by The Rogue
He was no more than his father had always said—weak, selfish, immoral. He’d done his best to live down to that every day of his life, until he found that it was nothing but the absolute truth.
Then along came someone . . . someone like Lady Jane Pennington . . . who made him dream of having more, of being more—
Which was no good for either of them. Sooner or later, he would fail her. He was quite sure that, sooner or later, she was going to want more than he had to give. She would come up empty, as had anyone who had ever depended on him.
So he’d tried to protect her from that tonight. He’d meant to break her, to shock her, to push past her limits and offend her so deeply that she would run from him forever.
Yet Ethan found himself a broken man as well. God, she’d been so trusting, so lovely, so openly, wildly responsive . . .
Nothing in his wicked and varied past could have possibly prepared him for the privilege and transcendent honor of guiding Lady Jane Pennington on her first voyage of sexual discovery. Nothing he ever experienced in the future could possibly compare.
He was a ruined man.
Ruined for any woman but the single one who could never possibly feel for him again.
“What have I done?”
Lady Boswell rushed out to greet Jane as she mounted the front steps and entered the front hall. The musicale was already in progress, to judge from the screeching soprano currently sharing her talents.
“I’m sorry to be so late,” Jane blurted. “The traffic—”
“Jane, dear! Are you unwell?” Lady Boswell blinked at her worriedly. “You look so feverish!”
Jane turned to catch a glimpse of herself in the entry hall mirror. Good heavens, no wonder her hostess was so alarmed. Jane scarcely recognized the pale reflection with the bright feverish spots burning in both cheeks. “The carriage jostled so.” She pressed her hands to her face. “I—”
I don’t want to be here, I don’t want to be in London, I don’t want to be alone anymore. I want to go home. I want to see my mother and I will never, ever see her again. The tears began to well up inside and Jane was afraid that if she began to weep, she would never stop. She would turn London into Venice with her tears.
That thought brought a bark of wild laughter to her lips. Lady Boswell looked at her as if she truly were mad. At this moment in time, Jane could not swear that she was not.
“I think I—I must return home,” she managed to say.
Lady Boswell nodded emphatically. “Yes, dear. I think you should. I’ll have your uncle’s man bring the carriage around again . . .” The woman nearly ran from Jane.
Jane almost laughed again. Her uncle’s man. Owned by her uncle, bought and paid for with Jane herself, willing chattel that she was!
Her uncle’s man. Such a vast understatement of the facts all but made Jane sit right down on the marble front steps and screech with furious, agonized laughter. She bit it back, digging her teeth into her bottom lip until it was sure to bleed. She didn’t care, she only wanted not to become more of a spectacle than she already was. Several people had come into the front hall and were watching her weave her way back outside. Tomorrow, the town would be abuzz with the incident of Lady Jane Pennington and her carriage sickness.
She nearly began giggling again. If they only knew!
Only the thought of remaining on display for one more dangerous moment could compel her to get back into that carriage with Ethan Damont. At least with him, she need not hide her confusion or her pain. At least with him, she could freely vent her wrath—
And why is that?
Oh, dear God. It could not be that she trusted him still? How could that be, after the way he’d humiliated her—after what he had done to her?
Worse, after what he’d commanded her to do to herself?
And she had done it. Horror swept her as she recalled her own simplicity. She’d mindlessly, willingly obeyed every word from his lips, every erotic command, every delicious, wicked, pleasurable—
As the carriage crunched its way back around the front of the house to roll before her, Jane came to the startling realization—nay, the stunning, shocking certainty—that if he asked, she would do it all again.
Ethan could not believe it when the carriage door opened and Lady Jane clambered right back in only moments after getting out.
“What are you—I thought the carriage was being moved—”
“It is,” Jane said flatly. “It is being moved back to Maywell House.”
Ethan nearly panicked. He hadn’t counted on having to face her again so soon. His groin was still on fire for her, his thoughts had barely worked their way through the first loss of her. He was depending on those hours to get his thoughts in order, to decide what to say, to shield himself against her pain—
Why didn’t she seem to be in pain? She ought to be writhing with humiliation, speechless with agonized shame . . .
He knew he certainly was.
Jane, however, sat ramrod straight on her seat across from him. Her chin was high, her eyes dry, her glittering gaze fixed on his.
Trouble. That was the only bit of sense that made it through Ethan’s confusion. When a woman looked at a man like that?
That meant trouble.
“Mr. Damont—”
A surprised laugh burst from him. “Please,” he said helplessly. “Call me Ethan.”
She frowned. “Mr. Damont,” she said firmly. “There is something we must discuss.”
Although he was quite sure of her meaning, he pretended nonchalance. “I can’t imagine what that would be.” Damn, he was tired of pretending.
“We must discuss your association with my uncle, Lord Maywell.”
“Well, I have to admit, I didn’t expect that.” Shaking his head, he eyed her with surprise. “I thought you were going to berate me for . . .” He made a vague gesture around the inside of the carriage.
Lady Jane brushed that topic briskly aside. “That is not important, sir.”
Not important? The sheer hopeless bloody importance of it had been enough to nearly bring him to tears a few moments ago. Ethan tapped two fingers over his lips. “I cannot seem to predict anything anymore,” he mused aloud.
“No. What is much more pressing is the fact that my uncle is trying to suborn you, Mr. Damont. He is a traitor to the Crown.” She sat back, all virtuous dignity and dogged righteousness. She was rescuing him. It was damned sweet, that’s what it was.
He nearly opened up to her right then and there. He almost told her everything from the moment Rose Lacey knocked on his door to this afternoon at Carlton House. He longed to tell her, actually.
What if this were a test? The black insidious thought, once arrived, would not leave. What if this virtuous fervor, the last hour’s erotic bravery, the parlor, the milliner’s shop, even the goddamned tree—
No. No, it couldn’t be all some complicated net of her uncle’s weaving. It wasn’t possible!
Except that it was. After all, here she was, alone with him in this carriage, coming back for more again and again, no matter that his behavior would send any proper virginal young lady screaming from him.
These suspicions made him feel a bit sick. Was Jane part of Maywell’s plan? Was she even a willing convert, sacrificing herself for the cause, submitting to his advances out of some twisted duty—
It was too much. There were too many strange factors, too many warped players. He could not keep them straight anymore. Etheridge and his Liars? Collis and his lies? Rose? Maywell? George?
And Lady Jane Pennington standing at the front of it all, a freckled, strawberry-blond whirlwind of sensuality and temptation, tailor-made to pierce right through a cynical gambler’s hard-won defenses . . .
She was simply too good to be true. Therefore, she must not be.
So Ethan leaned back, crossed his arms over his chest, and played along. If this was a test, then by God, he would pass it.
“You’re too late, my lady. I have already deci
ded to join your uncle wholeheartedly.”
“No!” She leaned forward, all her cool determination gone. “You cannot mean that, Ethan! You don’t understand! He’s on the side of the French, of Napoleon!”
Ethan nodded easily. “Yes, my lady. I know. I think it a most worthy endeavor.”
“No.” She leaned into him, putting her hand urgently on his knee. “I will not permit you to do this! You are too good, too honorable—”
He interrupted her with a harsh laugh. “You can say that, after what happened tonight?”
“Ethan, listen to me. Uncle Harold cannot—must not—succeed! You—you could help me stop him!”
Help her stop Maywell? What an absurd suggestion for a Society debutante to make. Now he was sure she was a plant. “I don’t see what you are so upset about, Lady Jane. I’m sure your uncle has provided you with an appropriate future in Josephine’s court.” Now he was simply taking cynical pleasure in baiting her—but a bloke needed to take his pleasure where he could.
She sat back, her face the very picture of disappointed confusion. “I know you don’t really want to do this,” she said, her voice husky with frustration. “I know this. I must make you see . . .”
Abruptly, Ethan wearied of the entire farce. “Jane, you cannot stop this—”
In one swift movement, Jane reached for him, catching his lips with hers. Ethan gasped slightly, his lips parting as he began to pull back. She grabbed both his ears and deepened the kiss, her tongue plunging with sweet awkwardness into his mouth. His hands gripped her head, fingers plunged into her hair—when had he reached for her?—and he kissed her back with all the need that threatened to drown his soul. Her arms wrapped about his neck as if she would never let him go. Thank God.
He pulled her down to lie across his lap. Holding her—oh, dear God, how had he ever lived without it! Caressing her—life was warm and welcoming again. She was cool silk beneath his hot hands, submitting sweetly to his touch. Then she ripped his cravat from him and flung it across the carriage. Things went a bit mad after that.
She squirmed on him until she faced him directly, without ever taking her mouth from his. She rode his lap as he pushed her skirts high, baring her thighs to his touch. He ran his hands up her soft skin to slip behind her, holding and caressing her bottom as she ground herself clumsily onto his groin. Her hands roved over him, fumbling with the buttons of his weskit, tearing his shirt from his trousers, tugging ineptly at his trouser buttons—
Then he was poised at the center of her, like a barbarian at her welcoming gates. She went soft and giving, hovering over him as her moistness warmed him and her curls feathered across the top of his aching erection.
The thought crossed his fogged mind that he was a bounder, taking an inexperienced virgin in a carriage this way. Although it could be argued that she was taking him. He let her drop a tiny bit, until her hot opening kissed the tip of his cock and she writhed in excited protest in his grasp. His mind went quite blank with lust and need at that point. There was nothing in his thoughts but the first thrust, the way she would wrap tightly about him, the pounding race to completion—
And then what?
What will become of her?
What of you? What will you become?
He tried to shake off the voice. He would be no worse than he was now, than he had always been. He wasn’t noble, for Christ’s sake. He wasn’t honorable, or good, or even very nice.
Which didn’t explain why he thrust her from him to land in a tumble of lacy petticoats on the seat across from him. With one fist he pounded the ceiling of the coach. “More speed, man!” he shouted. His voice was thick and harsh with unfulfilled desire. Across the short, eternal distance, Jane batted her skirts down from over her face to glare at him.
“Why did you stop?” Her voice was a mere breathless gasp.
“Repair yourself,” he growled.
She tried to wriggle into an indignant pose while tugging her bodice back to decency. It didn’t work at all. She ended up slipping to the floor, twisted in her gown, frustration wrinkling her brow. He bent to pick her up and set her on her feet. His heart pounded at the heady scent of her readied body and the gleam of humiliated tears in her eyes. God help him, she was so damn sweet.
Too good for him by half.
He set her to rights with experienced hands, even pinning her mantle back over her shoulders, and plunked her into the opposite seat, as far from him as the carriage would allow. Not that it would matter. The distance between them was so great that he could never cross it, not truly. Making love to her would only ensure that she would be cast from her own future.
“I am too . . . disadvantageous for you,” he said, forcing his voice to easy conversation level. His casual tone surprised her, he could see. The carriage was nearly at their destination. He must make it good and permanent this time. “I am too everything for you, Lady Jane Pennington,” he continued, infusing his voice with a jaded drawl. “Too experienced, too world-weary, far, far too decadent in my tastes. You are delightful in your way, there is no doubt. Anything fresh and young is enjoyable, for a short while. But now your continued importuning is only embarrassing us both. My loyalty is quite unswerving, I assure you.” That might even be true, if he could ever pinpoint just where that loyalty lay.
She was staring at him, her eyes wide in the uneven gleam from the swaying lanterns hung outside the carriage. It twisted within him that he had hurt her, that he must continue to hurt her and drive her away.
They arrived at their destination at that moment. Ethan was grateful, for the clatter and upset involving disembarking would surely drown out the way his body still hummed with wanting her. She looked away from him at last, her gaze going out the window to see that the carriage once more stood before her uncle’s home.
Her front door was open, casting a golden pathway down the marble steps for her. A manservant came to open the carriage door for her with a bow. There was little she could do to argue with him now, he’d ensured that. Her head bowed with apparent resignation, Jane pulled the hood of her mantle up to cover her hair and wrapped it tightly around her to hide her disarray. Then she stood to give one hand to the man waiting for her.
Ethan let go a soundless sigh of relief. She was going, taking away her tempting self and taking with her all the painful dreams of an impossible future that she inspired.
Then one small hand reached back to take his in an iron grip and he looked up into her hooded face. Her eyes gleamed over a small predatory smile. “Don’t underestimate me, Ethan Damont,” she whispered fiercely.
Then she was gone in a flutter of dark blue wool. The golden doorway closed on him, the carriage began to move—and Ethan sat there, cradling the feel of her warm, determined handclasp tightly in his fist.
Chapter Seventeen
The man sat before the fire again. This time he leaned forward with his elbows on his knees, gazing into the coals as if seeking an answer there.
The gambler was becoming unpredictable. Could the fellow maintain his focus long enough to finish the task at hand, or would it be better to sacrifice that particular chessman and begin again?
It would be difficult to find another operative with the gambler’s particular mix of skills and social level. Difficult, but not impossible.
Yet a great deal of time and effort had gone into the present game. All of that would go to waste if the gambler had to be dealt with before the strategy came to fruition.
The man closed his eyes for a moment to rest them from the dull glare of the coals. He’d been so sure the gambler would succeed—and the fellow might yet do so.
Many things teetered in the balance—a great load for one morally fragile man to bear. The danger could be eliminated in a single move.
It seemed a final test was in order. A test that would tell, once and for all, the steadfastness of the gambler.
And if he failed . . .
Well, that was the nature of the business. The fates of nations overru
led the destinies of mere mortal men. The game was worth more than the sum of its pieces.
Fortunately, the gambler would never see it coming.
Ethan hadn’t made it out of the circular drive before the carriage was stopped. The door opened and Lord Maywell himself stuck his bushy white head inside, ruddy and out of breath.
“Damont, there is a problem.”
When the housemaid came to tell her that her uncle wished to see her in his study, a flutter went through Jane’s stomach. She’d thought she had managed to cover her disheveled state when she had come in.
After pleading sudden illness, she had escaped to her room and had already changed from her evening gown to an older, soft muslin. She felt as though she were a completely different person than the girl who had left the house those few hours ago. Such heat. She never knew she bore such fire within her. It confused and delighted her at once. Her thoughts were still too jumbled and chaotic to sort through. She had hoped she could avoid seeing any of the family for a while, especially her uncle.
The ruthless gleam that sometimes came into her uncle’s eyes shimmered before her as she descended the stair. The unease did not dissipate at the sight of her aunt and cousins lining the hall to her uncle’s office.
Her aunt did not meet her eyes as she walked slowly by her. Serena was the only one who could not look away. Jane’s youngest cousin glared at her with hot betrayal in her tear-reddened eyes.
They are angry with me, she realized. How could they know—
Had Mr. Damont told all? Her stomach churned. Even after everything, she would not have thought it of him.
For some reason, Serena’s fury upset Jane more than the thought of her uncle’s reaction. She’d never had sisters, never had girls close to her own age to grow up with, and now she never would.
Then the study door was before her. A whisper of silk sounded behind her. She looked over her shoulder. Her aunt and cousins were gone.
