No Greater Pleasure (30 page)

Jericho’s eyes met hers. “We arrogant fools tend to do that.”

“You and your brother are more alike than either of you will dare to admit.”

“I’ll admit it,” Jericho said, sitting back against the settee. “Even if he won’t. My brother despises me for the circumstance of my birth. That, and my wit and charm and good looks, which far surpass his.”

She returned his grin. “I fear he outdoes you in modesty, however.”

“He might,” Jericho agreed. “He might, indeed.”

“Watch me, Uncle!”

“Watching, Nephew.” Jericho turned to see Dane roll by on one skate, the other leg held out behind him. “Brilliant!”

“Watch me, Quilla!”

“Watching, Dane.”

When she turned back, it was to see Jericho staring at her with a look so naked and honest it froze her in place.

“He is a fool,” Jericho said. “For not seeing what you are.”

Quilla blinked, unable at first to say anything. “He knows what I am, well enough.”

Jericho shook his head. “No. My brother has a gift he refuses to open. He won’t ever see it.”

“I am his Handmaiden. I can be no more than what I am.”

Jericho sat up, moved forward, closed in on her so subtly she could not have pulled away without making it seem as though he’d frightened her. “Is he soothed, yet?”

“I’m still here,” she replied. “The answer would seem to be no.”

From the end of the gallery she heard the noise of Dane’s whooping and hollering, the rumble of his skates upon the bare wooden floor, the thud as he fell. She looked into Jericho’s eyes, the shape so much like Gabriel’s but the color of a sun-kissed ocean rather than the depths of an unplumbed loch.

“If it means keeping you here longer,” Jericho told her, “then I hope you never soothe him.”

His hand upon her cheek left a trail of warmth that made her flush. His fingers twisted along the length of her braid before falling away. His palm left an unseen trail of heat along the fabric of her sleeve, ending with her hand, around which he curled.

“If you were mine, I would never leave you so forlorn you need seek the emptiness of a gallery to gather your thoughts.”

Quilla pulled her hand from his grip. “But I am not yours. If you find yourself in need of a Handmaiden, my lord, might I suggest you send for one.”

Jericho didn’t seem taken aback by the sudden coolness she’d forced into her voice. “The one I’d have already appears to be conscripted.”

“Stop this. You have to stop this.”

“Why?” He leaned back again, one leg crossed over the other, arm behind his head, in seemingly casual repose.

Quilla stood. “Because it does not become you. You want all that your brother has simply for the fact he has it instead of you.” Her gazed flicked toward Dane, who’d collapsed on the floor in a fit of giggles. “And I would say you’d taken enough of what is his, already. Stop being such a greedy bastard.”

This made him blink and sit up, and she thought she might have offended him. “You call me such?”

“I do,” she said. “For one who claims to love him as you do, you certainly don’t prove it by your actions.”

He frowned, beginning to speak, but she cut him off.

“And as regarding me, my other lord Delessan, you might taunt and tease me as you wish, though ’tis an even more unbecoming behavior than greed.”

“I’m not teasing you.” His voice had gone low and solemn. “I mean all I say.”

“I belong to your brother,” Quilla replied.

“You belong to yourself first.”

“I belong to the Service of the Holy Family, to the Order, to my patron, and lastly, to myself.”

Jericho stood, close enough to her she could smell the scent of the lemonwood in which his clothes had been stored. Their bodies aligned. He put his head next to hers.

“You are so beautiful,” he whispered in her ear, not touching her with anything other than his breath. “And you are not only a Handmaiden in my eyes, Tranquilla. You are a woman.”

The simplicity and sincerity of those words struck her like a spear, as though they stabbed her, deep in the gut, made her gasp from the impact but not, as yet, feel the pain from the wound.

“I would know you,” Jericho told her, still whispering. Still not touching. “I would know your dreams. Your joys and sorrows. I would know what makes you laugh and weep.”

A shudder of longing ran through her, for all the things denied her because of her purpose and her place. All that he now offered. Her eyes closed against the sight of his chest in front of her.

She perhaps imagined the brush of his lips upon her temple, the pressure of his hand upon her hip, drawing her infinitesimally closer. Or perhaps she did not. In the end, it didn’t matter, because the crash of the poor, belabored bust startled her and Jericho apart.

She saw a dazed-looking Dane sprawled on the floor amongst the remains of the porcelain piece. She pushed away from Jericho and went to the boy, checking him for injuries. She saw none.

“My father will be angry with me,” said Dane solemnly.

Jericho shook his head. “I don’t think so, lad. It was a figure of my father. He won’t mourn the loss.”

Dane smiled the Delessan smile shared by his father and his uncle. “I’m sorry I broke it, Uncle.”

“Sometimes,” Jericho said, his careful refusal to look at Quilla more telling than if he’d stared into her face, “things get broken. All you can do is sweep up the pieces and start over again.”

Quilla stood. “Your uncle is absolutely right, Dane.”

She ruffled the boy’s hair, then turned on her heel and left the gallery without a second look back.

Chapter 12

 

 

 

 

 

S
weep up the pieces and start again.
Simple advice, and words she knew he had not meant for the benefit of his brother. Nonetheless, Quilla intended to use them for such. She was Gabriel’s Handmaiden. Nothing that had passed between them, no action, no emotion, should change that.

Determined, she let herself into his chambers to discover him seated in front of the fireplace, a glass of liquor in his hand. He looked up, startled, when she came in, but Quilla did not hesitate. She went to him and Waited.

“I told you to go.”

She Waited in silence.

“Handmaiden, I told you to leave me!”

Again, she said nothing.

Gabriel made an angry noise. “It pleases me for you to leave me alone.”

Then she looked up at him and met his scowl with a calm gaze of her own. “No.”

“No?” He seemed flabbergasted. “You say
no
, to me?”

“You say it pleases you to have me leave, but it does not.”

His eyes narrowed. “Think you to know my mind better than I?”

Quilla nodded, slowly, eyes never leaving his. “I am what you need before you know you need it.”

He sneered, cruelty etched into his face. “And you think I need you.”

Another slow nod. “I do.”

“To do what?” Contempt coated his voice. “To serve me tea and simplebread? To hand me vials and take notes for me? To sing or dance or make pretty poems? In case ’tis not clear to you, I am working on nothing but intoxication.”

“Then I will pour your drinks.”

“I don’t need you to pour them!” His shout had, perhaps, been meant to make her flinch, but she did not. “I do not need you, Handmaiden!”

“Then send me away.” The words were calm only because she had some small skill in controlling her voice; inside, anxiety clutched its skeletal fingers around her heart.

“I sent you away.”

She shook her head. “No, my lord. You told me to go away. You did not release me from your service. Should you wish to do that, you must needs say ‘I release thee,’ thrice in succession. Only then will I be gone from your service.”

He stared at her for what felt like a very long time before answering, and when he did, it was not with words. He held out his empty glass to her. Quilla took it as she got to her feet. She filled it from the bottle of worm, wine mixed with opiate, the fumes of which were so strong they made her eyes sting. She gave him the glass, and he sipped it, all while watching her.

Quilla sank again into Waiting. Gabriel drained another glass. Held it out. She filled and returned it. He sipped again, his eyes now a bit less focused.

“Come here,” he said after a time, voice thick.

She did as he’d asked. He reached out a rough hand to grab her wrist and pull her to his lap. The glass spilled, wetting her gown and sending the stinging smell of liquor all around them.

“If I asked you to suck my cock, or to let me fuck you,” Gabriel said, “you would do it.”

She answered him in the way she always did, voice still calm, though his words had made her stomach jump. “If it pleases you.”

He licked his lips, eyes traveling over her face and down her body. His hand ran down her side to the curve of her hip. “And what of pleasing yourself?”

“Do you wish me to suck your cock, my lord? Do you wish me to allow you to fuck me?” She lowered her face to his, their foreheads touching. Voice no longer so calm, but instead slightly shaking. “Would that please you?”

“I want,” said Gabriel hoarsely, “for it to please you.”

She put her hands to his face. “I would be so pleased, Gabriel.”

He groaned and both hands went around her, one fisting in her braid to bring her closer for his kiss. Her mouth opened beneath his, accepting the dive and thrust of his tongue. He did not nibble or tease her lips, did not gently kiss her, did not request with his body that she respond.

His kiss demanded she respond, that she open for him, give in. Submit. Please.

And it did please her to do so. Desire so fierce it made her weak swept through her, making her shake. Her hands threaded through his hair. His pulled up the skirt of her gown to find without hesitation the heat of her center. He slipped inside her in a moment, his thumb finding the pulse of her pleasure, and Quilla gasped into his mouth.

“You want me,” he said, mouth trailing along her jaw to fasten on the soft skin at the base of her throat. “Tell me you want me.”

“I want you.” She moaned as his hand moved inside and against her.

He bit her but the pain at her neck only made the pleasure between her legs that much sweeter. His thumb pressed, on and off, then circled her nub. Her hips moved.

“By the Arrow, I can feel your desire.” His voice shook and broke. “I want to taste you. Tell me you want that.”

“I want you to put your mouth on me,” she whispered, unable to speak any louder. “Please, Gabriel.”

His hand left her, and she made a noise of protest, but in the next moment he had pushed upward, off the chair, and laid her down on the rug in front of the fireplace, all in one smooth motion. His body covered hers, the heat of his erection against her thigh, prominent even through two layers of clothes.

He kissed her again, rocking against her, his hard cock pressing between her legs in a way that made her squirm. He sat up, hand going to his tie and tugging it free. Quilla started to sit, to assist him, but he shook his head.

“You will not move.”

She lay back and watched him pull off his tie, unbutton and shrug out of his shirt, strip out of his trousers. When he stood naked before her, cast in shadows of gold and black and red from the fire, her breath caught.

Then he knelt beside her and his fingers went to the row of buttons on the front of her gown. They began at the banded collar and went to the hem, and Gabriel began with the topmost one.

He unhooked each button from its hole and spread the fabric as far as he was able, kissing every section as he exposed it. The neckline of the simple white shift she wore beneath began just above the curve of her breasts, and by the time he got there, she was already struggling to remember to breathe.

Gabriel laid open the cloth of her gown over her chest and nuzzled her breasts through the shift, sucking first one nipple and then the other through the material until it was wet through and both nipples stood erect. His fingers continued with the buttons as he kissed and sucked her nipples.

By the time his hands reached her waist, shivers of desire ran through her. His mouth continued to follow the path left by the open buttons, his kisses undulled by the layer of flaxen between his lips and her skin. Farther still, to her thighs, and the heat of his mouth found her heat. He kissed her there, nuzzling through the shift, and she cried out. His fingers moved faster on the buttons, pulling up the hem to finish and lay the gown completely open.

For an interminable moment he stared down at her, doing nothing. Until she spoke.

“Please.”

He put his hands to the front of her shift and tore it open, right down the front. The air hit her skin and she gasped and arched her back. His hands smoothed over her breasts, rolling her nipples, then over the slope of her belly, to the tender skin of her inner thighs. He parted her legs, laid himself between them, and kissed her curls. His tongue found her clit.

Quilla stopped thinking.

There was nothing to think of but the way his mouth felt on her, the scratch of his unshaven chin on her skin, the wet heat of his tongue stroking her over and over until the flow of her blood seemed to no longer go toward her heart, but to the secret place between her legs. Her pulse pounded there, every beat of it sending her closer and closer to the edge.

She tightened her fingers in his hair, not holding him to her, holding on to him to save herself from the feeling she was going to let loose from the earth and fly upward to the stars. Fire filled her, and the surge of the sea. The pulse and pound of creation suffused her, weighed her down and lifted her up all at the same time.

The dance of his tongue stopped as she hovered on the brink. His breath puffed against her, a touch as light as stardust drifting through a nighttime sky, or the flutter of a lady beetle’s wings against a flower from which it supped.