Captive of Sin

by Anna Campbell

  “I don’t pity you.” The words emerged as a choked murmur.

  Still Gideon didn’t look at her. “I don’t believe you.”

  With a jerky movement, he laid his other hand flat against the dark wood of the door. It had been as tortured as its twin. But staring at his hand against the timber, she saw the grace and beauty it must once have possessed.

  “My love…” Curse these tears, nothing stopped them. “I’m so sorry.”

  Words failed her. What could she say? Nothing was equal to what he’d been through. Instead, she followed where her heart dictated. Holding his shattered hand tenderly between hers, she raised it to her lips.

  She placed a fervent kiss on the uneven knuckles. It was an act of homage for all he’d borne. It was an act of overwhelming anguish. It was an act of gratitude that he’d survived so she could fall in love with him.

  Under her lips, his flesh was warm. His hands looked like they belonged to a monster. The skin she kissed was unquestionably a man’s.

  He went utterly still. His shaking quieted. He didn’t breathe. He didn’t speak. His back was stiff with tension. If his living hand hadn’t rested between hers, she’d almost wonder if he’d turned to stone.

  In the brittle silence, she finally heard him take a shuddering breath. The hand she held curled into a fist. He drew another of those long, difficult breaths.

  “I hate what they did to me.” His voice was so low, she strained to hear him. He spoke toward the door. “I hate that I have to live with Rangapindhi forever.”

  Oh, my dear.

  She recognized his shame and pain. Without thinking, she shifted, pressing herself hard against his back with its interlocking network of scars. She turned her hot sticky cheek against his skin, feeling the tight muscles, the lines of raised flesh.

  His shoulders bent forward. He was so rigid, it was as if he kept himself upright through will alone. Compassion, all the more poignant because she couldn’t express it, stabbed her. She waited in painful suspense for him to push her away, berate her, walk out. But he didn’t move.

  Without releasing the hand she’d kissed, she raised her other hand to cover his where it flattened against the door. He jerked infinitesimally under her touch, then subsided into stillness. She tried to infuse him with every ounce of her love. Physically. Through the human warmth he’d thought denied to him forever.

  She didn’t know how long she sprawled against him in wordless communion. She closed her eyes and let darkness take her.

  After a long while, she felt him shift. She opened her eyes and straightened.

  Finally, he turned to face her, forcing her to free one of his hands although she kept her clasp on the other. She steeled herself to look into his face as fear sent icy tendrils along her spine.

  What would his expression reveal? Anger? Disdain? Coldness, as he rebuilt barriers of pride and detachment that had crumbled tonight?

  His face was stark with some deep emotion she couldn’t identify. She stared into his burning eyes.

  “Charis…”

  He looked as though he’d lost his soul. The stony desolation in his eyes cut her to the quick.

  “It’s all right, my love.” She curled her arms around him, anything to assuage his cruel isolation. His muscles tensed as he resisted her. She tightened her embrace. “It’s over. It’s over.”

  For a long moment, Gideon stood unresponsive, unmoving. Then she felt him tense. Was he finally going to spurn her? She was astonished he’d endured her touch as long as he had. She was astonished he’d revealed his scars and his suffering. However he treated her now, the bond between them had become unbreakable.

  Which wouldn’t ease her hurt if he rebuffed her after all they’d shared in the last half hour.

  He made a choked sound deep in his throat. She felt his chest expand as he sucked in a massive breath.

  “Oh, dear God in heaven,” he forced out in a cracked groan.

  Shaking, he lashed his arms around her and tugged her roughly into his chest. His shoulders heaved convulsively as he buried his face in her neck. She felt the heat of his breath, the bruising power of his arms, the frantic race of his heart.

  “I want to give you peace,” she whispered into his thick dark hair. Painful tears welled again. She loved him so much, it was agony.

  “You have. You do,” he said urgently, but the hands that clutched her so hard spoke of desperation, not rest.

  This wasn’t peace. Perhaps peace and he were such strangers, he no longer recognized it. “Oh, Gideon, I wish that were so,” she said sadly.

  He held her so close, he crushed her breasts against his chest. She drew a shallow breath, all his stranglehold allowed her. His head was heavy on her shoulder. His hair tickled her neck the way it had after he’d shared her bed for the first time.

  “Whenever I look at my hands, it all comes back.” His voice was thick, hesitant as he spoke into her skin. “The stink. The heat. The cold. The hunger and thirst. The unending pain.”

  With a hand that trembled with horror at all he’d suffered, she stroked his disheveled hair. The caress seemed so natural. How curious to think before this morning she couldn’t have made it. Just as only a day ago it would have been unthinkable to cradle him in her arms and infuse his cold loneliness with her love.

  So much had changed since they’d left Penrhyn.

  “I don’t know how you endured it,” she said softly.

  He tautened, and the muscles across his back became as unrelenting as steel. “I didn’t endure. Before they finished with me, I screamed for mercy.”

  He was so hard on himself. If only he could spare some of the generosity he’d shown her to stanch his own wounds. “You didn’t betray your comrades or your country,” she said in a quiet but implacable voice. “You stood up to over a year of torture and didn’t break. You’re too brave for your own good.”

  “You wouldn’t think that if you’d seen the pathetic fool I made of myself when they started on my hands.” He rubbed his head against her neck in a desultory caress. The unforced gesture sent warmth spiraling through her. She could hardly comprehend he trusted her enough to stay in her arms.

  “Oh, my love,” she said in a low voice throbbing with emotion. She ran her hand in comforting trails over his powerful back. Under her hand, his scars created a bumpy tapestry, a map of the intolerable tribute his years in India had claimed. She couldn’t see his ruined hands. She didn’t need to. The sight would haunt her forever.

  “You have to forgive yourself, or you’ll go mad. Good Lord, Gideon. You’re covered in scars. You hardly sleep. You flinch if anyone comes within reach.” Her voice softened into persuasion. “You gave all anyone could ask. More. Much more. Everybody in the world sees that but you.”

  Charis turned her head and glanced a kiss across his cheek. The poignant tenderness inside her demanded some expression. She felt his breath catch. She suspected acts of uncomplicated affection had been rare in his life.

  Because she ached for his solitude, because it was all too easy to picture a clever little boy happier with his books than any companions, she kissed him again. A glance of the lips that caught him on the rim of one ear.

  Again the hitch in his breath. Slowly, he straightened and stared at her with a wariness that pierced her heart. Surely by now he must know she wanted only his good. But he’d been so hurt, he shied away from anything that smacked of love. For all the barriers she’d crashed through in the last days, she didn’t fool herself that he was near to accepting he was worthy of her adoration.

  The scars of Rangapindhi cut too deep for any simple remedy.

  For now, he was with her and showed no signs of wanting to go. She intended to take what advantage she could. Rising on her toes, she kissed one side of his neck, then the other. She still held him, but loosely, easily, without the quaking desperation. He shifted restlessly, and his hands slid to span her waist.

  She traced a line of kisses along one sinewy shoulder. Pausing w
hen she reached the top of his arm.

  A strangled sound emerged from his throat. She wasn’t sure whether it was encouragement or protest. She dropped another kiss on the ball of his shoulder.

  The kisses were quick, soft, playful. Like those she’d give a crying child to coax it from a fit of sullens.

  Except she knew to the depths of her soul that Gideon was no child.

  He was a full-grown man. Potent. Passionate. Predatory.

  A thrill shivered through her. More purposefully, she grazed her lips along the vein down the side of his neck. Feeling the powerful life thundering through him.

  His breath caught again. Then he shifted and pressed his lips to the collarbone revealed under her red gown’s square neckline.

  Her heart stuttered. He became a participant at last. She closed her eyes and forced herself to breathe. Her hands settled loosely on his hips.

  She pressed a kiss to his other ear.

  He kissed her chin, his lips warm and firm.

  She brushed her lips over his jaw.

  He caught one earlobe in his teeth and bit down gently.

  Response burned down to her toes, and a strangled moan escaped her. As he bent to kiss her shoulder, she caught a flash of masculine triumph in his face.

  They no longer clung to each other like the survivors of a shipwreck. She’d kissed him to comfort, but somewhere the game had changed into a duel of kisses.

  She angled her head and kissed the hammering pulse at the base of his throat. Instinct made her lick him there. His skin was warm and salty. Delicious.

  She forgot the playful battle and licked him again. Slowly. Luxuriously. His flavor filled her senses. His low rumbling growl vibrated against her lips.

  Dazed, she lifted her head and stared at him. The humor seeped from his expression. Replaced by an intense concentration that sent a sizzle of anticipation down her spine.

  The innocent games were over.

  Danger hovered.

  Danger and passion.

  Time stopped. Along with her heart and breath. She felt as though she poised on the brink of one of Penrhyn’s craggy cliffs. Would she plummet to her death? Or would he catch her, as he always had?

  As slowly as if he waded through deep water, Gideon raised his ruined hands. He set them on either side of her head and tipped her face up.

  The moment held untold importance. It was as if he’d never touched her before. The brush of his scarred palms on her cheeks made her shiver with pleasure. He stared at her, flicking back stray tendrils of her hair with his thumbs.

  With spine-tingling attention, his gaze traced her features. His black eyes glowed as if he looked upon his soul’s desire. Deep in her bones, she finally recognized that he loved her and always would. He didn’t want to love her, but he did. Perhaps he’d never say the words again, but the awe and worship on his face crushed any lingering doubts to dust.

  A shaky sigh escaped her. His eyes focused on her parted lips. She grew taut with uncontrollable longing. Surely he’d kiss her like he’d kissed her this afternoon. She desperately wanted him to kiss her again. Her hands curled into his hips to urge him closer.

  “You’re so beautiful, you break my heart,” he murmured.

  “Gideon…” she choked out.

  Any further response to that astonishing declaration was lost as with sudden decisiveness, he lowered his head and pressed his lips to hers.

  Gideon felt the moist cushion of her lips flatten against her teeth. Then, sweet moment indeed, she sighed and parted to let him in. He thrust his tongue inside, testing the hard smoothness of her teeth, the hot honey of the interior. His heart raised a paean of rejoicing as her tongue fluttered, retreated, returned to stroke and caress.

  She learned fast, his darling wife. Only this afternoon, his deep kiss had shocked her. Only yesterday, he would have been incapable of touching her, let alone sharing this astonishingly sensual kiss.

  Every second he held Charis in his arms felt like a miracle.

  Very deliberately, he licked the roof of her mouth, the insides of her cheeks, delighting in the contrasting textures. Delighting in her response as her tongue brushed the sensitive underside of his.

  She moaned and pressed her mouth harder against his. He sank into hot, succulent blackness.

  He lifted his head and rested his forehead against hers. They panted, sharing the small space of air between them. The act felt as intimate as that extraordinary kiss. As if one life united them.

  Feverishly, he slid his hand up her rib cage to where her breasts strained against her bodice. He slid his hand under the neckline, found a pebbled nipple, and pulled gently.

  “Yes,” she sighed, and traced the line of his mouth with her tongue.

  Hunger slammed through him. Drowning out all other sound, his blood thundered. He leaned forward and bit her lower lip. She shivered with excitement, her hips jerking against him.

  “If you want that dress to stay in one piece, take it off,” he said unsteadily.

  She gave a breathless gust of laughter. She hooked her hand around his neck and sent him a scorching glance under her eyelashes. “You’ll have to help. It laces up the back.”

  “Damn fool fashion,” he grunted.

  Her face was flushed with need. Her lips were swollen and red with their frantic kisses. Her eyes were a deep and mysterious green. Tarns in the Penrhyn woods. He moved his thumb against her cheek, feeling the warm smoothness of her skin, the sticky remnants of tears.

  She pressed her cheek into his ravaged hand. How quickly he’d accepted that his injuries didn’t repulse her. Odd when he’d nearly died of shame revealing them.

  He’d intended the searing honesty to break the connection between them, destroy her foolish infatuation at last. Instead, uncovering his secrets forced him to admit he was her slave and always would be.

  “I don’t want you to see anyone but me,” she said huskily. Her voice was thick with the tears she’d shed. He wished he could promise there would be no more sorrow, but even at this joyful moment, he knew that would be a lie.

  “I don’t.” He swallowed to dislodge the painful constriction in his throat. “I won’t.”

  Gideon kissed her again. The desperate urge to possess faded, and his mouth moved with piercing tenderness. He raised his head and looked deep into her eyes. Her spirit shone clear for him to see. Brave. Generous. Honest. So full of love, it left him humbled.

  He gently turned her around and began to undo the pretty red dress. Inch by inch, clumsy as a lad with his first woman, he revealed the smooth skin of her back. He pushed apart the edges and traced a line of kisses between her shoulder blades. Her breath faltered, then quickened. She lowered her head. He accepted the unspoken invitation and kissed a path up to her hairline. Her scent was stronger there. Carnations. Warm skin. Woman. Charis.

  He buried his nose in the soft mass of hair and breathed deep, drawing her essence into his lungs. Into his heart.

  He returned to unhooking her dress. “I’ll need all night to get you out of this confounded rag,” he growled in frustration, as yet another fiddly attachment refused to cooperate.

  “Are you in such a hurry?”

  The wench laughed at him. God help him, he liked it. “Yes.”

  Finally, the hook released. He turned his attention to the next one down. The line stretched endlessly.

  She flexed her shoulders, and he fought the urge to bend her over the nearest chair and take her from behind. This morning he’d leaped on her with a passion unlike any he’d ever known. The need to thrust his aching cock into her tonight made this morning’s passion seem a mere milk-and-water fancy.

  Patience, Trevithick. Calm down. She deserves better than a quick tumble. She deserves every ounce of skill you can muster.

  He sucked in a breath and spoke more steadily as he reconsidered his earlier answer. “No. I want to show you everything you’ve missed.”

  Another of those voluptuous shivers rippled through her. Dear God
, when she did that, he threatened to explode.

  He rode the surge of desire and concentrated on the next hook. After spending the last week in rags, he could understand she didn’t want to ruin the dress. But if the damned thing didn’t come off soon, he’d shred it.

  “Show me everything?”

  Her overt curiosity made him smile. “Well, everything might require more than one night.”

  Her quivering sigh was answer in itself.

  As though he unveiled something sacred, he slid the dress down her slender body.

  Gideon’s breath stopped.

  She still wore corset, shift, petticoats. The sheer covering did little to hide the glories beneath. His rod throbbed, but he ignored its greedy insistence.

  His eyes traveled down her straight spine to the firm bottom, pressing enticingly against the white lawn. With shaking hands, he released the tapes holding her petticoats. They fell with a whisper.

  He’d never undressed an Englishwoman. Never dealt with such complicated garments. His Indian lovers had worn the graceful native costume. He had a sudden yen to see Charis in exotic silks.

  One day…

  He stepped in front of his bride. She was slender and graceful as a young willow. His gaze traced the lovely curves, returned to her breasts, pushed up by the corset to press against the chemise.

  She raised her arms with a gesture of such natural sensuality, his heart jammed in his throat. A few deft tugs, and her hair fell in a curtain of shimmering bronze. Her scent filled the air so thickly, he thought he could touch it.

  She blushed under his fiery regard. It surprised him how she suddenly became the shy, inexperienced girl.

  She was a shy, inexperienced girl.

  He must remember that. The unfettered passion in her kisses was deceptive. He turned her around again and tugged at the corset laces. “Infernal contraption.”

  She laughed softly as he finally found the knack of it. Desperation lent his fingers a deftness they’d lacked earlier. He burned to see her body without all these confounded draperies spoiling his view.

  Swiftly, he slipped the corset off and draped it over the chair he’d fantasized bending her across. Cold sweat covered his skin. If he didn’t control himself, he wouldn’t survive this interminable disrobing. “Why do Englishwomen wear so many clothes?”