The Bride of Time (20 page)

The whole house was buzzing with wedding plans. Though it was a shock happening so quickly, no one seemed surprised. The painting was almost finished. The Prince Regent was still at Carlton House, and Giles sent a missive to him there. The prince responded, asking that the canvas be delivered as soon as possible, as he was leaving shortly for an extended stay at the Royal Pavilion in Brighton. Giles had originally planned to send the painting, wanting to stay close to the Abbey, but there was plenty of time before the next full moon,
and in view of the wedding plans, it was decided instead that he and Tessa would deliver the painting in person. Then, while they were in Town, Giles would purchase a special license for their marriage. This was Tessa’s idea, and she held out for it on the pretext that she would dearly love to visit London in his time, and Giles finally agreed. In truth, she wanted to range him as far from Longhollow Abbey as possible, as far away as she could coax him from the potential threat of fire looming over the house and her spirits like a pall. Convinced that if she could keep him away from the Abbey, she could change the terrible future she’d seen with her own eyes, she modeled for him gladly, and at the end of the second week, Tessa climbed the attic stairs after dinner for what would be the last time. Only the finishing touches remained to be worked on the painting.

She had no more qualms about appearing nude before Giles now that they shared the same bed, and had done since the night she gave him her virtue. He smiled as she entered. He had been working on the landscape behind the figure, and had just finished when she arrived. Candle branches were set about, flooding the solarium with golden light; and above, the misshapen moon in its second quarter shone brightly down, its silvery glow a stark reminder that soon it would wax full and the beast would rise again. If Giles thought of that, Tessa saw no evidence of it. He had eyes only for her, watching with unabashed libido as she stripped off her azure-blue round gown and removed the tortoiseshell pins from her hair.

“I shall buy you hairpins of gold, and a chinchilla-trimmed pelisse in the Bond Street shops,” he said, arranging her on the lounge. “The thin one we bought in Bodmin will not be nearly warm enough for you in Town now. It’s much colder there than it is here this time of year.”

“I do not need fancy things, Giles,” she said, taking the hourglass as he handed it to her. “I have never lusted after such. But you are spoiling me. I was content to order myself with a shard of broken mirror glass at Poole House. Now, I do not know how I could do without the elegant silver mirror in my dressing room. I’m becoming shamelessly extravagant.”

Giles laughed outright. How utterly handsome he was when he smiled; it freed his eyes from the deep shadows that clung to the edge of his brow and made them twinkle.

“It will be my pleasure to spoil you. And when we return, I will paint you as you were meant to be painted, in the most exquisite gown in London, with moonbeams in your hair.”

He always knew what to say to make her heart swell with love for him, and he meant these things. Tessa had next to no experience with members of the opposite sex. The few times she’d walked out, it was with men of her own class, and never serious. She didn’t know what it was to be courted, to be swept off her feet by a man who truly loved her, but she knew Giles did, and it was glorious.

“It ends to night,” he said. “A few more strokes and we will be ready to make the trip to London. A little more sienna to warm your skin tone in shadow…a touch of ultramarine to counter it and make the deepest shadows cool and mysterious, and ‘The Bride of Time’ is finished.”

“When do we leave?”

“In the morning,” he told her. “There is no reason to wait. Able will drive us. We must return before the moon is full. Better to become…what I become here, in the open, with fewer in harm’s way than in Town at the height of the Little Season.”

Tessa had almost forgotten about that. She was so happy with Giles that thoughts of the wolf which lurked within him had faded into the distance. Only when she consulted the mirror on her vanity did that nagging splinter return to prick her, for the wound was slow to heal, its progress closely resembling the manner in which Giles’s wound had healed in color, texture, and stubbornness. Not even Cook’s herbal remedies helped much, and Tessa lived in fear of what Giles would do when he discovered that she had been bitten, and that he was the one who had bitten her.

He honestly didn’t remember. That was the insidious way of the curse. Only fragments were retained and recalled afterward. Tessa often thought that a blessing. For how could a werewolf bear to remember what he’d done in the night, in the dark, to the innocents in his path?

It wasn’t surprising that he hadn’t realized he’d bitten her. She knew that in his human incarnation, and in his heart, he would never dream of harming her. Why, then, would he suspect himself? Though she sometimes almost wished he would. Better that than have him discover her secret under the full moon, for she certainly wasn’t brave enough to tell him outright. These thoughts she beat back, praying they were foolish. She was about to become Giles Longworth’s bride, and she put all her energies into focusing upon that.

“There!” Giles said. “You may relax, my dear. It is finished!”

Tessa leaned her head back on the lounge and set the hourglass aside. The moon was glaring down through the glass ceiling, and she closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them again, Giles was standing over her, moonlight breaking over his dark hair, his eyes steeped in deep shadow though she read their message
clearly. He was aroused, and she was in his arms before she realized she’d left the chaise lounge.

“You are the most exquisite creature I have ever seen,” he murmured against her hair. “And you’re mine.”

Swooping down, he took her lips in a smothering kiss that stole her breath away. With one arm tethering her against his bruising hardness, he tore open his breeches and rushed her against the wall. In an unstoppable frenzy, he freed his member from the buckskins like a man possessed. Then, seizing her buttocks, he lifted her, guiding her legs around his waist, and plunged into her in one shuddering thrust. Tessa clung to him as he moved inside her, plunging deeper than he’d ever taken her before. How he filled her, his hard shaft riding on her wetness, as he buried himself in her warmth. Every beat of his pulse vibrated inside her. Every thrust of his member drove her toward climax—a climax like no other. The shuddering, spiraling thrusts pounded into her as he took her lips in a bruising kiss, his tongue tasting her deeply. Release was inevitable, and she cried out as he found a place inside that saturated her loins with wave upon wave of rippling sensation.

Clinging to him, she matched his ardor thrust for thrust, calling his name as he set her heart racing, crying out as her sex gripped his as she climaxed, her hands laced through his hair. Soon his member was pumped dry, and she was full with the hot rush of his seed.

Enraptured, he stood frozen inside her, his hands splayed over the cheeks of her buttocks crushing her against him, his bowed head resting upon her shoulder, his breath coming short. After a moment, he withdrew himself, gathered her up in his arms and carried her to the bed.

“Sleep with me here to night,” he said. “I want to lie
with you beneath the moon. You are so beautiful by moonlight, my Tessa.”

“Whatever will the servants think?” she teased him. “I shall blush at the sight of them.”

“They will think what they already think, that I ravish you nightly like a randy beast. What the devil do you or I care what they think?” He gestured toward her lip. “No doubt they think I beat you on a regular basis as well. I must be more careful. That there is slow to heal, and I do believe I’ve made it worse.” He tucked the counterpane around her and kissed her forehead playfully. “So far as I’m concerned, we were one on the night I took your virtue. I need no piece of paper to finalize our marriage. But tomorrow, we embark upon that journey, and you shall see
my
London.”

He moved away then, and ordered his shirt and breeches. Striding to the hearth, he stirred the fire to life, then stalked toward the door.

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“We will be leaving very early in the morning, and I must instruct Foster. Stay where you are. I shall have a hip bath brought up for you.”

Tessa sat bolt upright. “Giles Longworth, you wouldn’t dare!” she cried.

He laughed outright, his handsome head thrust back, a few dark rakish locks of hair decorating his brow. “Very well, I shall have the tub in your chamber filled,” he conceded. “But I assure you, after the goings-on in this house before you came, they would rejoice that I have found happiness at last.”

“They can rejoice when we return with that ‘piece of paper,’” Tessa informed him.

He laughed again. “It’s just as well. You will want to pack your portmanteau. Enough clothes for a sennight or so. It will take at least two days to reach London
from here, as long as the weather is fine and we don’t linger about, and the same to return.”

“How long will we be staying in London?”

“No more than a few days. We must return before the moon is full, which is scarcely a fortnight away, and I don’t want to cut the time too close. We must allow for weather, detours, and carriage mishaps. Wheels do lose spokes, and leather straps break, as you well know. I want to leave nothing to chance. Besides, we should stay close to home until the child is found.”

“We both know where that child has gone, Giles, and good riddance!”

“Moraiva shares your view, that he has crossed over through one of her time corridors, but he is still a child, and the authorities will not be so easily convinced of the truth. I’ve caught the maids nattering about the boy’s disappearance on several occasions already. If such
on
-
dits
circulate outside these walls, there could be trouble. Half the populace of Bodmin Moor already think I’m a drunkard, a blackguard, and as mad as a brush.”

Tessa nodded toward the easel. “The paint is still wet on that canvas. Is it safe to transport before it dries?”

“It won’t be thoroughly dry for months, and yes, it will be quite safe. I have transported many paintings before the oils dried to the touch. Able is skilled at crating them. The crate has been in readiness since I began the painting. He’ll strap it up top on the brougham safe and sound, and all will be well.”

“As long as you’re sure,” she said. “I would hate to see all your hard work laid to waste.”

“It shan’t be, and besides, that is the last thing you, of all people, should be concerned about, having seen it in that London gallery quite intact in 1903!”

“I suppose you’re right,” Tessa said.

“Of course I’m right. Now go and pack, while Evers and Rigby fill your tub and Foster fills mine. Then return
to me here. That was only a taste before. It’s going to be a long night.”

Giles sprinted down the stairs to his apartments, rang for Foster, and had him prepare his bath. Sinking into the hot tub, he groaned as the fragrant water scented with crushed rosemary rushed at his tense, sore muscles. The pressure of racing against time, completing the painting in order to reach London and back before the rising of the full moon, had attacked every inch of his body.

“Will I be going with you?” his valet inquired, handing him soap and sponge.

“Not this time, Foster,” Giles said, working up a stiff lather. “I need you here, to keep an eye on the staff, and in case the boy returns. Rigby could never deal with the child; neither could Evers.”

“Well, I thank you for your confidence in me, sir, but I hope I shan’t have to prove my mettle in that regard.”

“Agreed. We leave at dawn. Able will drive us in the brougham. The crated painting will fit well on top of it. I shall need you to pack for me; clothes enough for a sennight or so. No longer than ten days. I must be back before the full moon.”

“You will be taking your lady?”

“Yes. She is packing now. Have our bags secured in the boot. We will need the top space for the painting alone, and I shall have Able lash down a tarpaulin over it, just in case of rain, though a fine lot that will do if a flaw hits.”

“As you wish, sir.”

“The main thing I need from you in my absence, Foster, is to try to keep the
on-dits
from spreading. I know that is next to impossible, but if word gets out about the boy, we will have the guards from the watch to contend with, and I will be hard-pressed to prove I haven’t done
for the little savage. I’m already branded an ogre. I’ve been careless, and my reputation alone will damn me in a trice if suspicion rises against me. I wouldn’t put it past that little blighter for it to be what he wants.”

“I shall do my best, sir,” said the valet. “I doubt you need fear any such gammon coming from Rigby, and Dorcas is above reproach, but Evers gossips with Cook and the maids, and they visit their families and friends in service elsewhere on their days off. The Lord alone knows what tales they have already spread, sir.”

“I will put the fear of God into them before I leave in the morning. Have them assemble in the study at sunrise. Then, while I’m gone, enforce my orders however needs must.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ll need you to go round to the Gypsy camp on the south moor and tell Moraiva where I’ve gone,” Giles went on. “She will be a great help to you here if the boy returns, so fetch her straightaway if that should occur. Then stay close to the Abbey. What I’m doing, old boy, is putting you in charge here until I return. It is asking a great deal, but I know you are equal to the task, and you will be duly rewarded.”

“I shall do my very best, sir.”

“I know you will, Foster,” Giles said, soaping himself with the sponge. “And there is just one more thing. If the boy does return, handle him with caution and keep him here. I’m going to make arrangements to have him packed off to either school or sanatorium when I return, whichever suits. Let someone with more expertise than I have sort him out. I will pay to keep him comfortably, just not here. I will not live in fear, or subject others to do so in my own house. I would stake my life on the belief that the little bastard caused my pregnant sister’s death. Unfortunately, I cannot prove it, but that does
not mean I intend to live with a murderer, no matter his age. Master Monty will not see the sun set over Longhollow Abbey on the day he sets foot back in here. You can bet your blunt upon that!”