Page 32 of Betrothal Between Enemies

‘Iz.’ Her name was a warning, a caution.

She looked up at him as she pushed apart his thighs. ‘Yes, I am about to take things too far,’ she warned in return. ‘I’ve wanted to do this since the moment I saw you come out of the water today, dripping like Neptune, hung like one of Apollo’s horses.’ She drew her hair to one side, delighting in the expression on his face—part shock, part awe, all parts pleased, and then she put her mouth to him. He was not the only one who could deliver pleasure.

He was salty even here, or especially here at his man’s core. He groaned and stretched, and she revelled in the response. Despite his warning, he was enjoying this. She felt his hand reach for her hair and bury itself in its depth as if she was his anchor and not the one setting him to sea. She sucked hard, her teeth grazing the tip of him. His hips moved, his sighs becoming groans, and she felt him gather. She switched to hands, encircling his length and stroking him hard, fast, with a ferocity that had him struggling not to cry out. She recalled too late this was not the beach, that they were not alone. They were in a house with others, where walls might not protect the light sleeper from accidentally intruding on their midnight tryst. She moved over him as release came, silencing him with her lips, swallowing his cries with her mouth, feeling his body shudder beneath hers as spasm after spasm racked him.

She was his life raft in the oblivion of orgasm. Alistair clung to her, his raw senses acutely aware of the ways in which her body covered his: limb to limb, mouth to mouth, that her lips muffled his cries, that his release covered her thigh, her stomach, that the scents of sea, sex and salt were strong in his nostrils. This was the spiritual release of climax, the promise of blissful oblivion. She’d rendered him boneless, conscious only of her, only of his body and what she’d done to it, his very own Circe. He never wanted to leave the island of her arms.

She was with him for a long while afterwards, her head back at his shoulder, her ear at his heartbeat, no doubt listening to the havoc she’d wreaked there, listening, too, as its speed slowed and peace returned to him and perhaps to her, too. She was not untouched by what had occurred. His excitement had excited her.

He played through her hair with his fingers, attempting to detangle the efforts of the day. ‘Good Lord, Ismay. Some days I think you’ll be the death of me.’

‘Stop climbing balconies, then,’ she murmured. He could feel her smile against his skin.

‘I don’t think it’s the balconies that will do me in. You are insatiable in the best of ways.’ He’d never had a partner that met him quite so equally in the art of bedsport, or so openly revelled in the pleasure that sport afforded, although there was more to this thing between him and Ismay than merely bed. Bed had been an unanticipated but not unenjoyable consequence.

She levered up, her head in one hand, the glorious fall of her hair spilling over her shoulder. She was Circe and Venus all in one. ‘Naples does that to a person—awakens them sexually.’ She drew a long finger down his torso, his damn body rousing again. He didn’t think it was Naples that had stoked this passion any more than he thought balconies would be the death of him. It was her. ‘Have you not read Goethe’s writings about his time in Italy? He claims Italy transformed him. One cannot be here in such a vibrant city, surrounded by nature—its beauty and its danger—and not feel its pulse echo in yourself.’

‘Are you my Faustina?’ He reached for her hips and pulled her beneath him.

‘Ah, so you have read Goethe.’ She laughed up at him and wound her arms about his neck.

‘We are not doing this—talking about German philosophers—in bed.’ He growled playfully, nipping at her neck.

‘Do you think you’ll be able to sleep after this?’ She moved against him.

Definitely. He’d probably sleep for ages, or at least until she woke him again.

Chapter Eighteen

Waking early, loving late and slipping back to his room undetected before sunrise were the delicious bookends to Alistair’s days; days that were punctuated by erotically charged furtive forays darting into alcoves or dark unused spaces at the events they attended. The winter social season was fully under way in Naples. The famed Neapolitan opera, the theatre with late suppers at restaurants afterwards, and balls and card parties filled their evenings, and they took every chance to give this passion between them an outlet. Perhaps like him, she was searching for a way through, hoping there would be a sign. Perhaps their passion would wane. It would make it easy to suggest this was merely a physical infatuation. As soon as the newness of it faded, all else would fade, too. He was sure of it. It was how it had always worked in the past.

But satiation wasn’t satisfaction, and Alistair was quickly discovering the hungry difference. The more he had of Ismay, the more he wanted. The fire was feeding itself—a rather shocking realisation for a man who tired of a mistress in no more than three months and quite often much sooner. But there was no tiring, there was only the sharp, exquisite edge of desire that he carried with him until the next time and the next.

Alistair lifted his chin as his valet finished tying his cravat. Tonight was the Eddingtons’ card party. He had it on good authority that card party was a fairly mild term for what the evening actually entailed, with their drawing room turned into a full gaming hell for the night. But it was tastefully done, Sir Thomas had assured him at dinner, adding that everyone looked forward to it each year, especially the ladies who didn’t have much chance for such fun beyond penny antes at whist. Sir Thomas had offered an indulgent smile for his wife and daughter. People were also moderate in their betting so as not to give the evening a sordid cast with exorbitant wagers a man might regret in the morning.

He’d offered the last as instruction more than exposition. Alistair understood the lesson Sir Thomas meant to impart. It was a plea for him to be on his best behaviour, to show everyone the man who worked beside Sir Thomas at the warehouse as opposed to the dashing rake who escorted Ismay about town. Ismay had pressed his foot with her toe under the table in warning.

Alistair knew that message, too. They could not let up, not for a minute. The horse race and the engagement party were just days away now, and Sir Thomas was on the proverbial fence about Alistair’s suitability, just as they’d planned. A reckless wager tonight would help push him in the right direction. He would not want to marry his daughter to a wastrel.

‘Thank you, that will be all,’ he dismissed the valet and slipped a ring on his finger—a sapphire of good quality but of no particular sentiment to him. He’d won it in a wager years ago and kept it because it was an attractive, versatile piece. Tonight, though, he might wager it, might make up a story about it to increase the stakes behind the bet.

He flexed his hand, feeling the weight of the ring, and stepped out into the hallway. Ismay was just emerging from her room, and she smiled mischievously when she saw him. ‘Are you ready to have some fun?’ She held up a reticule jingling with coins. His Ismay did love a good wager.

‘What fun would you be referring to? The moderate betting your father spoke of, or do you have a different kind of fun in mind?’ Alistair teased in low tones, his body already rousing at the sight of her in an emerald-green gown with a black lace overlay cut more provocatively than her usual style, perhaps because of the occasion. Gambling nights required something beyond normal fashion. The waist was tighter, the bodice lower, her breasts pushed up higher.

She laughed and leaned towards him. He could smell the fresh jasmine and the zesty lemon of her perfume. It took all of his willpower not to drop his eyes to the temptation of her bodice. He’d clock the first man who gave in to that temptation tonight. ‘I have been to the Eddingtons’ before. There’s a library they never use that gives out onto the garden.’

They reached the top of the staircase, and Ismay pressed his arm to signal a halt. ‘Wait just a moment. I want to look at you.’ She reached up and patted his cravat—a very domestic gesture to any onlooker, but it had him already thinking about the little-used library.

‘It’s fine, my valet just finished it ten minutes ago,’ he protested at the fussing.

‘It’s a mathematical.’ She gave him a secret smile. ‘I’m studying your knot for later, after I’ve taken your clothes off and have to dress you again.’

‘Careful, my dear,’ he warned at her ear as they started their descent towards her waiting parents. ‘I will need all my wits tonight if I am to push your father to a decision.’ She did not play fair. She knew full well what her words, her images, would do to him. Now he had to sit beside her father and across from her mother in the carriage and pretend their daughter hadn’t given him an erection to rival Vesuvius.

* * *

There was already a groundswell of boisterous noise when they arrived at the Eddingtons’ townhome off Via Toledo not far from the Chevalier DuBois’s, where they’d attended the scientific lecture. Lord Eddington was a short, round, jolly man with keen eyes, who held an undefined ombudsman position in Naples for the British government. No one was quite sure what he did beyond hosting lavish parties, but Alistair had come to discover Eddington was at the heart of anything British that happened in town. Whatever the man did, he was not struggling.