Lois Greiman (23 page)

“Can you promise not to get me with child?”

“Jesus!” The word escaped him.

“Can—”

“No!” Again the single word was released without his permission. If ever there was a time to lie this was it, but he was already shaking his head, already backing away. “There is always a risk. Always…” Her emerald eyes sparkled in the firelight. He lost his train of thought. Indeed, he almost lost his entire mind. “I’ve no desire—”

“Don’t you?” Her voice was a low whisper as she stepped closer. Her breasts brushed his chest, like tinder to his flame, or perhaps vice versa. He felt her tremble against him and trembled in return, though he tried to pretend he did not.

“Lass, my title may have come down a much-tarnished trail, but it is mine just the same.”

“And?”

“I and my forefathers are not known for our strength of character.”

“I am the last person you would need to convince,” she said, and laid her hand on his chest.

Every nerve ending jumped at the contact. He scoffed at himself. After all, he was hardly a callow youth. Indeed, he had accompanied a host of bonny debs, had been with his share of elegant ladies. But it had never felt like this. Never felt as though he would die if he couldn’t touch her.

“Why?” he asked and found himself unable to form a more coherent question.

“Maybe I have more in common with countesses and baronesses than I realized.”

He didn’t allow himself to touch her, though it physically hurt to keep that small distance between them. “I doubt it, lass.”

She drew a mere inch closer. “And is that an insult or a compliment, viscount?” A small lilt of her accent had returned and shivered through his system like mulled wine.

“I fear I don’t have the strength to insult you just now.”

She smiled. He watched the curve of her lips and felt his legs weaken. “Because I might change my course?”

“What is your course?”

“I plan to make love to you.”

“Why?” Did his voice crack? Please God, don’t let his voice crack. And it would certainly be preferable if he didn’t swoon dead away.

She shrugged. “I’m naught but a simple maid. Can you blame me for being overwhelmed by your grand title?” she asked, and leaned toward him.

He caught her by the arms, stopping her movement like some demented priest. “Why?” he asked again.

Her face became very sober. “Because I wish to.”

But not nearly as much as he wished to. Still, it appeared that he was not completely without scruples, for he spoke again. Against his will, but he spoke. “After tomorrow I shall not see you again.”

“Yes,” she agreed, and kissed him.

Scruples scurried for cover. Reason fled like river water, drowning him in its wake. He crushed her against himself, and she crushed back, wrapping him in her arms. He grasped her gown in shaking hands, pulling it upward until he felt her skin beneath his fingers. Someone moaned. It may have been him. He told himself to slow down, to take his time, but her hands were on his buttons, tearing them away. He heard them strike the floor. God’s bones, he couldn’t afford to lose more buttons, he thought muzzily, but in that moment her hands brushed his chest like electrical currents. The feel of her fingers against his skin ignited his very core, burning away every coherent thought. He backed her against the bed and she fell, pulling him alongside her. Frantically, he pulled up her nightgown and just as frantically, she undid his breeches.

But it was wrong, so wrong. She was Magical Megs, not some spoiled debutante. Life had wounded her. Circumstances had been cruel, but she had survived, and now she deserved more than being mauled in the dark—as wondrous as that sounded just now. She deserved tender words and honest promises. She deserved…everything.

So he caught her hands in his, kissing her, tasting her, trying to ease their frantic pace. She relaxed a trifle, panting against his mouth, her eyes closed, and he pushed away a mite, taking in her cascading hair, her ripe, parted lips.

He licked his own and steeled himself.

“Lass,” he said, employing every ounce of his self-control, “I know I’ve been less than noble in my dealings with you, but I’ve no wish to disappoint you in this.”

She opened her eyes and squirmed slightly against him. A drop of sweat slid languidly between his shoulder blades, but he remained immobile.

“You think you might disappoint me?” Her voice was husky, her eyes half-closed.

“God’s truth, lass, I’d rather be horsewhipped,” he rasped, and she smiled.

“That seems a bit extreme,” she said. “Since I’m asking for your favors.”

“Favors.” He tried to laugh. The word seemed absolutely idiotic in this instance, but the noise sounded like nothing more than a croak. “Believe this, lass, there is nothing I want more than…” God’s truth, she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. He throbbed against her thigh, and suddenly he couldn’t remember what he had meant to say.

“More than what?” she whispered, and it was those lips that drove him wild. It was those lips that made him forget that he was trying to hold her at bay. It was those lips that made his grip weaken and allowed her hands to break free. They slipped along his ribs. He groaned at the sparkling feelings, and, leaning forward, he kissed her. She kissed him back, hard and heated as her hands slipped downward, over his belly and onto…

He froze as she wrapped her fingers around him.

“Lass, I…” he began, but in that moment she squeezed. He sucked air between his teeth and tried again. “I would change your opinion of noblemen if I could.”

He felt her attention on his face, but could not seem to open his eyes and look at her. It was hard enough just feeling her.

“We should slow down,” he suggested. “We should—”

But she kissed him into silence, then trailed her lips down his throat to his chest. A half dozen protests came to mind. None of them came to his lips. Instead, he gritted his teeth as she pressed him onto his side and skimmed hot kisses down the quivering muscles of his abdomen.

And then she arrived.

He held his breath as she touched her lips to his erection. He throbbed as she kissed him there, and when she rolled
him onto his back, there was nothing he could do but give in. Perhaps she planned to escape. Perhaps she planned to rob him blind. Perhaps she planned to kill him with his shoe. But for this moment all that mattered were the sensations that throbbed through his system like native drums.

In his defense, he tried one last time to slow the pace, but her hands were suddenly on his hips, pulling him inside.

He growled as he entered her and swore as he tore her hymen, but she never slowed down, and there was nothing he could do. Nothing but race toward satiation and finally, though she gasped on the edge of her own pleasure, he lifted her away to deposit his seed on her belly.

He dropped his head back and gasped for breath, trying to find his bearing, to calm his racing heart, but when he glanced up at her he saw that she was scowling at him.

“Is something amiss?” he asked, striving for innocence, but perhaps it was a bit late for that.

Her scowl deepened a bit, though he would have thought it impossible. “Aye,” she said, and eased off him. “I believe this act of coupling has been well overrated.”

T
he viscount laughed.

“What is so amusing?” Megan asked. Her fists were still wrapped in his shirt, though the buttons were gone and the fabric torn. She wondered vaguely how that had happened.

He propped himself up on his elbow and gazed into her face. “You said you didn’t wish to become pregnant, lass. ’Tis the safest way I know.”

“If that is the best I can expect from the act, then I know an even better prevention.”

“Oh?”

“Aye,” she said, and forcing her fingers from his shirt, turned to roll away. He caught her arm and she scowled, ready to reject him, but in that instant, he kissed her.

Desire was resurrected like old Lazarus. She would have liked to refuse him, would have liked to pull away, but her body refused.

His hand was on her throat, cradling her jaw, and his mouth was hot and needy against hers, but he drew away in a moment.

“You didn’t tell me you were a virgin.”

She licked her lips. They felt bruised and sensitized and longing. Her hands, she found, were once again tangled in his shirt. She heard it tear. One would think a viscount could afford sturdier fabric. “You didn’t ask.”

“I thought I made it clear that I don’t sleep with innocents.”

She tried to push him away. but he licked her lips.

A bestial growl echoed in the room. It took a moment to realize the sound was hers, longer still to admit she had rolled him onto his back and was straddling him like a she-wolf might pin her prey.

He stared at her. Then, reaching up, he slipped his hand behind her neck and drew her down. “What else haven’t you told me?” he asked and sucked her lower lip.

“What?” Was she panting?

He kissed her again, hard and thorough, then drew back, his hands cupping her buttocks, her nightrail scrunched about her waist. His severed button threads dangled against the dusky nub of his nipple. She licked her lips and lifted her gaze back to his.

“What?” she asked again.

One corner of his mouth lifted slightly. The expression was indescribably cocky, and she wanted nothing more than to wipe that smirk off his face. Except perhaps to feel him inside her again. To douse the fire he had ignited. Still watching his eyes, she lowered her head and lapped her tongue across his nipple. He jerked like a marionette and against her bottom she felt his erection pulse with need.

“God’s bones, lady—

“I am not a lady,” she said, and, reaching down, wrapped her fist around him. He felt as though he might explode in her hand, but she eased off him a bit and guided him inside.

From then on there were no thoughts. Only needs, only instincts, only pleasure sought and found, given and taken.
They glided together, their bodies melding until she arched on the final stroke and collapsed with a small shriek against his chest.

His heart pounded against her ear. His arms were hard beneath her hands. She rolled to the side, sated and limp. Time eased to a crawl.

“Lass,” he said. “You are amazing.”

She was still breathing hard. “But no lady.”

She saw him grin as he turned to her in the darkness. “I see now that ladies are well overrated,” he said, and, easing onto an elbow, kissed the corner of her mouth.

“Are they?”

“Aye,” he said and fell silent for a moment. “Where will you go when you leave here?”

“Why do you ask?”

He tugged her nightrail higher. Cool air touched her breasts, but in a moment the garment was replaced by his lips. She gasped and arched against the contact.

“Why do you think I ask?” he said, and suddenly the elegant fluidity was gone from his speech, replaced by a hard intensity.

“I don’t know.”

“Then you are not as smart as I think you are,” he said, and, reaching down, pulled the gown over her head. It slid along her arms, leaving gooseflesh in its wake. She shifted her gaze to his, but his eyes had lowered.

His attention rose with slow heat to her face. His nostrils were flared, his eyes dark as sin. “You are beauty itself.”

She watched his face.

“Educated,” he added. “Alluring.” He curled his hand around her neck and kissed her with slow-burning passion. “There are a host of things you can do to make your living,” he said, and never shifting his gaze from her face, slid his hand onto her breast.

She shivered like a child against his touch, but she managed to speak her thoughts. “What are you suggesting?”

“You must not steal again, lass.” His tone was raspy with emotion, but she shrugged.

“I’ll do what I must.”

“What you must,” he repeated and eased his finger over her nipple. She closed her eyes and shivered. “What you must do is stay alive. Is that not what your mother taught you?” She tried to nod, but found it impossible to move. “Then you must not steal,” he said, and kissed her breast. “Promise me you won’t.” His chest called to her. Reaching out, she pushed his shirt aside. Another tear had joined the others. “Promise me.”

His skin was hot and firm. Leaning forward, she kissed him just above the nipple and watched his eyes fall closed. “I cannot,” she whispered.

His teeth were gritted when next he spoke. “Why?”

“Someone told me ’twas wrong to lie,” she whispered, and slid her hand from his nipple to his belly. Beneath his misplaced breeches, his desire reared its head again. Her hand brushed it. He quaked at the contact and caught her fingers.

“I could pay you,” he gritted.

She caught his gaze as a thousand emotions flitted through her, but she stilled each one and shrugged before slipping her hand up his abdomen to his chest. From there, she eased her palm over his shoulder until the shirt fell away. “So I would be your whore.”

“No.” He said the word as if he struggled for calm, but it did not matter, for she knew enough of men to realize much might be said in the heat of passion. And there was passion. Despite her innocence and doubts, she knew that much.

Sliding her hand down his arm, she felt the muscles tremble and shift beneath her fingers.

“There have been times,” she whispered, barely able to
force out the words for the heat of her own desires, “when all I had was my pride.”

He skimmed her with his gaze, and she felt both hot and cold beneath his perusal. His nostrils flared and his eyes grew dark. “You’re wrong, lass,” he said.

She felt the burn of his nearness, the longing in his touch, but she was what she was. “Then what capacity would I fill? Do you think the ladies of the
ton
might hire me to coddle their children? Or perhaps—”

“I said
I
would pay you. Not some pompous…” He had gritted his teeth and took a breath through them now. “I would pay you,” he repeated.

“To do what?” she asked, and skimmed a finger along the hard-ridged muscle of his abdomen.

He closed his eyes to the feelings, and though he opened them in a moment, his eyes burned, as if he were doing all he could to keep his hands to himself. To think things through. And the knowledge that she had driven him past his cool self-control was more than satisfying.

“Would you pay me to do nothing?” she asked.

“Many men have…”

She skimmed her fingers across his navel.

He winced but finished the sentence, though the word was gritted. “Wards.”

She laughed. “So I would be as a child to you.”

Since they were naked and sweaty amidst the tangled sheets, perhaps he was too embarrassed to admit verbally that that was exactly what he meant, but he nodded nevertheless.

And she laughed again at the absurdity of the situation.

“’Tis not a laughing matter, lass,” he gritted, as she skimmed her fingers upward.

“No indeed,” she agreed. “How could I refuse such an offer?” Indeed, why should she? She had been poor so long, she had lost so much. Surely she should jump at such a
chance, and yet, with this man…She looked into his eyes again and felt her soul quiver. Somehow she could not bear to take his charity. She would rather scrabble on the streets. Perhaps it was pride, or perhaps it was something she dare not consider, the very thing that had broken her mother.

“I’m offering you a way to better your circumstances,” he said. There was frustration in his tone, and she forced a small smile.

“’Tis very gracious of you, I’m sure, my lord.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“And why not?” She tried to keep the edge out of her tone, tried to remain uncaring, but her mother’s haggard face was staring down at her. To love was to lose. Yet the emotions swelled like a wilding tide within her. “I will always be beneath you…my lord,” she said, but in that moment he grabbed her arms and rolled her atop him.

“I believe we’ve already disproved that,” he gritted, and kissed her with fiery intensity. There was nothing she could do but return the fire. Nothing she could do but cock her bottom against his erection and kick his breeches away.

He slipped inside, and she gasped at the rush of feelings.

“Or…” he rasped. “You could pay me. I’m not too proud.”

“I don’t…” she began, and shivered as he tipped in and out. She was panting as she gripped his arms and shoved herself around him. He arched, filling her, and she moaned.

“Don’t what?” he asked, and stroked slowly.

She gritted her teeth against the languid pace and pressed against him. “I don’t have much money…my lord,” she said, and pressed faster. Her breathing sounded raspy and her lips felt dry. She swiped her tongue over them and leaned low so that his chest caressed her nipples.

“I might be convinced…” His voice was low and guttural as he stroked in and out. “To perform for free.”

She moaned and picked up the pace.

“If you’d tell me.” He gritted his teeth. His biceps flexed beneath her clawed hands. “Where to find you once you’re gone.”

She tilted her head back and pressed him in to the hilt, reaching, drawing, sustaining. Their hearts hammered together.

“Lass,” he began again, but she kissed him, stilling his words, quieting his worry until they fell together through the bliss and into satiation.

She rolled to her side, feeling languid and strangely soft. Yet, at the same time, something ached inside her chest.

He lay facing her, his expression somber in the firelight from behind. Silence stretched between them. He touched her face with his fingertips. She closed her eyes to the gentle sensations, and he pulled her into his arms. And then, against all odds, he fell asleep. She felt his hard muscles relax, felt his tension drain, and though she knew she should send him back to his room, she couldn’t resist the opportunity to watch him as he was now, with no barriers, no cynicism, with his handsome features blissful in slumber.

It was several hours later when she woke him.

“Viscount,” she said.

He opened his eyes with a start, glanced around and settled his attention on her.

“Lass.” His voice was a rasp, as if he were relieved to find her there. “I dreamt…” he began and stopped. Raising himself on one elbow, he watched her in the dying firelight. Outside, the world was still dark. “I have been considering…” He paused. “I thought I might purchase a house in the country.”

“A house? Such as Woodlea?” She smiled at the memory. She had slept very little, but she did not feel tired. Instead, there was a sort of wistful nostalgia, an aching hopelessness.

“Yes.” Silence again. Reaching out, he stroked her cheek with the back of his fingers. “Did you like it there?”

“Mrs. Barnes was kind. And young Brady.”

“I could…” He sounded strangely tense, almost breathless. “Perhaps I could hire them. Will rarely resides there. Maybe he could find others to replace them.”

Her hands begged to touch him, but she kept them curled against the mattress and lowered her eyes. “I cannot,” she said simply.

“Then—” he began, but she reached up with harried speed and pressed her fingers to his lips.

“Today will be trying. You’d best find your own chambers.”

He watched her in silence for a breathless eternity, then eased away and rose to his feet. “Good-bye then, princess,” he said, and, slipping his arms through his tattered sleeves, he pulled on his breeches. As it turned out, they were torn, too.

Nicol paced his bedchamber. The remainder of the night had been restless, the day hideously long, but now it was nearly time to leave, almost time to retrieve the princess and bid the pauper farewell. He ground his teeth. It would be good to have it done, good to know Anna was safe…and that Sedonia was safe from Megan. After all, he’d taken a huge risk. But the time was up.

The rules of exchange were exactly as they had been before. The princess would go to the theater, then find her way to the water closet at a precise time. Megan would meet her there. They would change outer clothing, and all would be returned to normal. He should be ecstatic. All had gone well. The princess had been given an opportunity to form her own opinions. The thief had learned a great deal, had earned a great deal, would be able to improve her circumstances. But she had refused his most generous offers. Had turned him aside. Had, in fact, been insulted. Damn her! Couldn’t she see he was giving her a chance to better her life?

But in the back of his mind, doubts lingered. Perhaps it
was his life he wished to better. Perhaps he couldn’t bear the idea of living without…

Tension gripped him. Able to wait no longer, he snatched up his redingote and strode out of his room.

He rode alone to the theater and sat impatiently through a poor performance of
The Merry Wives of Windsor.
From his box he could just catch glimpses of Megan. Lord Riven leaned toward her, whispering something, and she laughed. Although he couldn’t hear her, it seemed as if he could, as if the sound shivered through his system like mulled wine.

He hadn’t taught her to flirt. She had learned that on her own and had learned it well. Unlike the true princess, she had no qualms about living life to the fullest. And yet he’d been her first. The memory quaked through his soul. He remembered the feel of her skin against his. Remembered the heat of her feverish kiss, the rush of her frantic hands. Wild with desire. Where would she go? How would he find her? He slammed his thoughts to a halt and ground his teeth through the next half hour. The seconds clicked away like a dirge. God’s bones! It must be time now. It must be, and still the girl sat and flirted. He stilled his scowl, then checked his watch again, and realized with groaning impatience that only a few minutes had passed.