Lord of Sin (14 page)

Adele was keen in her insights, but her assumptions were flawed. He might want Nuala. Not might…he
did
want her. But his inability this morning was not natural. Nuala had sunk her claws into his flesh and would not let go.
She
had caused this to happen, whether or not she realized it.

The dreams…

He laughed at himself. Did he really think she’d worked some nefarious magic on him in vengeance for his treatment of her at Donbridge? He hadn’t even seen the witch since his return to London, nor had he wished to do so.

Now, it appeared, he had no other option.

Aware that Adele had deliberately granted him his privacy, he dressed and left the cottage. He didn’t think. Thinking was anathema to his plans. He rode hard back to Queen’s Gate Terrace, dropped into his club for luncheon, engaged in a furious game of billiards, ignored the pointed glances of the Forties and returned to his town house to change for dinner.

He could not be sure, of course. There was always a possibility that Nuala wouldn’t be present at Mrs. Saunterton’s soirée. But even if she entertained the
fear of gossip about her visit to Donbridge, she would not very likely let it keep her in seclusion. She was not that sort of female.

What she was was a thorn in his side, one he intended to pluck out with all necessary force.

Mrs. Saunterton’s drawing room was as hot and crowded as any good hostess might wish. Sinjin spoke to the other guests with only half his attention, just sufficient to maintain a reasonable level of courtesy. He noted the glances cast his way and could easily guess the subject of conversation as he passed. Doing his best to ignore the buzz of speculation, he maneuvered himself so that he could watch the door and the advent of latecomers.

Nuala, accompanied by the ever-effusive Lady Meadows, didn’t see him when she arrived. Her air was distracted, her gaze darting about like a bird’s.

Looking for
him
.

With finely balanced nonchalance he made his way in her direction, pausing strategically to share a quiet joke with a male acquaintance or to compliment a blushing young lady on her gown. It required the most exquisite timing to be in the right place just when Lady Charles was alone, temporarily unnoticed, and near a promising closed door.

Without giving her the slightest warning, Sinjin bore down on her, grasped her arm and opened the door. He pushed Nuala into the unlit space beyond and closed the door.

The space proved to be a gentleman’s library, but Sinjin wasn’t paying attention to the furnishings. He
backed Nuala up against the desk, trapped her there with his body and kissed her.

N
UALA’S SHOCK
passed in an instant.

In her final moments of sanity, she reflected that she and Sinjin seemed to be in a sort of play, where the same scene repeated over and over again. They hadn’t spoken, hadn’t so much as seen each other since she’d left Donbridge, and yet here they were, as if no time had passed. He was kissing her as if she were the last woman in the world.

And she was letting him.

She worked her arms around his neck, clutching at his hard shoulders as he thrust his tongue between her lips and ground his hips into hers. Her body was no longer subject to her mind. It had a will of its own, and it demanded the satisfaction she had tried to deny it for far too long.

Sinjin moaned as she opened her mouth to accept his invasion, deepening his kiss. He worked his long fingers into her hair, loosening the pins, raking through the curling strands until they escaped their bindings and fell about her shoulders. Every nerve in her body was on fire, so sensitive to his touch that a series of electric shocks coursed through her at every brush of his hands.

“Nuala,” he murmured against her mouth, his erection making itself very plain even through the multiple layers of her skirts and petticoats. He kissed her neck, the hollow of her shoulder, the place where her pulse beat so fast under her skin. She let her head
fall back as he ran his tongue over the swell of her breasts, rising and falling frantically within the abbreviated confines of her bodice. He worked his tongue into the narrow vee between them, an act that made her shiver with images of that same tongue between her thighs.

Her skirts were heavy, not made to be lifted and pulled and bunched higher than her knees. Sinjin was not deterred. He continued to hold her against the desk with the weight of his body while he worked at her clothing, raising her skirts inch by inch, exposing her ankles and her calves and her knees, spreading her thighs apart with a push of his hips. Only his trousers and her thin drawers stood between his hard body and hers.

A burst of laughter outside the door was like a gunshot in Nuala’s ears. Sense returned with a vengeance. She pushed as hard as she could, furious against Sinjin’s resistance, dragging her skirts down as soon as her hands were free.

Sinjin persisted a few seconds longer, but the tide had turned against him. He jerked away almost violently and faced the door with fists clenched as if he might assault whoever had so unwittingly interrupted them. But the voices had gone silent. He paced across the room and stopped before the bookshelves, cursing under his breath.

Nuala was scarcely more composed herself. She shook out her skirts with unsteady hands and pressed her palm to her bodice to make certain that Sinjin had not disarranged it, as well. Her heart and lungs con
spired to keep her from catching her breath, and her legs would not stop trembling.

She knew she could go. Sinjin would not try to stop her. She could simply leave, knowing that this…this thing between them would remain unresolved. The war would continue.

And she would continue to pretend that her long-neglected body would be satisfied with any man.

“Why are you waiting?” Sinjin demanded, his back rigid and his head bowed. “Go. Get out.”

Strange how her first impulse was to go to him, lay her hand on his shoulder and comfort him in his defeat. “Do you want me to go?” she asked quietly.

He half turned, his profile stark in the faint light that spilled under the door. “It was a mistake,” he said.

“To assume that you can have any woman you choose?”

“I can.” He finally faced her, his body radiating his unsatisfied lust. “Or do you believe you don’t have your price?”

His new attack left her breathless all over again. “Not everyone can be bought,” she said over the racket of her heartbeat, and started for the door.

“Nuala.”

The anger was gone from his voice. If Nuala had not known better, she might have imagined she heard a note of pleading.

“What is it?”

“Your hair.”

Belatedly she remembered the state of her coiffure and how its dishevelment would look to the
guests. She found just enough pins to secure it on top of her head.

But her armor had been breeched. Surely everyone would see and know….

“Nuala.”

She felt him come up behind her, longed to lean back into his arms and feel his breath on her neck. “I…I must—”

“I want you.”

H
ER KNEES SOFTENED
, and cascades of fire flowed into the pit of her stomach.

“I want you,” he repeated.

She might have asked him why, if she could have answered the same question of herself. “It is not possible.”

“You want
me
.”

The lie came to her tongue and died there. “What difference can it make?”

His fingertips brushed the back of her neck, lifting aside the hair she had failed to secure. “All the difference in the world,” he murmured. “You’ve won this round with Melbyrne, but he is still one of us. Perhaps you can persuade me…”

Nuala spun to face him, her hand raised. The magic came to her without thought or effort. A mark appeared on Sinjin’s cheek, the imprint of a small hand where no flesh had touched flesh.

He staggered back, more stunned than hurt, and lifted his hand to his face. Nuala’s arm went numb.

“Forgive me!” she cried. “I didn’t mean…”

His lip curled in familiar mockery. “Oh, you meant it,” he said.

“It was a mistake. A…a fluke.”

But it wasn’t. Not after the first two instances, in Whitechapel and at Lady Oxenham’s ball. All small magics, to be sure. But this one, like the one at the ball, had been meant to punish.

Dark magic, no matter how mild. The sort of magic she had fought so hard to quench.

“It will not happen again,” she said. “I swear…”

His gaze was fixed on her face, his eyes so dark that they made the rest of the room seem cast in bright daylight. “Perhaps you don’t intend to use your power,” he said without emotion, touching the fading brand on his cheek. “Perhaps it goes no further than these…small tokens of your displeasure. But even if it doesn’t, I will continue my campaign to stop Melbyrne unless you agree to my terms.”

A thrill of premonition turned her bones to ice. “I will not surrender to—”

“I do not think you’ll find them onerous,” he said. “I want you in my bed, Nuala. I want you naked under me, moaning as I take you. I want to see you helpless with desire.” He took a step toward her, his raw masculinity stealing the air from the room. “If you give yourself to me, tonight, I’ll leave Melbyrne alone.”

Nuala was already wet and wanting. She could feel him…pinning her to the bed, moving inside her as her legs wrapped about his waist….

She gasped and turned for the door.

“What matters most to you, Nuala?” Sinjin said behind her. “Your virtue, which has so little meaning in our world, or Lady Orwell’s happiness?”

Nuala closed her eyes. She knew what she valued most. And she was no virgin. There were already indications that her visit to Sinjin’s estate had provoked comment. She had little virtue to lose.

You desire him. Once you have shared his bed, you can be free of him completely. In every way.

“What you are doing is wrong,” she said, clinging to what was left of her principles.

“We are all guilty of some sin or other.”

“Do you use such wooing techniques on other women?”

His voice became a purr. “Only on you.”

She released her breath. “You will make no further attempts to influence Mr. Melbyrne?”

“None.”

“Then…” She turned around, resting her back against the door. “Then I agree to your terms.”

“Tonight?”

“Yes.” She could not meet his eyes. “Where?”

“I have a cottage in St. John’s Wood.”

She knew what men of means kept in St. John’s Wood. “Is it not already occupied?”

“Not any longer.”

She looked up, speaking before she could think. “You mean that Adele is…”

“That is none of your concern.”

“I am not taking her place.”

He laughed. “You couldn’t. I want quit of you, Nuala.”

“Then we are truly in agreement.”

They stared at each other. Nuala reached behind
her back for the door latch. Sinjin took one long step toward her, grabbed her around the waist and kissed her hard enough to sting.

“A reminder,” he said. He eased her away from the door, his sudden gentleness a conundrum. “I’ll go ahead and clear the way. Wait five minutes and then come out.”

“Why bother? Your new conquest will be revealed soon enough.”

He caught her chin in his fingers. “Oh, no, Nuala. This will be our secret.”

Moving around her, he opened the door a few inches, peered out and left the room. Nuala counted five minutes by the clock on the shelf and followed.

Sinjin had kept his promise. There was no one in this part of the house, though she thought she heard Sinjin’s voice, laughing, in an adjoining room.

She leaned against the wall. She must excuse herself as quickly as possible, calm her mind, prepare for this final skirmish.

“I want to see you helpless with desire.”
Well, she would not give him the satisfaction. She would be in control of her mind, if not her body. And when it was over, she could turn her attention to caging these small but dangerous remnants of her magic so that they could never escape again.

S
HE WAS FIVE MINUTES LATE
.

Sinjin checked his watch again and resumed his pacing. Five minutes after midnight, and she still had not arrived.

Perhaps she wasn’t coming. Perhaps she had decided that Deborah wasn’t worth the price he had demanded of her.

He paused again to twitch aside the curtains and stare out at the drive. Five minutes more. Ten. A half hour at most, and he would assume she had chosen to defy him.

What then? He remembered the supple, half-resisting feel of her body beneath his as he’d trapped her against the desk. He would have taken her then if circumstances had permitted. If she’d have let him.

And she would have.

But she’d lost her nerve. And he would have to pay his own price in lost sleep, violent dreams, a body that refused to obey his will….

The sound of wheels on gravel yanked him out of his thoughts. The carriage was making the final curve toward the cottage, as dark and silent as such an equipage could be. There was no footman at the footboard; only the driver, anonymous in dark livery.

Sinjin restrained himself as the carriage pulled up to the door. He walked slowly down the corridor to the modest entrance hall and waited until he was certain that Nuala had left the carriage. Only then did he move close enough to answer her very quiet knock.

His heart jumped against his ribs. He opened the door, carefully setting a neutral expression on his face.

“Lady Charles,” he said. “Welcome.”

She stared at him, her lovely face as unreadable as the Sphinx. She wore the plainest of gowns, almost
severe of cut and design, as if she were on her way to a funeral.

“Lord Donnington,” she said. She glanced back over her shoulder; the coachman was already driving the carriage back the way he had come. Evidently Nuala was no more enamored of having a third party present on the grounds than Sinjin was himself.

“Please, come in,” Sinjin said, stepping back from the door. Nuala nodded, walked over the threshold, paused to take in the stark entrance hall and began to untie her pelerine. Sinjin hastily moved to help her out of it, took her gloves and hat as a gentleman ought in the absence of a servant. She thanked him quite properly.

It was a sort of dance, he thought…each partner knowing his or her place, going through the motions by rote. It would not be so once they were in bed. But he knew the rules as well as she did.

Why, then, was he so damnably nervous?

“Would you care for refreshment, Lady Charles?” he asked. “Tea and cakes, perhaps? A light supper? I have—”

“That will not be necessary, thank you.”

So easily she put him in the position of getting directly to the point of her visit. He should have been grateful. Instead, he was annoyed. More than annoyed. He was angry.

Very well. She had set the tone for their liaison. He would honor her wishes.

Without giving her the slightest warning, he seized her shoulders and kissed her.

There was no give in her lips, no easing of her stiffly upright figure. She simply endured his attentions as if he were some common rogue mauling her for his own pleasure.

And are you not?

He released her. “Do you wish to leave, Lady Charles?” he asked in a voice he hardly recognized as his own. “I can ride home and summon a carriage….”

“No.” She met his gaze, her own clear and unafraid. “We have struck a bargain. I intend to keep my part.” She started away from the door at a firm walk, paused and turned.

“If you will show me the way,” she said.

He strode ahead of her, leading her to the stairway. There were but four rooms on the upper floor, one seldom used, one relegated to his female guests, one his own and one set aside for but a single purpose.

He led her directly to the latter. And hesitated, his blood boiling from his head to his loins.

“There is no going back once we cross this threshold,” he said.

In answer she put her hand on the latch, opened the door and entered.

Any woman not accustomed to such a room might have been startled by its decadence. Nuala was not, though she paused to take it all in: the walls adorned with hangings and carpets from the Near East, India and Northern Africa; the snarling tiger-skin rug, made of the pelt of a man-eater; the chairs overflowing with pillows of brocade and velvet; the vast bed,
its coverlet already turned back, the silk sheets gleaming in the low light.

Sinjin had designed it to appear like the bedchamber of a Turkish pasha or Indian raja, a sensual realm awaiting the arrival of an houri or odalisque. He moved a little closer to Nuala, close enough to hear the rapid sigh of her breathing and note the flush in her cheeks.

He was an expert in reading the signs of a woman’s arousal. She was far from indifferent to the place he had chosen for her initiation to his lovemaking.

“Do you like it?” he said, placing his hands lightly on her shoulders.

“I…It is most unusual.”

“That is what I intended.” He began rubbing his hands up and down her arms, feeling the tension beneath her unadorned sleeves. “Nuala…”

Her breath caught. He bent to her neck and kissed her, ever so lightly, above her high collar. The small hairs at the nape of her neck rose in response. Such a little thing, but it brought his cock to instant attention.

Functioning, thank God. Ready and more than willing.

He slid his hand to her waist. She was not wearing a corset or a bustle. He began to ache to the point of real pain. He could detect the fragrance of Nuala’s excitement, feel her trembling as he moved his hands to her hips. And turned her around, slowly, slowly.

She would not look at him. Like a virgin prepar
ing to accept a man for the first time, she gazed at the bare skin revealed by the open collar of his shirt.

“Are you afraid, Nuala?” he asked softly.

Her chin jerked up. “No.”

“Has it been so long, then?” He cupped her face in his hand, feeling as if he held a bird struggling to take flight. “Lord Charles…did he please you?”

It was the wrong thing to say, and he knew it even before the words were out of his mouth. She pulled back sharply.

“My husband,” she said coldly, “is none of your concern.”

His anger returned, quite irrational, slipping inexplicably from his control. “He wasn’t enough of a man for you, was he?” he demanded. “It wasn’t a real marriage at all.”

He fully expected her to leave then. But she remained where she was, fists clenched at her sides.

“Such words are beneath contempt,” she said. “I was happy with him, and he with me. And now he is dead.”

The hot flare of rage went out like a snuffed candle. Unfamiliar shame bade him drop to his knees and beg her forgiveness.

He could not go so far. But he wet his lips, forced his thoughts past the muffling cloud of lust and bowed his head.

“I beg your pardon,” he said. “I spoke rashly, and stupidly.”

Her silence could have felled an American buffalo. But once again she stayed when she could have gone.

“Lord Charles was a good man,” she said. “Our
relationship was one of friendship and mutual support. I did not feel deprived. I still do not.” She sighed. “If you are done with questions regarding my past, we may proceed.”