Loving Lady Lazuli (London Jewel Thieves Book 1)

by Shehanne Moore

  It was only another reason he wanted her. Another reason he needed to exorcise his inconvenient fascination for her, when everything resulted in him running after her today and now suffering this nonsense, not to mention agonies about what Tilly had told him. This was goodbye.

  “Lord Hawley, I must ask—”

  “Shhh.” Recollecting himself, he edged his mouth back, creating a tiny inch of space between them. “Tonight I’m doing the asking. Besides you did say it was fine.”

  “But—”

  “And you’re doing the listening.” Ignoring her protests, he reached to unhook her gown, working his hands fully inside, so his fingers splayed her back, so his fingertips touched welted flesh--unfortunately. “Unless you’re still annoyed at me for driving you around and around?”

  “I was beaten.” She lowered her eyelashes, so close against his face they brushed his skin, although noticeably she never lowered her eyes. “Even that first day. The time I returned without the Wentworth emeralds was the worst. Starkadder threw Matthew into the gutter, where he perished. He perished in my arms. I am only explaining something.”

  Christ. He closed his eyes. Revenge? Remember?

  “Then don’t right now. I didn’t fetch you back in here so we could compare scars.”

  “Fine.”

  “So you keep saying.”

  She disengaged herself and walked to the bed with her face set. Sitting down, she fixed her eyes on him like showering sparks burning particles of skin he wished he didn’t possess. Even when she bent to remove her shoes and then began unpeeling her gown they didn’t budge. She didn’t take her nose out of the air either.

  He emerged from tugging his shirt over his head to see she was in the process of peeling off her stockings. Obviously she’d not just seen, she’d examined his scar. It meant he could remove his trousers freely. What was more he intended to, while keeping his gaze fixed on her, after first removing his boots and socks. He had already determined to look bored, to look controlled. It was hard to look what he didn’t feel. But it was written in his cold blood, he was going to win here.

  He set the trousers on the chair, walked to the bed and sat down beside her. Of course she didn’t want him to kiss her. Those lips had haunted his dreams though. He leaned forward. She set her jaw harder.

  “Uh. Open.”

  “Or what?”

  “I could stop you seeing these papers. Or … ” He teased the long length of black ribbon that held her chemise shut. Christ, what was she doing wearing such a thing as a black chemise? “I could remove this, seeing as you’ve conspicuously failed to.”

  If looks could kill he’d be dead, although her iciness and the bored look she mustered was admirable.

  “Fine.”

  The iciness and the bored look she mustered were not going to put him off. Her lips tasted cool. In his time he’d kissed many women. He’d even kissed this one. How the hell was it though, that her lips were so delicious they spoke to his soul? The tiniest brush, the slightest taste and he wanted more. Because she kept her jaw set and her eyebrows raised?

  Easing his fingers inside her chemise, he cupped her breast. Its round, succulent fullness made him breathe his satisfaction. In spite of his resolution to remain unmoved, he was moved. Ridiculous. But that black chemise did things to his head. And now he inched it apart so her breasts were exposed to his touch, she did things to his head too. He lowered his mouth to the soft, creamy skin.

  “Lord Hawley, please, I really must insist that you desist from—”

  “What?” He raised his head. Christ, he wished she’d shut her mouth, except when he kissed her, although perhaps it was as well she didn’t, what thrummed in his blood at the sweet taste of her nipple. “Kissing you here?”

  “If you don’t mind.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m your mistress. And as your mistress I must insist on not being treated like a play thing.”

  “That may be, but who says that I am treating you that way?”

  “Me.” She clamped the chemise shut. “If you must know.”

  “Is this out of bounds too?” He edged his hand between her thighs.

  He hoped not although he wasn’t certain, when his head swam like this, that he wasn’t getting in to the kind of physical debt with a woman he’d never been in. Had no desire to be in, the worst thing being that he’d no desire to stop it either. He slid his fingertip inside her. Just the slightest bit. Anticipation washed over him in waves. For something he’d already had too.

  “Obviously not if I’m your mistress,” she said.

  Damn her, doing everything to put him off his mark. Well, she was in the hands of the wrong man that way. She could stick her nose in the air as high as she liked. He knew by the feel of her, by the hot, potent, scent, he was going to win here.

  “Who doesn’t want to act like it?”

  “You said it first.” She shrugged.

  He slid his finger further. “That’s because you don’t seem very bored to me.”

  “Only because you’re so addicted to opium you wouldn’t know the—”

  "But I do." He bent his head and kissed her. Thief or not, woman who had wrecked his life or not, he wanted to drink her. For pure, warm pleasure to unfurl beneath his lips, beneath his fingertips. For her to want him in that bold questing way she’d delved into that box and wanted these papers in the library.

  “—difference.” She closed her mouth against him. “But if you want I can yawn if that will convince you.”

  “Why should you do that when you don’t want to?”

  “I do.”

  “Well, I don’t think so.”

  He eased his mouth down her body, her soft breasts, the hollowed arch of her stomach. Thieving magpie or not, she was delicious. Especially the way she tensed when his lips found their mark. Probably tried to look even more bored too.

  He smiled. Slowly he eased her backwards onto the bed. Slowly he pushed into her. Christ, Jesus, and all the saints, maybe she was tight, but she was also slick as soft velvet. The feel of her had him close to release. As for the way she lowered her eyelashes? Or rather the reason? She wasn’t as immune to him as she’d like to be, or him to think. In fact he swore he cracked ice here. It was all delicious. He didn’t know about her, but he soared, leaving the world behind, especially when he felt her throb of pleasure ripple around him. Only with the greatest of efforts did he remind himself to pull free and spend on the sheets.

  He was shocked by how badly he didn’t want to. How badly he wanted to gather her into his arms too. How shocked he was that he did just that.

  In over his head. He was getting in over his head. But so long as he got back out again and found dry land, there was no danger of drowning.

  This was goodbye, wasn’t it?

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Having undone the rusty catch, Cass tried easing the window upward. It wouldn’t budge much more than a fraction. Certainly not without screeching and alerting half the household. Had she not needed fresh, cooling air, she wouldn’t have bothered. She wiped her hands down her robe, then tried again, managing to push the window as far as it would go.

  “I’m sorry.” Devorlane Hawley’s voice drawled from the bed, sending a shockwave up her spine. Another to match the several that had rocked it already.

  Sorry?

  “For sweating so badly.”

  She stiffened, fighting what rose in her as she stared upward at the catch. Oh God, did she need to hear him making whining excuses? No, because then she might forgive him, and she’d no desire to forgive him. Not for what he’d done, not for what he’d said. Not for damn well hanging about in her bed when what her whole self, every jangled bit of her, demanded, was him to damn well clear off and leave her alone, either.

  “Oh, don’t trouble yourself.”

  She heard him shift against the pillows. “Well, I am. It’s just … I … ”

  “To apologize that is. For that or staying here either.”
/>
  She turned on her heel and swept across to the sideboard where a small crystal decanter of water stood. “Here.” It was nothing to give a dog a drink after all. “I was only trying to cool you down.”

  Was she hell. And if the icy gust of wind howling around the room made him get up and go next door, so much the better. Gave him pneumonia for that matter. Now he was fevered again—not so badly as last night, at least the bed didn’t judder and a faint smile dusted his lips—she’d wasn’t falling into last night’s trap of caring for, or pitying him. Marveling at him too, that when he suffered so much … it did nothing to stop him making other people doing the same.

  He flicked his eyes open and stared at the glass she stuck under his nose. His voice rumbled from deep in his chest. “Oh, it’s not so bad as last night.”

  “Good.”

  “But maybe you want me to get pneumonia now?”

  “If I wanted that I’d break the window panes. All of them. But if you don’t want to drink it, or you would perhaps prefer a small half bottle of opium in it—”

  His gaze flicked the glass. “And ruin it?”

  She’d no doubt he meant the opium. “Fine. Suit yourself. I can just as easily take it away—”

  “Please don’t. Thank you.”

  Thank? Her? Goodness, wasn’t he the delirious one? She sat down and also said that word thank to God that she did. She might fall on the floor otherwise and that would detract from her ability to deal with him. “Please don’t apologize. It doesn’t become you.”

  The miniscule drop of pity cascading over her heart—the one she instantly arrested--wasn’t his fault, was it? She passed him the glass. All her conscious life had been governed by an immovable star. That she also knew dreams could not be destroyed, meant it was no trouble to her whatsoever to wipe her fingertips down her robe.

  After all Devorlane Hawley was not a man she could like, and when morning came, he’d be livid that he’d debased himself with pleases and thank yous. If indeed he did debase himself. If indeed this wasn’t some pathetically underhand attempt on his part to trowel on his sufferings for her benefit. Men were like that. Have two wooden legs, they were sure to have a dozen. All broken at that. Look at Gil. Look at him. Yes. Hands shaking like a tree load of leaves, lips barely able to fasten on the glass, yet not a single drop spilled, except down his rapacious throat.

  “I just sometimes think—”

  She did too. That he should go next door. “What, Lord Hawley?”

  “It’s that damn moment when I was shot.”

  And that was what, to her, that he bored on about it?

  “Lord Hawley, I’m somewhat tired, and I do have papers to search in the morning. Quite a lot of them, if yours and Tilly’s extravagant claims are to be disproved. I have other duties to fulfill too. So if you don’t mind just drinking that and getting off to bed now, so I can get that window—”

  His haggard gaze flickered over her face. “This is the best I’ve been like this, if you must know.”

  What had she just said? Whatever it was, he obviously wasn’t listening. Of course he never did, except to himself. “Well then, why don’t you try and get some sleep? Your own room is just through—”

  “And so I will.” He slid down the pillow. Closed his eyes and spread himself out. Not before he handed her the glass though. “Yes. If you lie down beside me.”

  She widened her gaze. Widened it fit to swallow the Turkish rug she was in the process of standing up on.

  “I could. Yes. But just because I could, it doesn’t mean I—”

  He dragged the cover up to his chin. “Look, I’ll return to insulting you in the morning if that’s what you’re so damned worried about.”

  “Oh, I’m not worried. What makes you think I’m that?”

  “And I’m hardly going to touch you. Hell, that would be a joke.”

  Yes. It would. Must he sound so insulting though? “And I’m hardly going to let you. But be that as it may—”

  “Anyway, it’s my house. My bed. I want you here so I can sleep.”

  Wasn’t that nice for him? And what about her? She flicked a stray tendril of hair behind her ear, after first raising her gaze to the ceiling and counting to ten. The man was an absolute bastard. But if he got out that bed now and fell on the floor, it would mean summoning Charlie. She’d no idea what room he was in. What if she knocked on Belle’s or Tilly’s door then she had to explain what Devorlane Hawley was doing on her floor? It would be all the fuel required by that fire to prove she was a tinker’s daughter.

  “I’m glad you can, Lord Hawley.”

  Of course, she wasn’t for saying so graciously. That would be a graciousness too far when she was going to have to lie down on this bed. Ruby was right. This was starting to take bits of herself. Still she had what he had done to her tonight, the assault on her senses followed by the assault on her senses, to sustain her.

  Believe Tilly had only told him that tinker tale this afternoon? Pardon her, but she didn’t think so. On the contrary it was probably why he wanted to start again. So he could get her inside to rub her nose in it. Then, just when she felt low enough to crawl ten inches beneath the floorboards over there and befriend whatever wood-lice would speak to her, get inside her. So even now heat scorched at the memory.

  She wouldn’t allow it. She was Lord Armstrong’s daughter. The proof wasn’t in the pudding. The proof was in those papers. And she wouldn’t rest till she found it. Until she faced Devorlane Hawley with it too.

  ***

  Cass ran her tongue over her upper lip. Dry as bone. Her lower one too. As for her mouth itself? A desert probably had more moisture. Of course she knew about deserts because she’d read about them in that book. The one she’d also read about Mysore in. She blinked an eye open. She knew about bottles too. What she didn’t know was what so many of them were doing on her bedside cabinet.

  She jerked upright. She was seeing this. It wasn’t a dream. These things were real. What they contained too. She gasped a breath. Before she could spring from the bed, spring from this house, Devorlane Hawley caught her wrist.

  “No. Wait.”

  She dug her nails in. Perhaps she’d been a fool in lots of ways, but on her mother’s grave this would not be one of them. On her own grave neither. She hadn’t survived all she’d survived for this.

  “I don’t think so, Lord Hawley. Get your soddin’ hands—”

  “No. It’s not a repeat of yesterday.”

  “Don’t have me scream and bring Belle in here.”

  His brows knitted. “We all know how good you are at doing that. But that’s not--. Listen to me, will you? Listen. I want you to have them.”

  “What?”

  “Yes.”

  “No.”

  He’d more than lived up to what she’d seen of him so far. Surpassed it. His arrogance. His impertinence. His bossiness. His eyes, his mouth, his body—oh God, his body—too. But this, this she wouldn’t do. He regarded the marks made by her teeth on his knuckles with nothing like she expected him to regard them. In fact he regarded them as if it was to be expected of a tinker’s brat. Expected she’d do it again too.

  “I don’t want you to join me, if that’s what you’re thinking. No. Listen. Don’t you see? I want you to take them away. That way I won’t use them.”

  He wouldn’t? She lowered her gaze from his impassioned stare, her attention fixing on the rumpled bedspread quickly enough to mask the surprise slithering about her throat like an adder. Losing control like this? Was she mad? She cleared her throat, set her jaw.

  “And why should I do that, Lord Hawley? Hmm? I’m not here for this. May I remind you what I’m here for?“

  “You’re right, you’re not.” He spoke as if it killed him. “I do have a problem. Not, not a bad one. But bad enough. These … these fevers are—”

  “You told me not to worry. You said that in the morning you would return to insulting me. This is morning, unless you’re so damned, soddin�
�� addled you—”

  “And so I will, if that’s what you want. I’ll do anything you want. Believe it or not. I’m better when I’m with you. And there’s no-one else will help me.”

  She darted her gaze sideways. Was he joking? Even if he wasn’t. Helping him would make her his friend. She couldn’t afford to be his friend any more than she could afford to be his mistress. It would mean believing he really had been ill last night, not just counterfeiting. More than that, putting everything else aside, an addict would always find a way. Already he had enough broken bits of her. Give him that bit more, what would be left?

  Do anything she wanted? There was only one thing.

  “Then please take these bottles away again.”

  “Why?”

  She lowered her eyelashes. Anything rather than look at his stark, troubled face. “The lot if you don’t mind.”

  “What?” As if he knew he did himself no favors still gripping her wrist, he released it, although he was still too close for comfort, so she could breathe him, inhale him.

  “I thought you knew something about this? At least the other night, and what you said—”

  She set her jaw. In no way could she afford to muddle this. “You think because I’m a thief and a tinker’s daughter I should also know about addiction? Is that it?”

  “Don’t be stupid.”

  “What exactly is it you think I stole?”

  “Do you really want me to damn well tell you?”

  Not if it meant her agreeing to this. Not when there was nothing beyond what she already knew. She held her chin higher. “Not unless it’s something I don’t know.”

  “Can’t? Or won’t do this?”

  “I suppose that depends on whether or not you bring out the coach and drive me around and around the lawn. Otherwise I think I have made my position quite clear regarding these bottles. Anyway, I do have papers to examine.” Provided he let her. Provided he didn’t clear them away again. “If you want to ruin your life with drink and narcotics, that’s up to you. I’m not your nursemaid. We agreed mistress, if you remember? So, if you don’t mind?”