“I told you. I wish to play cards.”
“Is this some sort of punishment you’ve designed for me because I left the cottage without telling you I was going?”
“How can it be punishment when I’m being extremely reasonable and calm? I’m not shouting at you or making snide remarks. I find I’m being quite pleasant.” She glanced around again. “But you lack a table. I suppose we can sit on the bed.”
Without waiting for his permission or even his agreement, she climbed onto the duvet and sat in such a way that it was obvious she’d folded her legs beneath her, her skirts circling her. She gave him an expectant look that harbored another dare.
He strode over to the decanters. He was going to need whisky for this. “Brandy?”
“Yes, please.”
After pouring a splash of brandy into a snifter for her and a hefty dose of whisky into a tumbler for himself, he carried both glasses over and set them on the table, only then noticing her slippers resting on the floor, as though she’d merely stepped out of them. He didn’t want to contemplate how much he’d enjoy seeing her slippers beside his bed every night.
Tugging off his boots, he tossed them across the room as though if they were anywhere near her slippers, they would be giving him permission to do what he ought not. As though she wasn’t giving him permission with her sultry eyes and her plump lower lip that glistened after she ran her tongue over it.
Grabbing his glass, he launched himself at the foot of the bed, fitting his spine to the post, and stretching his legs out at an angle that stopped any portion of him from touching any portion of her. “What are we going to play then? Whist?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Four-card brag.”
“You have the matchsticks for wagering?”
That smile again, the one that said she knew things, the one she’d never given him before she’d come to his club, before he’d exposed her to the sort of flirtation that did not take place in proper ballrooms. The kind of flirtation that promised a journey into sin.
Watching as her bodice stretched across her breasts, as the visible mounds plumped up as she stretched her arms behind her head and retrieved a pearl comb, he cursed her for ever coming here, cursed himself for ever giving her this place to come to. She was more dangerous to his heart than the dregs that lurked in the darkest corners of London. They’d use a knife to create the sharp pain that would kill him while she used every feminine wile at her disposal to utterly destroy him. When she strolled out of here, he would continue to breathe, but his heart would be going with her.
She set the comb between them. “My wager. If you win it, I’ll let down my hair.”
As though he wouldn’t do everything within his power to gain that reward.
She arched a brow. “You?”
“My neckcloth. But it stays on until you win it.”
“That hardly seems fair.”
“It’s how the game is played. You don’t take anything off until it’s been won.”
“Ah, it seems I misunderstood the details of the game.” She began shuffling the cards. “Since it’s only the two of us, we’ll play a simplified version. Cards are dealt. We’ll toss aside one. Show our hand. The best wins.”
After giving a curt nod, he sipped his whisky and watched as she deftly dealt the cards, no doubt from all her experience at whist. At the cottage, he’d been the one dealing, the one teaching her. She set the deck aside and picked up her cards. With no place to rest his glass, with one hand, he gathered his, managed to fan them out, and rid himself of the lowest card.
“You first,” she said.
He tossed his cards down, face up. A lousy showing, with no matches of any kind, but his jack of hearts beat her two, seven, and nine. And everything inside him went still as he waited for the unraveling.
She moved the comb to the bedside table. He didn’t object. The pearl adornment wasn’t his to possess forever, only for the span of this ridiculous game. Then she was plucking out pins and placing them beside the pearl comb, and he decided he liked the game very much indeed as the coppery curls began to spill around her.
If only he was as unencumbered. If only he could reach across and bury his hands in them. But she was not his to touch. Apparently, however, he was hers to torture and torment. If her victorious smile was any indication, she knew exactly how she was twisting him with need. A quick glance at his lap would be enough to confirm that.
When the last of the strands cascaded around her shoulders, she shook her head, sending the tresses flying around to land in a wild disarray when she went still. Why in God’s name did she ever pin up her magnificent hair? If a woman’s hair was considered her crowning glory, then hers was worthy of being associated with the Crown Jewels.
“My gloves.”
“What of them?”
She smiled as though he amused her, although he suspected it was his croak that delighted her. “I’m wagering them next.”
And lost them, her king no match for his pair of threes.
The torment began again, with her taking her time to remove the gloves, as though she had all night to do so. Rolling them down from her elbow to her wrist, before tugging on the fingertips.
“I assume your parents are still in Paris and don’t know you’re here.”
“They returned a few days ago but had long since retired before I snuck out.”
“And your trusted coachman?”
“Is as loyal as they come. He won’t tell. No one saw me enter. I waited until I was sure all your members had left. And I know you’ll ensure that your staff holds our little secret.”
“They hold all secrets. It’s what they’re paid to do, and they know they’ll answer to me if they don’t.”
The first glove came off to reveal her silky-smooth skin. Not a blemish in sight, although he recalled the freckles that had adorned her arms and hands in her youth. He took a quick glance at his right palm, at the scars there, saw the ones that were visible, the ones that were not, the ones that would take a lifetime to wash off. For the first time in a long while, he had a strong urge to hide them. He tossed back what was left of his whisky and set the glass off to the far side of the bed.
The second glove was gone, and she was arranging it, along with the first, across one of his pillows. Then her gaze was back on him. She took a sip of her brandy, and he watched the delicate muscles at her throat work as she swallowed. He didn’t want to remember how close that elegant slope of her neck had come to being sliced.
Following the attack, he should have seen her home. Not gone to the cottage with her, not kissed her there, not seen the moonlight glowing over her skin. Skin, that even now, though hidden from him, tempted him.
He saw a flicker of doubt in her eyes, before she took another taste of the brandy, as though she needed it for fortification. She had a string of pearls at her throat. Surely they would be next. Or her stockings. Not her gown, not something that would require his help in removing.
She set the snifter aside and licked those sweet, pink lips that he desperately wanted to taste. But he wanted another taste of other lips as well. She shouldn’t be here. He should drag her from the bed, toss her over his shoulder, and haul her down to the coach that was no doubt waiting in the mews. Instead, he watched, mesmerized, as she slipped two fingers down the front of her bodice.
“I wager this next.” She brought forth a gold medallion and chain—no, a pocket watch and fob—and placed the items between them.
He stared at the gold cover, plain save for the engraved ivy circling the outer edge, enclosing the G and S that resided in the center. Something was wrong with his throat. It was having some strange reaction to the whisky, swelling or knotting up so it was becoming difficult to swallow. Even more difficult to speak. Finally, he managed to lift his gaze to hers, to discover her studying him expectantly, perhaps a little nervously. “You’re going to deliberately lose the next hand.”
She gave the barest hint of a nod. And he knew she’d i
ntentionally lost the previous hands as well, had probably tossed away a card that would have seen her win. After each hand, the played cards were returned to the bottom of the deck. If he sorted through them, he could probably figure it out, but there was no need. He knew what she’d done.
“I don’t get to keep the comb or the gloves, but this—”
“Will become yours.”
“Why go through the elaborate ruse? Why not just give it to me?”
“Because a lady shouldn’t give a gentleman a gift such as this”—an expensive, personal item—“nor should a gentleman accept it.”
“You really think a man who owns a place such as this, where people are encouraged to do what they ought not, is any sort of gentleman at all and is going to say no to your gift?”
“Would you have?”
He gave a dark chuckle. “Probably.”
“A man of business should have a timepiece, don’t you think? I noticed you still didn’t.”
Reaching out, she turned it over, and he read the inscription. “‘To seizing dreams.’”
“You helped me gain mine when you wrote Kingsland,” she said quietly. “Now you have yours.”
Only he didn’t. Not if he was honest. He had acquired one dream, certainly, but another would always elude him. Justifiably so.
After picking it up, she scooted forward until her knee nudged against his thigh, and God help him, he felt the touch clear down to his toes. Easing the front of his coat aside, she tucked the timepiece into the pocket of his waistcoat and attached the end of the fob to a buttonhole. All he could do was be amazed by her expression, as though it brought her unbridled joy to perform such a service for him.
“I can’t accept it.”
She patted his chest. “Too late, it’s already yours.” Her gaze landed softly on his. “And it won’t fray like my hair ribbon.”
So she had recognized the marker in his book. Because she was incredibly near, he plowed his hands into her hair, relishing the feel of silk over his skin. “You shouldn’t have come. Not to this place. Not to me.”
“I won’t again. Only tonight. To have one more dream. To give to you as you gave to me.”
“If it’s a dream you want, sweetheart, we’re going to give to each other.” He took possession of her mouth, a mouth that tart words had often escaped, a mouth that could drop him to his knees. She belonged to no one at the moment, but soon she would. She would belong to a duke, and as much as he wanted that for her, it tore him up inside as well.
So he would take what she was offering and strive to ensure she had no regrets. Surely, a duke wouldn’t expect a woman of her age to be completely untouched. Perhaps he’d even appreciate that she came with a bit of experience. If Griff’s club succeeded, maybe fewer women would fear the marriage bed.
While the duke may never love her, Griff wanted to ensure she had one night with a man who did. But that he couldn’t confess to her. No regrets, no remorse, no looking back. No wondering what if.
They would have tonight. Then he would have his club, and she would have her cottage—and they’d have the shared memories.
Laces were undone, hooks untethered, silk and satin, linen and lace tossed aside until she was bared to him. “It never ceases to amaze me how beautiful, how magnificent, you are,” he told her, his voice raw with desire. “You seemed ethereal in the moonlight, but in the glow of this room, I can see all the shades. You’re as fair as I envisioned.” Pale, pink, and perfect. With a thatch of curls that matched her hair.
“I’ve only seen a portion of you, and I want to see all of you.”
With care, he removed the pocket watch she’d given him and positioned it on the table beside her comb. With much less care, he shrugged out of his jacket and tossed it to the floor. His waistcoat, shirt, and trousers followed.
Tentatively, she reached out and touched the healing welt that had formed in his side and would eventually leave a scar in its wake. “This nearly took you from me.”
He cradled her face. “No sadness tonight. No bad memories. The past doesn’t matter. All that matters is now.”
“That’s what this place is, isn’t it? Someplace to escape to, for a bit. Not to be who you are, but for a while to be who you want to be or who you wished you were.”
“I think it is different things to different people. Is that why you go to the cottage? To escape?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes I go to remember.” Flattening herself against him, she wound her arms around his neck. “In the future, when I go, I will think of you.”
She shouldn’t be here, shouldn’t be doing this, but the way he’d looked at her as though he’d never seen anything he wanted more made it so that for now shouldn’ts no longer mattered.
He didn’t take her mouth gently, but claimed it with a fury equal to that of a tempest that had the strength to destroy ships. Powerful, strong, determined to have its way. She desperately wanted him to have his way with her.
Even if this was wrong. But how could it be when it felt so right, when she was so comfortable with her body flattened against his while he devoured? She could taste the whisky on his tongue, was certain he could taste the brandy on hers.
She scraped her fingers up through his hair, remembering how the wind off the sea had blown it into disarray. Every aspect of Kent reminded her of him. She wouldn’t be able to return here after tonight, because every facet of him would make her want him. Again. Forever.
But she was following Wilhelmina’s advice, taking once for herself what a proper lady should not have. The rough and scarred hands of a man she couldn’t marry skimming over her, weakening her knees until she wondered how she was able to stand.
She released the tiniest of squeals when he lifted her and tumbled them both onto the bed, his body coming to rest halfway over her.
“I used to imagine your hair across my pillow.” Combing his fingers through it, he spread the strands out over the pillow where her gloves rested. “So incredibly beautiful. I wanted to do this that night you unraveled your plait for me.” After gathering up her tresses until they filled his hand and spilled over, he buried his face in them. “So soft. So thick.”
“I’ve always loved your eyes, the same shade as Althea’s, but I’ve never wanted to stare into hers. I think because yours always have a bit of wickedness twinkling in them, as though you’re thinking thoughts that should never be said aloud.”
“Hmm.” He trailed his mouth up and down her throat, over and over, moving along it only an inch at a time. “You smell of oranges. I love eating oranges. That’s probably what I’m thinking when my eyes are twinkling. I’m thinking of feasting on you.”
“I can be tart sometimes.”
He lifted his head, grinned at her. “I like tart.”
She scraped her fingers along his jaw, loving the rasp of his stubble. “Take all of me tonight,” she whispered.
His growl, unrestrained, unfettered, echoed around them as he brought his mouth back to hers and took possession of it as though he owned it already—and perhaps he did. Because when he was near, she thought about kissing him. When he was away, she thought about kissing him. No other man had ever stirred her as he did.
Then they were exploring each other with abandon. Hands and tongues, fingers and mouths. She loved the various textures of him, loved that all was available to her.
Second thoughts and guilt might come later, and she would deal with them then. But she would never regret her brazen move or his groans of pleasure, of want. She would never forget the way he’d looked at the timepiece as though she’d given him the most precious thing in all the world. She would never forget the manner in which he’d looked at her: as though she was the most precious person in all the world.
As he gave attention to her breast, kissing and licking the pink bud that pearled for him, she moaned, deep in her throat, creating a vibration that traveled through her chest and lower, to the secretive spot that she had guarded with chastity. Suddenly it s
eemed to be screaming for release, release that he would provide.
Tenderly, he parted her folds. “You’re so wet. Ready for me.”
He lifted himself up, and she felt him nudging at her entrance. Slipping her arms beneath his, around his sides, she dragged her fingers along his powerful back, a back that had hefted crates and sacks on the docks. While others might have seen the labor as beneath him, the son of a duke, she saw it as his determination to survive. He would do what had to be done. It was one of the reasons she knew he would have success here. He was not the laggard that people—she, to her shame—had assumed. He would make his way; he would succeed.
He eased his way into her, slowly, inch by inch, the breadth of him filling her, stretching her. She pressed her feet flat, her knees bent, creating a cradle for him, and pushed herself up to meet him. Nothing had ever felt more right as his groan shimmied through him, through her.
As he rocked against her, the sensations began to build. Whimpers she couldn’t contain circled around her. Their movements became more frantic, and when the cataclysm came, it tore through her with the force of a great wave hurled to shore by a storm. A wave big enough to take both of them, because his growl followed quickly on the end of her cry, both sounds echoing around them.
But it was only as she came back into herself that she realized he’d left her, that his seed coated her belly. It was the right thing to do, to ensure she didn’t get with babe, didn’t risk giving the duke she would marry another man’s offspring—and yet, she felt a momentary sadness that she would never have Griff’s child growing within her.
He kissed her lips, each of her breasts, the valley between. “Wait here. I’ll clean you up.”
Her grandmother had often told her not to think about what she didn’t have, but to concentrate on what she did. She’d had a glorious experience, and for tonight, for the remainder of her life, it had to be enough.
“He’s going to ask me to marry him. Sometime in the next few days he’s going to speak with Father.” She was snuggled against Griff’s side, his arm around her, his fingers drawing circles on her shoulder while she did the same on his chest. She knew she didn’t need to tell him who. She didn’t want to bring his name into the room.
Scoundrel of My Heart EPB Page 21
