Dark Fires (7 page)

The earl knew he was. He spoke quietly to Jane’s back. “I’ll send up Molly with water and some toast. It will be here on your bed table. You will probably be thirsty and hungry in a few hours.”

There was no reply. She was asleep. The earl turned away, to his mistress, who was waiting.

11

Jane felt miserable.

Somehow she had dragged herself out of bed and had managed to get dressed. It was just past noon. She was suffering from acute nausea and a headache and, worse, complete recollection of the night before. In the act of brushing her hair, tears welled in her eyes and she could not fight them. They spilled down her cheeks.

She had shown him just what a child she was.

The humiliation was unbearable.

The purple gown that Sandra had worn with such aplomb lay draped on the chintz chaise. Jane hated it. She wasn’t her mother, didn’t even look like her mother, would never be her mother. Her mother had been stunningly beautiful and perfectly curved. Her mother had had hundreds of men dying for her love. Her mother had been an actress … Jane was nobody.

She crumpled onto the chaise. She would never forget the look of malicious delight on Amelia’s face when she had seen Jane in her mother’s finery; worse, she would never forget the earl’s shock. And she had thrown up while in his arms!

When she had been determined to gain his attention, she had never meant to do it like that!

She could not, would not, face him.

Jane made her way to the nursery where Chad and Governess Randall were having lunch. The odor of baked cod turned her insides upside down. The little boy leapt up to greet her with a squeal of delight. Jane patted his shoulder. She could not eat. She needed air.

Then she became aware of his presence.

Before Jane even turned to look at the doorway, she knew he was there, filling it with his considerable magnetism. Dread and something else, something nameless, swamped her. Her heart began thundering. Her face went red. Oh, no, why now? She moaned silently.

“Papa!” Chad shrieked, lunch forgotten. He raced to his father who swung him up and around.

“How are you feeling?” the Earl of Dragmore asked over his son’s shoulder.

Jane stared at her hands, twisting them nervously. She prayed he would be as kind as he had been last night—that he would just go away. She lifted her gaze. “Not quite the thing.”

“You’re an unusual shade of chartreuse,” the earl said.

Jane’s stomach roiled. She knew she looked ghastly, but did he have to comment on it? Tears threatened again. And she was not a crier. What was wrong with her!

“Papa, yesterday you said you’d take me riding. Are we going? Are we?”

“Yes,” the earl said, his tone gentle. He stroked Chad’s head, almost unconsciously. “Finish your lunch, all of it. Even the peas. Then meet me in the library. All right?” He smiled at his son.

Jane’s chest grew tight. The earl was incredibly handsome when he smiled like that, with such softness and warmth in his eyes. She felt her heart turning over, drumming. Lord—was she in love with him?

Was she in love with the man England had labeled the Lord of Darkness?

A man who had been tried for the murder of his wife?

“Come with me,” the earl said to Jane, stroking Chad one last time. It was a command, his gaze expressionless and impenetrable now. Jane recovered from her monstrous thoughts. She had never been in love, did not know what it was like or how to determine if she was, indeed, afflicted with the phenomenon. She decided that, if she was in love, she would know it. Wouldn’t she?

“Jane,” the earl said from the doorway.

Jane did not want to go with him. She was sure he was going to berate her for her behavior the night before, and she had already berated herself enough. But when he used that tone he was not a man to be denied. Bravely, shoulders squared, mouth pursed, prepared to face any executioner, Jane followed the earl downstairs and into the library.

By the time they were there, Jane was feeling distinctly unwell again. Her head pounded mercilessly. She watched the earl pour coffee from a silver pot on his desk, then add whiskey to it. She started when he handed the foul concoction to her. “For me?” she squeaked.

The faintest of smiles touched the corners of his mouth. “It will help. Trust me.”

She looked up at him and saw a soft light in his eyes. Immediately he turned away from her. Jane was sure she had imagined that look, but she hadn’t imagined his words.
“Trust me.”
The tone had been low, coaxing—enticing. She wanted to trust him, oh, she did. Her heart leapt at the thought.

She sipped the coffee and found, to her surprise, it was not bad. And when she had finished, she actually felt better.

“Trust me,” he had said.

Jane realized that, despite it all, she did.

It was only her fourth day at Dragmore. Jane, feeling almost up to par after the earl’s brew, was walking outdoors on the edge of the mansion’s extensive lawns. She was already quite far from the manor. Stone-walled, rolling fields were on the other side of the grounds, marking its farthest boundaries. Sheep and their lambs dotted the hillside. It was a clear, cool day, the sky unusually blue and spotted with puffy cotton clouds. The air was fresh and invigorating. If Jane hadn’t overindulged the night before and made such a fool of herself
and
if that redheaded floozy had not appeared, she would be in very high spirits, indeed.

But Amelia had appeared, and Jane had gotten drunk and made a fool of herself. If she fell in love with the earl, who was thirty-three, she had learned, and who did not even know she existed, she would suffer even more humiliation. She resolved not to join the earl and his mistress for supper, not tonight, not ever. Just like she would not fall in love with him. She had learned her lesson.

She was wearing the plaid dress she had arrived in, the one she particularly detested. The hem was already muddy, for she had crossed the gash in the lawn that the earl had made that morning during his reckless gallop. Jane smiled. The gardeners had been mending it industriously. Each and every one of them had smiled at her and said hello, all fifteen of them. Jane had counted their astonishing number.

She lifted her skirt and climbed onto the stone wall and settled herself down. A black-faced lamb skittered away from her feet, to the safety of his mother’s side. Jane sighed and raised her face to the sun. A red robin took wing from one of the ancient oaks on her right. Jane admired it. She then heard a harsh, heavy panting.

She tipped her head toward the sound, which seemed to be emanating from the two huge oak trees where the robin had been nesting, near the wall. A strangled gasp sounded. Jane jumped to her feet, concerned, and then she heard a woman’s cries of ecstasy.

She backed away—but saw a flash of vivid magenta. She had assumed it was some farm workers dallying. But the flash of magenta riveted her. The fabric gleamed. No milkmaid wore magenta silk. Curiosity might have killed the cat, but it had never killed Jane. She had the worst, or best, suspicion, depending on how one looked at it. She tiptoed toward the trees, trying to make as little noise as possible.

Not that they would have noticed her if she’d been a mad bull seeing red.

Lady Amelia Harrowby lay flat on her back, her magenta skirts tossed to her waist, her plump white thighs wrapped around the man’s neck. He was clearly a farmer, and he was pumping into her. Jane had been raised in London. She knew what the act entailed. But she had never seen it performed before. She stared, mesmerized and fascinated.

Amelia’s breasts were bared. She was thrashing and moaning, her hands on the man’s shoulders, leaving red welts there. He was shirtless. Sweat slicked his broad, muscled back. He wore his pants, but they’d slid halfway down his narrow hips. His penis was big and red and slick as it plunged in and out of Amelia.

Jane couldn’t move. A wet heat filled her, tightening her, swelling her. She imagined the earl— he would look something like the farmer, broad, muscular, big. Her breath stuck in her throat. Her heart raced. The farmer collapsed upon Amelia, who was screaming in pleasure. Jane realized with a start that they had finished, and she might be spied at any moment. But her feet were like lead. Taking a breath, trembling, she started to turn. She heard Amelia cry out in surprise.

Jane’s gaze flew to the older woman and she saw her white, shocked face. A dozen thoughts raced through Jane’s head, not least of which was: Did the earl know? What would he do if he knew? Somehow, Jane did not think he would be pleased to find out that his mistress was cuckolding him with one of his tenants. Jane did not smile. She was indignant, even outraged. Did the earl know what kind of tramp Amelia was? And how could she, Amelia, do this to the earl, when he was so lonely and in need of succor?

Amelia closed her eyes, gasping like a fish out of water.

Jane found that she was upset, even angry. The earl did not deserve this. And with her anger came newfound hope.

12

He hesitated before knocking twice upon her door.

“Molly? Come in,” Jane said.

“It’s not Molly,” the Earl of Dragmore said, entering. Their gazes skittered, then locked.

She was the first to look away. He could not look away. Jane was sitting in front of her dressing table, brush in hand, her long, thick blond hair loose and flowing to her buttocks. The earl stared. It was a sight he’d imagined too often, and seeing her this way, in reality, made his chest quite tight. For a moment he forgot why he’d come.

Her gaze came back to his. “My lord?”

“Are you joining us, Jane?”

“No.”

He was taken aback. He’d expected her to shy away from another supper with him and Amelia after last night’s fiasco, but hadn’t expected her blunt refusal. “Why don’t you join us?” he said, his own tone flat. He didn’t know why it was so important for him that she dine with them, but he was damned if she should hide up here in her room.

“I’m not hungry,” she said, turning her gaze to the mirror. Still, their glances held in the looking glass. “I’m very tired.”

She was impossibly beautiful like this, her face small and perfect, her lips sensually full, her cheeks tinged a healthy pink, the pale gold tresses floating over her shoulders and down her back. She did not seem quite the schoolgirl. Yet neither did she seem a woman full grown.

He felt the stirring, the incipient burning, of desire, deep in his groin.

“Join us,” Nick said. It was a quiet command, yet it was a question too.

She looked at him directly, simply. “No, thank you.”

Their gazes held. Hers was determined, his suspended. He recognized the extent of her will in this instance, and chose to bow to it. He nodded curtly, his gaze sweeping her one last time, then turned and strode out.

Amelia was waiting for him in the library.

He thought her face a touch too pale despite her cosmetics, and a touch worried. She smiled brightly at him, too brightly, and handed him a snifter of whiskey. “Hello, darling,” she said. “I was just about to go looking for you.”

He didn’t respond, but moved to the open French doors and stared out at the twilight. He was aware of the slow, burning lust that was smoldering between his thighs. His reactions to Jane were getting worse. What the hell was he going to do?

Marry her off quickly, his inner voice said.

Or, take off to London, leaving her here.

Relief swept him. The second solution somehow pleased him. There was, he told himself, a lot to do to arrange a marriage for her, and it couldn’t be rushed. He would go to London and leave her here. A perfect idea.

“Darling?” Amelia came close. “What’s wrong? Is something the matter?”

He looked at her. She wore a stunning black velvet gown, low cut and glittering with diamantes. Her lips were touched with rouge, lightly, as were her cheeks. She was a beautiful woman, but he mentally compared her artifice with Jane’s natural, wholesome appeal. There was no comparison. “Nothing is wrong.”

Amelia laughed. The sound was strained. The earl looked at her sharply. She smiled quickly. “Where is your little ward?”

“She is tired, upstairs.”

“Yes, well, no wonder after—” The earl’s look stopped her in her tracks. “I happened across her today, while I was taking a walk,” Amelia said, her eyes on his face. “Did she mention it?”

“No.”

“Oh, well.” Amelia turned away. Nick sensed her relief. He wondered what she was hiding, then dismissed the thought, for he did not really care.

She came back to him, sliding her hand up his white silk sleeve. “Darling.” Her voice was throaty. “I know what’s ailing you.”

He was annoyed. “Nothing ails me, Amelia.”

Her hand tightened on his massive forearm. “Never before have you turned me away from your bed,” she stated, low.

She was referring to last night. “I told you,” Nick said, equally low. There was warning in his voice. “I was not in the mood.”

Amelia did not drop her hand. Their gazes met, clashed. “You are always in the mood. You are a stud stallion. I
know you.”

“Do you?” His tone was ironic. “Do not fool yourself,” he said, a dangerous purring.

Amelia actually stamped her foot, flushed now. “You want her!”

The earl whirled. “What?”

“I see the way you look at her!” Amelia cried. “You want that skinny little blonde!”

His jaw clamped. His eyes blazed. “I do not.”

She didn’t just sense the danger, that she was pushing him too far, she felt it. Amelia’s body was tight now, full, pulsing. “You want her,” she hissed. “You wanted her last night. That’s why you rejected me!”

“No.”

“No?” She grabbed his arm and yanked his hand to her breast. “Prove it.” “Amelia,” he warned. “Prove it!”

He hauled her up against his body by her arms, hard. She did not whimper, but her breath escaped. “You want me to prove it?” he asked harshly, crushing her breast against the steel of his chest. He jammed his hard thigh between hers, and she gasped. “You accuse me of being depraved, Amelia, of lusting after a schoolgirl.”

She saw the fury in his eyes. “I know what I saw.”

“You saw nothing,” he ground out, grabbing her hair, carefully coiffed, by her nape and wrenching her head back. She cried out. Her hair spilled free. He ground his mouth on hers brutally. Amelia opened for him, and he thrust his tongue savagely inside her.

She clasped his powerful buttocks, pulling him closer, harder, against her. He was hard, but not like a rock, not like usual. She felt a searing frustration. He grabbed her breasts, lifting them from her bodice and taking one distended nipple between his teeth. It hurt—yet it also inflamed her.

She slid her hand from his buttocks to his thigh, then between them. She caressed the heavy sack hanging there. He did not make a sound, but she felt his response, the steel hardness thrusting against her hip. She ground her plump groin against him, then slid her hand around to the front of his breeches and began stroking the long, solid length of him. He bit her hard in response, and she gasped in both pleasure and pain.

She freed his thick, straining phallus expertly. She dropped to her knees, clasped his hips, and took the big, slick tip into her mouth. He still did not make a sound. Damn you, Nick Bragg, she thought. She had been with him enough to know she was losing the little power she had had over him.

Nick thrust past her lips. He despised Amelia and he felt it in every fiber of his being. He despised all women, he despised Patricia, who was dead. Maybe he would have killed her if she’d lived. The only woman he did not despise was Jane.

Jane. If this was Jane’s hair in his hands he would come. The image was wrong, so very wrong, but it was so graphic and powerful, Jane taking him eagerly into her mouth, that a surge of desire more intense than any he’d experienced before swept him. Nick was on his knees, pushing Amelia onto her back. He did not, would not, look at her. After flipping up her skirts, he slid into her. She was wet and hot. He saw Jane as she had been last night, languidly lying upon the bed, breasts bared, head back, arching, offering her pure, virginal breasts to him. He saw the lazy, dark, languid light in her eyes. The sensuous invitation … The earl finished quickly.

He rolled away from Amelia, who lay panting in satisfaction. He realized he did not just despise his mistress—he despised himself.