Jane Bites Back_ A Novel - Michael Thomas Ford [6]
“Watching the storm,” she answered.
He walked toward her, his limp only barely noticeable. From what she’d heard of him, she’d expected it to be more pronounced. But nothing about him was exactly as he was described. It was as if he appeared in different forms to everyone he met.
“It suits you,” he said when he was standing beside her. “The storm, I mean.” He put an arm around her waist. “They all think of you as a quiet afternoon,” he said. “But inside you rage with passion, don’t you?”
She said nothing. How was it he could know her so well? Already she felt as if she’d known him for years, but it had been only a day since her arrival.
“The night shows stars and women in a better light,” he said as thunder rumbled overhead. “Come inside. You’ll catch your death of cold out here.”
She allowed him to lead her back into the drawing room. But he didn’t stop there. Instead he led her down the hallway lined with portraits and landscapes and into a bedroom. His bedroom. She paused, looking at the enormous bed of carved mahogany, its sides hung with ruby red velvet draperies. The sheets were a tangled nest, as if he’d just risen from them. Throughout the room candles burned, warming the air and filling it with the faint scent of flowers.
“I can’t,” Jane told him, suddenly afraid.
“Of course you can,” he said. “There’s nothing to fear.”
She trembled as he turned and began undressing her. She closed her eyes for fear that looking at him would make her flee from the room. His fingers moved deftly over her body, slipping her dress from her shoulders. It pooled at her feet. Then he was undoing the laces of her stays. She barely breathed as he took them from her. Finally, he removed her chemise and she stood before him naked.
When his hands cupped her breasts she gasped, and when his mouth touched her skin she felt her knees buckle. He caught her, sweeping her up in his arms and carrying her to the bed. He placed her atop the sheets and stepped back. She watched through half-closed eyes as he removed his clothes. His chest was lean, his skin pale as milk. When he stepped from his trousers she glanced briefly at his manhood before looking away.
Then he was beside her, his hand stroking her as he told her how beautiful she was. His kisses covered her face, her neck, her breasts and stomach. His hands drew from her such pleasure that her breath caught in her throat.
In seconds he was on top of her, looking down into her face.
His eyes bore into her, and she could not look away. Outside the storm raged, the wind blowing one of the windows open and letting in the rain. At that moment he leaned down and kissed her. His mouth moved to her neck.
As his teeth pierced her flesh her eyes flew open.
Chapter 3
As the gardener turned away and walked in the direction of the potting shed, something slipped from his pocket. Constance stepped forward and took it up, surprised to find that it was a copy of Milton’s Paradise Regained prettily bound in green leather. It was clearly much read, and as she turned the pages Constance found herself wondering if perhaps Charles Barrowman’s thoughts encompassed more than just the removal of hedgehogs and the planting of hydrangeas.
—Jane Austen, Constance, manuscript
JANE WALKED INTO FLYLEAF BOOKS CARRYING THE VERY LARGE, very hot, and very black coffee she’d picked up to banish the headache left behind by the wine. Worse than the headache was the lingering memory of her dream. I behaved so badly, she thought. Not at all like a lady.
“Nice of you to come in,” Lucy teased. She pushed a lock of long, curly black hair behind her ear.
In her early twenties, Lucy Sebring was sarcastic, funny, and fiercely intelligent. At her interview two years ago she’d told Jane that she’d left college to play in an all-girl punk rock band whose song titles were lifted from well-known feminist works. After six months on the road together the four of them had all started to get their periods at the same time. They’d broken up one night when, in front of an audience,