The Virtuoso

new meaning in the term.”

“Quite, quite,” Val murmured, nuzzling her breast. “I am off my pins, as well, then; in fact, my pins are scattered from here to blazing Halifax.”

“You’re well rid of them.” Ellen kissed his cheek.

Val levered up onto his elbow and peered down at her. “Are you all right? You cried.”

She ran her fingers over his jawbone. “Sometimes one cries for relief and for sheer… wonderment.”

Val nodded, somewhat reassured—he was suffering a case of wonderment himself. “I did not come over here today thinking to seduce you.”

“And for that, I can be grateful. Your spontaneous efforts were impressive enough.” Val felt her sigh against his cheek.

“It wasn’t enough.” This bothered him exceedingly. “I didn’t even make love to you properly, and you deserve at least that.”

“You are not the judge of what I deserve,” Ellen said, sounding smug and replete. “I was married for five years, Valentine, and did not merit the kind of pleasure you just visited upon me.”

“Five years?” Val grimaced, not knowing if he should thank old Francis for his ineptitude or castigate the lazy bugger.

“I will not discuss it,” Ellen warned him.

“Of course not.” But five years? “You inspire me, Ellen. That is a warning, by the way.”

“I am too content to be alarmed by it,” Ellen said, but then she fell silent.

Val traced a finger down her nose. “Your mill wheel is back in motion.”

“Spinning freely,” she agreed, turning her face into his palm. “So this is your idea of forty winks?”

“Twenty apiece. But having had my twenty, I now want to stay and poach another forty.”

“You shall not.” She framed his face with her hands and leaned up to kiss him soundly on the mouth. “I might want you to, but we’ve borrowed enough time and privacy from fate, and the afternoon is advancing.”

“I am devastated.” Val rolled to his back, taking her with him against his side. “To think mere moments after I’ve pleasured you, you can hop up, slip on your hat and gloves, and go back to weeding your lilies of the field.”

“You mustn’t be.” Ellen propped herself on her elbow to regard him solemnly. “Think of it as running away to someplace where I can regain my balance, Valentine, and catch my breath. You really have… disconcerted me.”

He smiled at her, understanding all too well what she meant. Oh, he wanted to kiss and cuddle and swive her silly, but he wanted to make sense of what had passed between them, as well. Or try to.

“If you insist on driving me away, could you at least help me with my falls first? I’m not as dexterous as I’d like with the buttons.”

“Hold still.” Ellen sat up and gazed down at him. His genitals were exposed to her view, which he’d known damned well when he’d made the request. Her gaze flew to his, and he gave her his best slumberous, heavy-lidded expression.

“How does one…?” She waved a hand at his groin, a blush creeping up her neck.

“You just tuck me up, Ellen. Then do up the buttons.” He waited, realizing however much Ellen Markham had loved her husband, they’d had a very restrained passion between them, at best. Tentatively, her fingers encircled his flaccid length.

“It’s unassumingly soft now,” she murmured. “Wilted.” She stretched him gently and glanced at him for further permission.

“You keep that up,” Val warned her, “and I’ll regain my starch in very short order. Your touch feels lovely.”

That prompted her to shift to a brisk, businesslike organizing of his parts in his smalls, then a deft buttoning of his falls.

“There.” She gave him an incongruously self-satisfied pat on the cock through his breeches, and Val realized just touching his wilted self in the broad light of day had taken all of Ellen’s considerable courage.

Ye bloody blazing gods, he would adore being her lover. Adore her.

“And now I will put you to rights,” Val said, sitting up and stealing a kiss before she could protest. “Hold still.”

He took his time, letting the backs of his hands brush against her nipples often and intentionally, until she batted his hands away and finished tying her own bodice laces.

“You are a naughty, ruthless man,” she accused, tossing the pillow back up onto the bench. “Help me shake out this blanket.”

Val rose first and helped her to her feet, resisting the temptation to draw her into his arms. If he yielded to his impulses, he’d hold her until winter descended and drove them inside, then hold her by the blazing hearth. The notion surprised him but wasn’t as alarming as it should have been.

Before she could don her wide-brimmed hat and leave the sanctuary of their willow bower, Val did wrap his arms around her again, this time positioning his body behind hers.

“I will come back after dark,” he whispered, “if you’ll allow it.”

She went still, and he knew a moment’s panic. “Talk to me, Ellen.” He kissed her cheek. “Just be honest.”

“My… tonight might not be a good time.”

“Sweetheart…” Val let her go and turned her to face him. “I will not force myself on you, I just want… I want to see you.”

To make sure she was all right, whatever that meant in the odd, new context in which he was trying to define the term. She must have sensed his bewilderment, because she turned away and spoke to him from over her shoulder.

“My courses are due.”

Val cocked his head. “So you become unfit company? Do you have the megrims and cramps and melancholy? Eat chocolates by the tin? Take to your bed?”

“Sometimes.” Ellen peered at him, her expression guarded.

“Then I will comfort you. I’ll cuddle you up and bring you tisanes and rub your back and your feet. I’ll read to you and beat you at cards and bring you hot-water bottles for your aches.”

Ellen’s brows knit. “I truly am poor company at such times and usually before such times, as well.”

“You are poor company for people who expect you to play on without missing a note, perhaps,” Val replied, holding her gaze. “May we sit a moment?”

She nodded but had gone too shy even to meet his eyes.

“My Uncle Tony’s wife,” Val said, wrapping an arm around Ellen’s shoulders, “is blunt to a fault. She told me relations with Tony were the best way to ease her cramps.”

“Valentine!” Ellen hid her face against his shoulder. “Surely you wouldn’t want to…?”

“What I want makes little difference. If you wanted, though, I’d be pleased to be with you. My point is I enjoy your company, Ellen. You are more than a willing and lovely body to me, and just because I appear on your back porch, that doesn’t mean I expect you to be sexually available to me.”

Ellen lifted her face to regard him closely. “But what is a dalliance if not… physically intimate?”

“It’s what we make of it. I likely have less experience with these things than you think I do, but I will not engage in a liaison with you that is not first and last a friendship. If your priorities are different, you had best tell me now before matters progress.”

Ellen peered at him, frowning, and he could positively hear her gears whizzing. “If matters between us… proceed”—she looked at their hands—“if they do, I will not trifle with you. I will not share my affections with you and then offer them to others while we are yet intimate. I will not betray your confidences.”

“You honor me,” Val said softly, his hand cradling her cheek. “I will try to be worthy of that honor, though I know I don’t deserve it. And since you have been so brave as to put into words the promises I would never, ever seek aloud, I will screw up my courage and give them back to you. I will not trifle with you, Ellen FitzEngle Markham, Baroness Roxbury. I will not share my affections with you then offer them to others while we are yet