The Damsel and the Daggerman: A BLUD Novella (9 page)

“Mmm.” He rubbed his cheek against her hip, the rasp of his stubble delicious against her skin. “I like the stockings, but I like what’s underneath better.” He took the silk in his teeth and lightly dragged it down her thigh, his breath hot on the inside of her leg as he exposed her flesh to the cool air. When his nose grazed the tender curve of her ankle, she shivered, and he slipped the stocking free with his teeth and tossed it onto the floor.

Jacinda lifted her eyes, and he was staring straight at her, a look of such profound emotion on his face that she was momentarily bewildered. There was hunger and lust and darkness and a strange sort of sadness in him, and before she could ask him why he was so worked up over simple love play, he was nibbling up her ankle, his hand on her other leg matching pace and pulling up the other side of her skirt to expose her completely. His tongue and lips traveled up her calf, paused to dip into the tender spot behind her knee, and then began the ticklish, devilish, delicious trip up the inside curve of her thigh, closer and closer to the place where she’d been dreaming of his touch. He was drawing it out as long as possible, making her breath build to pants and causing her body to strain toward him.

“Damn, Marco, but you can work a woman up.”

“I’m very generous.”

“Generous with torture.”

“It’ll be worth it. You won’t believe the things I can do with my tongue.”

“I’m more interested in what you can do with other parts of your body.”

Marco’s lips froze with a quick intake of breath, almost as if she’d wounded him, even though there wasn’t anything she could have done, spread out as she was.

“I hope I live up to your expectations,” he murmured, licking gently up the inside of her thigh until he exhaled, slowly, at the core of her.

Jacinda held her breath, waiting. He was so close, his thumb nearly brushing her, just next to his mouth. Her entire world started and ended with the place where she waited for his touch, and she realized she hadn’t wanted anything this badly in a long, long time.

When his caress came, it nearly ended her. Just the tip of his tongue, wet and gentle, barely dipping to taste her as his thumb pressed, softly, just beside it. She was already wet, dripping with want, and she whimpered and went stiff, beyond desperate for more. Lick by lick, he teased her, tasted her, touched her, pressed in the tiniest bit, nowhere close to satisfying her, taking his time as he had promised. One finger slid into her with infinite patience, his tongue probing her most secret of places. Marco was just as frustrating in bed as he was on his feet, and she loved and hated it with equal measure.

Since Liam, all her lovers had been fast and brash and pounding and innocently selfish, easy to lose herself in for a night and just as easy to forget come morning. But Marco’s touch brought her back to herself, reminded her of what it was to yearn and want and need. She couldn’t escape it, couldn’t escape him, couldn’t escape the feeling writhing in her chest, the hunger, the needing.

“Please.”

One long, deep lick, tongue flat, enough to make her shudder. “Please what, sweetness?”

“Just . . . please.”

He put his lips against her and hummed, sending a thrum throughout every cell of her body. “Hmm. Please go more slowly?”

She groaned. “Curse you and your damn lips, Marco Taresque.”

He paused, set his forehead against her thigh. “Care to rephrase that?”

“Yes. No. Faster. More.” He licked her again, and she whimpered. “Please. More.”

He chuckled against her, slid a second finger in beside the first, and curled them as if he knew every inch of her body as well as he knew his knives. His tongue began to work her with purpose, pushing in and out in perfect time with his fingers, and she met his rhythm with every breath, with the little moans and whimpers that escaped her as her head thrashed back and forth. Her fingers were numb around the iron bars, her hands forgotten in the frenzy he’d built inside her.

“Better?” he asked.

“So close. Still not enough. All of you. Now.” After one last, forceful, hard push of his tongue, he withdrew, leaving an emptiness behind where his fingers had brought her to the edge of a release she felt sure he wasn’t ready yet to give her. The knowledge was thrilling, that he was so attuned to her body after so little time, that he was reading every signal she threw. She felt like an instrument in his hands, as if he knew how to coax songs from her that she didn’t yet know how to sing.

Marco moved up, one knee at the juncture of her thighs, flush against the place his fingers had filled almost perfectly. “You haven’t let go of the bed yet. Good girl.”

He wrapped his hands around hers and bent his mouth to her lips, kissing her long and deep and fitting his knee more snugly between her thighs. His fingertips trailed down her arms, tracing over the fabric of her undone jacket until he came to the plain of her exposed chest, her breasts still floating over her corset and aching for his touch. He licked and sucked and teased them, but she could feel his patience turning to hunger, could sense that he couldn’t go on like this much longer, drawing out her pleasure while denying his own. One by one, he unlatched the hooks down the front of her corset, kissing down the valley of fevered flesh until the last one popped free, exposing her utterly. As she gulped a deep breath, he licked a long line straight up from her navel to her throat. In a heartbeat, he was back at her navel and circling there, briefly, before dipping below the waist of her skirt.

Before she could twist her hips to show him the buttons, he’d already undone them and begun to slip the heavy skirts and petticoats down her hips, his mouth lingering on the ticklish flesh of her hipbones. She lifted herself up, helping him slide the skirts off completely and toss them onto the floor. With a sigh of bliss, she wriggled all over, glad to be free of the heavy layers of fabric. His hands ran reverently over the curves of her, tracing and cupping and brushing as if he’d never seen so much of a woman before. When she looked up, she was moved by the softness and awe in his eyes. He caught her looking and leaned over to take her face in both his hands and kiss her with such tenderness that her desire melted away, for just a moment, into bliss.

And then his finger found her again, testing the wetness pooled between her legs.

“I think you might be enjoying this.”

He began to ease in one finger, and she tossed her head and whimpered. “I want to touch you, Marco. Please let me touch you.”

He shook his head no, but ever so softly, he said, “Do, then.”

Her fingers ached when she unwound them from the iron, and her head swam when she sat up. With tentative hands, he helped her draw off her jacket and unwrap the corset, and then she was completely naked before him, a field of sweetly flushed freckles and soft red hair. The way he stared with liquid violet eyes, as if she was an angel, made her feel cherished and beautiful and fierce. Jacinda slipped from the bed to stand between his knees, the wood floor cold under the balls of her feet.

With trembling hands, she began unbuttoning his shirt, pausing only to gasp when he cupped a breast in each hand and held them together, licking every curve. The soft black linen fell open, and she untucked his shirt and drew it down over his shoulders, skimming her hands down the smooth, hard muscles of his biceps and scratching her nails through the dark, curly hair on his forearms. Her eyes were drawn by a series of thick white scars that stood out from the golden skin of his shoulder, side, and chest.

“What happened?”

He grimaced and shook his head, turning it into a smile. “Being a daggerman has its perils. Like beautiful women throwing themselves at me.”

She knelt in one smooth motion, his knees on either side of her. Kissing down his chest, she ran her hands over the curve of his ribs, over hard muscles, down to that elegantly delicious line where his hipbones made a V pointing somewhere lovely. Marco held perfectly still, his eyes closed, letting her do her work, his hands making fists in the coverlet as if he was afraid to touch her. After running her hands along his thighs and to his knees, she sat back on her haunches and slowly, so slowly, undid the buttons on his breeches. He leaned back and groaned as he sprang free, and she was smugly gratified by the evidence of his desire, that he had taken such time to drive her mad with hands and mouth while he felt the same hunger she knew.

The deadly Marco Taresque looked so very vulnerable this way, torso bared and head thrown back, throat exposed and eyes closed, wild hair tangling down his back. And she very much wanted to shock him, to drive him mad. And so, with her hands on his knees, she bent and took him deep into her mouth. He groaned and tensed and growled as she tasted him, just as slowly as he’d tasted her.

“No . . . I don’t . . . I can’t . . .”

Without pulling away, she innocently mumbled, “Can’t what?” around him.

With a growl, his hands caught her waist and pulled her to standing, and her excitement ratcheted up a notch with his sudden ferocity and need. He pulled her close and gazed up into her eyes, and it was like falling into a cave of ever-twilight, into a dark, echoing, endless chasm.

“God, you’re unspeakably beautiful.” He laid his face against her side, nuzzling, and she tugged fingers through his dark, silky hair, waiting for his next touch, for him to finally initiate the release they both craved. But he made no move.

“What do you want, Marco?”

His lips tickled her ribs as he spoke. “Everything. I want to taste every inch of you and meet you a thousand ways for a thousand nights and hear you scream in my ear as you shatter under my mouth.” He pulled away, traced her curves up and down with his fingertips. “But since you’re asking, let’s start with this.”

He spun her around and sank his teeth into her ass briefly as his fingers found her, spreading her lips and pulling her back gently. With a smile of satisfaction, she spread her legs to straddle his knees. Ready as she was, he slid in easily, perfectly, deliciously, making her gasp as she settled against him. He let out a strangled sigh and set his forehead against her shoulder, and for just a moment, she imagined she felt the wetness of a single, solitary tear.

Then Marco’s arm wrapped around her, pinning her hands to her chest, and he rocked forward tentatively. With a little “Ooh,” she moved with him, grinding against him slowly. He moved her hair aside and caught the nape of her neck with his lips, finding a steady rhythm that battered against her, striking deep inside. With his arm still around her, his fingers wrapped around both of her wrists, she leaned forward, testing his strength, changing the angle just slightly, and his groan thrummed down her neck, down her spine, adding to the pooling pleasure at the core of her. His free hand roamed her body, cupping her breasts, pinching her nipples, and skimming her ribs, following the crease of her thigh to the crux of her, where he rubbed in time, moving faster in counterpoint to his thrusting.

Jacinda threw her head back and wrenched her arms free with a growl. Her hands found his thighs, finally, and she rode him without shame or regret or thought, becoming a being of pure hunger and desire and hot, wet sweetness, with no past, no future, no deep-down sorrow. As many times and ways as she’d imagined being with Marco since the first time she’d laid eyes on him, it was better still than that.

He fit perfectly with her, moved perfectly, knew just how to work her flesh with mouth and hand in a wild frenzy that drew her into ecstasy, into forgetfulness, into that pitch-black, starlit abyss where nothing mattered but this, but him, but the movement, the feeling, the riding. And still they moved faster and faster, until only his arm kept her upright and in one piece. She arched her back against him and whimper-screamed, her head over his shoulder and her fallen hair streaming down his back as he caught her mouth and swallowed the panting whimpers of her crest. With one last cry, she clenched her muscles around him and kissed him hard, until she felt the rhythmic pumping of his own release. The kiss ended when his climax ignited a second bloom of pleasure deep inside her, and she had no choice but to lean back against him and ride it out in one long, high scream.

She went silent and collapsed against him, and Marco fell bonelessly back onto the bed, taking her with him. Rolling off his body, she put her head to his chest and smiled at his slow, steady heartbeat.

“Damn, woman,” was all he could say before closing his eyes and going completely limp, his booted feet still on the floor and his undone breeches flung open.

“Damn, yourself.”

He flinched, and she nuzzled closer. “Maybe I should just say ‘Wow’ and leave it at that.”

“Wow, indeed.”

He curled an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close, brushing her hair back from her temples. “If I’d known it would be that good, I might not have resisted for so long,” he said.

“I had my suspicions.” She ran a hand over the dark hair fuzzing his chest. “But I always like it when I’m right.”

.11.

The afternoon passed with that sweet, slow discovery of things above the neck. He liked poetry and read well, and she curled on the bed happily while he paced in breeches and boots and wooed her with words. She found his violin case under the bed when she stubbed her toe and persuaded him to play a little for her. It was slow and mournful and made her think of looking up through pine boughs at the winter sky, just before the snow came. After delving into her girlhood, he unearthed that she had once sung opera, and clad in nothing but her skin, she sang a few rusty arias for him, for which he went still and wide-eyed and reverent, which gratified her.

He kept an eye on the clock, and she felt a twinge of sadness when he rose to prepare for the night’s show. His breeches had been utterly ruined, and she watched appreciatively as he pulled off his boots and stockings to change into a new pair that fit just as well. For all their leisurely and time-consuming lovemaking, she hadn’t seen his body fully exposed before then. Jacinda lay back and watched him go through his ministrations as if he were a classical statue brought to life, all strong lines and ideal curves and masculine power balanced with beauty and just the right dusting of dark hair. Only the scars marred his perfection, and she felt a twinge of doubt. Had she just slept with a murderer? He’d given her his body but not his truth. Had he shared himself with Petra like this . . . before she disappeared?

“You going to come watch me throw some knives, sweetness?”

She jumped guiltily. Of course he wasn’t a murderer, no matter how dangerous he appeared, no matter what the carnivalleros whispered, no matter what some biased rumor rag printed. He was watching her in the mirror as he brushed his hair and tied on his bandanna, and her heart softened at the smile in his eyes. She reluctantly stood and stepped into the petticoats puddled on the floor. She’d been here for hours, naked and learning about the mysterious man she’d needed so badly to bed. But now . . .

“I’ve seen the show. And I like the private show better. I’ll be in my conveyance, working.”

His eyebrows went down. “Abandoning me already?”

She stepped behind him, pressing her bare chest against his back and wrapping her arms around him. He was about half a foot taller than she, and on tiptoes, her chin fit just over his shoulder with a possessive intimacy that made her feel warm all over.

“You have your work, and I have mine. I’m not some fawning girl who’s incomplete without a man and needs to follow you about, mooning like a fool. But I’ll be counting the moments until the caravan is closed for the night and you’re knocking on my door.”

That seemed to satisfy him, and he turned his head to kiss her cheek. She went back to the pile of clothes, unlacing her corset so that it would fasten down the front again and then pulling the laces just enough for decency. The skirt billowed over her head, and the jacket covered her arms. Her legs felt naked and free without the stockings, but the matched pair was ruined now, thanks to his clumsy knife throw.

“That’s twice you’ve missed,” she said, holding up the slithery gray silk to show the bloodstained slice where his knife had found her ankle. She’d totally forgotten about the wound, couldn’t even feel it anymore as she laced on her boots.

“The first time was your fault. You dropped the card.”

“And the second time?”

He stepped close, fully costumed and ready for the show, all vestiges of vulnerability replaced by the raw power that had originally drawn her to him against her will. “The second time wasn’t an accident.”

“You hit me on purpose?”

He tangled his hand in her hair and pulled her close, kissing her hard and deep and reminding her how very easily he could make her insides quiver.

“And look how nice it turned out.”

“You sly dog. I can’t believe you cut me just to get me into your wagon. I would have followed you in here willingly.”

“Followed me? Girl, you broke in once already! But I wanted it on my terms. I wanted you in my arms, not driving me before you like some idiot sheep. And I wanted to give you a reason to run, if you were looking for one. Getting involved with me . . . well, I’m dangerous. And I’m not a man who lets go of things easily.”

“Like your past, for example?”

A rueful sadness filled his violet eyes. “Don’t rush me, sweetness. A man can’t give up all his secrets at once.”

“I just want to know—”

“I’ll tell you. In time. I promise.”

She sighed melodramatically and buttoned up her jacket. He watched her fingers, not blinking, his desire to see the jacket back on the ground all but palpable. “Fine. Then I’ll be waiting to screw it out of you in my conveyance after tonight’s show.”

His eyes raked her as she twisted up her hair. “What’ll you be wearing?”

She smiled, smug as a cat in cream. “Nothing but a smile.”

Before he could kiss her, she turned and left, letting her hips swing. She didn’t look back, just shut the door behind her as she stepped down to the ground. Far away, she could hear the banks rumbling over the moors, packed with city people, their pockets filled with clinking vials and coins. The carnivalleros were all in the wagons, preparing, as Marco was, for the night’s show. Being seen by the audience before everything was perfect was considered a grand misstep, and Criminy himself was walking the perimeter with a copper monkey scampering at his side, checking that all was in place.

The smug and knowing smile he gave her made her roll her eyes. What did she care if the ringmaster knew what she’d been at with the knife thrower?

“Finding success in your endeavors, Mrs. Harville?” he asked, giving her a polite bow.

“I’m getting what I need, yes.” She kept walking toward her conveyance, and he fell into step beside her, swinging the monkey up onto his shoulder.

“You’re not distracting my daggerman, are you?”

“As much as possible, yes.”

“That would upset me, if not for my wife’s charming insistence that your continued presence is the only way I can keep him among us. It’s hard to find a good knife thrower, you know. Especially one with such a lively reputation. I hope you don’t plan on ruining it with the pesky truth.”

“You’re just vexed that I’ve been chasing him instead of interviewing you for your chapter in the book.”

The ringmaster threw his head back and laughed, a wild sound that suited him perfectly. “For a journalist, you certainly have an honest streak,” he said. “Now, go back to your conveyance and find some new stockings before the two-headed Bludmen smell what you’ve been up to and get hungry. It would be such a shame if you died before you immortalized me in prose.”

“I don’t take orders from you.”

“I’d just hate to see you get hurt before you can completely corrupt my daggerman.”

“Marco’s a big boy. And I’m not one of your carnivalleros, you know.” She flounced away to hide her embarrassment.

“Keep telling yourself that, pet,” he called with another mad laugh. “You’re practically his assistant, which means you’ll be asking me for wages soon.”

A shiver ran up her spine at the word “assistant,” but when she turned back around to shout at him, the ringmaster had disappeared.

“I’m no one’s assistant,” she muttered under her breath. “I’m a goddamn journalist.”

She was beyond the caravan lights now, out among the wilder winds of the moors. A bludbunny darted out for her, and she kicked it away, wondering where Brutus had gotten off to. She’d left the metal dog on Marco’s doorstep, but she’d seen no sign of it since emerging and had forgotten to leave it with orders. It had malfunctioned before and was programmed to return to the homing beacon in her conveyance. Still, out here, without her guard or an escort, she felt ill at ease.

The field between her conveyance and the warm lights of the caravan felt larger, wilder, and colder than it did in the daylight. Thunder grumbled menacingly, and Jacinda hurried faster, stumbling over a rogue bludbunny and almost falling into the waist-high grass. Back on her feet, she broke into a jog and didn’t look back until she stood on the steps of her conveyance, unlocking her door by gaslight with shaking hands.

Gazing back down to the caravan that was beginning to feel like home, she shivered. Criminy was nowhere to be seen, and the carnivalleros were in place, waiting for the crowd that was moving down the moor in a frightened cluster of bright silks. No one looked toward the shadowy conveyance on the hill. And yet she felt eyes on her, danger hovering near, dogging her every step since she’d left Marco’s wagon.

Perhaps she should have gone to watch Marco’s show, paid her copper to wander again among the glittering golden lights and laughter, where things felt safe. But no. Foolish fears had never stopped her before, and they wouldn’t now. She didn’t know if Criminy had been joking about the dangers of his pet Bludmen and the wild animals, if there was any real threat other than the same strangely oppressing darkness that hung always over the moors.

Drawing her curtains, she realized what was missing. She wouldn’t feel safe again until the dangerous daggerman was back in her arms.