Page 11 of Lie Down With a Lyon (The Lyon’s Den)

S he took to the bed that night sore at heart for all she had lost.

But, exhausted, she slept like a rock, awakening only once as dawn broke through the little window on the far wall, and she saw Dáire on the smaller bed opposite.

When he had returned from his walk, she did not know. She’d been asleep. That in itself surprised her…and not. She trusted him. Trusted him, heaven help her. She’d considered this man, his chest bare, his toes sticking out from the blankets, so innocently handsome in his sleep. Different from thousands of others, wildly so, in his work. Articulate in his speech, he was accepted by Society—paid, too, for extraordinary work. His very person was kind, funny, proud, with a regard for her so high, so strong, that he had sent his men to follow her and protect her. That he had also ruined her plans for her future was now the matter she had to work out. The first thing she could do would be to stop haranguing him for what he’d done. Then she’d take his offer to help her create a new future somewhere, somehow.

With that as comfort, she’d rolled over and gone back to sleep.

As the sun streamed hot and bright through the window and the trees rustled in the wind, she twitched her nose. The aromas of bread and coffee filled the air.

Wrapping a blanket around her shift, she padded out to the tiny kitchen.

“You do cook!” She confronted him in his chair in the great room.

“I do. Only this today”—he raised his mug toward her—“but the caretakers came early this morning with fresh rolls, oats, and a pitcher of milk.”

“I am very grateful.”

He looked like a horse had run over him. His beautiful, wavy umber hair was disheveled, his eyes red, his body lax in the chair. He gave her a half-smile. “Help yourself.”

She sliced the bread and poured her coffee, then took her plate and cup into the great room.

She chose to sit opposite him in a chair before the very healthy fire. “You’ve been up and active early.”

“I usually am.” He regarded the dancing flames.

Very well. He’d decided to remain cool toward her. Wise of him, considering how she had lambasted him yesterday.

“I promised you a bath last night, but when I returned you were asleep. I will pump the well for water now, and heat it for you to wash. Then I thought we could walk into the village. Mr. and Mrs. Campbell—the caretakers—tell me it’s just a few minutes to the west, and a dressmaker has a shop there. You’ll need clothes.”

“So do you.”

He drained his cup. “So do I.”

After their return to the cottage, Mr. Campbell arrived, leading two horses saddled for a ride. Dáire asked Blanche to come outside to meet the man. She was pleased to find the fellow hale and hearty, with a smile wreathing his pudgy face.

“I asked Mr. Campbell for these two animals. Lovely, aren’t they? I thought you might like to see the countryside,” Dáire said, his attitude toward the caretaker and the two mares free of his and her argument. She admitted to herself his friendliness was what she preferred, and decided to encourage Dáire to show to her.

“I would very much like to ride.” She’d like the diversion. The two of them had fallen into an uneasy truce, avoiding any discussion of any length at all. Blanche had no more anger to pour out on him. It got her nothing.

To be on horseback again was a welcome release from the tension between them. No one else was in sight. The sun cast a golden-red glow upon the water and the air was calm. The world, it seemed, was hers—or theirs—alone.

She spurred her mare to a trot, and the animal managed to keep her pace upon the sandy rocks well away from where the waves crashed upon the shore. Her wedding gown certainly was no garment for taking the air on a horse, but she had let go of all the aspects of her life that did not fit her new reality.

At first, Dáire was a few lengths behind her. His mare as adept as hers, he was soon beside her. He even had a smile on his face.

“Might we have these horses each day?” she asked as they returned to the cottage.

“If you’d like that, I’ll ask.”

“I would. I’d also like to meet Mrs. Campbell. She was kind to make us dinner. I would like to go with you to their home and give her my regards.” While they had gone to the village, the couple had brought a good stew and hung the pot on the fireplace hook.

When they returned, the sun had set. The cottage appeared somehow lived in. From the aromas of stew and coffee, the little house had the fragrant sense of home.

The next day and the one after that, they strolled to the village. The dressmaker had finished two gowns for Blanche. A shift and petticoat, too. Blanche hated her half corset and asked for another. She’d rather none at all, but needs must if one had more flesh to display than the average girl. Best of all, the seamstress had made a riding jacket and skirt of lime green and navy worsted wool.

Dáire had been supplied with two shirts from the modiste. And Mr. Campbell had gone into the next village and found a men’s tailor who had a few pairs of breeches ready made. He’d bought them for Dáire. All three fit.

Blanche noted how well the new breeches clung to the might of the man who had captured her as if he were a pirate on the high seas. He stood in the kitchen one late afternoon, the dying rays of the sun falling over his dark hair and casting shadows over his sculpted face and magnificent muscles. He was a rare specimen of manhood, and her blood heated with her appreciation.

She shouldn’t admire him so. But then, from the moment they had met, he had thrilled her with his virility. If any man were destined to carry her off with him, she would have said it should be Dáire O’Neill.

Later, in the village tearoom, they sat and enjoyed fresh bread and roast beef with strong mustard. As they ate, Blanche noticed a man in the square carrying newspapers under his arm.

Dáire followed her line of sight. “I’ll buy a copy. Stay here.”

Her good spirits flew away with his words. She wanted to know what was said of her and Dáire, and the others.

The Sussex Inquirer had nothing good to say.

“‘An outrageous act of countless heathens occurred last Friday at St. Pancras Church,’” she read aloud. “‘A lady, alighting her coach to attend her wedding, was abducted in the sight of all. The intended bridegroom, a gentleman known to many in Society, attempted to rescue the lady from her captor. Alas, that was not to be. She was carried off, objecting loudly to her kidnapper. Bow Street has been advised, and we understand a very concerned lady who is a benefactor of the kidnapped bride has hired a runner to find her friend.’”

Blanche closed the paper in her lap and took another sip of her tea. “The piece glosses over much of what happened.”

“Leaves Winthrop’s name out,” Dáire groused. “As for the other omissions, I think Mrs. Dove-Lyon had a hand in that.”

“She would not appreciate a full revelation of her involvement. Who I am. Whom I was to marry. How that poor man disappeared.” Blanche took Dáire’s hand across the table. He’d had no news from his men of the welfare of Henry Mercer. “Your men must continue to search for him.”

“They will find him. Never fear.”

“Do you think your friend, Lord Carlisle, had any influence on what was printed?”

Dáire took a big breath. “He might, yes. For the world to know that I kidnapped a lady on her way to be married would not reflect well on his choice of me to accomplish his work.”

“Nor on you,” she added, concern growing that Dáire would pay dearly for his abduction of her. “If you had been named, such an incident might reflect poorly on all your future work.”

Dáire squeezed her hand. “Let us not worry. The news, bland as it is, is good. No names were printed. No aspersions cast.”

“Not mine,” she said with gratitude. “Nor yours. Nor my father’s.”

“We will count our blessings that this is all the news they printed.”

As they ate their supper that night at the tiny table near the fire, she noted their new companionship. Without her anger, without his fear for her marrying a less-than-honorable man, they had relaxed into their normal selves. She enjoyed the camaraderie—and wanted more. With the hope that was possible, she ventured to ask him about himself.

“I’d like to know why you and my father are at odds.”

The question made him blink. Those long black lashes swept down and hid his surprise.

“Please tell me.”

He paused.

“Three years ago, I took an assignment from a viscount and his wife to find letters missing from her writing desk. She had employed a new maid recently, and she was my first suspect. The girl did confess immediately upon questioning, but she had given the letters to her beau. That man was employed by your father—and he’d given over the letters to him. When I questioned him and he told me your father had them in his possession, I got up to go. He had a knife, which he brandished, but he was not as fast nor as skilled at its use as I was. In the scuffle, I pierced some organ near his ribs, and he suffered badly for weeks, trying to recover. Your father had one of his men come for me. I was taken to your father’s house in Seven Dials, blindfolded, hands tied, and legs shackled. He told me then and there that the man I had attacked was one of his best second-story men and he hated the loss of such a good fellow. You see, he’d been poorly ever since we fought. He’d not fight, nor climb a second story, nor walk very far ever again.”

She crossed her arms, envisioning how fiendish her father could be. “So my father threatened you.”

“He told me I should never come so close to anyone near and dear to him…”

She caught her breath. “Or…what?”

“He would see I suffered the same disabilities as his man. Worse, actually.” Dáire shoved back his chair and shot up to pour them draughts of whisky from his flask. “Fortunately, I have never since had an assignment that was in any way connected to your father.”

“Until now.” She knew what her father was capable of. How easy it was for him to steal or cheat or lie…or kill.

Dáire handed over her glass. “I knew the day would come.”

She placed her fingers over his and would not let him go. “But not over me.”

He pulled away and strode to the hearth. “When I met you on that bridal path, I thought of nothing but you. How could I?” He whirled to face her. “You were everything I’d ever wanted. No, not that. Everything I’d never known I wanted.”

His declaration drew her like a magnet. He wanted her. Had from the beginning. She rose, put her arms around his waist, and absorbed the stalwart man he was. He didn’t push her away but crushed her near. His body was her shield, his might her strength. “You knew who I was?”

“Yes! I knew who you were! I’d seen you before. Last year, it was. One of my men pointed you out to me. But then, after we met, I feared for you because of your father. I had you followed—yes, to keep you safe—and witnessed a terrible argument you had with him in the middle of Piccadilly.”

“That day he threatened to make me marry.”

Dáire raised her chin. “Oh, my darling, he should never have done that.”

“No,” she whispered, emboldened. Her lips brushed his. Her eyes closed. “You are my heaven and no one will ever compare.”

He muttered something in a lyrical language she surmised was Gaelic. He might have cursed, but she heard his words as ones of endearment.

“Sweet woman.” He pulled her even closer and claimed her mouth. This kiss, so much like the first, was filled with a passion that lifted her, buoyed her to a new and wondrous heaven.

She fell into the aura of peace and desire, contentment and need. She clutched him close and kissed him back time and again until he broke off and picked her up. She felt the chaise longue beneath her…and Dáire O’Neill pressing down above her.

His hands were in her hair, his lips on her throat, his legs tangled with hers. She arched into his warmth and drew him forth to settle all his strength upon her. She ran her foot along his calf and tilted up her hips to wrap her legs around his hips.

“Oh, my girl,” he moaned, and dropped his forehead to her chest.

He did not move, but nestled as he was in the hollow of her aching body, she reveled in the hot length of his desire for her.

“We cannot,” he ground out, and tried to push away.