His bad hand flexed against her hip. “I was always good at violence.”
Her hands moved of their own volition, sliding across his wide, warm chest. He was magnificently made, she knew, the product of years of fighting. Not simply for sport, but for safety.
“It was my purpose.”
She shook her head. “No,” she said. “It wasn’t.”
He’d been clever and funny and kind. And ever so handsome. But he hadn’t been violent.
He captured her chin in a firm grip. “Hear me, Mara. You didn’t make me into that man. If I hadn’t had the seed of violence in me—I never would have succeeded. The Angel never would have succeeded.”
She refused to believe it. “When one is forced into a role, one assumes it. You were forced. Circumstances forced you.” She paused. “I forced you.”
“And who forced you?” he asked, threading his fingers into hers, holding her hand against his chest, where she could feel the heavy beat of his heart. “Who stole you away from the world?”
Their entire conversation had come to this. He’d recounted his story with precision and purpose, bringing her slowly around to this moment, when it was her turn. When she could tell him the truth, or tell him nothing at all.
One way, she was safe.
The other way, she was in terrible danger.
In danger of becoming his.
Temptation was a wicked, wonderful thing.
She focused on the knot of his perfect cravat. “Do you have a valet?”
“No.”
She nodded. “I wouldn’t have thought so.”
He reached up and unknotted the neck cloth, unwrapping it until he revealed a perfect triangle of warm, brown skin, dusted with curling black hair.
He was beautiful.
It was a strange word to describe a man like him—broad and strong and perfectly made. Most would choose handsome or striking, something with heft that oozed masculinity.
But he was beautiful. All scars and sinew and, beneath it all, a softness that she couldn’t help but be drawn to.
The words came easily. “I have always been afraid. Since I was a girl. Afraid of my father, then of yours. Then of being found. Then, once I heard of my mistake—of what I did to you when I left—of not being found.” She did look at him then, meeting his beautiful black gaze. “I should have returned the moment I discovered you’d been accused of my murder. But the dice had been thrown, and I did not know how to call them back.”
He shook his head. “I run a casino. I know better than anyone that the roll is final once the ivories leave one’s hand.”
“I didn’t know what happened to you for months. I went to Yorkshire, and the news there was spotty at best. I didn’t even know the Killer Duke was you until . . .”
He nodded. “It was too late.”
“Don’t you see? It wasn’t too late. It was never too late. But I was terrified that if I returned . . .” She paused. Collected herself. “My father would have been furious. And I was still betrothed to yours. And I was afraid.”
“You were young.”
She met his understanding gaze. “I did not come back when they died, either.” It had occurred to her. She’d wanted to. She’d known that it was the right thing to do. But. “I was afraid then, too.”
“You are the least fearful person I’ve ever known,” he said.
She resisted the label. “You’re wrong. My whole life, I’ve been terrified of being controlled. Of losing myself to another. My father. Yours. Kit. You.”
His gaze caught hers. “I don’t want to control you.”
“I don’t know why,” she said.
“Because I know what it is to be controlled. And I do not wish it on you.”
“Stop,” she said softly. “Stop being so kind.”
“You would prefer harshness? Haven’t I given you enough of that?” He shifted beneath her, clasping her face in one hand. “Why did you do it, Mara? Why tonight?”
She didn’t pretend to misunderstand. He was asking why she’d unmasked in front of all of London. Why she’d returned, when he’d made it clear that she needn’t.
“Because I was afraid of who I would become if I didn’t.”
He nodded. “Why else?”
“Because I was afraid that if I stayed hidden, it would only be a matter of time before someone found me.”
“Why else?” he asked again.
“Because I am tired of living in the shadows. Ruined or not, tonight, I live in the light.”
He kissed her then, taking her lips in a long, lingering caress, his hands sliding down her sides, pulling her closer, leaving a trail of heat in their wake.
When he stopped the kiss, he pressed his forehead to hers and said, almost too softly to hear, “Why else?”
She closed her eyes, loving the feel of him so close to her, wishing she could live there, in his arms, forever. “Because you didn’t deserve it.”
He shook his head. “But that’s not why.”
She took a deep breath. “Because I did not wish to lose you.”
He nodded. “And what else?”
He knew. He saw the truth, yawning beneath them, a great chasm. All he asked was for her to say it aloud. To leap.
And on this, their last night together—their only night together, she leapt, her gaze on his, her body entwined with his.
“Because, somehow, in all of this . . .”
She resisted the truth, barely, knowing that if they were said, they would change everything. Would make everything more difficult. “ . . . you—your happiness—your wishes—they mean everything.”
But what she said in her mind was: I love you. I love you. I love you.
And perhaps he heard it, for he stood, and in one fluid motion, lifted her in his arms and took her to his bed.
Chapter 18
She’d never felt so valued as she did at his bedside, draped in silk, still warm from his touch and the promise of what was to come. His fingers trailed over her cheek and jaw, down the column of her throat, and over her racing pulse.
He traced the line of her collarbone and then the curve of her breast, lingering when she drew in a heavy, ragged breath. His black eyes met hers. “Do you wish me to stop?”
“No,” she said instantly. Wishing he would start again. Wishing he would keep going. Forever.
“I won’t hurt you,” he said.
She stilled at the words, at the way the promise came from deep inside him. She wondered how many times he’d had to make that same promise to other women. To calm them as they stood an arm’s length—closer—to the Killer Duke.
“I know,” she said, capturing his bad hand in one of hers, pressing his fingers against her skin, holding his touch to her. She reached her other hand up, threading her fingers through his hair, pulling his lips down to her. “You’ll never hurt me,” she whispered against his lips.
He groaned his desire, snaking his free arm around her waist and pulling her tight to him. He whispered her name and took her mouth in a powerful kiss, more devastating than any they’d shared before. Where the previous ones had been rivers of temptation, tickling at the seams of her, this was a wide sea filled with wicked promise. It was wanton.
It was wonderful.
His hand was everywhere—lush, stroking sin—and hers followed suit, sliding up the soft wool of his coat and into his hair, holding him close, matching his kiss with her own, not stopping until he groaned his pleasure and pulled away from her, leaving her gasping for air and desperate for more of him.
“No,” he whispered, turning her away from him, to face the massive bed, at once ominous and irresistible. His hands came to the fastenings of the gown, working the buttons and ties.
“Faster,” she sighed as he fumbled at the fabric. “Hurry.”
The button
s were stubborn beneath his touch. Or perhaps it was his choice to move with such slowness. “I will not allow you to tempt me to speed,” he whispered in her ear as he worked, the breath of the words sending shivers of anticipation through her. “I want the whole night.” He pressed a kiss to the curve of her shoulder, his tongue coming out to stroke along the skin there as the fabric of her bodice came loose and she caught it to her chest.
He lifted one of her hands, kissing her palm, then worrying the pad of her index finger with his teeth. Her dress fell to the floor, his gaze falling to her fine-spun chemise and beautifully boned corset, desire flaring hot and wonderful. “I want longer.”
She sighed at the words. Of course, she knew they couldn’t have longer. But they could have tonight, and he was enough to make her forget everything else.
Tomorrow, they would return to their lives—he, to the one he’d too long missed, and she to the one she’d too long deserved.
He guided her hands to the bedpost, leaving her there as he worked at the ties of her corset, his fingers pulling at silken strings, loosening the piece until it dropped to her feet, and his strong touch sent her silk chemise after it.
She was naked in the clocked stockings he’d bought her, the ones she’d imagined him removing when she’d donned them—even as she’d desperately tried to ignore the thought.
And his hands, those strong, wonderful hands that she’d come to love for their gentleness as much as their force, slid over her bare skin as his lips settled on the curve of her shoulder.
Not hands. Hand.
Always one hand. Always the good hand.
She turned to him. “Wait.”
He waited. Because she told him to. And she loved him all the more for it. She lifted his wounded hand to her lips, pressing a kiss to his knuckles, letting her tongue slide out to dip into the valleys between them. He watched, his eyes dark with passion, but something was missing. Something she might not have seen if she had not been looking.
He couldn’t feel her.
She turned the hand over, pressing a kiss to his palm. Whispering there, “What have we done to you?”
He snatched his hand away, but she would not let him escape.
Instead, she lifted his other hand and repeated her ministrations until his breath caught in his throat and he shifted with desire and want and a dozen kinds of lust.
Shock rocketed through her. His hand. They’d stolen it from him.
“Temple,” she said softly, reaching for it. Loving him more for it.
“No,” he resisted, turning her once more, returning her hands to the bedpost. Kissing the spot behind her ear, the place where neck met jaw. Where shoulder met neck. Her spine.
Distracting her with pleasure and wickedness. “You are trembling.”
And she was, too wrecked by his touch, by his nearness, to stop. To return the conversation to his hand. “I can’t—” she started. “It is too much.”
He growled, low and dark and promising at her ear. “It is not nearly enough.”
He kissed his way down her spine, the tip of his tongue licking and swirling as he marked his path. As he marked her, as cleanly and clearly as if he’d done it with a needle and ink.
And when he reached the place where back met bottom, he worried the soft, untouched skin there until she was gasping her pleasure. Only then, once she’d given herself over to his touch, to his kiss, did he turn her to face him.
She should not have been surprised to find him there, on his knees staring up at her once more, but she was, a thread of panic and desperation coursing through her. A desperate desire to repeat the events of the previous morning in the ring. A desperate desire never to repeat them again.
“Temple,” she whispered, reaching for him, letting him catch her hand in his, letting him press it to his cheek.
“William,” he corrected her.
Her gaze flew to his. “But you—”
“You’re the only one who thinks of me as such. The only one who has ever seen me.”
The truth ached. Reminding her of all she’d done. Of all this night could be. Of all it couldn’t be. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered, tears in her eyes. “I never—”
He came to his feet with stunning grace, pulling her to him. “No. You mustn’t regret it. Your seeing me has changed everything. It’s changed my life. It’s changed me.” He kissed her, long and thorough, and added, “Christ, Mara, of course it’s you. It’s always been you. It always will be.”
The words shattered her. “I cannot stand.”
“Then don’t. I have you.”
She fell into his strength, and he laid her back on the bed, spreading her legs wide as he sank between them, draping them over his shoulders, leaving long, lush kisses along the soft skin of her inner thighs, coming closer and closer to delivering on their promise as she writhed on the silk bedcovers and wondered how it was that she had come to be here. Come to deserve him.
She hadn’t.
She hadn’t, and this would be her greatest sin—taking this night. Stealing it from someone who might deserve it. Who might be more for him. Who might be better for him.
Taking it, with no regret.
Taking it for the memory.
For her lifetime.
For his.
And then his mouth was on the heat of her, and her fingers were in his hair, and he was giving her everything she desired, and she couldn’t stop herself from moving against him, from lifting to meet him, from begging him for—
He stopped, lifting his head. “What is it, love?”
The word was enough to send rivers of pleasure through her, if not for the slow slide of his fingers, the way they dipped and teased, the way they stroked, but not deep enough to give her everything she wanted. She raised her hips to him.
“My, that’s a pretty sight,” he said, and she couldn’t stop herself from watching him, his eyes on her, his tongue sliding over his beautiful bottom lip, as though he couldn’t wait to taste her again. “All pink and perfect.” His gaze found hers. “Tell me, when I did this in the ring . . . did you see it? How hot you get? How pink? How wet?”
She closed her eyes at the wicked words. Nodded.
“And you liked it.”
She nodded.
“One day, when I have more patience, we’ll try it again, with a smaller mirror. Closer. More private. I’ll let you tell me what to do. I’ll let you watch yourself come.”
The words sent a thrill through her, even as she resisted the idea of giving herself over to something so unexpected. So unclear. So strange and perfect.
He saw it—the hesitation—and raised one brow in a wicked challenge before he blew a long stream of cool air over her hot, desperate center. “You don’t think you’d like that?”
She exhaled on a shaking sigh. “I—”
“You are so perfect—” He flicked his tongue over the heat of her, sending a shock of sensation through her, her body somehow not her own when he was involved. “So wet.” She gasped as he licked and sucked, working her with unbearable pleasure, sending her spiraling tighter and tighter and higher and higher until his fingers joined his tongue in symphony, exploring and moving in glorious circles, teasing and touching. “I want you like this, open to me, aching for me, forever.”
To punctuate that word forever, and all its temptation, he slid one finger deep, and she could not keep her moan from escaping.
“Now that,” he said, his voice as dark as his gaze, “might be the most beautiful sound I’ve ever heard.” That wicked digit retreated, and she bit her lip, face flamed with embarrassment even as she wanted to clasp him to her and demand he repeat the experience. She did not have to. “Let’s see if we can make it happen again.”
A second finger joined the first on a long, irresistible slide.
Dear God, he was ruining her.
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He played her like a virtuoso, as though she were an instrument he had studied for a lifetime. She moaned again, louder and longer, and he rewarded the sound with his mouth, working her in that dark, secret place that was suddenly the center of her. She would never think of pleasure in the same way again.
It was forever entwined with him.
She came apart in his arms once more, lost to his kiss and his touch and the scent and sound of him. Lost to the knowledge that this man was everything she’d ever desired and dreamed and imagined. Lost to pleasure. Lost to him.
And somehow found.
She returned to earth in his arms, all strong, corded sinew, holding her to his chest, where her head rested on his good shoulder and she was easily lost in the heat and scent of him. His fingers stroked through her hair, spreading it long across his massive bed, and he pressed a kiss to her temple, whispering against her skin, worshipping it, “You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.”
She shivered at the words and curled into his warm body, her hand spreading across the white of his shirt. She spoke to the wide expanse of linen there. “You scare me.”
His touch stilled. “How?”
Her fingers worried at his shirt. “I never thought I would be so drawn to you. So connected. I never thought you would own me so well. That you would have such”—she hesitated over the word—“control over me.”
He captured her hand in his, sliding out from beneath her to face her. To have a better look at her.
She sat up, trying to explain. “Even now . . . with you inches away . . . I can’t help but mourn the loss of you.”
He reached for her at the confession, his hand stopping short of touching her, as though he did not know how to proceed. “Mara,” he said softly, as though he might scare her away. “I don’t want you to ever think that I take pleasure from—”
Her fingers moved to his lips, stopping the flow of words. “No,” she said, tears coming to her eyes. “You don’t understand. I ache for you when you’re not with me.” His eyes went black with desire, and her breath caught at the vision of him. At his promise. “I am in your thrall,” she said. “Of your touch and your kiss and your beautiful eyes. Quite desperately.”