He held her gaze and felt his jaw tighten. “The hideaway is buried deep in a slum—definitely no place for a lady.”
She blinked those brandy-colored eyes at him. “My dear Frobisher, we’ve just spent the last several hours going back and forth through a slum. While I would prefer never to walk such streets alone, there’s obviously no reason I cannot do so in broad daylight with you by my side.”
“That was there—the lower east slum.” A feeling awfully like panic tickled his nape. “The slavers’ lair is in the slum over the hill from Undoto’s church. It’s a much rougher, meaner area and, as I said, unarguably unsuitable for you to enter.”
She made a dismissive sound and shifted as if to get around him. He countered the move, remaining directly between her and the door.
She stiffened. Her head rose; her eyes narrowed. “If you will, Mr. Frobisher, please answer me this. By what right do you think to order me about? I am not one of your midshipmen.”
“Obviously not. My midshipmen don’t argue.”
“I daresay. But as we’ve now established that I am not yours to command, then”—the damned woman stepped close, her face tipping up so it was inches below his, her bodice all but brushing his chest—“I suggest you turn around, give me your arm, and we can pretend this little contretemps didn’t occur, and like the partners we have agreed to be, we can go down to the carriage and drive to the slum. And while you are consulting with your men, I will study the slavers’ lair.”
He couldn’t see anything beyond the stubborn and oh-so-feminine determination in her face. “No.”
Her eyes blazed. “No?” She raised her hands as if to push him back—as if she could.
He never quite understood what happened next. Her hands flattened against his chest, and a raging storm of impulses crashed through him, blinding him to anything beyond the compulsive need to keep the damned woman safe.
However he could.
Entirely without thought—governed wholly by impulses he didn’t understand but that she effortlessly goaded and provoked—he reached for her, hauled her up against him, and slanted his mouth over hers.
He kissed her with force, with deliberation, with an intent he fully comprehended.
So he could leave her wrung out, limp, and compliant—and safe in her room.
To that end, he tightened his hold on her, and when she gasped—in surprise or in shock or in simple reaction, he had no clue—he took immediate advantage, sending his tongue past her lips to claim, then plunder—
Sensation slammed into him. Hunger erupted and clawed.
He drew her yet closer, angled his head over hers, and with deliberate intent pushed them both into deeper, darker waters and set himself to devour.
The feel of her—warm, supple, and curvaceous—in his arms, the heady, intoxicating taste of her, all topped by the giddy realization that, far from wilting, the damned woman had clenched her small fists in his coat and was kissing him back, her lips against his, her tongue dueling with his, her ardor the very equal of his, fractured some wall inside him.
The diplomat—his façade—shattered, fragmented, and fell away, and his wilder side—the part of him he habitually held back, suppressed, leashed, muzzled—gleefully leapt free and seized his reins.
Hell. This would land him in deep trouble, and he knew it; trouble always followed when his wilder self led.
But he couldn’t draw back—did not have the strength, mental or otherwise, to retreat from an exchange that had taken on a will of its own.
Aileen’s wits reeled—and some part of her rejoiced. Which seemed strange, wrong, and yet...
Never had she indulged in a kiss like this. A kiss with a man like this, one more than capable of meeting her, matching her—challenging her.
And oh, Lord, he drove her wild. To desperation and madness.
To a level of feminine awareness she’d never previously attained.
His heat and hardness surrounded and cushioned her and locked her in a world where only he and she existed. Where the unforgiving pressure of his lips, the seductive caress of his tongue, and the flagrant temptation of his kiss became her consuming reality.
Giddy, driven, she clung to him and returned his fire with her own. She couldn’t—wouldn’t—allow herself to do anything else. Anything less. Sufficient remnants of rational thought lingered, enough to understand what this kiss was about.
To comprehend what he—instinctively perhaps—sought to gain by it.
She wasn’t going to let him succeed, but...for a few moments at least, she could indulge. Could indulge him, and herself.
Could explore and experience this new level of fascination.
She’d never been tempted by sensation like this—never craved more, not like this. With an abandon she felt to her soul.
Throwing one’s cap over a windmill had always seemed such a silly concept; she’d never understood how any intelligent woman could be so...well, unthinking.
Now she knew. With his firm, demanding, commanding lips on hers, she finally understood.
One didn’t think when in the throes of this—one felt, one thrilled, one desired.
Coming up on her toes, she slid her hands up his chest, thrust her fingers into the silk of his hair, gripped, and pressed her lips and her body even more fully, even more flagrantly, to his.
Robert gasped, at least in his mind. His mouth, his arms, his body were all too engrossed in seizing and savoring her, in taking and wallowing in all she was offering...
And she was offering. The realization mentally rocked him back on his heels.
This wasn’t how he’d expected this kiss to progress.
In some dim, heated recess of his brain, he knew he should end it—that it had been a mistake, a tactical error, that he should have remembered just how their earlier kiss had affected him.
His wilder side didn’t care.
Not in the least.
His wilder side was immersed in the kiss, hungry and greedy and well-nigh insatiable. Being seduced by a sharp-tongued termagant was, apparently, entirely to his taste.
Then into that dim, heated recess—his remaining kernel of rational thought—another realization slid. One more potent, more insidious—more compelling.
He wasn’t a novice when it came to women, far from it. Why, then, was he not in control here? How had this engagement transformed into something he’d never intended it to be?
Into a true exchange. A connection more personal and far more fundamental and direct than any he’d been a party to before.
Where was this tack—unexpected, unprecedented, and certainly unplanned—leading him?
His inner diplomat informed him he really did not want to know—that he should pull back immediately, before he was lost.
But his wilder side—the buccaneer inside him—wanted to find out.
This way lies danger should have been tattooed on her forehead. Lord knew, for him, that was the naked truth—and the ultimate lure.
Aileen reveled in a growing sense of certainty, of confidence—of knowing she could meet this man on this ground on equal terms.
She rejoiced in that discovery, yet an ever-growing sense of no longer being in control tugged at her awareness and sent welling wariness edged with concern to dim her delight.
On a gasp, she drew back—broke from the kiss, tipped back her head, and hauled in a much-needed breath.
She felt the unyielding pressure of his chest against her swollen breasts, the steel cage of his arms around her—became aware of the moltenness that had suffused her body. She dragged in more air, and her whirling wits steadied. Some semblance of strength reinfused her limbs.
She eased her grip on his hair, let her hands slide down to rest once more against the rock-hard planes of his chest as she brought her head upright and met
his gaze.
Could blue eyes smolder?
That was definitely a question for later. Right now, she needed to take charge—to get her, and him, too, back on the path they should be treading.
But she found it difficult to drag her eyes from his, to haul her senses from the thudding, compelling beat of nascent passion.
Like an entity that was neither him nor her, it thrummed in the air around them.
She couldn’t pretend it wasn’t there—and from the growing wariness in his eyes, neither could he.
He didn’t know what to do—with her, with what had erupted between them.
She read that truth in the hard planes of his face, in the set of his mobile lips.
Lips she could still feel on hers.
She dragged in another breath, pushed against his chest, and he let her step back, out of his arms. They fell from her. She quelled an urge to reverse her direction and feel them close about her again.
She’d felt safe—utterly and completely safe—while locked in his arms.
Given the hunger she’d sensed in him, that seemed a sure sign her wits had deserted her.
Enough. Get back on track.
She’d taken only one step away; she wasn’t going to retreat any farther.
She raised her head and, deliberately challengingly, looked him in the eye. “I know why you kissed me. Quite aside from being—patently—unwise, I have absolutely no intention of allowing you to use such...tactics to manage me.”
His lips tightened, and his eyes narrowed slightly, but he didn’t try to deny her insight.
She was far too experienced to attempt to deny her part in their recent exchange, but neither was she about to mention it; she tipped her head up a fraction more and haughtily stated, “I believe it’s time we were off. As I recall, you mentioned that your men will be expecting you.”
He considered her for a long moment, then, once again, simply said, “No.”
With that, he turned on his heel and stalked to the door.
“To get to the hideaway, I should follow the second alley to the left off the central way through the slum, which is the extension of the street that runs over the crest of the hill. Then—”
He growled and swung to face her. “You were listening when I gave the lad directions.”
She looked at him pityingly. “Of course.”
Plainly goaded, he ran a hand through his hair—hair she’d already thoroughly rumpled. Then he pinned her with an openly aggravated, very blue gaze. “Is there any way within the realms of possibility that I can convince you to stay here—in safety?”
She gave the question due consideration. “No.”
He tipped back his head; jaw clenched, he gave vent to a sound eloquent of male frustration.
Calmly, she confirmed, “If you don’t take me with you, I’ll simply follow you, which will be a great deal less safe, so I really don’t see why you won’t simply surrender with good grace.”
He straightened and looked at her.
She met his gaze and succinctly stated, “Where I go is not a decision that lies within your bailiwick.”
Several seconds ticked by, then a muscle in his jaw tightened.
“Very well.” The words sounded as if they’d been dragged from him.
All but grinding his teeth, Robert swung around and reached for the door. “Surrender” was not a word normally in his lexicon, but in this, it seemed, he was to have no choice.
He opened the door, waited while the thorn apparently now embedded in his flesh walked past, then he followed her from the room.
CHAPTER 10
Aileen found it remarkably easy to abstain from displaying any smugness as she walked beside her scowling escort into the teeming slum.
He’d been correct in stating that there was a difference between the slum they had visited that morning and this one. This slum was significantly farther from the settlement’s center, and its denizens were commensurately a great deal more desperate. Said denizens were also in the main not European, but mostly of mixed race.
The dwellings were smaller, more ramshackle, and more crowded. The sheer density of people was nearly overwhelming, the associated cacophony and the medley of smells well-nigh stifling.
She would never have set foot in such a place without an escort—preferably one similar to the one she presently had. A single glance at him was enough to have even the pickpockets giving them a wide berth. His ability to discourage all approaches, let alone any attack, lay not just in the way he loomed by her shoulder with his eyes constantly scanning their surrounds, nor simply in the way he scowled so ferociously at anyone who hove too close. More than anything else, his ability to deter lay in the dangerous way he moved—the menace he, apparently without effort, projected.
That said something of him—of the man he was inside.
On the outside, he appeared smoothly sophisticated, even debonair, but inside...she sensed that something far less civilized lurked beneath his polished exterior.
Five paces on, she hauled her mind from its fascination—fast becoming an obsession—and reminded herself that, in such a place, she, too, should be on guard.
They’d been walking down the narrow lanes and alleys for nearly fifteen minutes when he halted before a sagging wooden door. He glanced back along the street, then lifted the latch and put his shoulder to the panel—forcing it wide enough for her, at his wave, to slip past.
He followed her into a dimly lit, rather malodorous hallway. He pushed the door shut, cutting off the sunlight and leaving them in gloom.
Before her eyes had adjusted, she felt his fingers close around her elbow.
He steered her toward the rear of the hallway. “The stairs are this way. Step carefully.”
A set of stairs appeared on her left. At his urging, she raised her skirts and started climbing. With him reassuringly close behind, she went up two rickety flights, then stepped onto a landing only fractionally less rickety. A single door lay ahead.
Robert stepped past Aileen and tapped on the door. “It’s Frobisher.”
As he reached for the doorknob, he cast a searching glance at his companion’s face. He lived in hope that her sense of self-preservation was sufficient for a single exposure to the slum to be enough to convince her she didn’t need to visit again. Although he’d seen signs enough that she was aware of the lurking dangers of the place, he could detect no hint of alarm, much less fear.
He set the door swinging inward and waved her inside, then followed at her heels.
His men had vacated the room on Undoto’s street and transferred their pallets and bags here and made themselves comfortable. Benson, Coleman, and Fuller were sitting on stools about the small round table, while Harris was propped on a stool before the window, keeping watch. All four tensed as Aileen and he entered, but then they relaxed, rose, and nodded deferentially—first to him, then more formally to her; it always took the four several days to get out of the habit of leaping to attention and saluting him, as they normally would.
“This is Miss Hopkins.” Robert waited while his men mumbled greetings and bowed. “Her brother Lieutenant Hopkins is one of those who’ve gone missing.”
“Good afternoon.” Aileen returned their nods.
Benson offered her his stool. “Here you are, miss. Sorry it’s not a chair.”
She smiled. “That’s quite all right.” She glanced at the window. “Actually, I’m interested in taking a look at the slavers’ lair.”
Robert trailed her as she crossed to the window. Harris stepped back and waved her to his stool, and with a gracious smile, she accepted and sank down. With her seated, the sill rose as high as her collarbone, but she could still see out well enough for her purpose. Robert halted by her shoulder. “It’s the door you can see directly ahe
ad—the house across the lane from the one whose roof we’re looking over.”
She nodded. “The man sitting on the stoop—is he one of the slavers?”
Robert glanced at Benson, who had come to join them; he arched his brows in question.
Benson nodded a touch grimly. “We believe so, miss. He’s one of those who called on Undoto last night.”
“He’s not the leader, however,” she remarked.
“No, miss. That one’s a heavier man. Older, too.”
After a moment, Aileen glanced up—at Benson, Harris, and the others, all of whom had joined them about the window. “Am I right in thinking that the slavers are, by and large, mostly European? Primarily English?”
His men had started to nod, but at the latter qualification, they paused. Coleman said, “I wouldn’t say necessarily English, miss. Bit of a melting pot, countries like this. Easier to say that, generally speaking, we wouldn’t expect to see any purebred natives running with any slave gang.”
Aileen looked back at the house, at the thug lounging on watch on the step. “I have to admit that I’ve never understood the impulse to slaving, but in such a case as this, in a foreign country so far from home, to be preying on those who are essentially your own people seems peculiarly wrong.”
There was nothing Robert could think of to add to that; she was correct—in this particular case, the sense of a more fundamental betrayal ran strong.
After a moment, he shifted and looked at his men. “So what have you seen? Anything of note?”
They described the few comings and goings from the house, all of which sounded entirely mundane. Robert grimaced. “That suggests that they’re waiting, but have nothing definite on their plate as yet.”
“I reckon,” Coleman said, leaning against the wall, “that the first sign we’ll see will be a messenger of some sort. These blokes”—with a tip of his head, he indicated the slavers’ lair—“don’t seem to go out during the day if they can help it. We asked around. The locals know what they are and don’t like them. The bruisers pay for their meals to be brought in, and an old woman sweeps for them, but that’s the extent of any fraternization.”
A Buccaneer at Heart Page 20