Mystic Rider (9 page)

Ian’s lips parted in an intimate smile that reached his eyes
and said he’d like to consume her. The effect was so devastating, her knees
nearly buckled. He could have carried her off in that moment, and she would not
have protested. What the devil was wrong with her?

“I am glad to hear that,” he said solemnly. “I do not like
to share a woman with others. When your father arrives, I will make whatever
arrangements you desire to satisfy your need for respect. And if that is your
wish, I promise I will not repeat our earlier encounter.”

Somehow she thought they were not quite speaking the same
language, but she nodded anyway. “You assume too much on the basis of that
encounter. It is as if it never happened. We will find your chalice, and you
can be on your way.”

His smile widened against his exotic dark features until she
feared she would fall forward and into his arms unless she escaped his magnetic
attraction.

Before she was forced to run, Ian bowed slightly, sending
his long queue tumbling over his shoulder. Then he straightened and retrieved
his walking stick.

“Later,” he promised, and strode briskly from the room, leaving
Chantal to simmer in desire alone.

Wearing only a light muslin nightshift, Chantal sat up
against the pillows of her bed and listened to the noise of the city from her
open window.

Paris never slept. When militia weren’t marching, or mobs
gathering on street corners to protest the latest vitriolic political pamphlet,
she could hear the sounds of a normal city. Carriages careened down stone streets
carrying jovial theatergoers and inebriated young men. Farm carts rattled
through the city gates bearing the produce the city’s inhabitants would consume
on the morrow. Passersby sang and chatted and argued on their way home. The
clip-clop of metal-shod horses bounced against buildings and carried down alleyways.

And in the carriage yard below her window, a steady thud and
grunt drifted upward. She hugged herself tighter, fighting the urge to look
again.

Earlier, she’d given in to fear and crept to the window. The
sight below had sent her scurrying back to bed, blood coursing heatedly to her
cheeks.

So now she sat here, fretting about her father’s absence
while trying to avoid thinking about the incredible man practicing some form of
weaponry in the carriage yard.

She did not want to admit that the brave new Paris of the
Revolution was less than perfect, but she feared for her father’s safety. His
oratory was brilliant, but it irritated the more radical members of the Assembly,
who thought all aristocrats ought to be executed for their crimes against the
people.

Her father wasn’t a violent man and believed reason would
prevail. For the first time, Chantal wondered what would happen if he was
wrong.

The muted sounds in the yard reminded her of the danger
beyond these walls. She had expected to see thieves and murderers when she’d
peeked out earlier. She hadn’t expected her eccentric lover.

She couldn’t resist the temptation any longer. She might be
a well-bred lady, but she was also a woman. Throwing aside the coverlet, she
crept on bare feet to the mullioned doors opening onto a small balcony above
the yard.

Below, Ian had scandalously stripped to his breeches and
boots. Lantern light shadowed and accented the awe-inspiring muscles of his
brown arms and chest. His long dark queue hung down his back, and perspiration
streaked his bulging shoulders as he twirled his heavy staff over his head,
apparently lost in thought and unaware of his surroundings. Lean, trim, and in
fighting shape, Ian was definitely no scholarly monk.

Chantal grew warm just watching him. He was a Greek statue
come to life. What would he look like fully naked?

The blur of motion he created terrified and thrilled her. No
mortal man could move with such speed. His staff was a whirlwind — its force
dangerously invisible.

And he was her lover.

She was still trying to adjust to that fact. As much as she
would like to pretend she hadn’t behaved so wantonly, her body told her
otherwise. She craved a chance to experience such sensations again, to prove
she was still female and desirable to a man who looked like a god.

She must have made some sound, for he glanced in her
direction. The blur of his staff slowed to a more natural speed, although his
muscles still bulged with his efforts.

Chantal didn’t look away this time. Ian held her gaze as he
brought the staff to waist height and began spinning it hand over hand around
his torso, eventually slowing it to lazy figure eights. Enthralled, she admired
the fluid movement. But mostly, she wanted to see what he would do now that he
knew she was there.

When he finally brought the oak to a halt and hid it in the
shrubbery beneath her window, she should have fled and locked the door. But
kneeling on the balcony’s tiled floor, she clung to the wrought-iron rail and
let excitement pound through her as Ian studied the ancient vines covering the
stone exterior.

No civilized man in his right mind would attempt those
thick, leafy ropes. Certainly no gentleman would. But no gentleman would be
standing half-naked in her carriage yard either.

Perhaps he was some throwback to medieval knights. If so,
she was the maiden in the tower he meant to carry off. He was already halfway
up the wall, fitting his boots into crevices between the stones and hauling his
weight up with his arms, looking as if he regularly scaled walls while the rest
of the city slept.

Thrilled to the very marrow of her bones, she lingered to
watch. She could argue that she wished only to make certain the foolish man did
not fall and kill himself, but she could have done that from behind locked
doors.

Instead, she felt bold and eminently desirable while waiting
for her prince to come….

Scaling a wall…

For her.

She stood and eased backward as Ian’s powerful hands clasped
the top of the railing. He wasn’t even breathing heavily as he vaulted into the
narrow overhang. Bronzed, half-naked, gleaming in the moonlight, he stood not
six inches from her nose, his male musk strong and enticing. And she had yet to
scream for help.

“I need a bath,” he growled in husky tones that brooked no
argument.

She heard,
I need you.
This time, her knees did buckle at hearing what wasn’t said. His voice held
that kind of power. She grabbed the wall to steady herself, but it wasn’t
necessary. Ian caught her waist and carried her inside. To the bed.

“We won’t repeat this afternoon,” he assured her, laying her
crossways over the bed so her lower legs dangled over the edge, scarcely
covered by her filmy gown.

Before she could scramble up from that vulgar position, he
slid the muslin above her hips with a strong caress of her buttocks, then
kneeled between her legs. As his tongue stroked the aroused bud of her sex,
Chantal finally cried out.

But calling for help was the furthest thing from her mind.

* * *

Ian gentled his nervous mate by stroking her hips and
cupping her buttocks while he applied his mouth to give her what she wanted
without offending her with his perspiration-soaked body. She dug her fingers
into the covers and bucked and writhed against him. She aroused him to painful
proportions, but he was a man who knew restraint.

He deepened his kiss, and she moaned, then froze with the
tension building within them both. He didn’t need any empathic ability to know
what to do next. Suckling the sensitive bud of her sex, he filled her with his
fingers, and she came apart in his hands.

He would have liked to linger and take his time bringing her
to the crest again, then hunt for a mark that might prove she carried gifted
Aelynn blood. He would have liked to take a bath and come to her clean. But
trouble was on the wind. This time, his vision had shown Murdoch riding at the
head of French troops somewhere in the countryside.

He did not need the stars to hear the more immediate danger
riding this way now. He might have only this one opportunity to give her the
child her body craved and his family needed.

Standing, he peeled down his breeches. For now, he would be
crude and give her pleasure without subjecting her to his offensive stench. He
lifted Chantal’s legs to his shoulders, and kissed and nipped his way along her
delicious flesh. She tensed as his ministrations woke her from her lethargy,
but it was too late to stop him now.

Before she could pull away, he thrust deep within her tight
passage. Arching his spine in a paroxysm of gratification at this joining, Ian
closed his eyes and absorbed the wonder of her inner muscles convulsing around
him.

He needed so much more time….

But already, the galloping of horses in the distance rushed
to end this moment.

He leaned forward and greedily suckled at her breast through
the gauze of her bodice. She moaned and moved against him. That was all the
encouragement he needed. Lifting her hips to adjust the angle of their joining,
he thrust even deeper until he touched the entrance of her womb.

He’d spilled his seed inside dozens of women without
creating a child, but the gods had promised him this mate. Sending up a prayer,
he freed the animal inside him, plunging without restraint until the wave of
lust reached its pinnacle. As Chantal arched eagerly to accept him, the beast
broke free and, with a growl of possessive delight, filled her womb with the
seed of life.

Beneath him, Chantal shuddered and writhed in release, while
Ian relentlessly held her in place, preserving their joining as long as he
could. He wanted to start all over, lick her skin, kiss her senseless, and find
new ways to excite her, but the rattle of carriage wheels had already rounded
the corner and entered the street outside.

Still, he waited to feel that spark of life he’d been told
he’d feel when his seed found hers and a child began. Trystan had sworn he’d
known the instant his twins were conceived. If Trystan could, surely Ian would.

Maybe not. Ian felt an immense physical relief at the power
of his release, and deep gratitude for the woman who even now reached for him
again, but nothing that spoke of life. Still, he didn’t want to part from her.
Sheathed in her tight passage, he felt a new rush of blood quickening in him.

But there wasn’t time. As ever, duty called. Even Chantal
heard the shouts and musket fire now. Reluctantly, he released her, shuddering
as he slid free into the chilly night air.

She scrambled to her knees, letting the gown cover her again
as she stared in fear at the window. Ian regretted that he had yet to see her
fully undressed so he might learn if the mark of the gods was on her.

He pulled up his breeches.

“What is happening?” she asked in panic.

“I believe your father is returning. Dress quickly. You will
be needed downstairs.”

The peaceful street erupted in shouts and curses.

Without so much as a by-your-leave, Ian rushed out the glass
doors and swung over the rail before the gates to the drive could burst open.

* * *

Chantal grabbed her robe and ran to the balcony.

Her father often kept late nights, but he never arrived at
this speed and with this commotion. How could Ian know who it was? The crack of
a whip, pounding hooves, and racing carriage wheels resounded across the
cobblestones beyond the townhouse walls.

She saw Ian hit the ground running, snatching up his staff
and racing for the entrance, but she couldn’t see what happened farther down
the drive.

She could still sense the blunt force of Ian’s masculinity
inside of her. Jean had been scarcely more than a boy when they married. Ian
was a full-grown man, twice Jean’s size. She would be sore for days,
pleasurably sore, since each movement reminded her of what they had done and
aroused her all over again.

Her father would be disappointed with her if he knew. If she
came with child, she’d have to leave Paris and abandon their work here. Still,
she could not regret what she had done.

She jumped back, startled, as the rusty carriage gate
slammed open faster than she’d ever seen it swing. Galloping horses foaming at
the mouth rushed in, dragging a coach that appeared to fly on two wheels before
it crashed to a halt at the entrance.

Musket fire and shouts ensued, and she tugged her robe
closed, terrified. Part of the mob slipped through the open gate, before it
swung closed with a force that caught a man’s hand as he tried to shove inside.
He screamed in agony, but no one attended him.

She didn’t know whether to race downstairs to offer help if
that was her father in the coach, or run to Pauline’s room and rush her and the
children out a back door for fear of arrest. She kept searching for some sign
of Ian, for some signal as to what was happening.

A mob formed behind the gate, waving weapons and cursing as
the guard secured the lock. Even though she could barely see Ian’s shadow, she
knew he, not their aging gatekeeper, had been the one to open and shut the
gate.

The yard was black except for the flickering of torches
beyond the wall. She could see only shadows and hear grunts and scuffles. One
of the intruders groaned after a particularly hard thud, and in her mind’s eye,
she could see Ian using his staff to double his assailant in half. She didn’t
know how, but the image was there, reassuring her that he had matters under
control.

The coach driver and a footman climbed down to help out the carriage’s
occupant. Wearing a familiar cockaded bicorne and powdered wig, a tall man
stumbled out of his own volition, grabbing the footman’s shoulders before he
fell.

Without further question, Chantal flew from the room and
down the stairs.

Her father was injured.

And like a knight of old, Ian was single-handedly fighting
off their enemies.