Chapter 4

Chapter Four

Mrs. Crispin Sinclair. Baroness Neeley. Cece Sinclair.

~Scribblings in a young woman’s diary, 1814

T he gathering started swimmingly.

The Duke of Markham’s expansive estate was located in Richmond, close enough to London’s city center to allow for no more than a three-hour carriage ride in even the worst of conditions. Upon review of the guest list, it appeared a diverse but congenial group had been invited. No rabble-rousers aside from the Leighton Cluster. Suitable bachelors, society matrons, affable couples, and an exquisite widow or two for the scoundrels in attendance to entertain. The planned activities each day were expected or would have been if Cece knew what to expect. Lavish buffet breakfasts followed by lawn picnics followed by formal dinners. Afternoon teas for the ladies, fox hunts and shooting competitions for the men. Croquet, lawn bowls, archery, shuttlecock. A musicale the first night, a dance Hildy had promised wouldn’t be as decorous as a proper ball the second, and a final closing evening of card games with prizes open to both men and women, owing to the Duchess Society’s belief that women were as important in the scheme of things.

Without incident, Cece arrived a day before the attendees, allowing time to discuss details with Hildy and her partner, Georgie, the Duchess of Markham. They’d thought of everything, from the songs the orchestra would play, to lists of activities detailed for guests, to accommodating Cece in a private section of the house containing the nursery. She really had no skills available to help them, her knowledge of party planning paltry at best.

Hildy had admitted to finding out about Josiah during her investigations, which was fine with Cece because the boy wasn’t a secret. She refused to let him be. Moreover, she appreciated Hildy’s honesty and her lack of censure about the topic.

Cece knew what people suspected, and what they suspected was true, so to hell with them.

An aged servant had arrived on her Northumberland portico mere days after Edgerly’s death, clutching a boy’s trembling hand and a dew-stained letter. A note from the lad’s mother written hours before she passed, begging Cece to take pity and open her home to her son now that the earl was dead. One look into a pair of brown eyes matching her husband’s, and Cece’s heart sprang into action. A nursery had been prepared, books and toys purchased, an additional cook to make sweets and foods a child would appreciate hired. She’d always wanted children, although the few times she’d tried with Edgerly had been mortifying and wholly unproductive, leaving her motherless at the positively ancient age of thirty-three.

Josiah filled her empty heart with his adorable smiles and affectionate happiness, although deep, unfulfilled spaces only a man’s love would satisfy remained.

This she could live with—because she must. Unless… unless the one man her heart longed for could be reclaimed.

Hence this ridiculous society circus she’d thrown herself into.

With a dawning sense of dread the morning of the country party’s commencement, Cece recorded the entrance of one lavish carriage after another from her bedchamber window, none bearing the person she actually wanted to see. The buttered toast she’d eaten for breakfast was a looming weight in her belly, the few sips of tea she’d drunk not enough to ease her parched throat. Maybe Crispin had decided to stay in London with his latest tasty sweet, an actress rumored to collect more men than a cobbler collected shoes.

Why in heaven’s name would he want to get mixed up with this aristocratic charade when he’d desired to escape it so badly he’d created another identity?

Cece rested her brow on the windowpane as the sounds from the courtyard below filtered past. Rushed conversation, boisterous laughter, the crunch of boots and hooves on the pebbled drive announced a household preparing for adventure. A realm she’d never inhabited but, regrettably, had been born into. Her parents had loathed city life, and perhaps they’d transferred this aversion to her. During her mother’s bad spells, the countess often hadn’t left her chamber for weeks, much less thought to travel to London or take care of her daughters.

Although Cece hadn’t minded staying in Northumberland as there’d been no desire on her part to search for a life beyond.

She’d had everything she wanted.

Until he arrived. Until he left .

“I might like another cocoa, Mum. The first went down faster than a storm.”

Startled, Cece turned, the hem of dressing gown whipping her ankles. Josiah stood by the end of the bed, his slender arm circling the scrolled cherrywood post. His cheeks were flushed, his ashen hair disheveled, a streak of chocolate delightfully cutting his jaw in two. He’d been racing the length of the hallway for the past half an hour, pushing a wooden train they’d found at a delightful shop on Bond Street. The boy held her heart in his fist, and if she weren’t the greediest of creatures, he would have been enough.

If not for the love she’d tossed aside to save her family, she wouldn’t have longed for more. If nothing else, her brief time with Crispin had given her insight into a true relationship. Without him, she’d have believed her passionless marriage the most she could hope for.

Her heart giving an achy twist in her chest, she went to her knees before her son, cradled his face, and placed a kiss on his sweaty brow. She needed him. “My darling boy, I thought Mara was giving you a bath.”

Josiah yawned and scrubbed his fist across his chin. His nursemaid had taken him on a long walk across the estate grounds to prepare him for bed. Hopefully prepare, as the boy had a boisterous spirit. “I’m hardly filthy enough for that. Not one trace of dirt beneath my nails this time. And my trousers are only a tad stained from the puddle I stomped through.”

“If I promise to play a game of croquet with you tomorrow, will you agree to the bath and an early dinner? You can take the train to bed with you. The musicale tonight promises to be more boring than a maths lesson.”

Josiah wagged his head in consideration, gauging what else he could ask for, the little devil. Tracing his toe across a scrolled design in the carpet, he murmured, “There’s a billiards table in a lower parlor. Just like the one in my castle book.”

Billiards were not appropriate pursuits for women or children. However, those spaces were generally deserted before guests awakened, especially after a late evening. “Tomorrow morning, bright and early. A short game if I remember how to play.”

Her cheeks burned. She remembered how to play and who’d taught her.

Josiah grinned, his missing tooth giving him a charmingly crooked smile. “I suppose that’ll do, though girls are known to be rubbish at games.” He shrugged and gave his chest a scratch. “But who else can teach me?”

A memory whispered through Cece, of Crispin’s arms coming around her, his hands covering hers as he explained how to hold a cue stick. The lesson had led to their first kiss. And that kiss had eventually led to disaster. “There was a young man, a friend, who showed me,” she whispered, pulling herself from the remembrance before it swept her under.

Josiah squinted dubiously. “Were you rats at it? Was he?”

She laughed and gave him a squeeze he immediately wriggled away from. “I was fairly rats , as you call it, but he was patient… and wo nderful at everything he tried. I’ve never known a person to be good at so many things.” So. Many. Things.

The memory of a passion-laced afternoon in a baron’s billiards room in the lazy summer of 1814 circled her mind for the rest of the day. As did the lovely boy who’d become an unreachable man.

Consequently, hours later, in a brief respite from the madness of the party, Cece found herself hiding in a shadowy alcove outside a duke’s billiards room. She’d been unable to suppress the inclination to find the parlor, one of those gut feelings she rarely ignored. Instead of the boy’s trousers she’d worn that day with Crispin, this evening a dazzling ivory frock fashioned by Hildy Streeter’s personal modiste shimmered down her body. Her slippers pinched, and her head ached. Cece gave the pearls swimming through her braided strands a nervous pat, wishing they weren’t wound so tightly. She didn’t look or feel herself. Truly, the only recognizable piece was the faint aroma of orange blossoms drifting from her skin, her grandmother’s favorite scent that she’d taken as her own. A dreadful tune floated down the corridor, courtesy of Lady Chambers-Taft, who placed a higher value on her pianoforte expertise than was warranted. Cece made it out before the third atrocious attempt at fashioning Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata with the excuse of a ripped hem in need of repair.

Dinner had been a whirlwind of conversation about politics, fashion, and the pathetic state of England’s roadways, discussions she’d been expected to take part in with interest—when the only person of interest, the knave she’d enacted this farce for, had failed to attend. Names and faces had skipped around her brain like rocks tossed in a pond, a point of panic when she was forced to address a comment from a “prospective” suitor. Lord This, Viscount That. Handsome, witty, dry as toast. Tall, short, pudgy—men somehow strangely attentive to the woman the ton had begun to call the Veiled Countess.

When she’d never worn a veil in her life.

She understood, however, a moniker attached to her meant her popularity was rising.

Cece decided before the apricot ice cream and baked apples were served that she didn’t enjoy country parties. Or society life. Or gowns that itched. Or slippers that squeezed. Or pearls that pinched. She didn’t like being the center of attention or pretending to be the proper countess they thought she was. She missed her horse, Champion, and her lumpy feather bed that slumped on one side. She missed the gusty sea breezes and the scent of brine in the air. She missed Mrs. Amberton’s freshly baked bread and the host of lilacs she was tending on the back lawn. She missed her tattered gowns and scuffed boots.

If these people really knew her, they would be appalled.

If they heard the curses she uttered when she stumped her toe, observed her drinking her weekly glass of brandy, or found out about the love affair she’d had and did not regret—they would detest her.

The sound of breaking glass and raised voices had her peeking into the gaming parlor and witnessing a sight that dropped her stomach to her knees. Crispin stood clothed in formal black attire in the middle of the room, his hand clenched around the shirt of a man swaying on his feet from drink. The scoundrel must have sneaked in the back to avoid dinner and the horrid receiving line, she thought.

Shocked, Cece swallowed one of those swear words she loved so much.

At least he’d showed up.

Dash Campbell—whose literary reading had been the only highlight of the evening—stood with arms outstretched between the livid men, in a half-hearted attempt to halt what appeared to soon be a brawl.

“Don’t ruin another gathering,” Dash whispered to Crispin, his lips curled in a smirk that stated the situation wasn’t bothering him one bit. “Or this poor chap’s already kinked nose. Save your ferociousness for the hunt of that sad beast tomorrow. You know what’ll happen if Hildy finds out we’ve gone about this strife again. We’ll be relegated to the stables for the night, and my wee wife won’t follow me, not this time. The scrap at Leighton’s at Christmastide was the last I’m allowed. A solid week passed before I could take a sip of whisky without grimacing, and you were limping for a month. Though the ladies did love your injury, I have to admit.”

Crispin took a calming breath that lifted his broad chest, his fingers unfurling one by one. “Right,” he murmured before stepping back. “The tea set was of incalculable value, or so the duchess claimed, and we smashed it to bits. I’m still trying to locate a replacement. I have a lead with a family in Wales.”

“See here,” the drunken chap slurred and leaned in, a daring stance for a man a head shorter than his rival, “this isn’t the way to treat your betters, Noble. I’m the son of an earl if you’ve forgotten. A viscount myself. One of the oldest titles in England, by Jove. We don’t fashion mixing with vagabonds from the stews, although it seems the Duke of Markham enjoys diving low. Leighton, too, now I put it forth. I’d not have accepted this invite had I known the assemblage I’d be forced to mix with. A widow with a splendid face might not be worth this. She’s said to be quite curious herself, a bit outside the pale, typical for those ginger-haired types, which no one justly wants in a wife.”

In seconds, the space erupted in chaos as Crispin grasped the viscount’s arm and jerked it high, slamming his body against the nearest wall. “I’ll take this moment to ask not for a sincere apology, first offspring of a nob, but your vow to keep your bloody opinions about what is curious to yourself. In fact, it may be wise to keep your mouth shut in London as well. Should you deny my request, I’ll find out. Don’t imagine a venerable title or a secure lock or even a pistol jammed under your fat-headed feather pillow will save you should we need to have another discussion. You’ll wake to find me there.”

A middling forger who was evidently dreadful at surveillance, Cece gasped at the sight of Jasper Noble, rumored spy, in full glory, bringing the attention of the six men in the room her way.

Crispin’s sizzling sapphire gaze hit her last and held. His curse was vicious, his behavior following the whispered oath reckless. Letting the viscount slide to his knees, he shouldered through the crowd before brushing past her, and turning down the hallway.

She caught him at the end of the murky corridor and yanked him to a stop. His forearm muscles quivered beneath her gloved fingertips, then hardened as he held himself steady. “Crispin, wait.”

He turned so suddenly she gulped, the expression on his face lethal. “ Jasper ,” he bit out. “Never the other, Countess, do you hear me? It’s dangerous for both of us to mix those two in the space of one sentence or one room. He’s gone. Please, God above, forget him.”

That said, he shoved through the door exiting into the side gardens, sending it popping against the outer wall with a bang . Of course, she followed.

She knew where this path led because she’d taken Josiah along it this morning.

She knew where this tantrum led because she’d once loved the man owning it.

Strangely, however, her heart felt lighter.

Because she wasn’t sure if she liked this Jasper Noble fellow. Even if he’d defended her in that parlor as well as any knight, he wasn’t being very chivalrous now .

Stalking along a trail which snaked through a copse of azaleas and hydrangea, Crispin led her to the worst place for unspoken memories. When she stepped inside the stone dwelling, the scents of leather, hay, and brass polish rolled over her. The whinny of a horse in a distant stall echoed through the space. Pausing in the medieval archway of the stable’s harness room, she wondered why she and Crispin always seemed to end up in such places. Likely because they were often deserted with nooks perfectly designed for rushed encounters. She’d bet more than one set of lovers had coupled in this very spot.

Powerless, yet intrigued to her bones, Cece leaned on the doorjamb while Crispin prowled the moonlit space, a panther set loose among felines. He paused by a set of straps, drawing the tooled leather through his fist with the gentleness of a brigand. She didn’t love that the act shook her as she imagined his hands on her .

Being close to this man had always done remarkable things to her mind and body.

His temper was high, so she decided to prick it further, like she had in the olden days. “Venerable is quite a hefty word for a man raised in the rookery, isn’t it? You might want to tone down your language whilst you’re playing the thug.”

Tossing aside the straps, he turned on her. “Advice from the countess or the forger?”

Hiding her smile, she brushed a piece of straw off her bodice and, much to her delight, watched his gaze track the move. Oh , how she’d missed tangling with him, this dance she’d never had with anyone else. If memories of his body covering hers intruded, Cece could only guess the two types of sparring—verbal and physical—mated as well as they once had.

Knocking his coattails aside, Crispin growled and shoved his hands in his trouser pockets. A smile that never got close to reaching his gorgeous eyes settled in. It was a staged tactical stance she didn’t trust. “Go back to your musicale, Countess. You’ve got titillating conversations in your future, perhaps a stolen kiss in a dark corner if you’re willing. The aroma of horses slides beneath my skin and encourages me to do dangerous things, as you know. It might be prudent to not test me this eve. Getting caught here with me, even for a widow with certain freedoms, isn’t wise.”

Against her will or because of it, Cece refused, instead taking a moment to drink in the sight of him. Time had added bulk to his frame, silver threads to his hair, and grooves chalked into the skin around his mouth and eyes. If she couldn’t tear her gaze away from the sight of Crispin bathed in dull moonlight and tangled in temper, she wouldn’t be the first woman to be so entranced. This time, however, she indeed held certain freedoms. Freedoms she’d earned by struggling through an unpleasant marriage and years of loneliness.

She’d paid heartily for every advantage of widowhood. Why not benefit from it?

As she stared across the distance, his gaze darkened to a staggering shade of blue-black, a hue matching the threatening persona he’d assumed. Rough, keen, fierce. Jaw shadowed by stubble his valet hadn’t bothered to remove, jet hair overlong and dusting his crisp collar, he no longer looked like that tender young man. Six feet plus of broad shoulder and lean muscle, he appeared leery of his surroundings and ready to attack. She supposed it was a holdover from his rumored profession that no space housing him seemed up to the task.

Nonetheless, if he thought to push her away when she’d fashioned this foolishness for exactly such a chance, he was as mad as her Aunt Matilda, who’d believed she was the Queen of England for the last twenty years of her life.

Aptly reading her rebellious silence, Crispin knocked his bootheel against a flagstone, his frustration coming out in a rushed breath. She loved how he seemed flustered, as if he’d forgotten the rules of his own game. “Look your fill while you can, minx. I don’t mind being on display, though I’m only here because Hildy asked it of me. Don’t think I don’t understand where she got the idea. I’m rarely invited to the Duchess Society’s absurd matchmaking affairs as I add little value. Rogues need not apply, you see.”

Knowing it would further vex him, Cece drew her loupe from the hidden pocket she had sewn into her gowns and buffed it on her sleeve. She carried it everywhere because a forger without a loupe was like a blacksmith without an anvil. A girl never knew when a private document in need of alteration was going to appear. “What was the argument in the billiards room about?”

His gaze fixed on the tool of her trade as he released another exhalation, the faintest hint of a wheeze attached to the end of it. Holding up his hand, he snapped, “If you mention weak lungs, I can’t say what I’ll do.”

Humming, she gave the loupe another diligent rub. “Is the earl’s son chasing after one of the ladies you’re hoping to capture for the weekend? Men like to fight over such trivialities, don’t they?”

Mirroring her ploy, Crispin’s smile tilted at the edges as he slipped a knife from his inner pocket, released the blade, and began to shine it against his superfine cuff. A convenient way to prick her temper right back. “I’d never fight over a woman, minx. I’ve never found one worth the trouble, but your boy, a child, who I might risk a bruise or two over.”

The loupe slipped from her hand to the cobbles with a pop. “Josiah? What did that wretch say?”

He stilled, the blade catching a stray beam and shooting a metallic glow across his fingers. “The speculation is he’s Edgerly’s by-blow. If it’s true—”

“It’s true,” she said and bent to retrieve the loupe.

Crispin blinked, shocked she’d admit it outright. Wordlessly, he flipped the knife between his hands in a manner that told her he was extremely skilled using it. “It doesn’t need repeating in a duke’s parlor, though, does it? Among men who might be vying for your hand. I’m no gentleman, but it seemed impudent as hell to me for the viscount to mention it. ”

The knowledge that he’d protect her in even the humblest of ways swept over her like a caress, stealing her breath. She’d never been safeguarded by anyone, not once in her life. “Thank you,” she whispered, depositing the loupe in her pocket where it belonged, done with her effort to torment him. “Frankly, I can’t stop the rumors, but I appreciate your attempt. I simply want Josiah to be happy, and I’m doing all in my power to make sure he is. Which includes my not hiding him from plain sight. Let them look. Let them talk . They’ll find another scandal next week or the week after, and we’ll be forgotten.”

Clearly unimpressed with her strategy, he grunted as his gaze fixed on her pocket.

“I’m not playing games anymore, Cris— Jasper . I only floated the document with Tobias Streeter’s signature as a means to reach you. A plan I concocted during my first visit with the Duchess Society after Hildy left a letter on her desk. I would have shown up on your doorway if I’d been certain you’d admit me. Although, why my pride matters at this point is beyond contemplation considering our history. I suppose I’ve always wondered about you, about us . You never came to me, so I’m forced to come to you.”

“I beg of you, Cece, go back to that ear-piercing chorale disaster,” Crispin said and hurled the knife, impaling it in the wall. He’d positioned it dead center in a knothole in the wood. She watched the blade quiver with a sense of wonder and no little spark of arousal. He might not want to feel anything, but this impulsive show meant he felt something. It was almost as if he was trying to show off for her, a tactic of his she’d gotten used to when they were young.

She nodded to the shuddering blade. “You’re making too much of my meager side business.”

“Says the countess criminal.”

“Actually, I’ve only forged marital documents in Northumberland to keep my skills fresh,” she said as he moved past her, wrenched the knife from the wall, and closed it with a snap. “Harmless efforts for couples who want to wed but face familial objections. Some are even being forced into unhappy arrangements, like I was with Edgerly. I’m passionate about keeping this from happening to anyone else, lives ruined with a hasty signature. ”

“Brilliant,” he murmured and shot her an aggrieved sidelong glance.

“It’s merely a hobby . Like watercolors or knitting. Why must you be so vexed about it? I help people secure matches of their choice, which your Duchess Society friends arrange every day.”

His head dipped as he placed his hands in a prayerful pose before his mouth. His fingers were long and slim, no gloves in sight, the silver studs in his cuffs winking in the ghostly light. The scar on his neck was stark against his sun-kissed skin, a mark she longed to bite, then go lower, where she’d pleasure him before making him tell her the story of how he’d gotten the wound. Two lovers tangled up in conversation and silken sheets for days, a luxury they’d never had. A luxury they’d only dreamed about. “If you’d haven’t figured it out, Countess, you’re fearless in a way that frightens me. Same as always.”

“I’m fearless, Jasper Noble, because I’ve had nothing to chance losing .” If she repeated this new name of his often enough, she might come to believe it belonged to him.

Sighing, he braced his shoulder on the wall, his gaze glowing a hot blue and focused solely on her. The eyes of a man on a quest he meant to win. “You believe you can dip your toe in a hazardous pond and come out clean while I watch my back every bloody day, never, ever daring the gods. Not anymore. And it’s not my problem to watch yours. You signed away my concern when you married Edgerly, but I tell you as a friend that Tobias Streeter isn’t a man to dally with, even in jest.” He dragged his calloused fingertip down the hollow of her throat, halting when he reached the rounded edge of her bodice. In response, her nipples beaded beneath her bodice, and she could only pray he didn’t notice. “Nor am I, Cece darling, a change you’ve yet to accept.”

Taking the risk, she flattened her hand on his chest, the uneven beat of his heart beneath her palm giving her courage. The remembrance of what he’d meant to her swirled like mist, clouding her mind but strengthening her reserve. “What if I want to dally? Make use of those freedoms you mentioned?”

Crispin’s lids lowered, shielding her from peering into his soul—because they both knew she’d once been able to. “I have options, Countess. More than I can count. Why delve into a complicated past when a straightforward present is readily available?”

She drew her hand back as an unsavory fact crystalized in her mind.

He wasn’t going to forgive her.

And pride was a formidable foe.

“Perhaps I’m indifferent as well. You’re merely the easiest arrangement for a curious woman,” she murmured, hoping she could pretend for long enough to get to her bedchamber, where the tears stinging her lids could run freely. She had options, too. Her son. Northumberland. Rides through the morning mist astride her horse. A fledgling enterprise devoted to helping young women secure a wedded union they wanted. Independence and enough funds to live the modest life she desired.

She would not wilt before Jasper bloody Noble.

“I’m not indifferent,” he whispered when she started to turn from him, run from him. “That’s a lie I can’t let you leave with, God help me.”

Then he stepped in, using his broad body to trap her. Rough stone met her back as he guided her into it, his warm breath striking her lips as he lowered his head. “I’ll admit I’ve wondered,” he whispered on a lurid suggestion next to her ear. “If wondering means a thousand nights spent recalling the astonishing feel of your body wrapped around mine, your cries of ecstasy ringing in my ears, your nails scoring my back. Indelicate but real truths, minx. We were explosive together, and I’ve never been able to forget it. I’ve tried to recreate it and been grossly unsuccessful.”

Angry and aroused, she breathed in the tantalizing scent of him. Leather, soap, and the faintest trace of whisky. All the while, his cock was a hardening presence through layers of cotton and silk, proving his assertion that he wasn’t indifferent.

The shift to get closer to him was unconscious, instinctive, and the wrong move.

Cupping her cheek, he tilted her face to his, his gaze having gone a stormy near-black. His thumb swept the scar slicing her eyebrow, a wound she’d gotten while riding with him years ago. He’d cried tears for her that day, the first time she realized he loved her as she loved him. “My obsession no longer owns me, you no longer own me. So take your false hopes and your curiosity and trot back to Northumberland. Because I’m simply a man in the end, one who will acquiesce if tempted beyond what he’s able to endure.” A mocking smile tipped his lips, the grooves lining his mouth giving him a sinister appearance. “Is that what you want, Cece? Stolen moments with someone who is long over you?”

“You arrogant beast.” She shoved him as hard as she could, barely moving him an inch. “Make me pay, then, Crispin Sinclair. Crush me into bits before us both and be done with it.”

He mouthed a soundless plea, his expression bewildered before he took her lips beneath his—although the gentleness of the kiss belied every nasty word he’d uttered. Too soft , she silently raged and gripped his face, drawing him into something deeper. Hooking her fingers in the supple strands at his nape, she gave them a yank, entreating. In response, he groaned and gripped her tighter as their tongues touched.

And the dance began.

Her hunger eclipsed any uncertainty, his raw reply any debate.

It was a peculiar sensation, a merging of old and new. Parts of the kiss she recognized, while others were enthrallingly fresh. Jasper Noble didn’t hesitate where Crispin would have as he grasped her hips and yanked her against him. His shaft was hard, his lips controlling, his tongue insistent. His hands glided over curves and valleys, tender one moment, forceful the next, persuading when the woman needed no persuasion.

For the first time in memory, a man left no place untouched from hip to brow. His thumb caressed the hard bud of her nipple as his teeth teased the sleek line of her jaw. Her body sang, vibrating with the tremors running through it. The pearls in her hair rained down upon the flagstones beneath his onslaught, their harsh breaths filling the dank space with warnings neither heeded.

With a tangled moan, unsure where she was headed but needing control of some aspect of this liberation, she spun him around until his back was against stone, going on her toes, and bringing his pelvis to hers in mock copulation. Seconds spilled into minutes spilling into an eternity. Growling, he clutched her to him, through layers of cloth still able to do sensual damage. His cock was a hard ridge she rode, awkwardly but with effect. Unbelievably, the pinpricks of light behind her eyelids spelled a rising climax should this continue. Please, let it continue.

It wasn’t enough, certainly, nothing but him filling her would be enough, but it was glorious, nonetheless.

And she’d waited ages for it.

Years of lonely defeat at the hands of a husband who’d never cared to pleasure her, never cared period , roared through her like a train off the tracks. Crispin was the only man who’d ever satisfied her in this way. She’d desired no one else, had dreamed of no one else.

Evidently, it was a request he could not ignore.

He reclaimed her lips and hissed against them, “How close are you? We might not have much time before someone stumbles upon us.”

His understanding stunned her. He knew her better than he wished to—or perhaps it was the leagues of women he’d attended, a base thought she shoved from her mind.

She trailed her lips down his cheek, her jagged sigh an admission and a demand. “ Yes ,” she finally added, an answer that didn’t match the question.

His chest rose and fell on his own harsh exhalation, a charitable decision made, possibly against his will. Sounds from the musicale had started to intrude, the faint din of laughter and conversation as the doors to the veranda were opened. After glancing to the stable door, Crispin returned his gaze to her, his deadly expression representing a man on a mission. “Think of the time in your bedchamber when I feasted on your lovely quim until you screamed so loudly we had to capture your moans in your pillow. Do that while I touch you.”

Everything about him begged her to obey, and for once, she was willing.

Submission with a reward at the end seemed fitting.

The image of his dark head bobbing between her spread thighs arrived as if it were yesterday because she’d never forgotten her fevered cries mixing with his groans of delight, the rough abrasion of stubble on her thighs, her slick wetness coating his lips after. They’d learned a new way to pleasure each other that day, the only time she’d experienced such wondrous bliss. Closing her eyes, she traveled back as the man in the present murmured wicked things in her ear. As he nibbled on her neck and sucked her bottom lip between his teeth. As he slid his hand down her body, finally settling the bony edge of his palm between her legs.

“Grind against me,” he rasped, working his hand against her in deliciously languorous circles. “Just like that, as hard as you need to. I would bring you around faster, slide my fingers through the slit in your drawers and truly feel you, but there’s no time. Only know that it’s my desire to taste you until you come. Tup you until we can’t stand, breathe, think .”

His coarse words lit a fire inside her. An elemental fire she’d not felt since he left her.

The world spun away from them as the space filled with the primal elements of their lovemaking. Raw groans of arousal. Bumping bodies. Flushed skin. Sweat trickled between her breasts, her knees trembled. The past faded until there was only the now. The incredible now . She found herself wildly kissing him one second, then slumping to his chest the next, as wilted as a daisy. Her blood thumped in her ears and behind her eyes, a pulse of pleasure.

“Come for me, minx,” he urged, guiding her down the path. Stroking, pressing, demanding, his long body curled around hers. “They’ll find us soon if you don’t.”

Provoked beyond measure, her release was contained by his hasty kiss as no pillow was in sight. The shudders tore through her, stealing her breath. Toes to knees to thighs to heart, rolling waves of delight with the power to devastate. Words left her lips in a rush, and later, she’d wonder in dread what they were. She’d recall sealing her mouth to his neck and biting, gently, but a bite, nonetheless. Animalistic behavior unlike any she’d previously displayed.

Greedy for every beat of pleasure, she rode Crispin’s hand until her legs could no longer support her. There was simply no polite way to describe it. The climax left a spent soul clinging to a man who claimed to no longer care.

Although his actions said he did.

Tenderly, Crispin looped his arm around her waist and held her to him, his mouth at her temple whispering calming words. His breath was gusty, his own body shaking. For a brief time, despite any angst about what they’d done, they were whole again.

United and yielding. A force.

Cece realized it wouldn’t be long before this fact incensed him.

It took exactly two minutes.

With an oath, Crispin released her as if she was venomous. Stumbling back, he staggered on a loose pearl beneath his boot. “Damned if that wasn’t familiar,” he snarled and yanked at his cuffs in seeming need of something to do with his hands. Avoiding her gaze, he worked his fingers through his disordered strands in an effort to repair her enthusiastic damage.

Which only left him looking as ravished as she felt .

“We always liked stables, did we not? One of our three sins happened there and so many of the encounters leading up to it. I get aroused by the sound of horses whinnying.” He snorted into his closed fist in disgust. “Mad, isn’t it?”

Cece refrained from uttering anything she might regret when her brain was the consistency of porridge. “Thank you” sat on the tip of her tongue, but she’d die before saying it. Jasper Noble could take his scowls and his crossness and shove them up his handsome, duplicitous arse. She remembered every sin she’d committed with him, the lewd memories part of the reason he’d brought her pleasure standing up and fully clothed. Thoroughly vexed, she lowered her gaze, noting that his shaft was holding an arousing show beneath his trouser buttons.

He caught her stare, and his expression dove into a sinister pit. “I’ll save my enjoyment for later because my cock will be in my hand before my bedchamber door shuts behind me. Truthfully, I’m amazed I didn’t stain my drawers like a lad during his first tumble.”

Flustered by the admission, Cece began her own repair, reaching to tidy her sagging chignon. The remaining pearls tumbled to the floor, the sharp pops a blatant reminder of her foolishness. The thick strands had darkened over the years and were no longer a flaming ginger, but they weren’t easily overlooked, either. Her hair was her glory and her torment.

Sighing, he made a lazy loop with his hand. “You can’t go back like that. It’ll upset the husband hunt to have you waltz into the music room looking tumbled but good if I may be so bold.”

Cece gave her bodice a helpless press, realizing what he said was true. She was flushed and trembling, wrinkled, ruffled, unnerved. A disaster. Nothing new, actually, where Crispin Sinclair was concerned. They’d ruined each other with a similar performance.

Despite it all, she felt wonderful .

His frown was fierce. “Quit fucking smiling, Ce.”

She shrugged, her body having dissolved to the consistency of hot wax. When he left her, she was going to puddle to the cobbles and stay there until morning. “I’m not going to apologize for seeking pleasure, Noble. I’ve had little enough in this life. Hypocritical, isn’t it, when the rags devote a paragraph a week to your antics?”

“It’s different for a man. We’re allowed all sorts of mischief,” he said and swiped his hand across his lips. Pausing, his eyes closed as he took the gentlest of breaths.

It was then she realized her scent was clinging to his skin.

He lifted his head, spearing her with a fiery glower that meant her time was up.

She drew her arms around herself to hold back the shiver. “I suppose you’re going to turn to one of those tarts Hildy provided to prove how untouched you are by this.”

His mouth tensed, his jaw muscles flexing. His hand moved to the spot on his neck she’d bitten in her excitement. “Good idea, minx, thanks for suggesting it.”

When she would have kept him talking, kept him close , a strident knock intruded. An unnecessary strike on an open stable door.

The protective signal of a friend, a warning that she and Crispin weren’t alone.

“Back,” Crispin mouthed and motioned her into the shadows.

“Noble? Are you in there?”

Dear heaven , Cece thought and crouched in the shadows until darkness covered her. The voice belonged to a person she desperately wanted to please and was surprisingly intimidated by.

“Hildy, how nice to see you,” Crispin murmured with buttery charm .

“Where is she?” The question was as hard-edged as the knock had been. “Oh, you knave. You impossible, unrepentant knave . When I warned you, in clear language because I know very well how to deal with reprobates seeing as I married one, about your conduct at this party. You gave me your word you’d stay away from her, far away, signifying no assignations in pitch-black stables. I invited suitable ladies, meaning they are not suitable, to keep you occupied. But oh , no , you had to grasp the diamond and shove it in your pocket.”

Another set of footfalls, heavier these, sounded on the flagstones. “Hildy girl, slow down. It might not be what you think. He learned his lesson after that last debacle, I would guess.”

Cece dropped her head to her hands when she realized Tobias Streeter had joined his wife on the hunt—the man whose signature she’d forged to get this insane boulder rolling down a hill.

And what debacle had Crispin been involved in that his friend would think to mention it?

“Don’t ‘slow down, Hildy girl’ me, Tobias Streeter. I have men waiting to talk with the guest of honor when the guest of honor and England’s leading scandal are nowhere to be found. My excuse of a torn hem and a slight megrim is losing steam. I must produce a countess, and I must produce her now .”

“I’m hardly the leading scandal,” Crispin returned in a doubtful tone. “Truly, the leading? What about the men who came before me? Xander Macauley, for instance?”

“You fool,” Tobias murmured beneath his breath. “Don’t you know to calm the beast?”

Cece gave a loose strand a tuck behind her ear and shook out her skirt. There was no help for it, she was doomed. However… these were Crispin’s closest friends—his allies—and they wouldn’t toss her to the wolves. In addition, she’d hired the Duchess Society. Hildegard Streeter might seem a bit like the frightening French governess of her youth when she was, in fact, a consultant. An employee and Cece a client.

Confident in this judgment, Cece took a shaky breath and stepped from the shadows.

The first to react to the sight of her, Tobias cut short his smile and headed for the door. He was as scared of his wife as the rest of them .

After a defeated, head-to-toe review of her charge, Hildy gave Crispin a hostile shove. “Follow my husband to the closest whisky bottle, Noble, and promptly drown yourself in it.”

Pausing before he fulfilled her command, Crispin looked back. His face was obscured by shadows, but his protective stance was evident in the tense hold of his shoulders. Cece’s heart sang—and sank. He wasn’t going to leave without confirming she was fine, proof the young man she’d known existed inside the thug.

It gave her hope she might one day reach him.

“ Out ,” Hildy said in a harsh tenor that brooked no argument. Even from England’s leading scandal.

Freeing him in this way if she could in no other, Cece gestured for Crispin to go.

Nodding, he followed Tobias Streeter out the door and into the night, leaving her to calm the beast.

“I had to fight tooth and nail to get Toby to admit what I meant to him,” Hildy shocked her by saying once the men were out of hearing. “It was quite a battle, I admit. And worth every tear I shed during those long weeks.”

Cece’s cheeks lit, a flush she felt to her toes. She’d shed buckets over Crispin Sinclair. Now, it appeared she’d shed them over Jasper Noble.

Hildy squinted, then bent to retrieve a stray pearl. “I long to throw my endorsement behind one of the men invited to this catastrophe of a party, each approved by the Duchess Society’s rigorous investigative review, I might add. But it’s hard to do when Noble looks at you like you’re something precious he’s afraid he’ll break. A rare vase that’s somehow landed in his possession. It’s honestly the first time I’ve seen him unsure of himself, the bounder. He’d not make it past page two of our inquiry before being tossed out on his swaggering bum.” She let the pearl roll off her palm and into a crack in the flagstones. “Yet, here he is, inviting you into dark corners.”

Cece decided to omit she’d followed him into that dark corner without a hint of coaxing—and would do so again if asked. The kiss may have even been her idea. What she truly wished to do was ask about the debacle Hildy had mentioned, but she wouldn’t dare. She didn’t have the stamina to hear about Jasper Noble’s escapades when the scent of him lingered in the air as her body thrummed from his touch.

Hildy tilted her head, her smile cunning. “If only he weren’t a man with a most unimpressive background, we might consider adding him to your list.”

“If only,” Cece murmured and directed her attention to retrieving the pearls scattered across the stable floor.

Because Crispin’s secret was hers to keep.