Vexing The Viscount (11 page)

Jupiter!
Lucian needed no kissing instructions. As far as Daisy could tell, the man already knew perfectly well how to kiss. Either that, or he was the sharpest pupil in history.

He cupped both her cheeks and changed the slant of his mouth across hers, applying a little more pressure. Daisy let her lips part the tiniest bit and his tongue invaded her, hot and questing.

What would Blanche do?

She’d welcome him, Daisy realized as she twined her tongue with his in a warm, wet sparring. She suckled him and heard his low groan. He stole all the breath from her lungs and replaced it sweetly with his own.

Everything inside her went soft and liquid. She turned the tables on him and slipped her tongue into his mouth to explore. He mirrored the welcome she gave him.

She ran a hand up the indentation of his spine and he shifted closer. His hands left her cheeks, sliding along the sides of her neck and down to her shoulders. Very gently he pushed the frilly
casaque
of to slip down her arms.

Then his kisses wandered down to her jawline. Tendrils of pleasure followed in their wake. He kissed his way along her neck to the soft indentation at the base of her throat, his warm breath streaming over her chest and sneaking between her breasts. Her nipples ached.

She sighed his name.

“I like the sound of that.” He nibbled his way up to her earlobe. “The way you said my name. For a moment there, you didn’t sound a bit French.”

Jupiter again!
She forgot to pronounce it
Loo-see-ahn
, as Blanche would. At least, thank heaven, she’d used but a wisp of a voice, so the chances of his recognizing her were slim.

“And is it so bad, you think, that I am French?” she asked in Blanche’s language, using the moment as an excuse to pull back from him to a place of relative safety. Not too soon, either. He nearly had her trembling with need.

“Not a bit,” he said, his own tone ragged. “It’s just that my French isn’t the best, and it seems you use it to keep me at a distance.”

If that kiss was distant, she was lost if he got close.

“I think you’ve demonstrated that you have no need of my lessons on the art of the kiss,” she said, rising to her feet. She’d remembered at the last moment to insist on the high heels she’d worn before as Blanche. She tottered over and sat at the small table. “Please come and join me.”

His brows drew together, and she wondered if he’d discerned her secret. Other than the brief slip when she practically moaned his name, she couldn’t point to any un-courtesanlike behavior.

Then he rose from the fainting couch and took the other chair at the table.

“Nanette will be bringing a bite of supper for us soon,” she informed him. “I do hope you have an appetite.”

“That, mademoiselle, is not in doubt.”

His rakish grin told her that food was the last thing on his mind. She opened the deck of cards and executed a perfect shuffle. Holding the cards felt safe, as though the fifty-two thin pieces of paper were somehow shields.

“You would perhaps enjoy a game while we wait?” she asked.

“Only if it’s a game of chance,” he said.

“And what will you wager?” Daisy wondered. If his financial state was as bad as she thought, gambling was not the wisest course.

“Right now, you and I are partners in my search for the Roman treasure, split in half when we find it,” he said. “For each hand I lose, one percent more of the money we find will be yours.”

“Ah! And if I lose, that one percent shifts to you,” she guessed.

“No.” A slow smile spread across his face. “I’ll take my winnings now in satin.”

“How do you mean?” she asked, thankful he couldn’t see her puzzled frown behind the half mask.

He reached forward and gave the top ribbon on her camisole a tug. The knot gave and her bodice sagged open enough to bare the meeting place of her breasts above her pounding heart.

“Do we have a wager?” he asked. “Or are you afraid you’ll lose?”

A true
courtesan
wouldn’t be able to resist such a naughty game.

“Ah !
Monsieur le Vicomte
, either way I win.” Daisy shuffled the cards with more bravado than she felt and dealt the hand.

She lost the first round and, with resignation, started to untie the next ribbon.

“No, no,” he said. “Allow me.”

Very slowly he pulled the end of the bow, and Daisy felt her supportive camisole give a bit. More of her breasts spilled out. Still not as much as he’d already seen that first night at the masquerade, but enough that the heat of his gaze made her skin flush rosily.

And between her legs, her still-hairless folds began to ache. She shifted on her seat, but nothing eased the throbbing.

Before he drew his hand back, he pushed the edges of the
satin camisole aside, brushing her exposed skin with his fingertips as he did so. Now her nipples were scarcely covered. In fact, if the hard little points weren’t holding up the fabric, she’d be bared already.

Another lost hand, or even a deep breath, and…

“There,” he said. “Much better. No point in unfastening that contraption if the blasted thing stays in place.”

“We did not wager on touching. Merely on satin,” she reminded him.

“Perhaps we should amend the wager then,” he said. “When I win, I may touch what ever I see.”

Lucian drew his knuckles softly over the swell of her breast. A jolt of heat lightning streaked to her belly and stayed to simmer in an ever-tightening circle of warmth.

“Then we should adjust the wager the other way as well,” she said. “How shall you feel if I lay claim to your breeches buttons with each hand that falls my way?”

He chuckled. “Ah! Mlle La Tour, either way, I win.”

She’d blundered badly and she knew it, but she was momentarily saved when Nanette rapped at the door with their supper. If the maid noticed that Daisy was showing a good bit more skin than when she last saw her, Nanette was tactful enough not to show surprise. She laid out the fine china and silver for them, and left with a wink and a smile, but fortunately no comment.

Daisy lifted the silver chafing lids.

Oysters and chocolate. Aphrodisiacs both. As if Lucian needs that sort of encouragement!

Lucian helped himself to a couple of oysters while she poured tea for them.

“How did you find the assistant I sent’round to represent me?” She dropped a lump of sugar into his tea and added a dollop of sweet cream.

“I take it you mean Miss Drake?” he asked, dabbing at his lips with a linen napkin. “She’s competent.”

Competent! Was that all the man could say for her?

“I understand she’s an accomplished Latin scholar,” Daisy said primly.

“Is that why you sent her?”

“Well, yes, of course,” she said. “The dear girl did confess to me that she is extremely interested in Roman antiquities.”

“I’m well aware of the
dear girl’s
…curiosity about them,” he said.

“Then, too, she’s my hostess’s great-niece, so it was the politic thing to do,” Daisy said, wishing she’d never broached the subject.

“I was surprised that you didn’t send a man who could help with the actual labor,” he said as he selected a piece of chocolate and offered it to her.

She allowed him to tease the sweet treat over her bottom lip before popping it into her open mouth. Daisy closed her eyes and let the chocolate dissolve slowly on her tongue.

When she opened her eyes, she found him studying her intently. Not her nearly exposed breasts. She would have expected that. Lucian’s gaze was fixed on her eyes. To divert him, she offered him a chocolate, taunting his mouth with it as he had hers.

“The money I sent will more than pay for laborers to do your digging. That way you and”—she barely caught herself before she said “I”—“you and Miss Drake can do the more scholarly work together.”

“And it doesn’t bother you that I’ll be working closely each day with an attractive young lady?”

Attractive! Well, that’s several steps up from
competent,
at least.

“Not in the slightest.” Especially since the competition for his attention was herself. “Were you hoping to make me jealous, Lucian?”

“Never mind,” he said. “I’m sure you’re a stranger to such an emotion.”

“
Bien sûr.
For one’s heart must be involved in order to feel jealousy,” she said, remembering the real Blanche’s thoughts on the matter. “You and I…what we have is a pleasant diversion. Nothing more.”

“Well, good,” he said, agreeing with her assessment of their relationship more quickly than she’d hoped. “Then perhaps you’ll advise me in a matter of the heart.”

“Oui?”

“I plan to show a certain young lady that I admire her soon,” he said. “Perhaps you can help me know the right way to go about it.”

He wants me to help him woo Clarinda Brumley. Not bloody likely
.

It wouldn’t be very ladylike, or even very Blanche-like, to voice such sentiments, but she could jolly well think them as loudly as she wished!

“Here is what you should do.” She leaned toward him, forgetting for a moment the way her bosom was poised for exposure. “Ignore the lady. If you are in the same room, do not even acknowledge her presence. What ever you do, be as aloof as possible, and she will be panting in your wake in no time.”

“By heaven, mademoiselle! You make it impossible to ignore you.” He reached forward to circle an exposed nipple. When she started to pull back, he stopped her by splaying his whole hand over her breast, which was now quite bared. “We can touch what we see, remember.”

“So we can.” She willed herself to relax into his hand.

He continued his unhurried exploration of her breast, drawing his fingertips over her skin in featherlight strokes. She seemed to have grown a second heart, and it pounded between her legs. Daisy narrowly resisted the urge to squirm in her seat.

“How will ignoring her make her want me?” he asked.

“It is clear you are not a student of human nature, monsieur,” Daisy said, trying to come up with a valid reason for such poor advice. Maintaining a courtesan’s composure while he taunted her nipples nearly had her grinding her teeth. “Since the Garden, we have ever wanted that which is forbidden. If you are distant, the lady will see you as a challenge and act accordingly.”

Not Clarinda Brumley, Daisy knew. That young lady had to be coaxed into each conversation, and if it were not about either fashion or gossip, it would be a short exchange indeed. If Lucian ignored Clarinda, she’d simply sit like an inanimate lump unless her mother pressed the issue.

And if Lady Brumley was affronted by Lucian’s slight, so much the better.

“If you’re sure,” he said doubtfully while the pad of his thumb thrummed her nipple.

“Absolutely,” she said, feeling like a plucked string. Her whole body seemed to vibrate in concert with her breasts.

One side of his mouth hitched upward. “Then I will implement your excellent idea. You really think it will work?”

“Indeed,” she affirmed, her tone breathless.

“Upon your word, I’ll try it, then,” he said, pulling back his hand.

Daisy bit the inside of her cheek to keep from crying out for him to continue pleasuring her with his fingers. Who would have thought a woman’s nipples were so sensitive?

Lucian pushed back his plate. “And now, mademoiselle, I believe we have a card game to finish.”

Whether by accident or design, Lucian’s luck soured. Daisy found herself fighting to control the trembling in her hands as she undid his breeches buttons. More than once, her hand brushed his hardened groin in the process.

What’s he got in there? A lead pipe?

He was still covered by his drawers, but only barely, and he’d just turned up the losing hand.

He made a
tsk
ing noise with his tongue and teeth. “Looks like I can’t draw a winning card to save my soul.”

“Oh, my dear Lucian,” she said. “I greatly fear this game is of no benefit to your soul whatsoever.”

“Maybe not, but the rest of me enjoys it immensely.” Lucian stood, the better to present his remaining buttons.

She willed her hands not to tremble as she unfastened one side of his drop-front fly. The thin cotton fell forward and the tip of him was exposed above the cloth.

She’d seen artistic representations of penises in terra-cotta. The little Roman lamp sprang to mind. And a few in granite, most notably the one on the nude statue in Lord Wexford’s grotto in the center of his garden maze. There were even one or two displayed in quiescent form in the classical painting in Aunt Isabella’s boudoir.

But this was the first one Daisy had seen in the fresh. Of course, she could see only the head, the dark skin pulled smooth around the tiny mouth at the tip. Already she could tell the little Roman lamp hadn’t been anywhere near life-size. Lucian’s penis leaned toward her of its own accord, straining at its cotton prison.

“Remember,” he said, his tone husky, “in this game, what we can see, we can touch.”

Daisy swallowed hard. To her surprise, she discovered her hand fairly itched to touch him.

But how to go about it?

A circuitous route seemed safest. She circled his navel with her fingertips. A narrow line of dark hair led downward, spreading when it reached his groin. She followed the trail. She teased along the tip of him, exploring the smooth head and the spongy flare.

When she brushed over the bit of skin just below the head, Lucian groaned. A small pearl of liquid glistened at the tiny opening.

There was undoubtedly a good bit more of him, but the flap of his fly was still fastened on one side. Daisy looked up at his face.