Miss Tarabotti took a long, deep, shaky breath and from the smell alone had no doubt at all whom it was she held. For the scent was all open grassy fields and night air. Involuntarily, her hands moved against his skin in relief. Then, of course, she realized something else.
“Why, Lord Maccon, you are stark naked!” Alexia said. She was appalled beyond all reason by this last in the long string of indignities she had had to suffer in the space of one torturous evening.
The Earl of Woolsey was indeed completely nude. He did not seem particularly perturbed by this fact, but Miss Tarabotti felt the sudden need to close her eyes tight and think about asparagus or something equally mundane. Coiled about him as she was, her chin wedged over one of his massive shoulders, she was being forced to look down directly at a nicely round, but embarrassing bare, moon. And not the kind that caused werewolves to change either. Although it did seem to be changing aspects of her own anatomy that she would rather not think about. It was all a very heady—or bottomy?—experience.
But, Alexia reasoned, at least he is no longer trying to kill me.
“Well, Miss Tarabotti,” admitted the earl, “nakedness happens, I am ashamed to say, particularly to us were-wolves. To compound the offense, I must ask you most cordially not to let go.” Lord Maccon was panting, and his voice sounded funny, all low and gruff and hesitant.
With her chest pressed hard against his, Alexia could feel the rapid beat of his overtaxed heart. A strange series of questions ran through her head. Was his exertion the result of the attack or the change? What happened if he changed into wolf form in full evening dress? Would the clothes rip? That was sure to be inconveniently expensive! How come it was socially acceptable for werewolves in the wolf state to run around completely starkers, but not anyone else?
Instead she asked, “Are you cold?”
Lord Maccon laughed. “Practical as always, Miss Tarabotti. It is a little chilly in here, but I am well enough for the moment. “
Alexia looked at his long, powerful, but bare, legs dubiously. “I suppose I could loan you my underskirt. “
The earl snorted. “I hardly think that would look very dignified.”
Miss Tarabotti reared back so she could look him in the face for the first time. “I meant to drape over you like a blanket, not to wear, you ridiculous man!” She was blushing heatedly, but with her dark skin, she knew it was not noticeable. “Besides, remaining exposed is hardly a dignified condition either.”
“Aye, I see. Thank you for the thought, but...” Lord Maccon trailed off, becoming distracted by something far more interesting. “Uh, where exactly are we?”
“We are guests of the Hypocras Club. That new scientific establishment that opened recently right next door to the Snodgroves' town residence.” She did not even pause to let him interject but hurried agitatedly on. Partly because she wanted to relay everything she could before she forgot something vital and partly because their intimate proximity was making her nervous. “It is the scientists here who are behind the supernatural disappearances,” she said, “as I am certain you are now well aware. You yourself have become one of those very vanishing acts. They have quite the arrangement here. We are currently in underground facilities reached only by something called an ascension chamber. And there are rooms upon rooms of exotic steam and electric current machinery on the other side of the foyer. They have got Lord Akeldama hooked up to something called an exsanguination machine, and I heard the most horrible screams. I think it was him. Conall”—this was said most earnestly—“I believe that they may be torturing him to death.”
Miss Tarabotti's big dark eyes welled with tears.
Lord Maccon had never before seen her cry. It did the most remarkable thing to his own emotions. He became irrationally angry that anything might make his stalwart Alexia sad. He wanted to kill someone, and this time it was not at all tied into being a werewolf. It couldn't be, as, held tightly in her arms, he was as human as possible.
Alexia paused to take a breath, and Lord Maccon said, in an attempt to distract her from her unhappiness and himself from homicidal thoughts, “Aye, this is all very informative, but why are you here?”
“Oh, they put me in with you to check the authenticity of my abilities as a preternatural,” she answered, as though this fact were perfectly obvious. “They have your BUR files on me, the ones that were stolen, and they wanted to see if the reports were true.”
Lord Maccon looked ashamed. “Sorry about that. I still do not know how they got through my security. But what I meant was, how did you get here, to the club?”
She tried to find the least embarrassing place to rest her hands. Finally she decided the middle of his back was safest. She was seized with a most irrational desire to rub her fingertips up and down the indentation of his spine. She resisted and said, “Technically, I believe they were after Lord Akeldama, something about his being very old. Apparently this is an important factor in their experimentation. I was having dinner with him. I told you I was going to, remember? They chloroformed his entire residence and brought me along because I was with him. They only realized who I was when Mr. MacDougall came into my cell and saw me. He used my name, and the other man, he is called Siemons, remembered it from your paperwork. Oh! And you should know, they have an automaton.” She tensed at the memory of that awful waxy thing.
Lord Maccon rubbed his big hands over her back in an absentminded soothing motion. Miss Tarabotti took it as an excuse to loosen her own grasp a mite. The temptation to begin her own rubbing was almost overwhelming.