Luck Be a Lady (12 page)

Before he knew what he was doing, he reached across the compartment to catch her hand. “Maybe you need a friend,” he said. All those calluses in her damp little palm. Another woman in her shoes would have spent her days eating bonbons and ordering servants to do the lifting. “I'm a good one to have.”

She stared at him for a moment, an odd look on her face. Probably a trick of the side lamp—it turned her eyes large and luminous, and made her expression look oddly stricken. “A friend,” she said softly.

“That's right.”

She took a deep, audible breath. “But . . . why would you bother?”

Good question. It made him uneasy how much he wanted to look after her. Or maybe he just disliked that nobody else cared to do it. He'd been in that position, alone and friendless, nobody worrying where he laid his head. But he'd never imagined that kind of loneliness could afflict people of
her
rank. “Kindness never cost me a penny,” he said. “I see no need to hoard it.”

She bowed her head, then pulled her hand from his. “Thank you,” she said, very low. “But I think friendship would only complicate matters.”

Odd to feel a sting in her rejection. A thousand people would be grateful for his interest, but no surprise that a rich, spoiled girl from Bloomsbury wouldn't prize it.

Spoiled.
No, that didn't sound right. Nobody was coddling this woman. Nor, did it seem, would she allow someone to do so.

He slid open the window and spoke to the driver. “Bloomsbury,” he said. “Henton Court.”

When he snapped the window shut, she said, “Thank you.” Her sigh sounded relieved. “I had feared you might . . .”

“What?” What did she imagine him capable of doing? To a woman—a woman he'd married, no less, and carried in his arms when her ankle gave way. “What did you think I might do?”

But she only shook her head. “Never mind. The newspapers do you an injustice. You're a decent man, after all.”

A note of condescension, there, like she expected him to gobble up the words and wag his tail in gratitude.
Decent,
was he? And that surprised her? Whom did she think she'd married?

God above, but if she was surprised to find him decent, she must have been shaking in her boots at that register office. He remembered suddenly the coldness she'd shown in his bedroom, the great effort it had taken to crack her and make her yield to pleasure. No wonder. All the time, she'd imagined herself bedding scum.

“Sure,” he said, “I've no interest in complicating matters. But if you ever change your mind, let me know. Wouldn't mind shagging you again.”

Her spine snapped straight. “I
beg
your pardon.”

He snorted. Clearly she meant to forget that he'd ever touched her—that he'd seen her bare as the day she was born, and made her moan from the pleasure of it. Why, she'd probably scrubbed herself raw afterward, lest his filthy touch leave a mark.

“You're right, the vulgarity don't fit,” he said. “What we did in that bed, it was more than the normal fuck. I don't expect you to realize it, being a proper, prissy miss. But I'd be glad to prove it again. Pity this coach is so cramped.”

She gazed at him in open-mouthed silence for what seemed like a promisingly long moment. Then she sucked in a sharp breath and averted her face, showing him one rosy cheek. “You're a boor. Stop this vehicle and let me out.”

“Don't worry yourself, sweetheart. I'm not going to touch you. You'll just have to take my word for it. Rarely happens that two bodies suit each other, the way ours do.”

“
Did,
”
she bit out.

“Did, and do, and will do,” he said. “It don't change, that kind of chemistry.”

“Very good to know.” Her voice had stiffened and thinned, a schoolmistress speaking to a hopelessly slow child. “Is there anything else you wish to say, in the hopes of shocking me?”

“Shocking you? No. But here's a promise: if I get you beneath me again, you'll enjoy it even more. It'll only get better, Kitty. Why, the fifth or sixth time, I expect I'll make you come just by kissing your sweet little nipples. I'll suck them slow and soft, and then hard. And when I use my teeth on you, the slightest scrape—”

“Stop.” She hissed the word, her face red as she rounded on him. “This is—you are—”

“I'm not telling you this to insult you.” Maybe it had started as a jab, but suddenly he felt as bothered as she looked. “I mean it as a promise. God's word, Catherine. You're a gift waiting to be unwrapped. I'll open you up and make you glad to be alive, no matter what the day brings. Because you'll know that come nightfall, I'll be laying you down and spreading your legs and showing you how nature intended you to feel.”

Her lips moved around a soundless syllable. She cleared her throat, then said hoarsely, “By the terms of the contract—”

“We'll leave the contract outside the bedroom, I think.”

“If you
dare
touch me—”

“Haven't yet,” he said mildly. “But you're looking mighty flushed, all the same.”

“That is
shock
, Mr. O'Shea. Shock at your shamelessness—why, you have all the subtlety of an ox—”

“Be shocked at my restraint,” he said. “I'm a
decent
man,
after all. Otherwise you'd be under me by now.”

The coach slowed. She knocked aside the shade, then gasped in obvious relief before scrambling for the door handle.

He caught her wrist, making her freeze. Lifted it to his mouth, and pressed a close-mouthed kiss to her ­racing pulse.

“You right that I'm no gentleman,” he murmured against her fragrant skin. “I'd make you grateful for it. Give it a thought.”

She wrenched free and pushed open the door. “I'd rather—I'd rather sell my company!”

But after she stumbled out, she turned back to him, her lips parting as though she meant to deliver one last retort. Instead, however, she stared up at him, silent, her slack-jawed expression gilded by the mellow glow of the lamp.

“You're awful,” she said at last, in a reedy voice.

He laughed. “Seems you've got a taste for it,” he said, and pulled shut the door.

*    *   *

Falling asleep always proved difficult for Catherine. She spent the day on her feet; she never laid down but with a sense of exhaustion. But her mind kept ticking onward, cataloging the events of the day, showing her truths that she had not perceived in the frenetic hubbub of routine. This mistake, that oversight . . .

She'd learned a trick for it. Not counting sheep, nothing so juvenile. She simply focused on her breath. One could count on the breath to make a simple rhythm, in and out. Beneath this simple focus, her mind grew quiescent and drowsy.

Tonight, however, the trick failed her. Perhaps she was coming down with something. Each breath, which should have pulled her further toward sleep, only pitched her awareness higher—and of such commonplace things! The sheet, where it lay over her, close and soft as a touch. The braid that lay along her shoulder, heavy and somehow entrapping, like a rope holding her down. She felt restless, hot, though the air held a chill that the dying fire had done nothing to dispel.

If I get you beneath me again . . .

She pressed her palm to her cheek. It didn't feel feverish.

I'll suck them slow and soft, and then hard . . .

Her palm was sweaty, damp.
He
had done this to her. Unsettled her with those vulgar words. He'd known he was doing it. She should not give him the satisfaction of succeeding.

But when she squeezed her eyes shut, what she saw was his bare, tawny body stretched over hers, his head lowered at her breast, mouth pulling like a ravening beast. An incubus.

She cupped her palm over her breast. But that was not where she ached now. She slid her palm lower, to the spot between her legs.

He had put his mouth there . . .

This
was why women were cautioned to save their virtue for marriage. She'd never known how a man could make a woman feel. The knowledge had corrupted her.

It will only get better.

She touched herself where he had. A gasp broke from her. It was not entirely
his
power. He was wrong to say that she required a partner. She could make herself feel—not precisely the same. That would take the
scent and feel of his skin, the heavy delicious weight of him . . .

No.
She did not require those. She could take this power from him, place it in her own control. She
must
do it, for she could not accept his invitation. To do so would be to risk . . . everything.

She touched herself clumsily, frustrated by the comparison to how expertly
he
had done it. He'd touched a thousand women so, no doubt.

Her hand stilled. How curious that the thought should send a dark poisonous feeling through her. This was some trick of the fact of marriage, perhaps. Any decent spouse would dislike the idea of a husband's promiscuity. But hers was no true marriage. He was a criminal, who would never make her a true husband. And she was not fit to be any man's wife. Jealousy had no place in their agreement. He would laugh at her if he ever discovered it.

She shoved him from her mind, rubbing herself harder now. Her body belonged to her, not him. As much as she resented him for it, she must also thank him for showing her so.

But what harm was there in thinking of him in private? She would not allow herself to be alone with him again. With a sigh, she pictured his face . . . the bronzed length of his taut, hard body . . . the feel of his mouth on her skin, the skilled stroke of his hand . . . The pleasure began to build.
It
was coming.

A squeak came from her door. A key turning in the lock!

She sat up, blushing so brightly it was a wonder that the room was not illuminated. “Bodkin?” Only her ­lady's maid had that key.

No answer.

She threw off the covers and slipped to her feet. The dead bolt turned. “Bodkin, I don't wish to be disturbed tonight.”

Now came a scrape. That was the second dead bolt, turning.

God in heaven. Bodkin did not have that key.

*    *   *

Nick lay awake, staring at the ceiling. Fine job he'd done, talking so hot to Catherine. She'd sailed away cool as a breeze, but he just kept burning, visions sparking straight from his brain into his groin.

He should have resisted the urge to needle her, talked straight instead. She'd be safer at Diamonds. Even she should see that. She was valuable to him. One vote down, but who knew when others would come that he'd need her brother to help him with? He had every reason to keep her safe. But to her brother, she was only an obstacle now.

With a curse, he threw off the covers and stood. If she found out he'd wasted a moment's sleep thinking about her, she'd only bridle and remind him that per the terms of that contract, he was beholden not to think on her at all.

So he'd turn his attention elsewhere. Go downstairs and check on business, maybe join a game. He rarely indulged himself so—he was good enough that he almost always won, and clients didn't come here to be trounced by the owner. But a single hand of baccarat, maybe. And a shot of whisky, to take the edge off.

He had dressed and was heading toward the door when the knocking started.

Knew it.
Like any full-blooded Irishman, he had a sense for oncoming trouble. He turned the bolt and threw open the door.

His factotum, Callan, looked harried and flushed. “Begging your pardon, but that woman you brought here last week—she's downstairs, demanding to be let in. I would have tossed her out, but she's—”

He brushed past Callan, cutting through the lamp-lit passage into the back stairway, where he took the steps by twos.

She was sitting on a bench in the rear vestibule, wrapped up in a horse blanket. Callan must have lent it to her—it had the insignia of the House of Diamonds stitched into one corner.

She rose, chin high, evidently oblivious to her equine reek. “Do forgive my appearance,” she said. “I was forced to leave in some haste.”

“Yeah,” he said slowly. “I see that.” Not much sweetness in this victory. “What happened?”

“Nothing so much.” But as she shifted, the blanket slipped, revealing another layer—a cloak, her own—and beneath it, a frilly collar of transparent lace.

She'd fled in her night-robe.

Nick waved Callan off, waiting until he'd rounded the corner to step closer to Catherine. “What happened?”

She took a deep breath. “May I stay here, tonight? I know it—it seems very ironic, given my earlier objections. But I fear no hotel would receive me in such a state.”

Half dressed and shivering, she still managed to speechify like the Queen. “Of course,” he said. “Come on, let's get you a brandy.”

“I don't drink, Mr. O'Shea.”

He snorted.

*    *   *

Catherine was trying very hard to remain composed. But shock, to say nothing of the cold, seemed to be sinking into her bones, causing her hard-won control to fray, so at last she began to shiver.

O'Shea noticed, perhaps, as he seated her by the fire in his suite. He made some dark noise and turned away. “Stay there.”

As if she had anywhere else to go. She stared fixedly at the handsome Persian carpet, listening to his footsteps retreat into the neighboring room. What a flight she had made. Apparently the dangers of town at night were vastly overstated. She'd had no difficulty hailing a hack, and the cabman had seemed thoroughly unsurprised at her destination. Nobody had even attempted to mug her.

O'Shea returned, carrying the counterpane from his bed, gold threads glimmering in the rich brown satin. “Let's trade,” he said. “This blanket will be warmer.”