simon levered himself away from her, looking down into her face. “Are you all right, darling?” he asked, tracing the track of one of the tears that had escaped down her cheek. “I didn’t hurt you too much?”

Callie looked up at him in the dim golden glow of fading sunlight. “You didn’t hurt me at all, Simon,” she told him in all honesty, as all she could remember, all that she ever would remember was how wonderful she felt at this moment, how cherished, how loved, how very complete.

I do believe there are those of us who are more disposed as it were, to seek the mystery and adventure of the thing
, Imogene had said when speaking of the act of love between a man and a woman, and the words came back to Callie now.
You, gel, are one of those lucky creatures.

Imogene was right. She had all the mischief, the excitement, everything she longed for in this world. Right here. In Simon’s arms.

She reached up her hand and cupped Simon’s cheek. “Oh, darling, your mother is such a brilliant lady,” she said, then dissolved into giggles as his mouth opened, his face screwed up in comical dismay.

“Shh, Simon, we don’t have to talk now,” she told him, pushing him onto his back and burrowing her head against his shoulder—she fit so comfortably into that lovely small dip beneath his shoulder. “I have years and years to explain it to you.”

Kasey Michaels began her career scribbling her stories on yellow legal pads while the family slept. She totally denies she chiseled them into flat rocks, but yes, she began her career a long time ago. Now Kasey is the
New York Times
and
USA Today
bestselling author of more than 110 books (she doesn't count them). Kasey has received four coveted Starred Reviews from
Publishers Weekly
, three for historical romance,
The Secrets of the Heart
,
The Butler Did it
, and
The Taming of a Rake
, and for the contemporary romance
Love To Love You Baby
(that shows diversity, you see). She is a recipient of the RITA, a Waldenbooks and Bookrak Bestseller award, and many awards from
Romantic Times
magazine, including a Career Achievement award for her Regency era historical romances. She is an Honor Roll author in Romance Writers of America, Inc., and is a past president of Novelists, Inc. (NINC), the only international writers organization devoted solely to the needs of multi-published authors. Please visit Kasey on her website at
www.KaseyMichaels.com
.