Page 56 of The Ladies Least Likely
“Pen.”
There was light, a tiny candle, but light, pure and steady. “Pen?”
A woman’s voice. Something damp on his brow, cool—not blood. A cloth. He clutched the hand. A woman’s hand, fine-boned, delicate, the skin as soft as cream.
Bluebells. The beach smelled of bluebells. He was dead.
God, that was a relief. He wouldn’t have to face the failure. To learn who had died, who had been torn apart, how many good men had been lost in the bloody hunt for treasure and glory.
“Wake up. It’s anotherhunllef. A nightmare.”
“I’m alive?”
He felt alive. Blood rushed through his body. His arms worked. So did his legs. A woman’s form hovered above him—exposed to the guns and flames. She’d be shot and killed.
“Cover!” he shouted and pulled her down, rolling her under his body. She was warm and soft and yet at the same time delightfully firm, her body lithe and strong. And very shapely. He felt every line of it against his body. His alive, not bleeding, not maimed body.
“Pen!” Her muffled shout was a half-cry, half-laugh. One hand slapped his cheek, but gently. Her other arm snaked around him, her hand sliding over his back from waist to shoulder. He wasn’t wearing a shirt and her soft, hot hand blazed a trail over his bare skin.
“You’re at St. Sefin’s.”
Not Tenerife. He dropped his head into the crook of her shoulder, burying his face in her soft, warm, scented skin. He wasn’t dead.
Bowen was dead. Nelson lost his arm, removed mid-battle so he didn’t bleed out from his injury. Jervis had been made Earl of St. Vincent.
And he, Lieutenant Rhydian Price, had been recovering in a naval hospital when the black-edged letter came. His brother had caught pneumonia on a hunting trip to Scotland, some foolish dare to swim an icy Scottish loch. Not something the sensible Viscount Penrydd would do. So Rhydian was discharged to the house in London, limping, still swathed in bandages, his pain bone-deep and constant.
His sister Arwen was dead, too. The consumption had killed her in that awful sanitorium while he’d been playing buccaneer in the West Indies. His mother was long dead, buried in the lovely estate in Essex that she had brought to her marriage. His cold-eyed stepmother and his brother’s helpless wife had been at the London townhouse to receive him. Edwin hadn’t siredan heir, so Rhydian was now the Viscount Penrydd, fourth of that title. He owned the London townhouse, the estates in Essex and Cumbria, a hunting box in Scotland, a house and assorted properties in Wales. And all the obligations and duties of his grandfather, and his father, and now his brother had devolved upon him. Along with their debts.
There was a lot of debt. Something else the otherwise sensible 3rd Viscount Penrydd should never have dived into. Edwin was the heir, the sportsman, solid marks on his university exams, a pedigreed wife. Rhydian had always been knocked about by his father, his brother, his cousins, his own heedless exploits. He was the second son, an annoyance to his solid, competent, respectable brother. He was perpetually in a scrape, in a temper, or in trouble of some sort, living from one spree to another. Until he inherited the title, two viscountesses to support, the houses and estates. And Edwin’s mistakes.
He’d come to Wales for something to do about that. Recent events were still hazy. He held still, breathing in the woman below him who lay supple but alert, waiting for him to collect himself. He’d needed to sell properties to pay money his brother owed. He’d never seen the Welsh holdings, so they could go. He’d met up with a friend from his Eton days, Turbeville, a worthless sot but a great deal of fun. There’d been another man he’d agreed to see, a knight’s son who’d been sniffing around his brother’s widow back in London. Prunella wouldn’t wed again unless she could improve her station, but the knight had some property in Wales, so Pen thought to approach him as a buyer.
And then—something happened. He’d been hit over the head by bluebells.
“You’re back?” Gwen whispered.
“I’m awake.” He drew his nose along the line of her neck, then trailed kisses along her collarbone. She shivered. She was inher shift and wrap, hair in a loose braid. She smelled of night air and everything in the world that was pure and clean and lovely.
He couldn’t remember why she had come to him. He didn’t know why she hadn’t told him who he was. He couldn’t remember what he wanted in Wales, but he wanted Gwenllian ap Ewyas. More than he’d ever wanted anything in his life.
When she shifted, her legs parted slightly, and he slid his knee between hers. Her breath hitched.
“How do you feel?”
“I need something,” he murmured. The skin of her shoulder tasted oh so faintly of rosemary. Soft. Delicious. Her hand moved over his back again, inching downward this time, fingers trailing soft fire along his shoulder blade, ribs, then down to the waistband of his breeches. He’d fallen asleep wearing them.
When was the last time a woman had caressed him? He couldn’t remember that, either.
“Tea?” she whispered. “Another compress?”
He lifted his head to look in her face. Her eyes were enormous, shadowy pools. He didn’t care that he was falling into them.
“You.”
Her lips parted, and he swooped in and kissed her. She slid her other hand into his hair and held his head, kissing him back with a matching hunger. He dragged his hand from her shoulder down the side of her body and felt her hard nipple graze his palm. She was responding. She wanted him.
He groaned and kissed her more deeply, shifting his weight to the side so he didn’t crush her, slipping his hand beneath her bottom to cradle her against him. He dipped his tongue into her mouth and she caught him, meeting his passion, his need. He drew from her mouth as if he could draw out the essence of what she was. The truth of what lay between them.
