Partly because they were. And no one knew that better than Blade, who had found himself entertaining more than his fair share of wives who wanted nothing to do with their husbands. But also partly because the notion of Lady Felicity getting leg-shackled to some pathetic lord irritated the devil out of him.
“Not when your sisters’ futures depend upon them,” she countered.
There it was. Proof that she needed to marry—and well—for the sake of the ladies who would follow in her footsteps. He ought to release her. Give her the stupid book. Step away. Never again think of being near her.
She was a virgin, for God’s sake. A lady. And though he had bedded his fair share of those, this one was different.
It was despicable.
He was despicable.
“Why not enjoy yourself before you sell your body and soul to save your sisters?” he found himself asking.
Her nostrils flared. Her body stiffened. “I am not a lightskirt, Mr. Winter. I am selling nothing. I intend to marry, and soon. That is what is expected of me, and that is what is proper.”
What a cursed shame, that a woman as lively and lovely as Lady Felicity should find herself desperate to marry. Adhering to nonsensical societal rules. Curtseying her way into a dismal future. Sacrificing herself because her father was a terrible gambler who did not know one more turn of the cards or roll of the dice would only bleed him drier.
“Is it proper for us to be this close just now?” he taunted, sweeping his hand higher.
He found the nape of her neck, softer than silk, and warm. So warm. So inviting. His fingers plunged into her chignon.
“No,” she whispered, her lips falling open. “It is most improper.”
Her gaze dipped back to his mouth.
If she had exerted a hint of pressure to push him away, he would have allowed her to go. As it was, he was not holding her to him with any strength. There was nothing but the undeniable desire burning hot and bright between them that kept her where she was.
“Mayhap you ought to move, then.” As he delivered the challenge, he caressed her neck with his thumb. Slow, steady swirls over her skin.
And she moved, it was true.
But not away from him.
In the next breath, she tugged his head down to hers and their mouths met at last.
Chapter Five
At last.
Felicity felt as if she had waited an entire lifetime for this man’s lips on hers. Which was ludicrous, because she had only met him a scant few days ago. She scarcely knew him. And yet, she could not shake the sensation, deep and ingrained, that there was something inevitable about him. About this moment. About this kiss.
Not her first.
She had kissed a handful of gentlemen before. No easy feat, with watchful chaperones and the care she took with her reputation. But she had kissed several of her suitors. Each of them had left her feeling pleasant but hardly transformed.
None of those kisses compared to this one.
Blade Winter was a rogue and she knew it, but he kissed like an angel.
A wicked angel.
His lips moved over hers, parting them, his tongue slipping inside her mouth. He tasted like pineapple. He must have sampled one of the pineapples from the Abingdon House orangery at breakfast. Such sweetness, mingled with temptation.
She should stop this. Push him away. He held her as gently as if she were Sèvres porcelain. Felicity knew without bothering to try that she could slip away with ease. That was the problem. She did not want to slip away. She had been waiting all her life for this, for him.
Or so it seemed as his mouth worshiped hers.
She forgot about reaching for the naughty book that belonged to Lady Aylesford, which she had been tasked with rescuing from the salon by the lady herself. Forgot about propriety, all the reasons why she should be running as far from this room and this man as possible. All she could think about, all she could feel, all she wanted, was Blade Winter’s kiss.
Her arms wound around his neck. She pressed her body to his in shameless fashion. Hungering for him. Longing for him, quite desperately. Not even common sense or the fear of her future could stop her now. His lips were too potent. His touch on her nape—that incendiary graze of his thumb pad over her skin—enough to drive her mad.
She inhaled, and all she breathed was him. Decadent, forbidden, everything she should not want. Everything she wanted anyway.
Somewhere, a thump sounded.
The book, mayhap?
She should put an end to the kiss and fetch it. Certainly she ought to remember she had come to this country house party with one purpose in mind: to find herself a husband.
But then, his taunting, tempting words came back to her.
Why not enjoy yourself before you sell your body and soul to save your sisters?
She could not summon a single argument against his query just now, with his lips moving over hers. Melding to hers. Possessing hers. Good heavens, he kissed with such mastery, she could well understand why a married woman would go chasing after him.
Why not enjoy herself, just for a moment? Just for this kiss?
He kissed the corners of her mouth, then nipped her lower lip between his teeth. A startled moan tore from her. He was fierce. Savage. Wild.
Everything she should not want.
Everything she wanted anyway.
“You taste so bloody sweet.” He traced the sting of his tender bites with his tongue. “Damn it, I could kiss you all day.”
Yes, if you please.
But that was wrong. She could not kiss him all day. Or at all. Indeed, she had to stop this dangerous nonsense at once. And she would, just as soon as he…
“Oh,” she whispered as his knowing mouth traveled from hers at last, finding her throat. Latching on to the place where her heart beat so frantically. Sucking. Licking.
Her knees trembled.
She clutched him.
This was… No kiss had ever been so… She had no words.
None.
He kissed his way to her ear, his hot breath grazing her, making her shiver. And then he kissed the space behind it, his tongue roaming over the hollow she had never realized was so sensitive until this moment. This time, her knees did not just tremble. They turned to pudding. She would have collapsed had he not caught her with a strong arm around the waist, drawing her more firmly against him.
So firmly the undeniable ridge of his manhood pressed into her belly. Felicity was not entirely ignorant—she had paged through the secret book Lady Aylesford had requested she retrieve. And it had been…informative. Interesting.
Not nearly as interesting as Blade Winter’s hard, uncompromising body pressed to hers.
“Tell me to stop,” he said against her throat, before his wicked mouth traveled lower. Across her décolletage, the exposed portion of her bosom. “Say the word, darling.”
She should.
But then he tugged at her gown and stays. One strong movement, and her breasts popped free. Bared for him. She had never been so vulnerable, so exposed. And yet, she had never felt more alive.
His lips moved over her, inciting more passion. More pleasure. And when he sucked her nipple into his mouth, she cried out, her back arching, her body seeking. It was as if a cord ran between her breast and her core. He flicked his tongue over her nipple, making her ache in a wonderful, new way.
He lapped at her, and it was wicked. She ought to look away. To stop him. But the sight of his handsome face nestled so near to her breast, his mouth on her, was unutterably pleasurable. Sinful. Delicious.
She had never felt more alive than she did in this moment, in this scandalous man’s arms.
All wrong.
So right.
He moved to her other breast, delivering the same sweet torture.
Felicity tried to remind herself of the necessity that she maintain her reputation. That she find a proper husband. One with enough wealth to make her sisters’ debuts possible. A husband who was
the complete opposite of this rough-hewn rogue who fought duels with cuckolded husbands, whose kisses would surely lead to worse sin.
But none of these reminders rendered the pleasure he wrung from her any less potent. His mouth upon her made bliss sear her straight to her toes.
Just as she was beginning to lose complete control, and with it any ability to keep from ruining herself, however, he stopped. His head lifted, and with one violent tug that bespoke his experience in such matters, he pulled her bodice back into place.
Her heart was pounding with so much force, she swore he could likely hear it.
“Don’t suppose that was proper, was it?” he murmured, smirking at her.
Her cheeks went hot. Every part of her went hot. His dimple returned, mocking her. He was so handsome, and she had just allowed him to take shocking liberties. The sort she had never permitted another gentleman. The sort that were not just ruinous for her reputation, but deadly. If anyone were to have walked in upon them, she would have had to retire from polite society.
And then where would Esme and Cassandra be?
“You are a scoundrel, sir.”
He shrugged. “Never claimed to be a saint.”
“There is a vast difference between a saint and a scoundrel,” she pointed out, her voice trembling.
She had to retrieve the blasted book, remove herself from this chamber, and make sure she was never alone with him again. He was too tempting. Too adept at seduction. She wondered how many other ladies he had kissed and wooed, and her stomach clenched.
He was a rakehell. Undoubtedly, his conquests were legion. According to Lady Aylesford, Blade Winter was quite sought after despite his humble upbringing in the rookery.
Had he made any of them feel the way he had made her feel? Jealousy she had no right to entertain rose, strong and insistent, along with the need for self-preservation.
He watched her, not saying a word, that blue gaze of his positively scorching. She was trapped in it. Ensnared as surely as she had been by his kisses and his wicked, wicked mouth.
“Have you nothing to say for yourself?” she demanded, infuriated with him, with herself.
How could she have been so foolish? So reckless? So desperately wanton?
His grin deepened, unrepentant. “What would you have me say, darling? I won’t apologize for pleasuring you. I heard nary a complaint when my mouth was on your—”
“That is enough, Mr. Winter,” she bit out, interrupting him lest he finish his sentence and turn her to flame.
“I told you to tell me to stop. And yet, you did not. Nary a hint of protest. If anything, you were quite…welcoming.”
So he had. And so she had not. And…curse him, she had been welcoming in a fashion most unbecoming of a lady, it was true. Particularly an unwed lady. And most especially an unwed lady desperate to land herself a husband.
She huffed out a breath. “I have no wish to argue with you, Mr. Winter.”
“Because you would lose.”
His quick, smug retort made her long to box his ears. And then kiss him some more.
Drat.
Now where had that thought come from?
Felicity squared her shoulders, preparing for further battle. “On the contrary, sir. I am confident I would win. However, I have no wish to argue with you because I need to do what I promised. The owner of the book is eagerly awaiting its return, and I can hardly afford to be caught alone with someone such as yourself.”
His grin slowly faded. “Someone such as myself, Lady Felicity? And what is someone such as myself? Do tell.”
“Someone…” She searched for the word she wanted, but it felt like an insult. Her lips would not form it, not after his had just been upon them.
“Someone common,” he elaborated for her. “Someone baseborn. A scoundrel, a rogue, a rookery thief. An assassin. A bastard.”
She hated the way those aspersions left his tongue with ease. She hated even more that she had been about to say some of them. That she had said some of them.
But there was one which stood out, one she had never thought in conjunction with him.
“A-are you an assassin?” she asked haltingly.
This beautiful man—a murderer? She could hardly make the connection.
He inclined his head. “I was. Now I work to keep Winter family interests safe by encouraging all the cheats, thieves, and liars to stay honorable in other, painful ways. The East End isn’t a ballroom, my lady. We do not bow and curtsy. We fight for everything we have, and then when we have it, we do everything we can to defend what is ours.”
He had been an assassin. She felt lightheaded. Had he…killed?
Her gaze dropped to his hands. So strong, those long fingers tempting and yet mayhap dangerous. The inking of the dagger on the top of his hand taunted her. It was situated between his thumb and forefinger, black and bold and feral.
She shivered against her will.
“Fearful now, darling?” he asked, leaning toward her and lowering his head so their lips almost grazed once more. “You need not be. I protect my family’s holdings from enemies. Not from frivolous virgins who lower themselves to kissing a commoner.”
“Is that the way all the ladies you seduce think of you?” she asked before she could think better of the question. “That you are a commoner? That they are your betters?”
The moment they fled her lips, she wished she could call the questions back.
The other ladies—she must not think of them. Moreover, there was something of far greater import she must force herself to think of. Mr. Blade Winter was far more dangerous than she had supposed.
“Darling, I hate to tell you, but you are the one who seduced me,” he said, catching her chin in a gentle grip, tilting her face up to meet his.
How dare he suggest such a thing?
“You are wrong, Mr. Winter.”
“Mmm. Did you not kiss me first?”
Good heavens. He was correct. She had been the one who had kissed him first. What had she been thinking? Moreover, what was she doing, lingering with him now, putting her reputation in increasing danger with each passing moment?
She pushed away from him at once and knelt, searching for the book he had dropped to the carpets. It had fallen on its spine. And, as fortune would have it—mayhap misfortune, in this instance—the engraving upon the opened pages was positively indecent. She gaped at it.
Was the gentleman truly beneath the lady’s raised skirts with his head between her thighs?
“My, what have you been reading, darling?”
The wry question, issued in Blade Winter’s deep, delicious baritone, shook her from her momentary shock. Face heating anew, she retrieved the volume and snapped it closed before rising to her feet.
“I told you, sir, that it is not mine. Nor have I been reading it. I was merely asked to fetch the forgotten volume and return it to its rightful owner,” she said, avoiding his gaze, all too aware of her heated cheeks. And ears. Heavens, even her eyebrows were likely ablaze at this point.
What manner of scandalous treatise had Lady Aylesford required her to retrieve? The viscountess had said the book was a secret matter, and that Felicity should take care not to allow anyone else to see her carrying it about. But she had not said it was…lewd.
Bawdy.
Despicably sinful.
Wrongly intriguing.
Against her will, she wanted to carry the book to her chamber and page through it herself without Mr. Blade Winter’s scrutiny upon her.
“Return it to its rightful owner,” Mr. Winter repeated, his tone mocking. “Of course, my lady.”
He did not believe her.
She ground her jaws. “It is not mine, if that is what you suggest.”
He shrugged. “I suggest nothing. However, you are the only one I see attempting to retrieve the book in question.”
He was not wrong about that. However…
“You are the only one I see attempting to fetch our hostess’s sewing,”
she countered. “It is odd indeed for a gentleman such as yourself to retrieve such a thing. Why not a servant?”
“That is what I want to know,” he grumbled.
And she believed him. He may be many things, Mr. Blade Winter, but it did not appear that liar was amongst the many appellations which could be applied to him.
“Lady Emilia requested you fetch her sewing from this salon,” Felicity said, repeating his earlier claim.
“Do I look like the sort of man who goes about searching for sewing, for Christ’s sake?” he asked.
No, he did not. Instead, he looked like the sort of man who could make a lady bend to his whims with a mere grin. He looked like temptation incarnate. The sort of man every lady was sternly warned to avoid by her chaperones prior to her comeout. And every day thereafter.
“Of course not.” She frowned at him, understanding beginning to dawn upon her. “But Lady Emilia sent you here to this salon, yes?”
He nodded.
“And someone else also sent me here to fetch her book,” she said, deliberately keeping Lady Aylesford’s name out of their discussion.
“Do you know what I think, Lady Felicity?”
She blinked at him, flustered, confused, holding the book to her still-racing heart. “What is it that you think, Mr. Winter?”
“I think the book is yours.”
“It is not!” she denied hotly.
“Hmm,” was all he said.
The vexing, infuriatingly handsome man.
“It is not mine,” she denied once more.
“Nor is the sewing mine,” he allowed. “Have you seen it anywhere?”
“I was looking for the book.” And then, she had been looking at him. Only him. He had absorbed every last modicum of her attention.
“I shall search for it, then.” His full lips pursed.
God, how she wanted to feel those lips against hers once more.
It was a sin.
And she wanted it anyway.
“Very well,” she agreed. “And I shall return this book to its owner.”
She forced herself to dip into a curtsy. “I bid you good day, Mr. Winter.”
He bowed, the action perfunctory. Not quite elegant, and somehow mocking in true Blade Winter fashion. He was not a man who prized formality or society. Nor, she suspected, would he ever be.
Winter’s Whispers Page 5
