Captain Durant's Countess

chapter 7


If the Countess of Kelby had asked him to conjugate Latin verbs, he could not have been more surprised. Reyn felt as if he was being tested, and he’d never done well when he had to think about something very long. If she’d just kept quiet, he would have kissed her anyway. It was where the delicate dance had been going.

But she stood stiffly with her big brown eyes closed and her lips pursed like she was some kind of fish.

He cleared his throat. “Where?”

Her eyes snapped open. “I beg your pardon?”

“Where would you like me to kiss you, Countess? On your hand? On your lips, or perhaps somewhere more intimate?”

“What do you mean? Just the usual kind of kiss, Captain. Nothing f-fancy.”

“But we’ve agreed you’re unusual. And when we’re alone together, I think you should call me Reyn.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“There’s no one to hear you. Say it. It’s just one syllable.”

The Countess of Kelby looked like she wanted to turn tail and flee the cozy workroom. But she took a deep breath. “Reyn.”

“Thank you. May I be permitted to call you Maris when we’re up here?”

She flushed, but nodded.

He’d never seen a grown woman color up so often. The earl was right. His wife really was shy. “Even your name is unusual.”

“My father was nearly as Etruscan-mad as Henry. That’s how he came to be hired. My parents married late, and there wasn’t hope of a boy, so they named me Maris, the Etruscan version of Mars.”

“You don’t seem at all warlike.” Except when she was storming the Reining Monarchs Society. He felt he should explain in more detail about all that at some point, but not right now.

“Mars was also the god of agriculture. In Etruria, that meant fertility as well. Ironic, is it not?”

He touched her cheek with the barest of pressure from his thumb. “Maybe not.”

“We had better hope I’m fertile so this dreadful business can come to a conclusion.”

“Dreadful business? And yet just moments ago you asked—no, told—me to kiss you.”

“That was a mistake. It won’t happen again.”

He could feel her withdrawing into herself. What had she been like as a young woman, before she married a man older than her father? The earl said she’d been a rule follower. A good girl. There didn’t seem to be an ounce of frivolity or wickedness in her. She was so damned serious about doing her duty.

“What do you do for fun, Maris, when you’re not up here being long-suffering?”

“For fun?” She pronounced the word as if it was foreign. “And I am not being long-suffering. You must admit we are in an impossible situation.”

“Nothing is impossible. Your husband said you ride. What makes you laugh?”

She stared at him, her brown irises edged with blue-gray, and lit with gold around the pupils. If there was a child, he or she would likely have dark eyes.

“You know. Laughing. Ha-ha.”

“Things have not been funny around here for some time, Captain. My stepdaughter—my best friend—died, and my husband’s health was seriously affected. We’ve been busy trying to bring his life’s work to print. I haven’t had time or inclination for fun.”

“That’s a pity. I’ll have to see what I can do about that.”

“You don’t have to do anything! My life is perfectly fine the way it is.”

“If you say so.” The moment for kissing was lost, and it was all his fault. “Let’s see about these crates, eh?”

The attic had been divided into chambers, one leading to another. Some of the rooms had fireplaces, but most had been boarded up. The wooden floors were crammed with trunks, old furniture, and boxes. As she made her way through the slender path winding through them, Lady Kelby’s red dress caught on corner of a wash stand and she tugged it free.

“As I explained, the Kelby earls are expected to keep every blessed thing they’ve ever acquired, even if it needs mending,” Maris said, pointing to a broken chair. “But what we’re looking for—or to be more accurate, what I’m looking for—are the boxes with white ribbons on them. Those were shipped home from all over Europe and Asia over the last couple centuries. Henry’s father got as far as tying the ribbons on them before he passed. The Kelbys had very eclectic taste as you can tell from the furnishings throughout the house. Henry is convinced there are still hidden treasures to be found.”

“I don’t think the true treasure up here is in the boxes.” Lord, that seemed lame even to his ears. Maris Kelby was not the sort of woman whose head could be turned by a few honeyed words.

To prove it, she snorted at his attempt at flattery, shoved an ancient rocking horse out of the way and kept picking through the path, until she reached the last storage space. “We can take boxes into the workroom with a wheeled cart. Some of them are too heavy, even for you. I shan’t expect you to do much besides move things around.”

“Good.” Reyn gripped the charcoal stick, wondering what she had intended him to do with it. He’d seen enough white ribbons. He estimated there were at least sixty boxes of various sizes to go through.

That was it. He’d number them and open them in order. That would be one way to make sense of the project. He began by writing a big black 1 on a box.

“Oh! That’s a good idea. But when we begin uncrating things, let’s start with the room closest to your office. We’ll be warmer.”

“Whatever you say.” Even if it was long sleeved, she must be freezing in that flimsy silk dress, although it looked lovely on her. “Is that one of your new frocks from Madame Bernard?”

“Yes.”

“It suits you. The color is very nice.”

Her face and lips were absent the rouge she’d worn the last time he’d seen her, but she didn’t need the artificial enhancement. Her lips were rose-pink, and she’d blushed all afternoon.

“Thank you.”

There, they both got through his mild compliment.

“But perhaps not suitable for working up here. You must be cold. I won’t keep you anymore this afternoon. I’ll just continue to mark the boxes and we can get started in the morning.”

He expected her to flee, but she stood uncertainly, steepling her long fingers in front of her. “You do understand how difficult this is for me, don’t you?” she asked quietly.

“I think I do. The whole situation is nothing I’m accustomed to either. I expect we’ll find our way. I promise I will do nothing that you do not wish.” He reached his left hand out. “I’ll take that kiss now, if you still want to give it. To seal the deal.”

She hesitated, then placed her right hand in his. Took a step forward. Lifted her face. She did not close her eyes or look anything like a fish. Damn, but there were tears again, threatening to spill down her cheeks.

“No tears. I forbid them.”

“I-I can’t help it.”

Reyn felt a compulsion to touch his tongue to her skin, to taste the salt and sadness. She was a woman who had almost everything—a stunning stately home, occupation, a husband who loved her. But Reyn might be able to give her the one thing she didn’t have, and the burden upon him to do it with care was nearly overwhelming. He felt he owed her something, and wasn’t even sure why.

He didn’t think it was just the money the earl had already given him, or the comfort it had provided for his sister Ginny. Maris Kelby had pulled him into her orbit even while she tried to repel him.

She wasn’t any kind of siren. Reyn wasn’t swept away by her appearance, although she was attractive in her own quiet way, especially now that she was dressed properly. He’d like to remove that dress, loosen her hair from its prison of hairpins, but all that would come in time. It was much too soon, but it was time to kiss her. He dropped the charcoal from his right hand where it splintered on the floor, then wiped his hand on his breeches. He would try not to touch her with it, though he wasn’t sure that was possible.

Angling his mouth over hers, he gave the hand he still held a reassuring squeeze.

She squeezed back.

The kiss was velvet and lush moisture. Her tongue turned from tentative to determined, as though she was deconstructing the art of his kiss and making it her own. Gone was the uncertainty and the shyness and, he hoped, the tears. One couldn’t cry when one experienced a surge of lust so powerful it nearly rocked one off one’s feet, could one?

But perhaps he was alone in that surge, although he didn’t think so. Her breasts brushed against his chest as he brought her closer, and he could swear he felt her nipples harden against him. He could find out for sure, but he didn’t want to frighten her off, not when she was so languid in his arms, touching the back of his neck with those long white fingers. Reyn felt a shiver down his spine that had nothing to do with the chill of the room.

There were servants on the other side of the wall. But it wasn’t likely they were lounging about in their rooms in the afternoon. There was plenty of work to be done in a house that size . . . from before dawn to well after nightfall. And he could spend all that time in the coming days with Maris Kelby at the other end of the attic. Alone, undisturbed. Tangled before the fire, her ivory skin sheened in sunlight and dew.

Hang the boxes and the ledgers and the pens. The only things Reyn wanted to discover and catalogue were the secrets of Maris’s body.

She made a slight noise—a satisfied sound so quiet he could barely hear it, but he felt it inside him. She was unraveling and quite frankly, Reyn had very little to do with it. He felt so witless he had forgotten to use his tried-and-true seduction methods and his kiss was just as eager and unpracticed as a schoolboy’s. She tasted so damn good and felt even better, her height perfect for his, touching him in all the right places. He fisted his charcoal-stained hand on the small of her back and held her close, mentally stripping them both so they were skin to skin . . . in his mind, at least. Her nipples would be brown against her creamy skin, the color of cocoa. Small? Large? He didn’t care. Reyn just wanted to suckle, but that would mean leaving her lips, which would be a travesty. His cock nestled against her lower belly, and he swore she thrust the littlest bit at him. The friction was exquisite yet maddening. There were too many layers of fabric between them.

But he would stick to kissing just a “usual kiss—nothing fancy.” Odd that such a simple embrace was nearly flattening him on his arse. Lady Kelby’s innocent enjoyment was a heady thing, and Reyn savored each nip and nibble. It gave him hope that they would be able to manage with some degree of compatibility.

He had never and could never take a woman against her will, but for Reyn, that had never been a problem. Females had been throwing themselves at him since he was fourteen, and he had grinned and caught every one. It had boosted his confidence that while he might have been a disaster in the schoolroom, he knew his way around the bedroom very, very well.

So well, in fact, that he had gotten a bit bored. Hence the Reining Monarchs. To his chagrin, he discovered he did not have the necessary sin inside him to “rein” for very long. When he returned to London, he wouldn’t renew his membership.

London was far-off, and thoughts of being with anyone other than Maris held no allure at the moment. He opened his eyes a sliver and saw that a brown curl had escaped and fluttered against her cheek. He brushed it back with his thumb, marveling at its softness, then closed his eyes again and let the kiss take him on its course. He didn’t know where it might lead, only knew that it was not his to command.

Not the countess’s either. She seemed as bewitched as he was. Reyn released his fragile control and held her tighter. There was not a space of air between their bodies, and his was alight with sensation, his cock marble-hard. He didn’t want to alarm her, but he wanted more.

More for her.

His own pleasure could wait.

Reluctantly he broke the kiss, but not the embrace. “I want us to go to the workroom, Maris,” he whispered into her ear.

She showed her alarm immediately and pulled away. “But you said—”

“I will not bed you, not yet. I will only when you are ready. But I wish to continue to kiss you. Where it’s warm and we can be private.” He hoped he’d make her scream and didn’t want to take the chance that some housemaid was right next door laid up with a toothache.

She frowned. “I really should go.”

“Give me five more minutes. Ten at the most.”

“That’s a very long time to kiss, Captain.”

“Reyn,” he reminded her. “And if I take too long and you become disinterested, I shall stop immediately.”

“Y-you kiss very well. That is unlikely to happen.”

“Maris, you won’t believe me, but I feel as though I’ve never kissed a woman before today. You kiss very well, too.”

She gave him a skeptical look, then navigated the crooked path through the attics.

As he followed her, he gave thought that Maris Kelby had probably never been kissed by any man save for the earl. That they had great affection for each other was obvious. But physical passion was not apparent. God. Had her marriage ever been consummated? The earl must have been well into his sixties when they married. Reyn knew that people aged differently. He sure as hell hoped when he was an older man he’d still be able to perform. But from what little Kelby had implied, relations were impossible between them now.

Reyn was definitely not prepared to take a thirty-four-year-old virgin to bed. Or any virgin, for that matter. He was sure he’d never f*cked an entirely inexperienced woman in his life. If Maris Kelby was still untouched, it explained her shyness, and made the next ten minutes absolutely critical.

He couldn’t ask her. He didn’t know her well enough. And if he didn’t know her well enough to ask that question, he certainly did not know her well enough to kiss her where he planned to in the next few minutes. The absurdity of the situation almost brought him to laughter.