“You were right, Theo.”
“I was?” His eyebrow cocked as he lifted the glass to his lips.
“I do hate men.”
He choked, sputtering his drink mid-sip. “You—you hate men?”
“I do.” Her white-gloved hand drew upward, absently smoothing the front of her cerulean gown over her abdomen. “Rather, I should be exact and say I do not trust men. Adalia and Cass are the ones that say I hate men. And you. You said it as well. You recognized it in me. Regardless, I cannot seem to overcome it. I can lie about it, put on a pretty facade, but I cannot rid myself of it.”
“That is a sweeping statement to admit to.”
She shrugged. “Sweeping or not, it is true. And my interactions with that American downstairs only substantiated my belief that men are not to be trusted.”
Clearing his throat, Theo set the half-full glass of whiskey onto the cart. “I missed something terribly important. What did I interrupt down there, Vee?”
“The new Lord Vandestile thought it appropriate that he inherit the lady along with the title, and then proposed we go upstairs.”
“I will kill the bastard.”
She waved her hand in midair, stopping him before he took a step to the door. “You will do no such thing. I am a widow in an unusual position as the proprietress of a gaming hall and I am propositioned like that at least weekly, Theo. The American was just much crasser about it. Besides, Lord Folton was more than ready to come to my defense.”
“There—proof that Folton is the right man for you.”
“No—proof that men can’t be trusted. I know very well that Lord Folton was conniving his own way to a proposal. Hopefully, he would have managed more couth with the matter.”
His jaw flexing, his hands curling into fists, it was taking a great amount of control for Theo not to storm past her. But he held still, staring at her.
Something was far more important to him at the moment. What it was, she wasn’t sure.
He opened his mouth, his voice raw. “You said it before, days ago, but was it a lie, Vee? Do you trust me?”
Her head snapped back. She answered in the same breath, before considering her reply like she normally would. “You…you I do trust for some reason, Theo. It is odd. I never questioned it. It must be because I knew you from long ago, before…”
“Before what?”
“Before my husband.”
He nodded, his look calculating. “But when you are with men—at the Revelry’s Tempest, or tonight—you are gracious, yet you are stiff and I don’t think they notice that in the slightest.” The statement came slow, as though he was considering each word with the utmost care.
“No, men are usually too busy looking downward at my chest. Or staring at my lips. They see what they want to, and I allow it. It is easier for all.”
“How is that easier?”
“As long as I am charming and docile with the opposite sex, my coffers are full. I am not causing scandal. But I am not an idiot or a martyr. It is not good business to toss daggers at half of the Revelry’s Tempest clientele.”
“That seems cold—that you have honed a sweeping dislike of men.”
“I know the reality, Theo. My circumstances offer me no margin to like or dislike them. But trust? No. That is something I cannot afford.”
Silence fell upon them for long seconds. Theo stared at her, his cool blue eyes still assessing her. She didn’t care for it. Didn’t care for his probing, for his peeking under layers she would rather leave in place.
“Why are you so keen to offer me up to some random baron, Theo?”
“What?”
“Lord Folton.”
His fingers ran through his hair, setting the rogue blond tendrils haphazard. “Folton is a fine man. He would make a respectable match for you.”
She nodded, her eyes slightly squinting at him. “If he is so fine, why did you so eagerly pull me away from him?”
His jaw shifted to the side, his look hardening. “You know why, Vee.”
“Do I? Why?”
“Your hand was on his arm. It will not do. The gossips will explode.”
“I held the crux of your arm time and again tonight and you were not concerned on the gossip.”
He heaved a sigh. “Fine. I saw you touch him and I reacted. Without thought. Right or wrong or be damned to whatever man you deserve. I reacted.”
She took a step toward him. “My hand was on his arm and you could not stand for that?”
“No. You touching another man. It is not something I care to witness, Vee. It’s why I disappeared five years ago.”
She took another step forward, collapsing the space between them. “But it was an innocent touch, Theo. I was attempting to calm Lord Folton. Nothing more.”
“In your eyes, yes. In my eyes…” He stopped, shaking his head. “In my eyes I have great difficulty not breaking into two any man’s arm you happen to touch.”
Her eyes went wide, searching his face. “You think of me as yours, don’t you, Theo? Completely and utterly yours.”
The heat in his look was unmistakable. “The answer to that is not something you want to hear, Vee. I recognize that. So I will not admit to it.”
She nodded. He was right, she didn’t want to hear that. Didn’t want to be his property, his toy.
But she did want him to touch her.
Heaven help her, she did want him to kiss her again. She wanted him to turn the spiking tingle rolling down her spine into an uncontrollable fire. He made her feel, and after walking through hours of numb civility a floor below—of nods and smiles and polite agreement to any of the bland subjects being spewed upon—she wanted real like never before.
In that very moment, she realized when he had kissed her the day before he had ripped her out of a cocoon of numbness she hadn’t even recognized she existed in. With Malcolm’s death, she had thought she had given up all pleasures of the flesh for forever. Pleasures such as that only led to heartache—to betrayal—and she had no allotment left for more heartache in her life.
But then Theo had gone and kissed her. Sparked to life all she thought dead within her—things that should stay dead.
She had run from the conservatory because she needed that spark to stay dead.
But it had only taken one evening with Theo at her side—protecting her at every turn, staring at her like he wanted to devour her skin from head to toe, keeping her sane, not allowing her to cower—to realize what he had sparked to life was not about to be extinguished without satisfaction.
Her body needed it.
Needed him.
She took one final step to him, her breasts brushing gently across his jacket.
No more space between them.
Meeting his light blue eyes, she drew air deep into her lungs, her voice dropping to a whisper. “Why, after all this time, Theo, do you still not believe I would choose you against all others?”
{ Chapter 10 }
Hell. He was in hell.
Violet standing right before him, bloody well propositioning him.
A test. This had to be a test. She was testing him. Toying with him, because she could. Because he deserved it. Because he had revealed far too much.
She was his. She always had been. She always would be. Whether she knew it or not.
The instant her hand had landed on Lord Folton, he had morphed into a raging oaf. He deserved whatever she had in store for him.
Theo drew his hands behind his back and clasped his fingers tightly together, his knuckles near to snapping. As long as he didn’t touch her, he wouldn’t break. Wouldn’t fail her test.
Her azure eyes wide, twinkling in the light of the sconce, she looked up at him with far too much knowledge the last five years had given her. Touches of innocence lost in blue eyes that recognized well the benefits of carnal pleasures.
She knew exactly what she was doing.
Damn her.
She had claimed she didn’t want to be the one he
held onto, his sanctuary. But here she stood, a bloody buoy in a sea of raging waves tormenting his body.
She shifted slightly, her breasts dancing along his chest. “You have no answer?”
“What, exactly are you asking of me, Vee?”
Her head slanted slightly to the side, contemplating him. “Belief.” She nodded, more to herself than him. “That you have enough belief in yourself to give me what I need in this moment.”
“Am I a fool if I believe in what you are offering me right now?”
“You think me a farce?” She leaned ever so slightly into him, her left hand lifting, her fingers soft feathers trailing along his upper arm. “You think me standing before you, alone, in a locked room is something I would risk—with a house full of gossipmongers not but feet away—if I did not mean my words, Theo?”
He drew in a breath, her delicate scent of lilacs filling his lungs. He couldn’t take her any closer. Her hips any nearer and she would brush against the unmistakable symbol of how badly he wanted to touch her.
Her hand dropped away from his arm, her eyes widening at him. “Unless…unless I mistake this. You do not want me.”
Her foot lifted, taking a step backward.
He would have none of it.
Behind his back, his entwined fingers ripped apart and his right arm wrapped around her waist, his left hand deep into the thick of her hair at her neck, his mouth crushing hers before her toes landed on the floorboard.
She was sweet, then tart, tasting both of the claret and the jellies from below. Her hips drew toward him, her abdomen pressing against his rock hard member, leaving no doubt as to how very much he wanted her.
In a slight but pointed motion, she swiveled her hips against him. A smile curved her lips under his kiss, her words a whisper in his mouth. “I did not mistake this.”
He couldn’t tear his mouth away from hers long enough to reply, could only drop from her lips to taste her neck as his voice rumbled slowly from his throat. “No, you did not, Vee. Far from it.”
Her fingers slipped into the back of his hair, clutching him to her neck. He travelled downward, reaching the slope of her breasts. Below his chin, he dipped his thumb behind the lace edging of her dress, searching, her skin pricking under his touch. He tugged the fabric downward, freeing her nipple to the air for the slightest moment before he captured it in his mouth.
The bud hardened as he sucked, teasing it, his teeth raking the delicate skin.
She gasped at the touch, not in surprise, but in pure gratification. A soft mewl lifted from her throat on her exhale as her fingers dug into the back of his neck.
The sound startled him for the merest second and he had to remind himself that for as much as he saw her as she once was, she was no longer a virginal eighteen-year-old. Married for two years, she would be well versed in how her body reacted to being touched.
He tugged down the other side of her gown, moving to her right breast and forcing it into hard, taut submission.
He wanted her slow. Wanted time to worship her body. Yet her hips were insistent, thrusting forward against his cock through their mounds of clothes, writhing against him.
She pulled back slightly, her white gloves falling to the floor as her fingers dove between them, unbuttoning and stripping back layers of his clothes. Tailcoat. Waistcoat. Cravat she had painstakingly tied on the journey here.
And then her hands dropped, unbuttoning the flap of his trousers. Her palm brushing against his ready-to-burst cock.
For a second, he froze, rattled by her forwardness.
She had been married. He had to remember that. Experience. She had experience, and she damn well knew what to do with his trousers.
A soft moan from her as his mouth was on her breast was one thing, but this—this was beyond. She was fast at it, for blasted sake. This was her having intimate knowledge of stripping off a man’s trousers time and again.
The thought sent a shot of rage through his body, so visceral he had to curb the insane need to toss her to the ground and make her his—the need to erase every last touch that bastard of a husband put upon her.
Slow. Slow. Slow.
She would never feel anything from him but the pleasure she wanted—pleasure she begged for.
He lifted his head, capturing her mouth with ferocity just as she freed his shaft to the air. Her soft hand went tentatively to the tender skin on the head, encasing it with delicate precision.
His breath drew in sharply at the shards of exquisiteness ripping through his body. Her hand dropped, squeezing, stroking, and he allowed himself one full second of indulgence, of heaven coursing through his veins.
He pulled from her lips. “Not so swift, Vee.” The demand escaped in a harsh growl.
Her hand tightened on his cock.
Hell. She needed it. Needed it more than he did if that was even possible.
Give her this. Give her this and then they could slow. The next one he gave her he could have as his own, her body clenching around him, her naked skin dragging against his.
His hands moved down the sides of her gown and pulled the fabric upward, finding a path to the bare of her thighs above her garters. His right hand, swirling, running upward along her inner right thigh, made her motion still, her body sway, and he had to clamp his left arm around her waist to keep her from tipping.
He found the mound of her, parting her folds to his fingers, and she bucked slightly, the first deft swipe of his thumb sending her into gasps.
“Th—Theo—” Her words cut off as she gripped him at the neck with one hand. Curling into him, she kept her right fingers wrapped around his cock, but all motion from her ceased, her body only able to ride his hand, arching into his strokes.
Her nails dug into his neck, a gasping scream building from her chest as the crux of her throbbed, hardening under the circles of his thumb.
His fingers slipped back and dove inward, two fingers breaching her body, sending her into spasms. He quickened the pace of his circles, his body straining, muscles on fire as he fought against his own control that threatened to snap.
Her hold on his cock constricted—an excruciating challenge against his will to hold fast from exploding. But in the next instant her hand left him and reached up to paw, grasp at anything she could hold onto as a scream racked her body, her limbs shuddering. Pounding wave after wave pulsated through her folds as she came, her body quivering with every breath she attempted.
He had never witnessed such beauty. And he was not done.
Before she went limp, Theo spun her around, keeping his hand deep in the crux of her. He moved her hands to grip the curled top edge of the copper tub as his fingers continued their assault, slow, methodical, an intermission to breathe before the next storm.
She bent at the waist, still gasping, her eyes closed. Theo aligned his body to her back, his lips landing on the side of her neck as he pushed rough words from his throat to her ear. “You’re going to come again, Vee. And this time around me. Your shudders are mine. Your screams are mine.”
He shoved the rear of her skirts upward, draping them around her middle. His thumb swirled in her folds, starting to speed again as he looked down to the round swells of her creamy white skin.
“I am yours.” She turned her head to the side, opening her eyes and looking up at him. “I am all yours, Theo.” She arched with the motion of his fingers flicking her nub, gasping as she tipped her backside up to him. Ready for him.
Heaven help him.
He set the tip of his cock at her entrance.
A scream.
But not a scream of pleasure.
Hell.
Another scream, terror incarnate, and Violet shoved off from the copper tub. She slammed violently into him, sending both of them tumbling backward.
He landed flat on his back, catching Violet on top of him, their limbs tangling.
“The tub—the tub—the tub—” Her ranting sped, her feet scrambling, shoving her away from the copper tub.
<
br /> She couldn’t untangle from Theo fast enough to escape across the floor, and some terror gripped her even harder. Her limbs flailing, hitting him, hitting the floor indiscriminately. Escape. She was looking for escape. Desperate for it.
“Violet—Vee, what? What is it? Did I hurt you? I—”
“No, no, no, the bath—” She gasped a breath and then her words tumbled, furious. “I saw it and I ignored it but I didn’t think I would touch it and then I opened my eyes and I was looking down into it and I was touching it and I…I…”
Her voice cut off as she rolled herself off of him, effectively untangling their limbs. She jumped to her feet, scrambling to pick up her gloves with hands that shook so violently they could not grasp the fabric.
Gaining his feet with a quick glance at the bath, Theo stepped between her and the copper tub, blocking the sight of it from her. Quickly buttoning his trousers, he then grabbed her arms, pulling her upright and away from her gloves on the floor as he tried to still her frantic motions.
She fought him so he leaned down, setting his face just before hers. “I don’t understand. What is happening, Vee?”
Her eyes darted about, a rabbit in a trap. “It is—I have to get out of here, Theo.” Her words stuttering, she attempted to squirm away with little success. “I thought I could handle it but then I remembered and it’s too much, Theo. Too much. I cannot. I cannot. I have to get out.”
Theo looked over his shoulder at the copper tub. Nothing was amiss. It was empty. A standard bathing tub with nothing of note about it. A quick scan of the rest of the bathing room told him the whole of the space was bland, nothing at all out of the ordinary.
But what had just attacked Violet with a vengeance was not ordinary.
He quite clearly needed to get her out of the there. To get her out of Vandestile Manor.
Ignoring her swatting hands, he bent, sweeping up her gloves and his clothes with his left hand and then wrapping his right arm fully around her, enveloping her into his body.
To his relief, she didn’t fight him. If anything, she suddenly realized the haven he provided and she curled into him—no doubt would have crawled inside of him if it were possible.
Of Sin & Sanctuary: A Revelry’s Tempest Novel Page 10