The Peculiar Pets of Miss Pleasance (9 page)

12

Of course she couldn’t sleep; Thom sat just outside her door. The gallant man had promised not to let himself drift off until she herself was firmly dreaming, and she suspected that he was alert to her every toss and turn. Heaven knew her head was full of enough snakes to keep an entire block of London bludrats hopping.

She’d been twitchy ever since the fire. The new glass in her window was even thinner than the pane that the device had shattered, flying into her room and setting the curtains ablaze. She hadn’t heard the crash then, just as she hadn’t heard the arrow thwack through her sleeve and into the plush velvet seat, a finger’s span from her arm. She had told Thom the truth: she didn’t know who would wish her harm. But she was more scared than she could admit. Having him near was becoming a habit, and not just because she knew that he’d already saved her life at least twice and wouldn’t hesitate to dive between her body and danger.

She heard him shift outside and sigh, the old door creaking against his back. Without meaning to, she echoed his sigh and turned again, the bedsprings squealing beneath her. Of course, she was afraid to fall asleep, when her dreams held nothing but the memory of blood on snow, the jangling of the traces on the black horses of the funeral carriage, and, more recently, the hot reek of fire. She’d held her secrets alone too long, and a desperate glance at the closet only made her more fretful.

“Stop worrying and sleep, lass,” Thom called through the door. “You’re safe, I promise ye.”

She rolled over, cheeks hot and red, the ribbons on her nightdress caught under her hand. “I’m trying,” she called back, and he made a Scottish noise deep in his throat that seemed to say he didn’t believe her, not one little bit.

Long memories of a foolishly broken heart and a dead family weighed her down, and she was on edge about the recent and random attempts on her life. But what really kept her wide awake in the middle of the night was the warm and restless presence of the Scotsman in the hall.

“I could make ye some more tea,” he said uneasily, and she snorted. He struck her as the sort of fellow who could do anything but boil water.

With a final, deep sigh, she sat up, her hands gripping the rough new wood he’d used to rebuild her bed. No point in pretending any further. The uncomfortable truth was that sleep wasn’t what she needed most. Sleep couldn’t ease her heart.

Frannie stood and slipped a shawl over her shoulders. Her feet were silent on the boards, her nightdress whispering as she crossed the small bedroom and put a hand on the door as if she would be able to feel his warmth through it. With no warning, she twisted the knob, and the large man caught himself before he could fall backward into a lady’s chamber.

“What ails ye now?” he asked, pulling his kilt and unbuttoned shirt to rights and keeping his gaze politely averted from her bare feet.

She couldn’t see his eyes in the dark, and that made it all the easier to answer, “You do.”

He leaped to his feet and stood, dwarfing her. “I can keep watch downstairs in the parlor, if that would be easier. I know it’s damned improper, having a strange man about at night and not a lodger.” He frowned as he looked at the door of Casper’s empty room.

She only put a hand on his arm and said, “Can I trust you?”

“Aye.” It was half statement, half question.

He hesitated for just a moment on the threshold of her room before following her inside. The house was dark, but she knew every inch of it. She wasn’t surprised to feel his fingers catch her gown as she walked to the closet door. Frannie had kept her family’s secret faithfully, the only one left to keep it since Bertram’s death. As she opened the closet door and pushed aside the layers of tweed and wool, a little thrill ran through her, making her swallow down a giddy giggle. Even Charles had never known about this. She had planned to tell him after their wedding, which had never happened.

Thom’s breath was hot on her ear, one hand even hotter against the small of her back. “Dragging me into a closet, lass? I don’t think that’s going to help ye sleep.”

“Close the door and come along.”

She pulled the hook hidden under a coat, and when the panel slid aside, she reached behind for Thom’s hand and pulled him up a narrow staircase. Even as she shoved the coats aside, he didn’t grumble or question her, as if he understood that what he was about to see was important. The steps were tall and wooden and probably quite dusty, but it was too dark to know for sure. Frannie held her nightdress up in front, counting the steps until she felt the press of wood against her outstretched hand. The stair below hers creaked ominously as Thom stopped and waited, a solid presence behind her. Smiling to herself, she opened the door to the roof and stepped out into the most beautiful garden in London.

The smell always struck her first. Green things and deep earth and robust, natural health. And, yes, goat. Next came the tweets of birds in the branches, just as sleepy as their captive brothers below. After a few steps in, the smooth stone under her feet turned to soft grass, and she sighed happily and looked up at the half-full moon that lit the milky glass of the greenhouse ceiling.

“I’ll be damned,” Thom said softly under his breath. “Am I dreaming, lass?”

“You’re no sleepier than I am,” she said with a grin.

She tried to see it through his eyes, as if for the first time. She’d played in the secret garden all her life, had even taken her first steps here. Since first her parents’ and then Bertram’s passing, it had been a large part of her life, taking care of all the chores that allowed it to flourish. The small fruit trees, carefully pruned. The grass and rows of vegetables and tidy fences. The flowers and beehives, sleepily humming. The cantankerous but tiny goats that kept her in cream and milk when the rest of the city suffered. The troublesome process of turning their scat into the richest compost in the city. Even the high stone walls of the roof that hid the bounty within were painted the fresh, warm green of a summer that had ceased to be, ever since London had grown weak and watery with pollution and sharp with blud creatures. Frannie’s home was the tallest house for blocks. The glass ceiling could only be seen from an airship, and not many of those crossed this part of London. A small but powerful charm helped eyes slide away, should they actually land on the curved glass, which was carefully vented on the side so the wild birds could come and go.

“This is why you’re so scared of the Coppers, aye?” Thom asked. “And my badge?”

She looked up at the cold, indigo sky. “All very illegal, yes. If anyone ever found out, it would all be seized for the city. Probably ruined, as they ruin everything.”

Looking all around, he put a hand on her shoulder, where the shawl had fallen aside. The warmth and weight of his touch seared through her.

“This place is far too precious to be ruined,” he said gently.

“This is where I go when I can’t sleep. When I feel unsafe or unquiet or too alone. I lie back in the grass and stare at the sky and just breathe.”

With long familiarity, she went to a faded wooden trunk along the wall and cleared off the half-filled pots and trowels to lift the lid. When she turned back to face him with a rough wool blanket in her arms, a smile lit his face with the light of secrets shared and promises to come. A new heat unspooled in her belly, matching the wet warmth of the sun-kissed grass soft under her feet. He took the blanket from her, and she moved to an open patch where the grass was thick.

“This is my favorite spot,” she said, and he tossed the blanket high, holding on to one side and letting it settle smoothly over the ground.

Even though she’d done this a thousand times or more, this was her first experience in the garden with a man’s eyes on her body, on her face. She tried to avoid his gaze, busily bundling her shawl into a pillow and stretching out on the blanket, enjoying the trapped warmth of the greenhouse more than any coverlet and trying to ignore the fact that she wasn’t wearing nearly enough clothing. She had long ago decided that the rooftop greenhouse was a place beyond time, a place where nothing mattered but warmth and nature and light, and she struggled to convince herself further as Thom settled by her side, not touching but close enough that she could feel the brush of his kilt.

Frannie stared up through the glass at the faraway glitter of stars. London’s famous fog swirled in and out between the moon and the greenhouse, but she found her favorite constellations, the Swan and the Great Bear. Thom was a still and silent presence at her side. Barely moving, barely breathing. On high alert, and waiting.

An owl hooted overhead, and Thom startled.

Frannie finally had to laugh. “A bit jumpy, there?”

He sighed and chuckled and ran a hand through his hair, caught out. “Aye, well, I’m in an illegal garden, alone with a beautiful, half-dressed girl. I’m one step away from sitting on my hands.”

Frannie ran fingers through the grass, the uneven blades tickling over her palm. “Time seems to stop here,” she murmured. “I used to come here and watch the stars spin and fall asleep to the sound of rustling leaves. I came here when my parents died. I came here the night my brother was killed.” She rolled to her side, her head on her hand as she looked at him. “I came here after you kissed me.”

He looked down on her with soft, serious eyes. “I’ve regretted that. Poor wee thing. I didn’t mean to scare you away.”

“I’m not a virgin, Thom.”

He didn’t blink. Didn’t move.

“I was engaged for one day, and then he used me and left me. My brother called him out to the Dueler’s Green, sword in hand. My brother lost.” Thom groaned and put his head in his hands, and she sat up, a hand on his forearm. “I’m not telling you so you’ll regret kissing me, nor so that you’ll pity me. I’m telling you so you’ll understand why I bolted. I’m skittish. No one’s touched me in years. I’m . . . apologizing. It was a nice kiss.”

“No wonder you’ve no faith. Poor lass.”

The way he said “poor” made it come out “puir,” and Frannie leaned forward slowly to put her head against his bicep. He stroked her braided hair gently and then wrapped his arm around her.

“I had a wife.”

She nodded against his chest, scared to speak and break the spell of the garden. Something about the sleepy warmth, the cool darkness beyond, and the charmed glass that kept it secret created a bubble of solitude that she didn’t care to end. Thom ran his fingers down the long braid in her hair, and he swallowed hard.

“We were married young, and I left her behind when I did my service with the Scottish Navy. I didn’t know until I returned home with a bag of pearls that she had died in a fire just a few months after I left. I hadn’t been there. I couldn’t save her. Or the bairn she carried. I sold the pearls and left home again. I figured I would keep other families from losing their hearts, or die trying. Either was better than reminding myself of what I let happen. I should have been there.” He paused, and she heard his fingers scrape the stubble on his cheek, knocking away a tear, perhaps. “I don’t sleep so well, these days.”

“I only sleep well here. Lie back beside me. Look at the stars. Feel the sun’s heat still in the ground.”

He pulled back to look at her. “You’re a cheeky wee thing.”

He scooted down and lay back on the blanket, arranging his kilt and settling his hands over his stomach.

She stretched out on her back beside him, her feet crossed at the ankles. His elbow brushed hers, but it wasn’t enough.

“Cheeky? Is that what they call it?” She shifted, setting her arm against his with quiet purpose. “From what I hear, the fine ladies of society have another word altogether for someone like me.”

“Now, Frannie—”

“I like the way you say my name. With that little trill on the
r
. And I don’t care what they would call me. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I ran away when you kissed me because I can’t hide from my memories, not because I’m worried about my future. I made mistakes, and I have regrets, but I don’t want to run away anymore. You make me feel safe, make me realize that hiding isn’t actually living. Actions speak louder than words, for me. You make me want to live again.” She gazed up at the moon, praying to still her heart. “Are you still sitting on your hands?”

“I can think of better places for them, if ye trust me.”

He rolled to his side to cup her cheek, gazing down with watchful eyes that still held the sea. She put her hand over his.

After placing a careful kiss in his palm, she whispered, “I trust you.”

13

Thom ran a thumb over her cheekbone with the gentleness he’d used cradling her dainty teacups. His eyes went hooded, and he leaned over to dust her lips with his. Shivers raced through her at the touch. It may have seemed gentle and soft, but the promise of more lurked in his hazel eyes, gone shadowy with the moonlight. She understood that he was giving her time to bolt, to break away. To turn from him.

She didn’t.

She lifted her head, inviting, and with a slow, curling smile, he obliged. His mouth slanted over hers with firm purpose as his hand slipped to her jaw. Whatever had made her panic last time, that impulse was gone, her body rooted to the earth and yearning toward his. The kiss was long, slow, and tasting, and she opened her eyes to watch him, her fingers trailing over the golden hairs on his forearm where his sleeve had slipped up. His eyelashes were light where they fell over his cheeks, and tiny webs of wrinkles sprang from the corners of his eyes as if he was always laughing. But he wasn’t laughing now, and he ran his thumb along the corner of her mouth as he deepened the kiss, his tongue slipping within. She closed her eyes. Now she was the one struggling not to fall apart.

Charles had kissed her, and those kisses had excited her, but never like this. Charles had made love as he had done everything: quickly, sharply, selfishly, and with a mirror close at hand. She had been too young and anxious to please to consider that there might be something more to how bodies met. Thom seemed entirely focused on her, on her mouth, although he subtly sidled over, his hip pressing against hers with lazy suggestion. His tongue explored her, pressing sweetly and gently and playfully but with a slow tenderness that was half pleasure, half madness. He coaxed her with tender strokes, calling her into his rhythm, luring her to lap at his mouth with the same sly fascination, the same unhurried surety. She reached for his hair, for the tender back of his neck exposed beneath his collar.

When he pulled back, his thumb still pressed to the corner of her lips, he smiled down at her with a new heat. “Ye didn’t bolt.”

She just shivered and shook her head no.

Without the press of his body and the touch of his mouth, Frannie felt exposed, her skin alive and on fire under the thin cotton of her gown. She hadn’t thought it through, bringing him up to the garden, although it didn’t feel wrong. Still, it was strange to see the hills and shadows of her body through the worn chemise and know that even the wan moonlight would show him every place where the thin shift clung to her, the dusky shadows of her nipples and her thatch, farther down. She felt lush and fearless in the night air, laid bare for him as all her secrets now were.

“Ye look like a selkie dusted in starlight.”

His hand traced down her face and neck, making her shiver when he reached her collarbone. Leaning over ever so slowly, he planted a kiss there, and the breath caught in her throat as her back arched toward him.

His palm traced down her arm, and he took up her bare hand and matched his fingers to hers, one to one, a look of wonderment on his face. “Such a wee thing,” he mused.

Frannie’s eyes feasted on him in turn, from the shaggy cut of his hair, just grazing broad shoulders, to the V where his work shirt hung open, showing a patch of gold hair even lighter than the rest. He was stretched out beside her, bigger in every respect, at ease on his side with his kilt draped haphazardly, showing gold-dusted knees and his heavy work boots, carefully polished for their visit to the theater. She ached to touch him, just as she longed to feel his callused hands skim over her every curve.

With a satisfied rumble, he half-settled over her, his body pressed against hers from chest to thigh. The kiss started deeper, faster this time, his hunger showing in the pressure of his lips and the firm movement of one leg, protectively covering one of hers and moving her knees ever so subtly apart. Her tongue sought his, breaking past soft lips in a quick, tender caress, just testing the waters. He met her, moaning into her mouth as his hand slid from her collarbone to her waist, fingers splayed over the whisper-soft gown.

“No corset. Gods, woman,” he murmured, his palm hot as he explored the valley from ribs to hips, the cotton bunching under his fingers. He pulled her to her side, and she slid her leg over his, pressing pearled nipples against the planes of his chest, back arched and still bearing the damp kiss of dew-wet grass soaked up through the blanket.

Thom kissed just behind her ear, moving her hair aside and brushing the tiny curls with a finger between soft presses of his lips. Heat shimmered over her, making her ache inside for more of his body and his mouth. Her hand tightened around the tense knot of his bicep. He skimmed the lacy neck of her gown, leaving a trail of kisses down to the ribbon tie as his hand cupped her breast, his thumb stroking her hard nipple through the cloth. She felt heavy in his arms, soft and opening the way the tree leaves did every morning when the sun rose. Slowly, so slowly, he pulled the ribbon at her throat as his mouth dipped to her breast, suckling through the thin fabric, an echoed heat pooling between her legs and making her gasp.

With one hand cradling her head, he gently rolled her to her back and slung a leg over to straddle her thighs. She watched the play of his kilt and grinned, stretched her hands overhead, and reveled in the strange, leisurely pleasure, languid as a purring cat. His tongue returned, hot and wet through the gown, her nipple still peaked to his touch. With both hands free, he cupped her breasts tenderly and bent his head to lavish the other nipple with warm strokes of his tongue, his breath hot through the cotton. When Frannie ran her hands up the hard planes of his thighs, she was surprised to find that underneath his kilt he wore nothing at all.

“Goodness,” she muttered, and he caught her mouth in another kiss, briefly grinding his pelvis against her to demonstrate with no question that there was actually . . . quite a bit of something else underneath a Scotsman’s kilt. Before she could gasp in surprise, he found her nipple again, teasing with his teeth and making her writhe.

A shadow passed over the moon just then, casting the garden in shadow. Emboldened by the darkness, she ran a hand even farther up his leg and briefly stroked the hot silk of what she found there.

He made a strangled noise, deep in his throat. “Oh, lass. You can’t know what ye do to me.”

But she did know, and she moved her hand gently up and down, grinning slyly when he moaned, cheek hot against the skin of her chest. She moved her hand a little faster, and he growled, going tense all over. His hand tangled in the fabric of her gown before skimming up the inside of her leg, warm and yielding. When he stroked the hot center of her like a question, she answered by quivering and whimpering in turn, her hand locked around him. The sensation of his thumb, rough and wide, rubbing slowly and deeply, woke something in her, and she finally understood that just as Thom’s kisses were something different from the ones Charles had inflicted upon her, so would Thom’s lovemaking be an entirely new experience, one that her body was well roused to enjoy. Every touch, every taste, every look of his shadowed eyes told her that he was determined to take care of her in every way, that he wouldn’t leave her hungry. She closed her eyes, tossing her head back, yielding her body utterly to his care.

“You’re wet, lass. Do ye want this?”

One finger pressed in, ever so gently, and she rose to meet it, holding her breath. “More than I’ve wanted anything in a long time,” she whispered, and he made an affirmative noise and moved the finger a little faster. She felt his lips close around her nipple again, and an exquisite yearning surged through her like a flame connecting where his mouth and fingers met her body.

“Well, then,” he whispered, lips hot against her breast.

He pushed another finger into her, in and out slowly, and she ached for the fullness every time they withdrew. She found herself moving along with him, her body already knowing the dance. After a last, wet pull on her breast, he drew his shirt over his head and murmured, “Let me see you, love.” Watching the play of shadows over his chest, she shifted to help him strip her gown away. In all her years in the garden, she’d never been there naked. She’d never really been anywhere naked, other than the copper tub in the loo, and her lifelong fear of bludrats always urged her to hurry back into a gown, into anything. But now, fully exposed from hair to toes, she stretched in the starlight and sighed at the air’s warm kiss on her skin.

Thom still wore his kilt and boots, but she found that she approved. The brush of wool against her thighs was delicious, and she sucked in a breath as he kissed between her breasts and down the curve of her belly. Finally settling over her, he kissed her gently, sweetly, deeply.

“Ye must promise to tell me if it hurts ye.”

She nodded, biting her lip.

He nudged her thighs apart with a leg, and she opened willingly. Every nerve thrummed, ached, and she knew she was more than ready. The hot press of him where his fingers had recently worked made her shiver with anticipation. As he pushed into her, so slowly, he took her nipple between his teeth and suckled.

Frannie had never wanted anything so badly, never felt such a hunger. When he was fully inside, she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him close to whisper in his ear, “Don’t stop.”

He moved slowly at first, tentative, as if he was afraid of hurting her. She moved with him, learning, feeling, the tension building. He felt so big, filling her, blotting out the stars. It was hot and sweet and wet, and still she wanted.

“More.”

“More, lass?”

“Harder. I don’t know. More.”

He moved faster, pounding against her, making her wiggle and press against him. An ache was building in her, like an itch she couldn’t scratch, and he sped up the pace. She wrapped one leg around him and whimpered, trying to find just the right place. When he unlatched her arms and rolled her over onto her hands and knees while still inside her, she was utterly surprised.

“I’ve heard it said some women prefer it this way. Let me know, aye?”

She was about to protest when he pulled out and pressed back in, one finger stroking her cleft. Suddenly, everything fell into place. She let out a strangled cry and closed her eyes, finding her rhythm with him, meeting him with every thrust. Oh, the joy of it! That had to be how birds felt, flying into the sky. With every plunge, he struck some fine, secret place, and she felt a sensation building like a song, pounding toward a crescendo. His finger moved faster, their bodies in perfect harmony, the song spiraling on and on, until finally, she held her breath as the world stopped, the note spinning out inside her forever, higher and higher, until she saw stars against the inky darkness of her closed eyes.

“Gods, woman,” he said, and he pounded against her, drawing out that last note, finishing his own song with a groan.

When he collapsed against her back, her knees gave out, and they both tumbled to the blanket in a sweaty heap. She knew him well enough to know that he would be scared to crush her, worried about his weight.

“Bide a while,” she murmured, one eye on the stars. “I like how you pin me down.”

He chuckled and rolled to his side, taking her with him and making her yelp in surprise. “I won’t pin ye down, but I’ll hold you close enough.” Curling around her, he draped an arm over her side, pulling her against him.

Frannie relaxed into his chest, letting her head drop. Cradled by the warmth and magic of the secret she’d shared with a tender man who wasn’t about to leave, she drifted off to sleep.