HerOutlandishStranger (17 page)

She collapsed over him again and he kissed her as she
writhed on his body, so much like his wonderful dreams of her except
everything—taste, scent and the armful of lovely Eliza told him this was a
headier reality.

She reached between them to undo the buttons of his
trousers, but she faltered, perhaps feeling too forward. No such problem for
him. He hoisted himself up and shoved down the loosened trousers and linens
too.

Almost at once she rolled off him. Perhaps he’d moved too
quickly, but no, her hand grasped his hard cock. She explored him with her
fingers, her palm. She even slid down to eye him.

He resisted the urge to explain oral sex. She placed one
small kiss on the side of his cock and he shivered and pressed up into her
hand. She tightened her grip on him, gave another small experimental tug. He
was so starved for her touch, he already felt his balls tighten.

“Shall we, now?” she asked, sounding a little frightened.

“I’m in no hurry,” he lied and tugged at the string of one
of her slips. “Take this off. Let’s be skin-to-skin. Nothing between us.”

She gave a wordless moan, sat up and began to strip.

He wanted to help her undress, but knew the laces and
eyeholes would be beyond his trembling fingers so he watched, touching any skin
she exposed to him. An arm, the bottom of her leg. He moved closer and kissed
her foot, rubbed the sweet flesh of her calf. Her breasts, nipples hard and
red. He moved up to kiss and suck one swollen bud. She gave a thick cry.

“Does that hurt?”

“No, but it’s so sensitive. A darker color. It must be…well,
you know.”

He blew lightly on her damp skin then moved over to the
other breast to gently suck and taste. He pushed at her loosened skirt and
petticoats. At last, naked and more beautiful than he’d dreamed.

She reached for him but he had to see her. All of her. “You
are so lovely,” he said against her belly. He kissed her thighs and ignored her
small squeak of alarm as he pushed her legs apart and kissed the warm, damp
flesh of her clitoris and swollen pussy. Yes. This was what he wanted. With a
happy sigh, he set to work, sucking and nibbling.

She moaned and clutched his hair. He slid a finger into her
so he could feel her excitement growing with his hands, his mouth, and in the
salty-sweet taste of her.

“Please,” she cried out and arched her back as her body
tightened hard around his fingers.

“Jas, now, please.”

More than anything he wanted to fuck her. Thrust into her
hard. Filled to the brim with too much lust, he wasn’t sure he trusted himself.
So he rolled onto his back and pulled her on top of him. She gazed down at him,
confusion in her heavy-lidded eyes.

“Put me inside you,” he said through gritted teeth.

“It can be done like this?”

“Please.”

She rose on her knees and clutched his rock-hard cock. With
only a little fumbling, she managed to lower herself onto him.

Slick and hot. She’d told him a little about the concept of
heaven and he wondered how anything could be better than this earthly pleasure
of enjoying her body with his.

“Oh.” Her body moved, ever so slightly, and it was enough to
send him close to coming. He counted his breaths to stop himself. The earthy
sweet fragrance rising from their bodies reminded him of the cave, which was
enough to draw him back from that edge.

She moved more, circles and rising and falling.
Experimenting with his body, playing. She pulled her knees up along his sides,
and sank even deeper on him.

“Yes.” He clutched her hips again, controlling her
movements, pushing up into her. All the way in.

He fought to allow her the control, and then he concentrated
on pushing only so much and no harder. Her body shuddered around him. Her mouth
opened and she gave a small mewing sound of surprise. Then she collapsed on his
chest, her eyes closed, her body still.

“No, no, I want you to look,” he ordered in a rasping voice.
“Open your eyes. You are here with me. I don’t—no. It’s not like the cave.”
Shit, he had said too much. No. he hadn’t said enough. He shouldn’t do this
unless she knew the truth about him in the cave.

One word of that truth and she’d roll off his body and run
away.

He stayed silent, waiting for her to realize what he’d
admitted to, but she only smiled into his eyes.

Eliza sat up and braced her hands on his shoulders. She
moved and he jerked up, surprised by the intense heat of her body sliding on
him.

She seemed to know what he needed. She rode him hard,
pushing against him. “I am here.” Her breath came fast again, her eyes grew
heavy again and she squeezed his shoulders. “Oh. Yes. I am here with you.”

He groaned her name and she slid down to kiss him. Her
sweat-slicked skin skimmed his chest and belly as she rode him, and he knew he
couldn’t stand another second. He held her body tight against him as he came,
enveloped in her.

She lay on him, breathing hard “Thank you.” She seemed to
grow heavier and her breath slowed. Her hand that stroked his arm absently went
still.

“I love you,” he mouthed against her hair. More words he
wouldn’t say aloud, but he allowed himself to wrap his arms around her as if he
would never let go.

Selfish. Worthless pleasure-seeking pig.
He tried out
several phrases on himself but couldn’t find anything that would crack the
tender, unfamiliar happiness he felt holding Eliza. A few days more. And then
he’d do the right thing. Although now that he was playing by rules he made up
as he went along, he had no idea what constituted the right thing. Telling her
the truth or vanishing from her life so she could find her husband? Both, he
suspected and that thought was enough to dull happiness—though not pleasure of
holding Eliza.

Chapter Fourteen

Eliza sat and gazed at the loose-limbed figure of Jas. For
the first time since she’d met him, he slept peacefully and she could study
him. He lay on his back, naked, one arm over his head, the other resting on his
flat stomach, which rose and fell with his slow breath. She wished she had a
paper and pencil so she could draw the strong pleasing lines of his body,
though she doubted she had the skill to capture the exotic colors, the golden
skin, paler on the insides of his arms although strange and rough on the
peculiar rectangular scar. Now that he’d shaved his face, he had very little
body hair, only on his legs, under his arms and the curls near his genitals.

The lines by his mouth that she decided were caused by pain
had softened. He was handsome but she decided that kindness shone as the
strongest feature of his face. Perhaps that was why she trusted him almost from
the start, despite his oddities. Even his refusal to marry her did not change
basic facts she knew well. He was a good man and a kind one too.

His eyes opened. He was fully awake at once, of course, and
smiled.

She leaned forward for a kiss.

After a few delicious sleep-warmed kisses, she knew she had
to ask the question that continuously nagged her. She pulled back.

“Please. Give me a reason you will not marry me,” she said
and tried to sound simply curious. “So I will have something to tell myself.”

He nodded slowly, as if he understood her need. “I am not
allowed,” he said at last. “If I married, I would not be allowed back into my
community.”

“It seems to me that your community has abandoned you.”
Eliza did not try to hide her scorn.

She wished she hadn’t spoken, for his eyes grew sad. “Yeah,
that’s probably true. Been true ever since I was young.”

He continued, “But there are other, better reasons we should
not marry. There are good reasons my community forbids this. And there are
reasons that have to do with you, Liza. You will do better than me. I would
never fit into your society, for one. And your husband should. He will.”

“You fit me, Jas,” she whispered. “Very well indeed.”

He smiled but shook his head slightly.

“In a year, you will come to me again? Remember your
promise, sir.”

He still smiled and perhaps that small movement of his head
was a nod, but she could see the signs in his face he was withdrawn from her
again. The remote look in his eyes was not so pronounced as it had once been,
yet it still stung her and made her want to shake him.

She did not rail at him. Instead she lay down and pressed
herself as close to him as she could as she ran her fingers over the smooth
hard planes of his body, awake now and no longer relaxed with sleep.

* * * * *

They told each other she needed to recover from their long
trek. The week turned into a month. Neither of them discussed the fact that
Eliza’s health was fine and that their slow progress was a way to put off the
end of their time together. Eliza knew that he avoided the topic as she did.
She was reminded of when they were in Spain and she did not ask him questions
because she feared he’d leave her.

Explaining that he did not want to draw attention, Jas moved
them to another small town and another inn.

Eliza had grown used to walking in Spain and Portugal and
missed the exercise. They strolled through meadows and admired the fields of
tender green crops and sniffed at the air, redolent of spring blossoms.

Eliza stopped next to a hedgerow bordering a field. She
leaned over and plucked a new blossom.

“Ah, now that is as glorious a color as your eyes,” she said
mischievously.

He grabbed at the violet-blue flower she waved at him. “What
is it? A pansy?”

She giggled. “No, that described
my
eyes. This is a
tufted vetch.”

Just as he managed to pull the flower from her, she heard
the pound of hooves.

“Someone’s in a hurry.” Jas straightened and peered down the
narrow winding road.

A sporting canary-yellow phaeton pulled by four perfectly
matched glossy black horses swept past them. Despite the heat the driver wore a
many layered driver’s cape. Eliza stared thoughtfully after the rocking,
speeding phaeton and its familiar driver.

Jas muttered, “Idiot.”

“I recognize that particular idiot. He is the honorable
Peter Clayton,” she said. “I was introduced to him in London.”

Jas froze and stared after the phaeton. “Do you think he
recognized you?”

She broke off another flower. “Oh no. A fashionable buck
like Mr. Clayton would not recall a mere clergyman’s daughter.”

When they returned to the small inn, they found it jammed
with sporting, fashionable young men.

The harried innkeeper explained. “They come out here from
Town for a fight what’s to be held in one of Farmer Mason’s fields.”

At that moment one of the men spotted Eliza.

“Now here’s a sweet little pigeon,” he roared.

Jas scowled at the man.

“Ah, I apologize. The little bird is spoken for.”

“We’re out of here,” Jas muttered. He spread his hand on the
small of Eliza’s back and hurried her up the stairs.

He slammed and locked the door of their room.

“A fight?” he asked. Eliza took off the straw hat she had
bought in Lisbon.

“A boxing match, perhaps?”

“Did you know any of those…people down there?”

She pulled a few pins from her hair. “I think I remember one
or two faces, perhaps. But they do not know me, I am sure.”

“Still. I think you probably should stay scarce.”

She nodded her understanding of his strange phrase. And she
supposed she agreed. No maid, no proper chaperone. No real husband. She would
not risk it. She had to stay in the chambers so she would not be seen.

* * * * *

Jazz was free to wander among the gentlemen who drank,
played cards and shouted. He searched for Steele’s face among them, but perhaps
Jazz’d done a good job of hiding his trail. More likely the DHUy waited for
them in London, their obvious objective.

He still couldn’t relax his guard because the so-called
gentlemen were hardly safe. They leered at any woman who dared show her face,
peed in public places and showed off their splendid equipages by bowling down
the narrow main street at outrageous speeds, raising clouds of dust. They also
spent so much money few people grumbled about them, at least to their faces.

As he waited for an order of food to be brought from the
kitchen, Jazz listened to a huge party of sportsmen. No, he didn’t catch the name
James Sandton. At least Eliza’s future husband wasn’t one of these dolts.

He sat in his hidden corner of the crowded inn, scanning the
CR, and he was interested to see that there were historical records of the
boxing match. And the Irishman, heavily favored to be the loser, would win.

Was it cheating? He considered the handful of paper and
coins, all the money they had left. This was not betting; it was thievery.

Jazz slid a finger between his collar and cravat to loosen
it—Eliza had tied it for him—and after struggling with the blasted suffocating
piece of cloth gave up. He decided he didn’t have a choice. Starving was not
part of the DHU mission, and keeping Liza safe and well-fed was. He had to
smile at his excuse. He tended to recall his DHU mission only when it proved
convenient. More often lately he forgot it, especially when it proved
inconvenient in terms of loving Liza.

Large bets were too noticeable and struck Jazz as more
unscrupulous. He tried to pick out the most prosperous-looking young bleeders…no,
that wasn’t what the innkeeper called them. Prosperous-looking young
bloods
.

The rowdies around him seemed quite taken by Jazz so it was
not hard to find takers. Several drunken and well-dressed gentlemen even
insisted on taking his vowels though they had no idea who he was.

“Got the bearing of a military man,” a big red-faced one
told him as he handed him paper to sign an IOU. “I take the word of a military
man any day, though you are clearly a flat, my friend. I know the Irishman will
take a beating, the fool bog-trotter. I’m stealing from you.”

By the time the sporting crowd had moved along to the next
event, Jazz had raked in a large pile of notes and coins. He’d keep only a
small portion—first he’d have to find out how much money a man needed to
survive for five months in this world. No, now it was only a matter of four and
a half months before he’d be back.

His old life. Back to his comfortable rooms, interesting
work, contact with friends and family, meals he could consume without worrying
about food-poisoning, rat and stink-free streets he could walk without fear of
trodding in manure or worse. His heart grew heavy as he thought of returning to
his hideously empty life.

* * * * *

After four days of listening to doors slamming, voices
calling out and the other endless noises of a busy inn, Eliza was more than
impatient to go outside and feel the fresh air on her face. The flocks of young
men departed and she was ready for an outing.

She eagerly put on her battered hat and gloves.

Jas touched her arm. “Wait. Before we head out.” And he
unceremoniously dumped an enormous collection of coins and notes onto the bed.
Eliza gasped and reached over to touch a gold guinea. What had he done?

“How in the name of heaven did you earn this? Never say you
robbed some of those drunken fools or…God forbid, the mail!”

“I didn’t,” he answered lightly. “Though I suppose in a way
I did rob the drunks. I won it betting on the match.”

“Are you a gamester, Jas?” she asked, nearly as dismayed as
she had been a minute before.

“No, I normally have no interest in betting. But we need the
money.” He added, “I thought perhaps you’d like to buy a dress or two.”

She knew he was changing the subject. Eliza also knew that
if he didn’t want her to know how he’d gotten the huge sum, she would never
find out.

She looked wistfully down at the near-rags she wore. Despite
her best efforts and a good supply of soap and washing water, her clothes were
ruined. And growing tight in embarrassing places. “One dress, perhaps?” she
asked at last.

Liza thought he’d meet her outside the dressmakers when she
was done, but he followed her in, obviously intrigued by the fabric and the
laces. He wandered about and examined every piece of finery and scrap of silk.

Eliza managed to quietly request some stockings and
undergarments while Jas fingered some delicate satin fabric that hung from a
bolt thrown across a table.

She had no desire to watch him be so fascinated by ladies’
garments near the giggling shop girl who eyed him. He seemed oblivious to the amusement
or to the interest he aroused in women. And he had no proper reticence about
women’s clothing. Eliza smiled to herself, remembering his earlier delight when
he discovered the ribbon garter that held her stockings up.

He watched with curiosity and approval writ on his face as
the
modiste
pinned a ready-made blue muslin dress as it hung on Eliza.

“I wonder why your customer refused that thing,” Jas said to
the
modiste
as he examined Eliza. “It’s wonderful.”

“Oh no, it’s the wrong color,” Eliza said suddenly. “Recall
that I’m in mourning.”

The dressmaker gave her a puzzled frown. How many people
would forget such a thing when they set out to buy clothes?

“I do feel a thorough cheat,” she murmured after the
dressmaker took the order for three more gowns to be made up.

She would don the mourning for her father. And let others
assume it was for the late Peasnettle. An odd justification but from the moment
she met Mr. White, Eliza had grown adept at slippery reasoning.

In the next shop, Jas insisted she try on a dizzying number
of hats. As they waited for the milliner to attach black lace to Eliza’s new
poke bonnet, Eliza sighed. “I believe I have more than enough garments now.”

“Think so? I thought you looked good in that lined bonnet
thing. The one with the fake flowers.”

“I have never met a gentleman who had such an interest in
ladies’ fashions.”

He picked up her leather glove and rubbed a thumb along it.
“Some of it seems ridiculously uncomfortable, but it is all so much more
interesting and prettier than the clothing from my country. I especially like
the hats. They serve no purpose whatsoever except to make your face adorable. A
fine reason to exist if you ask me.”

“They protect me from the sun,” she pointed out.

By the end of their expedition to the dressmaker, cobbler
and milliner shops, Jas coaxed her into purchasing a cloak, five dresses, a
shawl, a pelisse, three pairs of gloves, and five hats.

“But what about your needs? We shall now visit a tailor, Mr.
White.”

“You sure we have enough money?”

She said in a low voice, “You showed me guineas sufficient
to buy a house, a carriage, a whole wardrobe and more perhaps. I think you have
enough for a few bits of gentleman’s clothing.”

He declared he had no interest in owning evening wear and so
managed to get away with a somber pair of trousers, a muted silk waistcoat, a
dark jacket made of superfine, a few cravats and several shirts. The clothing
would all have to be refitted of course. Mr. Boggs, the tailor, explained that
he was not used to fitting such splendid shoulders and long legs.

“I don’t want to draw attention to myself,” he grumbled to
Mr. Boggs, who tried to bully him into buying a gorgeous purple and gold
waistcoat and a robin’s egg-blue jacket that would fit him as closely as a
second skin.

“But if you should find yourself in a formal situation,
sir,” Mr. Boggs said.

Jas rubbed his neck. “All right.” He pointed to the breeches
and white silk stockings. “Those will do. And a greatcoat to replace that
blasted cape.”