My Surrender (23 page)

“Used
you,” he finally said and, damn him, his voice was as cool and dark and unaffected as the night sky. “Your faith in my character is truly impressive, Charlotte. First you think that I would make…would bed you just to rid you of your virginity thereby lending veracity to your role. Now you think that I’ve manipulated you into whoring for me so that my search of the castle will be marginally less dangerous.”

“Tell me I was wrong.”

“Would you believe me?” he asked with terrible calm. When she didn’t answer, he went on, “As I recall, when I left you it was with your request that I come to you the following afternoon. I came. You were gone.”

She would not let him see the agony he’d caused her. She wouldn’t. “I wished to spare you the difficulty of that parting,” she said. “I thought you would have found it hard to send your…mistress to another man’s bed. I should have known better.”

“Your consideration unmans me,” he said bitterly. “What a diligent little pragmatist you are, Lottie. I never fully appreciated it before. But since we are bartering suspicions and accusations, let me remind you that you told me yourself you were allowing me into your bed, into your body, as a means of ridding yourself of that problematic maidenhead. The only difference is,
I
didn’t believe you.”

“You bastard.” She struggled to turn in his embrace, her hand rising to strike his face. With a growl, he grabbed her wrist, wrenching it down, repositioning his hand low across her belly and pulled her forcibly back into him.

“You can’t play the abused lover,” she spat. “You’re here. You can’t deny what is plain for any fool to see. Even me. You can’t take advantage of my—” She’d almost said “love,” but pride stopped her. Thank God.

“But I
have
the advantage,” he said, the dark liquid accent caressing her. He shifted his arm, his hand spread wide and low over her stomach, his fingertips riding just above the jut of her pubic bone, pressing in a little and causing her pulse to lurch in her throat. She let her gaze flicker down to the sight of his hand, a dark possessive imprint on the pale satin. He lowered his head against the curve of her neck.

She hissed as he nipped the rounded point of her shoulder and soothed it with a kiss. Her joints went liquid.

“Such a valiant little patriot, Charlotte. Do you want to hear an explanation of how I came to be here? Of why I am here?”

Yes. No. What if he said things she could not bear to hear?
“I am not in the least interested. Now get out of here. St. Lyon may be coming.”

“You really are trying to destroy me. Well, darling, if that is to be my road, I insist we travel it together.” He released her wrist, toppling her forward so that she had to catch herself with her palms flat against the mirror to keep from falling. He followed her in, his loins pressed firmly against her bottom, trapping her there. His hands clasped her waist for a second before stroking down the side of her hips to the tops of her outer thighs.

Firm, warm lips slipped languidly down the side of her neck. The touch of his tongue set a quicksilver flash of desire spearing toward her core. She took a deep breath.
Wretched, treacherous flesh,
heedless of protecting her heart.

She started sideways, but his big hands tightened, holding her in place.
“Do not move. Do not, or I swear I do not know what I will do.”

She believed him, something beyond dangerous, something hunted, lived in his voice. She shivered, still tilted forward against the mirror as he moved like a dark incubus behind her, his hands unseen below.

“You have put me through hell, my darling, my beloved. But like that fool St. Lyon, I find I am made of dross metal where you are concerned.”

Incrementally, inch by inch, he rucked up the soft, malleable fabric of her gown gathering it into his palms as the back hem rose slowly from her ankles, to her calves, to just above the back of her knees.

“What are you doing?” she gasped.

“ ’Tis a little trick I learned from your demonstration this afternoon.” His mouth trailed fire down between her shoulder blades. He kissed the bare skin there, his mouth was open, urgent, his tongue tasting her as he fitted her more snuggly into the lee of his hips.

The tips of his fingers, warm and calloused, brushed beneath the edge of her hem, grazing the sensitive flesh high on her thigh. Her head fell back against his shoulder. She could barely hold on to a thought. Somewhere in the last few seconds she had ceded will to sensation. Her skin prickled with an electric sense of anticipation. She felt drunk with the need for more contact.

At least she was not alone. The breath buffeting her neck and shoulder was harsher now, quicker, the hands so skillfully playing with her trembled. She should feel triumphant. She only felt desire. And that way led to the destruction he’d promised.

“Stop.” Her voice sounded less like a command than a plea.

“No. Never.” His sounded almost tender.

Her head fell forward between her braced arms. She was panting now, her breasts shivering with each draw of his palm following the curve of her upper thigh around to between her legs, his knee between hers, gently nudging them apart. Her eyelids slipped halfway shut as his fingers found soft, tender swells of her most feminine parts. Higher. Higher. Brushing with tantalizing lightness until her whole body shook with mortification and excitement that he would do this, play with her so, here.

He fit his hips against her, pulling her back against the erection swelling the front of his trousers. His touch lightened, barely holding her against him, making her painfully aware of his arousal and of how little he needed to do to have her spread beneath him.

“Are you trying to shame me?” Her pulse pounded in her temples, her wrists, pooling in her breast and where his fingers played with such indolent ease. “Make me say that I want you.
I want you.
There. Satisfied? You win.”

His hands dropped from her as if her skin scalded him. He fell back a step and somewhere she found the strength to push herself away. She caught sight of herself in the mirror. Her hair was coming down, the short curls rampant on her neck. Her eyes were dark and luminous, her skin flushed with excitement.

Taking a deep, shaking breath, she turned to him.

“You have this wrong.” His face was set, terse, his eyes pools of glittering onyx. The light caught the wicked crescent of the scar he wore on his cheek.

“You told me lies.” Without volition, her quivering fingers rose and feathered a touch against the old wound.

“Many,” he agreed roughly, turning his head and catching her fingertip between his teeth, licking the tip and sending a firestorm jolting through her hand and wrist and spiraling up her arm to flood her breasts and belly with heavy desire.

“What do you want?” he asked. “To know the exact degree and extent of my lies? Which one? The ones I’ve told you or the ones I’ve told myself? Do you think I
wanted
this?” His laugh was low, tormented.

“You haven’t told me everything.”

“I’ve told you nothing,” he agreed again, his scent filling her head, suffusing her world, marking her. “I haven’t told you that I—”

With a sound of frustration, he pulled her into him and kissed her with checked violence and, God help her, she returned his kiss, her face lifted to his, her body arching in to him. She tangled her hands in his hair, drinking in the scent of him, her tongue stirring in his mouth.

His anger and jealousy and frustration melted at the moment of her surrender. He hesitated, knowing her capitulation was only desire momentarily relinquishing that formidable, obstinate pride and knowing too that her pride would return. He understood pride. Hadn’t she stripped him of his own? But he could no more relinquish her now than he could stop his heart from beating. She was his.
His.

He lashed one arm around her waist, with the other hand undoing the line of buttons at her back. He pulled the gown down, pulled the chemise skimming the tips of her breasts down, letting the silky material sag to her waist and freeing her breasts.

Her skin was milky and satiny, like moonlight over snow. He drew his palms down over the firm, high mounds, his thumbs playing with the tight nipples as she moaned into his open mouth. He sucked gently on the tip of her tongue and released her mouth, lowering his head to take an apricot-tinted nipple. She gasped and arched back, her hands in his hair holding him tightly as he suckled, cries of pleasure shaken from her throat.

His body tightened, swelled, ached.

His hands moved down her hips, dragging the material up until he felt the satiny twin arcs of her buttocks. He slid his hand between her legs and felt her little recoil of apprehension and more, the rich dampness of her body’s welcome.

She wanted him. Her arousal destroyed what little restraint he had kept. Need cut through him like a hot knife, like a fiery brand, instant and eviscerating and immediate.

He jerked at his trousers, pulling himself free of the constricting material, then caught her, one hand behind her knee, the other beneath the round, soft buttocks. He boosted her effortlessly up, her leg catching instinctively above his hip, the soft crisp curls and dewy womanhood pressed to his groin. He felt the softness slide like a warm, wet fist about the head of his erection and shuddered, pulling her closer, pushing into her.

She arched back, her other leg instinctively climbing about his other hip, until her legs locked about his waist, the movement thrusting him deep, deep within. He forced himself to go still, his gaze feasting on the sight of her pleasure as he held her suspended in his arms, her body cleaved to his, her eyes closed.

He lifted her slightly, withdrawing, and she gasped at the sensation.

“No,” she muttered, her eyes flying open to find his own hungrily watching her. The feel of his erection moving inside was alien, unbelievably exotic and stimulating, frighteningly powerful and arousing. “Do not stop.
More.”

Nothing else existed but this. She could not master a single thought. She only wanted, needed him, desired him. He let her slide down, her breasts dragging against the rough clean linen of his shirt but this time his hips worked in counterpoint to the movement, taking a deeper ownership of her body.

Her fingers dug into his shoulders. Even beneath the linen she could feel the strain of his muscles knotting. The ache that had begun in her breasts and lips and fingertips, raced thick and hot to pool where he filled her. An ache built with each long, restrained thrust he dealt her, swelling like a wave meeting another, building in force.

Another stroke. Another thrust. Faster. Deeper. She met each one. At first tentatively, awkward in her vulnerability, anchored to the world only by his body, his power, the strength of his arms holding her, his arousal filling her, stretching her, and then with growing desperation as the welling need within her grew.

His shirt grew damp with his sweat, his eyes burned as he stared down at her, his face muscles working with each thrust. He would have her utterly. He would take her from herself. Pleasure beat at her, thrummed in her veins, a rumble of thunder growing in her ears as the blood rushed in her body, driven on the cusp of an irresistible tidal wave. Gratification so intense it brought tears to her eyes jolted through her. Again. Again. She closed her eyes and with a sob, surrendered.

She felt him rock back then, the rhythm holding him in its grip growing faster, wilder, until with one last powerful thrust she heard his own cry of savage exultance fall heavy and triumphant in her ear as shudders racked his body. She held on to him, feeling the echo of repletion in the tremors shivering his muscles.

She collapsed then, limp, wrung of sensation, her thoughts hazy and drunk. Vaguely she was aware of him lowering her gently to her feet, of his arm supporting her as he pulled her chemise up. His mouth touched her temple, lingered. She drew a shaky breath. She must—

“Miss Nash? Miss Nash!” Madame Paule’s voice called from the other side of the chamber door.

The sound instantly recalled Charlotte to reality. She stumbled away from Dand, dragging her gown closed over her breasts, her hunted gaze darting toward the door handle. Thank God, she’d locked it.

Dand uttered a low, vehement curse.

“You have to leave. Now.
Please,”
she whispered urgently, her lips trembling on the verge of tears. She could not fall apart. Not now. She raised her voice, praying that it did not betray her. “One moment, Madame Paule!”

She turned to Dand, who was savagely repairing the front of his trousers. He raked his hand through his hair, damp and rumpled, his mouth twisted in a snarl.

“You have to go, Dand.”

He grabbed her arm, hauling her with him toward the open window through which he’d come. Only when he was within reach of it did he release her. “I’ll go. But lest you are uncertain about what that was, what
this
is,” he ground out in a low, savage voice, “let me make it clear for you. You are mine.
Mine.”

And before she could reply, he’d grabbed the upper sill of the window and swung himself up and out of the room.

Jermyn Street, Piccadilly
August 13, 1806

G
INNY
M
ULGREW IMPATIENTLY DRUMMED HER FINGERS
against the carriage’s open windowsill. Two hours ago the boy she had set to keep an eye on the Marquis of Cottrell’s residence had reported that the marquis and Colonel MacNeill had ridden out on horseback. A few coins to a maid had delivered the information that the marquis had left word for his wife that he and the colonel were going to Scotland to retrieve the marchioness’s sister.

Ginny had vacillated for an hour before deciding on her present course. It was time she and the abbey of St. Bride’s joined forces to bring about a mutually advantageous end to her quickly unraveling plans. She would approach Toussaint—and the thought of the soldier-priest’s face when he discovered that she knew all about him and his practice was the only bright spot in her day—and convince him to send word to the abbey that someone must intercept the would-be rescuers before they utterly mucked up Charlotte’s mission. She knew St. Bride’s to be within a day’s ride of St. Lyon’s castle. And there was only one road leading to that remote stronghold. It should not prove beyond the abbot’s surprisingly long reach to do as she requested.

The carriage rolled to a halt and her driver, a formidable ex-pugilist named Ashford, clambered down and pulled open the door. “Here it be, ma’am,” he said. “Number Twelve Sparrow Lane. And a rare rough patch of ground it be. I’m thinking I ought to go in wid ye.”

“Thank you, Ashford, but no,” Ginny said, climbing out and eyeing the rickety façade before her. “But if you would wait here and remain vigilant, I would be obliged.”

With a doubtful expression, Ashford nodded and then took up a position by the lead horse, his arms crossed over his thick chest.

Ginny knocked at the door and waited a good few minutes before knocking again more forcefully. She frowned when there was no answer. She knew Toussaint had not relocated. She paid good money to be informed of the monk’s frequent changes of address.

But then, it was a tall building and there was no saying that he wasn’t on the roof with his carrier pigeons and simply did not hear her. Well, she wasn’t going to stand around pounding on the door all day and she wasn’t going to come back here. Besides, if he had gone elsewhere she might find a clue as to where inside.

She motioned Ashford over. “If you would open this door, please,” she said and stood aside as with a mighty kick Ashford sent the cheap door exploding inward off its hinges.

“Thank you. Now, wait for me.” She sailed through the still swinging door and stopped at once as a foul odor filled her lungs.

“Dear God,” she muttered, anxiety pushing at the edges of her formidable self-containment. She had smelled death before.

Marshaling her courage she moved through the front hall and into the small, dark room in the back. The stench was thicker here, the scent of lye lying like a caul over it. Pulling out her lace handkerchief, she held it to her nose as she moved tentatively along the perimeters of the room. There was little furniture, a table with a lantern on it, a pair of chairs, a narrow bed, and beside it a small squat trunk.

She knew. But she had to be sure. She pulled up the clasp and opened the lid.

A man lay folded inside, the side of his head black where it had been caved in. A Bible lay open on his legs, as though someone had tossed it in as an afterthought. It was Brother Toussaint.

Choking on the stench, Ginny stumbled from the room, her broken leg screaming in protest. She barely felt it. Panic spurred her on, sending her racing into the street and calling for Ashford. But it was not the dead man that filled her with alarm.

It was Charlotte. The girl was in danger. She had been set up, manipulated into making the trip to Scotland.

Because Brother Toussaint had been dead for a long, long time. Too long. Whoever had given his blessing to Charlotte’s plan to take Ginny’s place as St. Lyon’s paramour, it hadn’t been this man.

LeMons dungeon, France
March 1800

“Did you tell him?” Douglas insisted, his fingers digging into Dand’s shoulder, the blood flowing anew from the deep brand on his chest. The exposed and raw nerve endings screamed in protest and Dand’s thoughts swam on a river of pain. “What did you tell him?” Douglas demanded, shaking him.

“Leave off!” Dand gasped. He was shaking all over and his stomach lurched. He was going to vomit. Sweat poured from his forehead and trailed down his face and throat, the salty perspiration adding its own special hell to the pain.

“Leave him alone, Douglas,” Ram said, grabbing Douglas by the arm and hauling him away. “Can’t you see? He’s near done for.”

“I need to know if he said anything to Gardien,” Douglas said, his eyes filled with a blind sort of desperation. “If he told him who our contacts were. If he told him where we came from. If he told him anything about our plans.”

“Jesu, Doug. Would you hold it against him if he did?” Kit came over, shaking his head and gently pulling the blood-soaked shirt away from Dand’s chest. “The poor lad has been burned even deeper than me. There’s only so much you can ask of mortal flesh.”

“You’re right. Of course, you’re right,” Douglas said, releasing his hold on Dand and sinking back, squatting on his heels, his head bobbing up and down in manic agreement. “Of course. You can’t ask more of man than what he can stand, and Dand, he never thought all that much of our vows anyway. Did you, now?” He reached out and Dand was amazed to see a tear course down his dirty, thin face. “It’s all right, Dand. It’s all right.”

With choked laughter that sent the nerve endings in his chest shrieking in protest, Dand swatted Douglas’s hand away. “Oh, no, you great bloody saint,” he said. “You’ll not be besting me this day.”

“What do you mean?”

“I didn’t tell them a bloody thing.”