She puzzled that for a moment while he shed his jacket, waistcoat and shirt, tossing them aside with no regard to where they landed. His boots followed, and then his trousers, and finally his drawers. The burn of embarrassment washed over her and she closed her eyes. She had been wrong all along. He wasn’t bluffing. He intended to go through with this dare. This challenge. This absurd war of wills.
“You…you win.” She struggled to sit up, hoping her capitulation would satisfy him.
“Yes, I do,” he said as he pushed her back and came down beside her. “That much was never in doubt. But I intend to see that you win, too.”
He kissed the line of her jaw to her ear and then whispered, “Say my name, Bella. Prove to me that you’ve surrendered.”
“Andrew.” She sighed and tangled her fingers through his dark hair as he bent to claim one turgid nipple. Oh, the liar! He’d had no intention of quitting. He was only dragging her deeper into his world.
Get up, her conscience warned her. Flee. He is too proud to follow you. But her body would not let her. Andrew Hunter had been right about that, too. Her words were lies, but her body sighed the truth. She wanted to stay. She wanted this deep magic he was working on her, no matter that she knew it was wrong—that this would make her irrevocably unmarriageable. Oh, yes, she would surrender it all for the things he did to her on that green velvet bed. And that made her as wicked as he.
“Andrew,” she moaned as he kissed a blazing path downward.
She twisted on the counterpane, gripping the fabric in her fists because she was afraid that if she didn’t hold on to something, she would evaporate like morning mist, rising toward heaven with the sensations he created deep inside her.
She gulped when he found a new place to kiss, a place of intense pleasure, and she could tell that he knew what he was doing to her, and that he was taking pleasure in it himself. She was tingling all over, ready for more. Wanting more. Needing more. “More…” she groaned.
He left that place and moved upward and over her, parting her thighs with his knees and drawing hers up to caress his hips. His voice was strained as he whispered, “You do taste sweet, Bella. A nectar unlike any other. Intoxicating…”
He kissed the little hollow directly beneath her earlobe, licking and nibbling until she shuddered with the delight of it. “Andrew,” she said again, because she couldn’t think of coherent words. Only of him.
Then he pressed downward, insinuating that wholly male part of himself into that vulnerable pocket he had so recently left. His intruding thickness was both terrifying and titillating. “Hurry,” she gasped, afraid she would change her mind in another instant. “Please!”
He cupped her buttocks, lifting and tilting them up to him at the same time he pressed forward. “So snug,” he whispered, “barely broken in.”
She rose to him as he thrust downward, and a sharp sting erupted through her. She moaned. It was done. Finally and irrevocably done. But Andrew’s stillness surprised her. Until that moment he’d been fluid, moving, seducing, caressing, creating a seductive rhythm. She opened her eyes and met his dark unfathomable gaze.
“Bella,” he groaned in a voice rife with regret. “Why?”
And, absurdly, tears trickled from the corners of her eyes into the hair at her temples. He regretted making love to her. He was angry that she hadn’t told him she was a virgin and not the courtesan he’d thought her. And all she could think was that now she truly was as wicked as she’d ever accused Andrew of being. She should care that she had just surrendered her virginity. Why didn’t she care?
She closed her eyes against that look and said, “Finish it, please.”
He began moving again, slower now, not as deeply, not as urgently. He smoothed her hair back from her face and kissed her closed eyes, her nose and cheeks, all the while moving within her, building the passion and the pleasure again.
His fingers laced through hers, holding her hands against the pillow, a gesture both innocent and somehow intimate.
She tilted her hips up to him again and adjusted herself to the mild discomfort and the fresh anticipation. Andrew’s muscles trembled, as if he held himself back with great effort. Instinctively she met his gentle thrusts. He released her hands and began stroking her again, doing the things he’d done before to make her forget her inhibitions. When the building pressure reached a fever pitch and she arched her head back against the pillow, he took long sure strokes, reaching deep inside her until she shuddered with the warm waves of pleasure sweeping over her, leaving a heavy languor in their wake.
Andrew sat on the windowsill, taking slow, measured breaths of the cool night air. He had to clear his head, had to make sense of the last hour.
What the bloody hell had she been thinking? Why had she not told him? Why had she not stopped him?
Ah, but she had tried, hadn’t she? The timid buts and little challenges designed to stop him. Her hesitancy. Her lack of sophistication. And, finally, her admission of defeat. All the signs had been there, and he’d ignored every last one in his own eagerness and anger.
And worse, she hadn’t screamed at him, hadn’t cursed him or struck him—which he richly deserved. But the look in those beautiful hazel eyes as tears rolled down her cheeks had been enough to make him consider castration. The memory of her softly urged, Hurry, and Finish it, please, ripped through him like a knife. She hadn’t been able to make him understand, or to stop him, and so she’d only asked him to be done quickly. God! That he could have done such a thing to her…
He glanced back at the bed and at Bella’s still form upon it. She’d been so weak and lethargic that he’d covered her and let her sleep. But he’d vacated the bed, knowing his own ungovernable lust would tempt him to seduce her again if he lay with her there. When she awoke, he’d take her home, but first he’d strip the counterpane and take it with him. He’d leave no evidence of what he’d done to her, and the cost would be discreetly added to his bill tomorrow. Then he would lie without shame to protect her reputation, and swear nothing had happened in this room but an argument and a compromise. Because he, of all the cads and villains in the ton, had been the one to despoil her.
He had to make amends. He would give her anything she wanted. He would compensate her, turn over his fortune, find her a husband she could love and trust. Swear to never importune her again. Anything. Just so he wouldn’t have to see those tears again.
But his problem went much deeper than simple remorse. After this event, he was even more confused about Bella’s motives. Virgin, by God, and kissing her way through the ton! She had committed social suicide. For what purpose? What significance did a kiss have for her?
He could not stop her. He could not interfere. But how could he stand by, now, and watch her offer those lips to other men? He’d have to find a way or be destroyed by it. And if he could not find a way, he would have to avoid her, forget she existed.
What dark irony! He’d wanted to feel again, to experience some remnant of human emotion, so the gods had smiled and given him guilt. And they’d added affection for good measure, but only after all hope of winning what he’d found was lost. Instead of redemption, he’d found a whole new level of hell.
Chapter Twelve
“Thank God you are home!” Gina whispered theatrically as she closed Bella’s bedroom door. “Mama woke up near midnight and went looking for you. She was ready to call the watch when I told her that you were sitting with a sick neighbor. Who, she asked. Oh, I am not good at making things up, Bella. I told her it was Mrs. Browne, who lives just around the corner and is a widow. Now Mama says she must meet Mrs. Browne as soon as she is well enough to receive guests. She believed me, but I think Nancy is suspicious.”
Bella groaned. “Poor Mrs. Browne is about to die from her illness. Or do you think Mama would want to go to the funeral?”
Gina covered her mouth to stifle a giggle. “That would be like her, would it not? But where have you been, Bella? ’Tis nearly dawn. I was about to raise
an alarm, myself. And look at you! Was your hair not done up?”
“It…became tangled and I had to take it down.” She did not like lying to Gina, but the truth would never do. I just gave my virginity to Andrew Hunter—that handsome man in the park—and my hair came down. She went to the window in time to see the coach pull away. Andrew had waited until she turned the wick of her lamp up. Thoughtful? Or merely making certain that she would stay put for the remainder of the night?
The ride home had been awkward, to say the least. Andrew had seemed at a loss for words, and she was suddenly shy. Heavens! The man had seen her naked! What did she have left to hide? They’d barely spoken and barely touched, the green velvet coverlet stained with a smear of her blood wadded on the seat between them. He’d spirited her out the rear door of Thackery’s and into a waiting coach, then swore to her that he would never tell what they’d done. He had instructed her to deny that anything had happened in that room but a private conversation.
She knew that he had nothing at risk. He would not fear the censure of society for sleeping with a…a courtesan, so his concern was for her. A part of her—the rational part—was relieved he was being so pragmatic, but the other part cringed with embarrassment and shame. Had she been so gauche that he could not wait to be rid of her? And now that he’d known her, was he done with her? Well, not entirely done with her, since he’d promised to find her again soon and discuss her future.
What future? She had no future. She could not even think beyond finding Cora’s killer. And it had not escaped her that Andrew still had not kissed her. Before, and all the way through his seduction, he had kissed nearly everything but her lips. Why? Was it still a point of honor with him that he had not joined the ranks of those she had kissed, but for that first aborted attempt? She could not count that first night when he’d turned away.
“Goodness, Bella! Are you certain you are quite all right? You have just gone very pale.”
“I am just tired, Gina. Exhausted. I long for my bed.”
“Do you need help?”
“No! I mean, I can undress.”
“Good. Then we had both best get some rest. We have our final fittings at the dressmaker’s this afternoon and we are to be at the Lockwoods’ tonight by eight o’clock.” Gina blew her a kiss and closed the door behind her.
Drat! The dinner party. How had she forgotten that? She would have to think of an excuse to stay home. There was so much she needed to think about.
Because she loved Andrew Hunter—for no particular reason beyond the look in his eyes and the desolation in his soul. Because she’d made an impossible muddle of their relationship with her lies and secrecy. Because there was nothing she could ever do to make things right.
And because tonight, after the dinner party, she’d sneak back to the ton and kiss tall, dark-eyed strangers again.
Andrew fidgeted as he waited for Wycliffe to finish signing his correspondence. He couldn’t imagine the reason for his summons, especially given that they had decided to keep their meetings clandestine to avoid speculation by any of Andrew’s less savory friends—the ones they hoped to draw out.
Hank was supposed to bring him a time and place for the next “blood game” tonight. He was close to finding out everything Wycliffe needed to end the slaughter, and he was risking that by being here now. But he suspected that Wycliffe had held back some information.
The man dropped his pen and pushed the pile of papers aside. “Thank you for coming on such short notice, Hunter.”
“Doxies,” Andrew said without preamble. “My source says doxies are disappearing, but you said it was innocent women. In town for the season, I believe.”
Wycliffe looked a bit surprised. “Would it have made a difference?”
“Aye, it would. I’ve been looking for a connection in the ton. You’ve misdirected me.”
“Not deliberately. Initially we thought we had two separate cases. We did not connect a few missing prostitutes with the other women. Without their bodies, how could we know? They could have just run off, or changed their crib. We have only recently made a possible connection, when a body with the same markings did show up. And we still believe the men who are engaging in this…activity…are part of the ton.”
Slightly mollified, Andrew sat back in his chair. “Was this why you sent for me?”
Wycliffe went to his cupboard and brought two glasses and a bottle of brandy. He poured for both of them and handed one glass to Andrew. Oddly enough, he did not want a drink, but he took the glass, guessing that Wycliffe was about to impart some unpleasant information.
“I’ve been told that you have fixed your attention on a woman known as Lady Lace.”
Andrew frowned. “What has she to do with any of this?”
“Quite a lot, actually. And I blame myself for not telling you sooner. I simply thought it would be better that way. My mistake.”
The first stirrings of uneasiness began in Andrew’s stomach. “You cannot suspect her?”
Wycliffe snorted. “Lord, no. Do you recall when I first approached you to help us? I told you about a young woman who’d been raped and mutilated, then left for dead?”
Andrew nodded.
“That young woman was Lady Lace’s sister.”
Everything inside Andrew stilled as he assimilated this information. What had Wycliffe said? Fresh into town for the season? Good family? But—
“I went to inform the family, and it was then that I met the woman you know as Lady Lace. As she was the eldest at home at the time, I escorted her to the hospital to identify her sister. It was a heartbreaking scene. I think her sister clung to life just long enough to tell Lady Lace goodbye, and to charge her with finding the murderer. To be precise, ‘Avenge me,’ was what she said. And Lady Lace gave her vow.”
Andrew took a drink of the brandy, trying to imagine Bella at her sister’s bedside. This, then, was the reason for her trademark black gowns, but was it the cause of the shadows in her eyes, the sudden moroseness and her determined drinking? Ah, yes. He’d done his own share of drinking to forget. “You did not tell me that you found the victim alive. What else did she say?”
“I had stepped back to give them privacy. We had already questioned the girl to find her family, and she had told us that her abductor had spent several days meeting her in the park and wooing her, but that he had lied to her and she did not know his true name. Only that he was tall and dark. You can imagine how little help that was. But I overheard a fragment that she shared with her sister—something she did not share with us. There was something peculiar about the man’s kiss.”
Andrew’s mind whirled with this information. “Something peculiar about his kiss? What was it?”
“I do not know, and Lady Lace has not said.”
This, then, was the reason Bella was kissing her way through the ton. She was looking for the man who killed her sister—identifiable only by his kiss. The right man. Good God! And he had thought her a courtesan in search of her next protector. Could he have been more mistaken?
“What else?” he asked, fascinated by the way this skein of deceits was unraveling.
Wycliffe shrugged. “It was after I heard the victim entreat Lady Lace to avenge her that she expired. Before I could question her, her mother and two more sisters arrived at the bedside. The rest was hysterics and general pandemonium. I fear our Lady Lace took the brunt of the mother’s grief. I am not often given to sympathy, but she had mine that day.
“From her subsequent visits to my office, I gather Lady Lace has been the backbone of the family since her father died a few years ago. The mother is completely incompetent and it appears that the victim was her favorite. She has been rather hard on Lady Lace and holds her accountable for not supervising her sister properly.”
“Lace…What is her true name, Wycliffe?”
“If she has not told you, Hunter, I shan’t betray her. I owe her that much, at least.”
He shrugged. Sooner or later, he’d find out. �
��When…when did all this begin?”
“We found her sister near the end of May. Lady Lace haunted my office every day for a month afterward, begging for news, but we had none. In fact, we came to believe she was the key to solving the puzzle, and so I finally resorted to telling her that we’d moved on to other investigations, and that we would do nothing further on her sister’s case unless we came into new information.”
“But you have not abandoned the investigation, have you? You lied to her.” And then the full implication of Wycliffe’s admission sank into his muddled mind. “You lured her into her own investigation. You let her think she was the only instrument for her sister’s justice.”
Wycliffe nodded. “We were finding more bodies by then, Hunter. We were desperate. Still are.”
“She could have been killed.”
“We have taken every precaution against that. I have one of my best covert operatives keeping an eye on her.”
“I have been keeping an eye on her and I’ve seen no trace of this operative.”
“You wouldn’t. He is good at his job. But you are also my agent. I put you in proximity to Lady Lace for that purpose, among others.”
Anger began to boil through his veins. “Your plan was to put the two of us together?”
“Aye. I hoped you might form an alliance. Unfortunately, from my reports, you have become adversaries of sorts instead. I hear that you are trying to force her from the scene.”
Andrew groaned. God, what he would have given to have had this information a week—or even a single day—ago.
“Then, yesterday, Lady Lace came back to my office, entreating me to reopen her sister’s case. She was desperate—almost frantic. She said that she fears exposure once she and her sisters enter society.”
“You allowed her to risk her life and ruin her reputation so that you could use her as bait? Bloody hell, Wycliffe! Are you man or monster?”
“Monster, no doubt, and I shall pay for it in the next life. Did I mention we are desperate? And what of you, Hunter? Your confrontations have been remarked upon. Desist. If you cannot help her, at least do not hinder her. I am depending upon her to draw the attention of our villain, and I am depending on you to be a gentleman.”
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