Fallen Angel (8 page)

"What I think," she answered in clipped accents, "is that one kiss has addled your brains."

"Two kisses," he corrected. "And that's only part of the story. Wouldn't you like to know what's happened to the rest of my anatomy? Ah, I think I see a blush coming. Does that mean that Malcolm has been before me again? Tell me, does he stand in the role of a brother to you?"

She gave his question some thought. "Possibly. How can I say? I've never had any brothers or sisters. He's my closest friend."

"You're not betrothed to him by any chance, are you?"

"No. Why?"

"Breaking a betrothal is a messy business. I should probably have to call him out."

She stifled a giggle. "Do you always talk this way to strange ladies?"

His bark of laughter was as immediate as it was spontaneous. The girl hushed him furiously, and that made him laugh all the harder.

"Have you ever been to Almack's Assembly Rooms?" he asked at length when the bout of laughter had subsided.

"No. Though I've heard of it,
ad nauseam."

"If you had, then you'd know that it's not
comme il faut
for the sexes to have any sort of converse that couldn't be broadcast by the town crier. But to answer your question, no, I have never before in my life talked to any female, with the possible exception of my mother and sisters, so openly and frankly, whether highborn or lowborn, not even to the occasional lightskirt I've had in my keeping."

She blinked rapidly, and Deveryn cocked his head, his look speculative.

"Don't tell me! I believe, yes I do believe, that I've been before Malcolm at last."

"What's a lightskirt?" She asked seriously.

He answered in the same serious vein. "A woman who gives a man sexual favours for money."

"Oh!" she said, and fell silent.

He possessed himself of one of her hands and gently nipped it between his teeth. "I can tell that you can hardly wait to run off to Malcolm to explore this subject of lightskirts. What is it you wish to know?"

When she remained obstinately silent he said in a matter-of- fact tone, "Come. I'm perfectly capable of answering any of your questions. Try me."

"I was merely wondering," she said stiffly, "if Malcolm ever had a lightskirt in his keeping. If you can answer
that,
you must be a clairvoyant."

He smiled. "How old is Malcolm?"

"Two and twenty."

"Then the answer is yes."

"You can't know that!" Her indignation was very evident.

"Not absolutely of course, but it's more than likely."

"Why is it?"

Because, my little ignoramus, it's almost
de rigueur
for any young buck to have dealings with the muslin company, else how can he prove to his friends that he is a red-blooded male? Besides," he added with amused tolerance, "the practice has its compensations."

"Logic isn't your forte, is it?" she intoned at her most haughty. "But I won't argue the point with you. I really can't stay longer. You must let me pass."

"Don't you want to know if I have a lightskirt in
my
keeping?"

"Not particularly."

"I shall tell you anyway. As it happens I'm quite unen
cumbered at the moment, or rather, I shall be when my business in this neck of the woods is concluded. Does that reassure you?"

"Talking to you," she said slowly and very deliberately, "is like trying to find one's way out of
a
maze.
Thank you for the lessons. I'm sure Malcolm will be able to clear up any misunderstandings."

She rose swiftly to her feet and made to push past him. It took very little effort to tumble her into his lap. His hands slid beneath her mantle and came to rest under her arms, just brushing the swell of her breasts. He ignored her sharp intake of breath.

"What a slowtop you are," he murmured, and his lips, warm and open, lightly traced the line of her jaw. "Haven't you been listening to a word I've said?"

She held herself stiffly, but she did not struggle to free herself from his embrace, and Deveryn said very softly into her mouth, "You belong to me. How am I to convince you of that fact?"

"With great difficulty," she answered, and he could have sworn that inwardly she was laughing at him, though her expression remained grave.

"What an unromantic girl you are!"

"I've never pretended otherwise."

"Don't you believe in love at first sight?"

"Balderdash!" But he could see the mischief lurking in the depths of her eyes.

His smile was self-deprecating. "It does happen, you know." She looked to be unconvinced and he said with a slight show of impatience, "I don't suppose you're familiar with Aristophanes's theory on love?" Without waiting for her answer he went on, "He believes that lovers are born joined but that the gods separate them at birth and they wander the earth, lost and lonely, till they find each other again. Only a few fortunate ones ever do. The unlucky ones learn to make do with second best—again and again and again."

"That's sheer myth," she retorted.

"So I believed. Until tonight. Now I'm not so sure." His tongue lightly flicked her ear. "Wouldn't you like to test the truth of Aristophanes's theory?" he coaxed.

"How?" Her voice was barely audible.

"Open your mouth to me and I'll prove that we are two halves who have found each other."

Her lips parted slightly and Deveryn, like a connoisseur savouring the bouquet of a rare vintage wine, brought his lips to hers and inhaled deeply. He wrinkled his nose. "You smell like . . . what is that scent? I can't quite place it?"

"Apples," she answered, and he thought he heard a challenge in her voice.

"Of course," he replied blandly. "I should have known that no ordinary scent would do for you. Tell me, do you drink it or sprinkle it?"

She smiled at this last, and said in a more natural tone, "Actually, I store it, or Janet does—the apples from our orchard, I mean. The clothes press in my chamber is the driest place in the house. Janet wraps the apples in paper and lays them down for the winter."

He chuckled. "Do you know what an extraordinary girl you are?"

It was her turn to laugh. "I like your choice of words. 'Extraordinary' has a nice ring to it. I'm used to thinking of myself as, well, slightly eccentric. Janet would tell you that I was
fey."

"You don't have to explain what she means. I think I knew it from the moment you walked into my arms. We have such a lot to learn about each other. Still, we have a whole lifetime ahead of us to make our discoveries."

Her jaw dropped.

"That's better," he breathed and his mouth, gentle yet unyielding, closed over hers. Deliberately, by slow degrees, he patiently fed the first small flame of her awakening desire. Even so, the sudden flare of his own passion surprised him. He checked it ruthlessly, but not before he had betrayed himself.

She made a weak attempt to evade his embrace, but he would not permit it. One hand moved to her nape and stilled her head. The other slipped the front fastenings of her cloak, easing it back so that only the thin fabric of his shirt and her gown was between the heat of their skin. He ignored her soft gasp of protest, and eased her breasts against the hard wall of his chest.

"I want to feel your heart beating against mine," he soothed,
and his lips followed the path of his gently caressing fingers from her eyes to her chin. His thumb slid under the collar of her frock. "Your pulse is throbbing madly in the hollow of your throat," he murmured. He loosened the top buttons of her gown and he opened the bodice. "Feel your pulse," and he captured her fingers and pressed them against her throat. His lips followed and he brushed them over the exposed skin. Her head fell back on his shoulder. He could feel her body shudder as her breath caught in her throat. Every pore in his own body told him that he could easily bring her to the point of surrender. His own checked passion exploded through him.

One hand closed over a softly heaving breast, moulding it with voluptuous pleasure. Her feeble movement to drag his hand away was easily parried. He wondered at the primitive drive throbbing at every pulse in his body, urging him relentlessly to make this woman his. His need to convince her that he was fated to be her mate surprised him as much as it delighted him. He had never thought to commit himself so totally to any woman. In spite of a string of past mistresses and so called "love" affairs, he felt, in that moment, that he was less knowledgeable of the mysteries of love as the girl in his arms.-He longed for her to initiate him into them.

When his head came up to take her lips again, he deliberately allowed her to taste the blatant urgency of his hunger. When she began to return his kiss with equal ardour, he forced himself to drag his lips away.

For a long moment he held her close as he fought for control. It would be only too easy to carry her off to some private place and complete what he had begun. The girl was in no condition to deny him anything. But that would defeat the purpose of the exercise. He wished only to demonstrate, though irrefutably, that by some happy accident of fate they had been permitted to find each other—on such a night, and in Inverforth, of all places!

But the temptation to make love to her in earnest, to forget that there was some point to the exercise, was almost irresistible. Deveryn resisted, not without some reluctance, drawing on reserves of control he had not needed in an age.

"I've been waiting for you all my life, I think," he said against her hair. "You can argue against my logic till you're blue in the face. I knew from the moment you stepped into my arms that I would never let you go." His laugh was faintly self mocking. "Now do you understand?"

Her answer was to hide her face against his shoulder. It did not displease him. He smoothed her tumbled curls and cradled her as if she had been a child. It brought to mind the rush of tenderness he had experienced when he had first looked into her sad eyes.

"Now that that little matter is settled between us, my love, will you not tell me what brought you out to seek Malcolm on a wild night like this? When I first saw you, you looked so . . . forlorn."

Her head tilted back, and her eyes, dark and liquid, gazed unblinkingly into his. In their depths he saw confusion, but also a childlike trust that brought a jolt of feeling which seemed to lodge itself in his throat. His arms tightened about her, and he wondered how he could bear to give her up to her guardians till he could claim her for his own. "Tell me,' he coaxed softly.

She spoke haltingly. "Have you ever hated someone you don't even know?"

"I don't believe so. Hatred is such a powerful emotion. Are you sure that you don't simply dislike this person?" He feathered her damp hair with his fingers.

"Oh no. I know what it is to dislike someone. This is much stronger. It hurts."

She was so patently honest and innocent. He shifted her in his arms till she lay curled snugly against his chest. "Tell me about it," he murmured in the voice he was used to employ to his young nieces when their safe world turned suddenly ugly and they had run to him for comfort.

"I know it's wrong to seek revenge. But it's all I can seem to think of."

He wisely held his own counsel and waited for her to continue.

"Everyone has a weakness. Did you know that?" she queried softly. "I intend to discover the weaknesses of my enemies and exploit them ruthlessly."

Though her words were fierce, she reminded him more of an angry kitten than an avenging fury. He kept his lips grave, but he wondered what tempest in a teacup had provoked her to
such a passion, and who, in her small provincial circles, could possibly be cast in the mould of an enemy.

"Did someone . . . hurt you badly?" he asked gently, and his thumb lightly teased the lobe of her petal-soft ear.

"Oh no!" she answered, nestling closer. "I'm thick skinned. I don't bruise easily. Really."

Her tone was wistful, with a trace of sadness, and it came to him that her denial was nothing more than bravado, a fragile pride to cover pain. It was her defense, he was sure, against a world that had dealt with her cruelly in the past.

Though he wished to say so much more, he merely said in a soft undertone, "Tell me about it, from the beginning."