The Light in the Darkness (37 page)

I understand you at last,
she thought as she caressed his hair.
I understand why you couldnt let me love you.
She remembered his words, spoken with such bitter self-loathing:
You deserve better than someone like me.
Finally, she understood why he had held her at such a distance, and why he had attacked her so viciously every time she had managed to slip under his guard. “You’re trying to drive me away again,” she whispered, bending over and kissing his ear. “It won’t work.”

At the touch of her lips on his ear, Grey went rigid. “Jennifer—” he gasped, catching her hands and trying to push her away. “You don’t understand.”

“I do understand.”

“No, you don’t,” he protested, trying very hard to ignore the fact that she was now kissing his throat. It was painfully difficult to ignore. “I’m a murderer and a drunkard and a self-absorbed bastard, Jennifer. You deserve better. You’re a lovely young woman, and I am only—”

“The man I love,” Jennifer finished. She straightened up and held out her hand. “Come upstairs, Edward.”

At the sound of his given name, Grey looked up at her, studying her features as if trying to convince himself that she really wanted him. Everything she felt for him was clearly written on her face. There could be no doubt that she loved him. And he knew it was far more than he deserved.

He could fight against her love no longer.

He took her hand.

•  •  •

The house was quiet and they encountered no one as they made their way up the stairs. Jennifer led him to her chamber, dark but for the moonlight that streamed in through the wooden slats of the Venetian blinds. Closing the heavy door behind her, she started to lead him across the chamber through the moon-streaked darkness, but he resisted.

“Are you certain you want to do this, Jennifer?”

His expression was very serious. She nodded. “Absolutely.” Standing on tiptoe, she brushed her lips across his chin. He stood, rigid and unyielding, for a moment. Then his arms came around her and she knew that she had won.

“Please kiss me,” she whispered.

His lips met hers hungrily. Torrential passion poured through him like Whitewater at the touch of her lips, and he picked her up easily in his arms and carried her across to the bed, laying her on the coverlet as carefully as though she were a child, or an infinitely precious treasure. He stared down at her for a long moment, devouring her beauty with his eyes, and then sat next to her and bent over to kiss her again.

As their lips met she ran her hands caressingly through his hair until the ribbon that secured it fell away. His long black hair swept forward, mingling with hers. Her hand slid beneath the heavy, wavy mass of his hair, caressing the nape of his neck, sliding across his linen-clad shoulders, and she felt his powerful muscles jump beneath her caressing fingers.

It was all he could do to pause. With a giant effort of will he pulled his mouth from hers. Cupping her face in his hands he studied her features admiringly. “You are so beautiful …” he whispered hoarsely.

“Not as beautiful as you are.”

Her words struck him like a physical blow, affecting him even more powerfully than her caresses. No one had
ever called him beautiful before. He lowered his head and met her lips in a ravishing kiss, then pulled away again.

“I don’t want to frighten you,” he breathed in her ear, thinking that she had every reason to be afraid of him. But she only smiled and kissed his cheek in a whisper-soft caress.

“I’m not frightened of you. I love you, Edward. I’ve loved you longer than you would believe.”

She was not frightened. It was all he needed to know. Propping himself up on his arms so as not to crush her, his lips began a leisurely exploration of her throat, then slid down toward the expanse of skin exposed by her low-cut blue gown. Her skin smelled of lavender. He kissed the top of her breasts, then kissed her nipple, hidden though it was beneath the blue fabric.

“Edward?”

Grey lifted his head slowly, sure that she’d been frightened by his ardor, painfully certain she was going to ask him to stop. “Yes?” he rasped.

“It seems to me that our clothing has become something of an impediment.”

Her husband stared at her for a moment in the moonlight, then let out his breath and whooped with sudden laughter. “Yes,” he agreed when he’d stopped laughing. “I find that I must agree with you.”

“Will you unhook my gown?” she asked, sitting up and presenting her back to him.

“I would be more than happy to assist you, madam,” Grey replied with mock formality, then found that he was laughing too hard to manage the hooks. He managed to suppress his laughter by leaning forward and kissing the nape of her neck. That seemed to take his mind off laughing rather rapidly. He found himself unhooking her gown at breakneck speed.

“Careful,” she whispered chidingly. “Don’t tear the fabric.”

“I’ll buy you a hundred gowns just like it if I do,” Grey promised huskily.

Somehow he managed to get her out of her clothing without doing any of it permanent damage. After he had unhooked her dress he unlaced her stays, then removed her boned canvas hoops. At last he untied her embroidered garters and pulled the silk stockings from her legs. He left her barely translucent linen shift on, assuming that her modesty might be offended if he took it off. To his surprise, she stood up and slid the shift over her head, then stood naked in front of him.

She smiled at his stunned expression. “I don’t want any impediments between us, Edward.”

“Evidently not,” he said hoarsely. It was her turn to laugh.

“And now,” she said when she had recovered her composure, and he had stared long enough, “I will take off your clothes.” She leaned forward and began to unhook his breeches.

“Don’t you want to take off my shirt first?” Grey inquired dryly.

She grinned cheekily. “Why? It’s not in the way.”

Once she had taken off his breeches and peeled off his stockings, Grey unbuttoned his shirt and threw it aside. “I don’t want any impediments between us,” he said softly, echoing her earlier words. “Nothing is going to come between us ever again, Jennifer.”

He caught her by the waist and pressed her back into the softness of the feather mattress, imprisoning her between his powerful arms. His lips sought hers hungrily. The last time they had made love, he had taken care to be gentle. This time he could not restrain himself. She was too beautiful, too sensual, too desirable for him to maintain any sort of self-possession.

He felt like a flame, burning out of control.

She did nothing to quench the flames.

His hands were everywhere, exploring her silken skin, caressing the taut flesh that was so unlike that of any other woman he had ever known. She was fragile yet strong, delicate yet powerful. Finding her small, firm breasts, he rolled
the nipples between his fingers and she writhed and cried out, clutching at his back.

Grey stiffened at the feel of her hands against his bare skin. “Jennifer,” he whispered harshly. “Touch me. Please.”

Her eyes flew open and she looked at him with surprise. “Do you like to be touched?” she asked softly, kneading his shoulders, which were rigid and damp with sweat. She had never imagined that he might enjoy being caressed as much as she herself did.

Grey closed his eyes and nodded, unable to speak, as she shyly stroked his back.

“Where?”

“Everywhere,” Grey grated. “Anywhere.” It occurred to him that he was virtually begging for her favors, like a clumsy teenage boy with his first woman, but he could not help himself. The touch of her hands was painful ecstasy to him, driving away all rational thought.

Shyly, her hands slipped lower, exploring the strongly contoured muscles of his lower back, sliding over his buttocks, caressing his thighs. “There?” she asked softly.

“Yes,” he whispered between gritted teeth. “Yes. And … there.”

He moved her hand. Jennifer hesitated a moment, then took him in her hand. Hearing his explosively indrawn breath, and realizing the ecstasy she seemed to be giving him, she stroked him delicately, taking pleasure in his soft groans. At last he caught at her hand, stilling it.

“Did I hurt you?” she asked, a little anxiously.

“Hardly.” His voice was little more than a harsh rasp.

“Don’t you want me to touch you anymore?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because,” Grey ground out, “you are driving me insane.”

Jennifer looked at his face in the moonlight. His face was dark with desire and tense with the effort of controlling himself. “I believe,” she said, reaching for him again and caressing him boldly, “that is the idea.”

At the renewed touch of her hands Grey could control
himself no longer. He slid between her thighs and plunged into her with a savage hunger, thrusting fiercely. She cried out with pleasure. An agonized groan tore from his chest. The flames consumed them.

Grey did not get up and return to his chamber after they had made love. Nothing could have moved him from her side. He held her against his chest, his chin resting atop her head, and felt utterly content.

He thought of what he had said to her:
Nothing is going to come between us ever again.
It wasn’t true, of course. The knowledge that he was a murderer still stood between them. Nothing could ever change that. But he would do what he could.

He had made his decision. Tomorrow he would go to Williamsburg and confess that he had killed Diana. He would hang, of course, but it was no more than he deserved.

For the first time in a very long time, he felt at peace.

When Grey’s soft, even breathing told her that he had fallen asleep, Jennifer propped her head on an arm and studied her husband.

Though she had lived with him for more than a year, she had rarely dared to look overmuch at his face, for fear of betraying what she felt for him too plainly. But he had always seemed to look older than his years, his face lined and weary. In the aftermath of their lovemaking, and in the peace of sleep, however, his face looked startlingly young. Perhaps, she mused, the impression of age on his face was due to his habitual embittered expression, rather than his features.

For his features were lovely, she thought, studying his hooked nose, the forceful lines of his black brows, the finely sculptured lips. No—“lovely” was the wrong word; there was nothing feminine about his strong face. On the contrary, he was powerfully masculine. “Handsome” was
not the right word, either; it conveyed a certain bland conventionality Grey was entirely lacking.

He was beautiful, just as she had blurted out during their lovemaking. It was the only word she could think of that could describe him adequately.

She stared at him for a long time, mesmerized by the man she had fallen in love with so long ago, who had at last demonstrated that he cared for her as well.

There was no doubt in her mind that he did care for her. Perhaps he did not love her yet, but he would come to love her. She would see to that. She would prove to him that he was no murderer, and then he would feel free to return her affection.

The happiness of their union still filled her, for although of course that peak of ecstasy she had experienced could not be sustained for more than a breathless, joyous moment, the intimacy of it could not be forgotten. Her happiness was so sharp that she could not sleep. Her eyes remained stubbornly open, drawn irresistibly to her husband’s beauty.

At last, when she had admired him to her heart’s content, as she had never dared to do before, and was just about to drop off into peaceful slumber, she was startled by the sound of the door to her chamber opening. Ordinarily she would have sat up in fright, but Grey’s presence gave her courage. She lay quietly, listening.

In the moonlight she could see a figure moving stealthily across the chamber. It stopped near her bed. “Jenny?”

“Carey?” she whispered in surprise. She would have recognized his soft tenor voice anywhere, even had he not addressed her by that old name that no one else used anymore.

“Jenny, I must talk with you.”

“Go away!” she hissed.

“I’ve tried to stay away,” Carey whispered, “but I can’t. Please listen to me. I want you. I’ve wanted you since we first met in Princess Anne County. It’s simply not fair that you should be tied down to a man incapable of satisfying
you when you’re capable of so much passion. When you kissed me today—”

“Shh!” Jennifer hissed indignantly, hoping against hope that Grey did not awaken. She thought of sliding from the bed and discussing Carey’s unfortunate lack of timing with him elsewhere—anywhere but here—but she recalled suddenly that she was naked beneath the linens. Getting out of bed was clearly not her best option.

“When you kissed me today,” Carey went on more strongly, “I realized just how much passion you have to give. I can’t offer you much, Jenny, but if only you would agree to share my bed—”

“I am afraid,” a sardonic male voice drawled, “that the lady’s bed is already occupied.”

Jennifer felt her heart lurch to a painful stop in her chest. Grey was awake. How much had he heard? What conclusions had he drawn? Silently she cursed Carey for bringing up the subject a second time. Damn it, she had told him forcibly enough this afternoon that she had no interest in being his mistress. Couldn’t the man accept a refusal gracefully?

There was a sudden, horrified silence, and then Carey said in an accusing tone, “You told me you always slept alone, Jenny.”

“I—” Jennifer began, then fell silent, aware that anything she said might be misconstrued by her husband. What would Grey think of the fact that they had been discussing her sleeping habits? Being Grey, he was bound to put the worst possible interpretation on Carey’s statement.

“Your earlier words were correct, Mr. O’Neill,” Grey rumbled, a sneer in his voice. “The lady indeed has a great deal of passion. However, I am quite comfortable where I am, and I have no intentions of vacating this warm bed so that you can enjoy her charms as well.”

“But—”

“Get out,” Grey snarled in tones of loathing and fury so intense that Carey fled without further argument.