The Duke's Seduction of Lady M Read online

  She nigh on skipped up the last dozen steps and by the time Brody joined her, trying not to wheeze, Mary had gained the gazebo, and leant on one of the low window ledges. As he entered the octagonal building she shook her head, mocking his slowness. ‘What kept you?’

  Brody held the picnic basket up. ‘Your lunch.’ He put the basket down on a side table and looked around.

  ‘Only mine?’

  He chuckled. ‘You have me there. Our lunch.’

  The room wasn’t overly large, just big enough in fact, for a day bed, two low tables and a pair of cane chairs drawn up in front of the window that overlooked the valley between the gazebo and the village. Plus, on one wall, the north, a floor to ceiling cupboard occupied the space between two windows. Mary walked over to it, rummaged inside and withdrew several large cushions.

  ‘These will have to go back to the house soon, before the weather gets damp and ruins them. For now, it saves me having to bring some creature comforts every time I want to come and enjoy the view and my own company.’ She put the cushions on the cane chairs and looked up at him. ‘What?’

  ‘Oh, nothing, sorry, I was wool gathering.’ Brody realised he was frowning. ‘Do you feel the need to come here a lot?’

  Mary straightened up from where she had plumped the cushions and set them to prevent cane stripes on any unsuspecting body parts. ‘The need? No. The inclination, yes. Why do you ask?’

  He shrugged, unsure of his reply, or why her feelings were so important to him. ‘It seems somewhat solitary.’

  She nodded. ‘Exactly. Sometimes I need to be alone, to think, to relax, to be me. Don’t you?’

  Brody began to unpack the basket, unsure of how to reply. ‘I… I suppose so.’ It was akin to peeling an onion. Every layer lost revealed a new facet of her and each intrigued him. How many more hidden depths did she have? He stopped what he was doing and looked at her. Mary’s expression was curious, but he felt that if he chose not to answer, she wouldn’t push. Which was all the more reason to try and answer her properly.

  ‘Y…yes. But I was alone in essence for so long, that sometimes I need noise, English noise, to make me feel safe again.’ He rolled his eyes as he struggled to put into words how he felt. Brody was embarrassed at how those few words revealed so much of his inner self. ‘Maybe that’s not the right expression. To make me realise those days are over. I can think in my own language, speak freely and roam at will without fear of being found out as a fake. Sometimes too much solitude can make me forget how constrained I was.’ He laughed and shook his head. ‘But I would go demented if I had to live within the constrictions and idiots of the ton all the time, so I’m not sure where that leaves me, to be honest.’

  ‘Here with me, to break the silence when needed?’ Mary moved over to him, and caressed his cheek. The gesture was so unexpected, Brody was struck dumb. She replaced her hand with her lips and then hugged him. ‘Just tell me when to chat and when to be quiet. I’m very accommodating… argh, lord.’ She put her hands to her cheeks and shut her eyes. ‘My ever ready tongue will drop me into very deep water if I don’t guard it. I mean, I can be quiet or noisy, whichever you prefer.’

  ‘When I’m buried deep inside you, and you achieve your release, scream it out for me to hear.’ He waited for her riposte.

  She gasped. ‘Brody, enough.’ Evidently she had no immediate comeback for him.

  ‘Nowhere near enough, my dear.’ He took one of her fingers in his mouth and sucked it, enjoying her soft gasp. She didn’t pull the digit away, however. This connection scared him. Oh he wanted it, needed to feel a man again. Someone admired and revered. However, was it fair to encourage Mary when he had no intention of going any further than dalliance? What a conundrum. One only he could solve.

  ‘More than enough, if you still want a pego to play with. Argh, I’m doing it again.’ She huffed, although she didn’t look too upset or embarrassed, as her eyes twinkled, and his pego was still in place. ‘I’m supposed to be a lady…’ She blushed. ‘Well you know what I mean. A lady as opposed to a hoyden.’

  Brody understood what she meant. After all, if she were a Lady, he would know her, surely? And we would not be in this position. A Lady would be careful not to be caught in such circumstances. That is not necessarily true. He thought of some of the Ladies who had tried to get into a similar situation with him. ‘It’s not fair to tease you,’ he said rapidly, his innate fairness coming into play. ‘Not yet. In all honesty I asked you to meet me to see if we could talk, be friends and enjoy each other’s company. What do you say?’ He reached back into the basket and pulled out two goblets and a bottle of wine wrapped in a dampened cloth. ‘Will you drink to that?’

  ‘Just that? Friends?’ She stared at him, with suspicion in her eyes. ‘Why do I think that isn’t the whole story? Are you about to add, with special benefits? For in that case my answer will be a refusal.’

  Brody poured the wine and handed one of the goblets to her. He held his glass to hers, and they chinked gasses.

  ‘You think you can read my mind?’ he asked dryly. She sounded so business-like. Was that a good thing or not?

  ‘It seems so. Am I correct?’ She looked disappointed

  Ha, my lady, you deserve time in that state. It hurt for her still to think the worst of him.

  ‘Time will tell. Your health.’ He waited until they had both tasted the wine. The smooth, gooseberry scented liquid slid down his throat like the finest cream. Brody thought it as perfect as any he’d find in his own cellar. If he still had one. He was embarrassed to admit to himself he had no idea if any wine had been laid down at all over the past years, let alone of what quality. He made a mental note to find out.

  He decided it was time to lay his cards on the table. Not in such a business-like manner as she had spoken, but to discover if they were able to come to some form of agreement. With he hoped fondness, or… or what? His mind went blank. ‘You’re wrong, you know. Let’s sit and I’ll tell you my thoughts. Then if I’m still in one piece with all my appendages attached I’ll serve the food. What do you say?’

  He was pleased she didn’t just come straight back with a reply but seemed to consider what he said. Eventually she inclined her head.

  ‘I’ll say I’ll reserve judgement until I hear what you have to say.’

  ‘That seems fair enough.’ He steered her to the chair, and deliberately ignored the day bed. If they sat on that his mind would go into sexual overdrive. Let alone the rest of him. It conjured up too many erotic pictures for comfort.

  Mary sat down in one of the chairs and settled her skirts around her. She looked at the other chair pointedly. ‘Don’t loom.’

  Brody snorted. ‘Yes, ma’am. Or should that be no? Whichever, I’ll sit.’ He suited his actions to his words and crossed his legs at the ankles.

  As ever the action stretched his pantaloons over his cock, and he watched her glance at it, give a secret smile, lick her lips and look away, hurriedly. That augured well, he hoped.

  She composed her features into an expression of mild interest. ‘I am all ears.’

  ‘Good, so let me see, where were we? Ah, yes, just friends. Now you mentioned friends with added benefits. I assume you mean sexual favours?’ She opened her eyes wide, and didn’t look at him. ‘What about walking and talking friends, not silent ones… You wouldn’t grant me that?’

  Mary blushed. ‘Ah, well… Could you be happy with just that and not tease for more?’

  Was she really that naive? No of course she wasn’t. She was toying with him as he was with her. We’ll soon see who plays that game the best. Brody realised how much he was enjoying their repartee. It was a long time since he’d been able to forget his worries and simply enjoy the risqué chat with a gorgeous woman.

  ‘I’d be a liar to say I don’t hope for more than a simple straightforward, walking, talking friendship,’ Brody said impassively. ‘However, I would settle for that even though, of course, I want to feel you sheath me, to move mys
elf inside you and for us both to shout our completion. Or swallow it if others are near.’

  Mary opened her mouth as if to speak and shut it again. She gulped and cleared her throat. ‘Swallow what?’

  ****

  ‘Sw… Did I really hear that, or is it my defective hearing and wishful thinking?’ He lapsed into silence and stared at her, brooding, dark, and she was sure downright dangerous.

  Mary didn’t answer him. The next move had to be Brody’s. All the more so because she still wasn’t sure if she liked him that much. And why did it seem as if they were conducting a transaction in much the same way as you would buy a horse? It didn’t sit easily with her. They needed to be more… more… She had no idea more what. Oh, they wanted each other that was certain, but in what manner? It was strange how like and lust could be so different. It was so hard to reconcile this man with the one his mama had spoken about so disparagingly, let alone the one Mrs Loveage recognised. In fact, Mary decided the real Brody was a mixture of both, along with a lot of rakish fancies striving to be let loose. With little or no encouragement he could upset her ordered way of life. And it seemed to her, she couldn’t stop herself responding to his looks and teasing with some of her own. She folded her hands in her lap and looked at him from under lowered lashes. He was not easy to read.

  Every so often he opened his mouth, raised his eyebrows and shut his mouth again with a snap. At one point he sunk his chin down towards his neck and swung one ankle over the knee of his other leg.

  An even more overtly sexually challenging position.

  And he knew it. That she could decipher. Mary caught the swift sparkling look he slanted in her direction from under those damnably long lashes. Why nature chose to give such things to a man she would never fathom. Most women would give their eyeteeth – or their virginity – for them. As she preferred to keep her molars and she had bestowed her virginity on Horace years ago, she would just have to pretend indifference for as long as necessary.

  Once more she decided, with glee, that she had stunned him to speechlessness. He nodded his head slowly, and laughed softly, before he swallowed the contents of his glass, stood up and refilled it.

  ‘Mary you are a dangerous young lady.’ He waved the bottle in her direction and Mary shook her head in negation. She’d need her wits about her, and one glass of alcohol was usually her limit.

  Instead she sat back in her chair once more and sipped the wine she already had, content to wait for his next move. She hoped she projected… not indifference, exactly, but an impression that she was not overly interested in how the result of their exchange would end. She knew that was a facade, she could only hope he did not. For once she wanted to be wooed. To be persuaded why she should do something, even though deep down she accepted it was a foregone conclusion.

  All the while, she looked at him over the rim of her glass and wondered what he would do or say next. Somehow she understood he enjoyed this teasing, sexually charged repartee as much as she did, and would do nothing to push her away, or draw her nearer. He might have an agenda, one she wasn’t sure of yet, but he was letting her set the pace. Would he understand what he needed?

  How long this present state of affairs would be the status quo, Mary daren’t hazard a guess. Men such as Brody had been well out of her orbit since… well since forever, she concluded. She sipped slowly, hoped her hand didn’t shake and the arousal-induced goosebumps and perspiration weren’t obvious. Her quim stung as tiny arrows of what if, what next, how, where, hit it. Her muff was damp, her channel wet and her libido high. If she had been alone, she would have pleasured herself. Here and now she would just have to suffer in silence.

  ‘Swallow what?’ Brody said ruminatively. ‘Now there’s a leading question. I wonder…’ he drawled, every inch the rake he had been, she supposed. ‘Do you like to rush or savour things, sweet Mary?’

  She put her glass down on the floor and tapped her lips with her finger. Stay strong, it’s my chance to continue to make him set the tone and the pace. ‘I could say, that would be telling.’ She waited for the mental count of three. ‘However, the answer is, I suspect that it all depends on the circumstances.’

  He dipped his head. ‘Well met my dear. The one answer that is… unanswerable. Ah well, I will find out in due course, I’m sure.’ He winked, very slowly and deliberately. ‘In case you were wondering, I intend to savour your…’

  ‘Enough. Aren’t we getting off the subject of simple friends, Your Grace?’ Mary asked desperately.

  ‘Mrs Niven’s cooking?’ Brody said ingeniously with a wicked glint in his eye. ‘Your wit? Your charm…s…’

  She looked away hastily. If they didn’t stop exchanging sexual innuendo she’d disgrace herself and dissolve into a puddle of excitement at his feet. Really she shouldn’t be like that, not as a widow with almost five years of marriage under her belt, but with him? Oh, she was, and it was damned annoying.

  But then it was those five years that made her capable of swapping quips as they were, surely.

  Chapter Six

  Dammit he had to slow this down. He could not, dared not, face a rejection. It would be unbearable, and not just down to the ache in his staff. Brody admitted he was in unknown, uncharted territory. Here was a lady he ached for, who as a widow should be knowledgeable, willing and within his orbit for some light-hearted dalliance. Something was wrong and he couldn’t put his finger on what. She was aroused, he was sure of it, but also skittish as a virgin, which if she was a widow was highly unlikely. So what, therefore, wasn’t right? Plus why was it so damned important they achieved an arrangement with a depth of feeling and understanding he didn’t normally bother about? She matters.

  ‘Then let us get back onto the subject,’ he said amiably. ‘I want to get to know you. Yes in every way possible, I make no bones about that. However…’ He held his hand in the air just in case she had thought to interrupt, which to be fair she gave no signs of doing, but he intended to pre-empt any such occasion. ‘However, I’m happy to let you set the pace. For us to discover everything about each other we need to know.’

  ‘Freely and no coercion?’ Mary asked suspiciously. ‘You’ll abide by what I say?’

  ‘Of course… well… I’ll do my best,’ he amended quickly. ‘I can’t promise not to try and push you in the direction I wish us to go. But then, I’m sure if it’s not the way you prefer you’ll steer us elsewhere.’

  ‘You had better believe it, Y… Brody.’

  ‘That’s settled then,’ he replied thankfully. ‘For more than anything else I need a friend. They are somewhat in short supply at the moment. People march on in a straight line. I took a different line and found myself out of step. We’ll go at your pace.’

  He stretched out his hand and stroked her cheek. ‘Your pace, whatever it is.’ A bee alighted on his sleeve and flew off, its gentle buzz loud in the silence. Nearby, a snail had crawled over a stone and Brody pointed to the silver trail it left. ‘As slow as a snail if that is what you desire.’

  She bit her lip, and sighed. ‘I don’t know what I want.’

  ‘Some of those lovely delicacies I saw in the pantry and packed in the basket?’ Brody said with deliberate flippancy.

  She grinned, and turned her head to kiss the finger which touched her. ‘That’s not a bad start.’

  Brody waved her to sit down as she began to rise. ‘You sit still, it will be my pleasure to serve you.’

  Mary sat once more and, he saw, relaxed without fussing over her gown. Again he was treated to a glimpse of her ankles and those tantalising ribbons from her sandals that criss-crossed upwards under her skirts.

  ‘It will be a novelty,’ she said. ‘To be treated thus. One I suspect I’d best not get too used to.’

  Brody chuckled as he unpacked crockery and silverware, and found some salt and pepper in twists of paper. He carried them to the long table between the chairs and set them down. ‘What did you say you do at the Grange?’ he asked in as casual a manner as
possible. He glanced at her sideways so as not to be too obvious he was watching to see how she reacted.

  Her eyes narrowed. ‘I don’t believe I did. Why?’ She looked up at him in suspicion. ‘Is it important?’

  Damn.

  Brody went back to the basket to extract cheese, bread and cooked chicken and fruit, which he balanced on top of each other for the few steps he needed to take. ‘Not at all and for no particular reason. I merely wondered who has first call on your time.’ There, that sounded innocent enough surely?

  ‘I do. Whatever I do at the Grange I do when it is needed. I choose.’

  ‘And your employer is happy with that?’ He passed her a plate and proffered the bread and cheese.

  ‘Thank you.’ Mary broke off the end of the loaf and did the same with some cheese. ‘My employer knows I do what’s best for the estate.’

  Her tone warned him not to probe further. Brody considered his options. Was there any need? Her words confirmed she was employed by whoever owned the Grange, and if he decided he had to know more he could ask Henning, or Boleyn. Along the lines of “who are my neighbours now?”. Which gave rise to the knotty problem of how much he wanted this lady who was not in his class. Would she agree to spend time with him? To be friends and see what resulted? Over and above anything else?

  He needed a friend who would be there, whatever. To say it again formed his intentions. Mary had to be the one, however things progressed. Brody ate some cheese in an absent manner, formulating his thoughts until the milky, sharp and distinctive local flavour hit his taste buds.

  ‘Lord this is good. Do you make it?’

  Mary chewed, swallowed and shook her head. ‘Not me, Mrs Niven.’ She tore another piece of bread from the loaf, wrapped it around a piece of cheese and began to eat once more. Brody couldn’t take his eyes off her lips as they moved. He glanced lower. For some strange reason, the way the skin over her throat and neck rippled as she finished her mouthful teased every one of his senses.