Conspiring with a Rogue (17 page)

“I’m warning you, Whitty. If you won’t let me stand with you, I’ll stand against you.”

She forced a calm she didn’t feel and prayed her face did not reveal her concern. “If you reveal what I’ve done or where I’ve been, you’ll ruin me. I might as well be dead to Society if anyone finds out. Think on this. If you force me home, I’ll fight you. I’ll run and run again until the whole
ton
knows there’s something amiss.”

By the way Sin’s eyes narrowed, she knew he was thinking, deciding and realizing he was trapped. She’d hit her mark with her bluff. The
ton
already treated her like a leper, and the last thing her cousin would want to do was anything that would make it worse.

Male voices erupted from the other side of the door but faded as they passed by. “You’re absolutely right.” Sin spoke with an eerie calmness. His voice was too steady for a man who should be nervous that he had lost the argument. “I’ll not force you home.”

“Thank you!” she whispered.

The door handle jangled, making her jump. “How can we get out of here?”

Sin shoved the torch at her. She grasped it as she turned to flee, but before she could take a step, Sin hauled her to his side. “We don’t get out of here.” He swung open the door and pushed her into the brightly lit hall.

Her stomach twisted into a coil of nerves as she recognized the steely gray eyes and cynical smirk of Lord Cadogan. Sin threw his arm over her shoulder and dragged her up against him. “I found this little tart wandering around the tunnels. She was lost.”

Lord Cadogan stepped forward and gripped her arm, pulling her away from Sin. “Jezebel, I presume.”

Sin’s hiss of breath followed her.

She nodded, afraid if she spoke, her words would come out as a jumble of nonsense.

“You’re new, so I’ll pardon you this one time. The tunnels are restricted to women.” The man ran a finger down the side of her cheek.

The urge to draw away from him consumed her, but she held her ground. His hand caressed her cheekbone, then slid behind her head to cup her skull. Suddenly, she was jerked forward, and his cool lips pressed against hers. Her skin crawled. A hard body pressed against her back, and a warm, thick arm twined about her waist. Thank God Sin would think of a way to protect her.

“Lucifer, I’m claiming Jezebel tonight.”

Her body heated instantly at Drake’s familiar voice. She turned her head slightly and met his coffee eyes. They danced with flecks of golden desire. His gaze traveled slowly down her body, lingering on her breasts, then coming back to her face. “You smell exactly like lavender.”

Her knees threatened to give way beneath her. Where had he come from? She prayed she had remembered to disguise her voice when she talked. She wet her lips, desire mingled with fear, making it hard to think. “Lavender? I think not. I smell of roses, my favorite flower.”

“We need to work on your taste.” Drake ran his finger over her bare arm and stopped on a small white scar she had gotten when she fell from a tree as a child. His thumb rubbed over the raised scar, once, twice. Had they ever spoken of the mark? In her muddled state, she couldn’t remember.

He pushed her hair back from her neck and breathed deeply of her skin. His eyes watered, no doubt his sensitivity to roses, but he did not move away. “You do smell as if you doused yourself in roses, but the lavender is under that scent. You can wash in my room, of course.”

She looked to Sin to save her. Her cousin would somehow intervene. He knew her desire to stay away from Drake.

Sin shrugged, a smirk pulling his lips into a hint of a smile. He glanced toward Saint Lucifer. “Sutherland has the right to claim her, since he’s being inducted tonight. I’ll bow out gracefully, as should you, Lucifer.”

Saint Lucifer dipped his head at Drake. “It is your right, Sutherland.
Tonight
. But tomorrow night is another matter entirely.”

Drake’s arm tightened around her waist, until their bodies pressed so firmly together they could be one. If she did not come up with some excuse quickly, she was going to find herself alone in a room with Drake and a very big bed, with nothing to stand between her and her desires but her self-control. If she relied on her threadbare restraint, she would be begging Drake to take her within seconds of entering the bedchamber.

Saint Lucifer waved a hand toward the end of the hall. “Everyone’s waiting to begin.”

As the group moved forward, Drake’s arm encircled her waist from the side in a light grip, a lover’s tender touch. They walked together through the candlelit hall and trailed a few steps behind the group. Every few seconds, Sin glanced back, an amused smile on his face. Her heart thumped a crazy rhythm as she strolled.

Drake’s close presence wreaked havoc on her ability to think clearly. She tried to consider what excuse she could make to get away from him, from this place, but she found herself imagining their bodies pressed as close as moments before, but in her wicked imagination their clothes were gone.

What if just tonight she did not just play at being Jezebel to get information? What if she did everything Jezebel would do? Tingles of pleasure made her breasts ache before the ache moved down between her legs and heated her to her core. She stifled a moan.

She wanted him.

But she could never have him.

Jezebel
could have Drake with no consequences.

They came to a wide entrance before what appeared to be baths. The men entered the room single file, the only noise the swishing of the water. She started to follow, but Drake held her back.

His lips pressed close to her ear. “Follow my lead.
Exactly
.”

At this moment, she would follow him to Bedlam if he asked. She could not think beyond her desire. Logic had fled.

She stepped into the room and stopped. Too stunned to move, she stood until Drake gave her a nudge. “Move toward the circle.”

Did he actually want her to disrobe as the women standing around the circle had? The demireps’ bare flesh glistened under the candlelight. Steam rose around them from the swirling water. She broke into a cold sweat. Could she disrobe? If she didn’t, would Drake bed another tonight? With trembling fingers she reached to pull her flimsy dress away from her shoulders.

Drake’s hand closed over hers. She glanced questioningly behind her and met his intense brown gaze. His eyes bore into her. “No, Jezebel. I’ve already chosen you. There’s no need to disrobe. You are mine.
Only mine
. Don’t forget it.”

What she forgot were any doubts about her decision. They fled under the sizzling heat that enveloped her entire body.

Tonight she was his.

Tonight she would lie in Drake’s arms and offer herself to him as she had wanted to do since the moment they first kissed.

All worries be damned.

All consequences be damned.

Tonight, she was Jezebel.

Trying to be bad just was not working out for Drake.
Damn and double damn
. He wanted to be one of those men who could live his life as a rake and never be bothered by guilt or even the slightest niggling sensation of right and wrong. Instead, he was about to break what surely had to be cardinal rule number one in the rake handbook—
never
walk away from bedding a beautiful woman. And Jezebel was not simply a beautiful woman. She was stunning.

That he wanted her surprised him. Yet what surprised him more was how much she reminded him of Whitney, and instead of being repelled by that, he was aroused. He could not bed the woman while fantasizing that she was another. Though Jezebel, with her flaming red hair, painted eyes, colored lips and seductive costume looked nothing like Whitney, many things about the woman stirred his memories of Whitney―her underlying lavender scent, the little white scar on her arm and the way she tilted her head to the right when she spoke, just exactly as Whitney always did.

He’d set out to become a rake to forget the woman he loved. Instead, he was going to save the first woman he had desired since Whitney left him. What the hell was wrong with him? Rakes lured women to join them in debauchery. Rakes did not plan to protect them from harm. He was a colossal failure, doomed to have his name listed on the first page in the big book of failed rakes. His name would be scrawled in large swirling black letters. Drake Sutherland, American shipping tycoon and supreme idiot.

What else could he do? Something was not right at this club. There were men here who played at more than pleasure, and Jezebel needed to be warned before she got in too deep. It did not matter that he barely knew her. He was not helping her simply because he was a nice fellow. He smiled at the thought. Maybe he was a bit of a rake, after all.

The image of the demirep, who reminded him so much of Whitney, on her back for various men or possibly in danger made him ill. He pressed Jezebel closer, aware instantly of her soft breasts just above his arm and the way she stiffened at his touch. He had the absurd desire to chuckle. He wanted her, and she seemed repelled by him. God’s punishment perhaps? He’d been prepared to sleep with a woman simply to forget another. Having been thoroughly exploited as a child, he was not a man who used people, but he had almost become such a man.

The ceremony ended quickly with a few affirmations at the appropriate time to the various rules of the order. None of which he planned to keep. Especially the final rule. What sort of real man slept with a woman and demanded she never utter a word during the process? That was a disgusting rule.

He hurried Jezebel out of the chamber as soon as he could. A few turns down the darkened corridor later, and he led her into the candlelit bedchamber where he was meant to bed her to finally become a full member. He closed the door softly and ran through how to begin this conversation.

Don’t worry about the fact that you don’t desire me?
What if he said,
Although I desire you, I won’t bed you, because you remind me of the woman I love. Oh, and by the way, one of the Saints may have been responsible for a woman’s disappearance, and though I have no evidence to back this up, I’ve a feeling if you stay here, you could be in danger.

He pressed his forehead against the door, listening to the soft rustle of Jezebel’s movements behind him. He could not say that little speech, and he needed to turn around. The words sounded absurd. He’d just tell her he did not feel well, but he would pay her handsomely to lie and say they had lain together, and then he would give her the warning about the danger and send her on her merry way.

Simple. Then he would go on his way and leave the finding of Lillian to Rutherford and Mr. Wentworth. They could team up and work together to find the girl. It had been crazy to think he could stay in England and ever forget Whitney, when he saw her every day in everyone he met. It was time to depart England and put his past behind him. He had to start fresh and new, or he may never be able to start again.

Bells jingled behind him, then fell to silence as if stopped by contact against something solid. He turned to face Jezebel.

Good God Almighty. When had she disrobed?

Desire pounded through him, leaving a buzzing in his ears. He opened his mouth, then closed it. What was he supposed to be doing? He could not remember, nor did he care at the moment. He drank in the astonishing sight of her beauty.

Her breasts were high, pert and perfect. Her waist small, her hips slender, her legs long and shapely. Even her feet looked, well…
perfect
.

Maybe he was having another one of his fantasies, but this time Jezebel was the star. He closed his eyes and opened them, but she still stood naked except for her headdress and the scarf draped around her neck that disappeared behind her back. She ran a cloth over her neck, breasts and abdomen, water sluicing down her skin in a way that made him wish he was the water. She cleaned her arms, every movement of hers graceful and so…
familiar
.

When she was finished, she dropped the cloth into a bucket of water near the washstand. She crooked a finger at him, and his legs moved of their own volition toward the goddess. Her arms came around his neck; her chest, soft and warm, pressed against his. His hardness, throbbing and aching, pushed against her flat belly.

What was he supposed to be doing or saying? Wasn’t he supposed to be saying
something
?

Her fingers stroked through his hair, her nails raking over his scalp in a way that made him shudder. Good God, if the woman did not stop he would throw her down on the floor and take her like a crazed animal.

She tilted her head back and to the right, her amber eyes large, luminous and so much like Whitney’s that his heart flipped. He raised his hand to touch her, then hesitated, suspended by confusion warring with desire. He’d not touched a woman since Whitney.

She grabbed his hand and pressed it to her cheek, ending his dilemma for him.

“
Touch me,” she demanded.
He stroked her cheek, the heat of her skin surprising him. Every inch of his body hardened in response. One more touch, and he would say…