Lady Belling's Secret (10 page)

Thomas came back in the room, strode confidently up behind her and plucked the demolished hat from her head then tossed it to the floor.

“This is horrible. It’s the first time I’ve worn this dress.” She fingered a large tear in the skirt. She added sadly, “This is beyond repair.”

“Then we shall have to remove it, won’t we?” Only Thomas didn’t sound even remotely disappointed.

She glanced around the room but all the maids had slipped away, and they were alone in the room. Oh my heavens. He did mean to… She couldn’t even say it to herself.

“The message is off to your mother. I told the footman to take his time.” He plucked the rest of the pins from her hair one at a time, allowing her curls to tumble down in thick, unruly locks. He ran his fingers through the long auburn tresses, gently pulling the debris from her hair. “You will have enough time to linger in the bath.”

She turned and faced him, immediately placing both hands on his chest to keep him from advancing on her.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

He said nothing, just grinned at her in the most infuriatingly sexy way.

“There are any number of reasons why what you’re thinking isn’t going to happen. Have you already forgotten that I’m engaged?”

He ran his hand along her shoulder where the material had separated at the seam. Despite every sane effort, she could feel herself responding to his touch. “How can I forget? You keep telling me.”

“Then how can you want this? You know that I cannot break it off with Dalton.”

“We’ll see.” Smiling, he gripped the fabric and tore at the sleeve with one quick downward jerk. The material came way in ribbons, leaving her arm bare.

Francesca gritted her teeth and tried to control the thrilling sensations of her traitorous body. She had to talk some sense into him before she lost hers entirely. “Thomas, the servants will talk.”

His fingers curled around the torn bodice. “My servants have been well paid. They will never speak ill of the lady of the house.”

“But I’m not the lady of the house,” she protested, her voice rising steadily as she jerked slightly when he pulled the rent lace away from her neckline.

“You will be soon enough.” He spoke with enough confidence that she found herself leaning towards violence.

“I’m not marr—”

He stopped her words with a kiss, a kiss that caused her icy resolve to falter dangerously. Any further protest flew from her mind as all her angry energy pooled in her belly and effused her flesh with passion.

Thomas deftly unbuttoned the row of pearl buttons down her back, kissing her senseless all the while. Placing both hands on her shoulders, he pushed the tattered remains of her dress down until it caught at her hips. One more light shove and the dress fell to the floor in a puddle at her feet. He skillfully unlaced her corset without her even realizing it until it too fell to the floor atop her dress.

Francesca stood before him wearing only her thin silk chemise, stockings and shoes. She crossed her arms over her chest, her hands hugging her shoulders.

“Thomas, we must stop this madness.”

He ignored her. Instead he took her by the hand and sat her down on a soft upholstered bench. Squatting at her feet, he slipped off her shoes and set them aside. Francesca responded by pressing her knees tightly together.

He slid his hands up her calves in a smooth, distracting caress.

“If I scream, will you see reason?” The last word ended in a squeak.

He gently kneaded her kneecaps and stroked his fingers on the tender flesh behind.

“I don’t want you to touch me,” she protested. But she did, desperately, and damn it all, he knew it. Her life was becoming a very complicated knot, and it scared the hell out of her. Faced with what she wanted and what she must do, the two sides of Francesca’s character warred at each other. She had every confidence that if she stood up and left right now Thomas wouldn’t physically stop her. He would do everything he could to sway her to stay, evenso she could stride away from his house, from this new disaster, but she couldn’t make her legs move.

Thomas smiled at her. “I think you do want me to touch you. You want me to touch you in scandalous places and with more than just my fingers. You want me to touch you deep inside.” At the pressure of his fingers, she relaxed her legs ever so slightly. “Say you want me to touch you, Francesca.”

She couldn’t say it. She did want it—more with every second. Her breath was harsh and rapid like she’d been running for miles, and she wondered if her pupils were as large as his were. His eyes were so dark they were black—like her reputation, her soul, her nonexistent moral compass.

“Say it, Francesca. Say you want me to touch you.”

“Why focus all your seductive charms on me?” That was really the question, wasn’t it? Why her? “Surely there are many ladies dying to remake your acquaintance.”

One hand smoothed up her thigh under her chemise. “I want you. You have me in your thrall. I am completely captivated.” His clever fingers found her garter and slipped it undone. He slowly rolled down her stocking and eased it from her foot, then did the same to the other leg, his fingers leaving a trail of heat where he grazed her skin. “Tell me you want me to touch you.”

She wouldn’t. She couldn’t bring herself to make him stop, but she also couldn’t form the words that she wanted to say and he needed to hear. Simple words that her body screamed:
Touch me.

She couldn’t get a full breath in her lungs.

He ran his fingertips over her arms and eased her fingers from clenching the opposite elbows. He raised her to a standing position in front of him and gathered the length of chemise in his fists. With a final curse to her lack of character, she lifted her arms so he could pull the silk over her head.

“You are perfection. A little grubby, but I won’t toss you out of bed for it.” He flashed the smile that always made her stomach flutter.

“You will ruin me, Thomas.” But at this precise moment, with his hands on her and her body coming to life at his touch, she didn’t even care anymore.

He responded between kisses to her shoulder. “Francesca, I’m not trying to ruin you.” A kiss on her chin. “I want to save you.” A kiss on her lips. “To save us both.”

“I don’t need to be saved.” Her hands wound around his neck.

He stepped closer, and his clothes brushed flush against her naked body. “You do, too. You love me. You need to be saved from a loveless marriage.”

It was so hard to think clearly with his hands setting fire to her skin. “I can’t break off the engagement even if I wanted to. Christian and Mama would never allow it. Not after the last time.”

“Stop talking unless it’s to tell me to stop.”

Tell him to stop, Frankie. Tell him now.
But she didn’t want to. Heaven help her she didn’t want to.

His hand slipped down her hip, around to her rear, and cupped her bottom. He took her mouth with his own. A gentle, lingering kiss gave way to a more determined one as he seduced her into admitting what she wanted. Her mouth opened to him and accepted his tongue. The reticence she felt earlier gave way as she returned his tongue’s caresses with the fire of her own. He adjusted her length so that she could feel his arousal at the curve of her stomach.

Before she knew it, he had scooped her up in his arms and was gently depositing her in the warm tub water. She slid into the warmth and let it envelop her. The aromatic steam rose around her.

Thomas removed his jacket and waistcoat and rolled up his sleeves. He knelt next to the tub and picked up a small fluffy piece of toweling.

Francesca bit her bottom lip. “What are you doing?”

Thomas dunked the washcloth in the steaming water and rubbed it with soap. “I’m giving you a bath. That’s not obvious?” He pulled up one dripping arm from the water and stroked it with the bubbly cloth, paying special attention to the tender skin on the inside of her upper arm. He soaped the small expanse of her chest above her breasts and lifted the opposite arm and soaped it as well, tenderly removing the dirty smudges.

“Yes it is obvious that you are giving me a bath. Something that I am pretty sure I can handle on my own.” She tried to sound stern, but he ignored her. Damn it all. Now that he’d made her want him, he wasn’t going to give her what she needed.

“Shhhhh.” He wiped the grime from her face and rinsed it. “Sit up and close your eyes,” Once she complied, he doused her hair with the warm water. She leaned her head back and the water cascaded down her back. She kept her eyes closed as he washed her hair, and visibly relaxed under his ministrations. He massaged her scalp, tenderly removing bits of twigs and leaves. He rubbed the soap through her hair, tugging gently, and then lifted the pitcher of water and rinsed her hair, refilling the pitcher several times to make sure that all of the soap sluiced out.

“Lean back,” he said, and releasing the washcloth, he lathered up his hands with the soap.

Beginning at the nape of her neck, he rubbed her collarbone, down her chest and across her breasts, cupping each with his soapy hands. He massaged her, testing the weight of each breast, rolling each nipple between his thumb and forefinger until they furled into tight little buds.

Francesca watched him intently, breathing through her mouth, her eyes riveted on him while he stroked her body. His hands smoothed down her breasts and continued their massage along her ribs to her stomach and then farther down to her legs.

Barely taking his hands from her, her anticipation grow as he moved around to the end of the slipper tub. His gaze stayed with hers when he wrapped both hands around her ankles and gently tugged her deeper into the water so that she reclined further. She relished the strange play of languid relaxation and exquisite tension roll through her body.

He placed her feet on either side of the tub, her knees slightly bent, hooking her toes under the rolled rim. His fingers traced the curve of her calves, lingering behind her knees, over the top of her thighs, his thumbs gently applying pressure to the tender flesh on the inside of her legs. Circling his thumbs, caressing her soft, soapy skin, getting closer to the apex of her thighs, he smiled when her eyelids fell half closed and her head lolled back against the rim of the bathtub.

She wasn’t surprised this time when his questing fingers located the triangle of curls between her legs, but she still gasped when his magic thumb found the tender nub of flesh and swirled around it. Both her hands gripped the sides of the tub as she writhed, her stomach muscles clenching and her breasts rising out of the water.

God have mercy, she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. Thomas’s free hand came up to her breast and pinched the rosy nipple.

“Tell me to stop,” he said, his voice as husky with want as his body was tight. He wanted her to be responsible for her need. She already loved him, now he would make her need him, too, emotionally and physically. “Say it, Francesca.”

He watched her, engrossed in her reaction as he slid first one finger inside her and then another. She gasped and writhed, moving sensually in the water and sending the contents of the bath sloshing over the side. His breathing was every bit as erratic as hers as he drove her on.

“Say it.”

“Don’t stop,” she whispered.

She said them. The magic words he was nearly desperate for her to utter. He rewarded her by caressing inside her with a slow, sensual rhythm and massaged her swollen flesh, pushing her higher and higher until she flew over the edge.

Thomas felt her contractions finally subside, though she still clutched the sides of the bathtub. Her hair floated around her like dark red ribbons. Her face was serene, her eyes closed, her mouth open as her breathing began to slow. He watched with appreciation as her breasts rose out of the water, and then slipped back underneath, the warm liquid rolling off them in rivulets of silver.

He came to his feet, his shirt soaked and stuck to his chest. He crossed to the top of the bath and sank to his knees on the floor next to her head. He slipped his hand under her chin and turned her face to him. He lingered above her lips, merely a fraction, feeling her breath, then his mouth descended on hers. His kiss was full of lustful desperation, full of his longing to join her in the bath, but it did nothing to slake his need. That would have to wait for another time.

He kissed each eyelid. “I’ll see you downstairs when you’re ready.”

“Thomas,” Francesca whispered.

“Yes, my love?”

But she didn’t answer. She looked at him with green eyes full of emotions he couldn’t decipher.

“The pleasure was mine,” he replied without an ounce of irony, and he walked out, shutting the door behind him.

Thomas was in his library when Francesca’s mother and Anna arrived in the closed carriage with a fresh gown for her. There was a fire in the grate, giving the room a toasty, welcoming warmth. He was sitting in his favorite leather chair reading the newspaper as they were brought in directly by Masters. He had resumed his perfect attire, a new crisp linen shirt, waistcoat and jacket, his neckcloth tied in an impeccable knot. He looked nothing if not the proper English peer. That feat had taken a few unsatisfying minutes alone in his room to accomplish, and of course clean, dry, well-pressed clothes. A belt of whiskey to fortify himself, and he was prepared to see the family.

“I’ll take this up right away,” the butler said as he removed the box from Anna’s hands. “Shall I send in refreshments?”

“Yes, Masters. That would be excellent,” he replied smoothly, then trained his eyes on the duchess. “I am sure that your daughter will be very grateful that you have arrived. I regret to say that her previous dress is in shambles.” He led the ladies to the settee.

“Well of course I came right away.” Francesca’s mother kissed him on the cheek before she sank into the upholstery. “Where is my daughter?”

“Please have a seat. Francesca is up having a bath,” Thomas explained. “In addition to general destruction of her dress, the ordeal left her quite filthy.”

“Oh dear.” The duchess fretted a lacy handkerchief through her fingers. “My poor dear. How traumatizing for her.” She and Anna clucked endlessly, talking nonsense that he barely heard. His head was filled with visions of the water nymph upstairs.