To be his.
Whatever he wanted. Whatever he needed. In that moment, she would give it to him.
The last tremors of release washed over her, leaving her tingling and sated. Her eyes closed once more. This time, it was an effort to block him out. To forget her enemy was the man who had made her feel more just now than she had experienced in her entire lifetime.
“Always a liar, Miss Palliser,” came the stinging scorn of his voice. He withdrew his hand, lowered her skirts, and stepped away from her. Cool air hit her bare breasts. “We are leaving for London fifteen minutes hence. I suggest you prepare yourself.”
With that directive issued, he turned and stalked from the chamber, slamming the door at his back with enough force that the outdated, gloomy oil paintings on the wall danced. She watched them moving, allowing her knees to buckle. Allowing herself to slide down the wall until her rump landed on the carpet.
He had won this battle.
But not the war, she vowed.
Never the war.
Leo stood outside the chamber door after he had slammed it and gave in to temptation. He raised his fingers, still glistening and slick with her juices, to his lips. And then he sucked.
Delicious.
She tasted better than any dessert he had ever consumed.
His eyes closed. He exhaled heavily. Inhaled. Exhaled again.
His heart was pounding. His cock was rigid. His confidence was burned to ash, set on fire by the conflagration that had occurred on the other side of the walls separating him from…he still did not even know what her true name was. It sure as hell was not Miss Palliser.
Miss O’Malley, perhaps?
Or worse, Mrs. O’Malley?
Damn it.
Damn him for his insufferable weakness where she was concerned, which rendered him incapable of staying away as he ought to. She was forbidden. His prisoner. His enemy. And yet here he stood, the sweet musk of her cunny on his tongue. Still thinking of the slick plumpness of her flesh, the husky sounds of surrender she emitted, the tremor of her body as she spent.
He would give anything to be the man inside her when she came like that.
Jesus.
Something was wrong with him. He was sick. A vile creature. The inclination toward the wicked and the wrong hovered on the edge of his every interaction with her. From the moment he had first seen her at Harlton Hall, he had wanted her. But then, she had been his nephew’s governess, and his honor had not allowed him to dally with her as he had so desperately longed. Time had passed, yet he remained at the same untenable stalemate, albeit for vastly different reasons.
She was a woman he could never have.
A woman he must never touch again.
Leo made certain he had locked the door before he stalked down the hall. Each step he took mocked him.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
It was a refrain inside his head. Everything he had just done to her within the chamber, every sensation rioting through him now, was wrong.
And yet he knew it without question. He would touch her again. He would kiss her again. As long as she was within his reach, he would bloody well do whatever she would allow him to do to her. Because he could not resist. Because she touched a part of him he had not known existed. A part that was weak and evil and vulnerable. That did not give a damn about her guilt or innocence. A part that was selfish and greedy and took what it wanted.
A better man than he would have made the woman who had abducted his nephew pay for her sins by now. A better man would have turned her over to the Home Office immediately so she could be imprisoned and sentenced as she deserved. A better man would not keep her within his control. Would not kiss or touch her. A better man would not want to sink home inside her.
Similarly, a better man would never have raised her skirts, found the opening in her drawers. He would not have bared her breasts and sucked her deliciously responsive nipples. He would never have heard her breathy, passionate intakes of breath.
But she was his weakness. His only weakness.
It was why he had stayed away. Why he had left a week ago after only returning for a scant few hours. He could not trust himself where she was concerned. But if he had hoped distance would have lessened the ache in his trousers that belonged solely to her, he had been mistaken. Because he wanted her more now than he ever had before.
And now, he wanted to lick her in truth. He wanted her spread beneath him on a bed, legs open. To suck her pearl into his mouth and sink his tongue deep inside her. Hell, if she was tied to the bed, even better, for he wanted nothing less than her complete submission.
It struck him then, with the force of a slap.
He didn’t want to see her to prison.
Impossible, for doing so was his duty.
He could not shake the feeling. It was a hell of a thing. There he stood, in the same hall he had traversed hundreds of times before she had ever entered his world, and yet he was hopelessly changed. He had somehow formed an attachment to the woman who would sooner lie to him—the woman who would sooner open her goddamn legs to him—than be honest.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
He traveled down the steps, making certain the domestics were prepared to accommodate his imminent departure. When they reached London, he promised himself, he would notify the Home Office of her presence. He would see her commended to…
Holy hell.
He had forgotten to bind her wrists. He had been too caught up in thoughts of lifting the banshee’s skirts and plowing into her. Leo spun on his heel and raced back in the direction from which he had just come, taking the steps two at a time. He reached the door and inserted his key into the lock. Misgiving churned inside him, for he wore no pistol, and neither did he have time to retrieve one.
Leo threw open the door, preparing for an attack.
Instead, he found her precisely where he had left her, back against the wall, bodice opened, chemise tugged back into place. She sat on the floor, drab skirts pooling about her, brilliant blue eyes still glazed as they met his.
He had expected to find a sword-wielding virago, a desperate woman about to make her attempt at escape. But she was such a small figure, almost childlike, and he knew another swift rush of shame at his callous treatment of her. The door clicked closed at his back, and he went to her, his strides eating up the distance between them.
“Miss Palliser,” he said, lowering to his haunches before her, feeling like a cad. She was his prisoner, for Christ’s sake. What had he been thinking to take advantage of her as he had? Though he had rushed back to attend to her bonds, the sole thing on his mind now was tending to her. “I beg your forgiveness for my actions. They were unpardonable. You have my word it shall not happen again.”
“You returned to apologize?” she asked, her husky voice steeped in incredulity.
Another punishing lash of self-loathing unleashed itself. “No. I returned to bind your wrists.”
“Of course.” Her lips, swollen and stained a darker berry hue from his kisses, compressed. “Perhaps you would be willing to wait until I restore my dress?”
He ought to retrieve her bindings and secure her now. His training and instincts told him as much. Yet he could not seem to move from this space now that he had once more found himself within reach of her. “I shall aid you.”
“I am perfectly capable.” Her fingers found the buttons, beginning to slide them through their neat moorings.
“Nevertheless, I am responsible.” He began at the top, his touch grazing her throat as he started his work, and damn him if the mere glancing connection did not make him burn. What was it about this woman that he could not resist?
“You are responsible for a great deal worse.” She gripped his hands, staying his motions. “I shall do this myself, Duke, if you please.”
“I have apologized for my actions,” he said stiffly. “You need not fear it shall happen again.”
“You will not shoot and then ravish me a second time?” Her tone
was arch.
He winced at her acid tongue. “I did not force you.” He had not imagined her wild response, her wetness, or the power of her release.
“No.” Her gaze lowered to her hands, which still held his. “You did not.”
“Are you another man’s wife, Miss Palliser?” He had not intended to ask the question, for it emerged from his own personal need rather than from the threads of his investigation he was attempting to tie together.
“If I say that I am?” Her eyes met his once more.
“It will change nothing.” But even as he made the statement, he knew it for a lie.
“I am no man’s wife.” Her thumb stroked the top of his hand.
His cock twitched. He gritted his teeth, reminded himself why he was here. Who she was. Who they were to each other. It was necessity and duty, not want and desire. “Who is O’Malley?”
Her thumb continued its slow torture. “What do you know of him?”
Her interest was palpable. It occurred to him that she could still be lying to serve her own interests. Lord knew she had done it on every occasion they had spoken thus far. “I know he is one of the men responsible for plotting the attack on the Duke of Burghly,” he bit out. “I know he is in prison awaiting his reckoning. What do you know of him, Miss Palliser?”
She pushed his hands away as if they were fashioned of flame and she feared her dress would catch fire. “I know that he is innocent of the charges against him. Cullen would not murder a bee. He has a good heart.”
In her devotion to her cause, she forgot to tame her speech into the proper English elocution, and her brogue softened her speech. She spoke with the fiery passion of someone who loved him.
O’Malley… O’Malley… O’Malley…
Why was the surname so familiar, as if he had dreamt it before?
He stared at her, another forgotten name returning to him. It had been a year or more since he had last heard it.
“Bridget,” he said suddenly, the name leaving his lips before he could contain it.
She blanched, confirming his suspicions.
She was not Jane Palliser. She was Bridget O’Malley, sometime shop girl, half sister to the Duchess of Trent, suspected Fenian sympathizer. Though she had caught the attention of his men a year before, she had disappeared, all evidence of her and her involvement in the Fenian cause both, had gone dormant.
What an interesting development, and now he knew who she was, he would have his answers from her. All of them. A smile stretched his lips, and he still tasted her on his tongue, mingling with the sweet tang of victory. “Miss Bridget O’Malley, we meet at last.”
Chapter Nine
Bridget had traded one gilded prison for another.
She stood at a window in the chamber she had been given at the Duke of Carlisle’s townhome and stared down into the bustling Belgravia street. It was a familiar pose. She had spent the weeks since her arrival at Harlton Hall observing the world beyond her window pane in one form or another, hopelessly trapped as any bird in a cage. And though she had vowed she would not sing, in the end, she had not needed to.
Carlisle had uncovered her identity on his own, connecting the trail of crumbs she had unwittingly left him. She had been so shocked from their encounter and his unexpected softness upon his return to her that when he had spoken her name aloud, she had given herself away. The duke was no fool. He was as wily as a fox. Though she had attempted to convince him he was wrong, the damage had been done.
He knew she was Bridget O’Malley. Half sister to Cullen O’Malley. Knew she was intertwined with the branch of the Fenians led by John that had been responsible for the Duke of Burghly’s murder in Dublin.
She, on the other hand, still knew nothing of what Carlisle planned to do with her or why he continued to keep her his prisoner instead of delivering her to jail. During their journey to London, they had traveled in icy silence, her wrists once more bound. When they had arrived at his palatial residence, he had cut her bonds with a grim air.
Do not do anything rash, Miss O’Malley. You will not like the consequences.
Even now, a day later, his dark warning sent a chill over her. Here she was, trapped as neatly as a fly in the spider’s web. About to become his dinner. Never mind the chamber in which he had installed her was the largest, most beautiful room she had ever laid eyes on, the sort of room she had not imagined existed. The bed and linens seemed dearer than gold, and everything smelled sweet and rich. The drapes were thick, the carpet plush, the pictures on the walls breathtaking. Whoever had decorated this room, from its polished, ornately carved headboard, writing table, and wardrobe, to its adjoining bathing chamber fitted with running water and a massive tub, had spared no expense.
One word summed it all: álainn. Beautiful.
Bridget wished she could say she was not impressed, but it would be a lie. She did, however, know a deep and abiding guilt at her surroundings when Cullen was clapped in gaol, enduring Lord knew what manner of conditions.
A gentle knock sounded on the door then, shaking her from her reverie. The duke never knocked, which meant she had a different guest altogether.
“Enter,” she called, as if she were required to give permission as a prisoner, which she knew she was not.
The sound of a key being fitted into the lock reached her, one more reminder she was at the mercy of the Duke of Carlisle, a man who—if John was to be believed—possessed none. But the person on the other side of the door when it opened was the furthest one could reasonably get from the duke. A petite, golden-haired beauty came barreling over the threshold in a magnificent violet silk gown. Her face and her midsection appeared fuller than the last time Bridget had seen her.
Her American half sister, Daisy.
“Bridget!” Daisy’s arms opened.
And though Bridget had never been the sort for shows of affection, having received so little of it herself all her life, she found herself in need of an embrace. She met Daisy halfway across the chamber, returning her embrace as best she could with her healing wound. It had been a year or more since they had last crossed paths in London, and that meeting had not been a pleasant one.
Daisy had come to inform her of her imminent wedding to the Duke of Trent. Bridget had panicked. She had returned to Ireland, only to regret her decision. For all too soon, Cullen had become implicated in the plots against the Chief Secretary for Ireland.
Much had happened to both Daisy and Bridget, it seemed, in that time. The reason for her sister’s rounder cheeks and midsection made itself known to her as a full belly bumped against hers.
“Daisy.” She jerked back, searching Daisy’s gaze. “You are having a babe?”
Her sister smiled, tears glistening in her eyes. “Yes, and I will soon be as large as a milk cow. But that is neither here nor there. What does matter is you, Bridget. Where have you been? I was so very worried about you.”
Bridget attempted a smile and failed. “I have been in Dublin and London and Oxfordshire and everywhere in between. But how did you know to find me here, and why have you come?”
“The Duke of Carlisle sent for me.” Daisy’s gaze scoured her face, as if hardly daring to believe she was real. “I thought it was a dream. You have no idea how hard we looked for you, how terrified I was that something ill had befallen you.”
“I am sorry for worrying you,” she said truthfully, shame filling her heart. Though she did not know her half sister very well, she wondered not for the first time if she had misjudged her.
Though they shared a father, they had precious little else in common. Daisy was the legitimate product of their father’s marriage to an American woman, and had been raised accordingly in the home of one of the wealthiest men in America. A princess in her castle.
None of that wealth had been offered to aid Bridget, his illegitimate child. Bridget’s mother had worked in a tavern, sometimes selling her body for bread, until she had found Sean O’Malley, a man who had used his fists far more than his bra
in or his heart. He had given Bridget his last name and more bruises than she cared to count over the years. But he had also given her Cullen, the brother she adored.
“I am still worried for you,” Daisy said then, her tone serious. “Carlisle has been typically guarded with the information he would provide, but he was clear you have been abetting the Fenians. Tell me it isn’t true, Bridget.”
Bridget wanted to deny it, but she stared at her sister’s big, bright eyes so like her own. And for the first time since she had last laid eyes on Cullen, she felt as if she were in the presence of someone who cared for her. Truly cared for her. Someone who cared was more rare and difficult to procure than gold.
So instead, she asked the question that had been eating her alive. “Did he say what is to become of me?”
“What is your next move?”
Leo sat opposite Sebastian, the Duke of Trent, in his study.
“Hell if I know, Trent.” And then he picked up the tumbler of whisky he had told himself he would not drink and drained it to the dregs in three burning gulps. With great effort, he controlled his features, keeping himself from coughing. Damnation, this bottle of spirits had more bite than he had recalled.
Trent had once been one of Leo’s most trusted men. Until he had fallen in love with the American heiress he had been assigned to watch for Fenian connections and had withdrawn himself from service. That lady was currently on the floor above, entrusted with the keys to Miss Bridget O’Malley’s chamber.
It had gone against the grain for Leo, particularly since he had at one time suspected the duchess of colluding with the Fenians herself. Her innocence had been proven, but Leo thrived on control, that which could be given and that which could be taken away. The dichotomy never failed to stir him, both in ways it should, and in ways it should not.
“You are keeping Miss O’Malley in the duchess’s chamber,” Trent pointed out unnecessarily, taking a slow, gentlemanly sip of his own whisky.
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