The Notorious Bridegroom. Kit Donner
awhile. Forget about the woman responsible for his brother’s murder. If only he could return to France. But Secretary Hobart expected a report soon of the sea fencibles stationed in Kent to protect the shoreline that he had been assigned the task of overseeing. With resignation, he knew he had to finish this mission before beginning his own.
Bryce sighed and flexed his shoulders, then rose to pour himself another drink. Returning to his chair, he moved it farther away from the heat still emanating from the fireplace.
What in blazes? He noticed something blue blowing across the window opening. Obviously not his curtains, which, upon closer inspection, he realized were deep red.
Intrigued, he cautiously approached the opened window. He rested his left hip on the sill, leaned out, and looked over to his right. What he saw amazed him and immediately removed any lingering effects of the liquor.
A young woman, very wet, with eyes closed, clutched the side of his house. The edges of her nightdress blew teasingly toward him. Whatever was a young woman doing outside his window? And why did she seem somehow familiar? Could she be spying on him?
Without hesitation, he leveraged his hip across the ledge and reached out his hand toward her while grasping the side of the window with a firm hand.
Softly he called to her, “Don’t be afraid. Step toward me and grab my hand. I will pull you through the window.”
The woman’s eyes fluttered open in shock. She paused and studied his outstretched hand before lifting one trembling pale hand from its anchor to the house and trustingly placed it into his. Immediately, he tightened his grip around her fragile hand and drew her gently toward him, murmuring soft encouragements.
She managed the last few steps to his window in a wet shuffle until he could grasp her narrow waist. In one smooth movement, he pulled the woman against his chest and carried her through the window onto safer ground.
Or that is what he would have believed. When he felt her cool, wet body against his, rationality escaped him. Before he had time to reflect on the desire hardening his body, the uneven weight of her high in his arms awkwardly knocked them to the ground. She landed on top of him with a whoosh, momentarily taking his breath away. Wet strands of sweet-smelling hair slapped his cheek as lovely hazel eyes in an ashen face gazed down at him in terror. She gaped at him as she braced her weight on both sides of his head, while the rest of her body pressed intimately against his.
“You.” The word pushed from his lips in an incredulous whisper. He could not help but stare.
This was her. Mrs. Grundy or Miss Grundy or whoever. What was she doing here? Her mouth opened as if to say something, but caught off guard by her familiar countenance and the very right feel of her supple body pressed against his, Bryce responded by raising his hand to her head and bringing her lips gently to meet his, his other hand holding her tightly against him. He would get the answers from her, but first his body willed his mind to forget for a moment. There would be plenty of time.
Strangely, she offered no protest, and he wasted no time examining his motives or his good luck, only pleased with this wet nymph’s response to his ardency.
Her soft, pliant lips quivered as he wooed her mouth in tender exploration. His tongue licked smooth caresses over her mouth in light persuasion until she allowed him entrance into the sweetest haven he had ever tasted.
He groaned at her innocent acceptance of his tongue. With his other arm still wrapped around her waist, he pulled her down until her breasts pressed intimately against his wet chest and the rest of her damp body lay more firmly anchored in the harbor of his legs. This woman had aroused him in a matter of seconds. His body responded to her sweetly rounded hips beneath his hand, and her peaked nipples against his chest tortured his sanity.
Caught in a dream of wanting and blood-pulsing, fiery desire, he easily circled her slim waist and rubbed his aroused manhood against her feminine heat, wondering if she ached as much as he did.
A knock on the door caught the entranced couple off guard, and Bryce heard the countess call out.
“Bryce? Are you in there?”
Chapter 4
His hands tightened on the young woman’s hips upon hearing Isabella, reluctant to let her go, yet not wanting his ex-mistress to find her here in his arms. A brief hesitation, then his wet companion rolled out of his surprised arms onto the hard floor with a thump. Her action immediately cooled his heated senses.
With no further delay, he rose onto his good knee and deftly raised himself off the floor. In his haste, he did not risk another look at the young woman, but hurried across the room to the unlocked door to prevent Isabella from entering.
Too late. She burst into the room in a manner which suggested no amount of bars or locks could have prevented her. Her azure-blue silk dressing gown hissed around her silk slippers as she pushed past him.
“Mon chéri, you know I do not like waiting. And it has been so long since you have made love to me,” she told him reprovingly, with red lips pouting.
He closed his eyes and muttered a groan. He did not turn around but waited for her anticipated reaction.
“Bryce, how could you? You are quite careless,” her cool voice adding to the chill in the air.
Ironically, she had just reminded him of how warm he had been. Puzzled, he turned to find the countess gliding to the open window. No trace of the damp sprite remained. She had simply vanished.
Suddenly a fearful thought occurred to him. Had she escaped the way she’d arrived? In a few strides, he reached the window, but Isabella had already closed it.
“This rain has certainment soaked the curtains. What a dilemma! You should have shut these windows earlier,” she chided him. She faced him with a sly smile painted on her lips. “Mon amour, I could not stop thinking about your invitation,” she purred.
He brushed her aside and yanked open the casement windows. A quick glance to the left and down allowed him to breathe again. She had not left by the window. The only other exit was the door to his valet’s room, which had a door to the hallway. Desperately, he tried to think of a way to get rid of Isabella as he shut the windows again.
Isabella’s long arms curled around his waist as she pressed her full breasts against his back, then stepped away and walked in front of him. “Bryce, why are you wet? Were you standing at the window letting the rain soak you?”
“Ah, yes, I thought I saw something outside, so I leaned out to see what it was.”
“I can dry you. Come to bed. I have what you need.” Her searching hands efficiently found his aroused member, still hard with the memory of another woman. “And you have what I want.”
Bryce removed her hands from him. This was a foolish idea. It had been from the beginning. She had been amusing a few years ago, but when he returned last November, she had insisted on accompanying him home. She thought he needed her. She was wrong. He had not had a need for her in a long time.
However, Providence had played a hand in the arrangements by bringing the countess’s cousin Alain Sansouche, a suspected French spy, with her to Paddock Green. And while Sansouche was under the same roof, it would be easier for Bryce to observe him.
Keeping Isabella at arm’s length while he continued with his plans to locate the ring of French spies had proven to be a nuisance these past few months. Obviously not undone by his lack of encouragement, she pressed her hands to his chest and raised her head to seal a wet, inviting kiss on his lips.
The kiss, vastly different from the one with his wet nymph, triggered Bryce to his senses. Where the nymph’s kiss had broken through his despair, Isabella’s felt cold and manipulative. He’d tasted youthful, redeeming innocence and wanted a second course of the vision that had dropped into his arms.
Intent on his comparison, he realized too late the countess had pulled him to the bed. He watched her dispassionately as if he was in the audience and not a participant of the