Authors: Juliana Gray
He placed his hands atop hers, where they gripped his lapels. “I’ve known any number of selfish women in my life, Alexandra, and you’re not anything like them.” He slid his hands upward along her arms, rounding about her elbows, drawing her body against his, and spoke in a low voice. “Let me show you, darling. Let me show you what sort of woman you really are.”
He felt the moment she gave in, when the taut resistance in her muscles eased away and her body melted into his. He moved his hands to her waist, and in a single easy movement he lifted her onto the worktable.
“Oh.” Her eyes widened.
He set each hand on either side of her hips and kissed her forehead. “Now then, Alexandra. Marchioness of Morley, leader of London society.”
“How did you know that?”
He reached deep inside himself for his calm, scientific detachment. “I’m not a complete recluse. I emerge from my workshop from time to time. I hear things. How the drawing room of the dashing Lady Morley is the only place to be seen on Thursday evenings.” He kissed her right temple, a light silken kiss. “How her sixty-eight-year-old husband died of an apoplexy two summers ago, and she has been seen only in deep mourning ever since. As is perfectly proper.” He kissed her left temple. “How puzzling it is that, though she never lacks for admirers, she has no known lovers, past or present. Much to the disappointment, I’m told, of the admirers in question.”
“Perhaps I’ve been discreet.” Her voice brushed against his cheek, hardly more than a whisper.
“I considered that possibility.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “And I dismissed it. You yourself said you were a loyal wife.”
“You’ve given the matter some thought, I see.”
“Endless thought. You’ve no idea. But to return to the point, his lordship found his eternal reward nearly two years ago.” He reached behind her neck for the top button of her bodice. “Which leaves us a long period of time to consider. Why, I asked myself, would a lady of legendary charm and beauty, still in the flush of youth . . .”
“Hardly that.” Her eyes were closed now, the dark curl of her lashes lying against her creamy skin.
He undid the second button. “You’re younger than I am, after all. Why wouldn’t such a woman take herself a lover?” The third button gave way, exposing the edge of her chemise under the tips of his fingers, beneath the parting plackets of the bodice.
“Perhaps I have.”
“No, you haven’t.” The fourth button. “You’re shivering, darling. Your eyes are closed. Hardly the actions of a woman experienced in clandestine liaisons.” The fifth button, stiff in its buttonhole, slipped free at last. Her chemise was fine and thin and delicate, alive with the warmth of her skin beneath.
She gave a shallow laugh. “You scientists. Altogether too observant. I ought to have chosen Penhallow for my first lover.”
“But you wouldn’t, would you?” The buttons were coming more easily now, aided by the slackness of the bodice; a good thing, as his fingers seemed to be growing increasingly clumsy. Owing, he supposed, to the unprecedented concentration of blood in his fully aroused loins. “Because your cousin is in love with him. And because”—the last button gave way now, and her bodice sagged away from her breasts—“you haven’t any interest in a chap like Penhallow, have you?”
“He’s frightfully handsome.”
Finn drew the bodice forward, extracting her arms from the sleeves with the greatest care, spreading his fingers along her skin. “Conventionally so. But you’re impatient with the things everybody else likes. You’re yearning for something different, though you don’t know quite what it is.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because you’re here with me. And I’m hardly the sort of conventionally handsome, conventionally employed sort of lordling that hangs about your Thursday evening salons, am I?” He let her empty bodice pool about her waist and placed his mouth just below the hollow of her throat.
“No,” she gasped, “you’re not.”
His lips moved against her skin. “And now you’re wondering to yourself just how much I’ve discovered in my scientific studies. Whether, for example, I’ve made any sort of research into matters of human biology.”
Her head angled backward, exposing the long white reach of her throat. “H-Have you?”
“We scientists are curious animals, Alexandra. And curiosity doesn’t stop at the boundaries of one’s chosen field of study.” His mouth traveled downward, to where her breasts swelled abundantly above the boning of her corset. “Ah, darling. You’re so beautifully made. So full, here.” He set his open mouth atop her left breast and ran his tongue along the pink sliver of areola that escaped from the top of its confinement.
Her body jolted in his arms.
“There are those,” he went on, kissing the valley between her breasts, “who insist that the human female feels no particular pleasure in the sexual act. Those are not, my dear, the sort of scientists you should invite into your bed.”
“No,” she whispered, “never.”
His tongue traveled along the edge of her corset to find her right breast, and this time she was ready, this time she arched her back and moaned when he found the sensitive ridge, when he drew down the corset so her breast sprang free, when he covered the peak with his mouth and suckled her through the muslin of her chemise. Her hands clutched at the back of his head, taking fistfuls of his hair.
His brain was ringing, throbbing. She tasted so delicious, so pure and womanly, her nipple hard in his mouth, her breasts large and full against his face, her heartbeat so rapid and eager he could feel it pound beneath his lips. “Ah, God, darling,” he muttered, and with his right hand he swept down the endless length of her skirts and found her ankle.
Such a beautiful ankle, trim and flexible beneath his fingers, covered with stockings of fine strong silk. He lingered over it, running his thumb around the little hollow beneath her anklebone, and then he drew his hand slowly up the inside of her leg, rucking up her skirts as he went: the curve of her calf, the round ball of her knee, the narrow silk ribbon of her garter. He was elbow deep in her skirts and petticoats now, and she had frozen, had stilled her breath in her chest, her only movement the involuntary quiver of her flesh.
He lifted his head back to hers and kissed her throat. “Shh. Don’t be frightened. Did your husband never touch you like this?”
“Yes—no,” she stammered. “Not like this. Not . . . I can’t think . . .”
“Did
you
never touch yourself like this?”
“No! I—no, not like this, not—I don’t know how—I thought . . .”
He thought, for just an instant, of the Cambridge landlady with her forthright use of anatomical terms, with her years of experience and experimentation. He’d parted from her, relieved and eviscerated, after two exhausting weeks, but the knowledge gained had been priceless.
“Darling, trust me. I’m going to show you something rather lovely, but only if you let me. Will you let me?” In his lust, in his raging need for her, he struggled to calm his voice, to sound patient and coaxing.
“Yes.” But her body remained as tight as a bowstring.
He moved his lips across her face and captured her mouth again, measured and lingering. Bit by maddening bit, he deepened the kiss, following the pattern of her yielding; he stroked her lips and her tongue, let her sweet, intricate flavor fill his mouth and nose and memory. With his thumb he circled the delicate skin of her inner thigh, just above the knee, in infinitely slow circles, as if he had all eternity to make love to her.
Her mouth began to move with his, to find the rhythm of the dance. He felt the slow unwinding of her muscles as she gave herself up to it, accepted his touch, accepted his intrusion beneath her clothing. “Trust me,” he said again, moving his lips back along her jaw, securing her against him with one hand, meandering his way up her thigh with the other, feeling utterly confident and powerful now, every nerve in his body trained on the vital task at hand.
Her skin felt indescribable beneath his fingertips; no silk had ever formed a weave this fine, this delicate, this warm and living. He found the edge of her drawers and slipped his fingers beneath them, schooling himself to patience, drawing out each moment, hardly daring to reach his objective.
Her head dropped into his shoulder. “Finn,
please
.”
“Hush.” His finger found the slit at the bottom of her drawers, slippery already, tiny curls springing against his touch. “You beauty,” he whispered into her hair. “You lovely thing.” His cock strained toward her, but he marshaled his ferocious concentration into the movement of his finger instead, the sensation of her slick, intimate skin, each precious detail of her composition imprinting itself on his brain.
She was gasping, sobbing into his shoulder; her fingers dug deeply into his back; her body rocked against his. With his thumb he found her tiny bud, that perfect cluster of nerve endings tucked under its protective hood, and began to circle it with slow deliberation. He imagined the way the sensation would burst along the pathways to her brain, setting off chemical reactions, leading to an ultimate eruption of pleasure; all the glorious science and mystery of her body, taking place by his own hand. “Let yourself go,” he crooned. “Let me show you. It’s all right. Don’t fight it, darling, ah, precious love, that’s it. Let it all go.” He sensed her building response, the crescendo of sensation coming to a peak inside her, and moved a bit faster, a bit harder, murmuring all the while into her ear.
She cried his name, almost anguished, her body poised and shuddering in his arms. He slipped one finger inside her and absorbed the fluttering contractions of her orgasm. Shut his eyes against the wonder of her.
His.
She was his, now. He would make her his, show her how perfectly they fit together. Would make her see, would make her believe her own beauty.
She gave a last tremor and went limp upon him, her face buried in his neck.
He held her for the longest time, savoring the way her breath heaved, the way her pulse knocked against his. The sunlight had found its way through the window at some point during the last tumultuous half hour, and the air itself seemed luminous, touched with gold. He watched the dust drift drunkenly in the light and felt, through the agony of his own withheld release, a most profound contentment settle inside him.
Hers.
He was hers, body and soul.
She stirred at last, curling her fingers into his jacket.
“All right?” he asked.
“Thank you,” she said, raising her head and avoiding his gaze. “That was lovely.”
He let his right hand slide back down her leg, leaving a trail of moisture along her skin. “That, my love, was only the beginning.” He straightened her petticoats and her skirt, slid her bodice back up her arms and into place, buttoned her up. He reached behind her for her hairpins on the table. With one large hand he gathered her hair, twisted it into a knot, and held it there while he stuck the pins, one by one, into place. The rich scent of her arousal drifted into the air between them.
“Thank you,” she said again, in a whisper.
He bent forward and brushed a kiss along her lips.
“Very good, then, darling,” he said. “I’m off to mend that tire.”
He picked up his cap and gloves and found his mending kit, and then he ducked through the doorway and across the meadow, ballocks aching to end the world.
FIFTEEN
O
nly the beginning.
What on earth did he mean by that?
She stared at the door in stunned disbelief. Had it all really happened? Had he just lit her body into a Roman bloody candle and then
left
? To mend his
tire
?
The beginning of
what
?
She slid off the table. Her legs nearly buckled beneath her, as if Phineas Burke had somehow managed to remove her bones as well as her capacity for rational thought.
She wouldn’t put it past him.
Only the beginning.
She cast her eyes about the room, now flooded in sunlight. It must be nearly noon. How much time had passed? A fog seemed to have seeped through her brain, hampering its normal course of activity, so that the images striking her eyes took some time to work their way through her faculties. Said faculties, at the moment, focused instead on the raw, delicious throb still radiating from between her legs, on the feeling of his fingers there: a phantom sensation, the way amputees were supposed to feel a missing limb for months and years after its removal.
Two thoughts arose, disembodied and simultaneous. First, she wanted those fingers back, as soon as possible, and the man to which they were attached.
Second, she was alone in Phineas Burke’s private workshop, with at least half an hour to herself before he could be expected back.
She wanted very much to concentrate on the first thought. It was pleasant and simple and perfectly understandable, this longing for his presence, especially after the monumental pleasure he’d just worked on her body. She was a woman of childbearing age, after all; nothing more natural than physical desire, nothing more delightful than contemplating its execution.
But the second thought kept poking through, dark and insidious.
What if there
were
something here that might help the Manchester Machine Works?
No. It was horrible, disloyal even to think it, after what they’d just shared.
But wasn’t this why she’d come here in the first place? Passion was all very well, but men soon recovered from passion, even noble-minded men like Phineas Burke. In a month, in a year, where would she be? Still destitute, her sister still unmarried, her life an unrecognizable ruin of its former self. No means of supporting herself, no means of finding her way.
She looked around her in despair. It was impossible. What use could Finn’s workshop provide to a manufacturer of steam automobiles?
Still, he’d made a breakthrough with his battery, and an important one. Perhaps she could convince William Hartley to do the same, to turn to electrics if he hadn’t already. If the advantages of electric power were obvious to her, a mere layman, they must be sound enough.
She only needed the company shares to rise in value. Only needed to sell them at a decent price and have her money back, so she could return with Abigail to London and her salons, to the life that had always defined her. To the luxury of footmen and decent French wine and fine dresses, to the duty of settling her sister in life, to the feeling of being rich and important amongst the richest and most important people on earth.
To the feeling that she mattered.
To the feeling that she was safe and whole and invulnerable once more.
She wouldn’t steal anything, wouldn’t pass on information directly. That would be wrong. She would only . . . study. Learn. Come to her own conclusions, and then write to Mr. Hartley with her advice. Nothing at all that would harm Mr. Burke.
And then . . . and then perhaps she could have both. She could have her comfortable place in London society, and Finn as her lover, coming to her bed in the evening, after everyone else had left. They could take a discreet cottage in the country, perhaps, and meet there together on little holidays. It would be idyllic. She’d make it all up to him, lavish him with love and care, cover his beautiful body with kisses. She’d make the best mistress a man had ever had, and never cost him a penny. She might even help him with his work. For as long as he wanted her, for as long as he desired her, he could have everything she had to give him.
Her hands were gripping the edge of the worktable in an iron hold. She released them with conscious effort and looked around the room. He must have notes, papers of some kind. Where would he keep them?
She drifted to the cabinet and the long table next to it, against the wall. Cylinders, bottles, boxes illegibly labeled, the gas ring over which he’d made her tea. No papers of any kind, perhaps because of the fire hazard.
She turned around. The worktable, of course, was clear of everything except her hat and her virtue.
The lamp table held only the kerosene lamp.
The pile of spare tires, the empty blocks where the automobile had sat, the chests stacked neatly upon one another, across the room . . .
Something caught her eye atop the chests. They sat apart, in a shaded corner where the sunlight couldn’t quite reach. Good, solid English oak, the kind once used to make English ships, to withstand cannon fire and hurricanes.
She walked toward them, briskly and with purpose. A stack of papers sat upon the nearest, topped by the envelope she’d handed him a few days ago. The letter from his mother, from the infamous Marianne Burke. She brushed her hand over the tidy copperplate handwriting and set it aside.
Beneath the personal letter lay papers, covered in the same unreadable scrawl she’d seen on the box labels. Finn’s handwriting, she supposed. She hesitated for an instant, her hand hovering atop the stack.
She closed her eyes.
Her body still seethed, still vibrated from the force Finn’s fingers had unleashed, that engulfing wave of physical pleasure that had lapped into every tip and corner of her. Her knees still wobbled, her breath still felt new and quick in her lungs. Behind her eyelids, she could still see him, his hair lit into golden flame from the sun, his green eyes looking up at her with tender warmth.
With trust.
Let me show you, darling. Let me show you what sort of woman you really are.
She opened her eyes and looked down at the topmost page. Notes, mostly, with drawings and diagrams scattered throughout. None of it made much sense to her. His handwriting was too difficult. Small, hasty letters, as if his hand had trouble keeping up with his brain. She could just make out the title:
Lead-Acid Battery (improv 4 Mar 1890)
. Or perhaps the 9th of March; the number had an odd curve to it that might have gone either way.
I’ve known any number of selfish women in my life, Alexandra, and you’re not anything like them.
She closed her eyes again.
When she opened them, she looked not at the stack of Finn’s notes. Instead, she reached for the letter, the letter from his mother, and put it back in its place, obscuring all the arrows and drawings and the quick black handwriting. Finn’s handwriting. She smoothed the creamy envelope with her fingertips and wondered what she was like, this woman who had given birth to beautiful Finn, who had raised and loved him in a cottage in Richmond.
Another way. There had to be another way. She was clever, resourceful. She would think of something that had nothing to do with Finn and his workshop and his illegible notes. Perhaps if she wrote to her nephew and told him to stop his nonsense and give up steam engines, or perhaps if she actually attended a board meeting for once and used her vote as a shareholder . . .
The back door rattled.
For a few seconds, the sound didn’t quite register, so deep in concentration she’d become. It only jangled at the back of her mind, an annoyance.
“Hullo there,” said Finn. “What are you up to?”
She jumped from the chair and hid the papers behind her dress. “Oh! You’re back!”
“Yes, I’m just opening up the carriage doors. I won’t be a moment.” He frowned. “What have you got there?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all. I mean,” she added, realizing that she was making things worse, “just a few papers. Your notes, I think. I was curious. About the battery.”
A smile spread across his face. “Were you, now?”
“Well, I did help you fix it, after all.”
“So you did.” He turned to the carriage doors at the back and unbolted the center. “Were you able to read my notes at all? My assistant back in England finds them impossible.”
“Not very well.” She watched the easy movement of his shoulders, his arms, as he spread the doors wide, letting in a gust of fresh air, already warm from the morning sun and heavy with the fragrance of blossoms from the apple trees nearby. The automobile sat just outside, paint gleaming in giant pools of reflected light.
“Then take them back to the house with you, if you like.” He turned his head in her direction and tapped his temple with one finger. “All in my head now anyway. I’d be happy to explain things, if you find yourself stuck. Or can’t decipher my scribbling, which is more likely.” He said the last words over his shoulder, as he went back out through the carriage doors and braced himself against the right-hand side of the machine, next to the steering tiller. With one hand on the tiller, he pushed the motor-car inside, rolling past the doors and into the space before the blocks. “There we are. All in.”
He reached inside, presumably to set the brake, his long, beautiful body stretched out before her in its sturdy English tweeds. Her breath stopped in her throat.
Are you, Lady Morley? Are you in love with my friend Burke?
He turned to face her. “Are you all right, Alexandra?”
She gathered herself. “I’m quite all right. I’m splendid, as you very well know. It’s you who . . . You must be tired. Exhausted. You should go back to your room and rest.”
He extended one arm to her, and she couldn’t resist, couldn’t resist going to him and laying herself against that warm, broad chest and feeling his arms enclose her. “I’m sorry, darling. You’re quite right; I’m completely done in. Would you mind terribly if I left you to yourself?”
“Not at all.” His woolen jacket felt comfortably scratchy beneath her cheek. She closed her eyes and absorbed the sensation. Memorized it, just in case.
His hand stroked along the back of her head. “Will I see you later tonight?”
“At dinner, of course.” Her belly fluttered.
He spoke softly. “And after?”
“It’s dangerous. Everyone will be about, Wallingford and my sister and the rest of them . . .”
He shrugged beneath her. “If you’d rather not . . .”
“No! I do . . . I want . . .” She swallowed. She wanted everything. She wanted him, all of him, every last ounce to fill the great emptiness inside her. “May I . . . if you’re not too tired . . . I might perhaps stop by your room . . .”
His arms tightened around her. “No. If anyone’s going to be lurking about, it should be me. If you’re caught . . .”
“I won’t be caught. Your room’s right by the back staircase. No one will see me.”
His breath warmed her hair. She could feel the beat of his heart through all the layers of shirt and tweed between them.
“If you’re certain,” he said at last. “If you’re quite sure.”
She pulled back from his arms and met his gaze steadily. “I’ve never been so sure of anything, Mr. Burke.”
His thumb brushed along the line of her lips. “Then, Lady Morley, I’ll be waiting for you.”
* * *
A
voice burst through the warm stillness. “Signora Morley! At last!”
Alexandra looked up in dazed bewilderment. Her eyes ached with concentration and her head swam with Aristotle. Several seconds passed before she remembered that she was in Italy, in the room she had begun, euphemistically, to call
the conservatory
; and that the woman addressing her was Signorina Morini.
An agitated Morini, headscarf askew and hands wringing the air. “Signora! The eggs!”
Alexandra blinked. “The eggs?”
“The eggs, the blessed eggs! They are gone!”
“The
blessed
eggs?” She frowned. “Do you mean the eggs from yesterday, the ones the priest . . . did that sort of . . .” She made a motion with her hand.
“Yes! The blessed eggs! They have been stolen!”
“Stolen! Oh, come now, signorina. Surely not. Why would anyone steal such . . . such saintly eggs? It would be blasphemous, wouldn’t it?”
Morini’s eyes narrowed. “Is that Giacomo.
He
is not being afraid of blasphemous.”
“Ah yes. The infamous Giacomo. He does seem a troublesome sort of fellow.” Alexandra set her book on the table next to her and steepled her fingers. “But why on earth would he steal your eggs?”
Signorina Morini flicked her hand. “He did not steal the eggs himself, oh no. He had the men of the stable do it. Because of the cheeses.”
“The cheeses?”
“Is necessary to put the
pecorino
to ripe in the stables. Is the tradition. Now, this year, the men of the stable say it is too much trouble.
I
say, is Giacomo.” Morini wagged her right index finger in emphasis.
“
Giacomo
is too much trouble?”
“No, no, the
cheeses
are being too much trouble,” Morini said impatiently. “To the men of the stable. Is the smell, they say. Giacomo, he stirs the pot. He tells the men, go to the castle, take the eggs. Tell the women we are keeping the eggs until the cheese is take away.”
Alexandra leaned forward and set her elbows on her knees, the better to rub her temples. “Does he know the eggs are sacred?”
“He knows,” Morini said, in a bitter tone. “He is not caring.”
“Oh, an atheist! Splendid. One needs a bit of variety. I do hope he doesn’t break the eggs on purpose. Imagine!”
Morini looked at her in horror. “Break the eggs!”
“I do beg your pardon. Only thinking out loud.” Alexandra tossed her a reassuring smile. “Of course, I see it’s a great problem indeed. But I’m afraid I don’t fully understand these matters. Why would your Giacomo begin all this trouble?”
The woman heaved a great sigh and crossed her arms. “He is disappointing.”
“Oh, dreadfully so. I quite agree with you. All because of cheeses, really! I’ve never been so disappointed in a man. Not in some time, anyway.”