“Beech.” Penelope could not entirely swallow down the bitter brew of her dismay. “I thank you for your candor, but I am quite firmly decided against being anyone’s duty.”
“Ah.” Her words seemed to strike him with force—his head tipped back—before he leaned closer. So close she could see the glint of his grey-green eyes, dark and piercing, regarding her with an intent that was as thrilling as it was mesmerizing. “Had you rather be my compulsion?”
Something darker and too needy for caution stirred within—a volatile mixture of pride and unadulterated want. “Lord, yes.”
Their lips seemed to meet with an elemental force, gravitating together as if both ends of the Earth had simultaneously tipped them into each other’s arms.
Yet once met, the second touch of his lips was less urgent, far more tentative. He slid his hand along the line of her jaw carefully, in the way a man raised a too-full glass to his lips—slowly so as not to spill. As if this were more than a mere tasting of flesh. As if he were offering his trust—his very self.
“Beech,” she said, because there was nothing else she could think to say, nothing that would communicate the riotous mixture of want and apology that made her feel hot and needy and unworthy all at the same time.
But his lips were smooth and taut above the soft brush of his beard, and he tasted of brandy—just wicked enough to entice. She wanted to drink him in, gulp him down, until she was intoxicated by the possibilities he promised.
She fisted her hands in his lapels, pulling him closer. Holding on to him the way a drowning woman clings to a lifeline.
He met her desperation with a merciful lack of reserve—slanting his mouth across hers and kissing her more deeply, searching with his lips and tongue, pushing his hand into the twisted arrangement of her hair, scattering the pins to the upholstery.
His thumb fanned along her cheek, and he kissed her with heat and abandon, drawing her out, thawing the chill of the winter night. Warming her in a way that nothing else ever had. Everything else faded, until there was nothing but the longing for the feel of his mouth on hers, and the pleasure so strong and sharp it nearly took her breath away.
Oh, Lord, how she loved kissing. Loved the give and take. Loved the sensual abandon. This was her true ruination—this hoydenish, hungry neediness. This unbecoming, unladylike affinity for passion.
Oh, how he kissed.
The rough texture of his whiskers rasped against her skin as he arched her head back to kiss down the curve of her throat. His teeth slid down her neck to worry and nip at the hollow at the base of her throat.
And all she wanted was for him to go lower. “Lord, Beech. Please.”
“Devil take me, Penelope,” he breathed against her skin.
The devil had clearly already taken them both. Because she did not care that they were in a freezing carriage, eloping to only Beech knew where. She did not care that she had abandoned everything she held dear—what was left of her good name and every last shred of her tattered reputation—to go away with him.
Because sometime in the past hour, she had fallen heart over head in love with Marcus Beecham, and she no longer cared anything for her name or reputation. She cared for him.
And so, she would give him the love and affection he so clearly needed, and so clearly deserved. She would give him her love until she had no more to give.
Or until he came to his senses.
Whichever came first.
CHAPTER 9
THE CARRIAGE BEGAN TO SLOW. “Warwick Court, Your Grace,” John Ramsey called from the box.
Marcus was obliged to stop kissing his duchess-to-be and attend to the practicalities of his elopement. “You’ll want to bring that fur, Pease Porridge—it’s snowing something fierce.”
“I am certainly Pease Porridge Cold and rather stupid to come away in nothing but my gown and evening slippers.”
He instinctively took her chilly hand to chafe warm and found himself at a disconcerting loss to do so—he could not do so with only one hand.
The realization shocked him anew, because for a moment there, he could swear he had felt it—pins and needles of feeling along the whole of his missing arm, from elbow to fingertips—alive and reaching for hers.
But the feeling faded into an empty ache. An empty, ravenous ache he needed to assuage. As soon as he got her safe and warm.
“Your Grace!” If his secretary was astonished to see his employer ushering a young woman with no cloak and no chaperone over the doorstep of Warwick Court, he hid it well. “You must be perishing from the cold.”
“We are indeed, Martins.” The snow had begun to fall in earnest, slanting down at such a rate that he and Penelope were covered from their dash from the carriage. “It’s a bitter night. My betrothed will require some warmed wine, if you would please alert the household. No—belay that.” Marcus had wanted to begin as he meant to go on—Penelope would be his wife as soon as he could find a clergyman to make an honest man out of him—but until he was sure of the special license, it were more prudent to keep the whole of the staff from gossip. “If you might do that yourself, to leave us privacy?”
“Of course, Your Grace.” Able Martins was all wary accommodation. “Let me wish you very happy.” He bowed to Penelope. “There is already wine, and a fire laid above stairs, in your chamber, Your Grace. If you pleased to take your ease there?”
“Thank you, Martins. We’ll go up directly.” Indeed, his Pease Porridge was shivering in her snow-dampened gown. “Damn my eyes, I seem to be conducting this elopement rather badly.”
Penelope’s small smile was teasing. “Have you conducted many others?”
Marcus could only bless his stars that she met difficulties with such good humor—it boded well for them. “Not a one. You are my first. And only.” He took her hand again and kissed it before he led her up the high, twisting staircase. “You?”
She shook her head. “No. Though I will admit I contemplated one, before I came to my senses.”
He did not need to ask with whom she might have contemplated eloping. He need to remember that she was eloping with him. They were together. And he meant for them to stay that way. Always.
He took up a fresh blanket from the carved chest at the bottom of the bed to replace the snow-wet fur but could do no more than offer it to her. “Wrap yourself up in this.” With only one arm, the ability to perform that service was beyond him.
What other services he was yet to be unable to perform, he would soon discover.
Penelope seemed to feel his unease—she rubbed her bare arms. “It’s very elegant,” she said of the tall room.
“It’s overlarge,” he answered, happy to talk of easy nothings. “After the comfortably close confines of shipboard life, I will confess I find Warwick Court so big it feels empty.” He poked up the fire to chase more of the chill to the corners. “But I hope you will like it.”
Penelope took a deep, steadying breath before she stood. “I like you.”
“Brave girl.” He handed her a glass of warm spiced claret. “Get that in you to chase out the chill.”
“Thank you.” She took a sip. “Gracious, that tastes divine. Almost as good as you.”
Everything within him eased and tensed all at the same time. “I am honored you should think so.” He kissed the soft lips she turned up to him.
She tasted of wine and winter warmth, of cinnamon and nutmeg-spiced happiness. A happiness he would drink in until he was no longer thirsty. He touched her face to draw her close, to feel her petal-soft skin pressed close to his.
She wrapped her hand around the back of his neck to run her fingers through his loose hair. “Your hair is wet,” she whispered against his lips. “And your coat is damp, too. Come under the blanket with me,” she coaxed as she began to push the coat from his shoulders.