by Anna Bradley
At last he tore his mouth away, but before she had time to sigh a protest he wrapped his hands around her back to arch her body into his. He bent his head to tease his tongue into the hollow at her throat, his mouth wide open and desperate against her flesh. “Lie back,” he murmured, his voice hoarse, his breath heaving in and out of his chest. He eased her down so she half reclined against the seat. He pulled away from her, his eyes glittering. “Are you pretending now?”
She shook her head once. “No.”
He looked down at her with half-closed eyes. “Don’t ever pretend with me. Don’t ever hide from me again. Promise it.”
Promise it. Her last defense stripped away. If she made him a promise she’d keep it, and yet she didn’t hesitate, but held out her arms to him—not to Captain West, but to Julian. “I—I promise.”
He closed his eyes for a moment, his long lashes dark against his cheeks; then he slid his hands under her skirts. He opened his eyes so he could watch her face as hands moved up her stocking-clad legs until he reached the bow on her garter. He toyed with the ribbon, then slid his fingers behind her knees to stroke the pale skin there.
She sighed, but when her eyes began to drift closed, his fingers tightened on her. “I need you to look at me, Charlotte.”
She opened her eyes and watched as he leaned forward and pressed his open mouth against the bare, hot skin of her thigh. “So sweet.” He darted his tongue under the edge of her stocking, uttering a low, harsh growl of triumph when her back arched sharply at the caress. “Even sweeter than I remember.”
Oh God, she remembered too, the feel of his hands feathering over her skin, touching her everywhere, his mouth devouring, ravenous. She cried out as he nipped lightly at her, her thighs parting as he worried her soft flesh with his teeth, then sucked the abraded skin into his mouth to soothe the bite.
“Yes. Open for me.” His hands slid higher, higher, until his fingertips brushed the soft curls between her thighs. She threw her head back against the cushioned bench, another cry escaping her lips as he parted her folds and dragged one finger gently up her damp center, lingering to circle the tender bud that leapt to meet his touch.
He made a hoarse sound in his throat, part groan and part protest. “Don’t look away.” He took her chin between the fingers of one hand to hold her face still even as he worked her with the other, his skilled touch so perfect against her swollen flesh. “I need to see your face when I touch you.”
His eyes met hers and held them as he probed delicately for her opening. She gasped as he slid one long finger inside her. “Do you feel me inside you, Charlotte?” The words rushed through his lips on a strangled breath. He dipped his head to kiss the insides of her knees, first one and then the other, but his dark gaze never left her face.
Her own voice emerged a choked whisper. “Yes.”
He slid a second finger inside her and began to thrust gently, his thumb still circling lazily. “Will you come for me?”
Ah God, she would, she would do anything he asked of her. “Yes.” Her hips rose in rhythm with his strokes, but her eyes never left his. “Please, Julian…”
A high flush of color stained his cheekbones and his chest heaved with his panting breaths. He released her chin to flick open the buttons on his falls. “Now, sweetheart. Let me see you…”
Charlotte arched against his hand as the ache between her legs began to pull tight, tighter, her lower belly clenching into that delicious tension, and oh, it had been so long since she’d been stroked this way, and yet the feeling was familiar still, and Julian too, above her, as if he’d never left her, as if no time had passed with so much despair between them, his dark eyes intense on her face and his whispered pleas in her ear to come, to take her pleasure—
A low, keening wail broke free from her lips as she shuddered into a devastating release, her body convulsing in waves around his fingers. He moved them inside her as she rode an endless climax, then slowed his thrusts as her taut spine went limp against the bench beneath her.
She lay for a long, quiet moment to catch her breath, but as the echo of her own impassioned cries faded she became aware of the growing silence between them and her face burned with sudden embarrassment. Oh God, she’d cried out for him, begged him, parted her thighs for him, and he…
She threw her arm over her eyes, but Julian leaned over her and moved it away. “No. Don’t hide from me. Not now.” His warm palm settled against her cheek, turned her face back to his. “What makes you hide?”
Because if you see me, you’ll know the truth about what I am.
She wanted to bury her face in his neck, in his chest, to avoid those dark, knowing eyes. “I can’t—I don’t have any choice.”
He cupped her face in his hands. “There’s always a choice, Charlotte.”
Perhaps there was. Perhaps, after all, it had always been that simple.
She drew his hand to her lips and pressed her open mouth to his palm.
He went still for a long time, but at last he straightened, smoothed the fabric of her skirts carefully back into place until not a glimpse of her skin was visible under the folds of mauve muslin, and moved away.
Charlotte dragged herself upright and leaned back against the carriage door. “Julian?”
He reached down and fastened his falls, then slid over to the other bench, but it wasn’t enough, the space he forced between them, because she could still feel the imprint of his mouth on hers, his fingers against her skin, inside her. She pressed the back of her hand hard against her lips, surprised to find she was shaking.
He sucked in a deep breath and met her gaze. “It’s been a long day.” He reached up and rapped his fist against the roof of the carriage. “It’s time I took you home.”
Chapter Sixteen
“Well, girls, I do hope you’re satisfied. Nothing else would do but Lady Elliott’s ball tonight, and now we’re obliged to stand elbow to elbow with every scoundrel in London.” Lady Chase’s irritated flush had turned her cheeks the same dull red as her turban. “I can’t think what’s come over Lady Elliott, assembling such a debauched company. Why, just look! Naught but rogues and demi-reps, as far as the eye can see. Thank goodness Hyacinth was too ill to attend.”
Charlotte followed Lady Chase’s outraged glare to a particularly noisy swarm of said rogues, who were strutting about with puffed chests for the amusement of three demi-reps who stood in the center of the fracas, yawning delicately into their white gloves. She grinned as Lady Annabel looked over the shoulder of a dandy in a canary-colored coat, caught her eye, and winked.
Those ladies weren’t demi-reps—that is, not strictly speaking. They were wicked widows.
Rap! Lady Chase’s fan came down on her wrist. “What do you mean by grinning at them like that, Lady Hadley? Why, you’ll encourage them to come speak to us!”
“Would that be so terrible?” Iris turned pleading eyes on Lady Chase. “They’re so elegant. May Charlotte not introduce us?”
“Certainly not! If I’d known Lady Elliott would invite such low company, I would never have permitted you to set foot through the door.” Lady Chase pointed one gnarled, shaking finger at the wicked widows. “Those three are bad enough, but wherever they go that Lord Demon follows.”
“Who’s Lord Demon?” Violet’s brow furrowed. “I’ve never heard of him. What an unfortunate name.”
“Ah, I believe you mean Lord Devon.” Charlotte smiled at Violet behind Lady Chase’s back. “Isn’t that right, my lady?”
Lady Chase pursed her lips. “Demon, Devon. What’s the difference? I won’t introduce the likes of him to my granddaughters any more than I’d let a fox into a henhouse filled to the rafters with remarkably foolish hens.”
“Oh, Lord Devon! Of course.” Violet turned wide, innocent blue eyes on her elder sister. “Iris thinks he’s terribly handsome, don’t you, Iris?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Iris flapped her fan over suddenly pink cheeks. “I never said any such thing about Lord Demon—that is, Lord Devon.”
“Never mind that, girls,” Lady Chase snapped. “Now, Lady Hadley, I’ll have your word, if you please, that we won’t be overrun with demi-reps and demonic lords tonight.”
“Of course, my lady. You needn’t worry.” About the demi-reps, anyway. The widows would no doubt be more entertaining company than an irascible old lady and three chaste debutantes, but for the first time in months Charlotte wasn’t interested in a scandalous romp. She’d declined Annabel’s offer of a place in her carriage this evening and accepted a place with Lady Chase instead.
The demonic lord, however, was another matter. She must see Devon tonight—at once, before she changed her mind again.
Devon, then Julian.
A tiny bubble of emotion rose in her breast, buoyant, familiar even, though as yet still just an echo of another, sweeter emotion, one she’d believed gone forever.
She thought it must be…hope.
She hadn’t gone into the house after Julian dropped her at Grosvenor Square this afternoon. She’d slipped into the garden instead, anxious to avoid Sarah’s penetrating gaze until she could piece together some explanation for what had happened with Julian in that carriage.
Those chits, at Lady Chase’s picnic today… When they’d cut her, she’d been on the edge of collapse. Not from shame—the ton had done their best to shame her since she arrived in London, but she wasn’t ashamed of doing what she needed to do to survive.
From fear. Fear they’d all see the scars and the ugliness hidden under the Marchioness of Hadley’s glittering mask. Fear they’d see her for who she truly was—a woman who’s coldness had driven her husband to his death.
The nightmare, where she had no place left to hide, no place left to go became frighteningly real today. But she couldn’t hide forever. There weren’t enough whorehouses in all of London to hide her from herself.
And Julian…
I saw your face when they all turned their backs on you. Damn it, I saw you.
How had he known? How could he have found her shivering with fear under her mask when she wanted so desperately to hide, even from herself?
He’d been so tender with her today, so passionate. Even now her heart ached to think of how he’d clasped her face in his hands, his eyes dark and soft, just as she remembered them. With one touch he’d made her believe hiding might be, after all, so much harder than simply being found.
She’d wanted to give him everything then, but when she’d taken his hand and brought it to her lips… He’d looked so strange. He’d drawn away from her, and she didn’t know why, or how to close the distance between them. Even now she couldn’t puzzle out what had happened in that moment.
Only Julian knew.
But as she sat in the quiet garden with the sun warm on her face, growing drunk and sleepy on the heavy, sweet scent of roses, the truth drifted over her, no less certain for all that it came softly, as if on the wings of the butterflies sipping nectar from the blooming carpet of sweet alyssum at her feet.
It didn’t matter why.
It mattered only that he’d saved her today. Not just from Miss Fowler and Miss Wolverton and that passel of spiteful chits determined to deal her a set down, but from someone far more insidious, far more dangerous—someone she’d despaired of ever escaping.
Herself.
For months Ellie and Cam had tried to help her. Her mother, her brothers, Lily, and Delia—they’d all begged her to come to Bellwood, promised to look after her, to take care of her, but it was only Julian who’d seen her, into her and through her. It was Julian who’d torn the mask free at last. Julian, the only man who’d ever held her heart in his hands.
Her breath caught on a sob too deep to make a sound.
His hands, his mouth on her skin, his whispered pleas to look at him, to feel him, to never hide again—he’d worked the truth out of her with his touch, and it would no more go back inside her than a bird will return to the solitary prison of its cage once it’s spread its wings in the open sky. She couldn’t pretend anymore.
Tonight she’d find Julian and tell him she would accompany her family to Bellwood tomorrow, even as her heart throbbed with dread at the idea of giving up London’s vices and distractions. Bellwood was so quiet and still, just like Hadley House.
She drew a deep breath and forced her skipping heart to calm. She’d already sent a note to Ellie to expect her tomorrow morning, and Sarah was in Grosvenor Square at this moment, packing her things. She would go. She wouldn’t disappoint her sister now, and God knew it was time—
“Oh, dear.” Violet drew close to mutter in Charlotte’s ear. “I’m afraid your demonic lord is headed this way, Charlotte.”
“Is he?” Iris rose to her tiptoes to see over the bobbing heads of the crowd. “Yes, just there! My goodness. He’s not a gentleman one overlooks in a crowd, is he?”
“He’s not a gentleman at all.” Violet looked from Devon to Charlotte and bit her lip. “And you needn’t sound so pleased to see him coming, Iris. Grandmamma is going to have an apoplexy. You’d better go and meet him, Charlotte, before you’re forced to introduce him to us.”
“Yes, perhaps that would be best.” Charlotte gathered her skirts in her hand, but before she could stir a step, Iris’s fingers clamped down on her arm like a vise.
“Nonsense, Violet. How rude you are. He can’t be as wicked as everyone says he is.” Iris raised an eyebrow at Charlotte. “Can he?”
Violet snorted. “I think you hope he’s every bit as wicked as they say, and worse too.”
Charlotte studied Iris’s flushed cheeks and bright eyes and hid a smile. More than one innocent debutante had fallen victim to the heady combination of Devon’s angelic looks and sinful reputation. “I don’t believe a word of the gossip about him, if that’s what you’re asking. He’s never been anything but kind to me.”
Iris couldn’t quite suppress a yearning sigh as they watched Devon approach, and Charlotte could hardly blame her. His severe black evening coat complimented his golden good looks, and his tight black breeches emphasized his long, muscular legs. He caught sight of Charlotte’s gaze on him and a surprisingly boyish, lopsided smile lit his face.
This time even Violet sighed. “Oh, my.”
Charlotte smiled back at him, but her heart gave a sharp, regretful tug in her chest. He’d been a true friend to her, and now she’d repay his loyalty by hurting him.
Violet and Iris stared at him with wide eyes, and Lady Chase began to sputter with rage as soon as she caught sight of him, but Devon didn’t notice. He joined them and took Charlotte’s hands in his. “Lady Hadley. I’ve found you at last. As always, you look lovely this evening.”
“Lady Hadley!” Lady Chase hissed. “You gave me your word!”
Charlotte gave her an apologetic grimace. She could hardly refuse to introduce Devon now. “Yes, ah, that is—Lady Chase, may I present Lord Devon?”
“Lady Chase.” Devon sketched an elegant bow. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, madam. I know you by reputation, of course.”
Lady Chase fixed him with a freezing glare. “I know the same of you, sir, I’m sorry to say, and you look even more devious than I was led to believe. Well, you may look elsewhere for your hens tonight.”
Devon let out a startled laugh. “I beg your pardon?”
Charlotte jumped into the fray before Lady Chase could make the situation worse with a reply. “Miss Somerset and Miss Violet, my lord.”
“My lord.” Iris dipped into an eager curtsey.
“Miss Somerset.” He raised her hand to his lips, then turned and bowed to Violet. “And Miss Violet. A pleasure. Now, Lady Hadley. May I take you for a stroll in the garden?”
Charlotte smiled and placed her hand into his gloved pa
lm. “Yes, please. It’s quite warm in here, is it not?”
“Exceedingly.” Iris fanned herself with vigorous strokes, her feverish gaze on Devon.
Violet tittered, Iris glared at her, and Lady Chase’s face flushed ominously at the idea of Charlotte walking alone in a dark garden with a notorious rogue. Charlotte, who knew an impending explosion when she saw one, began to hurry Devon away. “I’ll find you again before supper, my lady.”
“See that you do, Lady Hadley. And you, sir,” she barked at Devon. “Take care you keep in mind what I said about the hens!”
“Hens?” Devon looked down at Charlotte, a smile tugging at his lips. “Good God. Who is that poor, mad old creature?”
Charlotte returned his grin. “Family. Her two eldest granddaughters are married to my brothers. Despite appearances tonight, she’s actually quite sane.”
“Really, my lady, you do have a most unfortunate family.”
She let him lead her through the open French doors and out onto the terrace. She lifted her face and let the cool breeze waft over her heated cheeks. “Beautiful night.”
Devon didn’t take his eyes off her. “Yes. Beautiful, indeed.”
Charlotte’s breath hitched in her throat. Months ago he’d asked her a question, and finally, last night, she’d told him yes. Now, only one night later, she was going to take her answer back. Devon would never hurt her, she knew that, but he wasn’t the kind of man one trifled with, just the same. If she meant to disappoint him, she’d best do it at once. “I can smell the roses from here.” She took his arm. “Shall we walk?”
Blue heat flared in his eyes. “Are you certain you wish to stroll through a dark garden with me, my lady? I’m not quite as debauched as the ton likes to believe. I’m capable of waiting, as long as I’m not…unduly tempted.”
Charlotte offered him a wan smile. “I only want to speak to you. Privately.”
“Ah, well. That sounds far less intriguing than what I had in mind.” He smiled, but Charlotte saw the sudden uncertainty in his eyes. “I’m at your service, my lady.”
