How To Marry a Rake Page 15

  When had she ended up in his embrace? She cradled his jaw in her hand. ‘No. I think you’ve enough burdens,’ she whispered. ‘I’ll do my best not to add to them.’

  All of Stephen’s anger and fear had gone. There was nothing now except the feel of her yielding curves and soft heat. There was no mischief between them now. No bickering. Only the tenderness in her eyes and the racing of his heart.

  Her hands came up. His brain gave a last feeble try, shouting out a distant warning, but it was no match for the much closer press of her bosom to his chest or the rush of desire clogging his veins. He closed his eyes, went under and pulled her close for his kiss.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Her heart overflowing, Mae leaned into Stephen’s kiss. He’d done it. It had been horribly difficult for him, that much had been obvious, but he’d opened a piece of his heart to her in a way that he never had before.

  And this time it hadn’t been due to her prodding and probing. At last he’d taken the step himself, grabbed both edges of a tiny crack and pulled it wider, shared a dark part of his past that he clearly didn’t care to—and he’d done it to protect her.

  She well remembered the times when Stephen and Nicholas had gone away to visit their mother at Fincote Park, how Nicholas had nearly always been subdued when they returned, but Stephen had come back full of energy, almost frantic in his desire to play a bigger prank, tell a better joke, or make everyone laugh until their sides hurt.

  His desire for attention as a boy made perfect sense now. How horribly it must have hurt those brothers to see their mother fading away, retreating from life. How frightened Stephen must have been that the same thing might happen to him.

  She mourned for his sad mother, and for all the years that he had carried such a burden all alone. But she also revelled in this new openness, and in the incredible difference in this kiss. Their other embraces had been full of heat and excitement, thick with desire—and with more than a hint of combat. This … felt more like a plea. She could almost feel his inner turmoil begin to quiet.

  She feared the opposite was happening to her. Her body was vibrating as his hands moved over her. He made her feel alive in a hundred places, in a thousand ways.

  He broke their kiss and buried his face in the angle of her neck. She gasped. His tongue brushed her ear-lobe at the same time as his hands closed over her breasts and a line of fire jumped to life between all three points. A moan tore its way out of her. She was burning, from the inside out.

  She didn’t care. She wanted more.

  There was no undoing the many tiny buttons marching up the back of her habit. Stephen didn’t even try. He just pinched her nipple through the heavy fabric of her habit with one hand and started pulling up her skirts with the other.

  And she was helping him. He pressed her up against a rough wall and she lifted her leg up high, along with her climbing skirts. She wrapped it around him, dug her fingers into his hair and held on. Stephen was above her and around her, solid and reassuring. Her position should have felt precarious, but she’d never felt safer. Or more filled with hope.

  His fingers slid along the length of her leg, following the sweep of her garter on to the soft flesh of her inner thigh. Yes.

  ‘No.’ Stephen pulled his mouth from hers, but his fingers were still creeping higher. ‘We should not be doing this.’

  She suppressed a groan and agreed with him instead. ‘You’re right, we shouldn’t.’ But she hitched her leg higher, opening to him in a way she’d never done before. The thrill of it, the rightness of it set her heart to soaring.

  His breath stirred in her hair. A cool breeze whispered along the bare skin of her leg. But the spot where Stephen’s fingers touched now was molten hot.

  She jumped.

  ‘We can’t do … everything, Mae. We shouldn’t even have gone this far.’

  She only moved against his hand.

  He moaned. It was capitulation and she rejoiced to hear it. She’d never felt closer to Stephen than she did right now, and still it wasn’t enough.

  Suddenly he reached down and grasped both her legs. He lifted her easily until she straddled him and carried her over to a ladder leading to a hayloft. She felt the heat and hardness of him with every step.

  ‘There should be a clean bed of hay up there.’ His words came out a statement, but Mae saw the question in his eyes.

  Emphatically, she nodded.

  * * *

  Stephen had spent a good part of his lifetime engaged in a variety of selfish and destructive pursuits, but what he was about to do with Mae just might be the worst.

  He’d tried to stop, but her insistence had won out over the creaky objections of his conscience. There was nothing left now but the heat at her core, pressing against him, and the sure, inexorable pull of desire. He shifted her to his shoulder with an ease that left her gasping and quickly ascended.

  He’d been right. Here was a loft full of clean and sweet-smelling hay. Gently he laid her down and stretched out beside her. She pulled him close and the sweetness of her touch and the joy in her face erased all of his doubts, melting them into irresistible need.

  He kissed her again, enjoying the taste and the scent of her. It was only moments before her skirts were lifted high once more, baring a mile of silky, slender leg. He trailed teasing fingers along the milk-white inside of her thigh. She threw her head back and laughed at the sensation.

  He looked down into Mae’s face, alight with happiness, and he knew that she wanted this. Hell and damnation, he wanted it too, more than he’d ever wanted anything. But nothing was settled between them.

  He couldn’t deny that Mae was in his blood. She was so much more than he’d ever given her credit for—not just a genius at mischief, but intelligent and full of quick wit and sly humour that called to him like the pull of a magnet. She set him aflame with her innate sensuality.

  But this was a pivotal moment, one that could very well set the course for both of their lives. It was not a decision he should be making with his raging member. He had a racecourse that he’d worked hard to build and all the people associated with it counting on him. He had a reputation to build, and the undeniable need to prove himself. He could not abandon his task, not even for this.

  And Mae had a mission of her own. Was she even thinking how perilous this course of action could be?

  ‘Mae?’ he asked seriously. ‘Are you still practising your wiles?’

  She laughed. ‘Do I need practice? I’d thought it obvious they were up to the job.’

  He waited. She grew serious.

  ‘What’s worrying you, Stephen?’

  ‘I don’t know. Things are different between us now.’

  She smiled. ‘Indeed they are. For example, I don’t remember doing this.’ She cupped him with her hand.

  Involuntarily he pressed against her. ‘Lord, Mae. We have to stop.’

  She groaned and pulled away, pressing her hand to her eyes. ‘Yes, Stephen,’ she said in tone of utter frustration. ‘This has to stop. I can’t keep doing this. You can’t keep doing this! You are open, then you are closed. You push and pull me until I don’t know which way is up.’

  With horror he recognised the truth of her words.

  She took her hand away, met his gaze without guile. ‘You’re making me miserable.’

  Lord, but he knew what she meant. He was miserable too. And yet somehow he was, at the same time, happier than he could ever remember.

  He grabbed her fingers, held them tight to his chest. ‘I know. We’re caught up in the physical, now. And in the excitement of the search for Pratchett, too. But later, when we are not alone in a barn and we’ve either found that damned horse or failed, things might look different.’

  She pulled back to look him in the eye. ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘I meant what I said earlier—I won’t be like my father. I won’t leave you to face the consequences of my actions. And I won’t make you promises that I’m not even sure I’m ca
pable of keeping.’ He ran a caressing finger along the wonderfully stubborn length of her jaw. ‘I’m saying that I’m as miserable and happy and terrified as you, but I think we should just … wait. Let’s finish what we started, not only with Pratchett, but we’ll carry on with your mission too.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘And then, we’ll see how we feel when all of this is over.’

  She looked suddenly worried, and he wondered if it was because her feelings might change—or if she feared they wouldn’t.

  ‘Oh, very well,’ she grumped. ‘But it seems a shame to waste a perfectly good hayloft.’

  He looked at her. Her hair was tousled and her lips were swollen from his kisses. Her skirts were still hiked around her thighs.

  And suddenly he was tired of holding back, of keeping every damned thing out of her reach. There was one thing he could give her, one gift to symbolise the fragile new hope he felt in his heart. He leaned down, buried his fingers among her curls and sealed his lips to hers. He put everything into that kiss, all of his old loneliness and his new longings, as well as the promise of the pleasure he was going to show her.

  He couldn’t wait—and her eager movements beneath his hand told him he didn’t have to. Searching, he found the heated heart of her.

  Ahh. She was wet and ready. He slid his finger along her folds and she exhaled her approval. Back and forth he traced over her, just a little deeper with each stroke. Her breath began to come high and fast, her whole body tensed with the force of her passion.

  Ever so softly he eased higher, to meet the hard centre of her desire. Gently he greeted it, circling, rubbing lightly and drinking in with pleasure all the wonderful soft sounds and swift movements of her response.

  Without warning, she convulsed. Her head thrown back, and her hips jerking against his hand, she came beautifully apart. He drank in the sight even as he pressed the hot ridge of his length against her thigh.

  She collapsed against him. For several agonising moments he struggled for control. But then she lolled her head back onto his shoulder and looked him in the eye.

  ‘I had no idea,’ she said in wonder.

  Stephen laughed and kissed her on the nose.

  ‘Neither did I.’

  Chapter Fourteen

  The race meeting opened the next morning. A stiff wind blew as the first race went off, and Mae and her mother were there to cheer the beautiful thoroughbreds on as they thundered towards the finish line.

  Excitement coloured the air, along with a great many more fluttering ribbons and feathers than usual. Nearly every lady in Newmarket had come out this morning. They were not all perched in carriages or atop vehicles, either. Instead they were down among the men, debating the merits of the favourites, putting their pin money down with the legs and generally having a grand time. A few bold souls, including Lady Ryeton, even mounted up and raced to the finish along with the contenders, just as the young and unruly bucks of the ton did.

  Mae’s father was having a grand time as well—especially after Barty’s Shill won her race, narrowly defeating Lord Toswick’s Butterfly. She won him a solid amount of money and generated much talk of the possible private match between the two horses.

  And Mae—Mae was allowing herself to feel cautiously optimistic, because … well, just because. Her body was still tingling from everything Stephen had done to her last evening. But her heart was tingling with the cautious rebirth of hope—hope for her and Stephen, hope that her instincts had been telling her the truth all along.

  She brushed a stray leaf from her skirts in an effort to distract herself. She knew she looked well today, for Josette had commented knowingly on the sparkle in her eyes as she brushed the straw from Mae’s riding habit. Just the recollection of it brought a flush of heat to her cheeks. Even Mr Matthew Grange commented on her high colouring as he invited her to climb up and join him for a few moments in his cabriolet.

  ‘You must be careful, Miss Halford, or you will outshine the day,’ he said gaily. His admiring glance moved from her heated cheeks and passed over her sage carriage dress. ‘I can see that you are enjoying yourself this morning?’

  ‘Tremendously, sir. I hope you are as well?’

  ‘I am,’ he returned with a smile. ‘I can’t tell you how happy I am to be back amongst people again.’

  He didn’t have to tell her, it had been obvious since she’d first seen him arrive at Lord Toswick’s ball. And she rather thought his continued good cheer and unflappability had eased his way this week. His determined refusal to be ashamed of his differences or cast down by others’ prejudices had paid off.

  She wished her own hopes would turn out so well. If only she could collect her thoughts, review her options, and decide just what it was that she was hoping for.

  ‘Convalescence is a lonely business.’ He grinned to take the pathos from his words.

  ‘And entering society—or re-entering it—can be a difficult business. Yet here you are today with a crowd of friends and a host of admirers.’ She put her hand over his scarred one. ‘I hope you know that I count myself first among them.’

  He patted her hand. ‘Then we shall form a mutual admiration society,’ he said with a chuckle. ‘You are an unusual young lady, Miss Halford. Those of us with differences must stick together.’ He looked out over the line of horses and jockeys making their way to the start. ‘I’ve always enjoyed racing. I hope to start up my own stables again soon.’ He shot her a mischievous glance. ‘But I admit that today I am finding it most enjoyable to watch the results of the ladies’ experiment.’

  Mae glanced about at the people happily milling along the rail. ‘There does appear to be an air of female satisfaction hanging over the course today, doesn’t there?’

  ‘And an accompanying air of male interest, I would say.’ His gaze drifted over her shoulder. ‘Ah, here comes your friend Lady Corbet.’

  Mae turned as he called a greeting. Addy had Miss Lucy Metheny in tow.

  ‘Lady Corbet,’ Mr Grange said with a nod. ‘I’ve just finished telling Miss Halford how fine she looks, now I must comment on how very pleased with yourself you appear to be right now.’

  ‘And why not?’ Addy trilled. ‘I doubled my pin money for the quarter when Mr Halford’s filly won.’

  Miss Lucy grinned up at them. ‘And I’ve just heard the most titillating piece of gossip.’

  ‘I’m all ears,’ Mr Grange said.

  ‘Go on, dear,’ Addy urged her. ‘Mr Grange won’t mind a bit of tittle-tattle. Something like this must be of interest to any racing man, concerning Lord Ryeton as it does.’

  ‘Lord Ryeton?’ Mae asked sharply.

  ‘Lady Ryeton, actually,’ Miss Lucy said. She shot a quick glance in Mr Grange’s direction. ‘It’s being said that Lady Ryeton left London for a reason.’ She lowered her voice. ‘She was dunned out!’

  ‘By creditors,’ Addy put in unnecessarily.

  ‘I take leave to doubt this particular titbit.’ With a subtle gesture Mr Grange pointed off to the right, where Lady Ryeton herself sat mounted on a splendid, restive stallion near the finish line. She was dressed in the most elegant habit Mae had ever seen, all done up in black and silver in a military style. As they watched she laughed at something one of her companions said, her eyes alight and her face carefree. ‘She hasn’t a worry in the world, or so one would think by her manner today.’

  Or so we are all supposed to think, Mae thought darkly.

  ‘You might be right, Mr Grange.’ Miss Lucy looked thoughtful. ‘Perhaps we should not repeat it again.’

  ‘Well, it’s not as if we were likely to tell anyone else, in any case,’ Addy said. ‘Unless we find it is true.’

  Mae laughed.

  ‘Good heavens, is that the race at Beacon course they are calling?’ Addy asked. ‘I promised Corbet I would meet him before it began.’ She clutched Miss Lucy with one hand and waved a farewell with the other. ‘Good day to you, Mr Grange! Mae, I shall see you at Lady Ryeton’
s.’

  ‘I’m looking forward to it,’ said Mae.

  Matthew Grange watched the pair of them make their way through the crowd a moment before turning back to run a contemplative eye over Mae. ‘I meant what I said earlier, Miss Halford. You are glowing quite radiantly today. Perhaps on a related note, my good friend Lord Stephen Manning is prowling about with a look of abject frustration on his face.’ The wind tousled his hair and the sun highlighted the tender pink skin of his scars, but he had a smile on his face and mischief lived in his eyes. ‘Judging by the way Stephen was watching you the other night, I might be inclined to think that these two might be related. Or is it presumptuous of me to mention it?’ he asked with a grin.

  ‘Not at all presumptuous—especially if I might be allowed to comment on Miss Lucy’s new fascination with the past war with France.’ She twinkled up at him. ‘I did notice that she was particularly interested in the 13th Light Dragoons. Would it be presumptuous of me to recall that that was your company, sir?’

  He held up his hands. ‘Touché, Miss Halford. Although Miss Lucy is young and flighty still, and I am too soon broke free from my sickbed to contemplate anything except my new freedoms. Perhaps it might be safer all around if we both kept our observations private.’

  ‘Safer,’ she agreed, ‘but not nearly as much fun!’

  They shared a comfortable laugh just as Stephen approached the cabriolet. Mae noted that he was indeed wearing a ferocious scowl, as well as a coat of sable superfine that set off his short blond hair beautifully.

  ‘Good morning, Stephen!’ she said, intensely aware of the brightness in her expression, but unable to suppress it. She glanced at Mr Grange and then extended her hand downward. ‘Will you help me down?’ she asked politely. ‘I see my mother is coming to fetch me.’

  Her heart caught in her throat at the heated touch of his hand, but then her mother arrived, and for several moments there was no opportunity for anything other than pleasantries. Soon, though, a tumult began at the starting line and swept through the crowd toward them. Several false starts led to loud objections and cries of foul play. Everyone’s attention was soon occupied with the unfolding drama, and Stephen took the opportunity to lean in close to Mae.