She supposed he was right.
As they started to wander through the cold stone building, Rose couldn’t help gawking at the massive structure, a narrow building that was over 1,300 feet long, as Finn informed her. She’d never seen a masonry building so large. Stretched before her were massive skeins of rope that ran the length of the building, disappearing farther than her eye could see. Under them were steel tracks upon which sat complicated carriages that had rope wound in their interiors.
Moreover, all around her, there was still dust in the air, and Rose had the distinct impression that the workers had recently vacated the building.
Obviously, there were dozens of places they could hide.
“I’ve seen this place from a distance all my life,” she said, “yet it’s the first time I’ve been inside.”
“Why would you?” he asked. “It’s not exactly a sightseeing attraction.”
He didn’t hesitate in drawing her toward the building’s center, filled with every kind of modern machine for drawing out the hemp and turning single yarn into multiple strands and for twisting the strands and eventually braiding them into strong rope.
She was still breathing hard from the run and glanced at him to see if he was doing the same. It had obviously been difficult for Finn, whose limp was more pronounced than ever, though she hadn’t even noticed it when they were fleeing for their lives across the shipyard.
“Let’s go in farther,” he urged, and they went half the length of the first floor before he settled them down between two huge coils of strong, hemp rope.
Safely ensconced, Rose hunkered down beside him, sure no one could find them. And even if they did, she felt safe with Finn by her side.
He rubbed his shin a moment. Then he scooted forward, straddling his legs on either side of her, while she curled her own underneath her skirts, which she arranged around herself for warmth.
“We need to stay put for a while. When it’s dark, we’ll slip out,” Finn said, bringing back the clamp of fear that had only just released its hold on her.
“Stay put,” she repeated, considering the very real yet unknown danger.
Her brother would be livid. And William? She couldn’t even imagine what he would have thought, though this was precisely the type of situation into which he had feared she would become entangled because of Finn. He would certainly have been wrong in that, for she’d walked into it herself, open-eyed.
“Yes,” Finn added, “until the rest of the yard closes and empties out. I think the only way we can get out of here is under cover of darkness.”
She swallowed. Good God! Her mother would be frantic when she hadn’t returned at teatime and missed supper as well. Should she simply tell Finn that she was leaving? After all, the true threat was to him, wasn’t it? She’d been inadvertently caught in the same snare but by mistake. Surely, it had been a mistake! If she walked out the door and found any workers still making their way to the gate, she would be safe. She could probably walk along with the first kind-looking man . . .
“I know what you’re thinking, as you sit there fidgeting, but I can’t let you go out there,” Finn said, his tone brooking no debate. “It’s too easy for you to be nabbed.”
“I could simply—”
“With a man on either side of you, you’d be silenced and abducted without anyone noticing, even if there was a crush of workers. More easily so, in fact.” After a pause, he added, “Please, don’t be difficult.”
Difficult? Any residual fear was quickly channeled into anger.
“Me? Difficult? Whatever can you mean? I’ve been most accommodating ever since you reappeared at my engagement party.”
“You were always willful, going out after dark when we both knew it wasn’t safe. Not to mention headstrong, which I admit that I admired about you. Perhaps even respected you for, and it meant I could see you. I apologize for implying that you’ve been anything but helpful in this situation.”
Finn took her hands and held them both. “I can’t let anything happen to you, not on my account.” Then he glanced around at where they’d ended up. “Not more than already has, at any rate. You’ve been safe and you fell in love and you were happy until my return. I did not mean to wreck all that.”
Rose stared into his familiar eyes looking so intently back at her.
“It wasn’t all trifle and cream while you were gone,” she said quietly. “I did not simply bounce back to living the way I had before we met.”
Finn offered her a half-smile. “You were quite the social miss, as I recall.”
She felt her cheeks warm. “I suppose I was.” William had said something similar to indicate she’d been considered a bit flighty. “I was young.”
“I’m not condemning you. You were doing exactly what a beautiful young lady without a care in the world should have been doing.”
Rose sighed. “I feel as though I’ve aged a hundred years in the past month,” she said.
“Oddly, you don’t look a day older than 85.”
She slapped his arm.
“In truth,” Finn added, “I know exactly what you mean. I feel the same way. I thought I was an adult before. Looking back, though, I was a child. I built ships. I saw you and fancied you and fell in love in two shakes, and married you without a nod to propriety.”
At his mention of their marriage, she remembered the treasure she’d found earlier.
“I found the locket in your room. I can’t believe it survived.”
“My room?”
“Yes, I went there first before I came here.”
He shook his head. “That was dangerous.”
“The danger had come and gone from there, as it turned out.” She explained about the state of his living quarters. “Was someone looking for something?”
He shrugged. “Not that I can think of. Most likely another attempt to scare me the hell out of Boston. I have nothing from my life before, except the locket.”
“It’s amazing that you have it still.”
“No,” Finn contradicted her, staring into her eyes. “If I survived, it would, too. Not surprising at all. I never took it off, not until I came back and . . .,” he trailed off.
“And what? Saw your wife at her engagement party?” Rose supplied, tamping down any guilt over William. She had no reason to feel badly in that regard.
“Something like that.”
Finn slipped his fingers between hers, so they were firmly intertwined. Pleasurable sensations feathered through her. They had both grown up and grown apart, but her body’s reaction to him felt exactly the same. She knew what pleasant sensations would occur if he simply stroked the back of her hand with his thumb.
Then, as if reading her thoughts, he did so.
It was through her favorite gray gloves that he traced a heated path on her hand and then up her wrist. She clamped her lips around any sound that threatened to escape at his touch.
“I know I have no right to be jealous,” Finn said, his voice low. “But seeing you with another man, it was . . . it made me . . . I couldn’t stand it.”
She nodded. Merely imagining him chatting up some young miss while in England or Scotland pained her.
Again, as if knowing what she was thinking, he said, “I want you to know that I was faithful to you the entire time I was away.”
His words were a gift that went a long way to assuaging her lingering resentment over the hurt he’d caused her.
“From the first time we kissed, I could never imagine being with any other woman.”
Finn dropped her hands and briefly closed his eyes, running his fingers through his short hair until it stood on end.
“Despite what you think, I know the worst thing I have done to you was not staying away. The worst thing I did was to come back and ruin your perfect new life.”
“Then why did you?” Rose couldn’t help asking as any previous answer he’d give her had not been satisfactory.
“God help me, I knew my returning would d
estroy everything you had gained since I’d left, whether I reached Boston before your marriage or after. Yet I couldn’t help myself. I couldn’t let you slip away without seeing you again. Letting you know how much I loved you. Have always loved you.”
Rose flinched as if he’d struck her. His announcement of loving her — at long last — felt pointless, almost an insult, and certainly too wretchedly late. The wheels were in motion for their divorce, and like those of a fully stoked steam engine, she didn’t see how they could be stopped or even veer from the track. Nor did she even want to stop the proceedings.
Anger at his timing bubbled to the surface once again.
“You are a callous bastard to say that to me now. Yet I was a selfish child, who thought I was a woman. I should never have married you in the first place. No matter what you say, Finn, I won’t believe you ever loved me as I loved you. If you had, you could not have stayed away.”
He grabbed her by the shoulders and looked her in the eye.
“You’re wrong. My love for you and knowing you loved me, too, was the only thing that saved me from dying after the sinking. It was the only difference between me and the other men on that ship. When I got to Plymouth, I wrote a dozen letters while recuperating.” He glanced away, then back into her blue gaze.
“I destroyed them all. Each time I finished pouring out my love and explaining about the ship’s sinking and how I’d finally reached England, each time, I realized how ridiculous it would be for you to receive a declaration from a half-crazed, delusional dead man. I was still having vivid nightmares and didn’t know if they’d ever stop. Then when I got injured, I was barely able to stand upright. A penniless invalid, prone to wild imaginings. That was the man I’d become. I was, in short, a disaster.” His voice broke on the last word.
“It wasn’t fair to you,” Finn finished in little more than a whisper.
In the silence that followed, his grip relaxed, and he held her more gently. Rose stared into his stormy eyes, wishing impossible wishes as she did.
“I kept thinking of your joyful spirit,” he added, “and your family, so precious to you, and your life here. I didn’t fit in with any of it. Yes, I imagined you grieving though I didn’t comprehend the enormity of it because, honestly, I couldn’t conceive of you loving me that much.”
She gasped. How could he not have known what he meant to her?
“I was sorry to cause you pain, Rose, but I knew you would recover and live the life you were meant to have. With someone like Woodsom, not with me, a gentleman of the four oats, as they say.”
Without wit, money, credit, or manners — a ridiculous saying, Rose thought, and one that certainly didn’t sum up Finn Bennet.
Before she could speak, he placed one of his strong hands behind her head to cradle it and drew her forward.
“Through every minute of being away from you, I always loved you beyond anything.”
Then he kissed her, and the years fell away. They were simply Rose and Finn in a stolen moment, expressing their ardor as they’d always done.
With her eyes closed, with the familiar sensation of his mouth upon hers, in that instant, everything was perfect. She breathed him in and pretended.
When at last Finn drew back and she opened her eyes — and the memories rushed back of all that had passed — she recoiled, feeling as though she would burst into tears.
He frowned, most likely at seeing her devastated expression. Before she had time to do more than take in a deep breath, Finn kissed her again, this time teasing her mouth open with his tongue and then, with her small acquiescence, sliding it between her lips to taste her more fully.
Rose sucked gently on the invader, as a spark ignited low in her body. Instinctively, she lifted her arms and laced her hands at the back of his neck. The bodice of her gown restrained her breasts, grown suddenly sensitive, and the fabric rasped unbearably against her stiffening nipples. A vivid image of Finn’s mouth kissing her sensitive peaks shot through her.
When his teeth grazed her lower lip, biting it gently, the spark erupted into flames deep within her. Feeling as though she would incinerate, wriggling against the heated torture that burned at the apex of her thighs, Rose sucked harder on his tongue and moaned aloud.
His hands finally, blissfully, touched her breasts, stroking their plumpness, holding their aching heaviness through the fabric. It was not enough, only making her desire more frantic for release. She moaned again and whispered his name.
If only he could touch her skin.
She opened her eyes as he pushed her gently back to lean on the ropes behind her. Then he raised her skirts, his fingers trailing along her thigh-clad stockings.
Was he trembling? Or was that only her own shuddering she could feel?
His gaze reflected the desire she felt, as well as a mute question.
In the middle of this danger, with threat lurking literally on the other side of the wall, Rose wanted Finn Bennet more than she ever had before. She nodded.
A small smile played about his mouth.
As if they had all the time in the world — or perhaps because it seemed that time had suddenly stopped to give them a few minutes of paradise — Finn eased her skirts up the rest of the way, letting the cool air fan her briefly. She felt the chill for mere moments, only long enough to watch him undo his trousers and draw out his hardened sex.
Rose swallowed, feeling feverish again, throbbing with anticipation, and knowing exactly what she wanted. If Finn hesitated or asked permission, she might scream.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Finn pulled aside Rose’s drawers, feeling the dampness in her dark curls. His brain was awash in disbelief at what was about to occur. Sheer gratification, as well as gratitude, flowed through him when she arched and moaned as his knuckles brushed her opening. Clearly, she was as ready as he was.
Positioning the head of his shaft between her legs, Finn wished he had time to prolong their lovemaking, to touch every inch of her skin, to taste her, to suck her gorgeous breasts. But he couldn’t. That they were doing this at all, at this time, was madness — unexpected, miraculous, precisely like Rose — and he knew he mustn’t dally. Instead, he pressed into her, slowly and steadily.
Her body tightened around him, and he had to grind his teeth to keep from climaxing immediately.
“Finn?” she said uncertainly.
Was he hurting her?
“Should I stop?” he whispered against her neck.
“God, no,” she said. “Just . . . I don’t know. It’s strange, but wonderfully so.”
She relaxed under him as he began to move, deep into her warmth and wetness, then drawing out again. He couldn’t last long, that was painfully obvious. Yet more than anything, he wanted her to experience the joy of coupling.
He kissed the white column of her neck and she arched it, exposing her vulnerability.
“Please,” Rose said.
“Tell me,” he murmured, barely able to think and unsure what she was asking.
“Can you touch me? Down there? At the same time as you . . .?”
Frantically, he slipped his hand between their bodies, seeking her nubbin. He stroked his finger across its firmness, and she cried out. Loudly. Too loudly. Covering her mouth with his own to silence her, he continued his sensual ministrations.
“Mmmm,” she said.
“Mm?” he asked.
“Mmm, mmm, mmm.”
She was close, which was good because he feared he was closer.
Finn stroked her faster, while continuing to thrust deep into her passage. All at once, she stiffened, and he felt her body quivering against his. She twisted her head to break the contact of their mouths and take in great gasps of air as she neared utter repletion.
When he knew her to be sated, when the pressure at the base of his spine could not be held back a second longer, he pulled out of his wife and spent himself against the coiled rope beside her.
As soon as Rose opened her eyes and focused on h
im once more, she smiled, a satisfied look upon her lovely face.
Quickly, he helped her rearrange her clothing and then attended to his own.
“That was quite unexpected,” she said at last, glancing away and blushing as if he’d merely stolen a kiss.
Finn nearly laughed at her understatement. “That was extraordinary.”
Rose did laugh then, a throaty, delightful sound that wound its way around his heart. When she spoke again, it was to give him an order.
“Tell me what happened to you today.”
He hated to break the cocoon of placidity they’d created, but she was waiting for a response.
“A man held a gun to my head the other night in my room, so it’s no surprise you found it ransacked. I had no doubt he was quite real this time when he threatened to shoot my kneecaps.”
She gasped as if such viciousness had never occurred to her. And why should it have?
“Despite enlisting the help of the police, the intruder slipped away. Today, I thought I saw Liam here at the yard, precisely where he should not be, walking near the Commandant’s house.”
Rose nodded. “I know the one you mean, with the four chimneys. It has lovely gardens. I went to a party there once.” She frowned. “Did he go inside?”
“No. If he had, I might as well have tossed myself into the ocean right then and there. If this corruption went up as far as the base commander, as high as admiralty, my goose was cooked for sure. But he went right past, directly to Gilbert’s office. Why did I find Liam here instead of doing his job at Kelly’s?”
“I spoke with him today,” she offered. “Mr. Gilbert, I mean.”
Finn grimaced involuntarily, imagining Rose at the Musket House, like a lamb to slaughter.
“No doubt why you ended up here.” He couldn’t help the hard edge to his own voice. “Did you ask for me by name?”
She shook her head. “I made up a story so I could look around the base, hoping to find you because—” she broke off, a strange expression on her face.
An Inconceivable Deception Page 31
