Captive Bride (31 page)

“Then how will you do what you must to communicate with her?”

“I will slip within your soul sufficient to use it and your young lord’s as my conduits. Your intimate connection will allow it.”

Bea’s breaths shortened. “Will it give him pain?”

“Ah, you think of his comfort before your own.
True love.”
He chuckled derisively. “No,” he replied, his voice odd now. “No pain to speak of.”

“Have you done this before?” 

“I have walked this earth for so many decades, my dear, there are few things I have not done.”

“That isn’t an answer.”

Iversly
remained silent. Then: “It must begin now.”

Bea’s gaze shot to the clock. The hands pointed opposite each other. Her fingers in her lap shook.

“All right,” she said. “What do you wish me to do?”

“Stand, but remain relaxed.”

“This will not work,” she said, coming to her feet and resting her arms by her sides. She clamped her eyes shut. “He is very angry. He wants nothing to do with me now.”

“So you say,” the ghost murmured.

Abruptly, chill air swished around Bea’s arms, blowing across her exposed throat and face. Like liquid, it crept beneath the fabric of her gown. Goose bumps lifted across her skin, her hair prickling with cold energy on her head and each down-like follicle along her limbs. She shivered, the sensations so intimate, as though she wore nothing.

Across her lips and cheeks an icy breeze seemed to pass, brushing almost tangibly, settling on her face and neck and above her bodice where her skin showed.
Then on her breasts, down her belly, between her thighs and along her legs, circling back up to her buttocks.
It caressed her back and shoulders with frozen fingers, and curled
around her neck.

Then it delved within.

Her heart leapt, and then raced.

“Lord
Iversly
?” she gasped.

Frost clutched at her lungs, crept around her stomach, bowels and heart like certain death, climbing up her spine, along her neck. Her body seemed suspended, floating,
light
like air, yet so heavy she could not lift a hand. She tried to move and her arm snapped back to her side tightly. Ropes of tension bound her, icy straps clasping about her wrists, ankles, waist, and neck, bending her head back, splaying her palms upward, trapping her immobile. Her mouth fell
open,
her eyelids thick caps of frigid lead denying sight.

All thought fled, subsumed within emotion.

Apprehension, sharp and hard.

Fear.

Then, gradually, growing until it swelled in her head, her chest, and belly—

Terror
.

Bea’s throat worked and she tried to scream but no sound came forth.
Only her breathing remained, hard and fast, panic-driven, the fox before the hunt.

Her blood slowed, thick and cold in each vein, every artery,
the
scent of ash all around. Her lungs drained. From inside she was beginning to freeze, becoming solid, no longer living flesh, but dead, chill matter.

She sobbed deep within where light no longer
penetrated,
no pulse of existence, only inky darkness, beyond all feeling but despair and grief.
And consuming loneliness.

Endless . . . eternal . . . empty.

She slipped, slid, her body growing slack, releasing the remnants of her will.

Releasing life.

“
Peter
,” she
breathed,
a last hopeless whisper.

Warmth poured into her.

She gasped, heat surging up from her core into her belly, into her chest and neck, spreading along her arms and legs and around her head, filling her, replacing the cold like a maelstrom. Hands touched her, strong and deliberate, spreading on her waist and curving around to her back, over her shoulders, drawing her close to encompassing warmth. They moved, stroking along her shoulders and arms, lacing with her fingers and then caressing her hips, dipping between her thighs.
Intimate, tender.
Seeking.

Giddy, luscious flame licked at her, gripping, stretching her arms wide and working her throat. A sound came forth from her mouth, a moan of pure ecstasy as a wave of heat spilled through her, seizing her around the hips, prickling her nipples to peaks. She moved against the sensations, shifting her body to feel the lap of hot friction against and within it. Damp scored her thighs, the taut peaks of her breasts so hard they ached. She felt no need, only the rapturous concourse of answered hunger
.

She fell into pleasure, gasping, gulping in air, her flesh wracked with the sweetest delirium, convulsions of perfect delight. Joyful sobs shuddered through her, washing along her thighs, breasts, and hands, curling delectably in her womb.

Her palms sought her belly and mouth, pressing inward to hold
herself
together, clamping her lips to allow nothing to escape. Within, beneath her skin, deep and brilliant and miraculous, she trembled through a shower of illuminated bliss.

It came apart slowly, releasing her into awareness of her bedchamber, the scent of evening, the touch of fire-warmed air upon her skin.

Her body sagged, legs shaking and then collapsing beneath her exhausted body.

Strong arms surrounded her.
Familiar and safe.
Beloved.

Her mind let go, and she fell to the floor.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-TWO

Tip returned to the castle in a daze. Leaving his horse with
Dibin
in the drive, he went directly to Miss
Dews’s
chamber and deposited the antidote cordial with Lady
Marstowe
. She woke her sister to administer it, and Tip retreated to the corridor. He must clear his head.

At the cottage, he had stated the case to Miss Minturn, and she’d given him the antidote instantly. Or so it seemed. But something was wrong. He had entered her cottage the moment the castle bell struck the hour. Now, according to the clock across from him in the corridor, it was nearly seven o’clock. It did not require that long to ride back from the village, a mere ten minutes at best.

And the dream . . .

Had he dreamt it on the ride to the governess’s house, or on the path back?
Or not at all?

He could still feel Bea’s body in his hands, her quivering pleasure. He could still taste her ecstasy. He had never before dreamt so vividly, and certainly not while awake. It left him stunned and shaking.

The door behind him opened.

“The fever has left her. She is sitting up and asking for dinner.” Lady
Marstowe’s
face showed calm relief. “Thank you for your part in it, my lord.”

Tip glanced down the corridor. “Is— Has Miss
Sinclaire
—”

“When she did not come to us after some time, my maid went to her bedchamber. She has not yet returned.”

His heart clenched. “Excuse me, if you will, my lady.” He strode to Bea’s door. Wanting to burst in, he knocked. The dowager’s maid pulled the panel open a crack, breathed a wide-eyed sigh of relief, and beckoned him in.

“I found her like this, milord.” She gestured toward the hearth. Before it, Bea lay on the floor, a pillow stuffed beneath her head
.

He jolted forward.

She was warm. He lifted her and laid her on the bed.

“I couldn’t move her myself.” The maid wrung her hands. “But I didn’t dare leave her so I could run and tell milady. And what would she have been able to do? Someone needed to stay with Miss Julia.”

“When did you come in here?”

“Half past the hour.
Is she ill?”

“It’s all right. You did well.” He sat on the edge of the bed by Bea’s hip and rested his hand on her brow. She had no fever, and her breaths seemed to be the regular breathing of sleep. Her cheeks were dusted with the hue of a ripe peach. “She is sleeping.” He turned to the servant woman. “Go tell Lady
Marstowe
. Miss Dews is already recovered. Then wait in the corridor nearby in the event that Lady Harriet or Mr.
Sinclaire
should seek their daughter, and inform me immediately.”

“Yes, milord.”
She ducked an anxious curtsy and hurried from the chamber.

He smoothed back Bea’s hair from her clear brow. Even in sleep she was beautiful, and she held his heart as securely as though it were bound by chain and lock. He had gone to
Porthmadog
to escape the tumult that touching her and arguing with her created in him. But he had thought of nothing but her, even while transacting his business. Now, still furious with her for forcing him
to cry off, he could not look his fill.

He hadn’t meant it.
Any of it.
In the kitchen he had bluffed merely to test her, and she had called him on it. If she continued to refuse him he would force her to wed him. He had taken her maidenhead. And he could no longer live without her.

Her eyes fluttered open, and his breaths stilled. Her wide, dark gaze scanned his face, focusing, remembering,
then
returning to his eyes.

He whispered her name, his voice rough.

She drew in a slow breath and her body shifted, testing wakefulness. She returned the pressure of his hand. Tip swallowed through the desert of his throat.

“I must have swooned,” she said unsteadily.

He nodded, not trusting his voice again.

“Is
Iversly
here?”

He shook his head. His gaze traveled over her features, memorizing anew. “Did he hurt you?”

“No,” she said quietly. A flurry of emotion passed across her eyes—pleasure, doubt, then reticence.

Tip’s heart lurched. What had
Iversly
done to her to leave her sprawled on the floor unconscious? Memory of his dream rapped at his senses, of Bea’s body in his hands, her pleasure.

“What happened?” she asked. “Did it work? How is Aunt Julia?”

“Miss Minturn gave me the antidote. Your great-aunt has taken it and is already recovering.”

Bea pushed herself to a sitting position. “Oh, thank heavens,” she breathed. “But how long have I been unconscious?”

“Nearly three quarters of an hour.”

Her eyes widened. “When did you return from the village?”

“Several minutes ago.
She gave over remarkably quickly.”

Bea stared at him. “What did you—? What I mean to say is—”

“What did I do to
effect
her rapid acquiescence? I don’t quite know.” He took a short breath. Her slender hand within his felt like an anchor to sanity. “She allowed me into her cottage with a great show of reluctance. I confronted her with the knowledge that she had poisoned Miss Dews, and . . .”

“And then what?”

“Then, I don’t remember.” He shook his head. “Moments, later it seemed, she proffered the bottle of antidote and professed her profoundest apologies for having done such a wicked deed. But as to what occurred until then, I don’t know the words I spoke or the actions I took.” 

“You don’t?” Her eyes were bright.

“Do you?”

Slowly, she nodded. Her cheeks flushed a delicate rose.

“Bea.”

“Yes?”

“Did you . . . ?”

“Did I what?” 

He scanned her face. “Your cheeks are glowing. You look like—”

“Like what?”

He took a hard breath.
“Like you did in my bed two nights ago.”

A small smile curved her lips. “I do?”

Tip’s hackles rose, his fist tightening around her hand. “What did he do to you?”

The heat in her eyes sought him. “I don’t believe
he
did anything. I know he did not, after a time.”

“How do you know that?”

Her gaze remained direct. “Don’t you?”

As though scalded, he released her hand. It couldn’t be. Only lunatics believed in such nonsense. But a
sennight
ago, Tip hadn’t believed in ghosts. And he recalled her fast breaths, his hand caressing her tight womanhood as though he had been inside her minutes ago. He was hard now, wanting her.

“After I spoke with Miss Minturn,” —he maintained an even voice with great effort— “upon my return here, I had the oddest memory.”

“A memory?”

“Of a dream, in point of fact.”

“A dream?”

He sucked in a tight breath. There was no way to speak it aloud.

She glanced at their hands, separated now on the counterpane. Her look grew determined.