by Kimberly Nee
“Oh…” he moaned, and it sounded like a moan of pain, not of pleasure. Harder and harder he came at her. The pleasure stung her, wrapped all around her, and she thought she’d go mad if he didn’t shove her out over the abyss soon.
Pleasure swelled inside her, bloomed with each deep thrust. It coursed through her, made her entire body tingle, made her want to wrap her arms tighter around him and tell him how she felt about him.
This was even more than Claudia said it would be. So much more. Above her, Bennett smiled and dipped to kiss her as he gave a particularly hard thrust. He caught her cry in his mouth as the swelling pleasure burst to flood her body with a white fiery heat that left her head spinning and her fingernails biting into his shoulders.
“Elena!” He arched hard into her, and that was all it took. She spun out into the great beyond, her voice hoarse as she cried out his name as a blinding white flash burst before her eyes.
“Oh…oh… Dear lord,” he said, sinking against her, his head coming to rest on her breast. “Oh, Elena…darling…”
Her entire body tingled and her hand trembled as she gently stroked his hair, tucking the raven strands behind his left ear. “Are you all right?” she whispered, her throat squeezing shut and her eyes stinging with surprised tears. Why the devil was she crying? Why did her emotions suddenly feel so raw and exposed?
No one had warned her. Why didn’t anyone tell her nothing on earth even came close to giving herself to the man she loved?
Because she did love Bennett. He was smart and strong and kind, and when he smiled, the skin around his eyes crinkled in the most adorable manner. He was sweet and he smelled delightful. As she lay there, stroking his hair, with his head on her breast and his breath warm on her skin, she wished more than anything she had the courage to tell him.
“I’m fine, darling. Absolutely fine.” He lifted his head to regard her with tender eyes, which then narrowed. “Are you crying?”
She nodded, unable to halt the flow of tears, no matter how foolish they made her feel. They were nothing compared to the awe and wonder she felt at having shared something so special with him. At having been a part of this momentous thing.
At having given him the only gift she could—herself.
“I don’t know why.” She sniffed and wiped at one eye. She didn’t really want him to see her cry, but she couldn’t seem to make the tears stop.
He withdrew from her and then gathered her in his arms. “I thought the pain stopped.”
She sighed as the fullness inside her dissipated, but snuggled into him, resting her head on his chest. “It did. And what came next was wonderful. Incredible, even.” She wiped her other streaming eye and shook her head. “These tears have nothing to do with that. I—I couldn’t explain it, if I tried.”
He didn’t press her. Instead, he held her. His fingers trailed lightly over her hair as he fell silent. She lay there, content in his arms, listening to him breathe and knowing he was truly there with her. “Is this a dream?” she whispered, lifting her head to look at him. “Because it seems like one. I’m afraid I’ll wake up and none of this will have happened.”
He didn’t look at her, but stared up at the ceiling, his hand going still on her arm. Perhaps it was only her imagination, but the air seemed charged now, and not with the same spark of passion as before. Something wasn’t right.
“Bennett? What is it?”
The sheets rustled as he slid away from her, to the edge of the bed, where he sat up and shifted, letting his legs dangle over the edge. “I should go,” His voice was low and rough, as if it hurt to speak.
That feeling of something being wrong sharpened. Tugging the sheet almost to her chin as she sat up, Elena reached for him. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
As soon as her fingertips brushed his shoulder, he jumped up, as if her touch burned him. “Elena, don’t.”
“Don’t what?” Her heart sped up to send her pulse pounding through her temples with enough force that it actually hurt. “Don’t what, Bennett?”
He crouched, reached for something, then rose, his breeches in one fist. “This was a mistake, Elena. A terrible mistake.”
“A mistake?” She could barely hear over the roar of her blood rushing through her temples. Her mouth went painfully dry. Each heartbeat sent black dots dancing before her eyes. No. This isn’t happening. It can’t be.
But it was. Bennett thrust first one leg, then the other into his breeches, and tugged them into place as he closed the space between him and the door. “Forgive me, Elena.”
“Wait…” She jumped up, her modesty be damned, and lunged to grab him by the wrist before he could open the door. “What the deuce are you about, Bennett?”
He didn’t try to pull away from her, but shook his head. “This shouldn’t have happened. I should have never let it happen.”
She gave a sharp tug on his arm. “Will you look at me?”
He did, spinning about slowly until he faced her. Her heart skipped a painful beat at the pain in his eyes, and her stomach twisted into a sharp knot as he said, “I know better, Elena. You are young and innocent and I took advantage of that because it has been a long time since—” A dull flush rose along his cheekbones. “There can never be anything more than this.”
“If you mention that damned curse—”
“That damned curse.” He let out a dry, humorless laugh. “I suppose to you it seems silly. But to me it is all too real. I’ve seen it. Every earl before me has died before his time, and that is anything but silly to me.”
“Anything but silly to you.” She released him and stepped back, going numb as she stared up at him. No, this wasn’t happening. It couldn’t be. She’d come so close, only to have her happiness stolen out from beneath her. “It didn’t seem so silly to you a few minutes ago, when your eyes were crossing and you had a death grip on the coverlet.”
“Elena, you don’t under—”
“I don’t understand?” she finished, spinning away from him to reach for the coverlet in question, which she tugged off the bed and about her shoulders. “You’re right, Bennett. I don’t understand. I don’t understand how you can put such stock in such foolishness, but only when it suits you.”
“Suits me? This doesn’t suit me at all.”
“Oh, is that so? You didn’t give a fig about any curse until after you’d gotten what you wanted from me. And now that you have, you conveniently believe in it once more.” She clutched the coverlet so tightly, her fingernails dug into her palms, but she only barely felt it. Instead, the heat of idiocy swept through her and that stung more than any fingernails on her skin could. “You used me, Bennett.”
“I made myself perfectly clear where I stood, Elena.” He met her gaze and his eyes had gone cold. “You knew how I felt, you knew why I feel the way I do. If I used you, it was because you allowed me to do so.”
“Get out.” The words clogged her throat, fat and angry, and it took every bit of will she had to force them from her tongue. “You think you are so honorable, don’t you? Well, you aren’t. Not one bit. You are no better than Huxley. No, wait”—she shook her head, fury rushing through her with all the power of a wildfire—“at least he was honest in his intentions. I cannot say the same for you.”
To her surprise, he nodded. “You’re right. I am hardly honorable. You want what I cannot give you. I thought I could, but I was wrong. It’s a chance I simply will not take.”
He opened the door and without so much as looking at her, he vanished into the darkness, the door barely making a sound as it closed behind him.
Chapter Twenty
When Elena opened her eyes the next morning, she regretted it immediately. Her head ached. Her eyes were puffy and red from crying and exhaustion. She had no idea what time it was when she finally managed to fall asleep, but the sun had already begun its ascent.
The last thing she felt like doing was going below, but her stomach growled, so she rose from the bed, but when she turned to
draw on her wrapper, she froze, the pit of her stomach falling away at the bloodstain on her side of the sheet. It was reddish-brown and dried now, but her stomach hurt just looking at it. What would the maids think when they came in to change the bed? How would she ever explain it if it reached Conn’s ears?
“Best not to think about that. But, damn it, Claudia, you might have mentioned the blood,” she muttered, yanking the sheets from the bed and balling them up to stuff in the bottom of the wardrobe before she rang for the maid.
After dressing, she went below to the breakfast room. There was no sign of Galen and his new bride, or of Claudia’s family. In fact, the only souls in the room were Cordelia and Conn, and they seemed to be deep in conversation with one another.
Thank the Maker Bennett wasn’t there, either. She wasn’t at all certain how calm she would be able to remain, once they inevitably came face to face with one another. The last thing she wanted or needed was an audience. Especially one with Conn.
“Good morning,” she greeted. “I hope I’m not interrupting.”
Cordelia smiled. “Good morning, Miss Sebastiano. Did you s-sleep well?”
“I did, thank you. And yourself?”
She nodded. “Quite well.”
Conn sipped from his cup and set it down. “I saw his lordship earlier. He was looking a bit worse for the wear. Tired. As if he hadn’t slept much last eve.”
“Did he?” Her stomach curdled at the memory of Bennett, slinking from her room like a whipped dog. She struggled to remain as outwardly calm as possible. Inside, her emotions raged like a storm on the open seas, but no one else would ever guess. “Perhaps he just had a bit too much cheer last eve, like many guests, I’d imagine.”
With that, she moved to the sideboard and reached for a cup. She had yet to develop much of a taste for tea, as they drank coffee on St. Phillippe, but it no longer mattered. Before the day was out, she planned on pinning Conn down when it came to when they could leave England. She couldn’t tell him why, of course, but it wouldn’t matter. He had to know she missed St. Phillippe and that was reason enough.
She couldn’t wait to take her leave of England, to leave it and its gloomy weather, and even gloomier men, and let them all fade into memory. They couldn’t set sail soon enough, as the sooner they left, the sooner she would forget Bennett Markham, Earl of Dunning, ever existed.
But of course, that would never happen. As long as she lived, she’d carry his memory. And she’d hate herself for it with each passing day.
Her eyes stung as she brought her cup back to the table. She took her seat, sipped the tea, found it terribly bitter, and wrinkled her nose as she reached for the cream. “Now that the wedding is behind us,” she said slowly, the words as thick and cumbersome as they were the night before, “when did you wish to leave?”
Conn cast a quick glance at Cordelia, then looked at her. “I haven’t given it much thought, Lena. In a hurry, are you?”
She stared at him, trying to come up with a feasible answer. The tea was lukewarm, so she took a long drink, then lowered the cup to say, “I miss home, especially now that Claudia no longer needs me.”
“What about Lord Dunning?” Cordelia asked.
Elena choked on her next mouthful of tea, but managed to swallow it without indication. She set the saucer down and reached for her napkin to dab at her lips. “I beg your pardon?”
“You’ve been spending so much time with him, I just th-thought—”
“I was only helping him, Cordelia,” Elena said, her eyes stinging and her throat closing at the same time, “and now that he’s made his decision… I am ready to return home.”
Conn’s forehead creased. “Are you certain?”
“Very, yes.”
He nodded. “Very well. I’ll venture to the harbor and round everyone up as soon as I check the tides.”
“Good.” Everything went blurry as her eyes welled, and since she certainly couldn’t let Conn see her crying without it leading to questions she did not wish to answer, she rose to go to the sideboard. “Thank you.”
“Of course.” Wood creaked, skirts rustled, and she knew both had moved from their seats. A hand came down onto her shoulder, warm and soothing, as was Conn’s, “Is everything all right, Lena?”
She nodded, reaching for a plate. “Everything is fine, Conn.” She forced herself to meet his eyes and somehow managed a smile.
“If you’re sure.” He gave her a gentle squeeze, then moved to join Cordelia in the doorway. To her, he said, “Would you care to venture into the village with me?”
“I would love to. I only have to speak with my mother and then—” Her voice faded as they left the breakfast room.
With a shaky sigh, Elena scooped shirred eggs onto her plate. The quiet unsettled her. She just wanted to eat and return to her chambers.
It wasn’t meant to be.
“Good morning, Miss Sebastiano.”
Her hunger went forgotten at the sound of Bennett’s voice. She swallowed hard, forcing herself to look up, at him in the doorway, looking every bit as uncomfortable as she felt.
Without a word, she turned away, toward the sideboard. Although she wasn’t the least bit hungry any more, she reached for the bacon. And then toast. And jam. And when her plate couldn’t hold another morsel, she returned to her chair and buttered a slice of toast.
“Miss Sebastiano, I owe you—”
“No.” She cut him off around a mouthful of toast. “You owe me nothing, my lord. Nothing at all.”
He said nothing at first, but Elena didn’t miss how his gaze lingered on her and his right brow rose ever so slightly. It unsettled her almost as much as the quiet had before. No, it was far worse. After a night of shared passion, of feeling his hands, his mouth, his tongue, on her body and inside her, she never would have thought it possible to feel this uncomfortable now. Shy? Perhaps. But uncomfortable? She wouldn’t have thought it possible. But, as his gaze lingered on her, her discomfort grew, and even more infuriating? The heat that swept through her, that made her face feel hotter by the second. She could only hope he couldn’t see her blush. She chewed harder, as if that would make it fade that much faster.
“I’d like to apologize.” He went on as if she hadn’t just sputtered crumbs along with her words at him. “I led you to believe I’d changed my mind, when I hadn’t. And although I know that is unforgivable, I do hope you will find it in your heart to do otherwise.”
“Led me to believe—find it in my—” Fury swept through her, her toast forgotten as she could only stare, her words swirling wildly in her brain, desperate to assemble into some sort of coherent thought. The best she could snarl was, “How dare you?”
With that, she rose, fists pressed into the tablecloth as she no longer had any trouble meeting his eyes. “How dare you attempt to turn this. To make it so that I am the one—the simple island girl who was too simple to understand what you meant, when we both know perfectly well what you said and how you meant it. And even now, you are too much the coward to do anything other than blame it on me for not understanding.”
She straightened and came around to poke him in the middle of his chest. “And you, my lord, are a coward.”
To her surprise, he nodded. “Yes. I am. You should only know how I envy you the ability to see the brighter side, to see the dawn instead of the darkness. If I could do that, we would not be having this conversation.”
Despite her anger, her hopes rose, her spirits rising right alongside them. But a moment later, they crashed right down into the soles of her feet as he shook his head and added, “But I cannot do that. It isn’t in my nature. I’ve lived with this hanging over my head for my entire life and I don’t expect you to understand.”
“Good, because I don’t understand. I don’t understand how you could say one thing last night and then another after we”—she cleared her throat—“after what happened. I never once thought you would be the sort to play with a lady’s emotions, to make promises you nev
er had any intention of keeping. I thought you were better than that.”
He flinched and his voice was heavy with regret as he said, “I’m not.”
“No”—she shook her head—“you’re not. Now, if you will excuse me, I need to go pack my things. Conn’s gone to check the tides and when he returns, we will be leaving as soon as possible.”
She skirted the table, attempted to move by him but he caught her by the elbow. “For what it’s worth, Elena, I am sorry.”
“Of course you are,” she told him flatly, the numbness creeping in to tamp out her fury. “But your life will go on. Or perhaps it won’t. Either way, I hope you find happiness, if only for a little while, with Lady Rosamund.”
His fingers tightened on her, but then he let go. “I hope you find a man who can give you everything you’ve dreamed of finding.”
“It won’t matter,” she told him bluntly. “No one will have me now.”
“You’re wrong, Elena,” he replied softly, shaking his head. “A man would be fortunate to call you his.”
“I suppose we’ll both have to hope for the best.” Her throat tightened once more, so she turned away before he could see how shiny her eyes grew. “Excuse me, Lord Dunning.”
She didn’t wait for his reply, but hurried above, where she could hide behind her locked door and cry until there wasn’t a drop of water left in her body.
Chapter Twenty-One
The canopy had dust dangling from its lacy edge.
Elena scowled. Who cared about a canopy when everything else had gone so wrong? In the span of a single day, she went from the pinnacle of happiness to lying on her bed, staring up at dusty canopy.
More than anything, she wished she had Serena to talk this over with, to reassure her that things weren’t quite as bad as they seemed, although they’d both know otherwise. It was every bit as awful as it seemed. She’d done the dumbest thing she could, the one thing Papi would never forgive her for doing. And if he should ever learn that she’d slept with Bennett Markham…she shuddered to think what would happen. At best, he’d set sail for England at once and Bennett would find himself at the sharp end of a sword, righting his mistake before a priest or magistrate or however it was done here.