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“Not yet six of the clock, Your Grace,” the valet said with perfect, stony politeness.
Maximus’s mouth tightened, but he said not a word as he tied the laces. He threw on his breeches, shirt, waistcoat, and coat. Artemis was dressing just as swiftly, and he wondered if she did this every day: dressed without help. She must, though. She hadn’t a lady’s maid unless Penelope lent her hers. The thought made him more irritable. His own mother and most ladies he knew couldn’t dress themselves without the aid of another. They weren’t supposed to have to do it themselves.
That was the chore of the lower classes.
He snatched up a candlestick and led the way from his rooms. He’d made the trek to his hidden cellar so many times he could’ve done it without the light, but Artemis would need it. His heels clacked loudly on the steps as he descended, and it wasn’t until he stood before the door to the crypt that it occurred to him:
Kilbourne was a murderer thrice over.
They hadn’t bothered to chain the madman because he’d been insensible. Now Maximus bitterly damned his own stupidity. Who knew what waited beyond the door?
“Stay here,” he told Artemis curtly.
She frowned, watching him put the key to the door. “No.”
His head reared back, his eyes narrowing. He simply wasn’t used to anyone disobeying his orders. He took a breath to still his immediate impulse to order her back to his rooms. “We don’t know what his disposition is like.”
Her look was withering. “Which is why I’m coming inside.”
Maximus darted a look at Craven. The valet was examining the ancient graffiti on the wall as if he’d never seen it before and was considering writing an academic paper on it.
“He might be dangerous.”
She arched an eyebrow. “Not to me.”
“Artemis.”
She simply reached out and covered his hand with hers to turn the key and push open the door. Artemis started to enter the room, but Maximus was damned if he’d let her go in first. He might not be able to stop her from seeing her lunatic brother, but he could protect her at the very least.
He ducked his head and went inside ahead of her.
The cellar was very quiet. The brazier still glowed with the embers of the coals and a single candle flickered, casting light on the man in the cot. He was still, lying on his side, facing away from the door.
Maximus approached cautiously. Artemis might think her brother harmless, but he’d been found with the bloody bodies of three of his friends. A man capable of that was capable of anything.
He was within a stride of the bed when its occupant reared up like a sleeping giant awakened. Maximus had been aware that Viscount Kilbourne was a big man—he’d carried his dead weight out of Bedlam after all—but somehow Kilbourne seemed to have gained bulk along with his senses. His shoulders were as broad and thick as those of a smith, his head shaggy with untrimmed hair. His beard had grown, and now Kilbourne looked like nothing so much as a green man. Something big, feral, and ancient that haunted gloomy woods and knew not the language of men.
ore her mouth from his, panting. “Faster.”
“Like this?” he asked, and flicked with his thumb.
“Yes.” She closed her eyes, her words slurred as she felt the lovely warmth. “Yes, oh, yes.”
His long fingers explored her intimately, each touch sparking her passion higher as he kissed her with leisurely thoroughness. She felt something building beneath her surface, like water over a fire just before it comes to a boil. She closed her eyes, lost in the sensations, feeling wanton.
Feeling free.
He broke their kiss and suddenly took her nipple between his lips just as he sped up his flicks against her clitoris, and she felt as if something inside her detonated. She shuddered, arching into his mouth, his hand, waves of fiery bliss spreading to her toes and fingertips.
It was like finding a new world.
She opened her eyes to see him delicately licking the tip of her nipple as he watched her. “Did you like that?”
She nodded, voiceless with pleasure.
He suddenly closed his own eyes, his hips tilting into her as if involuntarily, and he ground against her. “God. I cannot wait any longer.”
He shifted and suddenly his thick cock was between her over-sensitive folds, sliding exquisitely, making her gasp.
