“I thought of the tears you cried”—Jack’s slippery fingers spanned her lower abdomen, hitching her closer; at the same time the long, thick glide of his penis stole her breath—“when you took the dildo from my fingers and acceded that passion may not exist.”
Rose’s head snapped back, cheek impacting bristly skin.
There was no rubber barrier separating his flesh from her flesh.
This was Jack.
His penis that cried tears of desire. His chin that was coarse with beard stubble.
His need that matched her need.
“I thought of how vulnerable you were”—he notched his penis so deeply inside her that she could feel the prickle of his pubic hair and the leathery pouch of his testicles; his left arm banded her breasts—“when you cried out in orgasm.”
But Jack was not a dildo.
He had tried to warn her the night before. But she had not listened.
“I didn’t know it would hurt this much” was wrenched from her throat.
“This?” vibrated her vertebrae.
Slick fingers molding her stomach—as if he could feel his flesh buried inside her flesh—he tunneled so deeply between her buttocks that they were one body, and Rose couldn’t breathe for his penis that filled her and the tears that dammed her throat.
“When you’re inside me like this, Jack”—the burning stretch of his sex and the intensity inside his eyes dissolved both flesh and bones—“I feel loved.”
Another betrayal of the man she loved.
Rose curved his slippery fingers around her womb.
The need to comfort Jack superimposed the need to be comforted.
“You asked why I now wanted a divorce,” she volunteered.
“Yes,” Jack acknowledged.
Red-and-gold fire licked his arm that banded her breasts; lifting up her left hand, Rose sank her fingers into the living flame, right hand firmly pressing his fingers around her lower abdomen.
“For many years I blamed myself for Jonathon’s pain.” His heartbeat pounded inside her throat; five matching heartbeats tattooed her womb. “He didn’t love me like I needed to be loved, so I thought I must be responsible.”
The pain of the past was dulled by the flesh that filled her.
“I joined the Men and Women’s Club in the hopes that I could reach Jonathon.” Rose swallowed sudden tears. “Or that I could at least learn to accept our situation.”
Light flamed his hair. Shadow shuttered his eyes.
“Then Mrs. Hart . . . purely by accident”—her voice husked, the memory of the red-haired woman overlapping the burning reality of Jack—“interrupted a club meeting.”
The heart beating inside her accelerated.
“She said she believed there are women who may want more out of marriage than what their husbands are capable of giving to them”—Jack’s dark eyes gauged the involuntary clenching of her buttocks, stubbornly clinging to a man to whom she brought only pain—“just as she believed there are men who may want more than what their wives are capable of giving.”
Jack’s nostril’s flared; simultaneously his chest expanded, wiry hair prickling her heart.
“She said . . .” Rose forced herself to breathe over the burning length of his penis that crowded her lungs “. . . she didn’t believe either are at fault.”
Jack did not physically move. His sudden distance cramped her stomach.
“When I received your subpoena”—Rose held him close with her hands and her body—“I realized I no longer had a reason to stay with my husband.”
Memories flickered inside his gaze: Wanting. Taking. Losing.
“You loved a woman, Jack,” Rose said, throat cording at the pulsating emotion that leaked from his body into hers, “to the best of your ability.”
Pain spasmed his face.
“You are not responsible for the death of Cynthia Whitcox.”
The first hot spurt of his ejaculate filled her chest. The second hot spurt scalded her eyes.
Jack closed his eyes on the fifth and final spurt.
Chapter 19
Jack watched Rose sleep until a muffled knock climbed the stairs and invaded the bedroom.
He had showered. Dressed. Now he would leave her to awaken alone, filled with his ejaculate.
Just as her husband had left her.
Bright chirps mocked the regret that pinched his testicles.
Rose’s cheek was flushed in the morning sunlight. A bruised nipple peeped above the sheet that smelled of roses, sweat and sex.
Jack reached out, needing to touch her.
A knock halted his hand.
Quietly he exited the bedroom and closed the door, shielding Rose’s naked sexuality from curious eyes.
His heel taps dully echoed in the bare corridor.
Dissipating wisps of steam roiled inside the bathroom.
The top stair creaked. The middle stair creaked.
Jack opened the front door just as a third knock vibrated the enameled wood.
A woman in her fifties—shorter than Rose but more stout—glanced up, hand raised.
There was no surprise in her canny eyes.
Behind her a tall, thin woman and a woman of middle height with a generous waistline stared at him with wide eyes.
They recognized his face. They comprehended by his damp hair and unshaven face where he had spent the night.
“Mrs. Dobkins.” Jack stepped back, hand gesturing for the trio to enter. “Ladies.”
“Mr. Lodoun.”
The use of his name confirmed that the three ladies had, indeed, recognized him.
“Are you the cook?” he addressed the most sturdy of the two nameless women.
“No, sir.” The tallest of the trio stepped forward. “I be Mrs. Finley, the cook.”
“And I be Mrs. Brown, sir.” Jack glanced at the woman of medium height who spoke. “All-around maid.”
The three women were clean, but their clothing was worn: Clearly they needed this position.
Jack did not have time for subtleties.
“You know who I am.”
Barrister of the Queens Counsel. Member of Parliament.
“Yes, sir.”
“And you know who Mrs. Clarring is.”
Knowledge of the newspaper articles shimmered inside their eyes.
“Yes, sir,” the cook and maid chorused.
“And we know who we be, Mr. Lodoun,” the housekeeper tartly interrupted.
Jack assessed the short woman who stood no taller than four feet nine inches tall. “And who would that be, Mrs. Dobkins?”
“Women who be grateful for the opportunity to work.”
Jack held her gaze. “You understand, then, what will happen if word should leak out that I am a visitor in this house.”
“If word leaks out”—the housekeeper did not glance away from the authority he deliberately radiated—“it’ll not come from our mouths.”
A faint smile twisted his lips: Rose had chosen well.
“Mrs. Clarring is sleeping.” Jack did not know what—or even if—Rose had eaten before meeting him outside the Houses of Parliament. “She’ll appreciate a hearty breakfast when she awakens.”
“The cupboards are bare.” The housekeeper held her ground. “And she ain’t got no dishes.”
The untouched bottle of wine and the two mismatched water glasses flitted through his mind.
Jack reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He peeled off a twenty-pound note.
“Buy what you need in order to cook and serve her breakfast.” Rose had only brought the one trunk from her husband’s home. “No doubt she’ll want to shop for the rest.”
“Aye.” Grudging respect shone inside the housekeeper’s eyes. “We can do that.”
“Very good,” Jack said dismissively.
The cook and maid followed the housekeeper, their steps clattering on the wooden floor.
A series of bongs trailed their retreat: It was eight in the morning.
The courthouse closed at noon on Saturdays.
Jack could only hope that Jonathon Clarring did not act first.
“Mrs. Dobkins.”
Jack’s voice barreled down the narrow corridor.
The three women turned, eyes hidden by shadows and the brims of black bonnets.
Rose had said they would not be living in.
“I do not want Mrs. Clarring to be alone in this house during the day. Make certain that every single person who walks over this threshold is known.” Frances Hart’s butler had made the mistake of allowing the madhouse doctors into her home; it had almost cost her freedom. “If Mrs. Clarring doesn’t know who they are, do not let them enter. Is that clear?”
The housekeeper’s voice rang with authority. “We won’t let no one take Mrs. Clarring.”
They could only circumvent a court order; they couldn’t stop it.
Neither could Jack.
The three women turned in unison.
“Mrs. Dobkins.”
The housekeeper paused, back stiff. “Yes?”
Rose smelled of roses. So, too, did Jack.
“Add to your shopping list a toothbrush and unscented soap.”
He could shave at work, but he often met with clients outside his office.
“And a shaving kit,” Jack appended.
The bed sagged, rolling Rose against a warm body. Gentle blue eyes stared down at her.
I forgive you, Rose.
An angry sparrow catapulted Rose upward.
The bedroom was empty.
She clutched her breast, heart racing, soft nipple hardening at her touch.
Musk filled her nostrils.
Over the scent of man and sex wafted the aroma of baking bread.
Sudden comprehension flashed through her.
Jack had opened her door to the housekeeper, and then he had walked out. His absence was a palpable void.
A distant chime announced the quarter hour, but it did not inform her of which hour.
Resolutely Rose jerked back the covers and sat up.
A soft knock pierced the aching portals between her thighs and buttocks.
“Mrs. Clarring?”
The housekeeper’s voice squelched the ridiculous hope that it was Jack who had knocked.
Rose clenched cool cotton and firm mattress. “Yes, Mrs. Dobkins?”
“Mr. Lodoun thought ye’d like a bit o’ breakfast; it’ll be ready shortly.” The older woman’s voice was matter-of-fact, as if every day she received instructions from a man who was not her employer’s husband. “Should ye like a tray, or shall ye come downstairs?”
Glass impacting marble slammed through her memory.
Jack had set the bottle of Rose’s Lubrifiant on the bathroom cabinet.
Had the housekeeper seen it?
Rose reached for black wool. “I’ll take breakfast downstairs, Mrs. Dobkins.”
“Very well, ma’am.”
Hurriedly she pulled on the bodice and skirt she had worn the night before, wool abrading sensitized skin. Without the bustle, it dragged behind her.
The marble counter in the small bathroom was bare.
Quickly Rose opened the bottom drawer.
A crystal stopper glinted.
“Should ye like assistance, Mrs. Clarring?”
Sucking in moist air, Rose shut the drawer. “No, thank you, Mrs. Dobkins.” Standing, turning—fingers fisting to prevent them from independently combing back her tangled hair—she asked: “Did you bring the cook and maid we discussed?”
“Indeed, ma’am.” White light flared; the housekeeper stretched to light the sconce above the sink. “Cook is preparing breakfast. Mrs. Brown is cleaning baseboards.”
Light illuminated white marble and a nickle-coated spout.
Above the sink, a gray ribbon of moisture streaked the bathroom mirror.
Jack had showered before leaving, Rose realized.
“What time is it?” Rose asked.
“Nearly ten, it is.” The housekeeper straightened—she was several inches shorter than Rose—and blew out the blackened match. A starched white cap topped her head. “Shall I start ye a shower?”
Rose was suddenly, painfully aware of the slippery oil between her buttocks and the masculine musk that clung to her skin.
“No, thank you,” she said shortly. “I can do that.”
“That Mr. Lodoun is a bit of a tartar.” The eyes that gazed up at Rose were shrewd. “I expect he’s the same ’atween the sheets.”
Shock bolted through Rose.
She opened her mouth to rebuke the housekeeper for her familiarity. Immediately she remembered the frigid condemnation inside the eyes of her husband’s butler.
There was no judgment inside the housekeeper’s canny eyes.
“Cook will keep yer breakfast hot,” the older woman said brusquely. “Take as long as ye like in the shower; it’ll do ye good.”
Rose’s mouth snapped shut.
“Thank you, Mrs. Dobkins.”
Firmly she locked the door behind the housekeeper. Dropping the blue towel onto the tile, Rose twisted the hot and cold water cocks. Stinging water scoured her skin that felt raw and abraded.
Rose tried to remember how she had felt the morning after her wedding night: She couldn’t. She had never experienced the degree of intimacy with Jonathon that she had experienced with Jack.
Snatching up the pink towel off the sink, she briskly dried—inhaling deeply the faint scent of spice—and threw on last night’s skirt and bodice.
The bedroom was filled with the chatter of sparrows. Black wool and more black wool filled the scarred chest.
When she had married, she’d worn gay colors.
Fleetingly Rose wondered at what point she had changed.
After Jonathon started drinking? Or after she realized he only drank when he was at home, alone with her?
Rose screwed on pearl earrings—the only jewelry she had brought with her—and made her descent.
“Ma’am.” A woman of medium height and appearance materialized at the foot of the steps; a white cap concealed her hair. “Would ye like breakfast now?”
“That would be most welcome,” Rose said. “You are Mrs. Brown, are you not?”
“Aye, ma’am, an’ it please you.” The maid—unlike the housekeeper—flushed with shyness. Or perhaps she flushed with the knowledge of Rose’s illicit affair. “I’ll get yer breakfast.”
“Please tell Cook I would like to meet her,” Rose called after the fleeing woman.
It dawned on Rose she had no dining room furniture.
The drawing room was chill and dark. The velvet armchair guarded the fireplace instead of sitting at the foot of the settee in voyeuristic readiness.
There was no sign of the two men her adultery would most affect: Jonathon and Jack.
Rose inanely realized that the two men in her life both had names that started with a J.