Hazel’s lips tightened, her countenance a study in disapproval. “Winchelsea will not be pleased by this development. But it will be as you wish. I will take my leave of you so you can prepare yourself for whatever it is you must do.”
She bit her lip as she watched Hazel go, staving off an unwanted rush of emotion. The door had scarcely clicked shut when she tore open the seal on the envelope and extracted a thick, folded sheet of paper.
The letter was written in bold, masculine scrawl, which suited him. She had never seen his hand before, but she thought she would have recognized it anywhere, without knowing it had been his. A tremble passed through her as she began to read.
Darling Johanna,
Keeping my involvement with the Home Office a secret from you will forever be one of my everlasting sorrows. I have but a few in this life. The first was losing my wife, whom I loved. My second was lying to you, whom I love.
My third was losing you.
Please accept this, the very least I owe you. Perhaps one day, you will forgive me. On that day, know that I will be waiting. I will wait for you, and I will never stop loving you.
Be safe, be happy, and be well.
Ever yours,
Winchelsea
P.S. If you will not accept this gift for yourself, perhaps you might put it to good use at the orphanage you spoke of visiting, back in New York City.
Along with the letter was a note for five thousand pounds. It fluttered to the floor from fingers that had suddenly gone nerveless. She closed her eyes against an unwanted rush of longing and a flood of tears.
He had remembered the orphanage. He claimed to love her still. That he would always love her. A great, shuddering sob wracked her. And God help her, she wanted to believe him. She wanted to believe those words, in conjunction with everything Hazel had just told her.
How difficult it was to remain strong. To keep him at bay. But she knew she must.
She folded the letter and placed it back inside the envelope, but not before tracing her finger over the words he had written. Not before tears slid from her eyes, leaving hot trails down her cheeks. Pressing a hand to her mouth to stifle her sobs, she allowed herself to sink to the floor.
Allowed herself to mourn what had been, what could never be. Allowed herself to mourn the pieces of her heart the Duke of Winchelsea would always own. She clenched the envelope, and she wept for everything she had lost.
And when her tears at last dried, she rose again, placing the five thousand pound note back in the envelope alongside Felix’s letter. She had lost their wager, and she did not want his five thousand pounds. He had won the bet, through fair means or foul.
But she was going to keep the money, she decided. And she was going to send it all back to the orphanage in honor of two little girls who had stolen her heart as well.
Pearl and Verity.
Chapter Seventeen
There were nights when the crowd’s energy infused Johanna with zeal.
Tonight, her fifth night back as Miranda after her unexpected absence, was one of those nights.
Beneath the glow of the limelight, she was hot and uncomfortable in her costume, and yet she felt vibrant and alive. Thankfully, Mr. Saville’s theater employed electric lights rather than the hot and odorous gaslight so many theaters still used. She and the actor who played Prospero had the audience coming to life. The sound effects of thunder rolling and crashing waves had seemed heightened, and the stage had been a place of awe.
Perhaps it was everything she had endured in the last week that had changed her. Perhaps it was the magic of the evening and the crowd. Perhaps it was love, which had been so long absent from her life, that made the difference. Whatever the cause, when she made her way to her dressing room to change following her final scene, she knew she had just delivered one of the greatest performances of her life.
She also knew she would never stop loving Felix.
It had taken her some time to settle back into her routine.
The door to her dressing room clicked closed behind her, and it was as if time had not passed since the last day she had first shed her costume within its walls. And yet, everything had changed. She had changed.
It might have been a lifetime ago.
But she could not dwell upon that now. Did not dare. For if she lingered too long upon her thoughts, she would unravel faster than a ball of twine. And she could not afford to unravel now. She had come too far, had worked too hard. She was an actress by trade, and by God, she would continue carrying on, just as she always had.
Johanna set to work on the thick paints on her face, scrubbing them away with water and soap. There was a knock on her door, which she presumed to be Jenny coming to aid her with the tapes in the back of her costume.
“Enter,” she called out, dabbing at her face with a towel to dry it.
Her back was to the door, but the moment it opened, the very energy around her seemed to change. The hair on the back of her neck stood up. And she knew who it was before the beautiful sound of his baritone broke the silence.
“Johanna.”
It was as if something inside her cracked and broke open. She spun to face him, her heart pounding. Longing hit her with a blow forceful enough to steal her breath. He was handsome as ever, and elegant too, wearing dark evening clothes. There were dark smudges beneath his vibrant eyes, just as there had been on the last occasion she had seen him.
She wondered what kept him awake.
And then she wondered if it was the same thing that kept her awake.
The endless, aching longing for him. The love that would not seem to die, no matter how much she wished to squelch it.
She forced her emotions aside. Summoned up her strength. Her armor. “Your Grace,” she said, keeping her voice cold. “What are you doing here?”
He crossed the threshold of the small, windowless room and closed the door at his back. “I could not stay away.”
She wished he had, because now he was here. Four steps away. Her feet itched to move.
“You should have,” she said, unable to keep the bitterness from her tone.
How impossible it was to be impervious to this man, when she loved him so.
His gaze seemed to devour her with a hunger she recognized all too well. “You were tremendous tonight as Miranda. Even better than the last time I saw you.”
“You were in the audience tonight?” She gripped the damp towel, twisting it in her fingers.
For some reason, she had not imagined he would watch her again. Perhaps it had been easier for her to believe. She was not certain how well she could have performed had she known his eyes were upon her.
“I was,” he confirmed.
She could not help but to note the taut manner in which he held his lips, the firm clench of his jaw. The dark stubble of whiskers shaded it, as if he had not shaved in a day or two. The urge to skim her hand there, to caress him, rose within her.
“Why?” she asked, though she knew she should not.
Though she feared the answer.
“I had to see you,” he said, the admission sounding as if it had been torn from him.
“You have seen me,” she said, gripping the towel harder than ever. “You may go now.”
“I had to speak with you also, Johanna.” He took another step nearer.
Instinctively, she took one in retreat. Her heart was thudding faster. If he touched her, she would be lost. Helpless to resist.
“We have already said everything that needs to be said,” she countered.
One more step backward, and her bottom connected with the sharp corner of the table upon which the basin and bowl of water sat. She cried out at the unexpected pain.
He rushed forward, reaching for her, taking her arms in a firm grip “What is the matter?”
“I ran into the table.” She wrenched herself away from him, putting some distance between them once more. “It is nothing. I was merely surprised.”
His scent washed over h
er, familiar. Haunting. Like the ghost of a caress.
He remained where he was, his countenance solemn. “How are you?”
She summoned up a false smile. “I am well. Can you not see? But I will be better when you leave.”
“I understand you are angry with me,” he began.
“Anger does not begin to describe the emotions I feel for you,” she interrupted, holding on to her indignation. It was all she had left.
“You have every right to feel the way you do,” he said softly. “I understand, Johanna. But what I do not understand is the danger you are placing yourself in by refusing to remain at Lark House where you are safe.”
So that was the reason for his visit? He must have learned from Hazel that she had left, much to the duke and duchess’s dismay.
“I have no intention of doing my brother’s bidding ever again, if that is what concerns you,” she assured him coolly.
“That is not what concerns me,” he said, stepping forward yet again.
It was rather like a dance between them. He tried to close the distance. She tried desperately to maintain it.
“To be candid, I do not care what does or does not concern you, Your Grace,” she snapped. “I do not care about anything to do with you at all.”
That was a desperate and terrible lie, of course, but one she needed to maintain all the same.
He flinched as if she had struck him. “Do you hate me that much?”
Quite the opposite. She loved him that much.
But she could not love him. Could not trust him. Because even if she allowed herself to do both of those things, she could not erase who she was. Nor could she bear to take the chance that Drummond might try to harm Verity or Felix again.
“I do not hate you,” she said, doing her best to steel herself against him and to avoid falling into his verdant gaze. “I feel nothing for you.”
He closed the last step between them, and there was nowhere else she could go. Nowhere to run. She had to remain where she was as he loomed, near enough to touch. Even as every part of her screamed to throw herself into his arms.
But that was not where she belonged.
He touched her then. Nothing but his fingertips on her chin, holding her still and in his thrall. “Look me in the eye when you tell me you feel nothing at all for me, Johanna.”
He forgot she was an actress. And it did indeed require all the skills she had honed in her years on the stage to hold his gaze. “I care nothing for you, Your Grace.”
“Kiss me,” he said.
His demand had the opposite effect of what it should. Heat pooled low in her belly, an ache beginning in her core and radiating throughout her entire body.
“Why do you hesitate?” he asked. “Perhaps you are not as unaffected as you claim.”
“I am,” she insisted, but the words left her as little more than a whisper, and when he cupped her cheek, she closed her eyes and could not resist nuzzling his big, warm palm.
How right he still felt.
How beloved.
Damn him, and damn her heart too. Damn her foolish, traitorous body. Damn Theo Saville for allowing him into the theater. Damn her for not leaving the dressing room the moment she had turned around and seen him.
“Kiss me, Johanna,” he urged, his voice a decadent rumble pouring over her like warm honey. “Kiss me and show me how unmoved you are. Show me there was never anything between us, that everything we shared, the love I have for you, is meaningless.”
Her eyes flew open, and she cried out with all the misery teeming in the depths of her soul. Because she could not do it. Her skills as an actress could not carry her that far. And neither could she resist him for another moment more.
The towel she had been clutching as if it were a shield fell from her fingers, unheeded, to the floor. She stepped toward him, into him, and then her arms were wrapping around his neck, and he was holding her tighter than he had ever held her before, and his lips were hard and fast on hers. This kiss was bittersweet, their mouths clinging and melding as naturally as always.
But there was a desperation simmering beneath.
She forgot all the reasons why she should not be opening her mouth to his questing tongue. Why she should not taste him, kiss him back, why she should not hold him to her as if she feared the second she would have to let him go again. She forgot she was not supposed to love him.
In those wild, frenzied moments of unbridled passion, she was once more his, and he was hers. Nothing and no one could tear them apart. Or at least, that was what she fooled herself into believing.
Having Johanna back in his arms was like seeing the sun again after being trapped in a windowless dungeon all the days they had been apart. Her lips were soft and responsive beneath his, her fingers tunneling in his hair. He could taste the urgency in her kiss. Could feel her body’s response through the flimsy costume she had worn as Miranda.
Her curves melted into him. The soft, breathy sound she made deep in her throat told him she was every bit as starved for him as he was for her. Gratitude unfurled within him, alongside a bolt of desire so powerful, his cock went instantly erect and his ballocks drew up tight. The need to be inside her was overwhelming.
He had not intended any of this when he had sought her out this evening.
He had told himself, of course, he should stay away from her. Give her the distance she so obviously wanted. His missive to her had gone unanswered, and he had heard not a word from her in each of the days since. Six days. He had counted them.
Almost an entire week.
The only fate worse than six days without Johanna was the prospect of a lifetime without her, which seemed increasingly likely with each day that had passed. He would have waited longer. He would have kept his distance, he told himself now as he kissed down the smooth, creamy column of her throat. He found the hollow at the base where her pulse fluttered a rapid staccato against his lips.
She was as affected as he was, and he knew it.
She knew it too, even if she despised herself for her weakness.
But then Arden had come to him, earlier that day, with word that Drummond McKenna was believed to be in London. Double agents in New York had confirmed the news to the Special League, and though Felix had resigned his position, Arden was a loyal friend who knew what the possibility of her brother being in London would mean for Johanna.
Felix had gone to the Crown and Thorn immediately, only to find the production about to begin for the evening. And so, he had watched Johanna perform once more. The pleasure he took in her undeniable talent had distracted him from his purpose.
That was his excuse for the reaction he had to sitting in the audience and witnessing her grand command of the stage. He had been, once more, in awe of her. He had never seen another actress like her.
He could still hear clearly the raw emotion in her voice when she had called out How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world that has such people in’t! And oh, how he had yearned for the brave new world of which she spoke, one with her in it.
He still yearned for it now.
But he yearned for something else. Something deeper. Something true.
“You want me,” he accused against her skin, tasting her there. Roses and sweet orange.
She swallowed. “Yes.”
The susurrus of her affirmation lit a new fire within him.
He wanted her too. Needed her, in fact. Had to have her.
How he had gone six days without seeing her was a mystery to him. He was going to make up for the lost time now. It did not matter that they were in a dark, almost airless space. That anyone could interrupt them at any moment. It did not matter that she had told him to go, that she claimed to have no feelings for him. Not even his reasons for seeking her out mattered.
All that did matter was the truth of the desire they shared.
They could worry about the rest later. First, the passion between them needed to be answered. Right here, right now.
He dragged
his mouth from her beautiful skin with only the greatest exertion of control. Looked down into her upturned face. She was pale, her skin flushed pink from the makeup she had scrubbed from her skin. Her lips were full and dark from their kisses, her eyes glazed, her pupils wide. Somehow, the loose chignon she had worn her hair in for the final scene had begun to come undone.
Golden tendrils curled over her forehead, framed her face.
And what he saw when he searched her face gave him hope.
“Tell me to go now,” he said.
Her lips parted.
Not a sound emerged.
He slid a hand from her waist to her breast, cupping it through the layers of her costume. She was not the innocent Miranda now, but Johanna, his lover. The soft weight of her breast in his hand almost took his breath, sending a sharp arrow of lust to his groin. He squeezed gently, damning the barrier of her corset.
“You want this,” he told her.
Still, she remained silent, saying nothing.
But she did not push away from him as she could have at any moment. Rather, her eyes dipped to his mouth.
“Say something,” he begged.
Because he was not above begging. Not when it came to this woman.
“Stay,” she said.
Not a confession. Not a lowering of her guard. But it was something.
And that lone word turned the fires inside him into an inferno.
He couldn’t speak. All he could do was act. He claimed her mouth again. This kiss was not slow, not a seduction. It was a possession. He slanted his lips over hers, kissing her as he had never kissed another. He kissed her as if he could brand her with his lips and tongue alone. Kissed her so she would never forget him, as long as she lived, no matter where she roamed.
If this was to be their final goodbye, he was going to make it worth every moment.
He devoured her mouth, his hands traveling over her curves in worshipful awe. The tiny room was cramped, sparsely furnished. In his whirling mind, he decided upon the table over the lone chair.
He moved them as one, kissing her, nipping her. He used his tongue, his teeth. And she was every bit as ferocious in her reaction to him. Her nails raked at his back. Her teeth bit into his bottom lip.
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