Chapter 3
Heart thundering madly in his chest, Percy struggled to catch his breath after a climax that had rocked him to his toes. Hell, but the woman was tight and responsive. Her every throaty moan and gasp had his ballocks tightening.
She smiled at him, her teeth gleaming in the darkness beneath her mask. “You’re markedly skilled at that.”
He tucked himself back into his breeches. Percy wouldn’t call himself skilled at sex, but that had been…remarkably good. “Mayhap we bring out the best in each other.”
Now, however, wasn’t the time to think too deeply on it. She’d been correct earlier: they hadn’t much time.
With a flick of his wrist, he withdrew a handkerchief from the inner pocket of his discarded coat and gave the woman a cursory wipe before he tossed the cloth aside.
Despite his bewildering desire to remain sequestered in the gazebo with this widow, he stood, fixed her skirts, and helped her to her feet.
Their re-dressing was swift and silent, but he could swear that her cries of pleasure still rang in his ears.
He straightened his cravat and tugged on his ridiculously feathered coat-sleeves, then helped the woman fasten her gown—all while the scent of flowers and their coupling filled his senses.
Unable to resist the pull of the woman, Percy stepped close and wrapped his arms around her waist. “Thank you.” He pressed a lingering kiss to her lips, letting his tongue play leisurely with hers now that the heat of passion had subsided.
They broke apart with a gasp. “Thank you,” she breathed.
“Come,” he said softly, offering his arm. “I shall return you to the terrace.”
She nodded, her colour still high as she accepted his proffered arm and walked with him from the gazebo.
The air had grown cooler since they’d entered, the breeze ruffling the feathers on their costumes and the wisps of the woman’s hair.
Damn, but he wished he knew who the widow was, for he would definitely seek her out again—once he returned from his assignment, of course. He caught her gaze through the dim moonlight, his chest constricting. “Won’t you tell me your name?”
Her lips curved in a half smile before she lifted on her toes to press a soft kiss to his cheek. “Good night.”
With that, she disappeared across the terrace and through the opened doors to the ballroom.
Percy blinked at her retreating figure, his heart and thoughts oddly unable to comprehend what had just occurred.
To his confusion, a tingling nervous sensation travelled up and down each of his limbs.
It had all happened so quickly that, if not for his sense of being utterly replete, he might have thought their encounter a dream.
His feet moved, the clipped sound of his footfalls filling his ears before he, too, reached the ballroom. Hot, stuffy air hit him as he entered, but his feet continued to drive him forward.
He scanned the masked faces and costumes, looking for any sign of the mysterious woman, an unfamiliar hum vibrating through him at the prospect of spotting her through the throng.
Fans waved and dancers swept past, and, despite himself, Percy’s lungs deflated in defeat.
She’d made it clear that she didn’t want him to know her name until the unmasking.
Perhaps she didn’t wish for him to know her at all.
Certainly she’d enjoyed herself, but might she be the sort of woman who wished for only a tryst and not a protector?
If so, he ought to respect her wishes—most particularly because he was to leave London on the morrow.
“Why so glum?” Leonard asked, sauntering to his side. “You disappeared for some time. Did something unpleasant occur?”
“Quite the contrary, I assure you,” Percy muttered.
“Indeed?” His friend’s eyes brightened behind his domino.
Percy inclined his head. “I met a woman.”
“Ah.” Leo nodded in understanding. “In the gardens?”
“Gazebo.”
Leo gestured suggestively with one hand. “And were both parties…pleased with the interaction?”
“Quite.”
“Then…” Leo left the question unvoiced, and Percy sighed.
“I wanted more.”
“Ah, yes. I see.”
“Rather.”
Leo sucked at his teeth. “And do you know the woman’s name?”
“No,” Percy grunted. “And I daresay I wouldn’t recognize her voice—even should I hear it again—for she whispered nearly every word.”
“No chance for a repeat encounter, then.”
“I should say not.”
The strains of another quadrille echoed through the grand room, and Leonard clapped Percy on the back. “Chin up, Percy.”
“Capital advice. Thank you.”
Heather slipped into the corridor alongside the ballroom and found her way to the ladies’ retirement room.
Despite the mystery man’s efforts, her inner thighs felt decidedly damp and in need of a more thorough cleaning.
Law, but it was a messy business, this making love. But decidedly worth the mess.
“Is anyone here?” she murmured into the small room just off the corridor. When no reply was forthcoming from beyond the privacy screen that hid the chamber pots from view, she entered and locked the door behind her.
In an effort at efficiency and expediency, she poured water from a pitcher into one of the two washbasins atop a low chest of drawers and plunged a cloth into the chilled depths.
She wrung the cloth, then lifted her skirts, carefully wiping away the faint smears of her blood and a splotch of a slick, milky substance that she could only assume was the man’s seed.
Her stomach dipped, and she hastily rinsed the cloth, then deposited the water out the window before she left, effectively discarding all evidence of her tryst.
The heat from the ballroom was suffocating, but Heather wove her way through the crush of masked patrons, her heart and mind entirely at odds with her surroundings.
She’d successfully changed her life in a matter of minutes.
She, Heather Morgan—the woman with no parents, few friends, and fewer prospects, who’d been forced into an engagement with an extortionist had done something with her own life. And she had loved every moment of it.
“There you are,” Maria said, leaving a group of admirers and approaching through the crush. “I haven’t seen you in an age. Where did you get off to?”
Heather’s stomach dipped again, her nerves bubbling just beneath her skin. She glanced around in search of prying ears, and whispered, “I had a last night.”
Maria’s eyes widened behind her mask. “My god, Heather! Did you really?”
“I did. In the gazebo.”
Her friend slapped a hand over her mouth to suppress her laugh of surprise before she leaned in conspiratorially. “Who was it?”
Heather shook her head, dislodging a lock of her red-blonde hair. “I don’t know.”
Maria gasped. “You had a—” She lowered her voice and leaned yet closer. “You had an anonymous tryst with someone? Was he a guest?”
“Yes, I believe so. He was in costume—dressed as a peacock.”
Her friend’s gaze snapped past Heather to scan the dancers. “There are dozens of peacocks here this evening. Which one is your peacock?”
Heather followed Maria’s gaze into the dizzying array of costumes. “He was a large man, thick, muscularly built…but I’m afraid that I did not see him well enough in the darkness to pick him out in—”
“You didn’t get a good look?” Maria said disbelievingly. “You mean to say that you didn’t look at it?”
Heat flared in Heather’s cheeks, and she clucked her tongue. “I saw it, but I daresay I cannot expect to examine every cock in the ballroom to identify the man.”
“Who’s examining cocks?” Juliana asked furtively, joining them from Maria’s other side.
“Heather took our advice,” Maria said with a grin and a wicked gleam in her eye.
“Excellent.” Juliana beamed. “Who was the man with the good fortune to capture our dear friend’s attention?”
“It was anonymous,” Maria hissed.
Heather sighed. “He was magnificent, though. Large and skilled.”
“And you took precautions?” Juliana asked.
“To prevent getting with child?” Maria added in a whisper.
“We did, yes,” Heather returned. “Despite my adoration for children, I’m not the right sort to be a mother.”
“We know, dearest,” Maria said with a soft smile.
Heather sighed.
The earl no doubt expected to sire a child directly upon their arrival in the Americas. She must, therefore, accomplish her task before they reached the other shore.
“Ah.” A familiar—dreaded—voice came from behind her. “My dear Calluna.”
“Lord Hanley, how lovely to see you again.” Maria dipped in a shallow curtsey.
He bowed in return, his thin white hair waving over his domino at the movement. “Your Grace.” The old man extended his elbow to Heather. “I believe that the last waltz of the evening is upon us! Come along now.”
Heather’s pulse hiccoughed with a combination of sorrow and worry, while her stomach buzzed with hope and eagerness over her assignment. She offered the man a small smile as she took his proffered arm and allowed him to lead her into her final waltz in London.
A wave of possessiveness washed over Arnold Fitton, the Earl of Hanley, as he gripped his future bride’s arm and led her to the dance floor.
That’s right, men, this one’s mine.
The wench wasn’t the young lady he’d first intended to ensnare as a means to fulfil his cousin’s demands, but after she had burned the documents tying him to his previous intended, he hadn’t another choice.
Threatening her, her family, and her friends with ruination had been more than enough to garner her hand. Foolish lamb.
Of course, her family was eager to be rid of her—and no wonder, with that garish, red-tinged hair and corpulent figure.
Her tits were adequate, he would grant, but they added little to her appeal.
She was, however, his, and would do well enough to satisfy his dying cousin and earn the entailment he’d been promised.