“Tell me, it’s all right.” His voice was gentle, reassuring.
“What are you doing?” she burst out at last, her tone breathless.
He arched a brow. “He never did this? Tasted you?”
She shook her head. “Touched me, yes. Claimed me, yes. But not that.”
“Idiot,” he muttered, but he was smiling. “Well, allow me to introduce you to the pleasure, Claire. I promise you it will be very good.”
Her lips parted. Taste her? So he did intend to do just that. Her heart was pounding now, thrilled at the thought of something so intimate, so wild. But would he like it? Would she please him? And would it feel good to her?
“Stop thinking,” he laughed. “Lay back and let me.”
Her shoulders relaxed with the order and she rested back against the pillows once more. Her nails dug into her palms as she waited for his mouth to settle on her again, and when it did, she sucked in a long drag of breath.
He ignored the sound and opened her a second time. He kissed her, gently, just his lips brushing her tenderly. The heat of his breath, the pressure of his mouth, they felt so good. She relaxed further, allowing the sensation to be and not fighting it anymore.
Once she had sunk back into relaxation, he opened his mouth and she felt the rough slide of his tongue across her slit. She bucked beneath it and the pleasure that simple touch evoked. He looked up at her, meeting her gaze and watching her as he stroked his tongue over her again and again. She twisted beneath the building sensation, her body shaking with it, her mind going still and focused only on his touch.
He began to swirl his tongue around her clitoris now, focusing his attention there. As he did so, he glided a hand up her thigh, rubbing a thumb over her entrance, and then two fingers. The tips of them dipped inside of her and she braced against the bed, longing to be filled in some way, any way.
He chuckled softly against her clitoris, the vibrations of his laugh making her gasp despite her attempts to remain silent. He didn’t remove the pleasure, though. Instead he slid his fingers inside of her, pumping them gently as he continued to lick and suck her.
The pleasure was intense, more intense than any she had found before by any means. It felt too powerful, too altering. She was afraid of it and yet she reached for it, lifting against him in the same rhythm as he stroked her. And just when she feared she would never find the release of the pleasure building powerfully between her thighs, he sucked her clitoris hard and she exploded. Her body rocked helplessly as he touched and licked her through the most intense orgasm she had ever experienced. And despite her promises, despite his orders, she cried out because she couldn’t stop herself. He had taken her control at last with his mouth and hands and there was no stopping what he had designed.
The tremors continued for what felt like forever, jolts of intense pleasure that shot through her until she collapsed, panting and spent. Only then did he withdraw his fingers and crawl up her body. He covered her like a blanket, warming her as he stared down into her eyes.
“So sweet, Claire,” he whispered. “Taste.”
He kissed her and she sighed as the flavors hit her tongue. Sweet and salty, but fresh, clean from her bath. It was arousing to know that he had coaxed such things from her. She wrapped her arms around his neck and drew him closer, lifting beneath him.
He smiled and pulled away. “Still struggling for control? You’ve been given your gift, Claire. Now we must continue what we started.”
Her eyes went wide. “Wasn’t that what we started?” she asked, her voice trembling.
He shook his head wordlessly and got to his feet. He held out a hand and she stared at it. He wanted her to stand? After what he’d just done? Her legs wouldn’t hold her.
But he didn’t stand back and he didn’t say anything. He just stared at her, waiting for her to obey, as he had put it earlier. With a sigh, she took his hand and got to unsteady feet. He drew her across the room to where a full-length mirror hung against the wall. He left her there, facing her own naked, flushed image, and moved to drag a chair across the room. He faced it toward the mirror in front of her.
“Put your hands on the back,” he said, motioning toward the chair. “Hold on.”
She looked at him. “I—”
“Just do it,” he said. “Argue later.”
She pursed her lips, feeling exposed by the image of them standing together, intimate, naked. But she didn’t refuse. She placed her hands on the back of the chair, gripping the fabric tight. He moved behind her, grasping her hips and forcing her to step back a little until she was partially bent over, her backside lifted.
She watched in the mirror, eyes wide as he stepped behind her. Watching as he smiled at her in the reflection, a wicked, possessive smile of a man who knew he would always get his way. And then he speared into her wet and oh-so-willing body with one long thrust.
He began to move behind her, slow at first, watching her just as she watched him in the reflection. Their eyes met in the glass and she blushed, turning her face so she wouldn’t see their joining. He grunted, continuing his thrusts even as he leaned forward and caught the long, slightly damp length of her hair. He tugged gently, wrapping the locks around his fist slowly until she was forced to look again. Forced to watch.
Shivers wracked her as she did just that. In the mirror, her back arched like a cat, her chest flushed as her pleasure built, this time faster because she had already found release. But she watched him too. As much as he was in control of her in these moments, she saw the strain of his pleasure. She saw the power of his need.
He wanted her, and she swelled with pride and power that she could make such a man skate so close to the edge. His neck strained as he thrust into her, his lips parted as he struggled for breath, his eyes focused on her, just on her.
He was hers as much as she was his in that moment, and the realization was enough to push her over the edge. Her second orgasm hit her fast and with little advanced warning. She bit her lip, struggling for the silence he required even as she slammed back against him, pushing for more.
His thrusts became more purposeful as he drew her through the pleasure. She saw the wire of his control tighten, tighten, and finally snap. He let out a roar that seemed to shake the very room and pulled from her, branding her with his release as he came.
“Stay there,” he panted a moment later when they had both somewhat regained their breath.
She froze, watching him as he moved across the room. He grabbed her discarded towel from earlier and dipped the corner in the fresh basin of water across the room. He brought it back and washed her clean from his release before he tossed the towel aside, swept her into his arms and carried her back to the bed where they had started.
He settled her against the pillows, pressing one rather chaste, closed-mouthed kiss to her lips.
“Sleep now, Claire,” he whispered. “Tomorrow will be a long day.”
She stared at him, wide eyed. After the passion they had just shared, the dominance he had displayed, she hadn’t expected this…gentleness. He smoothed her hair, pulled the blankets up around her naked body, and he held her close to him as her exhaustion took over.
Finally, she slept, but all night she knew she would be troubled by dreams. And not just the ones about her lost daughter, or of Aston’s cruelty or of her family’s disappointment.
Tonight she would dream of War.
War opened his eyes slowly and immediately caught his breath. Last night had not been a dream. Claire was there, tucked in beside him, her blonde hair across the pillows, her hand resting gently on his chest.
Time away had changed her. She was harder than before, less trusting, and she no longer laughed as she had once. But in sleep, those changes melted away. Her troubles no longer lined her face, her fears no longer haunted her. She looked like his Claire, the Claire before Aston.
And the Claire he wanted very badly. He would never admit it to her, but last night had
rocked him. He’d revealed his dominance to her, but he’d never thought she’d truly surrender. Perhaps in a way the revelation of his needs had been to protect himself from her. If she were horrified and refused, that would be the end of it. But she had given over freely, sweetly. Powerfully.
Now he wanted more. Which was a terrifying prospect when he knew Claire was using him.
He pulled away from her and got out of bed. The movement made her stir and she opened her eyes, the green stare tracking him as he gathered up his things and began to dress.
“Good morning,” she said softly—warily, he thought.
He forced a small smile. “Good morning, Claire. We should get going. We can reach London by tonight if we’re out the door within the hour.”
She sat up, pulling the sheets around her perfect breasts. The ones he now knew so well. He forced himself not to look at them or her.
“I’d love to go, but you tore my shirt into irreparable pieces last night, so that leaves me in a pickle. I think I would be noticed if I rode bare-chested into London.”
War groaned at the image of Claire as his very own Lady Godiva. He moved to his pack bag slowly and pulled out a shirt from it.
“This is mine. It will do until we get to London and can get you some new clothes,” he said, tossing it toward the bed.
She caught it in one hand and shook it loose. “God, it’s huge.”
He shrugged. “I’m six and half feet tall, Claire. What would you have me do?”
“Not tear my clothes into bits would be my first request.”
She laughed as she got out of the bed, gloriously naked and utterly tempting. She pulled the shirt over her shoulders. It truly was far, far too big. But it also was wonderful. Wonderful to see her wrapped in his shirt and nothing else. Wonderful to see her smile as she went about rolling and rolling and rolling his sleeves so that they didn’t hang comically around her hands.
He pulled on his boots swiftly and then shook his head. He was dreaming now. Foolishly looking at her and seeing some claim he didn’t have, even if he had marked her with his desire. She was using that desire against him. He didn’t blame her for it. But he couldn’t be so foolish as to decide it was something more permanent.
Claire would never be his.
“I’ll get the horses ready,” he muttered, “and ask the innkeeper’s wife for food for the road. Come down when you’re ready.”
She opened her mouth as if to speak, but he ignored her and strode from the room, all but slamming the door behind him. He leaned against the barrier for a moment after he had left, catching his breath and trying without success to clear his thoughts.
He and Claire were about to go into very dangerous territory. And if he wanted to keep them both safe, he would have to forget about any connection he shared with her beyond the physical. To do otherwise was to court peril.
Chapter Nine
Claire and War had been riding for hours and War was all but silent for most of them. Claire had watched his every move from the corner of her eye, marking how tight his lips were, how he focused his gaze straight ahead rather than on her. She didn’t think he was angry at her. But he was pulling away.
Of course, that was how it had always been for them. Her wanting him, him pulling back even when she saw the light of interest, desire, in his eyes. She’d hoped that making love would erase that hesitation on his part.
It hadn’t.
If anything, he seemed further away from her than ever. But was it worth it? Oh yes. Both times he had claimed her, she had been touched in a way she’d never experienced, even in the best of nights with Aston at her side. War was better than any girlish fantasy. And she would have these searing, powerful memories of him, of his touch, when all this was over. It would be enough.
It had to be enough. Because as much as she wanted War, he was not her goal now. Francesca was her goal. She straightened up at that thought and cleared her throat, putting focus back where it needed to be.
“Tell me about your brother,” she said.
She saw War’s posture shift, his spine straighten, his shoulders tense. His tight mouth grew impossibly tighter.
“Jack.”
He said the word like it was a curse. His tone was brittle and almost broken. She cocked her head at the sound of it. It felt familiar. When she dared to say her own brothers’ names, she sometimes heard the same tone. One of regret and heartache and betrayal.
Though in her case, she was the betrayer.
“Yes,” she said, gentling her tone both in the hopes that she would obtain some information and also because she empathized with War. Being estranged from family was difficult.
“What do you want to know?” he asked after a long pause.
She shook her head. “I must admit, when I realized your connection to the biggest criminal in London, I was shocked.”
War glanced over at her. “Yes, let’s talk about that. How did you find out that Jack was my brother?”
“I’ve told you that Aston is obsessed with taking over Jack’s stronghold on the underground,” she said. “They all talk about him a great deal. Aston researches him constantly. At one point, they began talking about his family and someone mentioned his brother. They talked about him for a while and someone said he had once gone by the nickname ‘War’. Of course, that turned my ears up. They didn’t know where you were—Jack had somehow managed to keep that a secret from Aston’s spies. But they said things that made it clear to me that their War was my War.”
She stopped herself and blushed. Her War? That revealed too much, indeed. She turned her face. “I mean that Jack’s War was you.”
“You knew the truth of my identity, even my location,” War said. “And you didn’t reveal it?”
She stared at him. “Of course not. Turn you over to Aston? For what?”
“You must have wanted out by then,” he said softly.
She shifted. “Even if I’d told him, he wouldn’t have let me out. And honestly, I was so stunned, I could hardly believe that our longtime horse master once led the underground side by side with his powerful brother.”
“But eventually you believed.” His tone was unreadable.
She shrugged, hoping to make that stunning revelation seem a bit less powerful than it was. She certainly wasn’t going to tell him she had cried over that truth. Heartbroken for what felt like a loss.
“I did,” she said. “But they never said how you two came to be criminals.”
“How does anyone come to be a criminal?” he said, and she could hear he was speaking through clenched teeth.
She reached out, touching his arm gently, and he looked at her. She saw the pain in his eyes then. The one that had perhaps always been there, but she hadn’t recognized it when she was so sheltered. Hadn’t wanted to see it once she, too, was broken.
“War,” she whispered. “We’re in this together now.”
“Because you begged and practically blackmailed me,” he replied, though his tone held no censure.
“Perhaps. But you know what brought me here. I’m asking you to tell me the same.”
His jaw tightened and he quickened Shakespeare’s pace a little, forcing her hand away from his arm. She urged Regret forward to keep up with his pace and said nothing even as he struggled. She wouldn’t force him. At least not yet.
“We grew up badly,” he said finally, when so much time had passed that she thought he might just refuse to share this part of himself. “Our mother sold herself on the street to any man who would pay. The man who raised us was the man who owned her. I doubt he was either of our fathers. I doubt we shared a father at all. When they weren’t selling her wares, they drank, and when they drank, he beat her. And us.”
“Oh, War,” she whispered. “When did it start?”
“Don’t remember.” He shrugged. “Always. Jack got it worse. He was older than I was and I think he tried to take the brunt to protect me. But ultimatel
y I got mine.”
“And your mother, did she ever try to stop him?” she asked.
He glanced at her. “Your mother would cross an ocean to save her child. I’ve seen her protective streak. My mother was…different. I think she was just happy not to be the one being beaten. She let it happen. Sometimes she participated if she felt it would make that man happy. When Jack was ten and I was eight, my brother decided we had to get out. So he started pickpocketing. Then he taught me the same.”
“At eight?” she asked, trying to remember what she had been doing at eight. Sitting in a schoolroom, playing with dolls, leaning to sew from female relatives. She’d known those not of the upper crust had different lives, she’d seen how they lived now that she was on the lowest level. But she’d never seen that kind of abuse of children in Aston’s ranks. Of course, her former lover had never allowed many children around.
“They go much younger,” he said. “But we were good at it. Eventually so good that a man named Longfellow took us under his wing. He taught Jack everything he knew about being a ‘proper villain’, as he put it.”
“Not you?” she asked.
“Jack tried to shelter me,” War explained, his voice tight again. “But one day he came home and found that our ‘father’ had broken my arm. Jack took me away that night and we never returned. My arm was set and my education began. We slept on the floor in Longfellow’s lair, eating what we could steal. And we both got very good at robbery. Jack struck out on his own when he was sixteen, me at his side. He looked like a boy still—that was how he got called Captain Jack. It was a joke about his baby face, that someone so young would be in charge. But anyone who challenged him soon learned he wasn’t to be trifled with.”
“Learned from you?” she said softly, watching his profile.
He nodded. “I grew to six feet the year I turned fifteen. I became the muscle to my brother’s brain. By eighteen I was the height I am now, and I grew stronger with the years.”
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