Besides. Messalina wasn’t entirely sure she could live without her sister.
She was still deep in thought when Gideon entered the sitting room with a bottle of wine and two small glasses. “I hope you don’t mind.”
“Not at all,” she replied, sitting upright hastily.
“Would you like a glass?” He indicated the bottle.
“Please.”
He poured and silently handed her the glass of wine, their fingers brushing.
She shivered, sipping the wine to cover. It was delightfully fruity. She set the glass on a table and cleared her throat. “Have you come to discuss the library?”
“No.” He abruptly set down his wine untasted. “Messalina. I’m not good with words where you’re concerned. But I want you to know that…” His beautiful mouth twisted. “Stay. Please stay with me. If you’ll let me—”
“Yes.” She held out her hands for him, not waiting for him to finish. “Yes.”
And strangely—perfectly—she knew it was the right thing to do.
He took her hands, sinking down to the settee beside her, his eyes closed. “Thank you.”
He lifted her hands palm-upward to his lips, brushing his lips over each one, sending shivers through her body, the touch light, almost reverent.
She caught her breath, tears pricking at her eyes.
He wrapped his arm about her waist and pulled her close, handling her as she had the psalter.
As if she were something infinitely precious and rare.
Something he didn’t want to lose.
He pressed kisses to the corners of her mouth. To her upper lip and then to her bottom lip. Slow and sensual. His head bent to hers as he wandered to her throat, making her skin pebble beneath his tongue.
The psalter dropped to the floor.
She tugged the tie from his hair, threading her fingers through the wild curls and breathing, “Make love to me.”
“Messalina,” he whispered, his voice sounding desperate, his lips moving to the base of her throat.
She was trembling—with need. With hope and love.
She cradled his face between her hands, making him raise his head, and looked at him. His lips were reddened, his black eyes wild. “Gideon. Please.”
“Yes.”
His hands actually shook as he pulled at the tie to her wrapper.
But then he dipped his head, catching her nipple through the thin lawn of her chemise.
All thought fled her mind.
He suckled and all she could do was feel.
She arched beneath him, whimpering, and he switched to her other nipple. The first, covered by the wet lawn, immediately peaked further in the chill.
She shivered, but not from cold. She knew how sensitive her nipples were now and could therefore anticipate the pleasure he would give her. Her entire being seemed to be focused on those points of aching, tight skin as he sucked and licked and bit.
She moved restlessly, her center hot and melting. “Gideon,” she whispered. “Please.”
He pulled her until she lay on her back on the settee and she looked up into his black glittering eyes.
He rose again, hovering over her in the dimly lit room, a strange creature conjured by her basest longings in the night.
“Pull up your chemise,” he whispered. “Show me your body.”
A hot thrill swept through her, so strong she pressed her thighs together. She gathered the voluminous skirts of her chemise and raised them, pulling until she had them bunched at her waist.
“Higher,” he growled, his eyes on her naked body.
With trembling hands she drew the thin material up, revealing her peaked breasts.
He simply looked at her.
She felt her nipples contract even more, becoming almost painful she was so aroused.
At last he met her eyes. “Messalina.”
And though it was only her name, in his voice she could hear all he meant to say.
He knelt over her, tearing at the falls to his breeches.
She held up her heavy arms. “Come to me.”
He looked at her as if she were the key to staying alive. As if he might die if he didn’t have her in the next minute.
He finally freed his cock, big and engorged. But when he began lowering himself onto her he suddenly stopped with a bitten-off exclamation.
Her eyes widened. “Your shoulder! Perhaps we should—”
“No. If you help me…” He shifted his weight to his left hand and looked at her.
Oh. She reached between them, taking his hard penis into her hands. For a moment she simply ran her fingers up his shaft, feeling the shocking heat, the soft skin. Then she reached the top and she ran her thumb over the pearl of liquid weeping from his slit.
His penis jerked in her hands and he inhaled sharply. “Messalina…”
She smiled secretly to herself for making his voice so gravelly. Then she wrapped her legs over his hips. The fabric of his breeches felt strange against her inner thighs. She guided his manhood to her entrance, looked into his eyes as his flesh touched hers.
He returned her gaze, watching her as he nudged inside her. He seemed to be telling her something with his eyes, and her heart pounded as she wondered what it meant.
She moaned as he stretched her, slowly, slowly invading her body, making pleasure streak through her. She fought to keep her eyes open, her gaze locked with his. This act was different from the ones before. It felt nearly sacred, a joining of minds as well as bodies.
She could tell he thought the same because he stared at her with an intensity she’d never seen from him before. He flexed his hips and withdrew from her, slow and controlled.
She immediately felt the loss.
“Messalina,” he said, his voice rasping and deep as he drove into her again.
He was blunt and implacable.
She gasped, her hand to his face tracing the arch of his devilish brows.
He looked driven as he made love to her, his eyes black and glittering, lines deepening around his mouth and nostrils. And his silver scar was like a brand on his darkened face.
He might’ve been a demon come for her soul.
But he wasn’t.
He wasn’t.
She arched beneath him, mindlessly turning liquid. Heating from her center as she clutched at his shoulders. She was so close, her peak just out of her reach.
She whimpered in frustration.
He slammed into her, shaking the settee, sweat beading his brow. “Touch yourself for me,” he gritted out, sounding as if he tore the words from his lungs. “Please, darling.”
The idea scandalized her. Made a thrill throb in her quim.
She burrowed her hand between them, feeling the flex of his stomach muscles, the scratch of the hair above his penis.
Biting her lips, staring into his black eyes, knowing that she could never do this for another man, she touched herself. Her skin was wet and slick, nearly too sensitive, and she clenched around him at how good it felt.
Her finger ground down on her pearl, firm and right, as he continued to…to…
He was watching her.
She bit her lip, unable to meet his black gaze. What they did was so wicked.
He relentlessly stroked bliss into her, the pleasure spiraling higher and higher, her fingers slick with her own excitement, until she bowed beneath him, unable to contain the ecstasy, blind with her own crisis.
She shuddered again and again as sparks spread through her, to her heart, to her mind, to her very fingertips.
And all the while he continued to pound into her.
When she could open her eyes, she looked up and saw a beautiful devil in torment. His eyes screwed shut, his lips pulled back from clenched teeth, his entire body sheened with sweat.
As if he were falling to hell.
As if he were ascending to heaven.
She held him as he shook and buried his penis deep within her. He froze in her arms, trembling, his head falling forw
ard to hang heavy from his shoulders as he panted harshly. She closed her eyes, feeling sated and peaceful.
At last, moving slowly, he withdrew from her and stood up.
Messalina threw down the skirts of her chemise and wrap, self-conscious now that she was no longer in the throes of lovemaking.
Gideon held out his hand to her. “Will you come to bed with me now, Mrs. Hawthorne?”
“Yes.”
She felt light as he pulled her to her feet, as if happiness were so close she could touch it. She leaned against him as they mounted the stairs. Reggie and the rest of Gideon’s men must be nearby, but they’d discreetly disappeared into the shadows.
When they came to Gideon’s room she pulled him inside and shut the door. Only then stopping and turning to look. “Do you want a true marriage?”
“Yes,” he said, his black eyes boring into hers.
She nodded. “Then I need to know one thing. What is the task that my uncle set for you?”
* * *
His blood seemed to freeze in his veins.
He couldn’t lose everything when he’d had it so nearly in his grasp.
Messalina squared her shoulders as if bracing herself. “I think if we are truly to start anew that there mustn’t be any secrets. For instance, I’ve kept from you what I intended to do with my dowry money.” She licked her lips. “I had planned to—to leave the country, leave everything and everyone to start a new life somewhere else. I did not mean to stay with you once I had the money.”
She took a deep breath and sighed as if a burden had fallen from her shoulders.
Then she looked at him with hopeful eyes.
He had to lie.
He had to.
She would not forgive him this. She would not live with him if she knew this. And she’d already made plans to leave him—leave the country.
She frowned. “Gideon?”
He stared at her, his mind spinning, scrabbling for the words to fix this. To make it better so that she’d smile again at him. To make things as they had been only minutes before.
“Gideon.”
“Messalina,” he whispered, crucified.
The fading hope in her beautiful eyes near killed him.
He reached for her hand.
She stepped away from him. “Tell me, please.”
“I…”
The hope was almost entirely gone. Replaced with something fierce. “Tell me.”
He clenched his jaw. Hating this. Wanting to stop time. To push back the inevitable disaster.
But he could not.
And somehow he could no longer lie to her, either. “Your uncle ordered me to kill Julian.”
She took another step away from him, shaking her head. “What?”
“I considered it,” he said, putting all his soul into the truth. “At the beginning. But that was before. I would never do it now.”
She closed her eyes as if she couldn’t bear to see him. “Then why didn’t you tell me?”
Because he’d wanted her never to know.
Because he was a coward.
Messalina opened her eyes, pinning him with her stark stare. “You were planning how to do it without me finding out.”
“Yes,” he breathed, knowing he was killing both her hope and his. “At first. But not anymore.”
She turned to the door. “I’ll have to wake Lucretia.”
“Please,” Gideon said, and was astonished. He’d never begged in his life. Not to the duke. Not to the men he’d lost knife fights to.
Not to anyone.
He’d beg Messalina, though, if it would but make her look at him for a second.
A fraction of a second. “Please listen.”
She paused at the door, her back to him. “What can you possibly say to me?”
Panic rose in Gideon’s breast. This couldn’t be happening. “Goddamn it, Messalina, I didn’t even know what the task was before I married you. I’m telling the truth. Please. You have to believe me.”
“But I can’t,” she said, finally, finally turning to him. He saw to his horror that there were tears in her eyes. “You deceived me before for your own gain. I won’t let you do it again. I wish that I could believe that you care enough for me to refuse to kill my brother. But I can’t.” She drew a shuddering breath. “I simply can’t.”
He felt as if his chest were cracking open. As if everything inside and all that he was—his hopes, his dreams, his very purpose in life—was leaking out.
As if he were dying.
And the truth burst from his bleeding chest. “I love you.”
Even as he said it, he knew it was too late.
She laughed—a terrible cawing sound. “No. No. No. That won’t work. No more manipulation.” She swiped across her eyes with a shaking hand. “I think I love you, Gideon. But that’s not enough. Not anymore.” She raised her head and looked him in the eye. “Goodbye.”
He watched dumbly as she walked out.
Leaving him alone.
Chapter Nineteen
Autumn came, and one day the fox returned home with a torn ear and a fine blue dress and gave it to Bet.
She pulled on the dress and it fit perfectly. “Why have you given me this?”
“To remember me by,” the fox said mockingly.…
—From Bet and the Fox
Messalina couldn’t leave that night, of course.
If nothing else, she needed a carriage.
It was morning, well past sunrise, when she stepped out of Whispers House for the last time with Lucretia by her side.
“Oof.” Lucretia was carrying the enormous wicker basket Hicks had made for them. The cook had told them that it contained Lucretia’s favorite cakes.
Which was probably why her sister refused to let anyone else carry the thing.
Reggie stood by her carriage—borrowed from Freya and Kester—his large frame shuffling awkwardly from foot to foot. He called as they neared, “At least let Pea go with you, ma’am. ’E’s small but ’e’s a terror when ’e wants.” He glanced up at Whispers. “The guv is that worried.”
Lucretia widened her eyes in mute appeal to Messalina.
Messalina shook her head. She wanted nothing to do with her husband. “I’m sorry, Reggie, but I’ve the Duke of Harlowe’s men to protect us. I think that’s quite enough. Besides”—she tried to smile and didn’t quite make it—“We aren’t going far.”
The last was a flat-out lie. She intended to flee to Kester’s country home to lick her wounds. After that she’d make her plans with Lucretia.
As dismal a prospect as that was.
Perhaps she could ask Kester for monetary help, for she hadn’t even gotten her portion of her dowry from Gideon, fool that she was. He seemed to be avoiding her this morning, and that hurt more than anything else.
“I think I’ll miss this place,” Lucretia murmured, glancing back at Whispers. She sighed and let a footman help her into the carriage.
Messalina nodded to Reggie and turned to step into the carriage.
“Ma’am!”
She looked back.
Sam was running to her, Daisy clutched in his arms. “You forgot Daisy, ma’am!”
She’d had such lofty plans to help Sam and boys like him. Now that was gone. Everything was gone.
Sam stood before her now, his eyes wide and pleading, and held out a limp Daisy. “Take ’im or ’e’ll be that ’urt. ’E’ll think you don’t like ’im.”
Her eyes blurred. “I like both Daisy and you, Sam, but I don’t know if he’d want a carriage ride. Can you”—she wiped at her eyes—“can you take care of him, please?”
Both puppy and boy stared at her bewildered. “Yes, ma’am. If you like.” Sam’s bottom lip trembled. “You’re really going away?”
“I’m afraid so.”
She entered the carriage before she started bawling in the street. How had she come to care for Gideon’s men and boys? How had she let herself love him?
The carriage jo
lted, and she looked out the window as the carriage rolled forward. Reggie was standing with his hand on Sam’s shoulder, Daisy still in the boy’s arms.
She turned away from the sight and screwed her eyes shut.
She would never be whole again.
* * *
Gideon watched the carriage pull away from Whispers House, taking with it Messalina and his heart.
He bowed his head, leaning his forehead against the cold glass.
He needed her.
Like air. Like water. Like bread. She was essential to his survival.
And he’d never see her again. The thought made his chest freeze for a painfully long minute.
He straightened, turning away from the window. He had business to attend to. Things that must be done.
He wouldn’t think of Messalina. He couldn’t think of Messalina now. Better instead to attend to business. That way he might never notice his mortal wound.
Gideon blew out a breath and left the room, running down the stairs.
Outside, the sun was hidden by clouds, giving the day a grayish tinge. Gideon began walking rapidly, making plans in his head, trying to expect any eventuality. Though of course that was impossible.
By the time he made the nondescript inn, his palms were sweating, but he knew this was the only way.
The only way left to him.
He opened the door to a taproom being swept by a yawning maid. She gave him the direction easily enough, and he climbed to the upstairs rooms.
The barmaid had said the third door on the right. He rapped.
There was no answer, though the room was supposed to be occupied.
Gideon shook his knife down his sleeve and into his hand. If he’d come too late…Well.
He knocked again, louder this time.
He wrenched at the door, yanking it violently open.
Julian Greycourt stood there, in shirtsleeves and breeches, barefoot and with his long, black hair loose down his back.
He held two pistols, and they were both pointed at Gideon’s chest.
* * *
Sometime past noon Messalina leaned against the window of the carriage, aware that Lucretia was staring at her.
“Are you sure this is what you want?” her sister asked hesitantly.
When a Rogue Meets His Match Page 29