Chapter Nineteen
Julian stared at the letter in his hand, reading it for the third time in as many minutes. His eyes raced over the preliminaries, then tripped to a halt when he reached the names.
“Horace Stone and Angus Macleod. Apprehended this seventh of June,” he read aloud. Somehow it seemed more real when read aloud. “Charged with drunkenness, vandalism, and breaking and entering with the intent to commit robbery. Sentenced to sixth months’ hard labor on the prison hulk Jericho.”
There it was. The truth, laid down in black ink on white paper, in Levi Harris’s neat penmanship.
Horace Stone and Angus Macleod had been apprehended the morning following Leo’s death, not a mile from the murder scene. Charged with smashing the window of a cookshop, with the intent to rob the place. According to Harris’s inquiries of the prison guards, the two matched Cora’s basic description.
These men were Leo’s killers. Julian knew it in his bones. He read through the letter again, though by now he could have recited it from memory.
“The Jericho,” he said wonderingly. “I’ll be damned.” He’d spent months searching, trudging down every gutter and lane in the county of Middlesex and beyond, and here they’d been floating on a decaying ship in the middle of the Thames, less than ten miles downstream. Virtually under his nose the whole time.
From his perch by the drawing room window, Tartuffe stretched his wings and squawked. “Jericho!” he trilled merrily. “Jericho!”
Ridiculous bird. “What is it with you and names that start with J?”
“Oh, Julian,” the parrot sang. “Mr. James Bell. Oh, Juuuulian.”
“Yes, don’t tell me. Guilty, guilty. Thank you, that will be all.” Julian shook himself. He was conversing with a bloody bird. For once, the blasted creature’s nattering shouldn’t even disturb him.
He did feel mildly guilty for pursuing the matter after he’d promised Lily he wouldn’t. But she’d been concerned for his safety, and he hadn’t done any of the investigating himself. He’d merely written to Harris and let him do the work.
And now, less than a week later, Julian held deliverance in his hands. True liberation from fear and doubt, in the form of two names. After attacking Leo and Faraday, this Horace Stone and Angus Macleod had gone on to commit more criminal acts the same night. Impulsive ones, by Levi Harris’s account. Acts like those didn’t suggest the behavior of two paid assassins. Wouldn’t hired assailants have fled the area and reported back to their employer, rather than bruising about the same neighborhood, indiscriminately smashing windowpanes? The pattern of events pointed to two drunken louts on a petty crime spree. Nothing more.
Lily and Morland—and he had to face it, pretty much everyone else—had been right all along, it would seem. Leo’s murder had been a random act of violence. The death was no less tragic, but the implications for Julian were markedly less profound. Of course, he would always regret not being there that night. Leo was a good friend, and his death cast a long, sorrowful shadow. But if Julian could see the killers punished—if he could feel certain, once and for all, that Peter Faraday was wrong and those men actually hadn’t intended to murder Julian—his future with Lily looked three shades brighter, instantly.
Julian folded the letter from Harris, jammed it in his breast pocket, and crossed to the escritoire, withdrawing two sheets of paper and taking up a penknife to sharpen a quill.
He needed to send an express to Ashworth at once. If the brutes were sentenced to six months’ hard labor, they were due to be released within weeks. Both witnesses to the killing were in points far West, out Ashworth’s way—Cora Dunn, the prostitute, had stayed on in Devonshire, and Peter Faraday remained convalescing in Cornwall. If Ashworth could deliver one or both of them to London before Stone and Macleod were released, they could bring the men up on murder charges before they ever tasted freedom. Leo would finally have justice.
And Julian could feel some measure of peace.
“Julian?” Lily’s voice, from the doorway. “Are you ready? The property agent will be waiting.”
Deuce it. With the arrival of Harris’s letter, he’d forgotten all about their appointment to look at houses for lease. She was excited; he could hear it in her tone. And now, with this news from Harris, Julian was excited, too. He didn’t dare tell Lily about this latest development, not yet. No benefit in raising her expectations or anxieties until he could be sure.
He looked up. Spied his wife, a vision in sage-green muslin and frothy lace. Promptly dropped the penknife and quill, as if they burnt his fingertips.
“What is it?” she asked, laughing at his clumsiness.
He smiled. “Beautiful,” he signed expansively, putting face and shoulders into the gesture. “Beautiful.” Because sometimes, spoken words just wouldn’t do.
She looked to the clock and finger-spelled, “Late.”
“The property agent will wait.” He readied his hands and waited for her attention. Feeling mischievous, he decided to test how her comprehension was improving. In swift finger-spelling, he described in explicit detail what he planned to do with that sage-green dress when they returned, and then what he planned to do with the body beneath it.
Her cheeks burned crimson as he went on. When at length he concluded his indecent proposition with the words, “five times,” she laughed and put a hand to his cheek.
She said aloud, “Finally. There’s the infamous scoundrel I know and love. I wondered where he’d been hiding these past few weeks. I was beginning to wonder if I’d truly married a boring, stuffy clerk.”
He dropped a playful kiss on her brow before offering his arm. “Shall we, then?”
Lily, Lily. The things she must never know.
“Oh, I like this one.” Lily’s face lit up as they stepped over the threshold of the third house that afternoon. She gripped his arm. “I have a good feeling about this house, Julian.”
“We’ve only seen the entrance hall.”
“Yes, I know. But it’s a very fine entrance hall.”
Julian thought it looked rather shabby. The paper on the walls was faded and peeling, and cobwebs shrouded the far corners of the ceiling.
“It’s been vacant for some time,” the property agent said. “The owners have only just decided to let it out.”
“The proportions are lovely,” she said, turning into what he supposed to be the dining room. With no furniture, it was difficult to tell. “And there’s so much air and light.”
True, for a town house, it did have a pleasant, open feel. Something about the number of windows and the harmonious arrangement of the rooms, he supposed. Julian would have liked to build her a lavish mansion from the ground up, surrounded by acres of green, rolling park. But such houses weren’t built in a matter of weeks, and a matter of weeks was all they had before Leo’s heir arrived from Egypt. Julian’s old house in Bloomsbury was out of the question, for a host of reasons. So they would choose from the available homes for lease in Mayfair. If Lily was pleased with this one, Julian was pleased.
She asked the property agent, “Is there a garden?”
“Yes, my lady.” The man led them down the corridor to the morning room at the rear, pulling back the dusty drapes to reveal a stone terrace and an overgrown jumble of weeds.
“Needs a great deal of work, doesn’t it?” Julian said.
“I’m not afraid of work,” she replied, giving him a cheeky smile. “Are you?”
He shook his head. No, he wasn’t. He dearly missed work, truth be told. Somehow he needed to find an excuse to visit his offices this week. They would only just now be expecting Mr. James Bell back from his journey north to visit the mills. He needed to settle his business affairs and quietly talk to his solicitor about selling off the whole concern—properties, mills. The thought left him feeling gutted and empty, not unlike this house.
Lily is worth it, he reminded himself. Lily is everything.
Surely he would find something to do with his time. Buy farmland and manage it, he supposed, like other gentlemen of leisure did. What he knew about agriculture could balance on the razor-thin edge of a scythe, but he could learn. He’d tutored himself in the principles of trade once. He would just start all over again. And if he occasionally woke in the night, roused from nightmare echoes of clacking looms and tolling church bells and scratching rats … well, Lily would be there next to him, her pale, slender arms and rosemary scent, ready to soothe his pounding heart.
“Tartuffe will love these high ceilings,” she mused, tilting her head.
The property agent led them on a tour of the second and third floors. With each bedchamber they toured, Julian found himself becoming oddly aroused. Since the object was to decide whether this house could be their house, it only felt logical to picture himself and Lily in every room. Dining in the dining room, sitting in the parlor … and now bouncing off the walls of each and every bedchamber.
Viewing the nursery gave him a very queer feeling indeed. A feeling that was not quite arousal, but extremely compatible with it.
“There’s the kitchen below, of course,” the property agent said as they descended the staircase once again. “And we haven’t yet properly seen the hall, but …” He checked his timepiece. “I’m afraid time is drawing short. I’ve an appointment back at my office in a quarter-hour.”
“Why don’t you leave us here?” Julian suggested. “We’ll show ourselves around the rest, then lock up. I’ll send a man round to your office later, to return the keys.”
The agent happily complied, no doubt sensing that the deal was within reach. He dropped the keys into Julian’s waiting palm. “Very good, sir.”
After Julian had seen the man out, Lily wandered into the hall. He followed her. She stood in the center of the large, open room, flanked on one side by a row of high windows. On the opposite wall, dark ovals and squares marked the spaces where portraits and mirrors had once hung.
“Oh, Julian. They don’t build houses with halls like these anymore, not in Town. We could have the grandest parties, with an orchestra and dancing.”
He smiled at her excitement. “Happy thought, indeed.”
Yes, they would throw grand parties, the two of them. With exotic foods and outlandish amusements and coveted invitations. Place cards engraved with whimsical creatures would live in the keepsake boxes of debutantes, for years and years to come. Lily would sparkle at the center of it all, joyous and carefree, surrounded by friends and admirers. And right there, it would be enough. Julian would know he’d lived his life to good purpose.
Yes. This house was going to be their house.
“We’ll need to replace the paper on the walls and give all the trim a fresh coat of paint.” As he moved forward, his boots clomped noisily over the parquet. The report echoed off the vaulted ceiling. “The flooring feels sound. Only needs a bit of wax.”
“Look, there’s even a pianoforte.” She went to the far corner, where the large instrument sat hidden under a dust cover. “I wonder why they left it here.”
“Couldn’t make it fit through the door, I’d wager.” Julian slid the canvas cover from the piano and let it drop to the floor. “It’s a great beast of an instrument.” He touched a few keys and winced at the discordant result. “Horribly out of tune.”
“I don’t care about that,” she said, leaning against the piano. “Do play something for me. I love watching you play. Love feeling it, too.” Her breasts plumped atop the closed case, like two silk-covered pillows sitting on a shelf. His mouth watered, and sensual excitement gathered in his groin.
“I have a very wicked idea,” he told her, rounding the enormous instrument to stand before her.
She shifted her weight onto her back foot. “Do you?”
“I warn you, I won’t be dissuaded.”
“Oh, dear.”
He slid his hands to her waist and lifted her straight up, then deposited her atop the pianoforte. He pulled at the fabric of her petticoat and gown, yanking her skirts out from under her, so that nothing but the thin lawn of her chemise would come between her intimate flesh and the surface of the closed instrument.
“You say you love watching and feeling me play?” he asked, walking back around to the keyboard. She nodded, clearly breathless from her sudden change of altitude. “Then you’re going to adore this.”
He touched a finger to one ivory key, then tapped it with a firm stroke.
“Oh.” Her hand went to her throat. “Oh, my.”
Grinning, he played a quick arpeggio with his right hand, skipping up and down the high range of the keyboard.
“Julian,” she said in a shocked tone, her cheeks flushing with color. “The vibrations, they’re … You were right. This is wicked indeed.”
“Shall I stop?” He held up his hands.
“Heavens, no.”
He teased her a bit longer, with light, discordant scales. Just as he would trace tantalizing caresses up and down her bared thighs. She closed her eyes, and her lips fell apart. A husky moan eased from her throat.
Enough with the études and foreplay.
He put both hands to the keyboard and coaxed from it a full-bodied, if ill-tuned piece of music, with dark, powerful chords and a lilting melody.
“Oh.” She squirmed atop the pianoforte. “Oh, Julian. Is that … Is that our waltz?”
God, how he loved her. He nodded in affirmation. “It is indeed our waltz. And this”—he paused—“is our country dance.” He gave her no time to adjust before launching into the brisk, vigorous, pounding rhythm.
She made a sound that was half shriek, half delight. “Have mercy, please,” she laughed. Her throat and chest were blushed crimson, and he could see the points of her taut nipples pressing against the bodice of her dress. “I can’t take anymore. Julian, do stop, or I shall speak of plaster.”
He stopped.
Her breath heaved in her chest. Strands of her hair had fallen loose, floating about her face. “Goodness,” she said, putting a hand to her brow. “I’m perspiring. I must look as though I’ve been tumbled.” Her eyes accused him merrily. “You truly are wicked.”
“Brace yourself, my dear wife. That was just the prelude.”
He reached for her over the keyboard, buffing the polish with her skirts as he pulled her toward him and spun her legs around. Now she sat perched just before him, sitting directly above the keyboard. Her knees grazed his chest. He pushed up her skirts and spread her legs wide, so that her feet dangled over opposite ends of the piano keys.
Lust surged through him, and he took a moment to adjust his trouser fall. He’d gone hard as marble, just watching that erotic display. He probably could tap out a tune with his engorged staff, if he freed it from his clothing.
But first he needed to free her from hers.
She was spread out before him like a luscious feast, her trim, stocking-clad legs converging in a shadowy valley of bare skin and dark curls and intoxicating feminine musk. He removed her left slipper and let it fall to the floor, skimming his hand up the enticing curves of her leg—from the high arch of her instep, to the gentle curve of her calf, over the knob of her knee, and further.
“Julian,” she said frantically, as he yanked at her garter. “We can’t do this. Not here.”
“Why not here? It’s our house.”
“No, it isn’t.”
“Oh. Did you prefer one of the other homes we toured?” He pulled the garter loose, then deftly rolled the stocking down her leg.
“No, you impossible man. You know I want this house, but—”
He shucked her other slipper. It hit the floor with a softly echoing thud. Then he ceased his attentions, momentarily devoting his whole body to communication. “You want this house, and you shall have it. I want you, and I shall have you. Right here. Right now. There will be no further discussion.”
Then he went back to removing her other garter and sliding her leg free of its delicate silk sheath. Once he’d pulled the garment free and exposed her dainty, wriggling toes, he kissed his way up her leg, tracing every smooth ivory contour with lips and tongue. As he reached the quivering slope of her inner thigh, her foot slipped to the keyboard in disharmonious protest.
“Be still,” he told her, shushing against her skin. He picked up her foot and braced it on his shoulder. Pushing aside the white, gauzy folds of her chemise and petticoat, he bared her most intimate places to his view. The petals of her sex were flushed deep red and dewy with excitement, and the sight alone drove him to a new peak of arousal.
Rather then dipping to taste her directly, he schooled himself to be patient. Instead, he licked a winding path up her inner thigh, giving her time to grow accustomed to the idea. Even so, her hips bucked with surprise when he made that first teasing pass with his tongue.
He kept a firm grip on her ankle, holding her bare foot braced against his shoulder. With his other hand, he clutched her hip. She wasn’t getting away from him. Oh, no.
He pressed his open mouth to her sex, just lightly. No kisses or fancy work with his tongue. He merely settled there, hovering near. Feeling her maidenhair tickle at his freshly shaven cheek, letting his ragged breath warm her aroused flesh. With devilish intent, he lifted his gaze and made eye contact with her over the heaving horizon of her bosom. Her brown eyes were glazed, her lips dusky and flushed.
He licked, once. In a reflexive move, her leg tensed against his shoulder, as if she would push him away.
He licked again, this time making a long, slow slide along her cleft, parting her. Her eyes fluttered closed, and she slumped back with a moan.
Eye contact ended. Her leg relaxed. Now he could tend to business.
He slid his hands up to frame her hips. She was so slender, he could curl his fingers over her waist and still reach toward her center with his thumbs, spreading her open for his pleasure and hers.
Damn, but he loved this. The teasing, the tasting, the tonguing of her every delicate contour and crest. Having explored every secret part of her, he swept his tongue to the pinnacle of her cleft and found her swollen bud.
Above him, she gasped and moaned. Her hand tangled in his hair, twisting and grasping. But she made no effort to wrench him away.
Needing to get closer, he lifted one knee to the piano keyboard. The incidental chord faded as he slid one hand up to knead her breast, tweaking her hardened nipple through the fabric. She inched closer to him, splaying her legs with shameless abandon and pressing her heat against his mouth. He began a swift series of experiments, running through his repertoire of kisses, nibbles, and licks until he found just the precise flicker of his tongue that set her thigh aquiver.
There, her body told him. Just like that.
So he did it again. And again. And again, refusing to slow or stop until she cried out in ecstasy, arching off the pianoforte with the force of her climax.
And still he did not relent.
Her fingers relaxed their grip on his hair, and she stroked him instead, raking her fingernails lightly over his scalp. A little sound escaped her throat. He doubted she was even aware of making it. A whimper, raw-edged with yearning. It was a sound of sensual satisfaction, and yet—it was an unmistakable plea for more.
Something in him snapped. She’d wanted a return to the wicked Julian, and she was going to have her wish. Turning his head, he kissed her inner thigh. Then he bit it, drawing on the fragile skin with firm suction until he pulled from her a sharp hiss of pain.
Widening his stance to brace his lust-weakened knees, he stood, pulling at the buttons of his trousers with desperate fingers. Within moments, he’d freed his rampant erection. He stroked himself a few times, gazing hungrily upon the plump, rosy display of passion so conveniently positioned at eye level. Staring at the way he’d marked her with that bite just at the top of her thigh. The tiny bruise was a violet petal fallen on fresh snow.
She was wet and hot and glistening. She was his.
“Beautiful,” he muttered, giving his aching arousal one last squeeze. “So damned beautiful.”
From the pianoforte, she rose up on her elbows. She gave him a sleepy smile, looking drugged with satisfaction. She would not wear that look for long. He was determined to rouse her, in more ways than one.
Grasping her by the hips, he dragged her down from atop the pianoforte. Her backside landed on the keyboard with a discordant crash, her legs on either side of his. Giving her no chance to prepare or protest, Julian guided himself to her entrance and thrust deep, encasing himself in bliss.
Sweet … heaven.
“Your legs,” he demanded, “wrap them over my hips.” He demonstrated his wish, lifting her thigh to aid her in compliance. Soon her ankles were linked at the small of his back.
“Arms, too,” he said.
She laced them tight around his neck.
With her clinging to him, he slid one arm around her waist. He braced his other hand against the pianoforte, to protect her from taking the brunt of his thrusts.
He worked her hard and fast, and beneath them, frenzied music played in an ungodly key, building to a quick crescendo. This was not tender lovemaking, but a claiming. This was his beautiful wife. This was his beautiful house. And this bright, elegant, glittering future … all of it, his for the taking.
She felt so good against him, under him, surrounding him. He threw back his head, and she chased him, pressing her lips to his throat. His whole body hummed with anticipation as he raced toward completion. She beat him to the finish, seizing around him in a second climax. He heard himself making harsh, guttural noises—shouting, almost. And why shouldn’t he shout? This was his house, his wife. No need to hold back.
So he didn’t. He came into her, losing himself in a clamor of bucking hips and strange, groaning piano chords, and clashing, open-mouthed kisses.
And life was very, very good.
For now.