The Art of Ruining a Rake (24 page)

Everywhere, they met. His tongue sought hers. She draped her arms around his neck and he grasped her thighs, hiking her gown to bring her more fully against him. The narrow skirt would wrinkle terribly, but she didn’t care. She curved her legs around his hips and clung to him. When he pushed his hands under her skirts and cupped her bottom through her drawers, she felt an ache so powerful, she almost came without him.

“Yes, that’s good,” he coaxed her against her mouth. “Come for me, my love.”

Her head swam with the intimacy of it. He’d brought
her
here. He was overcome with lust for
her.
She tightened her legs around him, bringing her sensitive folds more firmly against his thick manhood, and ground her hips to his.

He helped her ride him with his hands on her buttocks, lifting her just high enough to make it oh so pleasurable as he brought her down again. The hard plane of his stomach contracted with the effort, contrasting with the softness of her belly pressed against it.

She moaned against his lips. He answered her with more sweet kisses. As his movements became more urgent, she rubbed herself against him, meeting his demands, and was rewarded with tiny bursts of pleasure.

So very, very good. But not nearly enough. Full release seemed just beyond her reach. His fingers dug into her thighs, mirroring her desperation. Her lips parted against his, her mewls of pleasure contrasting with his harsh panting.

He thrust his shaft against her core. They moaned together.

She lost focus as he squeezed her bottom harder and harder, pulling her closer, working her against him faster.

 
“Lucy,” he rasped. “Now.”

Her body split in euphoria. Music that had been a whisper in the air became a symphony. She clung to him, melding to him as first her body betrayed her, then her lips. “Roman,” she gasped out. “My darling Roman. Yes. Yes.”

As her rapture subsided he quickly set her down, then turned away. While she stood in a daze trying to collect her wits, he bent and groaned as his seed spilled to the ground.

She stared at his back, aroused and sated and stunned at the same time. Had she caused him to do that? Here? In Vauxhall’s pleasure gardens?

When he turned back to her, his clothing was restored. From the silvery, moonlit hair at the crown of his head to his shiny, polished Hessians, nothing was amiss. And yet, she couldn’t forget what she’d just seen.

What they’d just done.

He came closer. She knew her eyes were still too wide, her lips parted, but she was powerless to extinguish her desire. He dragged his thumb across her lips, then began tucking strands of her hair back into place. She watched him as he worked. Concentration tightened his jaw. His mouth was still reddened from her kisses. Deftly, he righted her hair, then with an unexpected motion, he thrust his fingers inside her neckline and tugged her bodice back into place. His expert hands ran down her ribs, then her hips, flattening her gown though there could be no hope for the wrinkles. When he was satisfied, he wrapped his arms about her and kissed her again.

They were both breathless by the time he raised his head. He didn’t release her. “I shouldn’t want you again, but confound it all, I do. What is it you’re doing to me?”

She looked into his earnest face and hugged him until her arms strained with the effort. She never wanted to let him go. “I don’t know. I don’t want it. I don’t trust it. But I can’t resist it. You said we could do this forever.” Shyly, she lowered her eyes before catching herself and raising them again. “I want to do this again. With you.”

Hope lit his face so radiantly, she swelled with pride to be the one to make him shine. “Can it be? You’ll marry me at last?”

She blinked. “No. No, I—”

The light went out. He dropped her like a hot stone. “What did you mean, then? No. Don’t say it. I can’t hear it from
your
lips.”

He was so angry, even more livid than when she’d told him she’d used him.

“I-I wasn’t
using
you. Not this time,” she stuttered, wanting to reach for him, but afraid of his black look. “I was proposing an arrangement. An agreement. We are both long past our majority, able to—”

“I said don’t say it.” His light eyes looked daggers at her. “I’ll kiss you when I want to kiss you, not when it’s
convenient
for you. Not because you’re lonely and I’m the only hot-blooded man your brother allows you to see. Never because it’s
safe.
I know you don’t love me now, but I aim to change that. I can’t fix your way of thinking if you put me in a little box like a trinket you take out when the mood suits you.”

She stared agape at him. “I never—”

“Yes, you did. That’s what you want, isn’t it? That’s what an arrangement means. It’s clean for you. A tidy way for you to have your cake and eat your cake, and a ghastly misuse of some damned fine cake.”

She didn’t laugh. He was too outraged, and she was left with her foot in her mouth, again. How did she continue to misjudge him? He was an admitted womanizer, more than willing to kiss her in ballrooms and carriages and private ruins, but adamantly against the slightest implication they were anything less than almost betrothed.

“I don’t understand you,” she said, hugging herself. The night suddenly seemed cold. “Why must we marry? Why can we not take our pleasure and leave it at that? I enjoy your company. I’m obviously not immune to your…attractions. Why do you insist on having my heart?”

He crossed his arms and leaned back, looking down his patrician nose at her. “Why do you refuse to give it?”

She pressed her lips together. He wouldn’t understand. To him, her reticence was entirely dependent upon his behavior. If he persuaded her with pretty phrases and amusing anecdotes, she’d come around.

But she already
loved
him. She’d loved him for a decade or more. She feared who
she
was, not him, and who she might become in the future.

A shrieking, green-eyed shrew willing to murder him at the slightest provocation.

“It’s not you,” she said, because while admitting her fear aloud would make her sound as mad as a March hare, she didn’t want him to suffer needlessly. “I find you rather wonderful.”

He didn’t smile. “And yet I’m not reassured.”

She looked forlornly at him. They stood an arm’s length apart, yet a canyon divided them. “I
am
sorry.”

“We’re late for supper.” His stony eyes stared right through her.

“Yes.” She looked at the walls crumbling around them. Anywhere but at his face. She couldn’t bear his disappointment.

He indicated for her to precede him. They walked to the supper boxes in silence. With every step, she felt more doomed.

She’d already set out to hurt him once. A petty offense: breaking a man’s heart was rather innocent. But the better she knew him, the more power he gave her. To love him. To hate him. And yes, to hurt him. She’d done it again tonight without even trying.

“Roman…” She reached for his upper arm as the supper boxes ahead spelled the end of their privacy. Her fingers brushed his sleeve.

He stopped and turned to her. His displeasure didn’t immediately smooth away after he schooled his face into something less intimidating.

“I’ve hurt you. That wasn’t my intention. Please forgive me.”

He stared at her. A muscle worked at his jaw. Belatedly, she realized what she’d asked: for him to forgive her, when she’d been so unwilling to forgive him.

“It’s not fair,” he began, and she almost interrupted him to take her request back. But he silenced her with a shake of his head. “It’s not
fair
for either of us to be incensed with the other. You have reason to be wary of me. At times, I even question myself. And I have a right to feel resentful when I am kissed and set aside. My past behavior has no bearing on my present circumstances. You do not want to be a momentary indulgence, and that is your right—as it is mine.”

Some of her anxiety lessened. “You’re too generous.”

A wry smile titled his lips. “Mayhap, but I’m not a
saint.
If you kiss me, I will always kiss you back.”

He looked so forlorn, she chuckled in spite of herself. “I wish you wouldn’t say such things.”

“What?” he grumbled, taking her hand and settling it a touch too roughly on his arm. “It’s the truth.”

“I meant, you make things very difficult for me when you make me laugh.”

A smile cracked his stern façade. “Good.”

Chapter 12

ROMAN LED LUCY into the box. Were it not for her, he’d have returned home.

Were it not for her, he wouldn’t be fuming in the midst of a crowd, aroused and despondent at the same time.

The usual suspects were in attendance. Lord Scotherby, Mr. Barton-Wright, Lord de Winter and Lord Dare sat on one bench. Lord Steepleton and Mr. Tewseybury, two inseparable rogues with a weakness for each other, shared a second bench with Mariah Fawcett and Becky Bennett. Becky made room for Lucy to sit beside her.
 

Roman strode to one corner and rested on his walking stick. He could see and be seen by all from here. More importantly, he could stand. What with his emotions in a boil, he wasn’t about to lounge peaceably. He wanted to strangle something.

Lucy was so close to loving him, he could feel it. Yet she still didn’t understand. And how could she? He’d lose her if he told her exactly why she couldn’t make light of him. She gave him a wide berth, and she didn’t even know the half of it.

Which meant she couldn’t know why being her lover was entirely out of the question for him.

“Where’s Chelford?” Roman asked, realizing the earl was missing.

Mariah, a brazen member of the Muslin Company who exploited her worth to the penny, gave Roman a long, bored look. “Married.”

Roman was aghast. “To whom?”

“A country chit,” Becky replied, taking a bite of paper-thin ham. She wasn’t a ladybird per se, but possessed of enlightened thoughts that had earned her a place in the fast set. “We could not talk him out of it.”

“Astounding.” Roman glanced at Lucy. She steadfastly avoided his questioning look, feigning fascination with the plate of ham a footman had just set before her. He wasn’t fooled. She was frightened of him, of what he made her feel. Of what they’d just done under the moonlight.

Chelford, too, had been a rake. If it could happen for him…

Mariah’s gaze followed Roman’s. Her lip curled. “I see we didn’t frighten you away, Miss Lancester.” She leaned forward. Her breasts crested the low bodice of her silk dress. “Tell us what it’s
like,
being Lord Montborne’s mistress. An unusual arrangement for him, one we’re beside ourselves over.”

By Jove, if she blurted out his situation with Lady Letitia, he’d see to it she never worked again.

“Roman is helping me fulfill my dream of becoming an authoress,” Lucy said, wisely ignoring Mariah’s attempt to goad her.

Mr. Tewseybury perked up. “Indeed, I’d hoped we’d be able to discuss it today. I do understand why Lord Trestin refused us popinjays, even if Steepleton does not. What do you write, then? Poetry? Literature? Witty commentary on your fellow man?”

Lucy’s eyes danced. “Nothing so serious. I shall write novels. Lovely, sentimental novels.”

Becky dabbed the corners of her lips with a serviette as if the mere mention of sentimental novels left a sour taste in her mouth. “I should never read such rubbish.”
 

“I will,” Mr. Barton-Wright said, causing Roman to frown. “I’ll read it aloud, after the regular conversation’s been done with and we’ve all had too much brandy.”

Lucy turned to him with a too-bright smile. “Thank you.”

Roman saw red. Rationally, he knew Lucy didn’t remember Barton-Wright’s forward, disgusting behavior at the salon.
Irrationally,
he wanted to jab his walking stick between the man’s legs.

He needed a distraction. There was only so much unrequited love a man could savor before it became trying.

“Miss Lancester, I hope you’ll permit me to call on you on the morrow,” Barton-Wright said, a little too loudly.

Roman looked up and met the man’s steady stare. Barton-Wright was goading him. But why? He’d done nothing to earn the man’s derision.

“Be wary of Lord Trestin,” Steepleton put in with a sniff of his nose. “Looks down on anyone under the rank of marquis.”