He groaned and lowered his body over hers to take her lips again in a searing kiss. He thrust fiercely, rapidly driving into her. Her walls contracted on him and pleasure exploded within her, carrying her up to the stars.
He had given of himself, shared himself, all of himself, intensely, as he never had before.
Now, there was nothing for her but the pulsing of her sex on his, then she was falling, falling into a warm darkness that swallowed her up.
Alex panted for breath, his cock still pulsating within her as he slowly came back to his senses. That had been forgetfulness. The kind he had always prized and sought. To lose himself totally in his own sensual feelings and in the responses and fire of the woman in his arms. He’d come tantalizingly close to finding it so many times, yet never completely until here, tonight.
But he’d come inside her, exposing her to the risk of pregnancy. But he’d lost his head for their joining had been dark, hungry, desperate.
Angry.
God, he’d taken the woman who mattered most to him in the heat of anger.
Then he had demanded that she admit to him that which she probably wasn’t ready to admit on her own. At least not tonight in the wake of such an angry initial joining.
He’d shown her the darker side of passion, and that could only contaminate her with his own darkness. His spiritual bankruptcy.
His put his lips to her cheek. A gesture of atonement when no atonement could be made for the corruption of innocence.
Emily awoke to find herself beneath the covers. Candlelight glowed on the walls and the fire had warmed the chamber. Alex was sitting beside her in the bed, his hair loose, the ends just barely touching his shoulders. The mussed locks framed his face with shimmering gold and gave him a boyish look that tweaked at her heart.
“Alex?” she asked, not knowing where they stood with each other.
“I am going to go away for a time.”
His words fell on her like frozen rain.
“Away?” Shock prevented her brain from fully comprehending his meaning.
“I can’t keep my hands off you.” His voice resounded with regret.
He regretted tonight?
Yes, he regretted having ever met her, having fallen in love with her. He had told her as much. Her heart sank. “Alex, don’t—”
“If I stay, you will become pregnant with my child. God forbid you are not already. There is no other way. I must leave.”
“Leave?” Again, her mind steadfastly refused to believe he really meant that.
Surely not after what they had just shared tonight. Hadn’t tonight changed everything between them?
Hadn’t their intense passion proved that her doubts and his doubts meant nothing?
Only their love could matter after such a night.
She gaped at him. “No, you can’t mean that.”
“Yes, I am determined. I think I shall take a trip to New Orleans. I’ll be gone for six months, a year. I don’t know. However long it takes.”
“What takes?” she asked dumbly, still stunned by what he was telling her.
“For you to forget about whatever you thought we would be and find yourself a husband who truly deserves you.”
Finally, as though she’d been doused with icy water, his meaning fully settled over her.
Tonight had been nothing but a lapse, on both their parts. Her mind had been dazzled by the afterglow of passion.
But nothing had changed.
Nothing.
Not for her and not for him.
She should have felt relief. She wanted—no, needed—to separate herself from him. His solution was for the best. Yet her chest grew so tight that she could barely breathe. Logic seemed to have no place in this moment.
Tonight may have made everything worse.
Worse for her. For her heart seemed to be engaged in a way it had not been before. But then again, he had never shared all of himself, not in the intense manner he had tonight.
Her heart began to pound and hot emotion flooded her. She blinked rapidly. “So you’ve decided this all on your own and I am to have no say?”
“Oh, Christ, Emily, don’t. You’ll be better off. You will see that in time. Look at tonight—at how unhappy I made you at the ball. But it is only the start. It is as I have tried to tell you. I will disappoint you. I will hurt you in that way.”
“If you loved me as you say you do, you would change for me.”
“I cannot change. Not even for you.”
“I can be what you need. That woman you spoke of, the one who would fulfill your every whim, the one would give you endless…” She paused and bit her lip. It wasn’t as easy to say that word when she wasn’t fully aroused and out of her mind with need.
“That’s a fantasy, Emily. I am older than you and far more experienced in life. I can tell the difference between fantasy and reality. And the reality is, no woman will ever be enough to hold my sole attention for very long. That’s the truth. You must accept it.”
His refusal to change his mind on this stance sent her frustration level rising. Anger heated her blood, and a reckless sort of energy surged within her. “Then I will try to keep my expectations realistic, Alex.” Where had those words come from? From her foolish heart. But she hadn’t been able to hold them back. He was so smugly certain that he knew exactly what was best for the both of them. She lifted her chin. “I can be what you need. Whatever you need. I am stronger than you give me credit for being.”
“You’re going to play the worldly, sophisticated mistress and put up with any irregularities on my part without complaint?” There was a definite edge to his voice.
“I will not let myself be disappointed by you.”
“Then what was all that nonsense here tonight, about how you will be my only mistress? I have told you again and again, I am not capable of that kind of fidelity. Not long-term.”
She gaped at him. “But you say that you love me.”
Her voice sounded too soft, too vulnerable. How could this be happening? How could she be so weak to him? What happened to all her firm determination of the weeks just past?
“I do love you.” He closed his eyes, groaning as he ran hand through his hair. “God, Emily, how I love you.”
“Then why do you believe that you will disappoint me? Hurt me?”
“Love is not enough,” he said, without opening his eyes. “I wish it were.”
A note of pure misery echoed in his tone.
Even though they had already covered this ground, she couldn’t help but feel a spark of hope. She couldn’t let go of the belief that if she just impressed her love upon him strongly enough, in the right way, he would see that they could remain lovers. He would then decide to stay by her side, at least for now.
She wished to stay with him. Even when she had vowed again and again that she would find a life apart from him.
He said that was just a fantasy. And that she did not know the difference.
Well, he was wrong. She did know the difference, intellectually.
Her heart seemed to have other ideas and she couldn’t suppress the wild hope surging within her.
She had to try to convince him.
It made no logical sense.
Yet, she just had to.
She took a deep breath, hope still beating desperately within her. “It can be a start. Anyone can change.”
He opened his eyes, his blue gray stare pinning her. “It is too late for me to change, even for you. And you know it.”
“I do not know it,” she said, angered all over again that he declared himself so certain of her thoughts and motivations.
“Yes, you do. You have shown it all along.” He sighed. “You have not trusted me, not fully, all this time.”
She opened her mouth to explain, to deny.
He held up a forestalling hand. “No, I do not blame you. Your instincts have been correct. You sense that something shall always hold me back from you. Only it won’t be other women—it wi
ll be the corruption in my own soul.”
“You’re wrong about the ball. I wasn’t that upset about Maggie and Brigit.”
“When you came back inside, you were near tears.” He touched her face, feathering his fingertips over her cheek, smoothing lank, sweaty strands of hair away. “And didn’t you tell me—rightfully so—that you should be my only mistress? Indeed you should. You should be my wife, if I were capable of being the husband you need. But I am not.”
The depth of his self-reproach went so cuttingly deep, she never knew what to say to refute it. She took a deep breath. “I was near tears because of the strain of the evening, but not for the reason you think. Green was waiting in the gardens. Waiting for me.”
Damn it. Alex gritted his teeth against the wave of self-recrimination that hit him. He should have known Green would try to get to her. “Emily,” he said, taking her hands, wincing at their icy coldness. “What happened in the gardens?”
She told him, in a halting tone. Her voice choked at the end and she seemed wholly drained from the telling. “It can’t be true, it just can’t be. My father would never have traded in slaves.”
He pulled her into his arms and cradled her to his chest. “I don’t know, love. But I can find out.”
That was something he could do for her before he left for New Orleans.
In silence, he let her rest against him, listening to her breathing and bearing the restless shifting of her body as she slipped into what seemed to be a fitful slumber. But his blood seethed the whole time. Richard Green’s social status and background didn’t rate an invitation to one of Mrs. Hazelwood’s balls. Mrs. Hazelwood looked down on that branch of Alex’s family. Which meant Green must have been lurking in the garden, waiting for Emily. The man was insane. But until this moment, Alex hadn’t fully appreciated the degree of his insanity.
She lifted her head. Absently, he patted her back. “I’ll take care of Green.”
“Your cousin didn’t mean to upset me. I think, in an odd way, he meant to make amends for what happened at the Blue Duck.”
Her self-confident, compassionate tone sent a chill through him.
She had a gracious heart. She wanted to believe in the goodness of humanity, as a whole and individuals. Just look at how she wanted to believe in the goodness of him.
His naïve, noble-hearted girl. So idealistic, so gallant.
A surge of pride washed through him, followed by intense gentleness towards her.
She really was capable of sympathizing even with a man like Green. Green was always alert to discover weakness and foolishness in others to exploit. Emily was neither foolish nor weak. But she was still terribly naïve, and she refused to admit the depth of her inexperience. And she saw his every attempt to educate her on that point as part of some nefarious plot of his to control her life.
A stab of fierce protectiveness wiped away his gentleness.
As tired as he was of fighting with her over it, he knew he must make her see this situation clearly.
He took one of her hands and gave it a little shake. “Emily, Richard Green is totally insane. You must be wary of him.”
“I don’t think he’s insane, at least not in a malicious way. I think he is just very confused inside and feels misunderstood by others.”
“Aye—confused inside and unaware of himself. He’s a dangerous man, make no mistake about it. He does feel misunderstood by others, and he hates them for it.”
And he hates me above all others. Because I know…
It was even more reason for Alex to leave. He could leave Zachariah here to watch over Emily—there was no one in the world he’d trust more in that role—but in the meantime, if Green believed that Alex no longer cared for Emily, he would stop trying to harass her.
“I don’t think he’s evil. I think he’s just very scared inside.”
A dull ache set in between Alex’s eyes. She must be difficult over everything, even this.
“Emily, I know him. I know him better than probably any person living does, and I am telling you that the man is dangerous and you must take care for a time.” He caressed her hand. “He hates me—you know that.”
“I don’t think he hates you as much as he fears you.”
“He hates me because he fears me. That’s a powerful thing for a man.”
She turned to face him. “He fears you because of something that happened in Algeria?”
Cold, leaden weight settled into his chest. He let go of her hand. “He hates me and that’s all you need to know.”
“Why won’t you tell me about what happened?”
He stared into her eyes, glittering in the firelight. “You just need to listen to me and stay clear of him. Be watchful for a while and don’t go out alone.”
Emily stared at Alex’s closed expression. He would share nothing of himself—nothing deeper than carnal pleasure and his money. He never would.
The thought turned her blood as cold as the icy slush pelting the window outside. She sat up and hugged her shoulders.
“Zachariah will see you home.”
She started. “You will not see me home?”
“I have other business to attend to.”
“Oh…” She watched as he moved away from her and left the bed. “I see.”
She knew his appetites. He was fully capable of visiting Maggie or Brigit after she’d gone home and was tucked safely in her bed, in his house. What good did it do to be upset? She could do nothing about it.
She didn’t even care.
She wouldn’t care.
They had had their fling and now it was winding down. She could recover from it like a woman, not a girl. It was a learning experience.
An image of Maggie sprawled across Alex in bed, her red-gold hair spread over his chest as she licked her way down his belly, flashed across Emily’s mind.
She felt so staggered that she fell back against the pillows and gasped.
“I meant what I said, Emily.”
She looked up.
He was at the mirror, brushing his hair. “You are not to leave the house alone at any time for the foreseeable future.”
“What about after you leave for New Orleans?” she asked, unable to keep the bitterness from her voice.
“Most likely even then.”
She watched him take the final strokes of the silver-backed brush through his hair then he gathered the fine, silken golden mass and tied it securely with a black ribbon at his nape. And all the while anger seethed in her.
So he would have his freedom—freedom to see Maggie and Brigit and to go to New Orleans—and she would have none.
“And, Emily, I don’t mean merely that you should go out with Nancy or Sally. If I am not home, then James or Zachariah must accompany you.”
“James or Zachariah? Neither one of them can abide me! I would never dream of asking either of them.”
“Then you’ll have to wait until I can accompany you.”
“But you’ll be gone, to New Orleans.”
He gave her a stern look. “Then you’ll have to make your peace with Zachariah, won’t you?”
She stiffened all over. “Of course—it shall be as you dictate.”
He chuckled softly, a bitter sound that sent a chill into her. “That’s it. Wrap yourself up in your defiance. But still, do as I say.”
“It’s not defiance.”
“Then what would you call it?”
“I think you are being a little over-cautious.”
“Over-cautious?”
She sat up and leaned forwards. “Yes, seeing dangers where… Well, perhaps there is danger, to some degree, but a very small degree.”
“I think I am a little more adept at gauging danger than a nineteen-year-old sheltered girl who wandered blindly into a Hell City tavern to peddle her virginity.” He turned his attention to the mirror and began tying his cravat.
“There’s a piece of logic here that even you cannot deny.”
He paused and half-tur
ned to look at her. “Oh, yes, and what is that?”
“If Green truly wished to harm me, he would have done so already tonight.”
His face relaxed; a hint of tolerant amusement entered his eyes. “You were within screaming distance of some fifty-odd people, servants and all. He’d have been a fool.”
“No, that’s not how it was. The music would have quite drowned that out and we were at the very far end of the garden. Elizabeth was there, too. He could have used her to gain the upper hand. But he let her run away.”
He frowned and then turned back to the mirror. He tied his cravat with several terse jerks.
Ha! So, he didn’t seem to like being faced with the holes in his argument any better than she did.
“Why won’t you simply do as I ask?” His voice was deep and irritated.
“Because I think you are using this situation to gain control over me.”
He turned back to her, his expression one of incredulousness. “So your stubbornness goes so deep that you want to deny the real threat here?”
“No, I am not denying the threat. I know enough to be leery of Green and I surely shan’t be going off alone into any dark gardens and alleyways any time soon. But I also will not let irrational fear limit my actions to something less than any adolescent girl in this city is allowed.” She lifted her chin.
His forehead wrinkled up and he put his hand to it and shook his head for a moment. “Good God, girl, you must always make everything so difficult.”
“Alex, even you cannot deny the logic of it. If Green wished to harm me or seize me in some dramatic plot to get at you through me, he would have done so tonight.”
He dropped his hand and looked evenly at her. “Yes, I see your reasoning. But logic cannot be applied to a man like Richard Green.”
“You’re saying he would yank me off Main Street in broad daylight?”
Yes, she feared Green.
She also feared Alex using the threat of Green to control her. She wasn’t going to do anything stupid—but she also wasn’t going to live in daily fear and isolation. She had lived too many years like that.
Alex frowned. “I am saying I do not know what he would do. But for the next few weeks, we must be careful.”
Wild, Wicked and Wanton: A Hot Historical Romance Bundle Page 83
