“And let you summon Ivan to come and torture me further? I think not!” she sobbed. She didn’t trust Antonia. The woman was too much on Ivan’s side and no matter her kindnesses, she was dangerous. She tried to rise again but found she couldn’t quite make it.
“You’re not well. You look feverish. I’ll bring you some water. Stay there!” Antonia ordered.
Lissa looked up and wiped her tears. Antonia had barely departed before she dizzily headed for the hall and the front doors. In moments she was out the door, blending into the traffic on Oxford Street.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
By the time Lissa reached the Bell and Garter, darkness had fallen. The inn was gearing up for its nightly business, and even from the yard, she could hear men brawling and cheering in the common room.
With great trepidation she opened the inn’s door and discreetly entered. She was shivering and her mantle and gown were damp from the rain. She hoped her poor appearance would keep her from being noticed; still, she kept the brim of her bonnet down and clung to the far wall.
The common room was packed to the rafters. The rain had driven many inside, and the lure of the trade had brought in as many more. From the trestles, a girl with a customer squealed in laughter; from a corner men were rolling dice. The stout drinkers were three deep at the bar and Sly could hardly keep them supplied, let alone happy. She barely got to the wainscoted stair before someone had her by the waist.
“Ah, Sly! I may be ’avin’ a go yet with one o’ yer ‘ladies’! Where did ye get this little angel? Did she fall out o’ the sky?”
Startled, Lissa looked up and found herself in the arms of a brawny young man.
“No, please, I’m not what you think” was all she could say before the man began untying her bonnet. He had it off before she could stop him and soon his hands raked through the fine-spun gold of her hair.
“Ye are a rare beauty,” he admitted in a hushed voice.
“Unhand me, I say. Unhand me this instant,” she demanded, but her protest sounded weak even to her ears. She couldn’t fight this man off. Especially not now, when she couldn’t even stop shivering. She made a futile attempt to extract his hands from her waist, but that only deepened the gleam in the gent’s warm brown eyes. She gazed around her and saw a crowd was gathering.
“ ’ow much fer this one, Sly!” the man suddenly yelled across the room.
“You’ll have to work that out with the chit herself,” Sly shouted back. “I warn you though, she’s a hoity-toity one. Thinks she’s off to be a governess in one of them fine homes on Park Lane.”
Everyone in the common room snickered. But her assailant seemed to find it particularly hilarious. His hand tightened more possessively at her waist. “Ye mean the wench don’t know it that she’s got a job just waitin’ . . . ’tween ’er legs!” The man laughed even harder.
Soon, however, his face was etched in fear. From the crowd, a tall, shadowy man had pushed his way to the front. Before Lissa could even register that she knew that mask of deadly rage, a fist went out and smashed the brawny young man’s face. His blood spattered on the wall behind him and, in terror, the man shrank back, holding his bloodied sleeve to his broken nose.
“I ought to kill you,” Ivan hissed between clenched teeth as he shoved the man to the wall.
“Wha’s it to ye? Wha’s it to ye?” the man whined, hysterical.
Sick from the sight of the blood, sicker still that Ivan had somehow found her, Lissa leaned against the wainscoting and tried to keep from fainting.
“No more, man!” All at once Sly fought his way to the front of the crowd. He pulled on Ivan’s arms like a pit bull. “Let him go, I tell you! The poor bloke did nothing! Are you a madman?”
Sly’s words somehow seemed to jolt sanity back into Ivan. As if he were aware for the first time where he was, he abruptly let the man go. Absentmindedly he looked at his blood-covered knuckles, then it seemed to dawn on him just why he was there. With horror, Lissa watched as he stared right at her.
“Come here” was all he said to her, but it was all he needed to say. In that one utterance, passion and hatred were wed beautifully.
“No,” she answered, her eyes glittering with defiance.
He took a step toward her and she fled up the stairs. No matter that she heard his footsteps behind her, she picked up her skirts and ran down the passage. Fumbling for her key, she unlocked the door just as he was upon her. She pushed to close it just as his hand reached through and grasped the edge. With his far superior strength he was in her room in seconds.
“Get out I say! Before they come up here and drag you out!” she panted as she backed toward her bed.
Ivan laughed sarcastically. “Yes, I forget how chivalrous the men are in St. Giles-in-the-Fields.”
It was true. No one downstairs was going to stick his neck out to help her.
Behind her, she heard him close the door. The only light in her room came from the gaslights outside on the cemetery gates.
“Lissa,” she heard him say with a hard edge to his voice, “are you . . . all right?”
She closed her eyes. She knew exactly in what way he meant. “Yes,” she cursed.
“Thank God.”
“How did you find me?”
He stepped closer to her. “I put a notice in all the London newspapers. I offered a reward, and people were lined up all the way down Piccadilly to give me news of you. But finally it was a bloke named O’Hurley who led me here. He came to the town house this morning and was actually sorry to have told on you. But he said you were better off back in Nodding Knoll and that he could certainly use the thousand pounds.”
Lissa started. Ivan had offered a thousand pounds to find her? It was a huge amount of money.
“I still don’t understand how you knew I was in London,” she finally muttered.
“Harry McBain saw the Parks’s coach stopped by Violet Croft the night you left. I demanded that Arabella tell me where you went. When she finally broke down, she told me how she and her mother had helped you leave. She made quite a display of it too,” he added distastefully.
“She wants to be your wife.” She almost choked on the words.
“Is that why she made you leave Nodding Knoll?”
Angrily she spun around. “No! I was going anyway! I wasn’t going to stay and listen to those filthy rumors! And Arabella helped me! She is a dear friend!” Though she didn’t believe the latter part for a moment, defending Arabella seemed to infuriate him all the more.
He crossed the room and took her by the shoulders, shaking her. “No friend would send a young woman to London to be eaten alive!”
“Stop!” she cried out. When he did, she broke free and stumbled to the window. Feeling unsteady, she grasped the sill. Then she faced him.
She should never have done that. She stared at him in the dim gaslight of her mean little room, and she suddenly knew her weakness for him was back with all the force of a thunderbolt. Unable to stop herself, she devoured every detail of him that she had missed: his glittering eyes, his taut lips, his angry white scar. She saw that he was still in his greatcoat and that his hair was damp from the rain; it was slicked back as if his hand had agitatedly run through it many times. With sudden brutal clarity she remembered running her own hands through it, and crying out his name. That night should have been long ago, but suddenly, it seemed like only yesterday.
“Lissa, I’m taking you out of here. Get your things. We’ll discuss everything later.”
He was speaking to her, but she could hardly hear him. The pain she felt by tearing her gaze away was terrible, yet she couldn’t let him keep his hold on her. Already she felt as if she were growing mad from it. The room began to swim and she grasped the sill as if for dear life.
She felt as if she were watching from outside herself when she saw him grab her. He steadied her, then he swept one callused palm over her brow.
“My God, you’re burning with fever.”
“No,�
�� she denied staunchly.
“My coach is outside. I’m taking you now.”
“No.” She tried to pull from him.
“Lissa,” he began angrily. Taking her chin, he forced her to look up to him. “You’re not spending another minute in this rat hole, so don’t fight me on this, you cannot win.”
“And how will you make me leave? Shall you throw me over your shoulder and carry me out like so much baggage?”
“If I must,” he answered quietly, too quietly.
Ignoring his warning, she struggled out of his embrace. She felt a giddy pleasure as she angered him further. She threw off her mantle. Her bonnet was by now long lost in the common room, so instead she removed whatever stray pins remained in her hair. She then began combing her tresses leisurely. Maddeningly.
“Lissa,” he growled, his fury peaking. “You’re going. Now.”
“My, my, Ivan the Terrible has uttered his command, so everyone, jump to obey!” She turned back to her combing. She wasn’t acting like herself. She was feeling far braver than she should have. Perhaps she truly did have some kind of fever. Certainly she burned every time she looked at him.
“Don’t make me force you, Lissa. Not while you’re ill.”
“I am not ill!” she practically shouted at him.
Out of the corner of her eye she watched him pick up her sodden mantle. Purposefully he moved toward her, his face taut with anger. He would brook no disobedience now. Could she fight him? She doubted it, so she stumbled back, knocking into her bed. She lost her balance and landed on the edge of the mattress.
“Come,” he said as if he were now talking to a child. He bent down and wrapped her in the mantle.
She closed her eyes and, for the moment, gave into her exhaustion.
With her eyes closed and him so near, his scent teased her. In his dampsurtout, he smelled like a forest right after a rain. But she smelled underscents too, scents that she couldn’t quite name. They were dark and heavy, yet they promised pleasure beyond her wildest imaginings. Just breathing in made her pulse quicken and her belly tense. Her nerves suddenly felt raw from denial.
She opened her eyes and looked at him. As if he had her well in hand, he fastened the silk frogs on her mantle. His fingers brushed her throat, and that one tiny caress shot a bolt of sensation right through her. Unwillingly, her eyes met his. As usual, he looked like the consummate conqueror.
As if sensing her mood, he rubbed the back of his hand against her cheek. Taunting her, he said, “You know, love, you must have been mad to have come to this wretched place. Whatever made you run here?”
You!she wanted to scream; but burning with resentment and, worse, passion, she refused to answer. She tried to turn from him, but he wouldn’t let her. He held her head with both hands and demanded she look at him. When she did, he chuckled. Without remorse, she lifted her hand to slap him.
“Come now, Lissa,” he whispered nastily. He caught her hand in midair. “You ought to know by now you can’t win that way.”
“Then how can I win?” she spat at him.
“This way,” he told her, and pressed his lips to her own.
It was clear he had intended the kiss to be quick and punishing, but somehow it spun out of control. Her entire body stiffened when his lips first touched hers, but all too quickly she found herself growing hotter. Soon she was kissing him back, deeply, desperately. She could feel his reluctance as she opened her mouth to him, but she needed him too much to stop. She was no longer a child in the throes of an adolescent infatuation. She was a woman, and he alone had made her one. So he alone was the only one who could satiate her. Her body, soul, and mind had been existing in a desert the past few weeks without him, but now, as he kissed her, she was in Eden. She never wanted to leave again.
“Damn you.” He abruptly tore her from him. His eyes blazed. “You’re ill—what do you think you’re doing?”
Hurt by his rejection, she turned away. Her fingers touched her kiss-swollen lips, but that only enraged her more. Defiantly she tossed off her mantle. Angrily he pulled it to her once more.
Again she closed her eyes. Suddenly she felt too weak to fight him any more. The realization of how much she had longed for him in the past wretched weeks left her with no defenses.
“Have you not missed me at all?” she whispered to him when at last their furious gazes met.
“Do you expect me to take you here—with you like this?” His hand cupped her cheek. Her warmth seemed to disturb him.
As if in a trance, her finger reached out and touched his lips. She traced them lovingly, then moved to his jaw, scratchy with his evening beard. Before she could stop herself, she boldly pressed forward and ran the tip of her tongue down his throat.
That made him groan. His hands grasped her shoulders and they tightened almost painfully.
“You’re a wicked man, Ivan Tramore,” she admitted huskily. “My curse is that I want you at all.”
His eyes narrowed and he became speculative. He looked down at one of his hands. His knuckles were covered with tiny scars, and she surmised that must have been the hand bandaged when she saw him in the church. He seemed most reluctant, yet somehow, by looking at his hand, he came to a decision. With unspeakable relief, she felt him sliding her mantle off her shoulders.
“After this,alainn, you’re coming with me,” he said huskily.
She released a sigh of relief. “Perhaps” was all she said before he began unbuttoning the front of her gown.
Her body felt like it was on fire and she couldn’t shed her clothes fast enough. Though it was cold in her room, a thin film of perspiration glistened on her bosom as he opened her bodice. His mouth grazed one swell of her lush bosom and she wondered how she tasted to him. She seemed to taste good, for his tongue trailed down her breast until he almost found her nipple hidden beneath her corset.
He stood and, with his glittering gaze pinning her to the mattress, shed his greatcoat. He pulled off his cravat, shirt, and trousers until he stood naked before her. In the dim flickering light cast up from the street, she could see the muscles flex in his thighs as he walked to her. She remembered running her palm down their hard, muscled length while she had lain next to him. Watching now, her fingers curled into her palms as if she again felt such a wickedly pleasurable caress.
Without a word, he eased himself down onto the edge of her bed and pulled her to stand between his legs. As if starved, he pushed back her tresses with both hands, then brought her face to him for another kiss. His tongue roughly entered her and a charge shot down her spine. She was so unbearably hot, she didn’t want him to be gentle, she wanted him to be as impatient as she was.
With a moan, she felt his hand slide beneath her skirts. He easily found the split in her pantalets and though she gasped in protest, his hand claimed her anyway. His expert caress shocked her as desire darkened her eyes. He drove her mad with his touch, more crazed than she surely was already, but she didn’t care. There had been nights when the thought of death seemed preferable to never having Ivan again. Now, as he brought her to a peak, she knew she’d been right. Having Ivan was all that mattered.
As if torturing her, he abruptly let her fall. She cried out as he removed his hand. She knew she couldn’t wait for him any longer so she pulled him to her for another kiss. Gratefully he cooperated. Again his hand slid beneath her bodice for a caress, but suddenly something caught his attention. He broke free and roughly parted her bodice.
“What is this?” he asked as he pointed to the crystal pinned to the inside of her dress.
Her mind seemed too drugged with passion to answer, but soon she whispered, “It’s nothing, I tell you.” She tried to close up her dress, but he wouldn’t let her.
He unpinned the crystal and held it in his hand. It seemed to hold an unaccountable fascination for him. “Why did you keep this?”
“Give it back, Ivan. I tell you it’s nothing.” Becoming more agitated by the second, she tried to get off the bed.
But he would have none of it. He smiled and pushed her to the mattress. Her hair fanned out beneath her and he caressed her locks with one hand; with the other he dangled the crystal tauntingly over her.
“Do you know how beautiful you were that night at the ball?”
She shook her head and looked up at him.
“You shall be dressed like that always,” he mused, “or wear nothing at all.” Disparagingly he looked at her somber gray woolen dress.
His attention elsewhere, she tried to grab her crystal, but just as she did he closed his fist. He laughed as she tried again to get it, but to no avail. When she was worn out, she whispered, “You’re a wretch to take that from me, Ivan.”
He kissed her, letting his tongue go where it may, then he dropped the crystal maddeningly into the mass of her hair. When her hands reached to find it, he pulled them down and shackled them with his grip. Ignoring her protests, he went to work on her corset. After he’d freed her of all her garments, he eased her beneath his long form and took her mouth again, this time more wildly, more hotly. He seemed impatient now and she could feel his excitement grow. His hand forced open her thighs, then sought out the curve of her tiny waist, next the swell of her generous breasts. His hard mouth captured one nipple and a gasp caught in her throat as she experienced anew the familiar sweet ache she felt only for him.
“Alainn,you’re like fire beneath me,” he gasped. On massive arms, he pulled his body up off her as if she burned him. The slightest glimmer of guilt shone in his eyes. Then, without warning, he cast it away and drove deeply into her.
A grateful moan escaped her lips as she finally felt him inside her. Her need for him was soon to be banished. Forever, she hoped. Yet secretly in her soul she wondered if she was fooling herself, even as she welcomed his thrusts as if they were his love.
When their passion was spent, they lay naked on the little bed, entwined in each other’s embrace. Her tangled hair fanned out on the mattress and he easily had her trapped by his shoulder, which lay upon it. He studied her, though she seemed hardly aware of it.
When Angels Fall Page 31