An Ellora’s Cave Romantica Publication

www.ellorascave.com

Mechanical Rose

ISBN 9781419916267

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Mechanical Rose Copyright © 2008 Nathalie Gray

Edited by Mary Moran.

Cover art by Syneca.

Electronic book Publication May 2008

This book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the publisher, Ellora’s Cave Publishing, Inc.® 1056 Home Avenue, Akron OH 44310-3502.

Warning: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.  (http://www.fbi.gov/ipr/)

This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the authors’ imagination and used fictitiously.

MECHANICAL ROSE

Nathalie Gray

Chapter One

She held him until he had drawn his last breath. Only then did she let his lifeless form slump to the checkered floor, his face a sharp contrast to the black velvet jacket he wore. She did not hate him. She hated none of them, these dangerous men. But to preserve the fragile balance, to protect the world from their carelessness, their wars or grand ambitions, she had been tasked with either their capitulation or their murders. None had ever suffered at her hands for this was not her way. Eleanor Cleverly may be a spy, a murderess, but she was no fiend. Why resort to violence when a simple drop of potent poison would suffice?

Through her gloves she felt his neck cooling. After she gently let his head rest on the floor, she stood, dusted her corseted dress and retracted the spring-loaded needle into her broach, which she then reattached to her bodice. Shaped like a blood-colored rose, light reflected off its glossy petals. In fact, enough weapons were concealed on her person—her corset alone was a veritable armory—to kill a man in half a dozen ways. Slender dagger, garrote, pistols, poison.

Without a backward glance, Eleanor swept through the grand foyer, noiselessly opened the door and emerged from the man’s house to a clear, cool night where stars twinkled like sapphires in a sky of black satin. Steam-powered dragons of brass and silver flew overhead, their mechanical flapping wings and clanking gears discernible to her keen hearing, the subtle gleam of their hulls catching the twin moons’ light over the bristled city skyline.

The Divine Graces must have been on her side. Not that she had ever needed their intervention.

Smells of the night greeted her as she rushed from her target’s house, padded to the corner of the interior courtyard, making sure no one would surprise her while she activated her own dragon—a smaller version of those above. She nimbly climbed on the hinged stepladder, shook the hem of her dress out of the way as she turned to sit at the commands. Like burnished gold, the ignition lever glimmered when she wrapped her gloved hand around it, released the foot brake by small increments until steam hissed an angry tune as it filled the machine’s cylinders.

With a lurch, the dragon took off. Rose above the man’s house, higher until wind whipped at her hair and stung her eyes. The unseasonable chill shocked her. Only mid-autumn and already cold-charged high winds howled and wailed. Made it smell like winter. But then again, she should not be so surprised. Unfortunately, Terra’s climate had gone the same way as its population—out of control. If the latter had been fixed with an assisted selection vaccine for anyone not chosen to become parents, the former was proving more problematic. Due to mankind’s foolishness climate had grown unstable in the last decades, so much so that seasons blended into one long uninterrupted blur of gray days and cold nights. And the wind. Travel by air, lauded not so long ago, had now become the means of transportation of the poor. Or those who preferred anonymity. Such as herself.

She presently flew above the city center, built on piles hundreds of feet over the marshy lands that had, for all the rain, undergone a dramatic expansion in the last century. Eleanor swerved to the south, flew almost to the end of New Gaulis’ limits then spotted her destination, a belfry of brickwork and stone cladding with a giant clock on one of its five faces. She was landing on the topmost turret, a framed spire of cast iron, when the clock chimed the hour with its two-octave carillon. The profound sound traversed her belly, made her cringe. After securing her dragon with its mooring line so it would not topple from its precarious perch, she opened the door leading to the wrought iron steps, which she took two at a time.

Mr. Clarence already waited in the salon. Smoke from his longhorn pipe rose blue in the gas lamp light. He poured her tea from a long glass and silver carafe then set it back on its heater. Steam hissed from coils of copper pipes underneath the porcelain plate.

“He is gone?” Mr. Clarence asked, even if he must have known already.

Her colleagues of the Mechanical Rose Society prided themselves on their connections and vast network of informants and sleeper agents. She had often wondered if they also spied on full members, of which she was part. Probably.

“Everything went as planned.”

Mr. Clarence nodded, his brown eyes sad, wrinkles forming over his dark brow. “Unfortunate. I was hoping he would come to his senses before we had to act.”

He proffered the thin white cup, which she accepted before removing her gloves. “Unfortunate, yes, but inevitable, I am afraid. Even in the end, when he realized who I was, he would not sign the peace treaty.” Tea burned her lips, but she welcomed the small discomfort for it chased the lingering cold that had seeped into her clothes and bones on her way to the meeting. She shivered. “I would enjoy a few days to myself, I think. Somewhere warm.”

“That will not be possible, my dear Eleanor. A pressing matter requires your expert touch.”

She had not wanted to show her displeasure but could not stifle the long sigh. “Yes?”

Mr. Clarence nodded. “I know you have pulled more than your fair share lately. But our Society is needed now more than ever.” He reached inside his jacket pocket and retrieved a small tube he set on the table. Despite his age, his hand looked supple and possessed the rich color and shine of coffee beans. He must have been a striking man in his youth.

Eleanor took and uncapped it so she could unroll the sheets of paper and read. Some of her hair—the red tint gradually giving way to her natural black—spilled on the sheet. She blew it out of the way. The picture of a teenager occupied the top half while the intelligence the Society had gathered on the young man took the lower part.

“A child, Mr. Clarence? Has it come to this?” She had little qualms about engaging full-grown men or women, but an adolescent? What could he have possibly done to warrant the Society’s interest?

He shook his head. “Read the date. This picture is almost twenty years old. Leeford Gunn is a man of thirty-nine now.”

“From the Gunn family? The Gunns?”

“The same. My guess is that Mr. Gunn, a brazen young man and now a social disaster, embarrassed them one time too many with his inventions and eccentric behavior, and so they have exiled him to their seaside estate. He takes care of a cousin there as well. He is a decent fellow, this Mr. Gunn, from what I have heard. If only he had better judgment with his business associations.”

“What has he done? What danger does he pose?” Those blue eyes spoke to her.

Mr. Clarence rose, stretched his long frame. “Out of desperation, he accepted money from the wrong man. It is all in the file. Read it. Learn it. Tomorrow you leave for the coast. Fresh air would do me good as well, but I am afraid this requires your personal touch.”

After a nod, she poured over the file, all two measly sheets of it. So this Leeford Gunn was an inventor and during a recent trade fair had attracted the attention of a very dangerous man, an engineer named Aloysius Spark whom the Society had wanted to “approach” for many years—without success—and on whom it kept a very, very close eye. She should know how dangerous the man was—they had at one point been lovers, even if love had never been part of the equation. He did to her body what she, at that time, needed and vice versa. Sex with Spark had been brutal and exhilarating. She had ended their torrid relationship when the Society received information regarding his less-than-moral experiments on cadavers. To think she had received him in her own bed. Eleanor shivered.

Gunn’s invention, from what little detail was in the file, had the potential to start another arms race and, with Spark’s financial means and political aspirations, could become very, very dangerous. And they had a history these two, all the way back to their education—Spark at a prestigious university, the other sent to a modest backcountry college despite his family’s great wealth and influence. But that was all. Eleanor flipped both pages back and forth. Not much information. Gunn seemed to be a secretive sort, hence the lack of visual document, with a lighthouse for laboratory and a rural setting for his research. She would have to build the file as she went, not an ideal situation, but as far as field work was involved, the Society had no better agent. With the exception of Mr. Clarence, of course, but a distinguished older gentleman attracted more attention in certain circles than a thirty-four-year-old woman with more curves than a kettle.

Eleanor yawned, took another look at the picture of the narrow-faced, dark blond young man with the bluest, most intense, dazzling eyes she had ever seen. A hint of a mocking grin touched his lips. The old picture had been taken outdoors with wind playing in his hair. Such vitality back then, which she surmised had evaporated given his reclusive life and ostracism from the Gunn family. She hoped with all her heart she would not have to use her last card with him, that he would listen to reason and drop his research into the dangerous project. The sort of knowledge such research could yield—and the machines built from it—could not fall into the hands of men such as Aloysius Spark. No matter the cost.

* * * * *

The train ride proved long enough to give her time to ready herself, learn the file, arrange her new looks—back to her natural black-eyed, black-haired self finally—but not too lengthy that Eleanor grew bored. An easy feat with her. She had always been attracted to action and danger, even at a young age. At nineteen, she had been the youngest member to be approached by the Society—thanks to the dean’s contacts—and had joined right out of university with a degree in political science under her belt. Had it been fifteen years already? Mr. Clarence’s star pupil. The respect was mutual, even if she would never trust any member of the Mechanical Rose Society. With them, the common good superseded that of individuals. She accepted that.

Dawn slashing the sky with brown and purple, she presently stepped off the train, pulling the trunk behind her with an assortment of creaks and groans, and proceeded to scan faces. Her ground transportation, arranged by the Society, would be waiting for her. When she spotted a woman with a coach driver’s tall hat, Eleanor joined her, exchange a nod then followed her to a gleaming black vehicle already steaming and ready to go. They drove over graceful bridges and twisting streets where a few ramps jutted out over the void for those with flying machines.

Out of the city—she had never before visited Aconia and its fabled botanical gardens, and vowed to after her mission was over—they rode in silence through the lush hills, interspersed with whitish boulders and gnarled trees, until the road forked. Her driver swerved left onto the narrower road and soon Eleanor spotted the sea beyond, which seemed to become one with the gray sky. A timid dawn sun managed to poke a blade or two of light and hit the sea at an acute angle.

“Fifteen minutes,” announced her driver. “We should be there at six thirty, as arranged.”

Eleanor sat straighter. She had learned the file by heart but still went over the details to make sure she had everything right. Her name was Violet Escoraille, distant relative to Gunn’s cousin, a woman whose mind tended to wander, or so the Society had gleaned. A “Violet” did not exist in reality, but in such a large family as the Escorailles, no one could be certain who had given birth when and who had married whom. The Society had deemed it safe. So, fatigued with the city life of her native Sigona, Miss Violet had decided to pay her relative a visit and benefit from the fresh ocean air. End of story. She would have to invent the rest.

When the coach crested over a steep hill, a vibrant shade of green despite the clouds, the Gunn seaside estate came into view. It resembled a multitiered castle of cards made of angles and bridges, twisting wrought iron stairs and spires, glass and copper covered in verdigris, and the whole thing mounted on a collection of elaborate piles. It defied every law of physics, yet beauty and harmony blended well with the improbable juxtapositions. Beyond the asymmetrical roofline, a lighthouse stabbed skyward.

Her driver managed the twisting road up to the estate with speed and agility, if a bit of recklessness and soon pulled in front of the house. No one waited for her, for which she was glad, as it gave her a few precious moments to study the place. Numerous side doors and windows that could be used for hasty retreats. Entry points on every level. The gas line running along the easternmost wall. Nodding to her driver, Eleanor stood, pulled her trunk behind her and jumped off the coach at the same time as one of the doors opened and out rushed a young woman.

In a cloud of steam, the coach sped out the way it had come, the crunch of its wheels against the gravel receding fast. The woman must have been used as getaway driver more often than tame coach chauffeur.

“Violet!” called the young woman, her loose hair flowing behind her. Barefoot—it was cold in these parts—and with the hem of her faded burgundy dress in one hand, she rushed at Eleanor and engulfed her in a lavender-smelling hug that stole the breath from her.

Eleanor dropped her trunk to return the embrace. A genuine rush of affection filled her even if she had never met the person. Who could resist such reception? She tried to dispel her embarrassment by patting her “cousin” on the back. “Lily, I am so glad to meet you!”

She truly was. Eleanor made a mental note to keep her emotions under stronger leash. She would not remain for long and could not forge emotional ties with anyone here.

“Oh no, it is Lady Frivolous, that is what Leeford calls me.”

“Lady Frivolous?”

The young woman nodded, beaming. “I like it!”

“So do I,” Eleanor replied, grinning as well. She did like it as the moniker fit the person to perfection.

“Here,” Lady Frivolous said, reaching for the trunk and grabbing the handle. “Let me get—Divine Graces, what is in there?”

Eleanor wanted to laugh. On the outside, she may be dressed and look like a polite society lady—down to the long gray corseted gown, gloves and tilted hat—but inside the clothes, she was a woman who could scale walls, shoot pistols, outrun most men and hold her own in a fight. One who had enjoyed many a lover’s touch and returned the favor tenfold. So her suitcase content tended to reflect that. She doubted many ladies traveled with explosives shaped like buttons and a set of grappling hooks tucked away among their underthings.

“I will get that,” a male voice said from her right.

Eleanor aborted the fighting instincts at the sudden intrusion. A tall, bearded young man stood by, glaring at her from underneath thick brown eyebrows. The groundskeeper according to her file. A man with no past, or so it would seem, but a sour disposition. She logged him under “possible threats” in her mental catalog.

“Max,” Lady Frivolous said, tut-tutting. “Extra sneaky today?” She giggled when the man scowled as he bent to pick up Eleanor’s trunk. It looked small and light in his bear paw of a hand. But he did crack the young woman a small smile when he turned to leave. Eleanor made a mental note of this as well.

Arm in arm, Lady Frivolous and Eleanor followed the large man across the gravel courtyard, up a wide set of stairs that twisted to the first level and onto a wide, wrought iron balcony. Stained-glass doors opened automatically, steam hissing from the mechanism hidden near the floor. Eleanor gave a quick peek at the tiny set of gears and pipes coiled on the jamb, no doubt triggered by some sort of pressure plate near the threshold, and smiled. Clever.

Inside the foyer, the metal-and-glass frame ended to be replaced with elegant wood in rich russet tones and creamy plaster walls. If the outside of the manor looked definitely more industrial, the inside was warm and inviting. She shook the silly notion away.

“Leeford is due to come out in four minutes,” Lady Frivolous announced after checking a wall-mounted clock ticking in a corner. “He is never late.”

Four minutes? That was precise.

Max and the young woman took her to a great room filled with books and an assortment of machines great and small, of which she had no idea the use. Red velvet couches, worn threadbare but still elegant, occupied one of the walls, which faced the ocean. High winds, which could be heard whistling outside, frothed the sea into white caps. To her left, the lighthouse stood erect, a tiny path leading to its front door. Supported by wires, a slender copper pipe—the gas line, no doubt—ran from the corner of the house to the lightning rod on the lighthouse’s breast-shaped roof. The topmost window glowed amber and she wondered if this was where Gunn worked. Her eyes were once again drawn to the ocean’s majestic beauty. She could get used to such view.

“Why not take your gloves and hat off, Violet,” Lady Frivolous offered. Did the woman always smile? “And warm yourself by this here.” She pointed to a contraption of copper pipes made to resemble a strange, uncomfortable-looking stool. “Leeford made it.”

Eleanor had no doubt he had.

Gloves and hat on a table—or she thought it was a table, hard to tell in this place what was furniture and what was machine—she turned to the groundskeeper, but with a thunk, he deposited her trunk and left without a word or backward glance.

“Is it something I—”

The sudden explosion drowned the rest of her sentence. The tremor passed through her. Eleanor, forgetting her new “proper lady” persona for a split second, crouched in a fighting stance, fists up and ready. The discreet slit from the hem of her dress to the waistband opened over her leg, on which she had strapped her small pistol, its twin slid into the double back of her corset. Dust fell like snow from the rafters above. Remembering where she was—and who she was—she quickly straightened, smoothed her dress and rushed to the window. Smoke rose from the lighthouse roof.

“What was that? Should we go look?”

When no one answered, she turned to find Lady Frivolous gazing out the window, a faint smile playing on her lips. She hummed under her breath.

“Lady Frivolous?” Eleanor asked. “Should we not go check on Mr. Gunn?”

Humming, the young woman did not seem to hear her. She chuckled, twirled a lock of hair around her index finger.

“For good fortune’s sake,” Eleanor muttered, marching out of the great room in search of an access to the back door. There had to be a quick way out of this strange house!

After a moment of fruitless search, she found a narrow window through which she could spot a balcony that ran the entire length of the house before jutting out far enough to allow her—after a good jump—clear access to the stairs leading down. It would have to do.

Wind whipping her hair out of its pins, she passed a leg then a shoulder, squeezed out of the house and padded to the handrail, over which she jumped. The hem of her dress in a fist, she cocked back a leg, waited for a second then leaped the six-foot divide between the balcony and the stairs going down to the ground at least twenty feet below. She landed both feet on a step but snagged her dress and tore it at the waist.

Cursing, she rushed to ground level and had jumped onto the crushed gravel path leading to the lighthouse when another explosion, this time smaller, momentarily made her ears buzz. What if something had happened to him? The Mechanical Rose Society always primed peaceful means of resolution and loathed loss of life. She too would prefer Gunn survived and continued his genius work in a less dangerous field.

She shivered. Cold seeped into her ruined dress, which exposed her midriff to the humid wind. She charged up the path, took a shortcut through the long grass and leaped up to the lighthouse door just as it opened.

The door’s edge provided just narrow enough to bypass the hand she raised to fend it off and hit her in the face. She rebounded, would have fallen had the man who opened it not reached for her wrist, lightning fast, and kept her put. Eleanor’s momentum continued and she crashed against the wall, taking the man with her when she slid.

In a snarl of limbs and curses, they tumbled into the wet grass, landed both on their sides facing the other. Brass goggles gave him a curious, insectlike look while the smoky stench emanating from his clothes would make the hardiest folk faint dead on the ground. He pushed himself up on an elbow and clawed at his goggles.

“Good fortune!” he cried. The deep voice a perfect complement to the man’s long, lean body. An athlete’s frame. “Are you all right?” Amid a soot-covered face, dazzling blue eyes framed with “clean” crow’s-feet stared unblinkingly at her.

Under normal circumstances, Eleanor would have had a logical reply ready-made. She had them for every situation. Had she not been the only Society member able to tackle the Assanidian ambassador? She could have at least made a sound. Not that day. She lay there and could only stare in mute shock at the soot-covered face of Leeford Gunn—the same narrow nose and mocking mouth, twenty years older—her brain, sharpened into a dangerous blade, was now as dull as a butter knife. She had never experienced such strong reaction to a man. And for the first time in her career, she feared having to play her last card if it ever came to it. She subdued that chain of thought. What had to be done would be. The common good…

“Are you all right?” he repeated, this time slower.

She snapped out of her mental exploration of the man’s fine traits and intense blue gaze. “Yes, er, I-I am.” Her nose throbbed, as did her cheek. “I think.”

He climbed to his knees and offered her a long, ink-stained hand that she took with relief and not a little thrill. Heat spread from her belly to her sex. She could feel the tension coiling between them. She ought to say something. Quickly.

“I thought something had happened. The explosions…”

After a nod, they more or less helped each other get back to their feet. He stood well over six feet tall. As he did so, his hand pressed against her exposed skin and both froze, eyes on the other.

And as sudden as the explosion that had precipitated her downfall, Eleanor Cleverly, Mr. Clarence’s star pupil and one of the Mechanical Rose Society’s best agents, knew she had lost the edge of objectivity, the fine blade of detachment and professional separation. She had lost her indifference to a target.

* * * * *

Just his luck to have been saddled with another Lady Frivolous.

A nasty red mark rapidly spread from the bridge of her nose to her eyebrow. He could not believe the gorgeous woman still stood. Anyone else would have been knocked out cold. The door had literally rattled in its frame.

“We better put ice on that before it swells.” Was that his voice? It was not only the door she had rattled.

With a nod she turned right around and started back down the path leading to the house. Shaking his head, Leeford followed the black-haired beauty, wondering what in the world she was made of. Steel? But he was not. Already his trousers constricted him to the point of pain. Good thing he wore a long jacket or Lady Frivolous’ relative would see just what sort of effect she had on him. And a shocking thing it was too for he made it a rule to steer clear of women—people in general—unless he went to town for that exact goal, and even then he wasted no time securing a professional companion for a cordial supper and torrid night. Human interaction unnerved him. He preferred his machines by far. They never made light of him.

But this woman had stolen the breath right out of his chest. Literally. His shoulder ached from the door knocking back against him.

Leeford did not remember her name though his cousin had mentioned it at least twice. But he did recall Lady Frivolous mentioning her relative’s arrival time. This, he remembered well for his propensity to pay more attention to numbers than to people. All he knew from his guest was that she had arrived on time. Punctuality ranked high on his scale of virtues.

When they arrived at the house, she slowed. “Which way in?”

“The same way out, by my guess.”

He had never tried to be funny before and should remember why next time the urge took him. Leeford Gunn was many things—inventor, artist, tactless, alcoholic—but funny he was not.

“I do not think I would manage that,” she replied with an eyebrow arched high.

“I will help.” He offered his arm, which still smoked at the elbow. He tapped the singed fabric, knowing his awkward smile would only aggravate his situation. Typical.

She pointed to one of the second-level windows. “I am sure there is a better way in than that one.”

“You what?!”

How had she managed that one? If proper decorum had not demanded he take care of his bruised guest, he would have enjoyed a demonstration very much. That window? Divine Graces!

When she placed her hand on his arm, a stab of warmth shot through his chest. She seemed to have felt something too for her eyes flared—those striking gems were the color of a night sky—and her mouth parted. He found it very difficult to think when he started looking at those luscious lips painted a deep shade of purple.

“Ice,” she reminded him with a shadow of a smile.

He cleared his throat. “Yes. I need it.”

“For my nose.”

He cringed inwardly and ignored the comment.

Once in the kitchen, he tried his best not to act like a fool but ended up knocking things together in his rush to get ice from the ice maker. One of his first inventions. Not his best though. The machine creaked and moaned when he cranked the lever, waited for a few seconds—do not stare at her, for good fortune’s sake!—then lifted the grate so he could dip the copper ice scoop and measure out a fistful of the prized chunks. They burned his palms but he used this to focus as he walked around the kitchen, looking for a clean dishcloth. One hung from the chimney crane but it was filthy. Divine Graces, was there not a single piece of clean cloth in this kitchen?

In the end, the woman herself pulled one from the slop stone against the wall—which was filled with dirty dishes—and made a sling of it. Without meeting her gaze, Leeford dumped half the ice in the miniature hammock—he should try to design a full-sized version, with a small machine to power its pendulum, perhaps even enamel handles for that touch of beauty he enjoyed adding to his work and—

Focus, Gunn.

To his vexation, the other half of the ice fell and skittered over the tile floor. “Pardon me.”

“Oh, this is no problem at all,” she replied, smiling wide this time. Stretched over her pretty pearly teeth, her lips took on the shiny quality of black grapes. He would love to taste them. “Thank you.”

Oh great, I amuse her.

“My pleasure, Miss…?”

As much as he tortured his brain for the name, he could not remember it. Gunn, you idiot.

“Violet.”

As pretty a name as her lips. Would the color transfer to a lover’s lips, he wondered. Did they taste as sweet as they looked?

He snapped out of his trance. “Yes, of course, Miss Violet. My cousin has been waiting for you with great anticipation.” He had not been looking forward to entertaining a houseguest, but even he had the social grace not to admit it. He may have been too blunt and honest to the point of awkwardness in the eyes of “polite society”, but some modicum of etiquette had been properly beaten into him.

He shook her hand. It was warm and strong. He knew hands—his favorite part of the human anatomy, such precise machines they were—and they were not those of an upper-class lady in need of repose in the country. “What is it you do, Miss Violet?”

“I run several charities in Sigona. They keep me busy. I hear you are an inventor? How interesting!”

Her eyes broke contact for a split second. As much as he loathed human interaction, he had learned a thing or two from his family, the illustrious and insufferably political Gunn “dynasty”, and realized that Miss Violet had just lied through her teeth. About which part, he was not sure. Both he suspected because hands like those did not merely hold pens and cocktail glasses.

He felt a mocking grin pulling at his mouth. The one that had been his family’s scourge. There was one occasion where his Great Aunt Agnes had just about died of shame. No one had told him she had been deep in the business of negotiating her niece’s marriage when he had made his appearance in the great room. How had he known his mere presence at that party—dirtied from a day spent with the friendly old chimney sweep, who had shown him how things worked—would jeopardize the alliance of two powerful families? His parents, who never failed to tell him where he should not be, had put him on the train the next Monday to a boarding school across the land. They had had the largest chimneys he had ever seen there. Fascinating stuff.

Leeford smiled graciously even if he would have preferred shaking his head at her obvious lie. “You find my line of work as interesting as I find my groundskeeper charming.”

Miss Violet’s laugh surprised him by its suddenness and intensity. Such an indecorous woman! She would have made Great Aunt Agnes have a heart attack. With some degree of morbid delight, he pictured the Great Demise. Ha. He liked Miss Violet already.

“I do,” she replied, smiling. “I really do, Mr. Gunn. Inventions are what make this world go round.”

He sniffed at his singed lapel. “Or not.”

They shared a quiet grin over the dishcloth filled with ice. He watched it melt between her fingers, each droplet coursing over her skin a small instrument of torture that twisted in his belly. He was so hard it hurt. Through the ruined dress, he saw her skin pebbling in goose bumps. Leeford had to tear his gaze away when the urge to touch her all but overpowered him. For goodness’ sake, could he not even control his own mind?

You know you cannot, Gunn, hence the whisky.

True. He had a tenuous hold at best on his restless mind and when an idea struck him, sleep became all but impossible. In fact, when he worked on a new project—such as the one currently occupying his nights and what little sleep he managed to steal—he forgot everything and everyone. He still could not believe his mysterious sponsor’s grant. Unlimited research funds happened only once in an inventor’s life. Since the Gunns would not part with a single ecu from their fortune—and the chimney sweep incident was a mere drop in their oh-so-superior bucket—Leeford counted on sponsors to provide for his needs and those of his household. Lady Frivolous, whose family was also affluent and a bit more generous than his, could never hold work and no one would put up with his groundskeeper’s disposition. So to dull the incessant turning of his mental gears and to get much-needed sleep once in a while, Leeford had to resort to whisky. A lot of it, thanks to his inherited ability to hold his liquor. Well, he was a Gunn, even if he would rather not be. And for once, Great Aunt Agnes would agree with him!

Snapping out of his trance, he reached for her hand and raised the dishcloth to her face, gently pressing it to her forehead. “There, it will not do any good if it does not touch.”

She arched an eyebrow but let him minister to her. A drop of water escaped from the cloth and ran along her cheek, made it look as though she were crying, which pulled at his heartstrings for no good reason at all. Leeford thought about the bottle of whisky waiting on his night table and wondered if it would be enough today. He had a lot to forget. With a thumb, he brushed the “tear” away.

Those luscious lips of hers glistened after she moistened them. Satin. He wondered if they would be just as smooth. Of course they would. Just look at them.

She took a step forward, stood a mere hand from him. He could smell her, sense her. Her chin tilted upward. Those dazzling black eyes.

Lady Frivolous waltzing into the kitchen and humming broke the moment as effectively as if she had used a hammer to open a glass cabinet. Which she had done once. The Gunns owed a debt of gratitude to their closer relatives the Escorailles—Lady Frivolous’ family—and had thought it a perfect plan to get rid of him and to have someone watch over the unmarriable, absentminded woman. Perhaps they had meant to punish him for being a constant, clumsy thorn in their refined side. Truth be told, he would rather spend his life with Lady Frivolous and Max than a single minute with any member of his own family. The whole snobbish lot of them. She might misplace things, enter into daydreaming episodes at the least opportune times and repeat herself a lot, but her heart was in the right place. To him, nothing else mattered.

He sighed, stepped back so Miss Violet could take over the dishcloth, which she did with a long look at him.

“Oh Violet, what happened?” In a rush of swirling burgundy dress and loose brown curls, his cousin padded to the other woman and raised herself on the tip of her—naked—toes. “You are hurt!”

Miss Violet shook her head, cleared her throat. Leeford had the distinct—and very satisfying—feeling she was trying as hard as he to clear the air of the sexual tension thickening it. Had he really had an effect on her?

Other than amusement, that is.

“I am fine, really.” She shrugged. “There were these explosions, and, well, I thought it meant trouble.”

Lady Frivolous laughed. The sound of crystal bells. He did enjoy her company more than everyone else’s. Well, maybe no longer everyone else’s.

“Not here, my dear.” She turned to him, surprised him with a penetrating glance then sat on the counter, feet swinging below the frayed hem, a finger toying with the sugar nipper. Little chunks of precious sugar came loose from the cone and littered the blue ceramic tiles. “Explosions are commonplace here, are they not, Leeford?”

“Not that commonplace, I assure you,” he retorted a bit too huffily for his pride. “My house is perfectly safe.”

Now that he thought about it, maybe it was not so safe anymore. For his self-discipline anyway.

Chapter Two

Eleanor could swear the man’s hand still touched her long after he had taken it away. But his warmth remained. And the thrill, which had started at the base of her spine and now spread outward to her limbs, tingled to her extremities and hardened her nipples. She could hardly breathe, even if her corseted dress was for all intents and purposes torn in half under her arm and along the waistline.

And the attraction was mutual.

She could tell. In the way his gaze roamed over her when he thought she was not looking, and how his hands, contrary to the jerky movements that had made him dump the ice on the floor, slowed whenever he touched her. Heat wafted out of Eleanor’s adjusted collar and suddenly all she wanted was to yank it off and plaster herself against him. Because under the soot, singed clothes and disheveled hair, beneath the façade of eccentricity and social awkwardness, Leeford Gunn was a very energetic, very handsome man.

His cousin’s arrival ruined the moment and saved her from becoming entangled in her emotions. Eleanor was not sure she was grateful or not. She should be. She just was not sure she was.

“Well,” Gunn said, retreating by a step. So tall with long legs partly hidden underneath an adjusted jacket that had seen better days. He gestured at something above their heads. “I bid you good day. It has been a long night.” A quick nod and he walked away.

Eleanor could not help but watch him until he had disappeared around the corner. His long, sleek form embodied quiet strength, vitality, neither of which she had expected from a man of his profession. And where had he built shoulders like those? And his smell. It still permeated the air. Smoke and something deeply masculine yet subtle.

Lady Frivolous beamed. “He likes you.”

“I doubt that. I just invaded his privacy, made a mess of his kitchen floor. He must wish I were gone.”

Brown curls bouncing, the young woman shook her head. “He likes you, otherwise he would have gone straight to bed and not said a word. Are you hungry? I could find Max and we could share a meal, just the three of us. He is an excellent cook.”

Eleanor was. But not for food.

“No, thank you. Perhaps you would show me around your charming home? From what little I have seen, it is quite unusual.”

Lady Frivolous winked. “He likes you.”

“Ah…erm…yes. You have told me. He is a likeable fellow himself.”

“Have I? Oh, I guess I did. Repeating myself is something I tend to do.”

“Good, because I tend to forget,” she lied.

Lady Frivolous’ smile caused a stitch of remorse in Eleanor.

The young woman had made a mess of sugar on the tiled countertop by the time she swung off, dusted her dress. “His Great Aunt Agnes—she sounds like a terrible woman, that one—tried to marry him off. Twice.” Lady Frivolous smiled wide, shrugged. “The prospects she found for him were boring and dumb, dreadfully not good enough for him. But you are.”

Eleanor cleared her throat, kept busy putting the dishcloth back against the slop stone. She pretended not to hear. And tried not to agree.

She spent the rest of the day chatting with Lady Frivolous, who would lapse in her temporary fugues, humming to herself, only to emerge a few minutes later and resume the conversation as though nothing had happened. Eleanor learned to predict these episodes by watching Lady Frivolous’ eyes, which would cloud over shortly before. All in all, Gunn’s cousin proved a remarkable, astute, if strange, woman. Conversation topics ranged from men—Eleanor caught herself asking about Gunn’s recent love life, questions his cousin answered with obvious delight—to the machines populating the house and beyond. They visited the grounds, which were vast and more or less cared for, and the ragged cliffside where a metal framework caught her attention. Like railroad tracks that jutted out over the cliff for thirty or so feet then ended. A launching ramp? It was obviously a spot Lady Frivolous did not appreciate as she gave it a wide berth. As with the rest of the house and its odd inhabitants, a timeless, unfashionable beauty and shabby grace emanated from every corner, indoors or out. Clearly Gunn had no use for trendy things.

The rugged charm of the place filled Eleanor’s head with images of living here. In another life and time. When she would not have to convince a man to give up his dream using any means necessary. Even the most lethal.

When the day darkened to evening, Eleanor took a long bath—after spending a good two minutes trying to figure out the strange copper contraption hanging high over the tub—and slipped into flat shoes, a pair of loose-fitting trousers and a belted shirt. She had to look detached and relaxed if she wanted to convince him she just happened to be standing on the balcony at this hour of the night when he left for work. She had to initiate dialogue, learn his ways, earn his trust if she were ever to convince him to abandon his project. Seducing him would be easy since she suspected as much interest from him as she felt for him. But not tonight. Slow and steady. Perhaps a conversation, a shared interest. If it came to sex—Eleanor tried not to fidget at the prospect—it would have to look natural and not rehearsed. She knew her attributes and would employ them. Emotions would not play a part.

At five to ten, the time Lady Frivolous had told her Gunn would leave for the laboratory, Eleanor padded on silent feet out of the house using the door Gunn had taken coming in, fluffed her hair and leaned against the handrail. Waiting. Baiting.

Not two minutes later—punctual then—she heard a faint click up above, followed by a quick but light tread from left to right then spotted Gunn’s tall form climbing down the steps. In the twin moons’ bluish light, she watched wind pick at his hair and toss strands into his face. He did not seem to mind for he kept going, talking to himself, in fact arguing, and reached the balcony in quick, energetic strides. He did not wear a jacket that evening and only a pair of dark trousers, shirt and sleeveless vest that underlined his slim and long figure.

She wondered for a second what his mouth would taste like, if he was a good kisser or enjoyed making love to a woman with the lights on. Saliva pooled under her tongue. Eleanor berated her lack of self-control. For good fortune’s sake, she was baiting herself more than him. She rubbed her palms against her thighs to wipe the sweat. His body looked fit and firm, contrary to what she had expected from such a man. He exuded vitality as he fished inside his vest pocket, pulled a watch and angled it at the moons’ light so he could see its face. He seemed content for he nodded, pocketed it.

Eleanor, heartbeat quickening, admired his sharp profile, long narrow nose, incisive chin and high brow while he looked up at the sky, even if the business part of her watched how he moved, where he stood, how he placed his hands.

Those long hands. All over her body.

She shook her head. She had to focus. The more time she needed to do this task, the more dangerous it would become. For her self-discipline. Already, he was all she could think about. His tall and spare body, his intense gaze and that sharp mind of his—gears always turning.

“Good evening, Mr. Gunn,” she said.

He started, looked around. Spotting her, he put a hand to his chest and smiled. His teeth flashed in the gloom. “Miss Violet, next time you startle me this badly, you may have to call a physician.”

He joined her by the balcony, stood a good foot away, both fists around the handrail like a man in fear of drowning. She knew the feeling for she too held onto the metal bar hard enough to hurt.

“Why are you here?”

She could have laughed at his directness. So refreshing. So unlike her. “I came here for the fresh air. Nothing fresher than this.”

“Are you not cold?” he asked, turning to her. His angular cheekbones reflected moonlight in a way that mesmerized her. She could have watched that face all night.

“No. I am hardier than I look.” Now why had she said that? Truth would get her nowhere in this mission.

“I have noticed, yes.” He looked up at the second-level window and pointed. “You will have to show me how you did that. In a dress.”

“With the results you have seen, I think I would rather not ruin another dress.” Or show her pistol again, although no one seemed to have noticed the little silver barrel pointing out of the fabric. It had been a close call.

“There was nothing wrong with that dress.” He smiled without looking at her. That mocking grin must have caused him a lot of trouble. Had caused him a lot of trouble since the Gunns had in all intent banished him to this seaside estate.

Before she could stop herself, Eleanor moved her hand closer until his heat touched her if not his skin. She heard his breathing catch in his throat.

“So, Mr. Gunn, what are you working on?”

He shrugged. “It would not interest you, I am—”

“Why? Because I am a woman?”

He laughed hard. “No, because only fools like me waste their eyesight on machines that explode in their faces.”

As much as she hated herself for thinking this way, she liked his answer a lot and leaned an elbow on the handrail so she could stare up into his face. He seemed to become ill at ease and looked away.

“So those machines you are working on, are they merely meant to explode, or do they have other uses as well? I have seen quite a fair number in your house. Very useful.”

Gunn’s blond eyebrows furrowed, his eyes narrowed. “I am not a weapons monger, Miss Violet, if that is what you are insinuating. I design machines that help people, do things for them they cannot do themselves. There is nothing wrong with that.”

“Forgive me if I have offended you,” she replied, genuinely sorry. “I only tried to be light.”

He fanned the notion away. “Oh, do not mind me. I become testy when people ask about my inventions. It is usually to make light of them. Pardon me.” Licking his lips and looking seaward, he inched closer, close enough for his elbow to graze hers. Exhilarating. “To answer your question, I am working on a project that will help with crops to the south. With the winds there becoming more violent, they need a way to spray their fields without the seeds or fertilizer flying away. I am designing a powerful jet condensator that can be attached to any type of flying machine and…” He stopped abruptly, chuckled. “I am such a bore.”

“No! Not at all, please go on.”

“I should have a prototype ready in a day or two. If all goes well and nothing else explodes in my face.”

A day or two? The Society had not been aware of the imminent completion. She was under the impression a couple of weeks or so still remained. Gunn worked fast.

“Let us hope for that.”

He turned to her, his face angled down to study her. His scrutiny made her heart beat that much faster. “How long will you be staying with us?”

Eleanor’s heart sank. “Are you tired of me already?”

“No, but I am wondering if there will be sufficient time for me to work up the courage to ask you out for supper.”

The heat spreading from her chest to her throat flushed her cheeks. Fortunately, he would not notice. Acting like a debutante. “Have you not just done so?”

He shook his head, swallowed. A generous curve to his upper lip gave his slim mouth a dramatic look she found difficult to ignore until all she could do was look at those lips. When he spoke, she did not look up to meet his gaze. That mouth.

“Would you consider it? I know you only just arrived.”

“I would love it, Mr. Gunn.”

“Leeford.”

The fricative in his name made his bottom lip glisten in the moons’ light. She smiled. “Leeford then.”

“Would tomorrow be terribly inappropriate?”

She chuckled. “Terribly. And I accept.”

When his hand touched hers, she sighed without reserve. She was not faking. The man really did create a jumble of emotional responses from affection to the basest lust and most burning urges. She wanted him to do things to her she would never tolerate from any other man. Her plan began to unravel like a badly knit stocking.

When he cocked his head to one side and leaned forward ever-so slightly, Eleanor stood frozen to the spot, prey to the deepest fear that should she move, she would break the moment and regret it for the rest of her life.

And when his eyelids lowered by increments, his intent obvious, she raised herself to receive him.

Heat heralded imminent contact. His lips pressing against hers triggered havoc in the rest of her. Fever-like heat wafted in great surges out of her shirt collar. Surely he could feel each! His gentle hand landed on hers and wrapped long, tender fingers until he enveloped it in a warm and flexible cocoon.

She used the handrail as a brace to keep from keeling over in a rush of carnal abandon, but also as an anchor to push up against him. His mouth parted, slow and tentative at first, the tip of his tongue brushed the fleshy peaks of her upper lip as one would taste something delectable but bold and new. Testing. He must have enjoyed what he tasted for Leeford cupped the back of her head for a deeper kiss. Which she returned with fervor!

From her nape, his hand slid down to her neck and jaw, both of which he caressed with the tip of his fingers before slipping inside her parted collar and brushing her fevered skin. The combination of thrill and chilly winds hardened her nipples to painful points. She raised herself higher, pushed against his mouth. Dexterous, his fingers curled deep into the collar of her shirt and grazed the dawn of her breast, a gesture that elicited a soft groan through her nose and a tingling in her sex. She wanted this man more than anything at the moment. Everything else could wait.

She could feel his hand shaking when he slipped it all the way into her shirt and cupped her breast, which he elevated like an offering. Arching, Eleanor crushed herself against him, used her free hand to press his harder around her breast. He did. With exquisite precision, he allowed her tender nipple to slide between thumb and index finger before squeezing with just the right amount of force to prompt one fine peak of heat to shoot down to her belly.

She could no longer keep it in. “Mmm.”

His kisses left her mouth to travel down her throat. She knew where his destination lay and rolled her shoulder so the lapel would slip lower, denuding her skin to his lips. Clavicle, the base of her neck, the dawn of her trapped breast, his mouth covered every square inch of her until he zeroed in on her nipple and kissed it with delicate precision.

“Ohh.”

She felt teeth against her skin and surmised he was smiling. “Inventors are good with their hands,” he murmured.

“I…I would agree. Are they good with their mouths as well?”

“Some of them.” He wrapped her nipple with burning-hot lips and sucked.

“Ahh—fortune—you certainly are one of them.”

Because she enjoyed the pressure in her lower back, she rolled against the handrail until she stood trapped between it and Leeford’s hard front where a lump pressed against her belly. She cupped it, squeezed.

“Ladies in charge of charities are good with their hands as well,” she remarked, grinned when he stood to capture her mouth.

Abandoning his trapped erection, she arched back over the void, let her head loll and the wind play with her hair while Leeford resumed ravishing her throat and breast with his ardent mouth. Unable to contain herself anymore, she fisted both lapels of her shirt and pulled them out wide to denude both her breasts and shoulders. He dove for them with hands and mouth and teeth. Sucked, licked, squeezed, caressed.

And she, who had only planned to seduce him after awhile. Ha! She had been able to think of little else since meeting him and could barely keep her clothes on in his presence. Lust knifed her sex. She wanted more than his mouth.

“Leeford,” she murmured, whimpered when he sucked both nipples in rapid succession. “I do not usually act this way.”

“I care little how you act with other men,” he remarked between licks. She felt him run a thumb over the little scar left by the assisted selection vaccine. Not many lovers had bothered checking, as if the onus of procreation—or the management of it—rested on females alone. “That is your private life.”

She wanted to laugh. Most men cared a lot. Manly pride no doubt.

“Still,” she countered. “Do not think less of me if I want—”

Somewhere inside the house, one of the many clocks chimed the half-hour. Leeford froze. He looked down at her, anxiety, embarrassment and something else etched in his expression. Regret. He cleared his throat while he gently pulled her shirt back together.

“My work, is…er… It gets cold around these parts, Violet—Miss Violet.” He straightened, held her elbow while she adjusted her clothes. “Um. Please, I did not mean to be so impulsive. I hope I have not offended you.”

She tried to smile despite the insidious blade of disappointment twisting in her chest. Hiding her true feelings had always been easy for her. Until now. Her cheeks ached from trying not to show her pain. She throbbed everywhere with unspent release.

“No harm done. Perhaps we should, ah, reconvene some other time?”

He shook his head. “Forgive me. I meant no disrespect. But—”

“Your work is time sensitive. I understand. We all have our masters. Yours is time.”

He pushed a strand of her hair out of her face. “And what is yours, Miss Violet?”

“Duty.”

A quizzical eyebrow arched but he said nothing. After a quick kiss to the top of her hand, he retreated until only his silhouette stood illuminated by the moons’ light. “Is there a way to make it up to you? Tell me and it is done.”

“I would love to see your workplace, if I could. All these machines fascinate me.”

After awhile of obvious internal battle, he nodded, perplexed at her answer. “Oh? Yes, I guess I could. Um, not tonight. Dawn tomorrow? At four?”

She nodded. So she would get inside Leeford Gunn’s laboratory and see firsthand the design that had drawn Spark’s dangerous attention. Just as she had roused it a few years ago. A success on all accounts. The Mechanical Rose Society had trained her well.

To her surprise, it brought nothing but a bitter taste in her mouth.

After he turned to leave, she watched his long V-shaped back until gloom swallowed him whole. A moment later, a rectangle of light appeared at the base of the lighthouse, remained for a second or so while a dark silhouette entered then disappeared.

Pushing any other thought away, Eleanor took the path leading to the lighthouse, padded up the few steps to study the door’s mechanism. No automation that she could spot. No steam-powered trigger. Only an old-fashioned lock. In case he changed his mind and did not invite her in, she would still need to gain access if she were to complete her task. But at least she had accomplished one thing that day—secured Leeford Gunn’s trust. The rest should prove easy. Although she suspected looking at herself in the mirror once her mission was complete would take extra effort.

The common good…

Back in her room, she decided not to set the giant clock on her night table—no telling how loud the thing would be, and instead used her own travel version. She set the alarm for three o’clock, to be ready when Gunn came out of his laboratory. She changed her clothes, put on a nightgown, went to bed, rolled onto her back. Everything in her room had some mechanism or other, even the bed, which would rise if she cranked the lever near the headboard. She could see a use for such feature. Especially after her rendezvous of the night.

Need pulsated low in her belly.

Leeford Gunn had begun something that she would have to finish lest she made a complete, hormonal fool of herself come dawn. Focus was paramount since she had already lost her emotional detachment. At least she was experienced enough to realize this. A younger, less self-knowledgeable woman might not have recognized the subtle signs of affection creeping into her judgment. It had happened to her once or twice, to fall for a “client”—Society members were only human—but never so fast.

Supine, nestled in thick blankets and crispy white sheets, she parted her thighs, caressed her belly and mons, tugged the nightgown up over her legs until she could slip her fingers lower. With a sigh, she reached the object of her discomfort and frustration. Imagining Gunn’s long, supple hands proved easy as she parted her sex and inserted her middle finger. She usually felt quite content to clear her mind of any man’s image before masturbating. But tonight, fired with Gunn’s exquisite attention, she struggled to hold out even one minute without picturing his face between her legs, his hips working as he took her, that ambrosial mouth, thin and formed to perfection. He would make for a singularly gifted lover, attentive and skilled with his hands as he was.

Moisture gathered in her folds as she began to rub her aching clitoris, round and round then in a pendulum motion.

Gunn’s mouth all over her. His tongue in her.

The images swirled in her mind’s eye. Eleanor sighed when tingles in her lower back heralded a peak. She worked harder, faster. Rubbed and teased her hard little pearl, thinking of Gunn’s hands and fingers. Then into herself she slipped two fingers. Thrust. Quick. Quicker.

Gunn’s cock as it would feel if—she hoped when—he would push into her.

Exhaustion and frustration gave way to temporary pleasure.

His lean hips shoving in. Into her. Deeper. Gunn’s dazzling eyes mirroring her passion.

She arched off the mattress when a fine jab of ecstasy cramped her thighs and sex, vaginal muscles squeezing hard. So hot. So wet.

Losing herself in Leeford Gunn’s embrace while his member would fill and stretch her.

Orgasm. Puissant. A long whimper left her. Then complete serenity spread through her tired body. Eleanor succumbed to sleep with her fingers in herself, imagining all the while they belonged to him.

Chapter Three

At ten to four, Eleanor stood outside the lighthouse, prey to both nerves and a deep thrill that forced her to smooth the front of her corseted dress several times. She always cared about her looks and prided herself on being well turned out, even while scaling a client’s wall. But she had taken a special interest in choosing her clothes that morning—barely morning. She yawned. Gunn had said to be there at four, not around four. The man held punctuality in high regard so she made sure to impress him. All part of her plan to play to his likings.

Wind tossed her hair around her face. After a deep breath, she knocked on the door and took a step back.

A short moment later the door opened and Gunn stood in the embrasure, half his face illuminated by an oil lantern he held high. He smiled. “Miss Violet. You are on time, thank you.”

As if someone had punched her in the belly, the sight of his face—and how she had imagined it as she pleasured herself only a few hours ago—drove all other thought away. She stood there gazing into his brilliant blue eyes and forgot who she was.

He seemed to experience the same struggle for focus since he matched her intense stare, his head cocked to one side, his wavy dark blond hair looking as though he had been dragged through a rosebush backward. Twice. The collar of his shirt stuck out of his sleeveless vest on one side.

After a start, he bowed at the waist. “Where are my manners? Please, come in.”

He ushered her into a darkened vestibule where a strange contraption that resembled a cross between a metallic umbrella and a small tent leaned against an old fiddleback chair. Stairs to her right led up into darkness.

A strong gust pushed her as she stepped inside, turned right away so she could watch Gunn lock the door behind them. Double bolt. Steel. Strong but fallible. Her quick assessment finished, she straightened and forced her hands to stop shaking. What was wrong with her?

Gunn turned, gave a quick smile then seemed to be looking for something in his trousers pocket, from which he pulled the lining when he slid his hand out. A tiny pocket watch different from the one he kept in his vest pocket gleamed when he began to toy with it, twirled it around.

“That is exquisite,” Eleanor said, trying to break the spell even if at the same time she would have kept looking into Leeford Gunn’s face well past all bounds of propriety.

“Oh this?” He brought it up for her to see. The little thing resembled a golden quail egg nestled in his long hand. “I helped a friend work on a contract, adjusted a mechanism’s precision. He made this for me as thanks.”

“May I?”

He nodded and let the watch slip into her hand. It felt so fragile she cupped it gingerly and put her other hand below in case it fell. Tiny engravings of leaves and roses reflected light.

“It tells the minutes and seconds only,” he murmured, drawing near. “See this?” With an ink-stained index finger, he caressed the watch’s delicate button. “If I rotate it one full turn, it will start counting a sequence. Then if I press it, it will stop counting.”

Eleanor’s gaze shifted from the watch to his finger then his hand. He had stained the cuff of his shirt with ink as well. So he was a left-hander. Another mental note to add to the file.

She swallowed hard. His proximity interfered with her ability to think rationally. “So, it is to ‘time’ something, not to ‘keep’ time.”

Gunn opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. Then a wide smile stretched his lips. “To ‘time’ something of course. How astute!”

“Oh, it was only a silly remark. I meant no—”

“No, no, I love it. A timer, to time things. Perfect!”

He turned to climb the stairs, stopped then rushed back to her. “Um…” He reached for his “timer” with tentative fingers. “I will need this for my work.”

She wanted to laugh but would not risk bruising his ego. Eleanor returned his “timer” to him and fell into step behind Gunn. “What is this for?” she asked, pointing at the strange contraption by the chair. “An umbrella?”

Gunn chuckled, shook his head. “A folding table for outings. I have always wanted to eat a meal outside but not sitting on the ground. Oh well, when I do, it will not be on this thing.” He grinned. “I am afraid the design is flawed. I should get rid of it.”

Eleanor followed him up a couple of steps. Light cast scary shadows against the circular wall below them. “Could you salvage pieces of it? The hinges perhaps? Surely there is something good amidst the rest.”

Gunn threw her a slanted gaze. She snapped her mouth shut, afraid she had let on more than she intended, but he only shrugged and resumed his brisk climb. She could follow with ease but still realized the man was fitter than most. He took the last few two by two so he could open a thick wooden door at the top of the stairs before she reached it.

When Eleanor joined him on the landing, she froze in mute amazement.

Everywhere machines hung, lay or leaned, they stood, balanced or ticked, they rumbled, steamed and occupied every flat surface available in the giant circular room. To her surprise, it felt very cozy, very comforting. Below the domed ceiling of glass and steel stretched a metal framework where a collection of pulleys of all sizes and lengths of chain stirred in the amber light cast from gas bracket lights. She felt as though she were inside a living machine. Gears, chains, levers, switches, light bulbs, copper pipes, glass tubes. Sheets of paper lay everywhere. Drawings done in haste by hand covered three blackboards leaning precariously against a denuded portion of the wall. In a corner, a tiny enamel kitchen sink bolted into the wall, a cast-iron cooker on bowed legs, a small dresser filled with things that had little to do with cooking. Pliers, tiny iron hammers, a set of miniature clamps. The man was messy. Steam rose from a kettle the likes of which she had never seen. It stood a foot tall on its pewter pedestal with a long “beak” and a thick porcelain handle. It resembled a crane to her.

But what caught her eye was a table across the room on which a gray tarp hid a barrel-sized lump. Her heart skipped a beat.

“Would you like tea?” Gunn offered as he looked for a place to set his lantern. He leaned it against another thing of which she did not know the use. Patted it once for safety then rushed to the kitchen area, zigzagging between machines as he went. The man never walked, he always rushed and knocked things aside in his haste.

“Sugar? Cream?” he threw over his shoulder.

She tore her gaze from the tarp. “Just sugar, thank you.”

Eleanor joined him for the simple pleasure of watching him work. After he knocked a few things down, clanged the kettle against its heater then poured too much water into a pair of mismatched cups, he grabbed one, seemed to change his mind then retrieved the other—the one with the least chinks in the porcelain—and proffered it to her. Bits of loose tea leaves floated on the surface. No strainer, no spoon, no saucer. She wanted to smile.

Eleanor took it in both hands. “Ah, thank you so much.”

She did not remind him about the sugar and waited while he retrieved his cup then raised it to him in silent appreciation. Together, they took a tiny sip. It was vile at best but she smiled. The worst tea with the best companion easily beat any other kind.

“So this is where you work,” she began, nodded as she looked about then took another sip.

By her side, Gunn had frozen with his cup an inch from his mouth. His gaze was riveted to her.

“Oh! Forgive me! I did not mean to sound so judgmental.”

“No, no, I was only…er. What were you saying?”

He kept staring. Heat flushed her cheeks. “I love it here. So much energy, so many things going at once. It must keep you very motivated.”

Gunn drank deep, grimaced, but was obviously relieved. His eyes sparkled.

“For instance this,” she said, walking over to a collection of copper pipes and levers on a wheeled platform. “What does it do? Let me see.” She cocked her head, took another sip. “With the counterweights, I would say we use this to lift heavy objects and move them around, almost like a chimney crane.”

Looking impressed, Gunn put the cup on the tiny dresser—he did not seem to notice he had just splashed his hand with hot water—before joining her by the large machine. He ran a loving hand over the closest pipe. Eleanor shivered at the gesture as she tried not to imagine it was her thigh.

“You are correct, Miss Violet. We hook up the object to move—boulders in a farmer’s field or a rockfall blocking the railroad tracks, for example—then after we charge the conduits, we pull this lever here.” He stretched so he could reach it, grabbed the copper lever than pulled it down. “Unfortunately, it needs a vehicle to bring it to the fields. I have yet to come up with a design that suits my needs. Wheels are no good. Wings either for that matter. I need something else, something that moves forward while shaping itself to the land.” He made a squeezing gesture with his hands. Such long fingers.

She nodded, noticed another piece that piqued her interest. “And this? I will admit, I have no idea what purpose it serves. But it is intriguing, beautiful even.”

Grinning, Gunn rushed to it, swung it around on its chain then shrugged. “Me neither. I was just looking for a counterweight to move this one over there.” He pointed to a barrel from which protruded half a dozen thin glass tubes.

They shared a laugh.

Enthused, she meandered through the place—part workshop, part laboratory, part scrap yard—and spent the next hour or so peppering an eager Gunn with myriad questions about his inventions, slowly working her way to the one that interested her until she stood right in front of it, arms crossed, looking perplexed. She wanted to show curiosity but no undue interest in it.

“This one is hidden, why?”

Gunn pushed on one corner of the tarp with the tip of his brown boot. Worn but polished and covered in buckles, they came high on his knees, clasped his calves in a wicked manner that created visions of being intimate with him while he wore them. She took a sip of her cold tea with the sole purpose of doing something other than staring at the man’s long, well-formed legs in those dark, striped trousers.

“It is not hidden.” He cleared his throat. “Merely, er, protected from the dust.”

“I respect your privacy, Mr. Gunn. You do not have to—”

Had he decided to throw himself into a glacial lake, his expression would not have looked more a mix of stern determination and waiting imminent doom while he grabbed the tarp and yanked it off to let it fall on the floor in a cloud of dust that rose like tiny moths. He retreated by several steps so she could approach.

“I sometimes grow too attached to my designs. They are only machines. Tools.” His deep voice was muted.

Resting on a table lay the real reason of her stay at Gunn’s estate. Cylindrical, it resembled a brass and silver pistol muzzle, but a giant version covered in tiny dials and switches. She could recognize Gunn’s artistic work there in the guise of pieces added to the design that had nothing to do with functionality and everything to do with aesthetics. All in all, his invention was a gleaming work of art. One Spark would turn into something ugly and dangerous, just as he had warped their sexual relationship into a battleground. She saw the potential for an airborne cannon, or one mounted on any vehicle for that matter. The extent of Gunn’s genius suddenly revealed itself to Eleanor. Spark could not be allowed to appropriate this machine. Not even a rough design and certainly not a functioning prototype, even if the Society kept a cautious eye on the dangerous man and his many homes.

“This is the one you spoke of yesterday? The condensator? It is larger than I anticipated.” The thing must have weighed, what, at least ninety pounds?

Heat on her arm indicated he stood close behind her. “You have a good memory.”

“And you have good hands.”

She felt him come even nearer until he stood behind her. A smell she had come to associate with him—he smelled of winter wind and the leather of his high boots—enveloped her in a cocoon that sensualized and titillated her. Need knifed her. Every breath in her corseted dress was torture, every hair stood on end, every nuance in the air filled her mind’s eye with images of carnality. She ignored it all the best she could. She needed to study the machine. Or at least get the plans. If Gunn had them. This would be much simpler. She would steal the plans and bring them to the Society for safekeeping while making her case in favor of redoubling their effort and sending a team after Spark instead of observing him and cataloging his moves. She might go herself as well, for old times’ sake…

But if Gunn worked without sketches, she would have to find a way to either disable the machine or destroy it. As a last resort, she would make the lighthouse temporarily unavailable. A small fire, strategically placed, ought to do. Or she could cut the gas lines. It would minimize the damage to his work but would take care of the dangerous invention. Spark would be informed of Gunn’s mishap. This would buy her time to convince Gunn that his invention was dangerous. She held high hopes he would listen to reason and trusted in his judgment, although she had no reason except for her instincts. They had never failed her so far.

Heat from her high collar flushed her cheeks when Gunn took her teacup and set it down somewhere. His hand shook.

“The way you look at it,” he murmured as he stood behind her once more. “It would have me believe you find it beautiful.”

“It is. I also see the danger underneath the beauty.”

“Danger?”

“Someone could twist your beautiful tool into a weapon. Disfigure it.”

After a long silence, Gunn sighed. “I know it has the potential for it. But if we let fear stop us, we would never create. We would suffocate.”

She agreed with a nod.

“Miss Violet,” he murmured in her ear. “I have to make an admission to you.”

“Violet. You owe me nothing, Mr. Gunn.”

“Leeford. And yes, I do. I owe you the truth.” The words were like a razor across her chest. She swallowed hard.

“I could not function. All this night, I kept trying to focus on my work and could not. There should be a mounting device attached to the prototype, it was scheduled for today. But I could not… I felt…”

His long index finger traced her buttoned sleeve from shoulder to cuff. Pearly buttons created little bumps in his finger’s journey. She felt each in her belly and sex.

“I felt disjointed. Scattered. I could not even grasp simple numeracy. Equations kept jumping around. It was quite frustrating.”

She could relate well except that she had somehow managed to sleep. Only to experience vivid dreams of him.

Eleanor shivered beneath his touch. “I find your honesty refreshing. It seems to have become a lost art, has it not? Everywhere I go there is this dual conversation taking place. The words spoken aloud and those left unsaid.” She closed her eyes when he retraced his steps and ran his finger upward to her collar. “I find it refreshing and stimulating. Very much so.”

“Stimulating is a succulent word when you say it. Please say it again.”

“Stimulating,” she murmured, licked her lips. “Everything here is stimulating. Your inventions, your hands. You.”

His lips landed moth-light on the shell of her ear. He whispered, “Go on.”

“There is energy here, marvelous and dizzying. Each tick of the clock, each hiss of steam. It makes me want to…”

“What?” he whispered. “It makes you want to forget yourself? It sets your flesh on fire until it consumes you entirely? As it did me last night?” He kissed her earlobe, nibbled on it. “I want things from you, Violet. Decadent things that would make polite society shun me for life.” His chuckle made a strand of her hair fret. “Shun me again, but for different reasons.”

“Why are you here?” she asked while he kissed her neck. “Why work here alone when you could have a roomful of enthusiastic pupils writing down your every word?”

“Ha! I hardly think my words are worth the paper. Do you not know I am an embarrassment to the Gunns? The rare times I visit with them, I am a topic of conversation more than a member of the family. An oddity. Entertainment. Something amusing to show then to discard.”

She could not detect anger in his voice, but hers more than made up for his lack of it. They had no idea what genius Leeford Gunn represented otherwise they would have capitalized on him a long time ago. It frustrated and incensed her how the obtuse Gunns would treat him with such little regard and respect. But then again, who was she to judge? Was she not betraying him this very moment?

“May I?” he asked after he flicked the first button on her sleeve.

“If I told you how much I would enjoy that, you would think less of me.”

“Believe me,” he replied while flicking another button that denuded her wrist. He brought her hand up to his mouth and kissed the small bone there. “I could never think less of you.”

She was not so sure. She could see a day where he would.

“Oh, I completely forgot,” he said. “I wanted to show you something. Come!”

Eleanor wanted to grind her teeth when he spoiled the intimate moment, but the man’s enthusiasm—and her own curiosity—forced her to follow him as he jogged to a narrow door she had cataloged under “details yet to investigate”. He opened it to reveal a darkened, narrow set of stairs that he took two by two. She followed, the hem of her dress in her hand and silently lamenting that his lips no longer touched her. She missed his mouth already.

“There!” he called from above where a rectangle of dawn sky had appeared.

A door led to a balcony that encircled the lighthouse from which, through the old windows, she could see down into the laboratory. For the gas bracket lights, a wavering, amber glow kissed the glass panes at an angle, created whimsical patterns.

“Is this where you gain your inspiration?” she asked, raising her face to the sky, striped in brown and purple. The sun would rise soon. Bothersome wind whipped at her hair, sent it into her face, but at the same time vivified her.

Gunn turned, grinning like a loon, and offered his hand. “Sometimes. I figured with your physical abilities, you would not fear heights. Is that not a view? Breathtaking.”

She was about to reply when he pulled her to him for a long kiss that left her reeling. He was right, breathtaking. He cupped the back of her head with both hands as he covered her face with light, quick kisses before returning to her mouth and burning it under his passionate touch. Divine Graces, the man could kiss!

He tugged at her lips, licked them side to side, sucked on the bottom one before releasing it and smiling wide. “You taste of berries.”

“Kiss me.” Eleanor fisted the lapel of his vest and pulled him closer.

His next kiss evaporated her ability to think. He made it more demanding, deeper, with his tongue and his teeth. He sucked her moan out of her. She fed them to him—moans, sighs, soft mewling sounds deep in her throat. Leeford took them all into him before crushing his mouth for the deepest, most physically and emotionally profound kiss she had ever experienced. He filled her with him. With his heat, his energy and intensity. Eleanor felt rejuvenated. Filled to bursting. Yet she wanted more. So much more.

The thought of his wearing clothes infuriated and vexed her and so she made quick work of his worn vest, tugged at the brass buttons without looking, yanked it wide when she was done so she could start on the white cotton shirt. Hot skin and a wiry chest rewarded her. Matching her own, a small, circular scar on his upper arm from his assisted selection vaccine felt like a silk button under the pads of her fingers. Likewise, he had chosen not to become a parent. She placed her cold hands against him and sighed into his mouth.

“Over there,” she murmured, pulled away from him.

He followed her to the handrail and winced when she leaned back against it. “Violet, it is quite high.”

“I know.”

Leeford’s grin turned feral as he advanced and boxed her in between his arms, grabbed the handrail as an anchor before diving for her throat.

Despite the height—or perhaps because of it—she let her head loll, arched back, let her magnificent lover work his magic. Wind whistled around them, tugged at what loose garment it could find, played in his hair and in hers.

Hands shaking but still dexterous, he unbuttoned her sleeves up to her shoulders before starting on the ones at her collar, which he did with his eyes focused on her face. His lips gleamed. A trace of her purple lipstick lent an exotic touch to his mouth. He saw that she looked at his mouth and licked it slowly while he opened the bodice of her dress. Each button released her breath.

“You are…” He shook his head. “There are no words.”

Eleanor let him undo her bodice down to her waist. He hooked an index finger into her corset, right between her swelling breasts, and waited. Fortunately, she had not worn her “special” corset, the one concealing half a dozen weapons—a slender dagger in the central busk with a tiny decorative hilt sticking out just high enough to be retrieved with ease and discretion, a garrote worked into the lace trim, a tiny silver pistol slipped into the back itself with a matching slit in most of her dresses for fast retrieval, and a set of long and thin pins slid into the bones to be used as lock picks or for other more nefarious designs. A walking armory.

“Yes?” she asked, trying not to sound too desperate.

“I would like you to do it.”

Eleanor grinned. Oh, she could acquiesce to this request!

With fingers that trembled—a first for her—she unhooked the topmost clasps of her corset in deliberate slowness so he could watch each small release, each breath that swelled her flesh over the black fabric. And he did. When her cleavage deepened, widened, Leeford leaned over so he could place a kiss on each of the red temporary depressions marking her skin. She shivered.

He retrieved a strand of her hair and tickled her neck with it. “Your hair is so black, it is almost purple.” He brought the tip of it up and grazed her lips with it. “Purple just like your lips. What color are those below, I wonder? Rose? Plum?”

Her face must have betrayed her shock for he cringed. “I was too forthright. I always seem to do that. Forgive me.”

“I am not shocked in that sense,” she replied after a deep breath. The man had a way with words. “You just took me by surprise.”

“I will try not to do that again—”

Eleanor placed her hand over his mouth. His lips grazed her palm and triggered a slew of urges to knife her in the belly. “Change nothing about your ways. They suit you perfectly. As for my lips, their color is for you to discover.”

Above her hand, Leeford’s eyes sparkled. He nodded.

When she unhooked the last clasp on her corset, the sudden release freed her breasts. Leeford grabbed the handrail on either side of her waist and dove for her chest. Hot, his mouth provided a gasp-triggering contrast to the cold dawn wind. She tilted her head and shoulders back in an offering he seemed eager to take with his mouth and long, nimble hands. She moaned when he trapped her nipple in his mouth, rolled the other between fingers. She whimpered when he raised her breasts, pressed them hard against one another so he could suck them in quick succession. And she cried out when Leeford bit the underside of one. Just hard enough to shock.

“Ah!”

His dazzling blue eyes rolled up to look into her face, but his wonderful attention never wavered. His mouth never slowed its pleasurable work nor his hands their exploration. She had never had a more intense, perceptive and precise lover. Leeford Gunn may have been a social embarrassment to his family and societal spheres, but if she were a gambler, she would put her ecus on him in any amorous contest. Attentive men in bed were a rarity. Especially those who looked as he did. But then again, his angular features and tall, sleek physique were not en vogue and women probably never paid him a second glance. A pity. For them.

For the sheer pleasure of it, she squeezed her breasts together then against his hot chest and remained for a long while, enjoying the way their forms espoused, seemed to have been built of the same mold. One positive. One negative. Strange because he was all angles and she all curves.

“Stay this way,” he murmured in her ear while he wrapped long and sinewy arms around her shoulders and just hugged her. She heard him sigh.

Unable to contain herself any longer, she snaked her hands inside his undone shirt and underneath his elbows, raked his back downward with curled-in fingers. Muscles twitched. He swallowed hard. She enjoyed watching his prominent Adam’s apple. The urge to lick and bite it overtook her.

“I want you,” he whispered. “I want you so much.”

She pulled her face from the crook of his shoulder so she could look up into his eyes. “Take it. It is yours.”

“This is mine?” he asked, that grin coming back again while he weighed her breast in a gentle hand, thumb over the nipple. She hoped he would squeeze it. She hungered for it.

“It is.”

He trapped the nipple, rolled it twice before abandoning her breast to weave his hand down her belly, past the waistband of her dress. His agile hand slid with ease underneath the layers of clothing and brushed against her mons. She was so wet. Long fingers parted her. At the end of his long, narrow nose, his nostrils flared.

“This is mine as well? Mine to take?”

“Yours,” she pushed through her teeth. A roll of hips made him tuck his bottom lip behind his teeth and generated fever-like heat to spread through her sex and thighs. Moisture gathered.

He must have felt it for his hand slipped lower. Found her hard little pearl, which he trapped between two fingers. She all but pushed him down so she could spear herself to him. “What about this?”

“Yours,” she replied, breathless.

A moan left her when he slipped a tender, leisurely finger inside her. “And this?”

“Y-Yours.” She could barely breathe. “Take it.”

“Take it?”

“Yes.”

“Now you mean?”

“Yes!”

Leeford chuckled as he rubbed in and out of her. She was wet, throbbing, so ready it hurt. She wanted him inside. Now. Good fortune, she could not take this any longer.

Eleanor planted a foot on the handrail’s lowest rung, hooked the heel of her boot there and angled her knee outward to give his skilled hand all the room he needed to maneuver.

“Take me,” she growled under her breath. “With your hand. Please hurry.”

Instead, he took his hand away, bent to gather the hem of her dress and bunch it up so he could denude her raised leg. First a knee then a thigh, he exposed her leg to the cold wind and his hot stare. In the dawn light, his eyes were the color of blue flames. They flared wide when he discovered the slit in her dress. Good thing she had decided against her pistol.

“How clever,” he remarked, mocking grin rising again. He looked down, seemed to try to see how the stitching worked, the gears in his brain spinning fast. After a short inspection, he nodded, unhooked the tiny clasp holding the opening together. The dress parted wide over her leg.

“Well, that is most fascinating! A single little clasp holding it all together.” He crouched so he could take a closer look at it. “I have never heard of such a thing.”

Eleanor wanted to sigh in relief when it became obvious he held no interest in knowing why her dress had been assembled this way but how. She wanted to kiss him. Not an ounce of jealousy or malice in the man’s body. Such a refreshing departure from most men she knew.

“Do other women have dresses like this one? I should think it would be perfect for strenuous physical activities. Riding horses and duo-cyclers or even—” He stopped midsentence, kissed her exposed thigh and looked up at her. “Forgive me. I tend to get excited about such things. I think we were saying that this—” He parted her dress wide over her underthings, placed a kiss on her pubic bone. Through the thin cotton, the heat of his mouth warmed her skin. “Is mine to take.”

“It is,” she replied through her teeth. She wrapped her hand around the back of his head and curled her hips forward. “May I suggest you claim it sooner rather than later?”

After a quick bark of laughter—he had the most infectious and hearty laugh—Leeford kept her dress open with one hand while he pinched the lace holding her underthings and pulled. The knot gave with a tiny tug that she felt in her sex. She quivered with anticipation.

Eleanor hurriedly put her foot back down, allowed cool wind to seep in and tickle her flesh while he lowered her underthings down around her ankles then off altogether. He rolled them against his thigh then slid them in his back pocket. Eleanor chuckled. The man never ceased to interest and surprise her.

“I have thought about this little fruit all night, you know.” With a reverent index finger, he brushed her narrow strip of pubic hair downward. Eleanor’s breath caught in her throat. “I even tried to imagine how it would look. But to see it—”

“Touch it,” she whispered, eyes closed. “Kiss it.”

“I would prefer that you present it to me.”

“Present it?”

“Yes. Show me how to treat such delicate gift.”

Her fingers shook with thrill and the strain of not attacking him right then and there. While she kept herself put with a hand around the metal rail, she slipped her other down her belly, past the undone corset and dress until her fingers rested over her mons. With the tip of her index and middle fingers, she parted her sex for him, revealed herself to his ardent gaze, which felt like a physical entity going over her skin, her flesh, at times hot and tender, others pointed like a probing finger. Honey slicked her. She could feel it gathering in her folds.

Leeford shifted position so he could kneel in front of her and with his knees nudged her feet wider apart. His shirt and vest hung loose but would sometimes allow her a quick peek at his flat and defined front. Not thick with muscles as with some lovers she had known, but athletic and spare. Muscles played under the skin like cords.

He splayed his hands over her thighs, drew near. “Such a lovely gift. How do we unwrap it? Teach me. Show me.”

Eleanor’s heart skipped a beat. At least one. She stretched her fingers wider. A slow rotation triggered spasms in her thighs. He rubbed his thumbs in slow, tender circles from insides to hips. Each upward pass helped pull her lips wider apart. Her middle finger shook when it alit on her clitoris. Heat. Exhilaration. His gaze on her. So exposed. He knelt at her feet yet controlled the situation as a conductor would an orchestra.

“Let me see how one opens it,” Leeford said, licked his lips. “How one tastes it.”

Trembling from head to toe, she dipped her middle finger inside, collected her essence, rubbed ’round and ’round before she pulled the slender digit out to proffer to him. With eyes half closed, he wrapped his mouth around her finger, sucked on it gently. She felt his tongue pressing up against the pad of her finger.

Without warning a ring of fire tightened her sex. She was close. So close!

A wet pop followed her jerking her finger out of his burning-hot mouth so she could rub her flesh in brisk motions that pushed her beyond the edge, into a world of blinding pleasures and feverish images of their imminent coupling. A gasp choked her when Leeford penetrated her with a finger then with two. Bent back over the handrail, she let her head loll as she worked her clitoris while Leeford thrust into her with a cadence that accelerated, doubled, tripled. Something hot touched her denuded pearl. Trapped it. Sucking sounds made her bite her bottom lip. Suns behind her eyelids. Fizzing. Bursting suns of pure white light. Liquid heat seeping from her distended opening.

“Rosy.”

“W-What?” So close now.

“The color of your lips,” he murmured before licking her. “Rosy.”

“Ahh!”

Delirium threatened to make her a screaming madwoman. Ebullience. Dizziness. Marvel. He took her to heights unknown. On a long whimper, Eleanor released.

Leeford sucked it out of her in long, noisy draws. He planted his hands on her belly, used his thumbs to stretch her sex—she crushed it against his face in her desperation to crest the next wave looming over her. Then it hit. This time, she cried out. In shock, she realized it had been his name.

Chapter Four

Leeford’s heart swelled when his name came out like a battle cry. He ate her even more thoroughly, stretched her wide, licked and nibbled and sucked her tender flesh until more juices rewarded his work, soothed his inquietude—did she enjoy his touch? Would she grant him more?—and gave him the best pat on the back a man’s pride could ask. Not only did she enjoy what he did to her, she seemed bent on gifting him with even more of her sweet honey. Already it coated her cleft, his fingers. He spread it around. Plenty. Sweet-smelling. Glistening in the dawn. Her sex tightened around the fingers with which he discovered her, squeezed him hard, milked him with a strength and an energy that surpassed any other woman he had known. Her channel, so tight and wet, felt like a home to him. As if he had searched long and hard and had finally found it. But he had not been searching, had he? Although spending time with Violet was proving to be stimulating for both his mind and body. She fit him so well. Compatible.

“Take it,” she growled as she abandoned her sex to grab the handrail behind her. “Take me.”

With boots and all his clothes still on—if barely done up—Leeford stood right between her legs, kept his fingers in her while he tugged at his trousers closure, freed his cock from its constraint.

She looked down at it, offered him a wolfish grin that did wonders to his inhibitions then growled, “Do it! Take me!”

“Show me how,” he replied in kind. Where had his self-control gone? “Tell me how you want it.”

Violet spread her thighs as she took the heel of her boot from over the bottom rung then with a wicked smile, rolled against the handrail, flipped her dress back over a hip to present her curvy backside. With hands he forced to be gentle, he grabbed her on either side, dug the pads of his fingers in.

“This way,” she said over her shoulder.

Curves. Skin the color and shine of freshly baked loaves of bread. Just as hot. With a hand, he fisted his cock. “Here?” he asked, teasing. “This way?”

When he pressed his member against her cleft—so wet, so glossy and hot—his glans disappeared into her rosy flesh. He pulled out almost immediately. Violet let out a sigh of frustration.

“Again,” she urged with a push backward.

He twisted his hips to prolong the sweet torment. With his thumbs, he parted her wide so he could watch his cock press against the moist entry, sink by an inch or so before he pulled out again. Her back curved under the force of her buck.

“Do it!”

“You did not tell me how you wanted it,” he replied, feeling merciless.

“Take me, do it now! Now!”

“That is when, Violet, but how?”

Her mouthwatering lips released a vile curse that made him grin. “Oh, for goodness’ sake, take me now! Hard! Fuck me ha—argh!”

The word “fuck” had the effect of a whiplash on his backside. He thrust. Her long, ragged cry triggered cramps in his thighs. He had never taken a woman this brusquely before. His initial penetration unfurled her around him. He “ahh-ed”. Goodness. She was tight and hot and so wet. He pushed back in, pulled, shoved, pounded. Her rounded backside proved the perfect anchor as he held onto it with both hands, hips rolling, back and shoulders burning, bottom lip throbbing from biting it. The slap of skin against skin could be heard despite the wind. She curled up higher, spread her leg on the rung farther, let her boot slide sideways until he had to help keep her upright with his cock and hands. The heat of her channel—stretched so wide he could see his cock’s last inch going inside her—wrapped him, tightened around him. So slick.

She kept saying the same sentence under her breath. Leeford leaned over so he could hear.

“Fuck me,” she murmured. “Fuck me, fuck me.”

Out of vestigial dominant male instinct he had no idea was in him, he gave to Violet what she demanded. To hear her use such raw words fired his lower back and legs. He switched his grip, went for the handrail. Brutal thrusts rocked her forward. She let out cries and long whimpers. His name over again. Accelerant to the inferno spreading through him. His balls slapped her flesh under the violence of his claiming.

“Do it! Take it!”

“Mine to take,” he growled in reply. Thrust. Thrust. “Mine to take.”

“Yes!”

In a brilliant, blinding flash that seared the image of her, just as she was, in his mind, Leeford veritably exploded inside her. In burning jets, his semen shot out to add to the nectar already there. His teeth felt fused together.

They froze, coupled, joined. He, throbbing the last of his cum into her, she, squeezing like a fist around his cock.

“Violet,” he panted, kissed the back of her shoulder. “My sweet Violet.”

She grinned as she pulled from him and took the underthings from his back pocket. Even while she wiped herself of his seed, her rounded cheeks flushed and rosy, she managed to do it with grace and efficiency. He knew no one else who moved the way she did. But then again, she had scaled down the side of his house. In a dress.

“Allow me,” she said.

Leeford’s first instinct was to leap away when she gestured for him to stand still while she wiped his member. He felt his cheeks flush. “This is not necessary. I…I would have…” He cleared his throat, ignored her mocking grin as she dabbed his shaft, pecked the tip of her finger and placed the “kiss” on his glans.

“There, good as new.”

He murmured a mortified “Thank you” while he adjusted his trousers and shirt. He could no longer ignore her grin and joined her, relieved she would not make light of him but merely smile at the situation.

“Next time it will be my turn to wash you.” He held both sides of the corset together while she worked the tiny clasps. Such lovely curves. Large and heavy breasts, curvy hips, a strong waist perfect for anchoring a man’s hands.

She nodded. “And I intend to get very dirty when you do.”

“A challenge?”

“Yes.”

He enjoyed how forthright she was, how she behaved in a normal and simple way instead of the affected pretense so prized by his spheres. His family would despise her on the spot. Great Aunt Agnes would have an attack of the vapors. Mmm. Maybe Miss Violet and he ought to pay them a visit. Something told him his guest could take very good care of herself. In fact, it was the only detail that did not feel genuine about her—her occupation. He had been raised around ladies of high society, charity balls and other monstrously boring events, and she corresponded in nothing to it. Not physically—those hands spoke for themselves—and not mentally—she was too kind for starters, and too smart.

“Tell me, Violet,” he began while he helped arrange her dress. “Would you be interested in visiting the botanical gardens with me?”

She nodded. “Of course. In Aconia?”

Trepidation filled him. “We would not meet anyone interesting, mind you. But they have the most exquisite collection of orchids. Some all the way from Assanidia.”

Violet’s hands froze for a second then resumed working on the last button around her collar. “There would be someone interesting.” She looked at him and smiled.

“Who do you… Oh! Well, thank you.”

Could you become any more tongue-tied, you cretin?

After what they had just shared?!

“At what time?”

Leeford pulled his watch from his trousers even if the thing did not even give time but “kept” it—such an astute interpretation. But it did give him something to do with his hands. “Would four this afternoon be appropriate? It would give us time to sleep then ready. Do you need more time?” He pocketed the little gold item and fought the urge to find something else with which to occupy his hands.

Black eyes like pearls stared into his core. “Four is perfect. Will you call a coach?”

Thrill at her reaction mangled the words as he strove to keep them in line. “I have built a vehicle. Similar to a duo-cycler, but one a bit more, let us say—powerful—than the norm. I would be honored if you would ride with me.”

“Oh! I would be thrilled. Yes, of course.” She rubbed her hands and grinned. “I hope it is fast as well as powerful.”

“One literally flies in the thing.” He left the rest unsaid so as not to spoil her reaction when she would see it. “Shall we?”

She took his arm as he held the door for her, bolted it behind him then escorted her across the workshop.

“Tell me,” she said as she retrieved the tarp from the floor and let him take the other end. “Did someone ask you to build this or will you present it to a fair? Farmers will not sow their fields for another several months.”

He had often wondered about the identity of his secret benefactor, who must have heard of him and his design at the fair last spring. Someone rich obviously. Perhaps one who could not be openly linked to the Gunns. At least this project had been approved by the patents office. He was still waiting on another submission and suspected money should have accompanied the request.

“I have no idea, Violet. And that is the truth.”

Her eyes flared wide. “Have you no idea at all?”

“No, no idea at all. I received a letter, unsigned, offering to pay for my research and for the prototype. Then the ecus started being deposited in my account in Aconia. Five thousands every first of the month. I am to finish the project, inform them through my banker, who will deposit a note in my account, which will then be passed on to my sponsor’s customers. It is all very cloak-and-dagger but legal. I am willing to bet it is another powerful family who does not wish to openly trade with the Gunns.” The thought of thumbing his nose to his many cousins thrilled him. Although the biggest thrill would be to see his machine in the fields. Farming did not need to be the dangerous profession it was. Machines could do the hazardous work, not people.

“Could you not continue your work without this sponsor? Financially, I mean?”

She flapped the tarp out and let it float down over the condensator. Her comment that it resembled a cannon returned to torment him. Useful things did not need to be ugly. He wanted to see beauty in utility and so had made it beautiful of form as well as a tool, but even he could see the potential for violence there.

“My family all but severed financial ties with me.” He cleared his throat, avoided her gaze when she stared at him. “I fear you will find this all very pathetic. But I am not a rich man, Violet. I can barely live off the rent I receive for the estate. I would have to give up my work. I could never do that, and Lady Frivolous depends on me. So does Max.” The responsibilities, the weight of them depressed him.

She cringed. “My presence only compounds your trouble then. Perhaps—”

“No! Please, do not even think about it. I enjoy your presence very much.” He took her hand and kissed the knuckles. “Do not feel as if you are a burden. I have not known you a long time, but I already enjoy our conversations. Believe me, it does not happen often that I feel comfortable with a person I have just met.”

Her face registered sadness for a reason he could not fathom.

What did you say again?

“Are you well? You look tense.”

She shrugged. “I did not mean to intrude in your affairs,” she replied, kissing his own hand in return. He wanted to kiss her again. “I am certain you are doing what feels right to you. It is all we can do, each of us.”

So wise of her. Lady in charge of charities? Ha!

Remorse needled her like a physical blade between the ribs. Leeford’s pained expression, his financial situation, his detestable family. But what hurt her the most was how he had confessed not knowing who sponsored his project. She could only guess at the state of mind of such a genius, having to work for hire this way, for a stranger who did not have the courtesy of providing a name. Like a whore. Spark had made a whore out of Leeford and she loathed the engineer even more for it. For once, the Society had failed in its intelligence gathering—they were not aware Gunn did not know his benefactor’s identity. She would remedy the situation this day. She would find an excuse to leave Leeford for a short while, find a messenger bureau and send a short brief of her mission so far. Mr. Clarence would perhaps change his view. Might even grant her the authorization to come clean with Leeford Gunn ahead of schedule and reveal the identity of his sponsor. She had high hopes he would renounce his research, or at least this project, and make sure Spark would not get anywhere near such a dangerous prototype.

Leeford’s hands and cock still felt on her, in her, as she accompanied him back to the house then up to her room. He stood by the door, his dazzling blue eyes lost in thought, his lips moving almost imperceptibly as though the gears in his brain turned too fast for the rest of him and created a need for physical release.

“At four,” she murmured so not to startle him.

After a quick grin, he nodded, pulled his lining out of his pocket when he dug his hand out. “I look forward to it,” he said after a quick shake of head. “Forgive me, I was somewhere else. Too many things up here.” He jabbed his index finger against his temple.

“More people should have that many things up there,” she replied with a genuine smile for the most interesting, loveable and guilt-inducing client she had had so far. She could see herself becoming attached to such a man. Danger lay in that chain of thought and she pushed it aside. “Good day, Leeford.”

He turned to leave, spun on the spot. “Oh, before I forget, you will need to wear appropriate clothes, like this dress to ride the duo-cycler. Lady Frivolous has a riding outfit, if you do not.”

So considerate. Guilt stabbed her deeper.

“I do, thank you.”

She admired him as he walked away. Stood there so she could bask in his unconventional beauty, his hair that stood on end in places, that tall and athletic body, those hands. She watched him and marveled that despite his treatment at the hands of the upper class in general and his family in particular, he had not become bitter and cynical. She knew of many who used less sufficient excuses for feeling self-righteous about their wicked ways. She had had to deal with a few for the Society. But not Leeford Gunn. She would do everything in her power to spare him and his household. She would find a way, even if she had to go after Spark alone. She would not let the Society near Gunn either, in case they sent another agent instead of her, although she doubted Mr. Clarence would do this. The Society prized itself on working with agents who could think for themselves. That her thoughts would focus on Leeford Gunn’s fit and firm body, she would leave out of her mission brief. This gift, this privilege, was hers alone.

* * * * *

“What in good fortune’s sake is this?” Eleanor cried out when the doors to the hangar parted and out came this…this thing.

Lady Frivolous, jumping up and down and batting her hands, laughed long and hard. At Eleanor or at nothing in particular? Eleanor could not tell.

Leeford and Max pushed it out and onto the gravel where its wheels crunched. It resembled a duo-cycler, with two wheels and handles and a seat made of leather, but the comparison ended there. Waxed cloth wings, for goodness’ sake! The thing had wings. Half folded along its sides, they resembled those of a bat.

Brass goggles, leather helmet and jacket, high boots and gloves, Leeford made for a mouth-watering sight. Eleanor forgot herself for a few seconds so she could imagine what a hurried coupling would feel like with him dressed this way. Delectable.

“It is a duo-cycler,” Leeford called, grinning like a loon. “With adjustments.”

“I would say,” she replied as she joined Lady Frivolous by the metal, leather and cloth monster. “It flies?”

Leeford thanked Max, who threw a slanted glance at Eleanor then left without a word. “No, it glides.”

She tied her wool cap tighter under her chin. Something told her she would need it. Dressed in black and gray from heels to cap, a dress equipped with the discreet frontal slit, her high boots, a long adjusted coat that buttoned all the way up her neck, she felt fitted for the trip, if not entirely ready for it. “For it to glide, would we not need to launch it from a height?”

His smile widened. “We have all the height we will need by the cliff.”

“The cliff?”

Lady Frivolous giggled behind her hands. She sat on the seat, lifted the hem of her dress enough so she could put her feet on the pedals then pretended to drive the thing with her tongue sticking out the side of her mouth. To general laughter.

“Leeford convinced me once to go to Aconia on this machine,” she remarked as she let Leeford lift her off then gently set her down on the ground. “I believe I screamed the entire journey.”

He cringed. “You did, Lady Frivolous.”

Eleanor remembered the ramp and nodded. She had no idea it had been built for launching a duo-cycler. Her heartbeat accelerated. Such exhilaration!

Leeford bent over the front of the machine, put his booted foot on the ledge then gave the crank a good twist. At once a roar like a dragon drowned the young woman’s squeal of delight. Smoke came out of its dual exhaust pipes. Leeford kicked his leg over the seat, extended a hand to Eleanor.

Grinning wide, she leaped behind him on the seat where she grabbed the safety bar in one hand and snaked the other around his waist. Heat from his backside warmed her between the legs. She felt herself melt there. He could trigger such need in her sex. And so quickly!

Punctuated by Lady Frivolous’ applause and whoops of delight, Leeford twisted the handle, which propelled the machine a few feet forward along the gravel path leading to the back of the house. And to the cliff. Lady Frivolous ran alongside, sometimes skipping happily. When the lighthouse came into view, cliff on either side, Leeford aimed for the ramp, picking up speed, leaning over the handles. Eleanor held on tighter.

Lady Frivolous waving by their side, the duo-cycler rocketed forward in a thunderous roar, reached the ramp in a deafening metal-on-metal noise before following its steep curve upward. Thirty feet, twenty, ten. Eleanor whooped as loudly as Lady Frivolous had when Leeford launched them into the air with a boom, a violent shake and plume of smoke trailing. At once, he did something with his left hand and both wings flapped out wide, caught the strong wind and groaned under the strain. Like a giant bat, their duo-cycler took flight.

After taking their machine from above the roiling ocean to glide over land, Leeford turned back toward her, grinned wide. His goggles hid his eyes but she could tell they must have been sparkling. For no logical reason except that it felt good, she hugged him tight and leaned her head on the back of his shoulder. The leather of his jacket smelled of oil and smoke but she did not care.

Below them were rolling hills lush green in the afternoon light, the occasional house here and there, roads and stone fences like gray and white snakes. Wind howled at them, filled their wings, which groaned and creaked. In the distance, she spotted the megalopolis, its skyline bristling with metal spires and brick towers, glass cupolas, statues and bridges. A brownish haze hung over it like bad humors. She had been born in a city herself, but would not choose to retire in one. In fact, she much preferred living by the sea, such as Leeford’s estate. She could see herself living there forever. She would not miss the city nor its inhabitants. No one would miss her either. Her parents were both long dead and the rest of the family had no idea what she did, only that she was never without financial means. She kept them far from her affairs. The Society cared little about its agents’ families as long as they did not know. She was a perfect case. No family to speak of, no collateral liabilities, no chance at blackmail.

Soon, they glided over the suburbs, built directly on the ground, followed by the city proper, erected on piles like most megalopolises, Leeford taking advantage of the many hot currents and upward drafts. They met large flying machines where she could see faces turned toward them in the windows, fingers pointing, children smiling wide.

“There!” Leeford yelled above the din. “Landing!”

She tapped his shoulder to indicate she had heard and squeezed him harder as he maneuvered their machine with precision and finesse, entered into a lazy spiral above a large hanging garden where conservatories resembled glass breasts and gravel paths ribbons of satin. The piles holding it aloft above the marshy land disappeared when they flew right over the garden. Above the wide avenue, he brought them lower, circling still, before turning the handles one last time and setting them down along the fence, well away from coaches. These land vehicles would have to take normal roads on their way back from downtown—just as her coach had two days prior. Leeford’s machine would be able to just go off a bend in the road somewhere and glide home. Had no one ever approached him to buy his duo-cycler’s design? She could see a definite use for it, especially here in Aconia, built high aboveground. Other cities perhaps had no use for flying machines, but here, they did.

“Thank you for not screaming,” Leeford said, smiling as he took his goggles off. Red marks around the eyes and over the bridge of his nose gave him a comical air. “We will have to return before nightfall when the convective movement will make hot currents hard to find over land.”

She nodded, unsure she understood and not caring. They could find a place at an inn if there lacked sufficient wind to glide back home. Even share a room. She would enjoy that. Perhaps would even make him the offer. Her treat. Eleanor helped him push their machine a bit farther then turn it around so it would be ready and aiming the right way when they returned. She felt vivified, excited. Aroused. Very much so.

After he removed his gloves and jacket and stuffed them along with her own flying equipment into a valise at the back of the duo-cycler—she made sure he locked it, one could never be too sure—she slipped her arm under his. His eyes flared.

“I care little what polite society says of me, but someone could recognize you, Miss Violet.”

“I am a free woman without marital ties. Unless my presence embarrasses you in some way, I intend to enjoy my visit here, and that means holding your arm.”

Grinning, he glanced around the many people their arrival had brought. A few shook their heads but smiled. Others looked unimpressed. For a reason the logical part of her could not justify, she held her chin high and returned their stares a hundredfold. Stuffy, obtuse, intolerant fools.

“What a thrill, Leeford!” she added loudly. “Now show me all those flowers you spoke of, especially the orchid collection. Did you know that in Assanidia, such flower is banned from public display because it resembles the female genitalia? Which it does, remarkably. It is the texture, you see.” She added a conspiratorial wink to a group of women standing close together and whispering in each other’s ears. As one, they looked as if their refined little noses had smelled a horrendous stench and, clutching handbags and parasols, they marched off.

Insufferable idiots.

He gave her a quizzical look. “If this is the way you handle things, I wager your charity balls are the talk of town the next day.”

“I am usually more vitriolic than that, I assure you. But I would not want you to think I lack social graces. Even with those.” She snapped her chin at the clump of women ahead whose dress hems swept leaves in their wake. She hoped a dead squirrel or two would find themselves caught in the fabric as well.

“Social graces? You do remember who you are with?”

“A man who is both intelligent and of more quality than these sort would ever realize. It is their loss, really.”

“And your gain?”

She ignored the question, the mocking lift to his mouth and the way his eyes had narrowed in expectation, ignored it for if she addressed that question—the very notion—she stood to lose a good bit of self-respect when she would have to admit her true identity and the goal of her visit. But had she been able to answer, she would have said a loud and unequivocal “Yes” without a shadow of a doubt. He was her gain. A gift. One she was not allowed to keep.

“By what should we begin?” she asked, looking forward and not up at him.

“Did you not mention the orchids?”

They shared a quiet laugh on their way to the conservatory housing the Largest Collection of Orchids on Terra, or so claimed the brass plaque. As soon as they stepped inside the glass dome, she could tell they were in for a treat. By like-colored clusters, by genus, by native geographical locations, the collection spanned several smaller domes arranged like a pearl necklace strung together with covered walkways paved in granite and slate tiles. The smell of moist earth and the many exotic flowers tickled her nose while the patches of colors and blades of daylight dazzled her in a kaleidoscope of reds, purples and ambers. At one point, she let go of his arm so she could investigate a cluster of black orchids each the size of her hand.

She felt Leeford stand close behind her. “They are exquisite. And mysterious, just as you are.”

She cupped one of the flowers, smelled it. “What do you mean?”

“I have always held the human hand in great reverence. In fact, I have devoted the last years of my studies exclusively on these perfect machines. One can learn much from them.” He took her hand in his, turned it over a few times.

“And what do mine tell you?” She sounded breathless and hated herself for it.

“That you do not merely handle charities. Something else occupies much of your time.”

Her world vacillated. She said nothing because in all honesty, she did not know what to say.

“See these?” He pointed to small scars on the back of her knuckles—remnants from a recalcitrant target several years before. “I would think they are old and from another life, but when coupled with the strength of your forearms, the way the pads of your fingers do not bear the writer’s calluses, I am tempted to believe they are not so old.”

“This is all fascinating,” she murmured. Would she have to tell him about the Society right then and there? Before she had secured his cooperation? And what then? She still had to send her initial assessment to Mr. Clarence. “I had no idea one could tell so much from hands.”

He kissed her knuckles then held her hand in both his own. “You owe me nothing, Violet, I hope you know this. But out of curiosity, what is it that you do? What made these hands?”

The earnestness in his eyes pained her.

“A life of quiet battles,” she whispered without looking into his eyes. “Quiet battles and quieter wars. Secret meetings, clandestine rendezvous, covert gatherings. Quarrel made these hands, Leeford. Please do not ask me to reveal more. I have already said too much.”

She expected him to withdraw, to be shocked, horrified, frustrated by her lack of details. Any man in his position would have reacted strongly with animosity or rancor. Manly pride wounded, ego bruised. Leeford Gunn barely reacted at all. He kissed her knuckles again, his lips this time lingering for a few seconds before he let her hand go.

“Someday, I hope you can feel trusting of me enough to reveal more. For now, I will enjoy what facet of yourself you choose to share with me.”

Had he reacted any other way—understandable but still—Eleanor knew she would have felt better about accomplishing her mission. She would have rationalized Leeford was just like all the others, consumed by his own experience, his own needs, his own goals and cared nothing for the consequences of his acts or lack thereof. So what if their toxic, overpopulated world toppled into anarchy and chaos? So what if he sold a tool he knew would make a dangerous weapon? But no. He showed patience and understanding when he easily could have decided she was not worth the trouble. Instead he showed trust. In her.

“Come,” he said, taking a step away. “Let not my curious nature ruin a lovely day. What would you say to tea and cake? I know a perfect little place off the beaten path.”

Eleanor nodded, thankful he would not push the subject. “I would perhaps enjoy something stronger than tea.”

He laughed long and hard—received dirty looks in the process from those closest to them—and motioned for her to join him. They strode back outside to a glorious afternoon with a fair bit of sun poking rays through the clouds, and left the gardens altogether to cross the bridge into downtown proper. Aconia, built on piles as it was, boasted to many wind-operated drawbridges, lifts and swinging gangways. Leeford navigated them all at a brisk pace. Every time he would walk ahead, Eleanor could not help a quick glimpse at his backside clad in the adjusted riding trousers, and the way his knee-high boots made his legs that much longer. She would love to run her hands over and up his legs. Cup his warm cock in her hand and just lay by his side, still, silent, just listening to the beat of his heart against her ear. Taste him again. Make love to him and let him do the same to her. Not fucking. Lovemaking. If she were lucky enough to enter his embrace again, she would whisper sweet things to him, let him take his time with her senses—she knew he would have up on that lighthouse only she had been too much in a carnal rush to wait. But each facet of his personality that came into the light, each sliver of himself he either shared or let her glimpse, told her this man, this eccentric and gangly inventor with the hand and eye of an artist, was worth the time. He was worth the effort. Leeford Gunn was one of the good men. For once, her duties for the Society would not make her even more blasé with man’s sordid character as a species, but would instead leave her hopeful that good men such as Gunn still existed. One only needed to look a little closer.

Over a long, graceful bridge of metal beams and flanked with iron flying buttresses, they entered into a crowded but charming little tea shop where the smell of jasmine, rose and cinnamon made her feel warm and cozy. Unfortunately, she needed to send her message to the Society. She had spotted a messenger bureau not far up the street. It would be perfect.

“While we wait,” she said, rising from the delicate chair. “Would you mind if I went to the messenger bureau? I would need to send a few notes back home.”

Leeford stood as well. “Would you like me to accompany you?”

She shooed him off. “Of course not, I will be fine. It will only take a minute or two.”

That half grin of his and the heat it triggered between her legs accompanied her to the door and well beyond the tea shop. Rushing, she twisted a shoulder this way or that to avoid the thickening crowd. Late afternoons in Aconia must have meant the beginning of livelier times.

She wrote a quick assessment to Mr. Clarence, mentioned crucial details such as Leeford’s ignorance of his sponsor’s identity, his character and her hope of changing his mind before Spark came to claim his prototype. She also made an oblique suggestion about perhaps “taking care” of the man despite the Society’s previous costly failures. Mr. Clarence’s argument would no doubt be that others could take his place and show undue interest in the dangerous machine, thus the more pressing need for an agent to operate inside Gunn’s home. But it was worth the try.

She sealed it with one of the bureau’s generic stamps and gave the roll of paper to the young man behind the counter. He stamped it, slid it inside a metal casing then tossed it in the bin with the rest to be taken onto one of the dragons she spotted moored below a nearby quay, engines rumbling, crew smoking and sitting with their legs dangling out over the guardrail. She heard a shout of victory and surmised they had been playing a game or other while passing time.

She was rushing back down the street when she saw a dark-haired man dressed all in gray and sporting a tall hat enter the tea shop where she had left Leeford. She knew that silhouette.

Her heart in her throat, she jogged to the window and peeked inside. Her gut twisted. Her palms grew slick with sweat. The man had just sat with Leeford, who must have had different ideas since he stood and planted his hands on his hips. After a brief exchange, Leeford’s eyes flared, he seemed to be looking for words as he sank in his chair. His hand trembled when he raked it back in his hair.

Divine Graces, no.

Sitting in front of Leeford, the man took his gloves off, shoved them in his right pocket. Always the right. His sharp profile and aquiline nose, which she had once found so elegant and sophisticated, left her shaking with realization and fear. And horror. This man could ruin everything. He had not been supposed to contact Leeford so soon. And with her long gone by then.

She would have recognized him anywhere. Aloysius Spark never went unnoticed.

Chapter Five

Leeford tried not to stare at Violet as she left the tea shop with the brisk walk he had come to associate with her. The curve of her waist cinched by the dark gray corseted dress accentuated her rounded backside. His artist eye, always on the lookout for beauty and aesthetics, committed each detail to memory, from appliqués in the form of black vines snaking up her rigid bodice to the steel pearls and black lace fringe. A tiny broach like a miniature rose gleamed blood red. For some reason, the broach did not suit her. He found it too harsh, too big and austere. Her exquisite bosom deserved something more feminine, more rounded to fit her figure. Thinking about her body made him hot under the collar. Beneath the table, his hands itched. He wanted to touch her again. Taste her berry lips. Both sets.

A familiar waiter arrived, nodded a friendly welcome then set their tray on the table. On it had been placed a pretty little tea set hand-painted in a white-and-blue-floral design, tiny silver spoons, infusers and sugar tongs. He prepared both sets, one for her and one for him, put the selection of tea breads, fig cakes and seasonal fruits preserve jars precisely in the middle of the table. Equidistance and symmetry, precision and minutia. He could forget where he had put his gloves or teacup but could guess to within a hairsbreadth the exact measurement of things. Not obsessing and measuring by eye the space between her embroidered napkin and his proved difficult, but he managed by replaying in his head their lovemaking on the lighthouse roof. Sublime.

While he waited for her return, his stomach grumbled and saliva pooled under his tongue. He may not be a perfect Gunn, but he still had some basis of table etiquette. Plus, he did not mind if she were late coming back since he wanted to spend as much time as possible with her. For the first time in many, many years, he had not needed whisky to fall asleep that morning. He suspected Violet had something to do with that. Not only for the sheer physical exertion of making love to her—such a strong body and heated reception—but for the emotional release of being with her, of sharing himself in every manner possible. She seemed to understand the duality of his character, the inventor and the dreamer, the restless nature, his need to create, build then discard to work on the next project. She had not seemed offended so far by his lack of financial means or his poor manners. Had he not told her he wanted to see the color of her lips? The ones below. Violet was a woman in full bloom, not a silly girl, not a blasé and hypocritical “proper” lady. After making love to her, he had slept like a log and woken that afternoon feeling unbeatable and recharged. What glorious sensation!

Jasmine-scented steam rose from the pot as he tried to see how the thing had been put together. A tiny dot of soldering at the juncture of the handle—

A shadow fell across his table. He looked up, grinning as he expected to see Violet’s porcelain-doll face.

“Good afternoon, Gunn.”

Leeford felt his grin slide down. Aloysius Spark, in all his handsome, elegant, dastardly arrogant self. A graduate with honors from the prestigious university that had barred Leeford’s application at the request of his parents, forcing him to instead study at a humble country college—which had turned out to be run by visionaries afflicted, like him, with vivid imagination and little ego. He had learned much from those academic outcasts. Unfortunately, no firm would touch him when he graduated.

Spark. If there was an engineer who gave them all a bad name, it had to be this one. Greed and disregard for human life had cost him his post in the land’s most prestigious firm, which had been commissioned with the erection of a set of bridges to link a brand-new skyport. He had not cared enough about his workers to supply the most basic safety equipment, or establish decent working hours. Leeford would have sacrificed an arm to work on such project. So many people would benefit from a proper skyport. With every amenity thinkable. Automatic stairs, lifts, cookshops, bathrooms even! Instead, Spark had caused the death of seventy-two workers. Charming fellow. Not counting the rampant rumors about his “research” on cadavers. In fact, he was more Gunn than Leeford. Well, they could have him. They deserved each other.

“Spark,” he replied, barely tilting his head in salute. “What do you want?”

The engineer curled his upper lip in what he must have thought was a smile. It resembled the rictus of a dog with rabies. Only detail missing was the foam. Leeford entertained himself for a few seconds with the image of Spark frothing at the mouth despite the pricey clothes and elegant demeanor.

“Come now, Gunn, that is no way to speak to your sponsor. Have I not been generous with you over the last few months?”

Leeford felt the blood leave his face and accumulate in his legs. For a wild, outrageous second, he feared fainting dead on the floor. His heart skipped at least one beat. “What?”

Spark pulled Violet’s chair but stopped when Leeford jumped to his feet. “I am with a friend. You are not welcome at our table.”

He had sounded shriller than he would have preferred—patrons turned to stare—but the matter remained that he did not want Spark around when his pleasant companion returned. And he was not allowed to spoil the image of her sitting in that chair on top of things.

“Calm down, man. I only want to share a cup of tea. I have no interest in your friends.” Spark sat and pulled his gloves and hat off. “In fact, I loathe the very word.”

Leeford sat, seething in his chair and raked his hair back. He could not believe this was happening. The humiliation all over again, as though they stood in the annual engineering student fair, the disparate resources, the various public figures roaming the place, grinning like fools at the shiny things that sat there and did nothing useful, the press-like vultures around the richer schools while his project went unnoticed. His had been the only machine that had actually worked and served a purpose.

His sponsor was Spark? Of all people. Violet’s words about his tool being twisted into a weapon came back to gnaw at his conscience. She had been so right. What a fool!

A ring that resembled a steel scarab wrapped around his little finger gleamed when Spark rested his hand on the table. In spite of his frustration, Leeford spent a second or so admiring the tiny hinges and the way the ring fit the appendage to perfection. Flawless symmetry, smooth lines. No way had Spark designed this.

“What do you want?” Leeford asked without taking his gaze off the ring. He preferred to look at a steel scarab then at Spark’s beady eyes.

“To inquire about the project’s status. What else?”

Anger replaced frustration. Leeford usually did not waste such energy on people but Spark’s tone made him radiate with rage. He made him feel like a whore. Hateful man. “You have been forbidden from practicing as an engineer. I could report you to the Order.”

Spark’s eyes narrowed, a tic pulled at his eyelid. The man obviously had a tenuous hold on his mental stability. “Do not venture further on that path, Gunn.”

“I will venture on the path I choose and I suggest you stay out of it,” Leeford retorted. “And as for the project, it is not completed and neither will it be. Ever.”

The steel scarab creaked when Spark balled a fist. “I paid for your research. It is mine. Prototype, plans, everything. Do not toy with me, Gunn, you are not equipped. You never were.”

How the conversation had veered in the span of a minute. Leeford leaned back in his chair. “The prototype is not anywhere near completion and I work without plans. As for the money, I will send it back to you with the next post, to the last ecu, I assure you. I do not want it.”

Spark grinned wide. “You do not even have it anymore. As quickly as it comes in, it goes back out for that pitiful shack you call home and the fools who inhabit it.” He leaned over the table, still smiling as if they were exchanging on the weather. He barely moved his lips when he spoke. “I possess excellent sources of information, Gunn. You have no financial backing except for me, no status since your family all but banned you, and you drink what little money is left.”

Leeford took the hits without flinching. He had endured much worse at the end of his parents’ tongues. “I have something that you will never have, it is called professional integrity and mine is not for sale.”

“Professional integrity?” Spark chuckled, shook his head. “Gunn, Gunn, Gunn. You do not even have a profession. Do they not say inventors are failed engineers?”

“And do they not say failed engineers become financiers?” a woman said to Leeford’s left.

“Ha!” He wanted to slap his hand on the table but was afraid to make a mess.

Violet stood near the next table, her cheeks flushed from—he thought—the wind and the brisk walk to reach the messenger bureau and return. Not even ten minutes had elapsed.

If her words produced a satisfying twitch to pull at Spark’s cheek, his expression bordered on panic and shock when he turned to address Violet and saw her standing there. He quickly recovered, leaned back in his chair and took his time disrobing the woman with his gaze, who did not seem disturbed in the least as she stared back. Several seconds passed. Clearly these two knew one another. Leeford could not imagine a world where such dissimilar people could ever meet. Or more. Perhaps they had met because of her work. He stood out of courtesy for her.

“You find me profoundly stunned,” Spark purred, standing as well to give Violet her chair back. “I had no idea you kept such charming company, Gunn. A world apart from the ugly girls who found you amusing during our youth.”

Before Leeford could intervene, Spark pulled himself another chair from the neighboring table and would have helped Violet sit had she not pointedly ignored his hand to instead take Leeford’s.

“Thank you,” she said to him, warmed his heart with a smile.

“There was a time you would not have avoided my touch,” Spark put in while he rubbed the inside of his ring with his thumb.

“Experience comes from bad judgment,” she said as she warmed her hands on the tea pot. “And good judgment comes from bad experiences.”

Leeford’s mood was lifted considerably. If it did not mean he had to spend a lot of time around people, he would have enjoyed being as skilled at ripostes as Violet was. And delivered with a small smile and no outward sign of nervousness. Unlike himself. It was all he could do to not jump to his feet again and yell curses at the arrogant ass. Perhaps he should!

Spark put a hand to his chest and winced. “My dear, how you wound me.”

“I am sorry to have interrupted your conversation,” she said to Leeford. “Would you prefer if I left?”

“Absolutely not! We all know who interrupted whom here.”

“Yes,” Spark replied, pulling his gloves out of his pocket. “Speaking of which. I will await news from you, Gunn. About the project.” He threw a quick glance at Violet. “Or better yet, I will come by tomorrow to see for myself.”

“I have told you that our association is over. Had I known my sponsor’s identity, I would not have even started the project. It is over.”

By the corner of his eye, he saw Violet sit up straighter and angle her head as though she listened in on a mental conversation. She seemed happy to hear him say this. Perhaps she was proud he would not turn his tool over to a man such as Spark, who clearly had more money than morality or vision.

When a scowling Spark leaned over the table, Violet’s hand slipped below the tabletop to disappear in the folds of her dress. Leeford could see it well from where he sat. Taut like a violin string, she exuded intensity. A cat about to pounce. Such strange reaction.

“Understand me well, Gunn,” the engineer snarled in undertones. “I own that research, I own the prototype and I own you. When I come by tomorrow, I will take it and finish the job myself. If I find nothing to satisfy me, what your family has done will look pleasant to what I can do to you.” His gaze slid to Violet and he grinned. “Your companion can tell you more about this, I am sure. She is well acquainted with my drive.”

From recesses of male protective instinct he did not know he possessed, Leeford leaned over the table as well, literally growled. “Do not dare speak to Miss Violet in such a way, Spark. I will not tolerate it.”

“Leave while you can, Aloysius,” Violet snapped. Her cheeks looked flushed.

Spark’s black eyebrows arched high. “‘Miss’ Violet?” he scoffed, stood and pulled his gloves on. “What has she been telling you, Gunn?”

“Nothing that could concern you!”

For the first time in his life, anger evaporated the logical side of his brain and left the primitive male pride in charge of things. He saw whisky in his future tonight and hated Spark for it. Hated him even more. “I have no qualms about challenging you. Should we get the pistols?”

Patrons must have heard his challenge for they turned to look at their table. Pinched little noses and puckered mouths. How he loathed all of them, the prissy upper class and other fools who gravitated to them. “What?” he threw around the place. “Have you anything to ask? No? Then mind your own blasted affairs!”

Even though his deportment must have embarrassed her, Violet never let it show and kept staring pistols at their unwanted guest.

Spark laughed. “A duel? Good fortune, man, I would never partake in such asinine activity. I prefer to hire someone to get rid of my problems. I think it is a very common method, is it not, Miss Violet?”

“It is,” she replied, standing. “Goodbye.”

“Indeed, Spark. Good riddance!”

“Oh, I am not so easily dismissed, Gunn. At dusk tomorrow. I look forward to this.” He straightened. “Gunn, Eleanor, oh, forgive me, Miss Violet.”

Spark left before Leeford had found a proper reply that did not include calling him an assortment of names not suited for public hearing. For her sake, he would try to remain calm. Then it hit him.

“Eleanor?”

Violet stared at the table for several seconds before meeting his gaze. And he did not like what he saw there. A whole new person, older, colder. Cheerless determination, steely resolve. And sadness. Ah yes, a lot of that.

Eleanor hated the triumphant glint in Spark’s eyes as he left. But she hated even more the look of hurt confusion in Leeford’s.

“Is Eleanor your real name?” he murmured.

She nodded.

“Why not tell me? What difference does it make? You are still an Escoraille, still Lily’s family.”

She noticed he had not called the young woman Lady Frivolous. It pained her without reason.

“No. I am not an Escoraille nor related in any way to Lily. You let a stranger into your home, Leeford.”

He poured hot water into her cup then into his. His hands shook. “Not only into my home.”

Tears welled her eyes. “I am sorry. Truly.”

“You look sorry enough, but then again, you are a good liar.” He grimaced. “I should not have said this. Forgive me. As you said, we all have our reasons and do what we think is right.”

“You remember?”

He nodded. “Not only do I remember, I believe it. Your tea is getting cold.”

“Let me tell you. Everything—”

He raised a hand and looked out through the window a few tables down. “Not here. At home. So I can salvage some shred of pride and not make a bigger fool of myself in a public place.”

The knife of regret stabbed deep. She tried to swallow a bit of tea but it would not go down. “You are not a fool, Leeford. I was dishonest with you. My reasons are just if that makes a difference to you.”

He shrugged noncommittally, gulped his tea in one swallow then plunked the cup down on the saucer, which broke in two and spilled bits of soggy leaves onto the table. “Keep it for later when I am properly drunk and anesthetized. Come, we must leave while there is still light.”

She knew his financial situation was tight at best and was torn between letting him pay or offering to share the costs. Would he feel more slighted if she offered or if she did not? Hoping she would nullify the dilemma before it happened, Eleanor rushed to retrieve enough ecus from her little pocket sown into the bodice of her dress and put them on the table. To her chagrin, Leeford had time to pull out a ratty leather wallet but not to take the money out of it. He shoved it back into his pocket and stormed out of the tea shop, knocking a few patrons out of his way and yelling at them for being there in the first place.

Her heart in her boots, Eleanor followed in his wake, caught up to him only when he had reached the garden and yanked his jacket and gloves from the valise. He never met her eyes as he prepared the duo-cycler, cranked the handle then sat. She joined him, held onto the edge of the seat instead of his waist—she doubted he wanted her to touch him—and closed her eyes to keep from seeing the tight set of his shoulders or the way he stared stubbornly forward.

He followed the road until the first drop-off ramp then angled his machine out toward the precipice. After revving the engine, he leaned forward. She hung on with all she had—fought the instincts to wrap her arms around him—and gritted her teeth when he propelled them forward with all speed. They went over the ramp and fell into the void, aimed at the marshy ground below their feet.

For a split second, she thought it would end this way. In a crash. But he deployed the wings, which flapped out in the wind and strained against their metal armature. The sound much like her heart, a wounded beast in the throes of death.

She was barely cognizant of the way back home, if only to watch out in case Spark decided he could continue the project without its creator. No one attacked them. No private dragon came to swoop over them and pepper them with bullets. No mysterious malfunction afflicted Leeford’s machine. Either the Society had assured protection from afar or Spark had not tried anything. Yet.

They made it back to his seaside estate without a glitch. But the sky had darkened over the horizon with thunder clouds hanging low over the water, roiling closer in black fists and shadowy maws. In a series of bumps and rattles they landed. Despite his ignoring her, she helped push the machine into the hangar, stood while he closed the doors without locking them. She wished he would. Lock everything down and leave. Before Spark arrived, the Society no doubt a second behind. Before things turned ugly.

“You should not be here when Spark arrives tomorrow,” she said to his back. “He is dangerous.” And so were her colleagues. As careful and professional as they were, she would not trust one of them with Leeford’s life.

He whirled around and ripped the goggles off. Red rimmed his eyes. His chin trembled. “I will not be pushed out of my house by the likes of him!”

“Temporarily at least. Destroy the prototype, take your friends with you and leave. Tonight. Please.”

“Destroy it? Are you mad?”

“You have built it once, you can again. It is your genius that designed it.”

“Do you not get it?” he demanded as he threw his goggles to the ground. “When I finish a project, I can never go back to it. It is gone!” He twirled his index finger by his temple. “Gone forever! I could no more build another than I can turn back time and pretend you did not stab me in the back. But he still will not get the prototype. I will hide it. Tonight. There are no plans, no sketches. It is all here.” He pointed to his head. “He will have nothing.”

He turned and marched back for the house. “And neither will I,” she heard him mutter.

She ran after him but could not bring herself to touch Leeford so she trailed him like a disobedient dog would his angry master, afraid of having caused irreparable harm, afraid of being tossed out or deprived of his affection.

Fortunately, neither Lady Frivolous nor Max was present and Eleanor followed Leeford up to the third floor, which she had seen only once since most of it was his chambers.

After shouldering the door open, he threw the gloves aside, ripped at the many buckles of his boots until he could kick them off. One thudded against the wall and created a black scuff. His chambers were much like their occupant. A bit messy, a bit befuddled but charming in their laisser-faire charm, worn grace and subdued but strong masculinity. After he grabbed a bottle of amber liquid she recognized to be whisky, he collapsed onto his massive bed—the thing was made of wood and steel, unlike anything she had ever seen. One of his inventions no doubt.

She stood uncertainly by the door. “Leeford?”

“Oh, please come in,” he snapped. “Pay no regard to the state of affairs. Spark may be an oily bastard, but he had this one thing right.” He took a long swallow from the bottle, smacked his lips then grinned sadly. Another swig made him wince.

She entered, closed the door behind her.

“So,” he said with a circular gesture. “Let us hear the fable of Miss Violet. But first, a drink.” He proffered the bottle for her to take. She shook her head and watched the liquid slosh when he tipped the bottle high then back down.

“My name is Eleanor Cleverly. I work for a secret society that is privately funded. They—we—work with governments to rectify certain situations they cannot fix themselves for legal or political reasons. Or when the means unfortunately justify the end.”

“Fascinating.” Another swing. “Please go on. I feel there is more. Enlighten me.”

Eleanor walked to the foot of his bed, clutched her hands behind her back so he would not see how they shook, how vulnerable she felt in the face of his quiet rage, his raw disappointment. It would have been much better had he thrashed the room and thrown things. She had grown accustomed to anger and rage and what it did to people. In her line of work, one often witnessed the ugliest side to humanity. But watching him this way, quickly drinking himself into oblivion, in a way self-destructing before her very eyes, hurt Eleanor as she had never been before. She had done this to him. It was her fault. She could perhaps fix the situation, but she may never be able to undo the harm she had caused. Even if she managed to glue the pieces back together, there would always be cracks. She sighed long, rattling like a silent whimper of pain.

Above the bottle, Leeford’s eyes flared, rimmed in red as if he had endured strong winds too long. He let the bottle rest on the mattress and stared at the liquid moving up against the glass sides.

“This is the truth.”

Eleanor took a long breath. As she let it out, she told him. Everything. About the multitude of men she had charmed either into compliance or into their graves. The beds she had shared for her duties. The lies she had told. The reasons why. Always the reasons why. She gave him absolute truth right down to trivial details and shameful specifics that he never would have learned on his own. Leeford’s expression grew sadder as she told her tale. She had expected anger again. Her world was populated with angry people. She stopped after she recounted her rendezvous with Mr. Clarence and how he had tasked her with taking care of the present situation.

“Your ‘society’ sounds as bad as those they fight.”

She took the hit without—she hoped—letting the shame show. “The common good supersedes that of individuals, Leeford. It is our motto.”

He let out a mirthless laugh. “And so what if buffoons like me are trampled in the process?”

“You are no bu—”

“So you knew all along Spark was my sponsor?” Leeford cut her off. At once several timekeepers chimed, gonged or clicked seven o’clock. The storm had swallowed the sky outside his windows, which she noticed only then opened out onto the sea. Rain started ticking against the glass panes. “You knew but never told me?”

“We deal with all sorts of people. We could not take the chance you would refuse to cooperate. Even if I have grown to trust your judgment.”

He shook his head in obvious bewilderment. “It never crossed your mind to simply tell me?”

“Would it have changed anything?”

“Yes.”

“You are lying,” she shot back. He had to lie. No one was that understanding, that unselfish. Everyone wanted something.

“No, Violet—Eleanor, whatever your name is. Not everyone is a liar.”

Her heart sank.

He put the bottle back on the dresser and sat against the edge of the bed, raked his hair back with both hands. Light from a single gas lamp in a corner gave his dark blond hair a soft reddish glow. His lips glistened from the whisky. His gaze riveted her to the spot. “You should have had more faith in me.”

“Our world is dying, it cannot afford to be gambled on faith.” She struggled to push out the callous words.

“Then yours is a bleak world indeed and perhaps not worth saving at all.”

She had tried to hold them in check. But they came. Like a torrent. Tears spilled from her eyes and Eleanor found she could barely stand from the weight crushing her. Like bulrush in the wind, her spine bent, forced her to fold in on herself. She collapsed to her knees. She cried for him more than herself. She had long accepted the life she had chosen with the consequences that came with it. But Leeford had not chosen to be deceived and hurt. He had not meant for Spark’s money to enable his research. His first reaction—and it had come from the core judging by his emotions—had been to tell Spark he would not transact with him. He was a good man. The Society did not kill good men. She did not kill good men. But still she had hurt him.

Strong arms she did not deserve encircled her. She tried to hiccup explanations, how she never meant to hurt him, or let her affection cloud her judgment, that if she had to do it all over again, she would choose the same course because logic had ruled her life. Would to the day she died. Because she believed in the Society’s motto—that common good did supersede that of individuals. She believed in it. It was in her to do the things she had done, it was part of her, these deadly skills—she had on her person right this instant enough to kill a man in half a dozen ways—and if Leeford wanted anything to do with her, he would have to accept this or nothing would ever come of what they had. If it was still there. Such a tiny, fragile bud.

“Please forgive me,” she whispered through her hands, behind which she hid her tears.

“Shh. Say nothing.”

“I must tell you.”

“There is no need, Eleanor,” Leeford whispered against the back of her head. He pressed her against him, knelt on the floor by her side so he could gently rock her. “Shh.”

“I did not—” She swallowed tears, rubbed the rest with her sleeve. “I did not mean to befriend you. You were not supposed to get inside my defenses. As soon as I saw you, I knew.”

That lean and solid chest, those strong, sinewy arms. She tried to make herself as tight and small as possible so she could fit her all into his embrace. Something she had feared she would never taste again. Perhaps it was the last time.

“I believe you.”

Beneath the whisky on his breath, she detected the true man, the smell of him, that intoxicating mix of winter wind and leather, of fresh cotton shirt and deeply masculine scent, the subtle fragrance clinging to his skin. She heard the patient understanding in his voice, the kind of tolerance found only in those who have felt the keen edge of exclusion and solitude, the barbed blade of humiliation.

Twisting her head so she could look at his throat when he spoke, she pressed her lips there not for a kiss but for the sheer happiness of touching him.

His Adam’s apple bobbed when he swallowed. “Since I seem incapable of getting properly drunk, I have a proposition for you.”

Eleanor squeezed her eyes of the last few tears and nodded.

“We both agree that Spark is not to get his filthy hands on that prototype.”

Another nod. She wanted to cry again. From relief.

“We both agree that something should be done before he gets here tomorrow. So my proposition is that we all leave. With the prototype.”

She nodded again. “There are safe houses everywhere in the land. Aconia included.” She rubbed her eyes. Her head hurt. “No one but the Society knows about them. We would be safe there. The machine as well.” Her mental gears began to turn, slowly at first, then with more speed and purpose. A plan took shape. “My colleagues have kept a close eye on Spark for years. If he moves, they will know and act accordingly. Follow him here, send agents to the safe houses in case we must use them. It is standard procedure.”

“Perfect,” he replied, combed her hair back so he could look into her eyes. His sparkled like sapphires. “But one last thing. I must know out of sheer male pride and the hint of whisky in my veins. What we shared earlier…was, ah, was it real? And please rest assured that you may trample the last trace of my dignity and tell me the truth. You owe me that much.”

Nothing had ever felt more real than touching him and having him touch her, of feeling him move inside her. She had come alive in his hands. From the inside out. More than mere physical pleasures—she could find those at her own hands or that of other men—Leeford had lit a fire, a light, she did not know could exist in a person such as herself, cynical, intransigent. A woman sent to charm then poison men. “Yes.”

“Was it a mistake on your part?” Seriousness smoothed his high brow and prominent, angular facial features. For once, no mocking grin played with the corners of his thin mouth as he waited for her answer.

“It was an accident, but no mistake. I would do it again if I could.”

He nodded, a sudden new light dancing in his eyes. “You can. If you want to.”

“Do you?”

Leeford cupped the back of her neck and pulled her close for a kiss that left nothing to the imagination, to doubt and uncertainty. He wanted her. Divine Graces, he still wanted her.

Chapter Six

The salty quality of tears on her lips mixed with the taste of berries as he deposited tender kisses on her mouth. The moment called for gentleness, attention, focus. Now was not the time for carnal abandon. It would come later. His cock hardened painfully.

What had she done to his simple life?

There was no pretense in her pain. No artifice. Even if she lied for a living. Ha. A walking contradiction.

Any other man in his position would have tossed the assassin—an assassin—out on her curvy bottom and slammed the door. Any other man would have been too humiliated, enraged or drunk—a plague on that Gunn blood so resistant to spirits—to accept her apologies. Any affronted male of any species would have fluffed his feathers, stomped about in a great show of self-righteous disgruntlement. Then why did the thought never cross his mind to rage at Violet—Eleanor? It was his due. Was he no man? Could he not hate her as she richly deserved? She had come into his home under a false pretext, had snooped in his workshop to get a closer look at his prototype, had known all along he had associated with a toad like Spark yet said nothing. To top things off, she had shared herself with him in the most complete and personal way. What did he do? When she asked for forgiveness, he gave it to her. Just like that.

Even if he spent as little time as possible in society—or perhaps because of it—he had seen the truth shining like a pearl when she had pried open the oyster of her life to reveal it to him. He knew pain intimately. The public and ongoing humiliation at the hands of his family while growing up had hurt him in a deep, irreparable way yet he now held nothing but contempt for them, no rage, and maybe a bit of pity. They must be bored indeed to bother with him. So he knew what pain felt like and the many forms it could take.

While he held Eleanor’s shaking frame, her sobs like nails in his chest, he had come to the conclusion that either he liked her too much to be angry with her, or he was simply incapable of rage. Out of sheer pride, he preferred to think it was the former. What sort of man could not even dredge a bit of good old primeval rage after being treated this way? Plus, he suspected his affection for the woman ran deeper than mere “liking”.

He presently pulled from her, helped her rise to her feet, brushed with his thumb the last few tears glistening on her cheeks. Her nose was red, her black eyes huge. “Thank you.”

The simple words had more effect than any long-winded expression of thanks she could have formed—and he knew she wielded words with precision, Spark could attest to that. Strands of hair so black they looked purple hung loose around her face. He coiled one around his index finger to straighten it. A deep blush darkened her cheeks. She sighed.

“My life used to be boringly predictable—or predictably boring,” he began, brushed the tip of her hair against her ambrosial lips. “What happened to it? Why do I want the same thing from you even now that everything has changed?”

“Maybe because nothing important has changed?” Clearly she felt unsure. Or hopeful?

“Is it that you gave this to me…” he said while he pressed a hand to her breast, not in a proprietary or sexual way, but as a gesture of closeness to indicate indissoluble ties. She had given to him the gift of her intimacy. He had accepted. It was his. “And that makes us more than…whatever we are right now?”

A faint smile lifted her lips. The lamp in the corner of his chambers illuminated her in a slanted, sensuous way. “You have completely lost me.”

He smiled. “I have lost myself, I admit.” Leeford cupped her chin to raise her face to his. “I think I was the moment you knocked me back on my ass. Literally.”

“That was only two days ago,” she murmured, eyes half closed.

“How long does one need to know when a shoe fits, a wine ready, a meal cooked? What is time but a man-made tool?”

Time had once ruled his life. The many timekeepers clogging his house could bear witness to this. Did he not wear not one but two pocket watches? But tonight, with this mysterious and beautiful woman in front of him, time had lost its appeal. In fact, he would love for it to go away.

Eleanor turned her head to kiss his fingers. “Would you make love to me?”

Any other man he knew would have turned her away.

If he did this, Leeford would hurt himself more than he already was. She had lied to him, deceived him, but her affection felt sincere. And he did want to make love to her in a desperate, tender, loving fashion.

“How would you want me to do it?” Their disorderly coupling of earlier blazed in his mind’s eye. But for some reason he could not explain, he wanted it to be different tonight.

“Slowly,” she replied in a breathless way that did wonders to his ego.

“Slowly?”

She nodded.

“Like this?”

Leeford leaned over and kissed her so softly he did not feel her lips on his even if the heat of them all but melted his reason. With his hands, he traced her figure from hips up to bodice, the many different textures exquisite under the pads of his fingers. Up over her breasts, which rose and fell quickly. Each little steel pearl sown into the corseted dress provided sweet contrast against the satiny fabric.

“Yes,” she whispered, eyes closed. “Like this.”

“Before we do, I would like to see you. Without all this.” He undid a button on her high collar. “I would like to see the beauty under the dress.”

“Remove it.”

Even if the two words could have been a command, Leeford knew them for the plea they were.

He reached to her just as she placed her hand over the broach shaped like a rose. “Be careful with this thing.”

“It looks sharp.” And was ugly, but he did not say it.

Avoiding his gaze, she shrugged. “It is a weapon, Leeford.”

“A weapon?” He would have loved very much to see how it worked, but considering she looked awkward and uncomfortable by it, he let the matter rest.

She avoided his gaze as she unpinned the small metallic rose, put it on the dresser then returned to her former spot. A small, embarrassed smile played with her cheeks.

“Anything else?” he asked, teasing.

“You are safe for now.”

She breathed hard when he unbuttoned the adjusted sleeves, her rigid bodice. Each small release creating havoc in his trousers until the upper half of her dress had opened in front to reveal a purple and black satin corset that gleamed like wet steel. Above it, her pale skin rose and fell. He placed a kiss there, at the dawn of her breasts.

He caught her hands when she reached for the waistband. “Allow me.”

“Wait. There is…”

“Another weapon?”

She nodded.

Leeford fought against the grin. “Weapons are to be expected in your line of work.” It did not surprise him. In fact, he preferred that she was armed if she went about chasing ruthless brigands or foolish inventors.

“Thank you,” she murmured.

Pushing aside curiosity into the closing mechanism and clever little clasps, Leeford knelt in front of her so he could tug the waistband loose. The three metal clips clicked. He pulled the bottom half of her dress apart then the whole thing so he could lay it on the bed. So she was armed. A tiny silver pistol in an ingenious holster cinched her left thigh. He ran his hand along the leather strap, tugged on the release. The thing fell in his hand and joined the dress. He had never held such a small pistol before, though could draw its schematics simply by looking at it, or design a whole new way of projecting bullets fast enough and hard enough to kill a man. He just had no interest in such work. His challenge for a duel with Spark, who had been an excellent shot on hunts the Gunns had organized—another thing that made him an anomaly in his family, Leeford could not bring himself to kill an animal he would not eat—would have ended in tragedy. For himself. The one physical achievement that no one, not even Spark, had been able to top was rowing. To this day, Leeford held more championships than anyone in the single scull, and his many trophies still gathered dust in his college’s main hall.

When Eleanor’s shapely form was revealed to him, all other thought floated away. She was breathtaking.

Eleanor stood before him, wearing only her corset, matching underthings and black, low-heeled boots. The mix of black, risqué lace and purple satin suited her very well. She was a woman in full bloom, one who knew what she wanted and also how. For a second he tried to guess her age but came up empty. She could be twenty-five or forty. Her eyes were wise and hands experienced but her body strong and firm. And with enough curves to lose a man.

He sat on the bed so he could look at her as he pleased. “Would you turn for me? Your beauty demands to be admired from every angle.”

With a small smile, she turned her back to him, stopped when he was about to ask her to. Somehow she must have felt what he wanted. Kindred spirits? He never would have guessed. She unpinned the rest of her hair, let it spill down in bouncy ribbons between her shoulder blades. It was much longer than he had anticipated.

From the back, Eleanor’s voluptuous body cinched in that corset and with the gas lamp’s amber light caressing it at a very pleasing angle, set his blood to boiling. He would have looked at her until he grew blind. Black lace underthings created tempting mystery between her cheeks. What would he find there? he wondered. Warmth. Solace.

“You are so…” He sighed. “Beauty is such a small word for what I wish to express. An artist could search his whole life for such perfection of form and symmetry and never come even close. Colors, the very texture of life fade around you. Light means nothing. A culmination, the apex. You are—”

“Yours.”

Leeford was on his feet the second she said the simple word. With his hands on her shoulders, he kissed her nape through the purple-black hair. The delicate shell of her ears, the tender lobes.

“Such a lovely gift when I have nothing to offer in return,” he murmured in her ear.

“You have these,” she replied by running her hand over his. “And this,” she went on, caressing his head. “But more importantly,” she twisted and put her other hand on his chest, “you have this to give.”

“And what would that be?”

“Compassion, respect, kindness, sincerity. To a woman, there are no greater gifts than those.”

He doubted he possessed that many qualities but expressed his gratitude at the compliments by kissing the charming little liar.

Between the underthings and the bottom of her corset, he could spot a portion of her back. That skin! He salivated just looking at it. He ran his hand there, where twin dimples in her lower back made shallow pools of shadow, where he thought his tongue would make a perfect instrument to give her pleasure, to stimulate the sensitive skin. Leeford bent over and did just that. Spasms twitched along her thighs, her rounded bottom, her calves so smooth and curvy. She was curves. She embodied and captured the theory, the intuitive idea of every known curve. To him, she confounded and transcended numbers. Mathematicians and geometers, physicists and artists alike could dedicate their lives to mapping her every rounded plane and recess and still not chronicle an inch of her beauty. His algebraic queen, his lemniscate goddess. Eleanor excited the man and fascinated the inventor. Stirred the primeval male and mystified the thinker. He wanted her. Now.

With his hand, he wanted to experience her voluptuous body. With his mouth, taste her skin and heat. With his cock, he would unfurl her then make her his. Unite them into one person.

Eleanor’s heart rate accelerated. Each of Leeford’s hands triggered chaos, beautiful chaos in her sex, which squeezed with impotent avidity as she envisioned his lovemaking. Her clitoris throbbed in demand. Her nipples as well. She had become—he had reduced her to—a knot of nerve endings. Pulsating. Burning.

“Here,” Leeford said as he slid a small stool closer with one of his feet. “Rest a foot on this.”

She did and smiled when he knelt in front of her, proceeded to untie her stockings from the garter belt and unlace her boot. Dexterous fingers worked with quick, efficient movements. She had never had such a skilled lover. And one who could so easily guess what she wanted and how. Leeford finished with one leg, pulled off boot and lace stocking, pressed a soft kiss to the top of her foot—creating a jab of need to poke her in the belly—and set about undoing the other. Soon she stood barefoot. Her corset was his next goal. Slowly in a sweet torment, Leeford unclasped the top portion then the few bottom clips, kept the middle for last. Her breasts all but spilled over the edge. Her breathing quickened. Between her legs she had melted.

He stood before her, his dazzling blue eyes riveted to his work then circled her until he stood at her back. She felt her nostrils dilate when he reached around her, used his thumbs to unclasp the last two fastenings. With a thrilling little release, he clicked her corset open and tossed it on the bed.

“My,” he remarked. “It is heavy.”

“It is custom made for me, for my, er, needs.”

He walked back in front of her, nodding, clearly fighting between curiosity and arousal. “You must show me all your strange and intriguing tools. I may even be able to fine-tune one or two.”

The thought of those ink-stained hands holding a garrote made her wince.

Under the loose chemise, her breasts dropped by an inch or two, the sudden looseness creating tingles all along her chest. Gurgles in her belly made her grin in awkward apology. A sly wink from him put her embarrassment to rest. She raised her arms so he could slip the chemise over her head and wiggled a bit to alleviate the itching. As though he could guess her needs, he ran light but brisk hands over the red marks her corset had left until the itchiness had gone.

“Thank you,” she said through a smile.

“It is the least a man can do. Even if these make the most delectable silhouettes, corsets must be a pain to live in. We men are not expected to suffer this way. Inequitable at best.”

“One of many inequities.”

He agreed with a nod before tucking his bottom lip between his teeth and cupping her breasts, weighing them as one would a heavy purse of coins, his long hands easily managing her generousness.

“These are the most beautiful I have ever seen,” he whispered before pressing a soft kiss to each nipple. “And later I will make love to them.”

She swallowed because she could not force a single word out. When she looked down, the lump in his trousers made her want to skip a few steps and sink over him or collapse on all fours to curl her backside up for his taking.

In only her garter belt, she felt more beautiful than had she wore the most stunning dress and most precious jewelry. Leeford’s admiration was like a warm blanket covering her. He touched her here or there, lingered on a thigh then circled her navel or the curve of her belly. Given free rein of her body, Leeford made a mess of her heart rate with his soft lips or tender, inquisitive fingers. Needs spiked. Impulses. Urges. What had she done before her body knew his hands? How could she have found pleasure in another man’s embrace? Who better than Leeford Gunn could bring her to the precipice of delirium, keep her there with whispers alone, and send her plunging into a raging sea of delights with a mere flick of his hand? Her flesh had not known the heights to which it could be brought. She had not lived. Merely survived. Eleanor wanted to live, to taste and devour life and could not fathom how without this man by her side she could achieve such level of joy. When—if—they managed to evade Spark’s long arm long enough to either allow her colleagues to arrive or make it to Aconia and send an urgent message to the Society, she would tell Leeford. She would share this with him if he wanted to accept it. And if not, then she would count herself lucky that she had known such joy even for a short time. Others had never tasted ambrosia from its source. She had. And to her, it tasted of charming eccentricity, smelled of winter wind, sparkled blue like a fall sky. Ambrosia had another name to Eleanor—Gunn.

“Make love to me,” she whispered. “With your mouth.”

“I have a better idea.” From mocking, his grin turned rascally. “Follow me.”

He escorted her to the bathroom adjoined to his chambers. A skylight created a rectangle of cloudy sky overhead. Covered in copper except for a few details, the large bathroom boasted a coffered ceiling made of hammered copper sheets, pipes that ran along the walls, spigots, a large coffin-sized basin on a wrought iron pedestal. He did not turn on any light as he left her by the door and leaned over the basin’s rim so he could reach levers and pull a length of chain before smiling wide when a veritable rain of steaming hot water fell from a pair of slotted contraptions hanging above the basin. Another knob then foam splattered out of a thin glass tube projecting from a kettle-like apparatus. Fruity smells wafted to her. Yet water did not accumulate in the basin.

“I call this a ‘rain maker’ for lack of better word,” he remarked, proud of his invention. He hooked his index finger at her.

The sound of water drumming against the inside of the copper basin drowned the rapid whoosh of her heartbeat in her ears. She joined him, let him rid her of the garter belt. Offered him her nakedness.

“Stand in the basin, please.”

After he had helped her step over the rim, he detached from a clip in the wall an articulated pipe—the many copper rings and joints made it look like a metal snake—twisted it around to undo a kink then thumbed a small knob near the end. Water began pouring from the pipe and into the basin. He angled the pipe her way, smiled.

“Directional water jets. Very, very useful.”

Foam built at the bottom of the basin, reached to her ankles. Leeford scooped a small measure and slathered her leg with it, repeated the process with her other leg. Her belly followed, her back. Soon he had covered her in rich, fruity-smelling lather. She shivered at the exquisite sensations.

“Now for the best part.”

Oh, he was enjoying himself immensely. So was she!

With his “directional water jet” in one hand and the other rubbing her from head to toe, he rinsed her. His shirt was see-through with water. His trousers had darkened. His hair stuck to his high forehead. Eleanor sighed when he finished rinsing her but did not stop running the gentle jet over her, each tiny stream like a feather against her skin. She would curve and bend to show him where she wanted to be caressed and he would readily oblige. Such a sweet man.

“You have me at a disadvantage, Leeford. Here am I naked while you still wear most of your clothes.” She tugged at his wet lapel.

Leeford grinned wide as he wrestled his clothes off to toss them pell-mell. His cock bobbed in enticement when he yanked his trousers off, kicked out of them and all but ripped the shirt off his shoulders. Next door, the gas lamp’s amber glow silhouetted his long-limbed, athletic body.

She had been wondering about it long enough. “Where did you ever build shoulders like these?” she asked as she watched the lean muscles play under the shiny shoulders. His neck was long and strong, his jaw well defined. His belly was flat, hard-looking without being overly striated. Legs long and sinewy with great thigh and calf definition.

“Rowing.” He raked his hair back, licked his bottom lip. “I—in college, I rowed. Was good at it.”

“Good?” she replied, let her gaze roam over him. “How good?”

“My times have not been beaten yet.”

“Mmm.” She took a moment to look at him, really look at him. Magnificent.

“Sit at the bottom,” he instructed, holding her elbow as she did. “Part your legs for me.”

Now that she knew what he intended, Eleanor needed little time or coaxing to sit at the bottom of the basin and hook one leg over the rim while she caressed his face with a lazy hand. Hot water, fruity smells, the soft amber light illuminating his work, everything converged and combined to make this one of the most erotic, stimulating experiences of her life. And to say women spurned him. Fools! She knew not only because of what Lady Frivolous had disclosed about Leeford’s love life—or lack thereof—but also because she understood how women’s minds worked. And upper-class women were the worst when it came to judging and dismissing a man. They would find him cute in a gauche kind of way, would feed off his naïveté for their own jaded enjoyment, their palate dulled with ennui, then they would gather round like vultures and make light of him, ultimately spurn and wound him. They wanted a “real” man, whatever that might be. Arrogant, unyielding, domineering, rich. They wanted nothing of a gentle, caring man such as Leeford, who had no great title or fortune. She had seen it often enough. When came time for underhanded viciousness or cold disdain, women were champions. Well, all the better for her. She would keep him, thank you very much. And certainly would not share!

When he angled the water jets on the inside of her thigh, she forgot everything but what he did to her.

Teasing, he brought the water up along her leg, higher still until the first few jets touched the sensitive skin right next to her sex. He stayed there a moment, his gaze on her face, letting her reactions guide his hand. Astute gem of a man! She moaned with contentment when hot water tickled her skin.

Leeford narrowed his eyes in complete focus. “Spread yourself for me.”

Eleanor did with not a stitch of inhibition. One leg hooked over the rim, she parted her thighs with fingers that shook from excitement, pulled her flesh outward, denuded her pearl to his hungry gaze.

He scooped creamy lather with the back of his free hand and pressed it against her vulva, rubbed in tiny, gentle circles until Eleanor had to bite down to keep her legs in place. Heat spread to her belly. From the water and from his knuckles rubbing in all the right places. The man must have studied hands for he knew how they worked. And how to use them to pleasure a woman. With the water jets directed against her sex, and with his hand still rubbing ’round and ’round, she could feel the wave coming. The roiling, swirling surge. It began with a slight tingle between her shoulder blades. Grew outward, downward, between her legs, up and over her belly. Cramps—painful—tightened her. She let her head loll back against the rim. Leeford pressed his hand over her mons to pull the skin taut. On a long whimper, she released.

“Turn around,” he said in a hoarse voice.

Without question or even opening her eyes, she flopped onto her front, raised herself on her knees and grabbed the rim with both hands, elbows bent, chin against the copper. Water, hot, delectable, landed on her cleft. On her anus. With shock, a tremor rocked her. Pleasure hit. Leeford snaked a hand under her belly so he could cup a breast, squeeze it, roll her tender nipple. All the while he kept the water against her fissure, sometimes going up and down, other times just angled at her pussy. She nearly cried out in grief when he abandoned her breast. But oh what he had prepared for her!

Lather along her cleft, from anus to clitoris. Rubbing again. So much of it. Hot water everywhere. Tingles. Fever-like heat. A tongue?

“Ahh!”

He had just bent over and clamped his mouth against her pussy, worked his tongue. That magnificent organ!

“Oh Leeford. Good fort— Ahh.” Her voice rose. She braced against the basin’s rim. Her spine concaved. Still water drummed against her vulva and anus. Then fingers were inside her. How many? She could not tell. Did not care.

“Yes, take it,” she murmured against the copper. “Yes, yes.”

He seemed to grow bolder at her insistence and began to rub her cleft front to bottom with the copper tube’s smooth edge, making the tiny water jets all the more thrilling against her distended flesh. His tongue in her, his fingers, the smooth and hot copper. Into her sex, anus, everywhere she received him.

It hit. Euphoria. Inferno. Fireworks. Drunkenness from pure unadulterated pleasure. Ecstasy. She cried out. Leeford.

She rode his hand hard, pushing back against the rim to accentuate the movement.

Somewhere behind her the angle and rhythm of his hands changed. She did not know what he was doing until she felt his legs connect behind hers. He had stepped into the basin with her. His long and lean body espoused hers as he leaned over her back, abandoned the pipe so he could grab at her backside and part her nice and wide for him. She felt tongue and even teeth against her tender flesh. Then nothing but cool air.

For a second, she lamented the loss before something hot and silky pressed against her entry, smoothly parted her. In a leisurely, torturous curl, he took her. His cock slid in without effort. Coupled with the remnants of her blinding orgasm, the tender penetration triggered frissons of expectations.

“Eleanor,” he whispered right into her ear. Into her heart.

With him kneeling between her legs, long arms over hers to anchor them on the basin rim, Leeford retreated to the glans, curled back in for a prolonged, deliberate thrust. She whimpered her need at him. He delivered another measured push. Her voice rose several octaves. To say she had always enjoyed furious couplings! Again his claiming was slow. Profound. Retreat like a small death, thrust like an awakening. She had known nothing before this.

The rhythm changed. Accentuated. Quickened. She cried out for each thrust, whimpered at each withdrawal even as she knew he was only reloading. Literally. His long hands wrapped around hers while his firm body pinned her against the basin edge, his cock an anchor into her flesh. Potent shoves that rattled the pipes followed. Self-forgetting, frenzy. She shook from pleasure. Felt drunk. Lost. Deaf. Blinded by exultation. On a scream that deflated her lungs almost to the point of pain, she climaxed again. Behind her Leeford pushed one last time then wrapped an arm around her so they could lie on their sides, more or less comfortable along the bottom of the coffin-sized basin. Despite the shattering orgasms he had given her, she had not felt him achieve his own.

“Have you not released?” she murmured against the back of his hand, which she had pulled to her for a quick kiss.

“A short…reprieve,” he panted, reached over her shoulder to shut the water jets. “A proper bed…then I will make love to your breasts.”

Thrill needled her clitoris. After a series of quick pulsations, the vestiges of her pleasure drifted away, replaced with sweet, sweet throbbing.

Before she could protest, he stood, managed to scoop her in his arms and made his way into the bedchamber where he used his thigh to keep her up while he yanked the duvet off the bed. She yelped a laugh when he let her roll onto the mattress. A few feathers puffed out due to the sudden weight. A corner of the sheet stuck to her wet shoulder. She rolled onto her back, bent a leg that she let fall to one side. Her sex still pulsated from his handling.

He looked at it, made her feel beautiful and feminine in an unbelievable way then stood by the edge of the bed. Towered over her.

“Now,” he said, licking his lips and bouncing his eyebrows. “We pay proper attention to these fine gems.” He gestured to her breasts before leaning over and sucking one. “Mmm.”

Her toes curled up. She arched off the bed, gathered her breasts and squeezed them together for him to suck at his leisure. And he did. With much noise and greed, he massaged and rolled, licked and sucked her nipples until they were sensitive enough to respond to a mere breath. She moaned deep in her throat.

“You enjoy this?” he asked. “How about this?”

Fisting his cock, he curled his spine so he could press his silken glans in the gap between her breasts. Pushed slowly while she kept them compressed around his shaft. When the head popped out, she gave it a lick.

“Oh, you need to do that again,” he murmured.

While he retreated, Eleanor spared a hand so she could for a moment stoke her own fire before making his penis a home between her breasts. He seemed to enjoy watching her for his eyes narrowed, his mouth parted. His glistening cock reappeared above her breasts, but this time, she did not only lick the head, she wrapped her lips around it and sucked. He remained thus, curled over her with a hand against the headboard for support, his member snug in her ampleness, belly contracted with the effort of keeping the position. Muscles played under the smooth skin and a patch of dark blond hair parted his chest in halves. With one of his, he replaced her hand on her breast, each of them now squeezed one. A team effort. She resumed fingering her pussy with renewed energy.

Down between her legs, her fingers found the hard little pearl and started rubbing it. ’Round and ’round. She dipped her middle finger inside. So much honey there.

He groaned when she bared her teeth and pressed them on his cock. With a wet pop she sucked then released him.

Hips working quicker, he retreated, pushed back in. “Mmm. Keep your mouth open.”

Eleanor opened wide for him while he simultaneously made love to her breasts and her mouth, her fingers working hard, in and out, two at a time, thrust, thrust, tease her clitoris, push back in. Her thighs trembled as she spread herself wider. He watched while he penetrated the valley of her breasts and welcoming mouth. Pre-cum tasted salty against her tongue. She “Mmm-ed” loud, moaned and whimpered and sucked whenever his cock would pop out from her compressed flesh. Honey gathered in her folds. She used it to make her breasts slicker. His essence and hers filled her nose, her mouth.

“Harder,” she groaned. “Harder.”

Leeford bucked. With her mouth she made a home for him. His expression tensed. He retreated.

“No!” She abandoned her pussy to claw at his backside and forced him back into her mouth. Her pussy throbbed in demand. “Come back.”

So she could have her hands free to spread her sex and pleasure herself with a vengeance, she made Leeford capture her breasts and squeeze them hard together, make them a sheath for his cock. By increments, he introduced his shaft into her waiting mouth. Pre-cum, her saliva and remnants of her own nectar rendered his rod glistening smooth, one she welcomed and anticipated. One she needed.

“Eleanor.”

She sank fingers into herself when she heard the warning note in his voice. “Come,” she growled each time he retreated from her mouth. “Come, come.”

His fingers digging into her, he pushed deeper. Eleanor opened mouth and legs wide. Just as his semen jetted out of him in thin strands, she drove her fingers in to the knuckles. A fiery peak made her cry out. His cum landed on her lips and chin. While she eagerly licked the hot nectar, Leeford pulled out and dove for her pussy. His mouth a conqueror as he shoved between her legs.

She said things to him. To spur him on. To shock and stimulate. Whispered demands, snarled pleas.

On a long moan, she clawed at her pussy to make more room for his decadent mouth, but before she could ride the rest of the wave, he grabbed her by the crook of the hips and slid her down to him, right up against his thighs. Because he stood by the side of the bed with a perfect angle and height, his cock, less hard but still glorious, found its home once more. He took her. Demanded. Primeval male instincts overshadowing everything else. How she loved him this way. The shy, awkward inventor was gone.

“Ah!”

Her breasts bounced from the assault. He thrust, thrust, thrust. Harder, deeper. Eleanor grabbed her knees and pulled them up to her chest. Stretched to the limit. Delirium. A great surge swelling. His cock pounding. A hammer of flesh. Blue eyes dazzling in the amber light. Long hands around her hips. Taking. Taking.

When the final wave hit, Eleanor forgot which way was up or down. In a brilliant second of bliss, she released just as he thrust and stayed deep in her. Shivers took her. Like a fever. She came and came. All the while Leeford remained still, sheathed to the hilt. Outside a storm pounded.

“Divine Graces,” she murmured at length.

Leeford gasped for breath as he pulled out, rolled on the bed facing down and presenting his back and perfect rounded backside glossy from sweat. His hair stuck out where it had dried.

“That was…” she heard from within the mattress. He puffed a laugh. “Words fail me.”

He rolled slowly off the bed, staggered to the bathroom and returned with a warm, wet facecloth with which he wiped her face and chest.

“You did not have to do this,” she said, taking over after it became evident he was making a mess of things. “I would have kept it a while longer. You have a lovely taste.”

Despite the poor light, she could see his blush.

He collapsed beside her, facedown. With a hand, he caressed her thigh. “My life was utterly boring before I met you. Thank good fortune you came along.”

“I was thinking the same.”

“What? You, the spy and assassin, the woman who scaled the side of my house? I would think your life was already thrilling enough without me. I must be a damper indeed.”

“Absolutely not. Coming here was the best thing that has happened to me. Meeting you is…” She smiled as she patted his thigh. “My duties are oft times quiet ones. A lot of it is studying tedious subjects, learning, practicing.”

“Practicing what?” He rolled onto his back and ran his hand over her belly. His eyes blazed with inquisitiveness.

She should feel awkward speaking about her work to this man who would never do what she could—and had—but his curiosity touched her nonetheless. They may be from different worlds, but still shared much.

“Languages, hand-to-hand combat, climbing—which is my specialty since I do not have a fear of heights. I love heights.”

He shivered. “I do not mind sitting quietly somewhere high, or piloting a dragon, but scaling walls would be beyond me. What else do you study?”

“All sorts of ways to, er, well…”

“To kill?”

She nodded. “I do not test, please believe me. I study.”

His eyebrows arched. “There is a difference?”

“A world of difference. I take no pleasure in it and only use lethal force as a very last recourse.”

“I was only tormenting you.” Leeford raked his hair back from his face. It stuck up in places and gave him a comical look. It went well with his eccentric profession. “But what of the tools you use? Surely you have fascinating ones concealed.” He pointed to her corset, which had fallen to the floor.

“Oh, this is my pride and joy.” She smiled. “This thing is like a small armory. And indeed, I have brought things you will probably find interesting—”

Leeford cocked his head then climbed up on an elbow to look out the windows. “What is that?”

She rolled over so she could take a peek. On the dresser, the bottle caught her attention. Inside, the amber liquid shuddered in widening circles, the kind caused by vibrations.

“Divine Graces,” she heard him whisper as he leaped off the bed and rushed for the windows.

Instead of the stormy night sky they had admired while making love, the windows were now filled with plated steel.

Chapter Seven

He had never dressed with such haste. Nor had he ever seen a woman throw on clothes in such a hurry. She ran out of his room in only her chemise and corset. Lightning illuminated her curvy form for a split second then she was gone.

“Eleanor!”

“I need my things!” came her voice from down the hall. She was fast.

“Meet me in the great room!” he yelled back.

With shirt undone, trousers and boots barely on, he rummaged around his room for his vest, cursed at the lost time but finally found it. He nearly ripped the lining when he fished out his watch and tucked it into trousers pocket with the little timekeeper. Leeford then sprinted down the stairs leading to the second floor, spent a while pounding on Lily’s door without success then made his way in the dark to the great room where he retrieved an old pair of steam pistols from the trunk. Family heirlooms. Ha. One was only charged halfway but it would have to do. And on top of things, he would have to draw very, very near to the target for the shots to be effective. Instead of keeping these for closer study—something for which he had never made time—perhaps he should have procured tried-and-true pistols that shot bullets. How was he to know he would need to shoot his way out of his own home!

Outside, the storm roared. Rain like black whips lashed the windows. He dared not turn on any lights. Not until he had ascertained the danger. Although he knew it must have been Spark outside flying some large dragon.

The folded note on the coffee table caught his eye. After a quick scan, he breathed a sigh of relief. Lily often accompanied Max to Aconia to get supplies. This was where they had gone, had probably left by coach not long after Eleanor and he had taken off. At least they were out of harm’s way. For now.

A faint sound caught his attention. He whirled on his heels, pistols aimed more or less the same way, and spotted a smallish dark form rushing out of the stairwell. Eleanor emerged into the relative light of the storm, a dark pack in one hand and a peculiar silver pistol that he would have loved to study in the other. She wore her black and purple corset over the rest of her outfit, which consisted of loose black trousers and matching shirt. Flat shoes made not a sound as she traversed the great room, planted a kiss on his cheek. She had tied her hair in a tail.

“We need to act fast. I do not know how long it will take my colleagues to realize what is happening.”

“They are watching us right now?”

She shook her head, pointed above. “They are watching him. Have so for a long time. Where is Lily?”

“She and Max have gone to town so the house is locked tight. Spark will need time to work the—”

Outside, a loud whir followed by a muffled thoop drowned the rest of his words. With violence that made the entire house shudder, something crashed through the window, took a portion of wall along the way before retreating and latching on to the timber and plaster. A grappling hook. One the size of a coffee table.

“Good fortune!” he cried, crouching as debris rained on them. “What is he doing?!”

“Boarding us!” Eleanor slipped her pistol into a sheath he had not seen behind her waist then pulled an item out of her pack.

“Come!” he yelled above the din.

They ran to the kitchen, craned their necks by the windows to see what sort of dragon Spark flew. Leeford whistled in appreciation when he spotted the mammoth flying machine hovering by the house. A dirigible then, not a dragon as he had surmised. Lightning strikes illuminated it in all its monstrousness from gigantic silvery belly to steam engines roaring like white-hot mouths fore and aft along the plated steel nacelle that glistened in the rain. He had never seen such a large airship. Custom made. And from a masterful design, no less. He could readily determine the excellent craftsmanship that had gone into the machine and ingenious use of space. How could it be? Despite the gloss of success covering his every “invention”, it was a known fact Spark had never mastered even the basic elements of aeronautics during their school years. He must have now. Unless he had stolen the design from someone else as he wanted to do here and now. With the size and power of his airship, Leeford had no doubt the engineer could mount at least half a dozen condensators and use them as airborne cannons. His stomach twisted. The man was mad but rich and resourceful. The scariest combination.

“Is this the gas line?” Eleanor asked, pointing upward at a spot outside the window nearest her.

“From the house to the lighthouse?” Leeford replied, coming near and bending so he could look out the window above the slop stone. “Yes, that is the gas line. It goes all the way down the inside of the workshop.”

“Would the condensator survive an explosion, you surmise?”

“Absolutely. Most of my machines would.” Why did he say this with pride? As if the moment called for it!

“Where is the reservoir? For the gas?”

“Underneath the furnace.” He swallowed. “You are not thinking…?”

She turned to him, his grim little spy, and nodded. “If we can get the condensator before, we could sabotage the furnace to overheat, create a chain reaction. Could you do that?”

It saddened him to tell her that he could. With ease and quickness too. He sighed, closed his eyes for a second. “Yes.”

Pride and relief reflected in her dark eyes. He could not help but wonder what she would have done had he refused to blow up his own workshop. He preferred not to follow that chain of thought. Spark could not get his vile hands on the prototype, no matter the cost to Leeford’s work. Or his home. There was no telling what the man would do, and Leeford knew for a fact he would not live well with the guilt of his machine killing thousands of innocents. There was just so much whisky a man could drink before he drowned in the stuff.

“We will retrieve the prototype first,” Leeford pushed through his teeth. “Then I will prepare a surprise Spark will not soon forget.”

A wolfish grin stretched her mouth. Such a contrast to the lovely exterior. “Put your pistols in my pack. We will need them later, I fear.”

He feared it too.

“Then let us go,” he snarled as he opened the back door, checked upward to make sure no lines dangled from the giant hull hovering above their heads. Spark’s airship seemed to fight for stability against the high winds battering it. It twisted this way and that. The pilot must have been highly skilled but still, nature was so far winning. Spark would not be able to get anyone out until he had used at least two or three more grappling hooks. Leeford gritted his teeth. His poor house.

They ran out into the rain, sprinted along the balcony, jumped the six or eight feet into the tall grass so they would not be such easy targets for an eventual lookout and, bent in half, made their way to the lighthouse.

“How much does it weigh?” Eleanor yelled above the wind and Spark’s roaring airship.

“One hundred and two point five pounds! We cannot carry it down the stairs! Too slippery!” The few times he had moved the awkward thing had required the use of the hoist. Nor could they let it roll down by itself either in case it crashed through the rickety steps and became lodged in the inner timbering. They would never get it out again.

He ran faster than she did so grabbed her hand and helped her navigate the clingy foliage, which, wet and flailing about in the wind, hampered her progress. Clothes stuck and pulled when they reached the landing, which they climbed two by two. While he fished in his trousers pocket for the key, Eleanor dug around her pack.

He unlocked the door. They both rushed in so he could shut and lock it before anyone in the airship had noticed the interior light through the doorway.

Four by four, he rushed up to his workshop, ripped the tarp off the condensator then helped Eleanor get a line underneath so they could tie a sort of sling around it.

“Ready, one, two, three,” Eleanor said, widening her stance.

The thing rose by a few inches but slid out of the rope and would have landed on the floor had he not slowed its fall by bending over and letting the sling touch down first. After a few unsuccessful tries, he could tell Eleanor was growing frustrated.

“How will we get it out then?” She bent over and tried to “hug” then lift it, but the smooth surface offered no grip. It slid out of her arms and thudded on the floor.

An idea struck him. “We will use the chains to hoist it out of a window,” he said while he rushed to the chains and worked them down to the floor, the pulleys clicking like an army of mad robotic crabs. A frenzied sort of energy boiled his blood. He worked quickly to hoist the machine off the floor, pushed and pulled and yanked until he had it hanging right by the closest window.

A sound from downstairs froze both of them.

“They are here,” Leeford whispered. He knew every creak and groan in this building. Someone had just come in. “We cannot use the window now.” He cursed under his breath.

“The door,” she whispered.

Leeford knew just the thing to use. One of his machines—an aborted project for a wheeled ice maker from years ago—would prove large enough to serve their purpose. They pushed it in front of the door, snug against the jamb so he could wedge a strip of scrap metal in, using an imperfection in the old floor to make it nice and tight. No one was coming through that thing anytime soon.

Using his work gloves, he broke the bulbs on all but one gas lamp then twisted out of shape the pipe that ran along the wall. The smell of gas made him grimace. His eyes stung. They had little time now. While Eleanor waited by the door to the rooftop, Leeford ripped the face off the furnace, twisted the timer so it would automatically turn on five minutes forth. When the mix of oxygen and gas would be right, the enclosed space would become too small for expansion and, coupled with the furnace’s pilot light coming on, a large boom would ensue. He should know. It had taken him weeks to wash the soot off and fix the damage left by that particularly violent explosion a few years ago. One of many this building had endured.

“We have five minutes,” he snarled as he sprinted across the room, helped Eleanor unhook the condensator from the chains. They would have to do things by hands from there on.

Panting and grunting, they rolled, dragged, pushed the slippery-smooth, awkward thing up the stairwell leading to the roof. Leeford closed the door behind them, used his wet shirt as plug along the kickboard. He even tore off a sleeve so he could stuff it into the keyhole. Just in case. He wanted an airtight—or as much as he could—environment for the fireworks that would erupt in less than five minutes.

They emerged on the rooftop where rain all but blinded them. Eleanor rushed to sling the prototype then after having tied the end of a line to the handrail, both rolled it gingerly off the ledge. The sudden weight made them grunt. A few panic-inducing seconds during which Leeford was sure they would drop the machine or be pulled along with it preceded a loud noise from inside the workshop. He yearned to peek inside through the window but did not want to be spotted.

“They broke through the door,” Eleanor groaned. Hand over hand, she kept the line taut while Leeford did most of the heavy lifting. With a clever knot and using the handrail as a pulley, the machine’s weight must have been distributed along the line. Still, he felt the burn through his work gloves.

“I know,” he grunted back. “I heard. We have less than three minutes.”

“How can you tell?”

“Time and I are old friends.”

“I do not see any dragons,” she grunted from the strain. “Any minute, I guess.”

She may have counted on her colleagues to make an appearance but he knew Spark’s oily perfidy too well and preferred to act as though no one was rushing to help.

Suddenly the weight was lifted. Eleanor leaned over the handrail, cupped her eyes with a hand. “It has reached the ground. Quickly!”

Even though he could not see the airship, Leeford heard the loud thoop that had preceded the giant grappling hook piercing the window to the great room. Spark must have sent his thugs down even before they had secured the airship. Reckless disregard for life—again. Things never changed. Voices rose in the distance.

“Quickly!”

Rain whipped them and wind nudged them as they tied themselves to another line, which Eleanor had secured to the handrail before kicking a leg over it. “Keep your right hand behind you this way then move it up by your side to go down.”

His heart skipped a beat. “We are rappelling down?!”

“You know how to rappel?”

“No!”

“Time to learn.”

Even if he could understand the physics of the enterprise, the weight distribution and the whole concept behind the holds, the thought of rappelling down the top of his lighthouse during a violent storm did not appeal to him in the least. Mimicking her stance and holds, he leaned over the void, backside first, legs shaking and hands slick inside the gloves, then he leaped off the ledge.

The urge to yell something, anything, choked him. He gritted his teeth and tried to follow Eleanor as she bound down the wall smooth and quick. He slipped too many times to count, flattened against the wall, or swung out too far and twisted on his line so that his back connected against the wall instead of his feet. Good thing he could hold his weight with his hands for this was what he did more often than proper rappelling. Cursing but holding on with a death grip, he could spot the ground about twenty feet under him. Eleanor had done something to the prototype. He could see black lines crisscrossed over its silvery surface. Such an ingenious little spy she was.

Everything happened fast.

First, above his head, clunks against the wall made him curse. Wood slivers rained on him. Small eruptions followed his progress down. He was being fired upon!

Second, below him, someone else fired. Eleanor. He hoped she was as good a shot as she was a climber.

Third, a sound like a giant snore swelled to a roar before a ball of white and blue flames shot out of cracks in the lighthouse wall near the rooftop. Yells of pain cut the night. A split second later, the topmost portion of the lighthouse literally disintegrated in a ball of blown glass and wood. Shards and other debris and heat buffeted him. For an awful second, Leeford felt suspended in midair, no longer hanging, but floating.

Then he fell.

Eleanor thought her heart would stop when she saw Leeford plummet the last twenty feet or so. Because he had made such a twisted mess of things, he no longer hung over the prototype and herself, but had moved a few feet to the right. Luckily, he tumbled into the wet grass, rolled head over heels twice before springing to his feet, looking euphoric if a bit stunned as he patted himself down for injuries.

With the violence of the explosion, which had just destroyed the top quarter of the tower, debris both small and large began to fall around them. A body did too. Landed a mere foot from her. She did not hesitate to put a bullet into it—man or woman, hard to tell with the awkward position and torrential rain. Leeford must not have noticed where she aimed as he made quick work of rolling the machine into the grass and out of the way.

“The duo-cycler!” she heard him yell. “Hurry!”

Was he mad? “We cannot fly in these conditions!”

“No, but we can drive!” he shot back.

True, but what a mess it would be.

The explosion was sure to have drawn all kinds of unwanted attention, which forced them to roll the wet machine with their hands and feet, managing for a few rotations to pick it up between themselves and carry it until it slipped out of their grasps. Whatever worked, until they came to the crushed gravel path leading to the small hangar where Leeford kept his duo-cycler. While he rushed ahead and opened the doors, she did what she could to move the heavy piece of machinery forward. She managed a few rotations. Good fortune, the thing was so hopelessly awkward and slippery.

“Look!” he said, pointing back toward the house.

She turned to see several dark forms dangling from lines underneath the airship. The boarding party. One seemed to be in difficulty as he twisted and spun before plummeting down to the roof. He flopped along the ridge before slipping into a recess. Divine Graces. There were at least half a dozen people about to breach Leeford’s house. They would realize it was empty. And with the lighthouse now burning bright, the place would be crawling with them.

Where was the Society?

Her heart in her throat, she helped him move the duo-cycler out of the hangar and onto the path. Good thing his was a custom-made design with twice as much power as regular models. They would need every last iota of speed to make a successful retreat.

“Here!” Leeford yelled to be heard. The airship began maneuvering, rotating and firing the engines to deafening levels. Rain made it a gigantic, slicked, bloated larva. “Help me get it up on the seat!”

At the price of several fingernails, she held the machine on the seat then quickly sat so she could keep it put with her legs while Leeford cranked the lever, started the engine and charged back to sit at the handles. Space was tight but he managed with his long legs to stand on the footrests and lean his back against the condensator.

The sound of pistols momentarily drowned the rest. One hand as a safeguard for the precious machine, she twisted and aimed at the pair of dark forms rushing in their direction.

“Hurry!” she yelled. One bullet too close for comfort created a small eruption of rocks by the duo-cycler’s back wheel. “Hurryyy!

After what felt like an interminable wait, Leeford made the engine roar and tore off the path in the direction of the road. She fired several times to slow their pursuers. One of the forms collapsed but was replaced by two. She fired again. And again. Each bullet one more chance to save Leeford. Two more pursuers down.

Leeford maneuvered the duo-cycler onto the road proper, and after one reckless turn that almost knocked the condensator off the seat, he took them around the first bend, negating the enemy’s line of fire. She could have cheered in triumph. But they still had to make it to Aconia intact since it had become obvious her colleagues would not arrive in time. Once they reached her Society-appointed safe house then and only then would she relax and hug this man hard enough to crack a few ribs.

Storm clouds seemed to gather in front for them alone, clustered in tight, roiling fists that dispensed icy rain—shirtless and acting as windjammer, poor Leeford must have been so utterly cold—and slaps of wind that deafened and blinded them. She had no idea how Leeford could drive the duo-cycler in such conditions and without goggles, but he did. Perhaps the Society had sent coaches instead of dragons, which would explain the time lapse. But then again, Leeford was proving to be just as competent and stalwart as any agent she knew.

They came close to disaster on several occasions but he managed to veer them back to safety each time with a brusque tug on the handles or by slamming on the brakes hard enough to make her teeth rattle in her skull. The condensator was so heavy between her legs that she had lost feeling in her feet. The hand she kept on her pistol had long grown numb from cold rain and from keeping unceasing guard. From behind or above would come harm. If it did. That airship could not possibly overtake Leeford’s duo-cycler, but if they hit a snag and slowed, then they would have to either make a stand or try to lose their pursuers. The latter seemed too good to be true. Spark must have realized they had taken the machine with them. Knowing him as she did—in bed but amorous habits provided great insight into a man’s character—he would pursue them without respite. Aloysius was dogged if nothing else.

Just as she was turning back to make sure they were not being pursued too closely, a tiny ball of orange fire burst by the side of the road. Then another—closer. When that one burst, it illuminated the sky in a two-hundred-feet radius. And a pair of small dragons.

“Leeford!” she yelled as she took aim back and high. “They had dragons on that airship!”

She heard a muffled comment she could not interpret.

Eleanor cursed as she fished inside her pack, which she had slung over her shoulder as a messenger would. Most of the weight comprised extra bullets in neat clips of ten. Finding a smooth, disc-shaped item, she pulled it out, kicked a leg over the seat, used Leeford’s shoulder as an anchor to stand and twist back. “Drive steady!”

“Get back down! Eleanor!”

“Drive steady,” she repeated, aiming the pistol at the closer of the dragons.

When a third explosion burst, this time directly in the middle of the road, she took aim and fired a pair of bullets that had only one objective—force her pursuers to dive low and hopefully merge with the horizon. She had been part of enough chases to learn a thing or two about these types of men. They were vicious, sometimes well trained, almost always cunning, but mostly, they were predictable.

She should have gambled a few ecus on her lure for both dragons swerved low to the ground, wide apart to make themselves individual targets. Again predictable.

With her thumb, she pressed on a tiny button in the middle of the disc and threw it as far as she could.

One, two, three.

She could not see it but could imagine the silvery disc bounding along the road a bit slower than Leeford’s duo-cycler.

Five, six, seven.

If she had timed it right. Eleanor squeezed her eyes shut and waited for the telltale blast.

Eight, nine, ten. Now.

Like clockwork, one of her flash grenades, shaped like buttons for ease of concealment, detonated at the precise moment when both pursuers flew overhead, creating a bright ball of white fire through her eyelids, annihilating the pilots’ night vision and giving them a good concussion. She watched, grimly satisfied, as both dragons veered and swerved out of control before they crashed to the ground. No explosion. No sound other than the rain drumming against her skull. She sat back down and grabbed Leeford’s middle.

“What was that?” he yelled out of the corner of his mouth. Rolling hills flattened. The terrain changed. They must have been nearing Aconia.

“A surprise of my own!” she replied through a grin.

All in all, things had not gone too badly considering they had had no backup. And not even a mark to show for their trouble, for which she was grateful. Seeing Leeford plummet to the ground after the lighthouse’s partial destruction had nearly stopped her heart. Horror, fear, abject and all-consuming fear had gripped her throat and not let go until he had snapped back to his feet, looking more surprised than exultant at his little stunt. Good fortune, the thought of losing him still gave her cold sweats.

It took them longer than their first trip, but they reached Aconia, climbed one of the quieter streets and were driving over a metal bridge when they spotted “their” street. The safe house she had been assigned in case of trouble had at one point been a windmill and would be easy to find. And there it was, at the end of a forlorn street that bordered the city proper, a street just wide enough for Leeford’s custom-made duo-cycler. She could detect so sign of occupation. He squeezed into the coach door, waited while she jumped off and searched for a small crevice near the foundation. The brass key gleamed when she pulled it out.

She was about to slip it into the lock when the door opened. She was not quick enough to backpedal and only just managed not to receive one wicked hand-chop aimed for her throat.

“Eleanor!”

She regained her senses just in time to abort the riposte firing her muscles. Mr. Clarence stood in the embrasure, a pistol in one hand.

“Divine Graces, Eleanor! I had not anticipated you would get here so quickly.” He shook his head, stood back from the doorway to make room. “I received your message late this afternoon shortly after our informants reported activity from Spark. Please, come in. Hurry.”

She helped a bewildered Leeford push the duo-cycler into a recess along the wall and followed Mr. Clarence into the dimly lit room. This had to be the humblest safe house she had seen. Maladjusted wood planks for shutters and flaking plaster as walls, coffered ceiling that had seen better days, crooked floor, a narrow bed and a table with a pair of chairs. But in a corner a stove burned bright on fat bowed legs, and its glorious heat helped her forget they had not even a chair each on which to sit. She stood with her back to the stove but made room when Leeford joined her there, his eyes narrowed at Mr. Clarence.

“He is a colleague with the Society. He can be trusted.”

Leeford nodded but said nothing. His reaction surprised her. And bothered her too.

“Mr. Gunn, it is a pleasure to meet you,” Mr. Clarence said, extending his hand.

For a moment, Eleanor thought Leeford would shake it. But he did not. He only stared hard at Mr. Clarence, for the first time since she had known him displaying open animosity.

An uneasy silence lasted for a few seconds before her colleague, looking nonplussed, pulled his hand back. “The journey was a difficult one, I understand your reticence—”

“And I understand why no one made it to my house in time to help.”

“I am sure my colleagues are there by now,” she replied. “Making sure Spark is dealt with.” Something she should have done while he slept in her bed all those years ago.

“Of course,” Mr. Clarence answered. “His hasty departure caught us flatfooted, I am afraid.”

An admission Eleanor had never heard from the wily older man. She wondered at the sudden élan of candor.

“You remind me a lot of my father, Mr. Clarence,” Leeford remarked while crossing his hands behind his back. “The same charming smile and ruthless eyes. I would not shake hands with you if it saved my life.”

“Strong words, Mr. Gunn.”

“No. Honest ones. This would be a new word for you, honesty.”

Eleanor was shocked! Why would he treat their allies so poorly? She cleared her throat and forced her face to remain impassive. Her loyalty belonged to both men. She did not want to betray her emotions and take one’s side and not the other. Still, Leeford’s reaction mystified her. Poor man, he looked so cold and miserable. His lips were blue, his hair wet and clumped, dripped on his naked shoulders. He was quite a mess. She could only imagine how she looked herself.

“My dear,” Mr. Clarence said after a long look at her companion and smoothing his impeccable burgundy velvet jacket. “A word with you.” Lines marred the usually smooth dark brow. What could cause him to show his emotions this way? Eleanor could not remember a single time when Mr. Clarence had not looked the refined older gentleman.

Turning to Leeford, who still stared at her colleague, she acquiesced with a nod.

They left him by the stove. He shivered and turned his back to her. As much as she berated herself for thinking this way, she feared she had just made the wrong choice, given the incorrect answer to a question she had not heard. Failed a test. She shook the silly notion away. Her primary duties lay with the Society. Even if her earnest affection rested somewhere else.

She closed the door and followed Mr. Clarence out and under the small roof where Leeford had pushed the duo-cycler. His condensator gleamed on the seat. Water still pearled on its silvery surface. Her colleague ran a hand over it.

“What a marvel of mechanized beauty. You were eloquent and completely correct in your report, Gunn really is a rare genius.”

“Why must we hide from Leeford? He cooperated fully when I apprised him of the situation, and when Spark revealed himself as his sponsor, he aborted the project. His input would be valuable to us.”

She tried to suppress the fire, dull the edge to her tone, but her colleague must have heard it as clearly as a carillon for he looked at her, dark eyes narrowed, full lips pursed. “Emotional detachment is like a vase of exquisite design and great fragility. Once broken, even repaired one can still see the fractures.”

“I am inclined to believe it gives me greater motivation to achieve my goals.”

“I am inclined to believe it puts a blindfold over your reasoning. But I do not wish to lecture you on the merit—or disadvantage—of human character.” He leaned over Leeford’s machine, peered at the many dials and silver embellishments. “The Society finds itself in a very promising position. We have tried for years to approach Spark. And now we can.”

“We have risked our lives to keep it from Spark. And now we should turn it over?”

“No, not turn it over. Merely dangle it in front of him.”

“Spark is much too sly to be taken by such obvious bait.”

Mr. Clarence shook his head. “The Society disagrees. His thirst to possess this machine will override his judgment. We only need to play our hand carefully.”

Eleanor could not shake her head with more emphasis and not cause damage. “I strongly disagree, Mr. Clarence. Spark would never—”

Her colleague planted his gaze on her in a way he had never done before. Anger and frustration blazed like dark suns. “Eleanor, because you have bedded each man does not make you an expert in their character. The Society has weighed the matter with care. Spark is already on his way here.”

“What?”

The sting of his words—how dare he discuss her amorous choices—was soon drowned in worry for Leeford. “You have told Spark about this safe house?”

“Once we realized the purpose and destination of his hurried travel, we decided it was better to set a trap for him than to interfere directly.”

“You mean offer assistance. We barely made it out of Leeford’s house.”

“I had every confidence in your abilities. That is why we have left a trail, so to speak. One that leads here.”

She retreated by a step. Rain hit the back of her head, cooled her nape and shoulders. She shivered. Rage replaced horror. “How could you?”

To his credit, her colleague looked shocked by her reaction. “It is for the common good—”

“I do not care about the common good!” she yelled.

The door opened and out stepped Leeford. He stood by her side. Clearly lines had been drawn. “What is going on?”

“We have sprung a trap to catch Spark,” Mr. Clarence said, his smooth mask back on. “I fear Eleanor finds our means distasteful.”

“A trap?”

“Spark is on his way here as we speak. The Society wants to bait him with this.” Eleanor pointed at the glistening machine.

“I do not believe this,” Leeford replied. He threw his hands up, spewed a vile curse. “What is wrong with you people?”

“We protect society, oft times from itself,” Mr. Clarence replied in a smooth voice.

“By baiting madmen with something they can use as weapons? Are you out of your mind?”

“My mental processes are not open to discussion, Mr. Gunn. Yours are. How infantile of you to have built it. You must have known someone would make a weapon of it. Yet you did not care enough to stop.”

“Care? As if you care about anything at all?” Leeford shot back. “I will not let you take it.”

“It is already ours.”

“No,” Leeford said, taking a step toward his duo-cycler. “It is not.”

“Agents are taking position right now. You will be surrounded. With nowhere to go. Why do you not rely on our expertise? You have your role, we have ours.”

“What if someone is hurt?” Eleanor asked, knowing full well the answer.

A sad smile pulled at Mr. Clarence’s mouth. “We will have saved countless. What are a few losses?”

In her haste, she had not secured her second pistol at her thigh, but the one hidden in the backing of her corset was. She had it in her hand within a split second. Old habits. She could not let Spark anywhere near Leeford. She would not allow it. What if something happened and Leeford was wounded? Or worse.

“That gamble is not acceptable. Leeford is too important to me. I am truly sorry, Mr. Clarence.” Where had this aplomb, this detachment come from? She felt as though she had been meant to say this all her life, that nothing preceding this evening had made sense—even if intellect had ruled her world. Life had been a dress rehearsal until now. This moment of brilliant clarity. No doubt, no regret.

“Eleanor, reconsider your action, my dear. It is a perfect plan. Lure Spark in with the machine and spring the trap. Society agents are taking positions around the neighborhood. You will not escape.”

“And what if something does go wrong?” Leeford demanded. “What if your perfect plan does not work and Spark gains the prototype? Do you have any idea the harm he could cause?”

Mr. Clarence nodded. “We are confident the plan is the best course of action.” He turned to her, reached out. “Put the pistol away, my dear child.”

He had never called her that before. He wanted to make her feel small and insignificant, and she hated him for it. “You disappoint me, Mr. Clarence. Leeford, we must go. Now.”

She aimed the pistol at her colleague while Leeford rushed to the duo-cycler and pushed it out into the rain once more. They had minutes. If that. Already each roll of thunder could be Spark’s monstrous airship rumbling closer.

Chapter Eight

Leeford’s heart skipped a beat when she pulled the pistol from the back of her corset. Good fortune, would it come to this? He did not want her to murder a colleague for his sake, even if said colleague gave him chills down his spine. He had never met anyone who reminded him so much of his family. The same wily pleasantness, the cunning eyes, the mental gears always turning. He had disliked Mr. Clarence right away. A first for him as he preferred waiting a while before forming an opinion on someone.

“Where is your dragon?” Eleanor asked through her teeth. Her aim was steady as she leveled the pistol at her colleague. Leeford hoped against the odds she would not fire.

The older man pointed at a pair of double doors across the interior courtyard. “You two will not make it out of here.”

“You mean us three.”

He looked more hurt than surprised. “You cannot do this.”

“I can and I am. With you along, they will not shoot us down from the sky.”

“Are you so sure?”

“Yes. No telling where the prototype would fall. The Society cannot risk two such important assets. Perhaps one, but never two.”

She gestured with her pistol for the man to lead them to his dragon, which he did with his eyes flashing in menace. Doors open wide, he took a seat in the back while Eleanor activated the steam pump. With a shudder the dragon’s engines rumbled to life. She drove it out of the hangar and pulled by the duo-cycler.

“Help him.”

The man did, to Leeford’s surprise. They had the prototype in the dragon’s trunk in no time. Mr. Clarence was a fit older gentleman.

Leeford could not believe these cretins had been arrogant enough to tell Spark where to find the prototype, even after having watched him for years. They knew the sort of man he was. He had money, he had connections that probably rivaled those of “the society”. How could they think for one minute he would not see through their ruse? With the kind of man he was? Overconfident fools.

While Eleanor kept her pistol to her former colleague’s head, Leeford sat in the pilot seat, marveled at the dragon’s smooth controls before readying for takeoff. The articulated wings spread without sound.

A deep rumbling overhead made all three look up in apprehension.

“Please, Eleanor, do not make us turn on you.”

“You already have,” she murmured, still gazing at the sky. Rain plastered her hair to her forehead. At least the worst of the storm seemed to have passed. “There!”

Leeford swallowed hard. Divine Graces.

A shadow amongst shadows, a rounded shape in the sky grew until they could make out tiny amber dots along the underbelly. Spark’s giant airship broke from a thick cloud, steel nacelle gleaming, steam engines glowing.

“Quickly!”

“No!” the older man growled. “Let him come to us! We have sharpshooters along the rooftops!”

“Too late!” she yelled back. “Leeford! Now!”

Pistol shots were heard. Tiny explosions erupted along the brick wall. Either Eleanor’s former colleagues were firing at them or Spark’s goons were. Neither meant friend to him so Leeford pushed the engine to the maximum and snarled a curse when the deceivingly standard-looking dragon turned out to be a bullet in disguise. It tore off the interior courtyard as if it had been fired from a cannon. Bullets thudded against its metallic sides. Wings filled with wind as soon as they cleared the nearest walls.

“Are they mad?” Eleanor growled, shooting back over the side of her door.

“These shots are not from our positions!”

“Who cares?!” Leeford roared as he maneuvered the dragon into a sharp left bank. Inside the trunk, the prototype thunked against the side.

Rooftops glistening with rain sank around them as he pulled on the altitude lever. Small silhouettes darted back and forth along roof ridges and chimneys. Glowing orange spots indicating they too fired pistols. The sound of bullets zipping past made him cringe. Leaning over the controls, he yanked the lever higher while turning the yoke to bring their dragon left then right, down into a crazy dive before leveling off at the last second. An iron clock tower flew past a couple of feet to their right. That had been too close.

“They launched dragons!” Eleanor warned.

True. When he turned to check, Leeford spotted dark forms coming out of the giant airship. As though the monster had given birth in flight. Like bats, they converged and turned as one. Turned toward them.

“You must evade them!” Mr. Clarence cried. “This was not in the plan!”

“Your plan was bad from the start,” Eleanor shot back as she sat to reload with a clip from her pack.

Leeford angled the dragon down and left. “We will evade them over there!”

Below them, the botanical gardens stretched like a quilt of black satin patches. Darkness enveloped the trees and glass domes. If they managed to make it there, he could then hide the machine for a while until Eleanor’s friends had taken care of Spark. Or whatever else. They were running out of options. Hiding seemed a better idea than trying to fight off Spark’s little private army. Plus, where else could they go?

Lily.

Eleanor and he had returned just by nightfall and Lily and Max were still not home, which meant they had stayed in town. Perhaps they had been caught by the storm and decided not to risk calling a coach. Not uncommon for them to do so. She always stayed at the same place, a little inn by the edge of downtown. Not far from the gardens in fact. He used it sometimes when he came to town for female companionship. Paying for sex had never bothered him. An uncomplicated friendly transaction from an establishment he knew and trusted. Although he doubted he would ever go that route again. Fulfilling basic physical needs would never be enough now that he had tasted so much more. Had tasted a woman for whom his affection deepened with every passing second in her presence. The urge to squeeze her tight tingled his hands.

First, he had to get rid of Spark’s men.

His plan was simple and, well, quite desperate—they would lose their pursuers through the gardens, drive their dragon on land and hide the prototype at the inn. For a while anyway. It was better than nothing.

“Hang on!” he yelled.

His reckless piloting drew gasps from his passengers. Before his pursuers could match his course, he set off for the darkened gardens, swerved around giant trees and landed in relative smoothness on one of the side paths he knew well. Spending all that time walking the botanical gardens of Aconia finally paid off.

“What are you doing?” Eleanor demanded, seeming torn between pointing her pistol at Mr. Clarence and reaching for the altitude lever. “Leeford!”

“I have a plan,” he said, turning back. “And it does not involve him.”

Eleanor turned to her former colleague and gestured at the door. “Forgive me, Mr. Clarence. You left me no choice. Please get off.”

To Leeford’s shock and relief, the older man stepped off the dragon and retreated by a few steps. He shook his head. “I wish you would have trusted our judgment as you once did, Eleanor. You have just squandered your only ally. We cannot help you if we do not know where you are.”

“The common good does not always justify the means. Goodbye, Mr. Clarence.”

Leeford drove away. He did not spare a look at the older man for he knew Eleanor kept a close eye on him, pistol ready in case of trouble. Overhead, the sound of several dragons could be heard roaring by. Spark’s men had not seen him diving into the trees. Maybe they stood a chance. At least they had rid themselves of one set of pursuers. With friends like this “society”, who needed enemies?

“Forgive me,” Eleanor began, cleared her throat. “I had no idea.”

“I know. We all have learned something tonight.”

“The price of this lesson was high, I fear. What now?”

“Lily and Max must have been caught in town by the storm. It is not the first time. They rent rooms at a small inn not far from here. We will hide the prototype there until we think of a better plan.”

She nodded, hooked a strand of hair behind her ear.

By the corner of his eye, he could see her spine curving under the weight of what must have been awful regret and bitter disappointment. Betrayal always hurt. He should know.

“We will be safe for now.” He patted her thigh.

With the wings retracted once more, he drove with the lanterns off until he had reached the edge of the park. The wrought iron doors were wide open as they always were, bolted into the concrete proper. They gleamed with residual rain when Leeford drove past. No dragon flew overheard except for a large, commercial one ferrying a few night passengers to and from the land-based suburbs a mile or so south.

Buildings in this part of town had none of the glossy newness of downtown proper but boasted a quiet grace that had always appealed to him. Built on piles like the rest of downtown, they stood close together. Shadowy sentinels. The bridge on which they drove made deep metallic sounds that reminded him of Spark’s monstrous airship. He checked overhead often. Nothing. Relief coursed through him. They had made it.

“I think we are safe now,” Eleanor said in a muted voice so different from the self-confident, composed woman.

“I think so too.”

A sign creaking in the wind announced their destination. He drove the dragon under the coach door, found an empty spot at the back of the interior courtyard and, after making sure to back the vehicle as close as possible to the brick wall, stepped off and stretched his legs. His poor body rang with grief. And he was so utterly cold without a shirt and with his trousers soaked through. A hot bath would do him good. Tea and sustenance too.

“I think I better go to the desk myself,” Eleanor said with a tired smile. “They would call the constables in if they saw you in that state. Drawing that kind of attention is the last thing we want tonight.”

While he waited in the courtyard—where he checked twice that the trunk was locked—Eleanor left and returned not long after with a brass key he knew well and a small card. “I convinced them to prepare us something to eat. Miss Escoraille is in room twelve. Maximilien Envers is in room thirteen. Ours is ten.”

He followed her to the side of the building. Heat from inside wafted to him when they opened the thick wooden door. “They gave you their room numbers?”

“No. I peeked at the register. There are only five guests, including us four, and three key clips from the staff members’ board were missing. My guess is about eight to ten people are in the building. Most of them asleep. Acceptable numbers.”

Well, she was a spy.

Flowery wallpaper yellowed with age but still graceful and a recently cleaned runner cushioned their steps as they rushed along the second floor and up to the third. A single gas lamp on a moon-shaped table along the wall lit the way. They located doors twelve and thirteen. Leeford knocked at Lily’s while Eleanor did the same at Max’s. Leeford knocked harder as the door remained shut. When he saw Eleanor take a step backward, he knew she had had more success and joined her.

Max’s bearded face appeared in the embrasure. He cocked a dark eyebrow. “Can I help you, Mr. Gunn?”

Even if the moment called for cool logic, Leeford’s first reaction was to demand to know where Lily was…until the young woman opened the door wider and stood by Max’s side.

He was so glad to see her unharmed that he almost forgot she shared a room with Max and that she must have been stupefied with sleep and might not react well to being embraced by a very wet, disheveled nighttime stranger wearing only trousers and boots.

“Leeford?”

“Lily, forgive me the intrusion…” he started, threw a look he hoped menacing at Max, who leaned against the doorjamb and waited. Muscles bulged in the parted blue flannel shirt he wore. “We need to talk. All four of us. Now.”

“You never call me Lily,” she replied, yawned then after a quick nod at Max stepped back from the doorway. She smelled of lavender when he passed her. Max and Eleanor followed and Lily closed the door.

Their room—Max and Lily sharing a room!—just like any other in the little inn, had been lovingly decorated by a woman’s hand, from flower patterns to crushed velvet drapes the color of cranberries.

“Well,” she began, chuckled when she took in his state of undress. “You make quite the pair.”

“Quite,” muttered Max. His dark hair stuck out in the back. He finished buttoning his trousers and shirt then stuck his sizable fists in his pockets.

“So do you,” Leeford snapped while trying his very best not to sound like an overbearing older brother. “I guess the second room is for show.”

Lily grinned wide. As much as he thought her a delicate little thing, that smile had been too mocking and naughty to let him delude himself any longer. But then again, Lily was twenty-five. Some women had already given birth at that age. But not his Lily, his Lady Frivolous.

Leeford sighed while he pinched the bridge of his nose. “I do not even know where to begin.”

“I know.” Eleanor leaned back against the door, blew through pursed lips. “Lily, I have lied to you and everyone else in this room. I hope you can forgive me when you learn why.”

Such subtlety.

Lily opened her mouth to speak, seemed to change her mind then clasped her hands in front of her, waiting in silence. Max arched an eyebrow.

With his heart hammering out of empathy for her difficult position, he listened while Eleanor spoke. She explained everything in sequential, logical manner. Leeford could almost draw a mental time line of events as she spoke and could no doubt sketch a detailed chart to it too. Her words were concise, blunt and economical. Except for a few exclamations from Lily, only Eleanor spoke. By the time she had finished though, his cousin had lapsed into one of her episodes, humming under her breath as she twirled an index finger around a lock of hair. Poor woman. Leeford felt so bad for her. She must have thought she had found a friend in her “cousin”. Eleanor’s lies, though well intentioned, still cut him deep. And Lily as well. Only Max betrayed no emotion. He snorted once and shook his head. But that was it. Silence rang like a cracked bell when Eleanor finished.

Leeford wrapped an arm around her shoulders and brought her near. “I do not expect you to understand my motivation but I support Eleanor fully. We are in this together.”

Max’s scowl lessened when he cast a quick glance at Lily, still in her happier world. “I understand more than you think, Mr. Gunn.”

“I guess you would.”

How could he have missed it? The subtle glances, the rare smiles, always directed at Lily. Max knew Leeford’s motivation, for the men shared something deeper than a home and an employer-employee relationship. He loved Lily. Just as Leeford loved Eleanor. The realization came like a thunderbolt.

He loved Eleanor.

* * * * *

“And we need a plan,” Eleanor said with the last shred of composure she had.

She wanted to curl into bed, pull the covers over her head and not come out again. But such luxury was not for the likes of her. She would have to outmaneuver and fight her way out of this one. Just like any other mission. Only this time, she stood to lose a lot. The affection in Leeford’s eyes mirrored what went on inside of herself. Why had the Divine Graces conspired against her this way, thrown in her path a man for whom she would come to care very much only to threaten him after? So cruel.

Lily smiled as she turned on the spot a few times. “The train.”

Leeford gently took her by the hand to guide her to the bed, but she pulled it out. “The train,” she repeated. “The bad men will wait for you in the sky because dragons are faster. The train is slow but safe.”

“The snail and the squirrel,” Eleanor said through a sigh of relief. “They will expect us to leave Aconia in all haste. Lily is right. Trains are slow but safe because there are so many daily departures. If we use the train, we can hide the prototype in the luggage wagons. In a crate.”

Lily nodded, beaming. “We could ship it by train, split up and each take a different route. How exciting!”

Leeford shook his head. “Much too dangerous. The train is a great plan, but Eleanor and I will go alone. No need to implicate you.”

“Seems you already have,” Max said, staring at Eleanor.

Bristling, Leeford took a step forward. “I meant implicate you further. And mind your tone.”

“Look, we are all tired,” Eleanor said, hoping to pacify both men. “Thinking is rapidly growing difficult for me. If I do not get some sleep, I fear I will collapse.” She turned the doorknob, cracked the door open and after checking both sides, stepped out.

Behind Leeford’s back as he joined her in the corridor, Max threw a glare at Eleanor. She met his gaze without flinching. There was nothing this man could say or do that would hurt her, more so now after Leeford had lent his support. And his affection.

“You have hurt Miss Lily’s feelings,” Max remarked. “You lied to her. I will not forgive you.”

Lily took his arm and tut-tutted. “All is well, Max.” She leaned her head on his thick arm and smiled. “Good night, Leeford.” Lily blew a kiss at him, set her gaze on Eleanor. The grin disappeared. “I have lost a cousin I never had.” She shrugged. “But I think I have gained a friend. Time will tell. It always does.”

Eleanor’s heart squeezed. She nodded as the door closed.

Without a word, Leeford took the key from her and unlocked the door to their room, waited while she trudged past then closed it without a sound. A soft rattle indicated he had tested the lock. Good man.

Good fortune, she had trouble just standing. “I am so very tired.”

A knock at the door made both start. Leeford answered, thanked someone then proffered, grinning, a tray filled with victuals. This time, she locked the door. And wedged the clothes valet under the doorknob.

They fell on the food like ravenous wild men, ate every morsel and drank every drop. Leeford’s glistening lips reminded her how handsome and athletic he looked in only his trousers. The thought, so incongruous with their risky situation, made her smile.

“Something I said?” he asked as he put everything pell-mell back on the tray.

“No, nothing.”

“Bath. Bed. In that order before I fall on my face.” His tight grin did not fool her. The man was dead on his feet.

She had a quick bath, made sure to leave enough hot water for him and climbed into the crispy bed. As tired as she was, the sight of him coming out of the bathroom, naked and smelling of fresh soap, put a little bit of life back in her weary body. By the embrasure she noticed he had hung their clothes on the hot water heater. So thoughtful. They spooned with the covers tight around them. Behind her, Leeford’s body grew warmer. He had been so very cold. Poor man.

“Good night,” she whispered.

He kissed her cheek, her shoulder, her upper arm. “I regret nothing, Eleanor. Do you believe me?”

“I do.”

“Good. Sweet dreams.”

She doubted her dreams would be sweet for the foreseeable future. She had almost cost this man his life. More than once. Her allies had turned on her, the Society failed her. Once organized and compartmentalized, her life had disintegrated around her like a sand castle in the surf. Maybe it had begun earlier and she had been too blind to see. Or perhaps her affection for Leeford had precipitated events. She was not sure. All she knew was that she would do anything, anything at all, to protect Leeford Gunn. And may the Divine Graces help those who stood in her way.

She slept by fits, woke often, would have tossed and turned had she not been afraid to wake Leeford. When she woke again, this time to the sound of labored breathing, her instincts hurriedly aligned, left her dizzy with overconcentration. On the alert, she slipped her hand under her pillow, mouthed a silent curse when she realized she had been too tired to even remember to arm herself. Stupid, deadly mistake in their present situation. But she realized the sounds came from Leeford and had nothing to do with danger. He was dreaming. Or having nightmares, judging by the sound. In the darkness, she felt him twitch. She would have let his sleep take its normal course—he needed the rest, even troubled—had he not begun to grind his teeth. Eleanor placed a gentle hand on his biceps and squeezed. Despite her efforts, he woke with a start.

“So sorry,” she whispered. “I did not mean to disturb you.”

He stirred. “Nightmare. Did I wake you?”

“No.”

A hot hand landed on her shoulder. He rubbed his thumb there, ’round and ’round. “Can you not sleep? Even a little?”

“I did.”

“Are you afraid?”

Her first reaction was to say no. But she was. Not for herself, for him. She had made her choices early in life, had chosen this dangerous profession knowing the risks and consequences. He had not. “Yes.”

“I am as well,” he whispered, chuckled. In the gloom, the sound was like velvet against her cheek. “I should never have attended that fair last year. Your Mr. Clarence was right on one point—I had to know my machine had the potential for evil, yet I pursued the research anyway. I had to build it. I had to see it through. That is my greatest weakness. I could not help myself and preferred to see my machine as only a tool. But whisky has that effect. It helps us delude ourselves quite thoroughly.”

“Do not blame yourself, Leeford,” Eleanor replied, fighting to keep her voice below murmurs. “Spark would have sponsored someone else. Someone who would have continued even after he revealed himself. You refused. As soon as you knew, you stopped. This has profound meaning to me.”

“Yes, it means that I am a coward.”

Eleanor rolled to her side so she could find his face in the darkness and cup it in a hand. “You are no coward. We all know Spark’s reputation—rightly earned. Who would refuse him? Name another inventor who would reject Spark’s money and rebuff him in public the way you have. There is a difference between bravado and bravery.”

After a long silence, she heard him take a deep breath.

“That nightmare… I was in a scull, rowing,” Leeford began in a voice so subdued she had to pay close attention to hear his words. “Despite all my skill, all my efforts, I kept reaching the shore too late.”

“It is only a dream. We make our own choices, not the Divine Graces.”

“I pulled so hard on those oars.” His voice broke.

Eleanor’s heart followed suit. In shaking arms, she gathered his head and cradled it against her. “Shh.”

“I was always too late,” he snarled against her skin. He returned her embrace, held her hard. Muscles like iron bands dug in her flesh. He shook. “Each time, you had fallen before I could get to you. And he was there, that bastard, laughing.”

She could well imagine whom. A man who had shared her bed, even for a short while in her younger years when she had sought pleasures from dark places and darker characters. Until she had realized that natural and conventional lovemaking had stopped pleasing her, that she could no longer stoke her own fire, that small details, which had always attracted and charmed her, were no longer enough to tantalize her. In her early thirties, Eleanor Cleverly had already grown jaded. The realization had had the effect of a cold shower. No more would she let men like Spark desecrate her flesh. No longer would she snub simple delights and instead hunt for extremes and excesses. Decadence had lost its appeal, debauchery its thrill.

“He is not here,” Eleanor whispered in his ear. Kissed his lobe, his defined jaw. “There is only you and me in this room.”

“Every time. And he would say, ‘What, Gunn? Did you not care about her enough to take that bullet? It was meant for you, after all, was it not?’ That…argh, there is no word vile enough.”

“Do not give in to anger. Do not let it eat you inside. You are better than this, than him. Smarter and much more handsome as well.”

She felt him shake his head. “I am so afraid of losing you, Eleanor. Should something happen to you, it would kill me as well.”

“I am not dead.”

She did not voice the last word, the one both knew fit their situation—not dead yet. No small success considering the enemy massing against them. Like poisonous mushrooms, insidious and toxic. Cut one and three will take its place.

Leeford twisted onto his side, draped an arm across her chest and kept rolling until he lay on top of her, a knee between hers, his elbows on either side of her head. He was much heavier than he looked. His hard chest pressed against her naked breasts. His breath against her mouth heralded a deep, demanding kiss that tasted of desperation, joy, fear, exultation, frenzy, dread. He sucked at her bottom lip, took it into his mouth while his hand captured a breast that he molded with pitiless fingers.

Rush and her own inner fears fired her body. She arched her pelvis against him. He was hard. With his thigh, he pushed against her sex, worked back and forth, hips pumping and curling while his mouth conquered hers. He planted her hands above her head while he worked his way downward.

Moans left her when Leeford kissed her throat, sucked at it, licked upward. She whimpered when he trapped a nipple between his teeth. His hot breaths against her feverish skin. Then lower on her belly. He abandoned her wrists but she never moved except to part her legs. She had melted for him between her thighs. Even she could smell her stimulation.

In the darkness she felt him kicking at the sheets and covers, in anger ripping everything off the mattress before shoving a pillow under her backside to elevate her pussy to his hungry mouth. She balled her fists and squeezed them under her back for added pressure. A groan of anticipation left her when Leeford closed his hands over her wrists and kept her there in bonds she would never undo even if she had a key.

A split second of total silence and stillness. Then his mouth crushed her pussy. She “Ahh-ed” loud and long. He bit the insides of her thighs. Sucked her clitoris hard enough to curl her toes. She undulated without moderation. His name became a whip with which she incited and roused Leeford. In her head, she asked him to fuck her senseless, demanded it, taunted him to the breaking point. Outward, she let him know how to touch her by the brusque roll of hips and mewling sounds deep in her throat. Although he must have already felt her hunger for forcefulness since his fingers found her pussy and worked her harder than he had before. Nimble, precise, skilled. To be finger-fucked by Leeford Gunn had no equal.

An abyss opened under her. She fell into a black and red gulf, tossed and thrown and lost. Her lips formed his name even if her lungs had already emptied on a long cry.

Chapter Nine

Her pussy closed around his fingers as a fist would. Squeezed him, rippled in rings as pleasure ripped through her. Leeford thrust them in and kept them there to feel her flesh make a home for him, her sweet, wet flesh that had left such a luscious taste in his mouth. With his other hand flat against her belly, he felt every wave and ripple, every shudder and spasm in turn tightening then distending, like shivers, frissons, a body-wide fever.

Eleanor’s voice filled their room and his heart, just as his fingers filled her pussy. She gifted him with her vocal pleasure and he returned it tenfold with powerful thrusts. Honey spilled onto his fingers. He licked it off in greedy abandon, returned to his work. In turn, she begged, demanded, threatened, cajoled for him to do it again, again, harder, deeper, gentler. In softness—with force—she wanted to be fucked and made love to. Leeford acquiesced. In the dark, all he had was her physical responses and the sounds she made. In the darkness, all he had was her. His world was reduced to Eleanor’s sex, to her breasts, and to her mouth, all of which had provided homes to his cock and would again.

He pulled his fingers out, devoured her to make sure the fire remained high and strong, then when she had begun to writhe beneath him, he knelt between her legs, grabbed her by the crook of the hips and took her. In a long and vigorous penetration, he pushed to the end of her, to the end of himself, retreated. In hiccups and whimpers, she pleaded for him to return. Which he did. Lost himself in her welcoming pussy, her sweet, wet cunt. All his. He abandoned one of her breasts, which he had seized to roll her hard nipple, so he could grab the headboard. With this added anchor, he bucked forward. She cried out, gasped, moaned.

“Tell me,” he whispered before another push made a spur of her voice. “Tell me how.”

“Hard,” she snarled. “Make it hard. Hard.”

The bed rattled and creaked in their furious coupling. In his hand, the headboard grew slick with sweat, but still he pumped. Pounded, took, staked a claim in her. Hammered, thrust, sheathed himself to the hilt.

After Eleanor crossed her ankles behind him, he raised himself off her, used his pelvis as an anchor so he could free his hand off the mattress, grabbed her knee instead and brought it up high by her shoulder. Her pussy, distended around him, became so tight that he feared coming before it was time. He wanted more from her. He wanted period.

“Kneel up,” he whispered in her ear. His voice came out like a harsh command. But he knew—somehow—she would not take offense. She trusted him. With her flesh. Perhaps even with her heart. He loved her. Had always. Would always.

He released her so she could roll to her side, climb to her knees. As if she had known what he wanted, she turned away from him, her back slick with sweat, her thighs sticking to his with her honey. He heard the twin plop of her hands landing against the wall. He could just imagine how she looked, her curvy backside curled up for his taking. Her rosy flesh glistening with pleasure. The way her hair fell in a point between her shoulder blades. He saw it all in his mind’s eye. As though he had always known her.

Instead of taking her right then and there—his cock was about to explode—he curled a hand into her wet cleft while with the other he seized a breast. She felt tense with expectations. He did not want to disappoint her.

“I am going to take you,” he murmured with his chin on her shoulder.

She panted, swallowed. He heard it all, so close.

“I am going to make you writhe for me, Eleanor. With my cock in you, with my hands on you. But only if you want it.”

“I…I do. I do!”

He felt merciless only because he knew her body responded to his with such readiness and with copious amount of honey. No greater proof than that. He knew she would find pleasure at his touch. Her flesh yearned for his and vice versa.

Her cleft tightened on his hand when he rubbed back and forth from clitoris to anus. A sense of power and ownership gripped him, one he relegated to primeval male instincts over which he had little say.

Leeford curled his middle finger into her pussy. In passing, her little pearl grazed his knuckle. So hard. “Do you want this?”

“Yes—ahh…yes!”

His ring finger joined the first. Around his knuckles, her flesh tightened. Good fortune, he wanted to push her down and spear her to the mattress! He pushed his fingers with a slight twist of the wrist so his pads would rub her sensitive flesh all the way in. She shuddered.

“And this?”

Her nipple proved too hard to resist in his hand and he squeezed it, rolled it and tugged a few times to make her gasp.

“Oh please, yes, I want this. I want it!”

Where had the awkward man who shunned society gone? He felt victorious and powerful. She was his. All his. Would always be his.

With his knees, he pushed hers wider. His cock hung between her cheeks. When he pulled his fingers from her she whimpered threats at him that made him smile.

“Is that right, Eleanor? If I do not take you, you will force me to?”

He curled his backside out and rubbed her cleft with his member, all the way down to its base. Did it again. And again. He was close to coming but would not let himself. There was still more he wanted to hear from her. So much more.

“How would you do this?” he taunted by rubbing his glans against her wet cleft. “Mm?”

Eleanor curled her backside up, which distended her pussy and elevated her breasts. Leeford knew how she would force him to take her. By making him lose his mind. The way she just had.

He gripped the headboard on either side of her hips. On a long snarl, Leeford fisted his cock and found her drenched entry, which he penetrated with his teeth about to fuse together.

Her voice turned from whimpered commands to keens. One for each of his thrusts. If the bed had rattled before, it positively smashed against the wall now. Burning, all-consuming, a climax made his lower back, his thighs and cock one big throbbing mess of nerve endings and muscle spasms. He came just as he had pushed deep into her. Instead of retreating, he stayed there, as deep as he could. And waited. Pulsating out the last of his cum, he felt her own orgasm rip through her. She arched back, far back, took her with him and they tumbled backward against the mattress. Spent, joined, elated, sweaty, feverish, exhausted. In love.

Leeford woke with a start. Light poked thin rays in between the drapes. He could no longer feel one of his legs. Raising his head, he realized Eleanor and he had fallen asleep still coupled. Sweat and cum made everything sticky. He chuckled as he tried to extirpate his legs from underneath hers. So she snored. He never would have guessed.

“Eleanor,” he whispered as he pushed hair from her face. “Eleanor. We must get ready.”

“Mmm,” was her reply.

“I will wash up first and try to find something to wear. Taking the train in just my trousers would be too strange, even for me.”

She grinned with her eyes closed as he finally managed to roll her off him and stand. So beautiful she was, relaxed in the messiest bed he had ever seen. The quiet moment of appreciation and discovery was gone a second later. Spark was breathing down their necks. That “society” as well. They had no time.

After they took turns with the bathroom, he went knocking on Lily and Max’s door, not too sure what to expect and trying not to have expectations in the first place. For an inane reason he could not fathom, that Max answered the door dressed and looking his well turned-out—if gruff—self made Leeford feel a whole lot better. Was Max and Lily’s bed as messy as the one he had shared with Eleanor? Had they…?

“You better take this,” Max said as he passed his long jacket to Leeford, who took it with a nod of thanks. “What now?”

“Now Eleanor and I will book passage to anywhere on the next available train.”

“Miss Lily will not like it.”

“Where is she?” Leeford asked. He caught himself trying to peek over Max’s wide shoulder. The bed had been made.

“In the bathroom.”

He could not help it anymore! “How long have you two been intimate?”

The blunt question triggered a rare smile to lift Max’s cheekbones. “What does it change, Mr. Gunn?”

“She is my cousin. My responsibility.”

“And she is my best friend.”

“Ah. I see.”

“I am glad you do, Mr. Gunn.”

“Do you intend to marry her? Protect her?” He put the jacket on to give himself something to do, noticed the smell of cologne. Max wore cologne?

“No and yes.”

Leeford planted his hands on his hips. “And why not?”

“Because I do not want to,” Lily replied from inside the room. “I am quite happy with the present situation.”

Max’s grin widened for a split second before it disappeared. “The lady has spoken.”

Caught between the urge to stamp his boot in the man’s face and laughing at his own idiocy—he had set that trap quite well and had stepped right into it—Leeford shoved his fists in his pocket, muttered about checking the dragon then stomped off.

Outside, drizzle and fog greeted him. The dragon was where he had left it with the prototype still inside the trunk. He locked it back, wiped the rain off the front seat as he waited for the others.

Eleanor’s subtle tread made him turn to greet her. Again her beauty and grace knocked him back a step. He would never tire of looking at her. Dressed in black from head to toe with that delectable black lace-purple satin corset, even the way she had slung her pack across her shoulders, gave her an air of stylish mystery.

“Are they coming?”

She hooked a thumb over her shoulder when the pair appeared around a corner. Lily skipped around a puddle in the cobbles. Her dark red dress and brown hair bounced around her petite frame. She was back to Lady Frivolous that morning. He had missed her. Even Max’s sour disposition. These two had been his world for years. Although he would love to make room for his lovely Eleanor if she decided to come visit them once in a while. She could make his house her home and he would be the happiest of men. But he would not push her. The choice would be hers. She knew where to find him—well, would know because as it stood, he might not have a house left. He would give a thousand ecus to see his parents’ faces when the news reached them. Ha!

The way out of downtown and onto land proved easy in the early morning rush of dragons and land-based vehicles. Wind whipped at them and stung their eyes. Leeford squinted and lamented he had no goggles, but at least, he had the glass windjammer in front of him. Lily and Max, sitting in the back seat, had no such protection. By the corner of his eye, he could see the large man had an arm wrapped over Lily’s shoulders so he would take the brunt of it. How had he not noticed the amorous pair earlier? Had he been so oblivious?

Beside and above them, passenger-carrying airships—much smaller than Spark’s silvery monster—floated silently by as he maneuvered their dragon around the city, spotted the train station five hundred feet below and to their left. It resembled a collection of shiny black worms. None moved either. At this time of the day? Odd.

He felt Eleanor tense by his side and followed her gaze. The dragon shuddered when his surprise bled into his handling of their craft. A veritable caterpillar of coaches waited on the road leading to the train station. Their steel and brass hulls gleamed despite the fog. So many of them. Something had happened.

When he landed at the end of the queue, a young boy running back to his family’s open coach yelled in excitement that there had been “an awful accident, Mum” at the station involving a night train and repairs were underway. It would take “several ages, Mum” according to their little impromptu informant. Other vehicles soon packed right behind Leeford’s, close together, as if their proximity would trigger movement. They were stuck now. No way around, no room to maneuver and back out of the road. Everything took on a sinister air. He felt spied upon, every sound held danger, every glint of passengers’ eyes hid menace. To keep his mind and hands occupied, he retrieved his watch from his trousers pocket and took a quick look before slipping it back in. Five to seven. Right in the middle of rush hour. He looked at the three tight faces and knew he did not suffer from paranoia. Max positively glowered.

“The Society must have done this. I cannot believe they would cause an accident,” Eleanor muttered, sitting deeper in her seat. “Bastards.”

Lily leaned her elbows on the backrest between Eleanor and him. “Perhaps it is a genuine accident. Should we go investigate?”

Eleanor nodded. “I will.”

“I will come with you,” Max said, already opening the back passenger door and stepping off. He still did not trust Eleanor.

She did not seem to care either way as she leaned over, planted a quick kiss on Leeford’s mouth then followed Max. She turned once to wave. The difference in heights between the bearded man and her was almost laughable.

“She loves you,” Lily commented with a grin. “And you love her back.”

“I hope she does. And yes, I love her. Very much.” He held her hand in his, kissed her knuckles then returned his to the altitude lever, nervously twisting it to keep the engine rumbling at idle. If things turned ugly, they had no time to waste trying to start the machine again. Not that there was any room to go anywhere. But he had to do something with his hands. A glass of whisky would be wonderful right now. An entire bottle even better.

By the corner of his eyes, he saw Lily looking skyward directly overhead. “What is that?”

He cut a quick glance up. His heart sank.

“Divine Graces.”

* * * * *

The woman looked at Eleanor a split second too long.

Reaching out to Max’s wrist, she squeezed it. “They are here.”

“Where?”

“Everywhere. Are you armed?”

Max snorted in derision.

“I will take that as a ‘no’.”

“What do we do?”

“We go back. We must warn Leeford. But do not run.”

They had almost reached the train station by the time she had spotted the woman and she could see, through the onlookers and members of the press gathered at the wrought iron fence, that a train had indeed plowed into the buffer stops marking the end of the tracks. Constables patrolled the site, some inside the perimeter, armed with notepads and all sorts of measuring equipment, and others outside, armed with batons and pistols. Several police dragons crowded the landing area, their gold and red hulls a sharp contrast to regular citizens’ dark or silvery vehicles.

How could the Society have done this? Had there been casualties? A week ago she would not have believed Mr. Clarence would have ordered such reckless and immoral act—she had been part of missions where violence would have made for much quicker success yet had been ordered to use it as very last resort only. But today? She would put nothing past the Society.

“The woman in a blue dress is one,” Eleanor said through her teeth, walking fast. Her palms grew dry and hot, as they did during such situations. Nerves left her. She knew what to do. “That constable too, the one by the fence. Those two coach drivers with top hats as well.” A covered coach gleamed like black ink behind the line of police dragons. She could recognize a Society mark there too.

Leeford would get away. She would make sure of it. She cared nothing about consequences. She slipped a surreptitious hand behind her waist, retrieved the slim pistol from the sheath sewn into the corset. The thing was barely larger than a skipping stone and just as smooth. But it could kill. Had many times.

“Hurry but do not run, Max,” she breathed when the woman in the blue dress began to walk in their direction. In her limited field of vision—she wished she had Max’s height—every agent she had described to her companion was converging toward them.

She felt him tense, saw him ball fists the size of honey melons. If her colleagues wanted to apprehend him without causing a scene, they were in for a surprise. She would not go down easily either.

“I will draw them to me. Use your size to warn Leeford. Jump on coaches’ rooftops, anything, but do not let them take him.”

He nodded as he put his bear paw of a hand on a man’s shoulder so he could circumvent him. The crowd had thickened with curious onlookers or bored passengers. She cut through the mass of bodies.

A flash of blue to her left triggered it all. So it would come to this, agents against agents.

“Now.”

To his credit, Max did not seem to hesitate one second. Without a word, he put his shoulder forward and ran. People were like pins on either side of him. He had knocked several back against their vehicles by the time Eleanor took up a run, leaped on the closest dragon’s front—to the occupants’ consternation—then leveled her pistol skyward and took a single shot. The sound was like a small thunderclap. As one, people began to scream and push to get out of the way. Chaos ensued. Perfect cover.

From the left, a flash of blue dress forewarned her by a split second. She pistol-whipped the woman just as she jumped onto Eleanor’s perch. With a whirl of blue satin and black lace, the woman spun once then fell back down to land in a heap on the cobbled road. Another shot rang in the air. Not for her though. She pivoted just in time to spot the fake constable taking aim well above her head and firing. So the Society wanted her alive. Their mistake.

The pair of coach drivers in top hats converged on her, one to the left, the other from the right. Pistol in hand, she jumped dragons, once, twice, thrice, toward the back. A great shadow fell over them all. She looked up and almost missed her fourth jump.

Spark’s airship. Barely three hundred feet above their heads. A hail of shots followed. Not from behind, but from above.

Several vehicles farther back, she saw Max about to reach Leeford’s dragon just as the airship’s giant nacelle split down the middle. For a moment, nothing happened. Then several lines fell from the darkness. They wiggled like convulsing snakes before dark forms slid down each. Pistol fire erupted from all sides. Both men in top hats turned from her to start firing at Spark’s goons. She did too. They all wanted the same thing if for different reasons. She kept leaping from dragon to dragon since it proved easier to navigate than trying to cut the screaming, churning crowd. And it afforded her a perfect view of everything.

It all happened in such slowness. Such slowness.

Max reached Leeford just as he tried to maneuver the dragon out from between the closest vehicles. A quartet of Spark’s men landed on either side of the vehicle and swarmed it. Pistol shots were heard.

Eleanor screamed. She had no idea what.

As if time had slowed, she saw Leeford’s inert form being slung to one of the goons and both began to leave the ground, being reeled back up to the nacelle. Max, using nothing more than his fists, dispatched the first two men he encountered.

Eleanor took aim and fired at the back of a third who was pulling something out of his jacket as he dove for Max’s unprotected flank. She put another shot into his closest enemy before she aimed up at the man slung to Leeford but was afraid of missing her aim so jumped onto the last dragon before theirs. From this close, she felt more confident with her aim. Eleanor shot three more times, downed three more of Spark’s men. But before she could dispatch another, Max leaped up to try to catch Leeford’s feet, missed by no more than an inch. He landed on one of the attackers, who turned the pistol against the bearded man. A shot, muffled, was heard. Max shuddered. When they fell pell-mell into the backseat, to Lily’s shrieks of horror, Max lay very still.

Around them, the lines the men had used to come down were jettisoned and landed on the ground.

She tried jumping as well but was much too short. They had reeled the pair up by fifteen feet, twenty feet. Much too high. She could not fire. She could no longer climb. Could do nothing.

“Leeford! Leeford!”

Like a monstrous maw, the nacelle closed with a metallic sound over her view of Leeford while the steam engines roared to renewed life. In a slow, inexorable escape, the airship turned and angled upward, away from the carnage on the ground.

Tears blinded her as she turned the pistol to the last of Spark’s men, who had engaged the two Society agents in the top hats, and fired in the leg of each. She wanted them alive for interrogation. They would tell her where Spark was taking Leeford. They would tell or may good fortune help them.

“You!” she yelled at the closest. But before she could ask him anything, one of the agents in the top hat put a bullet in each of the man’s chest, ending their pitiful cries. And annihilating her chances to learn anything from them.

After the bullets had been fired, silence rang dull in her ears. Except for a small sound that tore at her heart. Lily’s sobs.

Her colleagues had ruined everything. Spark had been able to capture Leeford because of the Society’s interference. They could have had a chance. It had been stolen from them, and now Spark had Leeford. Eleanor shuddered at the images crowding her brain before a crimson veil descended on her reality, blocked out light, cast her in an abyss of burning red fog.

Rage bubbled over. She whirled around, pistol aimed high.

“Eleanor!” a man called from a distance. “Wait!”

Mr. Clarence stood behind her, a trio of agents surrounding him. Each had at least one pistol pointed at her. The woman in the blue dress had two. By the corner of her eye, she spotted both men in the top hats running around Leeford’s dragon and popping the lock with the butt of one’s pistol. “It is here!” he called.

“The prototype was there all along?” Mr. Clarence said, approaching. He gestured for his agents to lower their weapons. Eleanor did not. “Why did Spark not take it? Could he have not known it was there?”

“He knew!” Lily cried from the backseat. She rose, shaking from head to toe, her dark red dress glistening in the front. A scarlet patina covered her hands. “I told them! Take the machine! It is in the trunk! But leave Leeford alone! They would not listen…he tried! He fought them off, tried to help me when they came for me instead—they struck him from behind.” Her voice had gone from yells to whimpers. She raked her hands through her hair, streaked her face with blood. “It was not the machine they wanted.”

“Spark was after Leeford all along,” Eleanor murmured. In the silence, her words cut like ice shards. Cold and sharp.

To his credit, Mr. Clarence did not appear victorious as he walked around the dragon, leaned over the contents of the trunk then closed it gently. Sadness made him look old and tired. He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Eleanor.”

She aimed at him, knowing at least four pistols were aimed at her. “I should kill you for this. To make myself feel better even for a second.”

“The prototype is safe. It would change nothing,” he replied. “Think about it. We have secured the only working prototype.”

“But Spark now has the inventor behind it. He has Leeford!” She yelled the last word.

“Spark has not the time to properly convince Mr. Gunn to build another. An unsavory journey, but a satisfying outcome.”

“For you. And what do you mean, no time?” She did not like the sound of this nor the look of resignation in her old mentor’s eyes.

“For us all.”

“You did not answer my question,” she growled. “What are you planning to do? Tell me.”

A deep crease marred Mr. Clarence’s smooth dark brow. He acquiesced with a small nod. “Since we have lost control over the creator, then the research itself must stop.”

A cold fist gripped her innards and squeezed. She did not dare ask how they would achieve this.

“Do not do this,” Eleanor warned in a low voice.

“I see no other option, Eleanor. Do you?”

Lily sank back in the seat, cradling Max’s head on her lap. She had lapsed into her world again. Eleanor could not blame her. She wished she had an escape too, a place warm and dark where she could hide her head and never come back out again. Perhaps the best use of the bullets in her pistol would be in her skull. But then again…

Leeford needed her now more than ever.

“Give me a day. You know where Spark is going,” Eleanor said, slipping the pistol in her corset. Everyone visibly relaxed. “And you will tell me.”

“A day?” Mr. Clarence shook his head. “I cannot risk Spark forcing Mr. Gunn to draw him a schematics or explain the mechanisms. Pain is a powerful motivator, you should know this. Eleanor, do you not see? We must stop it now. At all costs.” He gestured for the agents to seize the dragon. The woman in the blue dress reached out to help Lily off but had to literally pry her hands off Max first. It broke Eleanor’s heart anew. They had both lost their beloved in a matter of seconds.

“He is gone, child,” Mr. Clarence whispered. “Come, we will take you back to your family and arrange for your friend’s sending off. We can do this much.”

While he helped the shaking young woman off the dragon, other agents dumped Spark’s man off it but draped Max’s body with a blanket from the trunk. They worked with precision and efficiency. She hated them for it.

Eleanor wanted to hug Lily but she walked by as though she did not know her, lost in an inner world, a better world, that dreamy smile gone. She wondered if her “cousin’s” smile was gone forever.

Tears rolled down Eleanor’s cheeks when she looked up. Fog and low-hanging clouds had swallowed the airship, and although she could not possibly see it, she still tried all she could to catch a glimpse, as fleeting as it would be, to see where Spark was taking Leeford. At least a direction! Anything!

For a split second, she wondered if it would not have been better for Leeford to have died quickly instead of being captured alive. Especially by Aloysius Spark. Her throat closed. A great weight pressed on her chest. She could stop Mr. Clarence but would not be able to do a thing to stop the rest of the Society from launching the attack on Spark’s hideaway. Wherever it was.

Mr. Clarence waved everyone away. Most of the crowd had been cordoned off by the constables. The Society had done what it did best—control the situation. There would be no inquiry, no mention of it in the press except perhaps for a small column about how a disgruntled commuter had fired on fellow passengers or some fabrication to that effect. It all left a bad taste in her mouth.

Soon, her former mentor and she were alone by Leeford’s dragon. Blood glistened on its copper hull and on the backseat around the blanket covering most of Max’s body. A small golden item caught her attention.

“Oh Leeford,” she whispered as she leaned over and retrieved it from the footwell. Leeford’s little golden “timer” watch. It was broken, its tiny brass entrails spilling out of its casing. She wrapped it in a shaking fist.

Mr. Clarence cleared his throat, drew very near.

“A day. For old times’ sake,” he whispered, placing a hand on her shoulder. “There is an island three hundred feet off the coast, shrouded in fog for most of the year. About one hundred and twenty miles north of here. It is almost impossible to see from the air. But from the water at low tides, one could hypothetically gain access via the many caves. From there, one can only improvise. The Society will take no action until dawn tomorrow.”

Her heart leaped. She nodded.

With a last long look at her, Mr. Clarence turned and walked away.

“For old times’ sake,” she called after him. He stopped. “If Leeford is well and we escape, I will find you and thank you, although I will never again work for the Society. But if something happened to him and he is…” She took a deep breath. Steely resolve filled her. “Or if you lie to me and set out today, then I will find you. And I will kill you.”

She did not wait for a reply. Any word of his had become irrelevant. She had a mission to accomplish. The most important yet. Leeford counted on her. Short of death, nothing would stop her.

Chapter Ten

The smell brought him back to his senses. A mix of rotten fruit and camphor.

He remembered the fight, the desperate attempt to kick the men off the dragon while keeping a grip on Lily’s wrist, who was being dragged out, and the other on the altitude lever so he could take off. Both had slipped from him when someone had struck him behind the head. It felt as if his skull had split open to allow blinding sunlight to stab in. A mechanical sound caught his ear. Rhythmic clinks and clanks.

His nape presently felt tight and hot. Leeford reached back to touch it and cringed. The tang of blood filled his mouth. His tongue felt raw on one side. He must have bitten it. His feet were cold. After he wiggled his toes, he realized he was barefoot. Where had his boots gone?

Cringing and cursing, he moved his legs, his arms. He lay on a hard surface, opened his eyes to see the underside of a long table with rusted ironwork keeping it together. The sound of water dripping nearby made him shiver. It was cold and damp but fortunately he still wore Max’s jacket, opened wide. He rolled onto his side, sat up. After the wave of dizziness left him, his surroundings sharpened into clearer focus around him.

And he wished they had not.

“Graces.”

Even in his worst fever-induced nightmares, he would not have imagined the scene before him, the grotesque, ghastly scene that reached into his brain and chased his sanity into the farthest recesses like taunting little bullies. Bile rose in his throat. His teeth clenched tight, Leeford leaned on the table for support and stood.

Around him, a chamber hewn from bedrock. Water dripping down the walls in oily rivulets. The slate floor, looking dangerous and slick underfoot. And machines in various states of completion. Horrible machines not entirely made of steel or wood… Machines that never should have seen the light of day. What diseased mind had made these? Had thought them up, put them together? No wonder the smell was so bad.

Leeford closed his eyes to sever the image. For a second, he thought he was going to vomit. The urge passed, left him shaking and bent over the table. Tools dug in his palms. Sharp, pointy tools. More bits and pieces there too. Those horrific bits and pieces…rusty brown and pale gray, the occasional speck of white.

“Good fortune, what is this place?”

For these machines, these putrefied inventions surrounding him had nothing to do with engineering or mechanical curiosity and everything to do with madness. All around him sections of rotten flesh and tendons, protruding bones, madly bolted, riveted, tied to brass joints or plated steel, forced into unthinkable shapes and functions, phalanges for pivots, rib cages for casings, empty orbits serving as receptacles for switches. The sound he had heard came from a corner where an automaton, part rusty steel, part decayed male corpse, stood face to the wall, in a futile attempt to take a step forward would only bump against the bedrock, stumble back then try again. Over and over. Clinks and clanks. Its gears showed in the empty back.

Not far, portions of another automaton, this one unmoving, lying on a trestle table with his semi-organic, semi-mechanical entrails spilling out, with mismatched eyes and twine to keep its mouth sewn closed. And beyond, more trials and errors, severed hands, some rotten almost beyond recognition, lined up by size, a few of them much too small to be those of adults. Who would do this? For Graces’ sake, who would do this?

Leeford felt bile rise dangerously close. He squeezed his eyes to shut out the mad experiments of a brain long gone beyond the edge. As though the designer had tried to meld together human and machine. Failing miserably. Horribly.

With a snarl, he pushed off and meant to backpedal but something caught his foot and he sprawled on his ass. Metallic sounds made him look down at his legs. A manacle of steel bound his ankle with a long length of rusty chain cemented into the floor between broken tiles.

Feeling dirty, so very dirty, Leeford floundered back to his feet and wiped his hands on the back of his jacket until his palms tingled, until his fingers ached from rubbing against the stitching. Until heat from the rubbing turned into burning. He was shocked to see blood on his knuckles when he brought his hand in front of his face. Madness tickled the back of his neck. The automaton looked at him from the table, its dead, glassy eyes pleading, accusing, begging.

He knuckled his eyes, avoided looking into the haunting face. “Graces…no.”

“Welcome back, Gunn,” a man said from behind him. “Sooner than I expected. But you were always a punctual one.”

Leeford whirled around, dragged the chain when he meant to rush at Spark, who stood not far, stood very still. He must have seen the whole thing, witnessed Leeford’s horrific awakening. Must have reveled in it too, the monstrous bastard.

“What have you done?” Leeford demanded with much more force than he had thought himself capable just a few seconds ago. The smell alone nearly floored him. “What have you done?”

Spark’s gesture encompassed the whole chamber when he stood by the work table’s corner. A mere inch away from Leeford’s reach. “My work, you mean?”

“Your ‘work’? This is…Graces. This, this filth is no ‘work’,” Leeford spat. “It breaks every rule of morality.”

“Rules are for common men, Gunn. You and I are far from common. We are architects of ideas, geniuses. Rules do not apply to the likes of us.”

“Us? You think we are alike? You did these things—”

“These things did not exist before I made them. I am a creator. Like you.”

“Listen to yourself! Your mind is gone, this is all madness, perversions of a diseased—of a festering mind! You vile bastard—you foul, neurotic bastard!” He took a step forward. The chain abraded his ankle.

“My, my, Gunn,” Spark said, grinning. “Who would have suspected you had all this colorful language in you?”

“Come here and I will show you what else I have in me!”

“Jealousy is so unbecoming of you, Gunn. But not really a surprise. My scientific interest is uncompromising. Not everyone can understand, although I had hopes you would.”

“Jealousy? Scientific interest? There is nothing, nothing, scientific about any of this!” Leeford punched his fist on the table.

A small sound caught his attention. It came from under the table. He took a few cautious steps away. From the darkness emerged a tiny machine no bigger than a man’s hand. Perched atop its spiderlike body and many legs, bits of fur still clung to a tiny skull—a rabbit’s maybe, or some other small creature. It clinked and clanked, spurred on by a spring-loaded mechanism, skittered across the room until he could no longer see it. How big was this place? At the edge of light, a trapdoor was open, its grilled iron cover leaning against the wall with unspeakable fluids of all consistency and color slithering down the gentle incline to drip into the hole.

I will go mad. I will go utterly, completely mad here.

“Genius is often confused with madness by common men. And I thought you had vision, Gunn.” Spark removed his gloves and put them in his jacket pocket. The steel ring like a giant scarab clutching his little finger gleamed in the light of gas lamps bolted to the walls. “Shall we start? Tell me what you require.”

“Start what? I will do nothing for you. Nothing.”

Spark’s grin crystallized at the corners. “You will, or I would be placed in a position of doing some very, very wicked things.”

“You can do whatever you want to me, it will not change a thing.”

“Who said anything about you?”

Horror closed a cold, clammy fist on his guts and tugged downward.

“I would not touch Eleanor in anger or do anything untoward to your charming cousin, but…” Spark shrugged as if he were faced with a hopeless situation. “I may have to now. Is she a virgin, I wonder? Your cousin? I know for a fact Eleanor is not. You are a fortunate man indeed to be the object of her affection. I have once been such a man. Does she still enjoy having a lover bend her on elbows and knees and take her? And such an adorable little mole—right there.” He pointed to a spot in the middle of his chest.

He knew well the one. Leeford’s stomach knotted. “What happened between you and Eleanor is none of my affair. And from what I can tell, it is in the past.”

Spark took the hit without flinching, but his eyes narrowed for just a moment. He smiled. “Not a stitch of jealousy? You are a better man than I. Then you will not object if I share her with my men? Properly motivated, she would be receptive enough.”

Abject fear paralyzed his body. Only his mind worked, and the things it showed him. “Neither woman is here.”

Spark arched an eyebrow the way Leeford remembered, the way he hated. That insufferable air of arrogance. As though he owned the world. “Would you gamble them, Gunn? Which one first, the lover or the cousin? Or have they both already shared your bed?”

“You utterly repulsive swine.”

“Which one, Gunn? Choose. Your lack of cooperation just cost one of them her female dignity, and I can assure you—” Spark grinned wide. The glint of malice made Leeford swallow hard. “That you will hear her screams from down here. A bit of background music to season your work.”

“Let me see them, and I will do whatever you ask.”

Spark shook his head, black wavy hair like snakes. “This is not the way of things. You do whatever I ask, and I will touch neither one. For now.”

His heart beat so hard, so fast, dizziness gripped him. Rage boiled low in his gut, simmered beneath the surface. If there was justice in this world…

“What do you want?” he spat, turning away from the most gruesome view, only to notice other details even more appalling. There was no safe place for a sane man in Spark’s laboratory of death.

“A condensator. Similar to the one you already built, but more powerful. Much, much more powerful.”

“It will take weeks. At least.”

“Then we better get to it!” Spark rolled the sleeves of his shirt and rubbed his hands.

“I work alone.”

“Not this time, old friend.”

Leeford could not believe he would be forced to work like this, surrounded by…these things. He had no choice. What if Spark did hold Eleanor or Lily? Chances were he did not, but Leeford would never gamble either of them if there was the slightest, remotest possibility Spark spoke the truth. He would never forgive himself.

With his heart in his throat, his hands shaking, Leeford took a long, deep breath and forced the gears in his brain to start turning. Maybe if he kept busy on the project, he would not go mad. Maybe.

* * * * *

Finding the island proved easy. Mr. Clarence had been right, fog shrouded the thing like veils on a sinister bride. Caves also dotted the island, and atop its rocky, bristling crest stood a large stone mansion where several chimneys spewed black smoke.

Eleanor did not have much time. She rowed to shore near the mouth of a cave, pulled her small skiff up on the rocks so high tides would not pull it out into the choppy strait frothing between the mainland and Spark’s island, but not far enough that she would need much effort or time dragging it back to the water.

If at first rage had fueled her tired limbs, a cold sort of determination now filled her veins. She had donned every bit of equipment from her pack, had added the thin plates of steel to her corset for protection against bullets—unless they shot her in the head, in which case, she would simply die. Armed with a dagger, wire along the corset’s rim to serve as a silent and efficient garrote, Leeford’s pair of peculiar pistols, her own little silver one, a length of thin silk rope and resolve that took roots in the coldest, meanest, angriest part of her soul, Eleanor set forth.

Silent as a toxic fume, she slipped along the darkened cave, used her hands as safeguards. Lichen provided patches of aqua-colored light. But someone had smoothed the rocky ground. For ease of transport, she surmised. Around the first bend she spotted a man sitting on a boulder, a long-range rifle across his lap and an oil lamp by his feet. With practiced movements, Eleanor slipped the wire from the edge of her corset, fisted the slim handles on either end.

Heart beating at a normal rate—this was nothing new or distasteful to her—she pounced on him, wrapped the garrote once around his thick throat and used her knee against his nape as an anchor. Together they fell in a heap, his limbs flailing at first. Her fists never relented as she pulled on the wire’s thin handles. Soon, the man stilled. Eleanor pulled the wire, used a corner of his lapel to thread the blood off then walked on. Daylight greeted her not far ahead. The cave had been shallower than she had expected. Spark was so predictably arrogant in his overconfidence.

As she slipped out of the cave and hid between boulders, she spotted a small brick house that much resembled a guardhouse in her experienced eyes. Through the tiny window—more like a slit between bricks—she spied a pair of men sitting in watchful silence, drinking from mugs. The door around the back was ajar. She dug a small button from her trousers pocket, clicked the mechanism then lobbed it in before closing the door and hanging onto the handle. A muffled poof indicated the button had done its job. Economical and silent, Eleanor padded inside, used one of the men’s jackets hung on a hook to wrap around her hand and deaden the sound of her pistol. She put a shot in each of them, rolled them back onto their fronts.

Beyond the guardhouse, fifty-two paces onward, towered Spark’s smoke-spewing mansion. Even this did not deter her. Leeford was inside somewhere. She would find him. She would kill her way to him. Without problem. Without remorse.

Eleanor spotted the more “work”-related portion of the house, its chimneys smoking, colossal gears poking out of walls as they turned, dripping brown-black grease onto the rocky slope beneath. She squeezed by one such gear, peeked inside, saw nothing but giant cogs and pistons so after slipping her pistol back into her corset proceeded deeper into the mammoth mechanism to emerge into a sort of small refinery. Fumes and the smell of rotting meat made her gag. Teeth gritted, she padded along a metal gangway overlooking basins filled with bubbling gray goop, vats of green jellylike substance where electrodes dipped a few inches beneath the surface. Past a cleated steel door, she plastered herself against the slick rock wall when men walked by in the perpendicular corridor. Their voices receded soon afterward. Fortunately for them because she had retrieved one of Leeford’s steam pistols, practically noiseless compared to her own, and waited.

Something touched her ankle. She jumped, whirled with pistol pointed down. A tiny spiderlike thing crawled around in circles. A tiny skull with bits of flesh and fur clung to a mad assemblage of screws and springs. Disgusted, she kicked at it so it would not impede her progress. A tiny sound erupted from it as soon as her foot made contact, grew disproportionate to its small size, rose to a high-pitched whistle. Eleanor tried to stomp on it but could not catch the demented thing as it spun in erratic ellipses, steam hissing out of its body. Voices down the perpendicular corridor rose. Someone yelled a challenge.

Eleanor cursed, pulled the second steam pistol from her belt and started running for the corner, hoping to catch the men before they raised the general alarm or before more of those nasty little things started chasing her around. Thwarted by a fist-sized mechanical…toy!

As soon as she rounded the corner, running full speed, bullets ricocheted along the rock walls on both sides. The two men she had seen earlier stood in the middle, apparently oblivious to the fact they made excellent targets. She put a shot in each, ran past the bodies. Doors lined one side. One opened just as she was about to run past it.

Spark, looking frustrated, barged out of the door, spotted her. “You!” He turned tail and ran down the corridor. Surprisingly fast. And she had always thought of him as a fop.

“Stop or I shoot!” she roared, doing just that. The steam pistol’s shht preceded the recoil. A bullet thudded against the wall by Spark’s head.

“Eleanor!”

Only for a moment, Leeford’s voice shifted her focus away from Spark, who, without even turning around, yanked another door open and disappeared behind it.

“Leeford? Leeford!”

After she poked her head in the embrasure, checked for danger then stepped inside, she spotted him standing in the middle of a nightmare. The smell here was even worse.

“In the name of all that is Divine,” she murmured.

The things that were in this place. Horrible things. She shook her head, focused on Leeford’s haggard face. Down the steps four by four, she leaped the last few and threw herself into his arms.

“You should not have come!” He tried to push her away. “Run! Far! Hurry!”

“Not without you!” She kissed his mouth then retreated. “Come! I have a way out!”

“I cannot,” he snarled, pointing at his foot.

Chain had been wrapped around his ankle with a rusty lock that had made a mess of the skin on top of his foot.

“Here,” she gave him a pistol. “This will not take long.”

One of the slim steel picks from her corset’s busk proved perfect. She wiggled it about in the rusty hole, easily triggered the mechanism. The bolt slid with a grating sound. Freed, Leeford joined her by the door.

Voices drowned what he said next. They had no choice! Eleanor slammed the door, let Leeford, who had understood their predicament, bolt it while she rushed back inside, started poking around the place for something she could use.

“The trapdoor!” he growled. “There! It is some sort of chute by my guess.”

“I will follow, give me a moment here.” She squeezed a button under the door. When it would open, the tiny clip would trigger the charge and a loud and painful surprise would greet them. Hopefully Spark would lead them but she doubted it. Coward.

“No,” he said. The finality of his tone made her turn to him.

“We cannot leave this place the way it is…look at it!” Red rimmed his eyes. His frustrated gesture encompassed the whole room. “Look at what he has done!”

Eleanor shrugged, even if the sight of that upright machine in a corner—half human, half something else—bumping mindlessly as it tried to walk made her stomach turn. “We have no time for this! The Society will come at dawn and take care of it.”

“And you trust them?”

“For this one time, yes.”

“Well, not me. We will make time.”

“Ah, for fortune’s sake! They are much better equipped than us to deal—”

“Eleanor,” Leeford said, coming to her and ready to touch her. But he looked at his hand, snarled a curse and let it drop by his side. “I will not leave without making sure Spark can never build more of these—these aberrations. Children, Eleanor—little hands.” He raked his hair back. “This madness must stop.”

Eleanor thought fast. The refinery. It would speed things up until the Society finished the rest. “Fine. I think I know a place where you can achieve what you want. But you must be quick. Please, Leeford, for both our sakes.”

Relief smoothed the wrinkles on his high brow. He nodded. “I will.”

She hoped retracing her steps would not cost them but understood how Leeford would want to annihilate Spark’s “work” himself. It simply could not exist. It had to be destroyed, and the madman with it.

After retrieving her little surprise from under the door, Eleanor fished around for more, found only three left.

“Are you ready?”

He nodded. The pistol gleamed in his hand. He looked so intense, determined and grave. But no anger shone in the dazzling blue eyes. She doubted the man had a mean bone in his body. Unlike her.

Without sound, she cracked the door open, received bits of rock in the face for her trouble when someone shot. She armed the first explosive button, lobbed it out of the tiny opening. Then another.

A split second after the first explosion, she opened the door, took aim and shot at a clump of men standing perhaps twenty feet from the door. The first button had worked well as a few of them lay still on the ground, stunned. She fired until the second button exploded.

“Now!” she snarled.

Running. Running as fast as her legs could carry her. Thankfully, not only could Leeford follow, he outran her to check the corners while she navigated the turns, took him back to the refinery into which she had emerged on her way in. Mumbling incoherently—to her—he set about gathering piles of things, which he dumped in the vats of green jelly substance with the electrodes. They overflowed, spilled some of their content on the floor. He emptied several large bottles of clear liquid that had been lined on a table by the wall.

“Do not let it touch you!” he said, working fast at disassembling a machine that resembled a furnace but could have been something else. He took the inner mechanisms, pulled out copper pipes, reassembled them to lead to the vats.

While she stood guard by the door, she spotted Leeford pulling his watch from his trousers pocket then patting around the other, cursing.

“The little gold watch?” she called.

“Yes! I have lost it! I need more coil!”

“I have it. Here.” She tossed the thing at Leeford, who caught it in a nimble hand and set to work, kneeling by the pipe’s mouth, muttering still and shaking his head as though he were in deep argument with someone.

Sounds alerted her. “Hurry.”

“I am.”

Shadows preceded Spark’s men as they crept toward the refinery. Eleanor was there to greet them.

“Hurry, Leeford.”

“I am. Do you have one more of those things? The little bombs?”

“Only one.” Which she would have preferred keeping in case of further trouble.

“I need it!”

She put it on the floor and sent it his way. It skittered across the tiles like a silver cockroach on ice. Leeford stopped it then added it to the clump of tubes and pipes and watch and switchboard. Where had he gotten that?

“Good,” she heard him murmur.

She fired, cursed when the steam pistol only hissed impotently. “Pistol! Is it ready?”

Leeford sent the other pistol her way. “Yes! We need to be far from here in about…forty seconds.”

“What?”

“Run!”

They hightailed it out of the refinery proper, toward the massive gears poking in from the outside, squeezed into the mechanism, hurt their hands and elbows against the unforgiving metal, slipped on the grease coating everything but managed to stumble out into the night. Cool air replaced the fetid stench permeating Spark’s place.

“Hurry,” Leeford murmured through his teeth “Hurry!”

The way back proved more hazardous than her stealthy entry had as they ran flatfooted around boulders and over smaller rocks, stumbled and floundered and fell too many times to count. Poor Leeford barefoot. Her knuckles hurt from holding the pistol, from scraping her hands everywhere, her skull too, and her ankles and knees. She had twisted an ankle but would not slow to check.

A sudden roar from above would have made her turn her head—they were in a tunnel and could see nothing anyway, but what if bits rolled down at them? The ground shook under their feet. Portions of ceiling detached and fell in front, behind and on them. Dust choked her. Leeford coughed.

“What was in those vats?”

“Nitrated resin and picric acid.”

“How did you know?”

“Simple! There was a clipboard with composition and time of mixtures.”

She missed a step. Simple?

“I just added alcohol. And ran a gas line close enough to the first vat. Your device did the rest.”

She could just imagine the cloud of smoke mushrooming behind and above them. With the amount of chemicals and who knew what else, the place would still be smoking the next day when the Society would come. Debris was still raining into the sea when they reached the skiff. Leeford looked in his element as he expertly pulled it to the water while she stood guard, facing away from the sea.

“Come, quick.”

He had already dragged the thing into the water and stood with one leg in the boat, the other on shore, waiting for her like a pirate of the high seas. She grinned as she ran past, could not help the élan of affection and thrill. He rowed them away from the bank in record time. He truly was a master at this.

Leeford grinned as he rowed hard and fast. “I told you,” he growled between pulls. “Unbeaten. In. Several. Divisions.”

His grin turned to pure horror. She followed his gaze upward just in time to see Spark’s monstrous airship rising within the smoke still roiling around his ruined mansion, and, like a vengeful fist, came at them with horrifying speed.

Mr. Clarence would be too late! Eleanor stood in the skiff, legs wide, feet on either side of the bench. “Pull!”

“Sit!”

She did but with reluctance. Firing from a sitting position, especially a steam pistol, would make her miss her mark half the time! But she waited, not wanting to waste precious bullets and hoping against the odds a flock of the Society’s dragons would come finish the job. Waited until the monster roared closer, engines blazing, articulated wings and nacelle gleaming in the gloom like giant, murderous blades. No dragons in sight. So Mr. Clarence would leave her until dawn, as he had promised. How ironic.

Bullets began to thud against the bottom. Despite the iron plates overlapping the wood, the bullets pierced the hull. Water oozed in. Still Leeford rowed with all his might, made the boat lurch forward with each powerful pull. She returned fire. Suddenly lines dangled from the nacelle. Not again!

She shot once at the top of one line, yelped when a man crashed into the water not far from them. Then again at the closest line. An impotent hiss alerted her she had used the last of the steam pistol’s bullets. She threw it into the boat, retrieved her own. Despite her valiant effort, a pair of Spark’s men succeeded in reaching their skiff. One shot at her, missed for a reason she could not fathom. He was barely ten feet away! To her horror, he pulled a sling from behind his back and flung it toward Leeford.

Oh no, they would not get him back!

Despite Leeford’s orders—which he was roaring now—she stood, and, after a shot at the man closest to her—who slid off the rope and into the frigid water—slipped her pistol in its sheath in the backing of her corset and leaped at the next line.

The rope burned her hand as she swung under Spark’s man, managed to slip her dagger out with the other and blindly slash upward. She must have caught something because he screamed in pain. The line began to rise. She was not climbing, but still rose higher—quickly—still fighting for her life. She meant to let go but the man grabbed her by the arm, kicked her in the belly and slipped the sling around her shoulders before she could stop him. Something tightened around her waist. She humphed when more kicks landed on her, writhed, stabbed and twisted. To no avail. She was caught like a fish on a hook. Everything happened so fast.

In the skiff, a valiant Leeford tried to follow the airship but had no chance. His yells diminished the more she neared the nacelle, which gaped with half a dozen men pointing pistols at her.

“Hello!” Spark yelled above the din. His smile gleamed maniacally when he gestured for his men to reel her in and onto the gangway inside the nacelle proper. She used the commotion to switch dagger for pistol.

His clothes a burned, tattered mess, he rushed from his post so he could welcome her onto another of his mad machines.

“Drop the pistol, my dear Eleanor. And perhaps I will not eviscerate Gunn after I catch him. Although he would make a fine automaton, do you not think? A very handsome one.”

Bile rose in her throat. She surreptitiously checked the gauge to her pistol. She had three shots left. Above her, the vulnerable dirigible under which the nacelle had been bolted filled with more air. They were about to climb.

A life with Leeford would have made her the happiest of women. But knowing she would ensure his safety, despite the cost to herself, worked just as well.

Three bullets. No time for parsimony.

“Goodbye, Aloysius.” Eleanor smiled then pointed her pistol upward.

Chapter Eleven

Leeford’s heart stopped. He could swear it had.

Horror, fear of the most abject nature, filled him as he watched the airship speed away, carried the woman he loved far and high. He rowed with vengeance. Muscles burned. His chest ached. His throat was raw from screaming her name. But he could not stop himself. She had come for him. And in his arrogance, in his petty little dispute with Spark, the old grudge, he had cost her her life. Instead of escaping while they could, he had slowed things so he could deal with Spark’s madness. As if it mattered!

A shot was heard. Then another. To his utter shock, the airship pitched forward. Blazing white, the engines tipped up, up. Much too far. With a loud sound like a giant yawning, the airship began to dive, a third of its hull in flames before it spread in a wave of fire that seared an image of itself behind his eyelids. He heard voices raised in alarm. Then Spark’s airship sank even lower, strangely slow, as though time had stopped and resumed, but on a different rhythm. By the light of the fire, Leeford watched the flaming husk sink toward the sea, but not in it. It scraped the mainland, dragged along the shore in a shower of burning bits and raining debris. Frantic calls turned into cries of pain.

Leeford had never pulled so hard or so fast on a pair of oars. He must have broken even his record as he aimed for the shore, despite the choppy water he cut through the tops of waves like a blade. If he was fast enough…perhaps he would…he had to make it. He had to.

Then he saw them.

How could it be?

But Eleanor’s unmistakable form, silhouetted by orange and white flames detached itself from the blaze, stumbled and floundered to fall on her knees. Not a second later another form followed her out of the inferno. Much taller.

No.

Leeford more or less crashed onto the rocky beach. No time to waste. He ran. Ran as hard as he could.

The pair of shadows struggled. Her voice rose in pain. Then Spark’s.

Leeford leaped over a cluster of low boulders. Seconds away from her. Details of the scene blazed a path straight to his brain.

That image…he had seen it before but could not remember how or where. He had never been here, had he? Perhaps as a child? Everything felt strangely familiar, as if in a recurring dream. How Spark stood over Eleanor’s kneeling form. How she turned her face toward Leeford, tried for a valiant smile that dripped blood. How Leeford would arrive too late.

Spark did the unthinkable then. He raised a hand.

“No!”

Leeford’s yell drowned the pistol shot.

Spark took a vacillating step back. Wiped his mouth with the sleeve of his jacket. His eyes glistened in triumph when Eleanor, in a slow, graceful dip slumped onto her back to lay utterly, heartrendingly still.

As he knew he would, Leeford reached her too late. He had lived this before. It all felt so familiar. The terrible ache. The fire in the background. She felt so light and fragile in his arms.

“What have you done…?” Leeford murmured. He could no longer scream. The will to just live had bled out of him.

Eleanor’s face so pale, dark eyelashes like fans against her cheeks while he gathered her in his arms, slipped his hand on her lower back to support her limp form. His curvy little spy, the woman he loved.

The feel of cool metal against his palm crystallized something in him. A resolve. An awakening. Cool metal, and lethal. The slim item, no bigger than a good-sized skipping stone, a perfect match to his numb hand.

“Such a waste,” Spark said, spat blood. “Such a waste.”

Still smiling, he adjusted his long coat then turned. Rocks crunched under his heels. “I could kill you, Gunn,” he threw over his shoulder, not even deigning to look back at what he had done, the tragedy he had precipitated, the precious light he had extinguished forever. “But I would much prefer that you did it yourself after a few years of racking guilt and whisky-induced lunacy. Imagine what people will say, Gunn. ‘Oh, he was never the same after he lost the great love of his life. The poor, poor man. First, his heart then his mind. Such a waste.’ And it is a waste.”

“You should not have hurt her.”

“What will you do, huh, Gunn? Slink back into your hole and drink your loss away? You were always a fool. A pathetic, bleeding-heart fool.”

“You should not have hurt Eleanor.”

Had that been his voice, that low snarl? Even Spark must have heard the difference for he froze in mid-step, turned back only partly. “You do not have it in you, Gunn. You are weak. Always were.”

Leeford knelt up. His arm did not tremble when he raised it in front of him. His hand was steady, his fingers still. Would he sink so low, take a life for another? Could he do this, shoot a man in the back?

“I have changed.”

Leeford aimed and fired. The first shot sounded like thunder, the second, third, fourth, he lost count, were impotent clicks.

Like a puppet with its strings cut off, Spark crumbled.

How long did he stay this way? Leeford did not know. Dawn had risen. Pale and forlorn. Sky striped in browns and purples. His world had stopped. All light left. All warmth and all life. He wanted to die but could not summon the energy to turn the pistol on himself. Plus, he had no bullets left. The last one had killed Spark. Fitting end. All he wanted was hold her still form, cradle her against his breast. His broken little porcelain doll.

At least there had been no blood. She did not seem to have suffered too much. A single shot. A fated, single shot. Leeford held her limp body to his, drowned his tears in her purple-black hair loose about her face, kissed her warm hand.

Warm? After so long?

Trembling in hope and sheer panic, he put his ear to her mouth. The sea drowned what he thought he heard. Did he hear anything? Could it be? But she was so pale!

With shaking fingers he patted her down, found no blood but a little hole in the front of her corset. This was where the foul man had shot her. At point blank. The monstrous, aberrant, deviant piece of filth.

“I hate you,” he growled, eyes closed. Opened his eyes, repeated the words. They felt good. They tasted bitter, like despair and the foulest curse.

The Graces had abandoned him, had let Spark do this dark deed without lifting a divine little finger. How he hated all of them. Despair threatened to swallow him whole. What now? Where to go? He could not just leave her there.

The sea.

He would let the sea take them both, hold onto her and sink into thankful oblivion.

Leeford looked down, rubbed his tears from her cheeks. “My little violet.”

Eleanor’s lips trembled. Now this he had not invented! Her eyelids fluttered, behind her teeth her tongue moved. He could catch a faint glisten of it.

“Graces…Divine Graces, thank you.” Tears blinded him anew as he waited. Waited. Hoping against hope, berating himself for letting his fancy take flight. She could not be. Spark had shot her from barely ten feet away.

Eleanor’s eyes flared. She whimpered and tried to move. “Spark.”

Her voice a mere ribbon of breath, not even a whisper.

He kissed her forehead as gently as he could. Heat graced his lips. He was not imagining things. “He is dead.”

“Leeford.”

Her hand rose slightly. He captured it in his, kissed it all over, whispered thanks through his tears, made an utter fool of himself. He did not care. Eleanor was alive. Nothing else mattered.

“My love,” he said. Repeated the words. Such sweet sound. “Do not ever scare me this way again.”

A half grin, half grimace pulled her lips. She patted her front, slipped a bent metallic plate from underneath the ripped purple satin and gave it to him. “I would like this mounted on a frame above our hearth.”

He laughed. He cried. So did she. “What a blabbering pair we make,” he said when he could talk without his voice breaking. “Divine Graces, but I need a stiff drink.”

“I need a bed. And a boring life afterward.” She rose with him doting on her like a frantic nurse. Even if he could have stopped himself, he still would not have.

“I can provide both. The latter most of all.”

“Good,” she replied, stood with his help. “Lead the way.”

“Look,” Leeford said.

Together, they watched as a veritable armada of small dragons flew overhead, converged on the still-smoking mansion atop the island. Fog shrouded most of it once more, and swallowed the silvery dragons like a cave would a flock of bats returning from the hunt. Except that these had only just begun.

They did not stay to watch. Nothing remained there that interested either of them. He had what he wanted.

While explosions erupted behind them, she guided him—from the safety of his arms, he would not let her walk—to a dragon she had hidden on her way in. He recognized Mr. Clarence’s personal dragon and wondered if the man had lent it or if his little spy had turned thief as well.

He argued with her the entire way that she needed professional medical attention but made no progress so took the dragon home where they found both the house and lighthouse in pitiable state of ruin. Before following them to the “society’s” safe house, Spark and his men had gone through everything, broken what was of no use to them and taken the rest. Most of his machines had been tipped to their sides, ripped open or just plain destroyed. He should have fallen dead on the floor from the despair alone. The work of decades. Gone. But the one thing most precious in his life was in his arms. He would have taken her up the stairs to his room had there been a stairwell left. As it stood, only the great room lay relatively undamaged. So he set Eleanor down on the couch by the window—intact, by a feat of good fortune—while he rummaged around the kitchen for something to drink and eat. He managed tea, banana bread from the ice box, which had been dumped onto its face, and a tall glass of whisky from a bottle under the slop stone. Max’s personal reserve. He pushed the anger away. It would serve no purpose now. It had filled his heart, in one blinding second of rage, he had shot a man in the back and killed him. He would do it again. A thousand times if he had to. But the rage was gone now. Hope replaced it.

“Here,” he said, coming into the great room to find Eleanor resting in the position in which he had left her. She grinned at him when he set the things on the floor at her feet.

Sitting cross-legged, he passed her the chipped cup of tea, broken bits of cake and took a long swallow from the glass. Liquid fire filled his guts.

“Should you make yourself completely drunk and start singing, would you mind if I still fell asleep on this couch?”

“Drunk?” Leeford replied, snorting. “With this pitiful amount?” He downed the glass. “I am a Gunn, my lady. It takes more than that to make one of us drunk. Comes with the constitution, tolerance to the blasted stuff.”

Her eyes rolled around to the destruction then settled back on him. “I am so sorry, Leeford. So very sorry.”

“Do not ever apologize to me again, Eleanor. I mean it. I may be a social leper to my family, a hindrance to the scientific community and a pain in the backside to your ‘society’, but I am still master of my house. There will be no apologies from you under my roof.” He grinned, gestured at the demolished section of roof. “No matter the state of it.”

“You may come to regret ever uttering those words, Mr. Gunn.”

Her smile warmed his heart just as the whisky had warmed his belly. He could live without one, but not the other and vowed to start this very day. He no longer needed the stuff anyway. No point dulling his brain when he had to reinvent everything. Plus, what sort of fool would be going to sleep when he had the most beautiful woman in the world sharing his bed? Or his couch.

“You have lost so much,” she murmured. “Your home, Max. Lily…”

His heart squeezed at the memory of Lily’s horrified shrieks as Spark’s goons descended on them. He had never heard such screams and hoped never to again. “I cannot bring Max back to her, but I will take care of Lily to the best of my ability.”

“What of your work?” she asked.

He patted her leg, lingered for the sheer pleasure of feeling her warmth through the fabric of her trousers. “I will find more things to build. The world still needs tools to make life easier. My life is perfect the way it is now.” He toasted the dismantled table by his leg and drank the last of the whisky.

Eleanor took a sip of tea, grimaced. “I wish I could do something. This is mostly my fault.”

“You have done something.” He set the glass down, knelt between her feet. “You have come into my home, my boring home, and brought your own personal sun to warm and light my life. I could not ask for anything more.”

Tears filled her eyes. After a nod, she set the cup down, made room on the couch for him. Despite his arguments, he was forced to lie behind her or have her come to the floor with him. Unthinkable! The heat of her warmed his tired bones, his throbbing hands and achy skull. He would not change a thing.

To feel Leeford pressed against her back, a protective arm around her shoulders and a long leg wrapped over hers proved the most enticing, loving, undeniable “cage” into which she had ever been held. One from which she would never try to escape.

Just as she was falling asleep, a small crunching sound alerted her. Leeford must have heard it too for she felt him tense, raise his head.

“Someone is coming,” he whispered in her ear.

She reached back for her pistol, grimaced when she hurt herself for nothing. It was gone. Leeford must have left it at the beach.

“Stay here,” he murmured, slipping off the couch and retrieving one of the table legs.

“Wait, I am coming.”

He turned, an expression she had never seen on him before. “Eleanor, please.”

She slipped the dagger from her corset—in the early morning light, she could see specks of dried blood on the blade—hid it along her forearm.

True, she would have been in no shape to fight off an old lady armed with a parasol. For the first time in her life, she would have to rely on someone else to assure her protection. A novel idea and an even more peculiar sensation—trust.

Glass crunched—the poor man was barefoot—as Leeford crept across the great room, plastered his back against one of the intact walls, table leg brandished high. And with his height, the thing almost grazed the ceiling.

Movement beyond the doorway caught her attention. She would have recognized that silhouette anywhere.

“Come to finish me off, Mr. Clarence?” she called.

To his credit, Leeford did not move or make a sound as her former colleague came into the room carrying a small valise in one hand and an envelope in the other.

“You hold very little regard for someone you once respected,” he said, grinning. “Or was it all acting?”

“What do you want?”

“You look well, considering.”

Eleanor sat, failed at stifling the groan of pain. Her chest burned, as did an ankle. With a sigh, she focused on Mr. Clarence’s eyes, never at Leeford. Clobbering the older gentleman to death did not seem beyond his will or capability. Anger narrowed his eyes, thinned his mouth. As much as he was a pacifist, Leeford Gunn could prove to be a force to be reckoned with when anger took him. For a reason she could not pinpoint, Eleanor liked this new angle of his personality. She loved the different layers, the sometimes unguarded, clumsy side of him just as much as his more combative angle pleased and aroused her. A friend had once said the perfect man was three-quarters mildness seasoned with a quarter aggressiveness. He seemed to embody this measure.

“We have always prided ourselves in taking care of our own, even after they have, let us say, chosen different paths. A coach should arrive promptly to deliver supplies. And later, a construction crew will start repairing what has been broken. What can be repaired anyway.” Mr. Clarence put the valise on the floor and the envelope on top of it. “Your things are in the valise. What we could recover.”

“What of Spark?”

“His remains have been cremated and will be sent to his family. With his research, no one will be surprised to learn a terrible fire destroyed his home and killed his staff.” He dug in his pocket.

Behind him, Leeford raised the leg higher. His long jacket parted, revealed muscles corded and ready. The sight of his naked chest and belly fanned the little flame in her soul.

“Here,” Mr. Clarence said, pulling a letter bearing a green seal. “I think Mr. Gunn will find particular cause for celebration in this.”

“What is it?” she asked, eyes still on the face she had known for years. Trust had never come easily to her. Could she? Should she?

“A small token of the Society’s trust in his good judgment. He had applied for a patent last year, before the fair, which had been denied for lack of financial backing. A sponsor, one I trust implicitly, has come forward to endorse the project.”

She nodded at Leeford. He lowered the impromptu weapon.

A small, spiteful part of her took satisfaction in seeing Mr. Clarence’s shock—quickly subdued—when he spotted Leeford walking around him to take the note.

“Mr. Gunn, what a surprise. I had not seen you there.” He took note of the leg in Leeford’s fist. “And well prepared, I am happy to say.”

“Where is Lily now? Is she well and safe?”

“She is safe. As for well, I could not say.” Mr. Clarence cleared his throat. “She seems quite content to live in a world only she can see.”

“A world you forced her to inhabit,” Leeford snapped. “I will go see her at first opportunity.”

“I think she would enjoy that.”

Leeford mmm-ed noncommittally while he read. His eyes narrowed. “So I am to work for another mysterious sponsor? Will you—oh, forgive me—will ‘he’ or ‘she’ come destroy my house should I fail to cooperate?”

“Eleanor trusts you, Mr. Gunn, and I have learned to respect her choices. Too late, I fear.” Sadness filled the dark eyes. “For what it is worth to you, I regret calling you child. One more regret among a thousand in our line of work.” He tipped his chin at them both, turned.

“I said I would thank you if I found Leeford safe and sound,” she called after him. “A promise is a debt, you once told me. So thank you.”

He nodded and left.

Eleanor wanted to say something more, for old times’ sake at least, but could not. She watched her former mentor leave the destruction of Leeford’s house.

“Eleanor,” Leeford said after he flipped to the rest of the pages. “The patents office has approved it all. Everything. The research, the timeframe, the costs.” He sank onto a broken footstool. “My work…” He looked at her, all dazzling blue eyes and mocking grin again, the man she had met mere days before. Returned to her. Intact.

She smiled back.

The rest of the day passed in a whirl of comings and goings. Because Leeford was busy directing workers to and from the lighthouse, she took care of those inside the house proper. Her body clamored for rest, but with all the work to be done, she barely had time to sit, let alone lie on a bed. But the call was strong. And when the workers left, to return the next morning, and the estate quieted, Eleanor sat on the couch and propped her swollen feet on the footstool.

So the Society had given her a severance package. Several thousands of ecus in a trust fund, plus the envelope containing even more for immediate use. She knew where to invest them too. Leeford sorely needed a proper security system to his workshop. And his house. She would make sure to consult the best in the field and make his house the safest in the land. As for her, she intended to take a long break then contemplate her choices of professions at a later date. She had always enjoyed having a young agent in apprenticeship. Perhaps she could use her knowledge and teach political science at a nearby college or university, or rhetoric, or even the fine art of assassination. Ha! Whatever she chose to do, she would stay here by Leeford’s side. She loved the man, the location, the man, the odd way his house was put together, the man… Well.

“That will not do, I am sorry to say,” Leeford remarked from the doorway. His hair stuck out in odd places, dark circles rimmed his eyes but he looked satisfied.

“What will?” She yawned.

“This.”

He strode to her, picked her up, carried her to the repaired staircase and took them with extreme caution, as if he carried an object of inestimable value and extreme fragility. The incongruous thought made her chuckle.

“I have something for you. Something I made,” he whispered in her ear while he pushed the door open with the toe of his boot—he had finally found another pair in the ruins—and deposited her onto the bed.

She was so dirty and the bed so clean with starched linen sheets of the best quality she had ever seen. The Society had splurged on its little exculpation mission. “A bath first, please, I would feel so much better.”

Leeford scratched the dark blond stubbles on his chin. “True. Well, off we go then.”

Grinning, he picked her up again and carried her to the bathroom where she had had the workers fix the peculiar plumbing and assortment of pipes, to their obvious delight and interest.

Leeford ran hot water into the bath, let the level rise before he knelt in front of her, pinched the trim of her corset. “Nothing deadly hidden in there?”

“Let me see.”

She unhooked the first few clips but had to relinquish the rest to him after he gently batted her hand away.

His eyes flared at the bruise Spark’s bullet had left. It spanned from the top of her left breast and spread in a bluish, diagonal contusion over her sternum. An inch or so higher, and it would have missed the corset and its life-saving plates.

Anger flashed in the blue orbs. He clearly fought to keep a straight face. “Maybe I should have shot him in the legs first.”

Eleanor burst out laughing then sobered right away. “I am glad you did not. That would have made you like him, which would have been several notches down in my view.”

He shrugged. “Then maybe the backside then. Let him stew on that for a while.”

While he removed her clothes, he kept muttering about what he should have done to Spark instead of “just killing the monster”. To say she was glad he had “just killed” their nemesis would be quite an understatement. She would never want Leeford to pollute his remarkable character, his inner strength with such unsavory actions.

Once naked, he helped her into the tub, talked about everything—even the weather—while she washed, kept talking when it was his turn to wash, which he did by letting the water run while activating the “rain maker” he had built. The sight of his naked body, long legs full of bruises, his back too, narrowed her center of attention to things which would require stamina and energy. Both of which she had precious little.

Dripping wet, he insisted on carrying her to bed—her legs would become atrophied if he kept this up—deposited her on the mattress to lie behind her, an arm draped over her. The pads of his fingers triggered an urgent need in her belly. And judging by the lump pressing against her backside, one he shared.

She rolled onto her back. “Make love to me.”

Shock flared his eyes. Leeford opened his mouth to speak, snapped it shut, tried again. When he let his fingers graze her hip, saw her reaction, the mocking grin returned tenfold. “Do you not wish to sleep? Getting shot must be tiring.”

“We never know what awaits us. This could be—”

He shook his head. “This could be the most boring day of our uneventful lives? This is what you were about to say?”

She smiled. “Yes,” she lied.

“Good.” He retrieved her hand so he could kiss her knuckles. “Now what was it you wanted from me?”

“I wish for you to take me slowly, to feel you move inside me. To make love to me.”

Leeford grinned. “You are just indomitable.”

Chapter Twelve

Leeford could well imagine the look on his face. Not rolling over her and doing just that—fortune’s goodness, feel him move inside her—required every shred of strength he possessed. He would take her in slowness, move inside her, make love to her. But first, he intended to properly address the many bruises, the multitude of affronts covering her body. He meant to kiss, lick and caress every hurt from her, every ache and every bit of grief she had suffered.

“Do you think I am one of those weak men who cannot resist the most beautiful woman on Terra? The affront, my dear. Wounding.”

She laughed. He loved to watch her laugh, could wait all day to see those little dimples in her cheeks deepen. A strand of wet hair around an index finger, he “reeled” himself close to her face.

He had shut himself for three hours in what was left of his workshop. The bottom part of it anyway. Three hours he had spent crafting a small gift for her while the workers took away the debris and sorted the rest. Three hours bent over the broken worktable, getting cut by the tiny sheet of silver he had pounded, burned by the soldering iron. He had come close to throwing the special project aside at least half a dozen times so he could start another one, a perfect one. Always trying to better the first trial. But the tiny item had sparkled like dew in the grass when he had finished and stood to admire it. Just like Eleanor, it was a curvy little thing of beauty made of durable material. Deceptively tough. The rose broach she kept pinned to the bodices of her dress had never appealed to him. He found it too austere, too thorny and old-fashioned for such a vivacious, such a beautiful woman.

Leeford hoped she would like his gift. If not, then he would make another. And another.

The sun had set below the horizon, the last of its copper rays had graced the opposite wall in his room. Cracks and outright holes punctured the wall. Would his house ever look the way it had? The lone gas lamp that still functioned on the second floor provided just enough light to illuminate her hip and leg and create a patch of tantalizing darkness to pool at the juncture of her thighs. Her nipples stood in proud points, looked hard like pink candy.

He loved candy.

“You know,” he said, kissing her throat, her cheeks, her mouth. “I have not courted you properly. Not even a proper meal.”

“Ah yes, dodging bullets and murderous madmen has a way of disrupting the finer things like courtship.”

She licked her lips, received him when he planted another kiss, this one deep and passionate. He sucked her tongue into his mouth, nibbled on her bottom lip before moving lower over her, every inch and every angle, wanting to touch her in all manners possible. As lightly as he could, he kissed the awful bruise on her chest. She did not seem to mind or be hurt by it. He moved on, went by her reactions, and if he gauged them correctly, she wanted more—much more—of what he was about to do.

Leeford wanted to linger, but seeing as she would arch her pelvis whenever he came close to her sex, he went right for it, parted her with delicate fingers so he could kiss her there, lick the tender flesh, suck the folds into his mouth and play with them. Tremors shook her. She fisted his hair.

“Well, so much for slow and gentle,” he remarked against her vulva.

Eleanor gripped the other side of his head. This time, he forced her hand away and planted it on the mattress. “We do things my way.”

She growled words he did not understand. His little tigress! His curvy little assassin. The other half—the better half—of his soul.

If he did not start ramming his tongue into her pussy within the next few seconds, she would go up in flames. Or dislodge a good fistful of his gorgeous dark blond hair. Her thighs quivered when he set to work. Long hands pressed on either side to denude her hard little pearl and take it into his mouth. She moaned her delight. He sucked another one out of her with greedy pulls on her pussy, the lips, the clitoris. Such skilled hands. Such a knowing, decadent mouth! He may have thought women would not give him a second glance, and sometimes, her acerbic self would tend to agree—nothing more blasé than a woman—but she knew too that anyone would commit a crime to lie with such consummate lover. Such attentive, ingenious—

“Oh Divine Graces!” she cried when Leeford’s tongue, which he had made pointy, tickled her clitoris. Oh. Goodness. “Do it again…please. Do it again.”

Another tongue-lash like a musician plucking the string of a harp. Fever spread through her bruised body. Frissons tickled her.

“Again…again.”

Despite the fatigue pulling at her, Leeford’s tongue fired her muscles, triggered images in her mind’s eyes. She wanted him. She had to have him. He had to take her. Take her now.

Another flick brought the wave. She arched off the mattress, fisted the sheets, head lolling, fire ripping through her, taking her on a frenzied voyage in a sea of red and gold, of drums in her ears. She let him devour her—take it, take it all—to the deepest recess, the last shred of herself. She let him make love to her with his mouth, his fingers, which he had introduced into her searing flesh, let him pump them, twist them, stretch her wide to collect more honey.

And when the wave receded, when she opened her eyes to catch him studying her, she raised both hands above her head, linked her fingers then lifted her knees to her chest.

“Take me.”

With the soft amber light, Leeford’s athletic chest and shoulders corded as he advanced on her, knelt up right by her backside, seized her knees to keep them wide apart. She made herself bare for him, exposed, vulnerable. Trusting. Unlike other lovers, she knew he would not do to her things that had felt good at the time but only brought regret and shame the morning after. Spark had used her thus. She had wanted the extreme and received it. Eleanor now wanted something different. She wanted vigor tempered with gentleness. She yearned for strength softened by skill. A perfect mix of intensity and carefulness that only a man who loved a woman would ever achieve. And because Leeford loved her, she knew he would touch her in ways that would fulfill her every need, and her expectations too. She would give to this man her body, willingly, but she would also give him her heart. Trust had never come easily to her, except for Leeford. In his case, it had come naturally.

“Take me,” she repeated, never leaving his dazzling blue gaze.

One of her knees in each hand, he brought his cock right against her pussy, curled his spine and claimed her in a long, tender penetration. As smooth and glossy as his member was, she felt each ridge and vein as if he had tongued her clit for each. On a ragged whimper, she released.

Instead of working his fine hips back and forth, he knelt very still then abandoned a knee so he could lick his thumb and press the pad of it against her sex. ’Round and ’round, he rubbed her hard little pearl. Eleanor fought against the urge to lock her ankles behind his head in case she hurt him. Bruises covered him. She wanted to stay this way, open wide for him, hands locked together above her head.

“Am I making love to you slowly enough?” he asked. Oh that mocking grin!

“Yes,” she hissed.

The fullness of his cock inside, coupled with the wet thumb rubbing her triggered another series of frissons to shoot down her back and thighs. Vaginal muscles working hard, she squeezed around him. He must have enjoyed this for his eyes narrowed, his mouth parted on a slow, lascivious smile. Leeford pulled out by a few inches, thrust back in. A little bit harder. A little bit deeper.

“Ah!”

He smiled at her reaction. Thrust again.

“Oh! Divine Graces! Yes!” She welcomed his cock into her with furious bucks but could only do so much without changing her position. She grabbed her knees, forced them higher.

“Touch your breasts,” he murmured, pushed deeper. “Touch them.”

Eleanor let him deal with her knees while she squeezed her breasts together hard, worked her fingers into the mounds so the nipples would protrude. So very hard. Achingly hard.

The bed creaked when he grabbed her ankles, raised them out high and wide. Long arms corded, he kept her there, spread around his cock while she worked her breasts and nipples.

“Since I cannot, you kiss them for me.”

Bruises forgotten, she brought them high, met them halfway by dipping her chin. Each received a kiss.

“Do you know what I would do?”

She nodded.

“And…?”

A nipple between her teeth, she watched Leeford’s expression turn from shock to delight.

He gave a sudden, potent thrust that rocked the bed. She cried out in thrill and anticipation.

“Brace your hands,” he whispered. Curled back for another deep penetration.

His cock felt long and hard inside her. Exquisite sensation. The headboard creaked when she braced her palms against it, locked her elbows.

Leeford pushed her legs in a wide V, took his time admiring her sex stretched around his, both glistening and throbbing in need, his gaze like a physical thing going over her, leaving burning need and urges in its wake.

He pulled back to the glans. Stilled.

“Leeford?” She curled her hips but could not deepen the touch. He barely parted her lips.

The explosive thrust ripped a yelp from her. And each subsequent claim triggered a staccato of cries. Higher her voice rose while his cock plunged. Higher the cries. Deeper the claiming. As though they had met in another reality, on another level, her voice and his drive met somewhere in a pure moment of ecstasy that blinded and deafened and stupefied her. His orgasm preceded her own by a second or so. She felt each throb before her world became a raging sea. His name resounded over and over. Hers as well. She cried her pleasure, whimpered and yelled it. Leeford received it, took it, gave her his. After a series of disorderly thrusts, he freed her ankles, folded her legs behind him then rose between her thighs in a sweat-covered, panting rendition of perfect male symmetry and vigor. His disheveled hair gave him a rugged look.

“Well…” He pursed his lips, nodded, took a deep breath. “I love you. So much.”

Not what she had expected. Eleanor smiled in lazy contentment as remnants of climax tickled through her. His semen coated her nicely. She was loath to let him go. He leaned over to the side, used those long arms of his to pull the drawer out by a few inches. After rummaging inside, he retrieved a tiny object and showed it to her.

“There. This is what I made.”

Eleanor took the delicate little pin. A flower. A violet, to be exact. Tears welled her eyes. Silver welded with astute steel clasps. She recognized his touch there, if only in miniature. The tiny petals fluttered with minute little hinges. If she angled it downward, the flower would close and if she tilted it back up, the petals would open as if in full bloom.

“It is breathtaking. I cannot believe you created this in such a short time. How can I accept such gift when I have nothing to give in return?”

He pinched it by the stem and pinned it to the corner of the sheet, looked at it for effect. “Of course you can accept it. If not, then I will only melt it and use it for parts in another project.” His grin mocked her. “A violet made of metal. Beauty and strength. I thought it appropriate for you. Even if I know very little about you.”

“Something we will remedy as soon as I am more coherent.” She grinned. “I do not know what to say. Thank you seems so tired.”

“Have you not already thanked me enough? You braved Spark’s madness to come get me, knowing the sort of man he is. You still came.”

“I could not do nothing!” The thought of a man such as Leeford, such an honest and good man at the hands of a sadistic monster like Spark. She shivered. “Did he tell you about us? He must have gloated…”

Leeford put his index finger on her lips before pulling out and lying by her side. Gravity darkened his eyes. “What you two have shared has nothing to do with this. With us. The past is gone. The future yet to come.”

“I would very much like to stay here with you.” She laughed when he grimaced.

“I wonder how your mind works sometimes,” he said, pinching the shell of her ear and pretending to peer inside. “I thought the matter already settled. But if you must have a formal invitation, I would like to inform you, as officially as can be, that you are most assuredly welcome in my house and in my heart, despite my long-standing celibate status and the countless bad habits that have sprung for such condition, forever and ever, or until one of my machines blows it all up. In which case, we would have to move. Satisfactory?”

Eleanor nodded. “Very. No more whisky?”

A dark blond eyebrow arched. “No more assassinations?”

“Agreed.”

He shook her hand, kissed her knuckles. “Agreed.”

A gust of wind outside whistled into the many cracks in the house. Light from the lone gas lamp on the second floor blinked then died.

“And I know just which project to start,” Leeford remarked dryly in the darkness.

Her snort of unladylike laughter surprised Eleanor. She had an inkling that life with Leeford Gunn would be anything but boring.

Author’s Note

Writing this story, I have learned two things—one, the English know how to whip together some awesome cakes, and two, afternoon tea is more than just crust-less cucumber sandwiches. Ms. Jane Pettigrew wrote a fascinating book on the subject titled Tea Time: A Complete Collection of Traditional Recipes, Dorling Kindersley, London, 1986. For the reader interested in a good recipe for winter warmers or Bara brith, Tea Time is a fascinating compendium of everything tea. Discrepancies, omissions or disasters of the teacup kind are from my own stock.

Leeford Gunn’s house was furnished, lit, equipped and decorated thanks in part to a book from author, environmentalist and influential figure to the self-sufficiency movement John Seymour titled Forgotten Household Crafts, Dorling Kindersley, London, 1987. Any mistake, oversight or outright fabrication is not anyone’s fault but mine.

Eleanor Cleverly’s very special corset could not have been the awesome personal armory it was without input from award-winning author, corset connoisseur and great friend Sahara Kelly, who attacked the proposition with maniacal glee. A pistol and a dagger in a corset, I asked? Bloody brilliant and don’t forget the garrote, she replied. Thanks Sahara!

About the Author

I am a mother, spouse, older sister, writer, ex-soldier, high school drop-out, dog owner (or dog owned), half couch potato/half intermittent jogger, wannabe renovator and avid reader who watches too much television, sinks too much money in clothes, likes animals more than humans, recycles, wore braces, never downloads copyrighted stuff, was a nerd without the grades, has a belly laugh that turns heads in theaters, can’t stand bullying, is mother hawk more than mother hen, votes even if candidates aren’t that great and thinks formal education is highly overrated (probably because she has none).

Nathalie welcomes comments from readers. You can find her website and email address on her author bio page at www.ellorascave.com.

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Also by Nathalie Gray

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Femme Metal 3: Cold Fusion

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Lycan Warriors 1: Feral

Lycan Warriors 2: Primal

Lycan Warriors 3: Carnal

Shades of Silver

Sinful

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Discover for yourself why readers can’t get enough of the multiple award-winning publisher Ellora’s Cave. Whether you prefer e-books or paperbacks, be sure to visit EC on the web at www.ellorascave.com for an erotic reading experience that will leave you breathless.

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