Where The Heart Leads (27 page)

She stirred, still loose-limbed, relaxed to her toes. He dropped a gentle kiss on her hair. “We have time. No rush.”

She humphed, and slumped again. “Good.”

The word, almost purred, conveyed pleasured content beyond description. He smiled, more than pleased to hear that in her tone. To know it was there because of what they’d shared.

At long last he understood, fully and completely, why his friends—Gerrard Debbington, Dillon Caxton, and Charlie Morwellan—had all changed their minds about marriage. At one time, albeit for widely differing reasons, the four of them had been firmly set against the wedded state. Yet with the right lady, as each of the other three had found, marriage—to have and to hold from that day forth, forevermore—was for them the true path, their real destinies.

Penelope Ashford was the right lady for him. She was his destiny.

That had, to him, been proved beyond doubt. He’d been feeling restless, dissatisfied with his lot; since she’d walked into his life, restlessness and dissatisfaction had been banished. She was the missing piece in the jigsaw of his life; with her in place, his life would form a cohesive whole.

He no longer even contemplated a life without her; that was not in the cards. So…

The best, possibly the only, way to ensure she agreed to wed him was to subtly lead her to decide, of her own will, that being his wife was her destiny. That decision had to be freely reached; he might encourage, demonstrate the benefits, persuade—but he couldn’t push. Even less could he dictate. And as the evening’s endeavors had illustrated, allowing her to pursue her own route to that decision meant letting her follow her own script.

Unfortunately—as she’d just demonstrated—her script might require actions, even sacrifices, on his part that were more than he was accustomed to, more than he felt all that comfortable making. Letting her take him rather than the other way about had shaken him; it had required more strength than he’d known he possessed to even indulge her as far as he had.

If he wanted to be able to let her follow her own road…he was going to have to limit the byways.

Or, perhaps, to subtly suggest avenues she might wish to explore—ones that left him in control.

Eyes narrowing, gaze unfocused, he considered. Under her skirts, his hands cupped her naked bottom, porcelain curves he’d glimpsed the night before but hadn’t had time to visually savor.

He could easily envision an interlude that pandered to that and associated whims.

Perhaps, with her, what he needed to do was not minimize his control, but rather make her crave it, desire and invite it, by casting that as a natural part of the game—as indeed it was.

Curiosity, after all, was her major motivation.

All he had to do was interest her in the right things.

’E
re, ’Orace? You seen this?”

Grimsby came shuffling from the back of his shop, blinking owlishly at Booth, a jack-of-all-trades who occasionally brought him knickknacks to sell. “What?”

Booth set a printed notice on the counter. “This. Saw it in the market yesterday—lots being passed around. ’Eard about it, too, in the pub last night.” Booth stared hard at Grimsby. “Thought you’d want to know.”

Frowning, Grimsby picked up the notice. As he read, he felt the color drain from his face. When he saw the announcement of a reward, his hand shook; he quickly set the notice back down.

Booth had been watching him closely. “Just thought I’d tip you the wink, ’Orace. We go back a long ways—old friends need to look out for each other, right?”

Grimsby forced himself to nod. “Aye, Booth—that we do. Thank ye fer this. I don’t know nothing about it, o’course.”

Booth grinned. “No more’n I do, ’Orace.” He saluted Grimsby. “I’ll be seeing you around, then. Bye.”

Grimsby nodded in farewell, but his mind was elsewhere. While Booth made his way out of the shop, he picked up the notice and read it again.

Then,
“Wally!”

The roar brought Wally thumping down the stairs. He scanned the shop, then looked at Grimsby. “What’s up, boss?”

“This.” With one grimy fingernail, Grimsby poked the notice across the counter. His tone was disgusted. “Who’d ’ve thought ho
ity-toity Scotland bloody Yard would take an interest in East End brats!” Leaving Wally perusing the notice, he stomped around the counter. “It ain’t right, I tell you.”

Which was the point that exercised him the most. In Grimsby’s experience, such unnatural occurrences, things that stepped beyond the normal order of life, never boded well.

Wally straightened. “I…er, did hear a few whispers at the tavern last night—didn’t know it was about this, but I heard people were asking around after boys.”

Wally’s diffident tone and his avoidance of Grimsby’s eye didn’t escape Grimsby. With a snarl, he caught Wally’s ear and cruelly twisted. “What else did you hear?”

Wally hopped and wriggled. “Ow!”

Grimsby twisted a little more and leaned closer. “Were they, by any chance, asking who might be running a burglary school hereabouts?”

Wally’s silence was answer enough.

Grimsby lowered his voice. “Did anyone say anything?”

Wally tried to shake his head and winced painfully. “No! No one was saying anything at all. They was just wondering about the people asking, and why, is all.”

Grimsby pulled a face; he let Wally go. “Get back to the boys.”

With a careful glance at him, Wally turned and went, rubbing his abused ear.

Returning to the counter, Grimsby stood looking down at the notice. The names and descriptions didn’t worry him; the boys hadn’t left the house, and now wouldn’t, except at night. And all urchins looked the same in the dark.

It was the reward that bothered him. No one had said anything
yet,
but someone, sometime, somewhere, would. There were those in the neighborhood who would sell their mother for the whiff of a solid coin.

He read the announcement again, and drew a little comfort from the reward being specifically for information about the boys, not about any burglary school. As the boys hadn’t been seen, not even by his nearest neighbors, he wasn’t, he felt, staring at the prospect of being fingered by the locals just yet.

But the boys needed to be out on the streets for the latter part of
their training. Normally, Wally would have first taken them out during the day to wander around Mayfair, growing accustomed to the layout of the wider streets, learning about possible places to hide, like basement areas and the steps leading to them. Such spots didn’t exist in the East End; good burglar’s boys needed to know the lay of the land they worked.

Now all that part of their training would have to be done at night, and Wally would be no use for that. Smythe would have to do it all. And even then…

No matter how set on his plan he was, Grimsby couldn’t imagine Alert would want to risk the whole thing blowing up in his face.

Yet by his reckoning, they were only a week or so away from concluding their business. Despite the pricking of his thumbs, Grimsby felt reluctant to pull back—especially not with Alert holding a sword over his head.

And there was Smythe to consider, too.

Grimsby glanced again at the notice. Had he been acting on his own, he’d turn the boys out, let them find their way home, and wash his hands of the whole business. He was too old for prison, let alone transportation.

But Alert would be a problem. He was a toff, and arrogant with it.

Smythe, on the other hand, knew the ropes.

That afternoon, Penelope lolled in Barnaby’s big bed, and couldn’t remember ever being so content. So at peace.

Outside the windows, the gray November afternoon was quiet, dull and subdued. It was Sunday; there was little activity on the streets, a nippy breeze carrying the scent of winter keeping even the more hardy within doors.

The room was cozy, warmed by the fire burning cheerily in the hearth opposite the end of the bed. Slumped on the pillows, she snuggled under the covers, warmed to her bones and similarly relaxed, all of which owed little to the fire. The bed curtains had been loosened; although only partially drawn, they created a sense of enclosure, transforming the bed with its deep, cushioning mattress
and numerous soft pillows into a cave of secret pleasures and illicit delight.

It was the pleasures and delight that had melted her bones.

After an early luncheon she’d told her mother she was going to deal with Foundling House business, then had taken a hackney to Jermyn Street. While they’d been readjusting their clothes in Lady Carnegie’s parlor the previous night, Barnaby had mentioned that Mostyn had Sunday afternoons off. Barnaby had therefore opened the door to her knock—ready to welcome her, and entertain her.

Thoroughly.

“Here.”

She turned to see him standing by the bed—gloriously naked—offering her a glass of sherry. Smiling in transparent appreciation, she freed one arm and reached for the glass. “Thank you.” She could do with the restorative; it was early yet and, as she’d learned the previous evening—and had had confirmed over the last hour—she still had a great deal to learn.

To experience and absorb, not least about herself—how she reacted to his patently expert lovemaking and, more important, why.

She’d had no idea the activity would prove so enthralling. So engrossing. So demanding not just physically but in ways she didn’t fully comprehend.

Certainly there was more than physical communion involved.

And that only intrigued her all the more.

She sipped, from beneath lowered lashes watched as, after checking the state of the fire, he prowled back to the bed.

Picking up his glass from the bedside table, he lifted the covers and climbed in beside her. His weight bowed the bed; the nearness of his hard body, always so warm, the promise inherent in his naked presence beside her, no barriers of any sort between, sent tendrils of anticipation snaking through her.

Now that she had a much better idea of what that promise entailed, the anticipation had only grown sharper and sweeter. She sipped, and savored.

Closing her eyes, she mentally stretched, reached, assessed. Her body thrummed gently, all but purring; her mind was an unusually calm sea. She truly couldn’t recall any time in her life she’d felt so
completely satisfied in the moment, so truly content. Even though frustration over their lack of progress in finding her missing boys irked and worried her, in this moment the frustration and worry were distant. Beyond the bed curtains, outside this room.

Within this room, within the private confines of his bed, she’d experienced not just pleasure and delight, but in their wake a deeper, more powerful sense of peace.

Beside her, Barnaby sank against the pillows, sipped his wine, and eyed her profile. She was thinking; he couldn’t guess the subject, although judging from her serene expression it wasn’t their case. They’d dealt with what little there was to discuss concerning the investigation before he’d got her up the stairs. With no news, no progress, no possible useful activity to occupy them, she’d been gratifyingly eager to fall in with his plans for their mutual distraction.

With his latest, more subtle direction in mind, he’d allowed his natural, dominant side to show—not completely, just enough to intrigue and challenge her; after an initial moment of surprise, he’d been rewarded with her complete and utter attention.

Exactly as he’d hoped, her curiosity had stirred.

He’d waltzed her into the room, kicked the door shut, then proceeded to waltz her to the bed, stripping her as they went.

She’d responded with gratifying eagerness, although at one point her insistence on divesting him of his shirt had caused a moment of confusion—at least for him. He hadn’t expected her to filch the reins back, but she had. Even though he’d retrieved them again, later she’d wanted them back; passing control back and forth—sharing it, switching from leading to following and then back again—wasn’t what he was used to, but he’d managed to adjust.

By the time he’d had her spread naked across his bed, all he’d been able to think about was sinking his by-then throbbing staff into her luscious body. As she’d been similarly urgent and insistent, wantonly writhing, seductively beckoning, he’d done just that, setting aside his wish to spend considerably longer exploring her naked curves.

In daylight. At length.

He glanced at her, sipped, and promised himself he would. Soon.

All in all, he’d judged her correctly: knowledge was indeed her
price. In this sphere, it was a currency in which, compared to her, he had bottomless coffers.

Unsurprisingly, she was more adventurous than the norm. Ladies of the ton tended to invite, instigate, and then acquiesce; she did the first two, but not the third—she actively engaged, expected to contribute if not equally then nevertheless definitely to the outcome, to defining the landscape through which their passions took them, and at what rate and by what route they scaled the peak.

She was keen, applied herself to the task, and was steadily learning.

And while he preferred to remain firmly in charge, he was starting to suspect that he might enjoy at least some of the benefits of occasionally sharing the reins.

Sipping the crisp amontillado, he shifted his gaze to the fire, evaluating where on his path to a wedding they now were.

A step or two further along than they had been last night.

It was, perhaps, time to seed a few more notions into her receptive and fertile mind.

Draining his glass, he reached out and set it on the bedside table, then turned to her, stretching out beside her.

Her lids cracked open; he caught the glint of her dark eyes beneath the lush curve of her lashes.

Picking up her hand from where it lay on the covers, he lifted her fingers to his lips and kissed—then drew her arm up and placed her hand on the pillows above her head.

He had her complete attention, but didn’t meet her eyes. Sliding his arm beneath the covers, he set his fingers to one side of her throat, lightly tracing the curve from just beneath her ear to her collarbone.

She tensed fractionally, watching. He raised his hand to repeat the caress, easing back the covers as he did, then he leaned in and set his lips to trace the same line, and her breath shivered.

He shifted and repeated the caress on her other side; she tilted her head to give him better access, lips lightly curving as she sighed.

Moving on, he subjected her shoulders to the same exploring touch, first with his fingers, then with his lips and tongue.

The covers had dropped to lie just above her breasts. Sliding his hand beneath the edge, he closed it about one breast. He didn’t try to hide his possessiveness, simply closed his fingers about the firm
mound and claimed. Then he set his fingers stroking, circling the tightening nipple until it was taut, then catching and rolling it between finger and thumb.

Her breathing broke, fractured.

Leaning closer, with the back of his hand he nudged the covers aside so he could examine the flesh he was fondling. View it, study it; then he bent his head and slowly licked.

She sucked in a breath.

He settled to taste her—to fill his senses with the arousing taste of her after he’d already had her once. Twice would come, but only after he’d had his fill and satisfied his craving to explore every fascinating inch of her.

With his eyes, his tongue, his hands.

A subtle branding that she would allow because she’d never experienced it before. A branding he fully intended to deepen and reinforce the sensual link between them, making her even more unquestionably his in her mind as well as his own.

Her skin was impossibly white and fine. When cool, it felt like the most delicate alabaster, smooth yet warming to the touch; flushed as it now was, her breasts swollen and peaked, the evidence of his claiming apparent, it felt like peach silk.

Satisfied he’d adequately explored one breast, he edged the covers lower and moved on to the other. She trembled as he took possession—interesting considering how intimate they’d already been. When, after a thorough study, he suckled her fiercely, she gasped, spine bowing, her head pressing back into the pillows.

The hand holding the sherry glass wavered; reaching up, he slipped the stem from her weakening grasp; reaching farther, he set the glass down on the bedside table. The click of the base on the wood echoed in the room, an unequivocal statement of intent.

One Penelope heard. As he drew back from her breast, she reached for him. To her surprise he caught her hand; without shifting his gaze from her flushed and swollen breasts, he drew her hand up over her head, setting it alongside the other in the pillows.

“Leave them there.” His voice was a raspy growl, deep and dictatorial. “Just lie back and let me…worship you.”

She hesitated, studying his face, trying to determine what it was she saw there—something harder, more powerful than she’d yet en
countered. Curious, she acquiesced. And tried—unsuccessfully—to cling to her earlier calm as he—with a species of deliberation that was peculiarly exciting—continued his study of her, of her body and how she responded to his caresses.