Star Crossed Seduction (11 page)

“This is but the faintest echo of the magic of the East.” He broke off another piece, dipped it, and gave himself up to savoring the flavor. “Were we really in India, you’d not be hearing the feeble chirps of London starlings but the sharp warble of the bulbul and perhaps the distant growl of tigers.”

“Tigers. How beautiful they must be!”

“And deadly, don’t forget that. They eat unwary women when they come down to the river to do their wash. But they
are
beautiful, as is so much in India. Beautiful and deadly. An Indian fever can turn a hearty man into a corpse within a day. You’re so much safer here. Englishwomen do not take well to India. They waste away and long for the cold potatoes and boiled sausages of home.”

“I wouldn’t.”

“Perhaps. You
are
courageous.” His unexpected praise warmed her like the curry.

He reached for the cover on another of the dishes. “This one might be stronger. Take only a tiny taste.”

She did. It was almost too much for her, but he relished the bite he took of it though after he savored another spoonful he, too, reached for his glass of the fruity drink and swirled it around in his mouth. His tongue and lips must be on fire.

“Is it too hot even for you?” she asked.

“It’s never too hot for me.” He grinned, and the lamplight made the copper highlights surrounding his pupils twinkle. She wondered what it would be like to kiss his lips while they still burned with the bite of the curry. Would it burn her or make her burn for him?

“Rajiv has baked you a pheasant in the Indian fashion. It is a mild dish. Here, let me serve you.”

He put the small plate before her, where small pieces of fowl, skinned, disjointed, and tinted an unusual shade of red, lay on top of a bed of saffron-colored rice. As he gave her the food, he leaned toward her, his lips so near she could have leaned over and kissed them. With difficulty, she suppressed the impulse to do so. He helped himself to another dish, spooning some of it onto her plate, too, and motioned her to dig in.

As they ate their way through the delicious meal, he didn’t gobble his food, as so many men did, but gave his attention to each bite, enjoyed it, and moved on. She wondered if he would bring the same attention to his lovemaking. When he had eaten enough, he lay back against the pillows with his eyes half-closed. A satisfied smile flitted across his lips.

He looked as if he had already had sex. As if he didn’t need it. As if he didn’t need her. He wallowed in his satisfaction for a few moments, then he asked her if she was done, and when she said she was, he clapped his hands loudly, three times, to summon Rajiv.

In heavily accented English, the man asked, ”Did
Bichchu
enjoy his repast?” At Trev’s reply, he bowed, loaded the dishes onto the tray, and removed them. The boy who had followed him into the dining chamber pulled the table away from the divan on which they reclined. Then the two foreigners withdrew.

“He will leave us undisturbed until I summon him again,” Trev informed her.

“Why did he call you
Bichchu
? Does that mean ‘master’ in his language?”

“No. It’s the nickname they gave me in India. It means, The Scorpion.”

The Scorpion, which Lady Hartwood had called the symbol of her self-destruction. “Why?”

His indigo eyes widened under the deep hollows beneath his brow, “The scorpion has six eyes. He sees everything.” He paused, and, with a dismissive wave of his hand, added, “Soldiers call each other by such names. It started out as a joke.”

But it was not a joke now, and they both knew it. And she knew just how much he saw with those eyes of his, whose color deepened in the light of the oil lamps like cloth left too long in the vat. He’d stripped her soul naked, and he knew the impact he was having on her. Her lips still burned slightly from the last of the curry. He was so close, she could breathe its spicy aura on his lips. He reached toward her and ran one strong finger along the delicate skin by her ear, where she had stroked him before, back when she’d been so afraid of what it might be that he wanted from her. Her skin prickled at his featherlight touch.

“Do your lips still burn?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Perhaps I can soothe them.”

He leaned toward her, and his lips met hers, parting them with the tip of his tongue. It was hot—hot with spice, and hot with the warmth of rising blood. She sucked hungrily at him and felt his tongue swell in her mouth, pulsing and sending waves of desire throughout her body. His hands cupped her breasts, kneading them through the thin fabric. Her nipples hardened as his thumbs pressed against the stiff peaks, which rose to meet his touch. He was responding to her unspoken desire, and once again, she was losing control.

She struggled to regain it. Much as she wanted him, she feared to give herself entirely into his power. She pulled away slightly, and when she did, he didn’t attempt to draw her back but waited patiently until she got up the courage to rejoin him. Then he savored her kiss the way he had each mouthful of their feast, with the same unhurried calm.

He would enjoy her, but he wouldn’t let himself need her. He wouldn’t let himself lose control any more than she would if she had a choice.

But he gave her no choice. He kissed her until she thought she must tear off her clothes and fling herself on him, so strong was the hunger he’d aroused in her. But he still made no move to remove her garments or his own. She reached for the swelling bulge barely contained by his buckskins, brushing her fingers across it, provocatively. He grasped her wrist and gently lifted her hand away. As he had when he’d stopped her from stealing at the masquerade.

“Not yet,” he said, smiling that tormenting half smile of his. “Curry must be savored in small bites. Let us linger over every step as we get to know each other better.”

He was holding her off. Charmingly, gracefully, but effectively. He had found a way to control her, and he was using it. He was playing her game, better than she played it. The sense that they understood each other deepened. Then he drew away, pausing like a cat poised above a rat hole. He wanted something from her, and it wasn’t her body. He had that already, and he knew it. He wanted something more.

“I will take you, Temperance, and then I will leave you for my chosen bride. By this time next year, I will be ten thousand miles away. I pledge you nothing. And yet you want me. You are beautiful. You are clever. You could do better than me—far better. Why do you need to be punished?” he demanded. “What is it that you’ve done?”

T
rev saw her shrink back at his question. It had touched her to the core as no sexual move of his could have done. She’d been willing to strip herself naked and let him possess her body even if it meant suffering pain. But she hadn’t expected this. She was retreating now, hiding her soul in the same tattered covering she’d already pulled so tightly around her heart, unwilling to show him that kind of nakedness.

But he must make her do it. His body burned for her, but he had disciplined his body to suffer hunger and thirst, for without discipline, a soldier died young. He could ignore the throbbing in his loins. He could endure pain that dwarfed this insistent craving. A soldier must learn to ignore pain if he was to survive amid the agonies of battle.

But she’d penetrated too deeply within his own defenses for him to be satisfied with just possessing her body. He must understand how she’d done what no other woman had ever done—how she’d made him drop his guard. What was it about her he was reacting to? Why had he been so close to tears when he’d twisted the knob of her door, convinced he’d find her gone? He must learn why, so he could keep it from ever happening again.

“What have you done,” he repeated, “that you would let me become an instrument of punishment? That’s not what I want to be. Yet you would have let me hurt you. And even when I try to be gentle, you hurry me and urge me to take you before we have a chance to know each other. Why? Is it because you can’t pardon yourself for being unfaithful to your dead lover?”

She flinched.

“Were you faithful to him while he lived?”

She nodded. But as she did, her gray eyes grew more luminous as the tear she was trying to suppress escaped and hung for a moment on the edge of her lashes.

“And he. Was he faithful to you?”

The tear rolled down her cheek.

Bastard.
“He must have been a brave man to betray you. I should think twice before offering you such an insult. How did he dare do such a thing knowing your strength?”

Her answer was spoken in a voice that was barely a whisper. “I trusted him too much. But he didn’t believe in marriage. He said we must live in freedom, not like slaves, and that fidelity was just a form of slavery.”

How convenient for the man
. “Was he the first?”

Again, she nodded.

“How old were you?

“Almost sixteen.”

So very young. Too young.
“Where did you meet him?”

“At the fair in our village. He’d brought his crew with him—it was as close to a holiday as he’d allow them. He said it was good to travel around and learn the people’s mind. While the girls went out a-knuckling, he’d get people talking to him, pretending to tell their fortunes.”

“Did he tell you yours?”

“He said I would marry a wealthy man just like my father and give birth to more parasites to prey upon the workers.” She blinked back another tear.

“An odd way to make love to a woman.”

“He wasn’t making love to me. He was making revolution. He said I was just an empty-headed rich girl. I said that was a lie. I told him I would prove it. He laughed and said I couldn’t give myself to a poor man.”

“Did you prove that was a lie, too?”

She bit her upper lip and looked down.

Clever bastard,
but he said only, “And where was your mother in all this? Too busy oppressing the workers to notice?”

“She died at my birth. I was raised by the woman my father married later. She spent her time praying for God to soften my hard heart, so I might not sin and fall into the fiery pit.”

“But you did sin, didn’t you. You sinned when you gave yourself to this man without marriage. Why?”

She bit her lip and said nothing for a long time. Then she took a deep breath. “At the fair, Randall had told me there was a book I must read,
The Rights of Man.
He said he’d bring it to me that night if I’d meet him behind the stables. So I did. But my father found us together and went after Randall with a horsewhip.” She shook her head as if trying to get rid of the memory. “Then he used it on me. He went mad, he did, and called me filthy names not even the stableboys would use.”

She stopped. Only the way her chest was heaving betrayed the emotion she had kept out of her voice.

Gently, he prodded her. “What happened next?”

Her eyes had taken on a pleading look. “I was so innocent, I didn’t even know what it was my father thought I’d done. I’d only let Randall kiss me—nothing more, and I didn’t know, back then, what came after kissing. But when he was done whipping me, my father dragged me home and locked me in my room. So I showed him. I smashed out the window and escaped. I found Randall at the fair and begged him to take me back with him to London.” A faraway look had come over her face. She hesitated. “He didn’t want to, not at first, but I convinced him.”

“Was it then that you found out what it was your father thought you’d done?”

Her eyes squeezed shut. “Yes, I gave Randall my maidenhead that night.”

“Did he love you?”

“I thought he did.”

When she opened them again, her eyes had lost their sparkle. Her words had been oddly chosen. He’d lay a pony on it—there was a secret buried here—but he gave up his probing for the moment. He’d disturbed her enough—and himself, too.

This lover of hers had been a scoundrel and her great love a tawdry affair. He was glad the bastard was dead. He’d taken her innocence from her, not just her virginity. He ached for girl she had once been, vibrant with ideals, whose courage had not been equal to a scoundrel’s cunning. He wished he could soothe her even though it was his own merciless probing that caused her pain. He yearned to enfold her in his arms, tenderly, and offer her comfort.

But he resisted the impulse. The curve of her breast was too enticing. He didn’t trust himself to offer her only comfort. If he were to touch the downy softness of her skin, he might not be able to stop himself, and he must—else he would be no better than this Randall of hers had been.

But that wasn’t the only reason he must leave her untouched. For when he’d stripped away her defenses and forced her to reveal the bleeding wound that was her heart, he’d torn open his own wounds, too. Her pain echoed with his own, as different as its cause might be. She wasn’t the only one whose heart was raw and naked. If they were to make love while both were so exposed, far more than just their bodies might merge—and, after a few brief weeks, he would have to leave her. It would deepen her wound.

It wasn’t right. He wouldn’t do it.

She reclined against the sensuous cushions on which he had planned to take his pleasure with her, her head thrown back, her swanlike neck curving down to the delicate collarbone, beneath which rose the mounds of her perfect breasts. She arched her back, making those breasts more prominent, with a motion that was intended to distract him.