An Affair with Mr. Kennedy (27 page)

All eyes, she rolled closer. Zeno glanced at her with a close-lipped smile.

“I hope you don’t mind? I have never seen this done.”

His grin broadened. “Would you care to learn? I would find your hand in the matter pleasurable.”

Up on her knees, Cassie straddled him.

He turned the tin around. “Please select one of these fine suits of armor, milady.”

She reached in, took out a rubber, and removed a band of paper that encircled it.

“Affixing a condom is simple, but needs to be done correctly.”

Her lesson appeared to be hugely arousing, as Zeno had to still the jerking recipient while she placed the rolled up rubber on the head. She encircled his penis with her hand and pressed down. “Grip a bit harder.” He sucked air through his teeth and groaned.

Alarmed, Cassie took her hand off. “Don’t stop, love.” He wrapped her fingers around his girth and rolled the condom down. Lifting her by the hips, he pressed her onto his erection, pushing deep inside. Mesmerized by her gloriously naked form, he groaned and thrust his cock in and out. “Come closer.”

He suckled and she murmured musical and mysterious female whimpers and growls that elevated his arousal to dangerous levels.
To keep himself on the edge of climax, he held on to the base of the rubber and drew the head of his penis along her cleft. He stroked slick folds until he heard, “Don’t stop, please—don’t stop. Yes … yes.”

While Cassie floated in the land of bliss, he moved her under him and reinserted his throbbing shaft. He kept himself ready with easy, shallow thrusts. He kissed her eyelids until they fluttered open and she wrapped her legs around his waist—gathering him into her, deepening his penetration.

His need grew to nearly intolerable excitement as her hips lifted to meet his body, accepting all of him. Slapping hard against her, he growled out his pleasure and she answered him with breathy cries and moans.

“Dear.” Thrust. “God.” Thrust.

He exploded into her. Or, more accurately, he spilled into the reservoir of a knight in latex armor. Oblivious and spent, Zeno chuckled softly.

“You are amused?” There was a smile in her question.

“Ah-hh no, love, just amazed.”

Cassie rolled onto her side. “What we have is very special, isn’t it?”

“Very.” He stroked the small of her back and traced his fingers over the cursive letters swirling along her hip.

“SHALL WE GET you dressed before you catch a chill?”

“Must I?” His warm-blooded lover snuggled under the bedcovers beside him.

Of course he would rather she spend the entire night with him. Zeno kissed her nose and reluctantly mumbled words he did not mean. “I insist.”

Cassie stepped into pantalets, and he buttoned up her skirt and blouse. They left off her petticoats, bustle, and corset. “There you are, respectable enough for a silent scurry down the corridor.”

Cassie patted the loose hairs around her neck. “I suppose my hair is a fright.”

He studied her carefully, committing the picture to memory. “You look well pleasured.”

He opened the door. An alarmingly loud creak came from the stairs.

Wide-eyed, she hesitated. Zeno put a finger to his lips. Sliding past her, he kept the door open a crack.

The quiet was so complete, he could hear the soft clatter of tools and hammered tin from the workshop below.

“Rob?”

She nodded. “He often works late.”

He signaled back toward the hall. “Servants?”

“Possibly.” Cassie squeezed in and he let her take a peek. They were chest to chest now. He inhaled the smells of her skin and hair.

She jerked her head back and he edged forward for a better look. Long shadows broke across the expanse of hallway floor as two figures moved into view. The dark intruders turned down the corridor and halted.

“I need to dress, Cassie.” Without taking his eyes off the hallway he stepped into the slacks she handed him. “Two men, heading away from us. They just entered the second door on the left.”

She frowned. “That’s my room.”

Abandoning his post, he reached into his luggage and removed a pistol. “Since this is likely no burglary, I must assume this a kidnapping attempt.” He tossed on his shirt and she buttoned it. “When they find an empty bed, they will either search other rooms or they will abandon the job.” He crossed the room and pushed up the window sash. Sure enough, one of the men had already started down the trellis outside Cassie’s window.

Zeno leaned out and fired a shot overhead. “That was a warning. The next bullet won’t miss.”

Panicked, the prowler jumped to the ground just as Rob ran out of the workshop. Zeno aimed at a limb and fired. The man growled in pain. He called down to Rob. “Two men, kidnappers, watch him close! He may have a weapon.”

Rob swung a large wrench at the man’s skull and knocked the writhing man out cold. Zeno grinned. “Good enough.” He nodded toward the house. “One more.”

Heavy footsteps pounded down the hallway. Zeno back-ed out the window and in two long strides was at the door.

“Stay here, Cassie.” Senses sharpened, Zeno stepped out into the corridor and headed toward the banister. At the top of the stairs he spied a shadow in motion on the landing.

He cocked his pistol, and the intruder froze. “Don’t make me shoot you.”

But the man chose to flee. Missing a tread as Zeno fired, the trespasser tumbled down the rest of the way. Rob stepped from the shadows to clunk him over the head.

Zeno bent over the bulky frame. “Good man, Rob.”

“A couple of crime solvers, I’d say.” Cassie stood on the landing, shoulders back with her hands on her hips.

He scowled. “I thought I told you to stay in the room.”

She held out her hand. “Give me the gun while you two find something to tie him up with.”

“What the devil is going on here?” Dr. Erskine’s voice traveled down the stairwell.

“It’s all over, Daddy, we’ve just caught some—” She hesitated. “Zak and Rob have caught a couple of burglars.”

Smart girl. No sense in alarming her parents, yet. Zeno climbed a few steps and pressed his pistol into her hands. “Remember to cock first and hold the gun with two hands.” He showed her the stance by lifting her arms. “That’s it.”

He stepped away, admiring the determined expression on her face. “You can put your arms down now.”

She nodded, her stare frozen on the fallen man below. “Go on, Zak, I’ll be fine.”

Chapter Twenty-one

C
assie’s heavy-lidded gaze surveyed the chipper crowd at the breakfast table. Stirring her tea, she listened absently to the comfortable undertone of her mother’s lively chatter.

“Remind me to never have that pesky creak in the stairs repaired. Forever more that high-pitched squeak will be music to my ears.” Mother’s gaze stopped on Zeno.

“As for the notch one of your bullets put in my parlor molding, no need to apologize. We’ll have a brass plaque made up. ‘Here lies the bullet that scared our intruder half to death.’”

“Thickheaded, lucky skunk.” Zeno grunted. “After the bullet missed, the tumble downstairs should have killed him.”

Rob snorted a laugh and scooped up a forkful of egg.

Cassie stifled a yawn, as her brother and Zeno shoveled platefuls of sausage and ham into their bellies.

Constable Sheffley ladled a dollop of clotted cream onto a warm scone already slathered with blackberry jam. The man’s eyes glowed with happiness over prowlers and pistol shots. “You were fortunate to have a Yard man such as Mr. Kennedy here on the premises. We’ve seen more than our share of riffraff pass through Surrey of late.”

“Pass through? I hope so.” Father turned over his paper and continued to read.

Their bright-eyed constable shrugged. “Summer holidays coming on, seasonal laborers make their way out to the shore—down Brighton way. Decent folks mainly, but we’ve run into a few bad characters.”

Rob leaned across the table. “I say a bracing plunge sounds about right to me. How about a dip in the pond, Zak?”

With a mouthful of ham and egg, Zeno shook his head. “Knackered, sorry, Rob.”

Her brother’s raised eyebrows and bright eyes scanned the table. “What about you, Tadpole?”

Cassie scrunched up her nose. “I’ve ordered a steaming-hot bath and have plans for a long nap.”

They had each taken turns recounting a ludicrous cock-and-bull story for her parents, who asked few pointed questions. No “why were you two up and about at such an hour of the morning?” Not even a “from where exactly did you both spot the intruders?” Of course, it helped that both doctors had been too busy bandaging groggy prowlers to inquire too heavily as to her exact whereabouts.

Bone-weary, her eyes drifted shut as she listened to the clink of her mother’s teacup in its saucer.

OUTSIDE CASSIE’S BEDCHAMBER, Zeno placed his hands on her shoulders and rubbed her upper arms. “Will you be all right?”

“Happy dreams.” Rob staggered off to his own room, leaving Zeno and Cassie alone in the upstairs hall.

She pressed her cheek to his chest with a sigh. “You wouldn’t mind a check under my bed for the Dippenhall Troll, would you?”

Zeno chuckled softly and turned the knob to her room.

He tilted his head to see around the door, and made a show of looking about. “Your bath awaits, but I see no sign of the local troll. Perhaps I should have a closer look.”

He led her by the hand and closed the door. The light, airy room featured a canopied bed placed in the center. “So, this is Cassie’s room.”

Zeno stepped around the copper tub to have a look out a large dormered window, which featured an inviting, cushioned window seat. He lifted the sash to let in a warm breeze. One of the intruders had made a hasty exit this way. He noted a torn curtain and a number of displaced pillows.

An old doll stuffed in the corner of a chintz-covered chair lent the room an aura of adolescence. He examined the details of her girlhood, including a bookcase filled with classic childhood tomes.

“As comfortable as an old shoe, yet suddenly it feels a bit foreign to me.” Cassie dipped her fingertips into the bathwater.

Anger stirred inside him at the very idea that she would be made to feel unsafe in her own bedroom. He was also in a temper at himself, for this damnable menace, this consortium of danger that had appeared out of nowhere to threaten her. Zeno collapsed onto the window seat. “Take your bath, Cassie. I’ll curl up here and have a nap.”

He leaned against a stack of pillows as she undressed. She turned her back to him and he loosened the strings of her corset, which dropped off along with her camisole. Small pink lines ran up and down her midriff, pressure marks from the stays of the corset.

“You certainly don’t need much help from that contraption.” A blush colored her cheeks.

“Mother is forever loosening laces and advising her patients to breathe. ‘Let go of your vanity, ladies. Let those dresses out an inch and exercise your lungs.’”

Captivated by her nude form, he still managed a grin at the near perfect mimicry of her suffragette mother. She dipped a hand into the tub and mixed a scented powder into the steaming water. “A bit of Epsom salt, infused with carnation. My favorite.”

He settled into a sight most pleasing in the morning light, her lovely figure in profile. A shapely curve ran along the back of her thigh over smooth, rounded buttocks.

“You are staring at my bottom, sir.” He caught the prettiest stolen glance, the dart of a narrowed eye, and the dimple of a suppressed smile.

“Yes. I am.”

She made no secret she enjoyed his interest, which charged the air in the room with a dangerous level of desire. In his mind, he walked up behind her and cupped each round cheek, running his hands over hips and quivering belly.

“What on earth are you mumbling about, Zeno?”

If he did not control his fantasies now, he would have to toss her onto the bed. “Get in the tub, before I …”

She laughed and stepped into her bath.

Zeno leaned into a stack of pillows and closed his eyes. He held on to the picture of her in his head and listened. The drizzle of water drops falling from a sea sponge onto her skin was a kind of music to his senses.

Such fierce natural beauty. Lovely of face and body. Talented, intelligent, and brave. No wonder she captivated him at every turn. Even this bad business with the intruders seemed to have little effect on her until moments ago. He felt buffeted about, upended by this exceptional young woman.

He opened his eye a crack. “Do you need someone to rinse the soap from your hair? I am at your service.”

Cassie sat up in the tub and nodded. He found a pitcher on her dresser with warm fresh water. He moved to her bath and she dipped her fingers in to feel the temperature.

“Too cool?”

Cassie murmured her approval, and laid her head back, closing her eyes. Zeno poured the clear liquid over her hair and then worked it through her scalp. He picked up long waves still soaking in soapy tub water and ran fresh water through them. She helped him gather up strands of wet hair and wring them out.

“Might you help me with the bath towel? There, on the chair, please?”