A Love So Dark (The Dark Regency Series Book 4) (12 page)

So she did. She gave herself up to the sensations he sparked inside her, her hips arching upward to meet his questing fingers. Tension coiled deep within her, building to something she didn’t understand but that she still strained toward. Reaching out, she clutched at him, her nails digging into his flesh as her body bowed beneath his.

It happened suddenly, every muscle drawing taut, her thighs quivering. Her whole body trembled as the release washed through her. Lights danced behind her eyes as she shuddered in his arms, his name falling from her lips on a desperate cry.

“That’s it, my sweet,” he murmured. “Let it take you.”

She had no choice in the matter. It was as if her mind and body were no longer connected, overwhelmed by the passion he’d stirred in her and the completion he’d brought her to. When he moved between her thighs completely, bringing her legs up to wrap around him, Olympia was almost ashamed of her eagerness. But she wanted to know what else would occur, and she desperately wanted to give him the same pleasure he’d brought her.

The sensation of him pressing into her, filling her was so very different from the tender stroking of his fingers. This was more primal, and while it wasn’t exactly pleasurable, she still felt compelled to urge him on, to take what he offered her greedily.

He moved deeper and she felt a tearing sensation followed by a burning pain. It dissipated quickly and only the strange sensation of fullness remained. When he thrust his hips again, driving deeper, Olympia felt that same burning need building again. But it was more insistent, more urgent. Every thrust drove her closer to that now familiar edge. Hitching her thighs higher on his firm hips, she savored each stroke and the climb. Her belly drew taut and quivered against him. Her thighs trembled as she rocked her hips against him, accepting each surge of him within her with an eagerness that should have shamed her. Her hands roamed his back, sliding lower to cup his firm buttocks as he drove into her again.

She shattered. The world fractured around her and nothing existed but the points of contact between their bodies. As she clenched around him, her muscles spasming with her release, he thrust again and then uttered her name on a harsh growl. Abruptly, he withdrew from her and she felt something warm and wet on her thigh.

Griffin slumped against her, pressing his forehead to her shoulder as his ragged breath fanned over her skin. Olympia closed her arms about him, holding him close. It wasn’t romance. It certainly wasn’t love. It was something darker, deeper… even animalistic. And it made her feel alive in ways she’d never known existed.

O
lympia awoke slowly and stretched
. Her body ached, subtle reminders of all that she’d done with Griffin the night before. Recalling all that had transpired between them the day before, and again during the night, she could feel a heated blush creeping up her neck as Collins bustled into the room carrying a breakfast tray.

After a jaw cracking yawn, Olympia sat up in bed, clutching the covers to her chest to hide the fact that she wore nothing beneath the bedclothes. She’d donned a nightrail at some point, but Griffin had quickly disposed of it. The decadence of sleeping naked in his arms had been an eye opening experience for her. She’d realized that intimacy went far beyond just the act of lovemaking.

“You’ve slept very late, m’lady!” Collins said as she bustled about the room. “And that hair looks like a bird nested in it!”

“Collins,” Olympia said reprovingly.

The maid blushed, realizing she’d said something inappropriate. “My apologies, m’lady. I do forget myself at times. Tis an odd business being a lady’s maid!”

“I’m sure it is,” Olympia agreed. “Would you fetch my wrapper?”

Collins looked at her sharply. It wasn’t typical for Olympia to have her fetch and carry so much, but as she was completely nude beneath the covers, she could hardly cross the room and get it herself.

The maid returned to her side with it and gave her a questioning look. “We won’t be returning to London, will we, m’lady?”

Olympia blushed. “No, Collins, we will not. For better or worse, we are remaining here. Neither Lady Florence nor Mrs. Webster will be able to refute my right to be here now.”

Collins shuddered delicately. “They won’t like it, m’lady. Not at all. I think it’ll only make them more dangerous.”

The maid was more than likely correct. “We’ll be cautious. Both of us.”

“Yes, m’lady… and I’d avoid her today at all costs, if possible. Seems one of the newer footmen spurned her advances last night and she’s in rare form. Broke everything in her chamber she could lift to throw.”

Which meant she’d be out for blood, and she already had a taste for Olympia’s. “Thank you, Collins… I’ll try to avoid her.”

“Won’t be possible, my lady,” Collins said smartly as she laid out the new gown she’d been working tirelessly to complete. “Not in this house. I’ve a word of advice, and you can take it or you can sack me for it… That woman is not to be trusted. I’d have her out of this house as soon as I could if I were you. And to be even bolder, if you mean to press his lordship to do what you ask, now would be the time. Also, Mrs. Webster has asked to see you.”

Olympia grimaced at that. “Tell her I’m indisposed.”

Collins shook her head vigorously. “No, m’lady. I’ll not do it. You show her any hint of weakness and she’ll chew you up and spit you out.

Her maid was right. Any hint of cowardice would only make things more difficult later on. She had to face her, whether she wanted to or not.

Olympia nodded and lifted the cover from her breakfast tray. The aroma of fresh kippers and eggs had her mouth watering. “Fine. Have a bath prepared for me, Collins, while I enjoy my breakfast.”

“Yes, m’lady. I imagine you’ve quite the appetite this morning,” the young woman offered with a cheeky grin as she left the room.

After Collins left, and Olympia’s blush had faded to a reasonable degree, she made short work of the food. Climbing from the bed, she donned her wrapper and crossed the room to the connecting door between her chamber and Griffin’s. She knocked softly, and he called out for her to enter.

Olympia stepped through the door and paused. He was naked, fresh from the bath. Water still glistened on his dark skin. Her gaze focused on one lone droplet that hovered at the base of his throat and then slid down, winding over his chest in a way that made her want to press her lips to his skin and trace each droplet with her tongue.

Even as she thought it, her eyes traveled lower. His body hardened beneath her gaze, his shaft growing thicker and longer. “I had wanted to speak to you about Lady Florence,” she finally managed to choke out.

“Well, that would effectively wither any man,” he said sharply.

Olympia’s gaze remained fixed on his member. “It seems to have no effect on you.”

“It’s counteracted completely by your alluring presence,” he replied. “But I imagine that you are not here to aid me with my morning affliction.”

“No,” she said, though her tone was less than certain. “Collins informed me that she’s in high dudgeon. Rejected by a footman and having a tantrum, to put it bluntly. I think we should send her to the dower house. I do not trust her, Griffin, and I fear she means to do you irreparable harm.”

He sighed wearily and dropped the towel he’d been using as he reached for his small clothes. “Olympia, I will gladly send her to the dower house once it is habitable, but you must stop seeing plots and machinations where none exist. No, Florence is not to be trusted, but do not give her more credit than she deserves. The woman is obsessed with clothes and handsome footmen. As long as those needs are met, she’ll be no trouble at all.”

“If I give her too much credit, you give her too little… That woman is a viper and if you do not see it, you’ve willfully blinded yourself.”

He pulled his breeches on, his movements agitated and clearly annoyed with the topic. “I cannot toss her out without her having a place to go and, at this time, the dower house is not an option. The roof is leaking and the place hasn’t been cleaned in more than a year!”

As she looked at him, Olympia realized that he was utterly exhausted. He’d spent the evening making love to her, and had continued well into the night. She’d woken up in the wee hours of the morning to the sounds of awful screams filtering down the hallway. She’d seen him slipping out of her chamber to attend his sister.

His present mood had nothing to do with their current disagreement. It wasn’t Florence. It wasn’t even her. It wasn’t even that he was beyond physically and mentally exhausted. It was frustration, because he was running out of options and time. The new medication he’d prepared for her had worked for some time, but was already losing its potency. The wailing and screaming had grown in intensity throughout the night until dawn when it had abruptly halted. All of those things had mixed and mingled to form his current dark mood, and she wasn’t helping him. At the moment she was only adding to his already overwhelming problems.

“I didn’t say it had to be immediate! But we both know that there will be no peace in this house while she is here!”

“Fine,” he agreed. “I will send workman to the dower house to begin repairs as soon as the roads have cleared and I will inform Florence that we mean to send her there. But if you expect that to bring us any peace at all, you are sadly mistaken.”

In the course of their conversation, he’d dressed entirely, save for his neckcloth which most of the time he eschewed anyway. He struggled into his boots and then left without a backward glance.

Turning on her heel, Olympia retreated to her own room. She’d won the battle but there had been a cost.

“That could have gone better,” Collins said. She’d apparently returned during their discussion and overheard everything. Olympia gave her a baleful stare as the maid added rose scented oil to the freshly drawn bath. Two other maids entered, each one baring a bucket of steaming water which was added to the tub. When they left and only Collins remained, Olympia removed her wrapper and climbed into the tub.

It was pointless to correct Collins’ behavior or to try and treat her as simply a maid. They were conspirators, in plain point of fact. Between them, they shared the dark and ugly secret that had prompted Olympia’s hasty withdrawal from London, her reason for willingly accepting marriage sight unseen to a man she’d never even heard of. They were, in all likelihood, murderers as there was little possibility that her uncle would have survived, much less completely recover from the blows to the head that the two of them had delivered. She was quickly learning that the best way to deal with much of Collins’ inappropriate behavior was to simply refrain from acknowledging it at all.

Olympia sank deeper into the heated water and bit back a sigh of relief. Keeping Florence and her machinations out of their lives was the most important thing. And Mrs. Webster would have to follow, she decided. Whatever it took, that woman was another viper and her strange hold over the house needed to be abolished.

When her bath was completed, Olympia sat on the small ottoman before the fire as Collins combed out her hair. The heat from the fire, would help it to dry quicker.

“I’ve no hand for the curling tongs, m’lady, but mayhap if we braid your hair and let it dry we can get a nice wave to it.”

“That would be fine, Collins. Thank you.”

When the task was complete, her damp hair arranged in a series of braids and then pinned up in a simple coronet, she dressed in the new gown that Collins had created for her. The green wool fit her to perfection, though the neckline was a bit deeper than she was typically comfortable with.

“Perhaps a fichu?”

“No,” Collins said. “You want his lordship to be in a better mood, don’t you?”

“Yes,” Olympia replied.

“Then showing a bit of bosom is a good way to start,” the maid said of matter-of-factly.

Curiosity warred with common sense and Olympia felt compelled to ask. “Tell me the truth about your past employers, Collins, before you came to my aunt and uncle. I know you were never a lady’s maid and if memory serves me correctly, you were not a very good scullery maid, either.”

The woman’s thin face scrunched as she considered her options. “Very well, m’lady. My mother worked as a wardrobe mistress for a theater… but not a fancy sort of theater where respectable folk would go. It was… well most would call it indecent. And rightly so, I reckon.”

“How indecent?” Olympia asked.

“Most of the women what worked there were more light skirt than dancer or actress,” the maid admitted.

“And you made clothes for them… Costumes?”

Collins raised an eyebrow. “Yes, m’lady. Well, helped my mother with them. As she got older, her hands stiffened up and her eyes weren’t what they used to be. Helping her turned into just doing the work m’self. Though the gowns I made were hardly anything that would be fitting for you. ”

“I don’t mean to wear it to dinner, Collins,” she said, thoughtfully. “But… I imagine you could fashion me something suitable to wear for my husband in the privacy of our chamber?”

The maid smiled. “Aye, m’lady. I can. His eyes will fair pop out and I daresay you’ll get anything you ask for.”

A peaceful home with him, free from the influence of people who intended to harm either of them. That was all she wanted. To feel
safe
again, she realized. It was something she hadn’t experienced since before her parents’ deaths. Griffin hadn’t either, she was certain, though the difficulties they had faced were very different.

With her morning toilette completed, Olympia braced herself for the coming confrontation with Mrs. Webster. Leaving her room, she took a deep breath and straightened her spine. She found the housekeeper in the hall just at top of the stairs.

“I see you’ve finally decided to leave your bed. And his,” the housekeeper said disapprovingly.

“You overstep, Mrs. Webster,” Olympia snapped. “What occurs between my husband and myself in the privacy of our chambers is none of your concern.”

Mrs. Webster smiled coolly. “You may think that you’ve won… that by seducing him you’ve gained the upper hand, but rest assured, m’lady, the things I know about this family he will never want made public.”

Cold fury washed through her. “Do not threaten me, Mrs. Webster. And do not threaten my husband. You are in his employ but that can change at any time!”

Mrs. Webster’s smile faded into a gruesome snarl. “Mr. Swindon might have had the final choice in bride for his lordship, but I made certain that he gathered enough information about you to keep you well in hand! I know about your uncle! I know why your aunt was so eager to have you married off and out of her home!”

Cold dread washed through her. She hadn’t told Griffin about her uncle’s advances, about the lengths she’d had to go to in order to avoid being ruined by him. The shame of it was something she’d hoped never to share with anyone. She hadn’t told Mr. Swindon about the final night, the night when her desperate attempts to save her virtue had resulted in grave injury to him. Had it not been for Collins, her uncle would have raped and murdered her that night. Mrs. Webster couldn’t possibly know everything, but she possessed enough information to get to the truth if she chose.

“I have nothing to hide, Mrs. Webster. You will not rule in this house forever,” Olympia brazened. She would be certain of it. “And if you think to use his sister against him—.”

The woman grabbed her arm, twisting it painfully as she dragged her toward one of the unoccupied chambers. “What do you know of Cassandra?” Mrs. Webster demanded.

Olympia yanked her wrist free of the other woman’s grasp. “He took me to her room last night. I know about her condition and I know that you’ve helped him to care for her! But that doesn’t excuse what you’ve done here, and if you ever manhandle me in such a way again, I will be certain that you regret it!”

“You know nothing,” the woman sneered at her. “You don’t know the hell I’ve endured in this house… that my mother and grandmother endured in this house as we nursed one member of this family after another through madness! We’ve covered up their atrocities, we’ve lied for them, protected them, and yet he brought you here! This is
my
house
. It will
always
be my house!”

“Oh, la! What a party I’ve missed!”

Olympia would have groaned at the sound of Lady Florence’s voice but she wouldn’t take her eyes off Mrs. Webster. Any distraction from the woman in front of her could prove disastrous. Griffin feared he was going mad, but in surveying Mrs. Webster, Olympia realized he was not the one who should fear it. The housekeeper was nigh to insane herself, paranoid and dangerous.