Beautiful Distraction (16 page)

And yet here he was, thanks in great part to the insistence of his…well, what would he call Malcolm Graham anyway? Assistant, sometime secretary, occasional estate manager…
friend
. Possibly the only one he had left, and that was likely due in large part to the fact that Mal was on his payroll.

But whatever Mal’s motivation, he had dragged Liam here to “take the waters” and take the waters he would.
 

He measured his breaths, trying desperately to empty his head of all thoughts. It was a nearly impossible task, it seemed, for his mind was always filled with memories he didn’t want to consider and guilt he refused to acknowledge.
 

He squeezed his eyes shut, but his thoughts continued to race, bombarding him from all sides.

“Damn,” he muttered, and then sank beneath the water entirely. Beneath the depths, there was no noise, nothing to see, and his brain began to quiet finally. Cut off from everything, even breath, he could almost pretend that his life above the surface didn’t exist.

Almost.

Unfortunately, his body required air to live and so he rose reluctantly. He wiped his face off and slicked his now-wet hair back with his good hand. He opened his eyes and froze.

There, standing on the edge of the steps that led down into the large, square pool where he reclined alone, was a woman. Not just any woman, but probably one of the most beautiful women he had ever had the pleasure to look upon in his thirty years.
 

She was intensely exotic, with a slightly olive-toned skin and thick, sleek black hair that was drawn back loosely, though strands of it continued to bounce around her oval face. Her dark brown eyes, which were currently focused intently on his face, sparkled in the lamplight and held on him with a confidence he normally didn’t see in women. Especially women wearing a white chemise that left no curve of her body to the imagination.

He licked his lips as a hot slicing shock of desire ricocheted through his body and settled in his loins. Beneath the water, he began to throb.

“This is a private room,” he managed to croak out.

Her eyebrows lifted and a slight smiled turned up her lips. “Oh, I certainly hope that is true, considering what I have planned.”

She took a step into the water and immediately that white chemise went sinfully sheer against her calves. Another step and her thighs were revealed as the water sloshed up and down against her movements.
 

He swallowed, his head spinning now, but not with its normally unpleasant thoughts. No, it spun with desire, confusion and a desperate need to have her come deeper into the water.

“Who are you?” he asked.

She smiled. “Violet Milford, my lord,” she said, and he almost expected her to put out a hand as if they were meeting under more normal circumstances.

He sucked in a breath, and her smile broadened.

“You know my name, do you?” she asked.
 

He nodded. “Yes. The courtesan.”

She hesitated on the third step of the pool and nodded. “And I know you, as well, Lord Windbury.”

Liam settled back, resting his good arm on the edge of the pool behind him as she continued into the water. Waves covered her body, but she was waist-deep now.
 

“Did my man arrange for your appearance?” he asked. Sometimes Mal did that, but never without Liam’s request as the impetus.

She shook her head. “That hulking beast outside? No, he has no idea I’m here.”

“Then I almost hate to ask this question, but how did you get past him?”

She smiled, and something in him shifted. When her full lips tilted upward, her already beautifully exotic face became even more intoxicating. He wanted to drag her against him and kiss her until she couldn’t form coherent words. It had been a very long time since he felt such strong, animal reactions. Sex had become a necessary bodily function, not a pleasure as of late.

“I brought along a distraction,” she replied, seemingly unaware of the place his wicked thoughts had taken him with just her smile. But then, her gaze dropped under the water swiftly.
 

He doubted she could see he was naked beneath, or hard and ready with just her unexpected appearance here, but given her vocation and knowing eyes, he would wager she had guessed both.

Perhaps she even counted on both.

“I am not looking to become someone’s protector,” he warned her, though he found himself offering a silent prayer that this fact wouldn’t scare her away.
 

She moved into the water, dropping under so that it soaked her shoulders before she stood up again and revealed her chemise, utterly sheer and plastered against full breasts. He couldn’t contain a grunt of ever-increasing need.

“I’m not seeking a protector, my lord,” she whispered as she reached him. She reached out and touched his face, the side without the scar, so he didn’t move away from her fingers. “I’m on holiday. I’m only looking to enjoy myself.”

She was so close, he could smell the light musk of some kind of perfume, and he lost all semblance of reason. He reached for her without thinking and dragged her hard against him. Her arms wound around his neck and she lifted her mouth just as he smashed his down.

The kiss was spectacular. Her lips, which looked so full, were exactly what he wanted. Soft and supple, they parted as his tongue demanded entry into her mouth. She denied him nothing, even as he fisted her wet chemise in his hand and dragged his nails against her back in the process. She merely arched against him, rotating her lips against him with suggestive and wanton response.

“Damn,” he muttered against her mouth as his blood began to boil with out of control desire.

He crossed an ocean to find her. His secret could prevent him from claiming her heart.

Claimed by the Rogue

© 2014 Hope Tarr

Claimed, Book 1

When Robert Bellamy signed on with the East India Company and set sail for Calcutta, Lady Phoebe Tremont took his promise to heart. Their separation would be but brief; in six months he would send for her.

Six
years
later, believing her love to be drowned at sea, Phoebe hides her tears behind a disguise at a masked ball to celebrate her engagement to a dashing French aristocrat. It is there she encounters a handsome guest costumed as a rogue of the sea—a pirate. When he drops his mask, she finds herself looking into a dead man’s eyes. A ghost’s eyes. Robert’s eyes.

Through hardship and degradation, Robert never lost his resolve to return home to England a rich man. Now a successful ship’s captain, there is one prize left to reclaim—Phoebe.

But the demure debutante he left behind has grown into a dazzling, decidedly self-determined woman. Nor is Robert the callow youth who set sail in search of adventure. Yet the one thing that could win her heart is the very dark truth his pride warns him never to reveal…

Warning: This book contains steamy sex, some violence—and a hero so swoon-worthy you’ll find yourself seduced into staying up into the wee hours turning pages.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Claimed by the Rogue:

The garden lay below, lit by torches and strings of Chinese lanterns much as it had been six years ago, the breeze sweetened by early blooming roses and the honeysuckle intertwining the trelliswork. Phoebe crossed to the rail, reaching it as the first angry tear splashed her cheek.
 

Oh, Robert, if only…

The costuming, the music and collective chatter, the ceaseless press of people wishing her happy when she felt anything but, was suddenly all too much. Feeling as though she might suffocate, she pulled at her mask, the surprisingly sturdy ribbons resisting snapping.
 

“Bloody, bloody,
bloody
hell.”

She tore the accursed thing off, hauled back and pitched it over the ironwork, the force straining her gown’s seams. Breathing hard, she gripped the ironwork and looked over. The fit of temper, better worthy of Belinda, had reaped the intended and instantly regretted result. Beyond reach in the thorns, her mask was as good as gone.

“Whoa! Whoever he is, he’s not worth it.”

Phoebe let out a gasp and spun about, her backside bumping the balustrade.
 

A tall man costumed as a pirate pushed away from the plasterwork column against which he must have been leaning. “You would fare far better with a lover who makes you laugh than one who makes you curse—and cry,” he added, stepping into the cone of colored light.

Beyond mortified, Phoebe dashed a quick hand across her damp eyes, hoping he might at least miss that much of her shame. “Sir, you should have made your presence known.”

One dark brow arched upward. “I believe I am doing just that.”
 

A gentleman would apologize for the intrusion and excuse himself to go inside. He, however, showed no sign of budging. Arms folded over his broad chest and legs akimbo, he stood his ground, raking her with his gaze. Stunned by his boldness, Phoebe studied his lantern-lit face. Who did he imagine himself to be? More importantly, who
was
he? His broad-brimmed hat with its extravagant plume and form-fitting doublet coat were not the standard fare found in costuming shops. He must have taken the invitation’s call for authenticity seriously indeed, for his leather breeches and riding boots wore a cannily real-looking coating of dust.

As foolish as she felt, still she forced her shoulders back and her chin high. “I do not care for being spied upon.”

Beneath the hat, his brow beetled. “Spied upon?” He let out a guffaw. “I’ve been standing in plain view all along.”

Phoebe hated to admit it, but he had fact on his side. Given the way she’d barreled out, it was a mercy she hadn’t plowed into him.

Still, she refused to be cowed. “You are forward, sir.” She lifted her chin another notch. “And rude.”

And handsome as sin, or so he seemed from what she’d so far surveyed. The throat of his silk shirt lay indecently open, the undone buttons revealing a muscular neck banded by a fine silver chain similar to hers. Even in the low light, she marked the darkness of his skin. Gentleman though he undoubtedly was, he must spend a great deal of time out-of-doors.

“You wound me, lady.” He fell back, pantomiming pulling an invisible dagger from his pectoral. In contrast, the wicked-looking curved sword tucked into the crimson sash at his waist looked frighteningly real. “You’d be better served to save your ire for another—the one who made you weep.”

Robert. Robert made me weep.
And yet she could hardly fault a dead man for being dead any more than she could a living man for failing to live up to him whom she so dearly loved.

A square of snowy linen appeared in one bare, broad-backed hand. “Please,” he said, passing it to her, his eyes no longer mocking but softened by what seemed to be concern.

Phoebe hesitated and then accepted the handkerchief, acknowledging the courtesy with a small, silent nod. He was barehanded, highly irregular considering the formality of the affair. Their fingertips brushed and gloved though she was, still she felt a tiny tremor trill through her.
 

“All brides cry,” she snapped, blotting at her eyes with the hankie, the cotton so soft and finely woven as to be Egyptian. “It’s…
tradition
.” The latter was a lame excuse but she couldn’t think of what else to say. Indeed, with his eyes fastened upon her, she could scarcely think at all.

His smile froze. “I wouldn’t know. I’ve never had the pleasure of being leg-shackled.”

So he was a bachelor. That tidbit of intelligence lifted her spirits far more than it ought. “In that case, you’re hardly in a position to be offering romantic advice.”
 

“I suppose you are correct on that count.” Framed by black felt, his bold gaze perused her, the thorough inventory beginning and ending with her eyes.
 

Handing back the hankie, Phoebe eyed the sword at his side and a hopeful thought struck her. “Perhaps you might employ your weapon to retrieve my mask from those bushes below. I…dropped it,” she added, the bald lie brought on by his steady stare.

His crack of laughter flared heat into her face. “The devil you did. You tossed it over the rail out of pique.” Phoebe opened her mouth to protest, but his chuckle cut her off. “By the by, you’ve an impressive arm for a woman. Beyond my sister, I’ve never seen the like on any female.” One corner of his mouth, his full, sensuous mouth, curved upwards. Phoebe’s heart hitched. She hadn’t seen a smile like that in…a very long time.
 

More put out with herself than him, sharply she asked, “Will you help me or not?”

“Since you implore so charmingly, how can I refuse?” He turned to the rail, braced both hands atop and peered below.
 

Coming up beside him, Phoebe tried not to notice how ungodly good he smelled. Not like Aristide, who had a heavy hand with bottled scent, or the other gentlemen of her acquaintance, but rather like leather and sandalwood and the musk of male sweat. And his breath bore the faintest aroma of what must be licorice. “It’s just there,” she said, pointing to the thorny bower upon which it perched, her shoulder inadvertently brushing his side.