Fanning the Flame (16 page)

They walked back to the house and Jillian thought of the woman in the garden and the love and respect her son had shown her. The man Jillian had once considered hard and unfeeling had considerably more depth than she had believed.

She felt his eyes on her and a little tremor of awareness ran through her. He was so unbelievably handsome. And more and more appealing. Jillian warned herself to beware. She knew what he wanted, what he still undoubtedly planned to collect as payment for his help.

Ignoring the heat in his eyes as he opened the door, and the corresponding warmth creeping into her stomach, she let him guide her inside the house.

Chapter Twelve

Adam paced the masculine Falcon Room, a salon done in dark red and heavy wood that was one of his favorites. It was dark outside, the sky a spray of diamond-white stars. After a supper of roast quail and oysters, Jillian had disappeared upstairs, leaving him alone.

All afternoon he'd been thinking about her, thinking of the kindness she had shown his mother, remembering her interest in his antiquities. She was intelligent as well as lovely, an interesting combination—especially in bed.

Through the French doors, he could see her out on the terrace, gowned in pale yellow silk. Unlike her borrowed, more revealing dresses that had helped to convince him she was an old man's whore, this one made her look young and innocent, and reminded him that she was likely a virgin.

His body reacted to the knowledge with startling force and instantly he went hard.
Bloody hell.
He couldn't remember wanting a woman so badly.

He could see her outline, Jillian staring up at the faint circle of moonlight glowing through the clouds. The light of the torches glinted on her auburn hair, and a throbbing began in his groin. Beneath the circle of light, he could see the rise and fall of her breasts, tantalizing him with memories of their weight in his hands. Her eyes were a brilliant, cornflower blue, so vivid a man could drown in them.

He wanted to open the doors and walk out to her. If he did, he would kiss her. He would cup her breast as he had before, test the weight of it, tease her nipple until it hardened into his hand. But he wasn't sure he could stop with heated kisses and a few brief caresses, and if Jillian was a virgin. . . .             

To say nothing of the matter of the murder.

He believed she was telling him the truth, that she had no part in the crime.

Experience told him to beware.

He had trusted Caroline Harding. He had even thought he loved her, naive fool that he was. He'd been twenty-one years old, looking at life through the unspoiled eyes of early manhood. He hadn't really decided what he would do with his life, but he had a small inheritance from his grandmother and he thought that perhaps the Church would suit, the vicar of some small country parish, perhaps.

A vicar.
Thinking of the carnage he had seen and wrought, it seemed almost funny now.

But he had been different then. Bursting with plans, eager to share them with his future bride, he had gone to her home unannounced. Since she lived near Seaford, the trip took only an hour.

Caroline wasn't there when he arrived. He knew she enjoyed raising flowers, as he did, and often spent time in the old stone cottage her family had set up as a nursery and potting shed. A white-stockinged bay grazed in the shadows of the lean-to out back, but he didn't think that odd.

It was the sounds he heard as he approached the front door, the guttural moans and sweet cries of passion that twisted his guts up inside. In the cottage two weeks before, those same sweet sounds, combined with soft words and laughter, had come from him and Caroline making love. Adam didn't stop to knock, just slammed open the door and walked in.

Caroline was lying on one of the rough wood plank tables, her apple green skirt shoved up to her waist, her pale legs spread wide. His cousin, Robert Hawthorne, rutted between her thighs, a tall man with dark brown hair and the same lean, broad-shouldered Blackwood build. Adam paused only long enough to let them know he had seen them, to let them see his loathing, then he turned and walked away.

The next day he challenged Robert to a duel, but his cousin refused to meet him. Robert said that he was sorry, that he never meant for it to happen and he couldn't possibly duel with a member of the family. Adam thought he was a coward.

Since Robert never offered marriage, simply took off for his family home in York, leaving Caroline to face the scandal, undoubtedly he was. The knowledge wasn't enough to satisfy Adam. He ached with disillusionment and betrayal.

Two weeks later he joined the army. Anything, just to get away.

Adam shook his head, forcing the painful  memories aside. Through the French doors, he watched Jillian with a mixture of desire and something else, something he refused to explore.

The night before they'd left London, his body strung taut with sexual need, he had contemplated again a night with Lavinia Dandridge. In the end, he hadn't gone to her. He didn't want Lavinia. He wanted Jillian Whitney.

As he watched her cross the terrace and slip quietly back inside the house, he reminded himself that she was untouched.

He wondered if the knowledge would be enough to stop him.

Jillian couldn't sleep. She had always been a person who could fall asleep without a problem, but since the night of the murder, sleep had become elusive. She sighed as she set aside the book she had borrowed from the library,
Thaddeus,
a Jane Porter historical novel, and swung her legs over the side. Perhaps a glass of warm milk would do the trick. Or maybe a few sips of sherry.

Drawing her robe over her long white cotton night rail, she crossed the rich Aubusson carpet to the door. She had just stepped into the hall when she heard a noise in the room next to hers.

Adam's room. She caught the sound of his deep, familiar voice mumbling incoherent words, then a harsh, pain-filled moan. He was dreaming again, another of his torturous nightmares.

Just keep walking,
said the voice inside her head.
Remember what happened the last time.
Even as she remembered how easily he had pinned her beneath him, how his lean, hard-muscled body had pressed her down into the mattress, her skin flushed and soft heat unfurled in her stomach.

Jillian bit her lip, wanting to erase the memory.

Wanting to savor it

He mumbled again and the sound drew her toward the door. Her braid fell over her shoulder as she crept closer, bent down, and pressed her ear against the panel. Even through the heavy wood, she could hear him thrashing restlessly in his bed.

She should summon his valet, Harley Smythe, she knew, but poor old Harley was scarcely in shape to wrestle with the earl if it came to that—and Jillian knew firsthand that it could. She would be careful this time, she vowed, as she turned the silver doorknob and stepped into the master's suite.

Just as before, she could see him lying in his bed, his wide chest bare, the sheet shoved down, lower this time, to a point below his hip bones. A thin line of inky black hair trailed down from the thatch on his chest to a point just above the freshly ironed sheet. She could see his flat belly and the taut ridges across it.

Lean muscle rippled as he twisted on the bed, lost somewhere in his painful past. His skin was smooth and dark, and there was that intriguing, crescent-shaped scar across his ribs that she remembered from her last visit to his room. As his head moved back and forth, wavy black hair curled against the stark white pillow and the scar on his jaw stood out. But his nose was perfectly straight, his lips sensuously curved.

Her stomach contracted. Lord, he was beautiful. Her nipples tightened at the memory of his long, elegant fingers molding her breast, of his dark head bending to take the pink bud into his mouth. Just thinking about it made her feel light-headed.

It occurred to her that now that he knew she hadn't been Lord Fenwick's mistress, he probably wouldn't touch her like that again. In his own way, the earl was quite gallant, though he didn't seem to know it. He was a hard man, perhaps even ruthless at times, but she didn't believe he was the sort to take advantage.

Not unless she wanted him to.

The covers slipped lower, exposing a faint glimpse of black curly hair surrounding his sex. When she'd read about the male member in one of her father's anatomy books, she had thought it sounded disgusting. Instead, gazing at Blackwood's magnificent body, she had the oddest urge to pull the sheet even lower, see what those dark, intriguing curls protected. She wanted to see what he looked like—all over.

That was the instant Jillian realized that taking advantage of her was exactly what she wanted the earl to do. She wanted him to kiss her until her knees turned to jelly. She wanted him to touch her until she was hot and breathless and couldn't find the words to speak. She wanted him to make love to her.

Her heart began an erratic thudding and she suddenly felt hot all over. For an instant, she could almost feel his hands skimming over her body, his mouth moving over her shoulders down to her breast. Then he moaned and thrashed on the bed, and she shoved the erotic thoughts away.

"Adam," she said softly, moving a little closer. "Adam, it's Jillian. You need to wake up. You're having another bad dream."

She was almost disappointed when his eyes instantly snapped open and he shot bolt upright in bed. He blinked several times as if he tried to regain his bearings, then let out a long, shuddering breath.

"Sorry," he said, running a dark hand over his face. "I didn't mean to wake you."

She turned her back as he swung his legs to the edge of the mattress and started to climb out of bed. She heard him moving behind her, heard the rustle of fabric, then the sound of his footfalls as he padded toward the dresser and poured water into the basin.

When she turned she found him dressed in a pair of black breeches, his chest still bare—no shirt, no shoes—his feet long and slim, as elegant as his hands. He plunged his cupped palms into the water, then splashed the liquid over his face. He rinsed his mouth and drove wet fingers through his sleep-tousled hair, shoving heavy black waves back from his forehead.

He glanced up, saw her standing as she had been, just a few feet away from the bed, and frowned. "I thought you'd gone."

She should have left. She should be back in her room by now, lying in her own bed. But she simply could not leave. Now was her chance, the only chance she might ever have. She was ruined by scandal, her reputation in tatters. She would never marry, never have a husband. She would never know the joys of a man and woman—not unless she threw caution to the wind and took the chance.

She swallowed, forced the words she had only realized she was thinking past her lips. "You said once that you wanted me. Tonight, when I came into your room, I discovered how much I want you."

Something flashed in the depths of his eyes. "I don't think you know what you're saying."

"I know exactly what I'm saying. After everything that's happened, marriage for me is out of the question. I'll never know what it's like to make love with a man I desire . . . not unless you show me."

He shook his head. "I don't know, Jillian. I'm not sure you really understand—"

"I understand enough. I want to know what it feels like to be a woman."

A long moment passed. His gaze remained on her face as he started toward her, his strides long and rangy, a panther on the prowl. He stopped just inches away and his eyes seemed to burn. "Are you sure this is what you want?" His mouth was set, his jaw hard, his expression hinting at wildness and danger.

Was she sure? She wasn't certain of anything anymore, not since the night she had been accused of murder. She only knew that her heart crumbled when she thought he had lost his belief in her, that her body ached when he touched her.

"Neither of us knows what's going to happen on the morrow. If you want me, then I want you. I want us to spend this time we have together."

Perhaps a heartbeat passed before he reached for her, slid an arm around her waist, and drew her against him. She could feel the heat of his naked skin, the tension in the long bands of muscle across his shoulders. Her palms pressed flat against his chest, and short, curly black hair wrapped around the tips of her fingers.

Adam caught her chin and tilted her head back, forcing her eyes to his face. "I want you," he said. "I have since the first time I saw you. I can't remember anything I've wanted more than to make love to you."

Lowering his head, he brushed his mouth over hers, once, twice, a slow, gentle exploration of lips. A soft meeting of mouths that deepened into something more. Jillian opened for him and his tongue slid in, hot, wet, and hungry, incredibly exciting. Her own tongue curled around it and she heard him groan.

He kissed her even more deeply, taking his time, his lips so much softer than they appeared, first teasing, then demanding. Her senses filled with him: the scent of him, the taste of him, the texture of his skin. She didn't notice when he slipped off her robe, barely heard the whoosh of it pooling at her feet. He tugged the pink ribbon at the front of her night rail and slid it off her shoulders, letting it fall on top of the robe.