Sweet as the Devil (20 page)

Douglas shook his head. “Quiet as the grave, sair.”

“Good. Archie and Ian will spell you soon. It’s been a long day so we’re keeping the shifts to three hours. And don’t even think of saying what you’re about to say.”

Robbie looked at his brother, his grin breaking free. “Ye won.”

“Told ye.”

“Very amusing,” Jamie grumbled.

“Dinna forget to sleep a wee bit, my bonny boy.” Douglas lifted one brow. “Von Welden plays o’ wicked game.”

“She might throw ’im out,” Robbie teased. “Ye niver know.”

“We leave at seven.” Jamie wasn’t about to discuss the night ahead. “And I’d appreciate no more betting.”

Douglas’s grin widened. “Would ye now.”

“Too late,” Robbie said.

Jamie groaned. “At least she’s not to know. Are we clear?”

“Yes, sair, yer lordship,” Douglas replied, trying mightily not to break out into a guffaw. An unspoken democracy in the Scottish mercenary tradition played the devil with rank and authority.

“Oh Christ, I give up.” Whenever his men called him
your lordship
, there was no point in carrying on a serious discussion.

Jamie grabbed the doorknob and gave it a turn.

W
HEN HE WALKED in and shut the door behind him, Sofia glanced at the clock on the mantel as if it mattered.

As if the time would be a clue.

“Do you have an appointment?” he said, watching her, not moving from the door.

“It seems I do now. Or do I?” She set her napkin on the table, leaned back in her chair, and looked him over with a speculative gaze. “Why are you here?” It was a woman’s question, wanting to know everything.

“I thought you might like me to wash your back.” A man’s nonanswer.

She smiled faintly. “You’ve changed your mind.”

He shrugged. “Some things are possible and some aren’t. I’m not going to agonize over it. Did you like the dildo?”

She lost a modicum of her sangfroid. “You saw that?”

He nodded. “I almost woke you.”

A small lascivious jolt. A pause. Then she said, “I wish you had.”

“There were too many people around.”

“Where do they think you are now?”

“Here—fucking you.”

A infinitesimal moment passed; she wasn’t being wooed. But how did it matter when she wanted the same? “Will they snicker tomorrow”—she lifted her hand in a small gesture—“about this?”

He shook his head.

“They’re afraid of you?”

“Respectful in their fashion. I outrank them.”

“Who outranks whom here?”

He smiled. “You, naturally.”

“I’m not sure I believe you. In fact, I know I don’t.”

“Don’t worry. It won’t come up.”

“You know that, do you?”

He could have said,
It never has before
, but he knew better. “Would you like a bath?” he said instead.

“Not yet. Or would you like me to? You’ve bathed, I see.” His hair was wet, slicked back behind his ears. “And you’ve changed clothes.” He was casually dressed in a soft chamois jacket, an open-necked linen shirt that looked as though a valet had just ironed it, black wool trousers, and soft leather half boots with decorative tracery on the toes and braided trim down the sides. “I like your boots. Hungarian?”

“Croatian.”

“Close.”

“Only in a geographical sense.” He smiled faintly. “I won’t give the lecture on their many long-standing disagreements.”

“I’m afraid I was unable to change.” She felt as though she needed an excuse when faced with such sartorial splendor—simple and unaffected as it was.

He smiled again. “You’d look good in sackcloth, Miss Eastleigh, or if I might persuade you—in nothing at all.”

“You persuasive?” Her brows rose delicately. “An obvious challenge for a man of your authority.”

“But not impossible, I think you’ll discover.”

She held his amused gaze for a moment, wondering how many times he’d stood before a woman, confident and assured, knowing he was wanted. “At the risk of breaching this new rapport,” she crisply said, instinctively reasserting her position, “I
will
need clothes tomorrow.”

“Then we’ll get you some tomorrow.”

“Just like that?”

“Just like that.”

His will was like a physical force, the impact on her body swift and explosive. “Your air of command is a potent aphrodisiac.” She forcibly restrained the tremor in her voice. “You know that, I suppose.”

He supposed he did. “Your brazenness is an aphrodisiac, Miss Eastleigh.”

“Sofia. Since we’re going to be friends,” she added, knowing how to play the game as well as he, dismissing her niggling reservations. Had she not been wanting this for some time?

“Yes, of course.” He pushed away from the door, slowly crossed the room, came to a stop beside her chair, and bowed faintly. An elegant, effortless bow. But then he’d been trained by a Spanish princess one summer at Biarritz in his youth. “Might I interest you in furthering our friendship now?” he softly inquired. “I feel sure we have much in common.”

She met his cool, insolent gaze and smiled. “You’ll certainly be an improvement over the dildo.”

“Indeed I will.”

“So immodest, Blackwood.”

“Jamie. And I selected that dildo, so it’s fact, not lack of modesty.”

“I thought of you the whole time I was using it,” she said, capable of dégagé conversation once again, her raging desire under control. “You were my inspiration.”

“You’ve inspired me as well,” he smoothly replied.

She looked up at him from under the lacy fringe of her lashes. “Enough to give up your scruples, I see.”

“Or ignore them.”

She laughed. “I don’t have many scruples.”

“I noticed.”

“Hmpf,” she said, looking up at him with a frown.

“Come,” he said, pulling her chair out, taking her hands, and lifting her to her feet. “I don’t want to argue. I don’t even want to talk unless you do.” His brows arched faintly. “I recall you mentioning you don’t require conversation. A commendable quality in a woman.”

“Or man.”

He smiled. “We really will get along,” he said, drawing her toward the bedroom.

“Did you ever doubt it?”

“Honestly, no. I just preferred avoiding it.”

“But lust intervened.”

“Yes.” He stopped in the bedroom doorway and met her gaze. “Unfortunately.”

“Why did you change your mind?”

“I have no idea. You’re too enticing, I suppose. I tried to stay away.”

“Will you be angry afterward?”

He smiled. “Hell no.”

“No guilt about loyalty or duty?”

His mood was suddenly sober. “This doesn’t impinge on my duties,” he said. “As for the rest, it was more bloodymindedness than high principles.” He’d disliked Ernst pimping his daughter, disliked being drawn into some family dynamic that was none of his concern.

“To think I could have had you rather than a dildo.” She grinned. “Where did I go wrong?”

“You have me now,” he said. “All night in case I didn’t mention it. Don’t expect to sleep.”

“In that case, did I mention that you’re riding in the carriage with me tomorrow? At least for a time.”

“Hmm,” he said. Then his expression cleared and his smile warmed his eyes this time. “It would be my pleasure.” He touched her on the cheek, very lightly, with just the tip of his index finger. “Ready?”

“First, I have a shopping list.”

Nothing moved in his large body. “You do?”

She looked up and scrutinized his narrowed green gaze. “Am I not allowed?”

“Yes, of course you are.” The warmth returned to his eyes.

“I’m sorry. Does every woman say that?”

The answer was yes if he’d been willing to give it. “Not in exactly that way,” he said instead.

“Did you think I was different?”

“I suppose not. Maybe it’s the country air. It reminds one of simpler times.”

“And less-demanding women.”

He shrugged. “I’m guilty as well of making demands.” “Dare I say, oh good?”

He laughed. “Say anything, darling. This is all so stupid anyway. If not for your father I would have had you in bed long ago.” He pulled her fully into the bedroom and shut the door. “Now, what’s at the top of your list?”

“You.”

His gaze rested on her for just a second. “Besides that.”

“No, I mean I want to watch you undress. Don’t look at me like that. It’s perfectly reasonable. I want to paint you, not here, but later—so I want to look at you. I’m going to get paints and canvas from Mother when we see her.”

She wouldn’t be painting him anywhere. Once they reached Blackwood Glen, he was dropping her off and returning to Vienna. “Sit over there.” He pointed to a chair. “Or on the bed.” He began unbuttoning his shirt, willing to please her. Later he’d please himself. “I’ve never posed for a painting,” he said pleasantly.

She sat across the room and watched his confident hands slide the buttons free, the long, slender fingers working quickly, and she suddenly thought when she shouldn’t:
Has he killed anyone with those hands?
Or more to the point tonight, how many women had been caressed with those hands, brought to climax, stroked, and petted? She shivered slightly, wanting to feel those fingers on her, in her, everywhere—on her skin, face, hair, deep inside.

He saw her shiver and understood. Women were peculiar ; they liked brute force even while they pretended they didn’t. Not that he cared about the subtleties or the reasons why. He’d just learned long ago how to share their excitement. “Would you like to help?”

She shook her head, anticipation tightening the back of her throat. “I don’t think I can move without shattering into a thousand pieces.”

“I’m sorry you had to wait so long. Do you still want me to do this? I could keep you from shattering, and we could finish this later.”

Her smile was a wince. She shook her head.

He moved more swiftly. She might think she could wait, but he wasn’t so sure, and for reasons he chose not to scrutinize, he didn’t want her to go on without him. Like some tenderhearted cub, he grimly thought. Now that
was
stupid. His jacket, shirt, and shoulder holster came off in concert, and he dropped the lot on a chair. He pulled off his boots and socks next, and as he began to slide his trousers down his hips, he heard a small little squeak. “Wait!” he said fiercely, stripping off his pants. His tone changed abruptly, softened. “Think of something else, of your first teacher, a pet you liked. Did you have a dog, a cat? I had a dog,” he said, quickly covering the distance to the chair.

A second later, he had her in his arms and was carrying her to the bed. “His name was Aramis for one of the Three Musketeers.” He placed her on the blue silk counterpane, swiftly unlaced her boots enough to jerk them off, and speedily stripped off her pants, which shifted the focus of her thoughts more than any conversation about a dog. My God he was forceful, a professional who knew what he was doing, his hands moving skillfully, deftly. All her former lovers shrank to insignificance—all the men who’d flattered and cajoled and asked her for what they wanted.

Not him
, she feverishly thought, hastily spreading her legs as he lowered his body over hers and guided his erection to her throbbing sex.
Not him
, she reflected with a little muted cry as he pressed forward and her warm, pulsing flesh yielded by slow degrees to the swollen crest of his cock.

While Jamie was wondering if he should go on, every nerve and cell in Sofia’s body was melting in a welcoming frenzy. This is what she’d been wanting from the first sight of Jamie Blackwood weeks ago—this dissolving rush of pleasure at the feel of him inside her. “More,” she whispered, stretching her thighs wider to accommodate his sizeable body, lifting her hips in a flagrant act of seduction. Or perhaps it was an act of submission. Not that motive mattered when she was feverishly conscious of the hard, solid feel of him stretching her taut, when she was currently in the grip of the most blissful delirium vibrating outward from the pulsating, exquisitely tenuous merger of their bodies. “Oh God, please, more, more, more!” A flash of a sulky look. “Do you hear?”

Good God, she needed manners. But that was surely permission. Although the question still remained whether permission translated into feasibility. Not that he was in the mood to question anything at the moment with his senses seriously focused on orgasm. He eased forward with caution. That she was lusciously wet was a blessing.

“Please, I really need you,” she breathed, reaching up to reverentially touch his face.

“You have me.” The lady’s capricious moods didn’t alter the fact that he was sunk only crest deep in her sleek, hot flesh. He was more than willing to ignore her previous sulkiness so long as her satiny tissue continued to give way—like that; he forced his erection in another small measure. A pulse beat later he penetrated deeper still with a cautious forbearance that brought a fine sweat to his brow.