Never Judge a Lady By Her Cover: Number 4 in series (The Rules of Scoundrels series) (26 page)

He warmed at the words. At the battle in them. He had expected her to be late. He’d prepared for it, having received the contrary note earlier in the day. She’d made it clear by the missive that she was not interested in being controlled. That their time together would be equal, or nothing.

He’d read the damn thing a half dozen times, feeling as though he hadn’t been so well matched in years. Possibly ever. He was reminded of it again now, as he stared into the darkness, the easy sway of the carriage beneath them.

He’d replied, wanting to win, and somehow not wanting that at all.

He’d expected her to be late, nonetheless.

She was not late, but he still had not won.

Indeed, she was early. So early that she’d come to his office to collect him. Yes, he could grow used to the way they matched. “You are ever a challenge, my lady.”

A moment passed, and she shifted, the sound of silk against silk like cannon fire in the dark carriage. The fall of her skirts brushed against his leg, and he remembered watching the way they clung to Langley on the ballroom floor.

Wondered at the ways they might cling to him.

Tonight.

Forever.
 

The word slid through him like opium smoke, curling and insidious. And unwanted. He pushed it aside as she replied, “I should not like to bore you, Mr. West.”

There was absolutely nothing about this woman that could bore him. Indeed, he could spend a lifetime in this carriage, without the benefit of sight, and he would still find her fascinating.

He ached to touch her, and it occurred to him that he could do that. That she’d designed a scenario that would allow touching and more. Indeed, there was nothing stopping him. Not even her, if he had to wager.

But touching her would end the game they played, and he was not ready for that. He pressed himself back against the lush velour seat, resisting his baser urges. “Tell me,” he said. “Now that you have me, what do you intend to do with me?”

She lifted a flat, wrapped package from the seat next to her. “I have a delivery for you.”

He froze, suddenly irritated that Chase had infiltrated this quiet place, this evening, that promised so much. “I told you I did not want you involved in deliveries from Chase.”

She set the package on her lap. “Are you saying you do not wish to receive it?”

“Of course I want it. I simply don’t want it from you.”

She fingered the strings of the parcel. “You don’t have a choice.”

“No, but you do.” He heard the accusation in his voice. Disliked it.

She lifted Tremley’s file and extended it toward him. “Take it,” she said, the words firm and something more. Something sadder.

He narrowed his gaze. “Come into the light.”

She took a deep breath, and for a moment, he thought she might not. For a moment, he thought that this whole night might end here, now. That she might stop the carriage and toss him out. That she might rescind her offer for a harmless affair.

Because suddenly, it did not seem very harmless at all.

She leaned forward, her beautiful face coming into view.

She wasn’t wearing paint.

She might be dressed in Anna’s frock and wearing Anna’s wig, but she was Georgiana tonight. Come to him freely. For an evening of pleasure. A week of it. Two weeks. However long it took for her to secure her husband and her future.

A life away from this one, where she played messenger between London’s two most powerful men.

She extended the file. “Take it, and return the evening to something more than business.”

He looked at the parcel. Tremley’s secrets, which he needed to protect his sister. To protect his life. Tremley’s secrets, more valuable than anything else he owned, because they were the key to his future.

And yet a part of him wanted to toss the damn file out the window and tell the carriage to keep driving. To get her far from Chase. To get himself far from his truths, truths that seemed to haunt him more and more each day.

If not for his sister, would he do it?

He took the package. Placed it on his lap as she leaned back, returning to her shadows. “Something about it – about you being a part of it – makes the evening business whether we intend it or not.”

And he hated that, even as he opened the parcel, eager to see what was inside. He extracted a pile of paper, written in Chase’s familiar hand. Held the top sheet up to the small candle in its steel and glass compartment in the wall of the carriage.

Funds removed from the exchequer.

He turned a page.

Missives from a half-dozen high-ranking members of the Ottoman Empire.

Secret meetings.

Treason.
 

He closed the file, his heart pounding. It was proof. Undeniable, perfect proof. He returned the pages to the envelope in which they had come, considering the implications of their contents. The sheer value of this information was nearly incalculable. It would destroy Tremley. Wipe him from the earth.

And it would protect West without doubt.

He lifted the small scrap of paper that accompanied the package. Read the words there, in that bold, familiar scrawl.

I do not for a moment believe that your request was the result of a reporter’s skill; you know something that you are not sharing.

I do not like it when you do not share.

Too goddamn bad.

West had no intention of sharing with Chase – either his connection with Tremley or his connection with Georgiana.

His gaze flickered to her. No. He would not share her. “You’ve done your job.”

“Well, I hope,” she said.

“Very well,” he acknowledged. “This is more than what I imagined.”

She smiled. “I am happy to hear it is worth your trouble.”

There it was again, the implication that his assistance was purchased. And so it was. Even as he resisted the truth of it. He pushed the thought away. “And now we are here. Alone.”

There was a smile in her voice when she said, “Are you suggesting that I’ve paid you for companionship?”

It sounded ridiculous. And yet, somehow, it didn’t. Somehow, he felt manipulated, as though it had all been carefully planned.

“Tit for tat,” he said, echoing so many of their conversations. Her words. His.

He could not see her face, but was keenly aware of the fact that she could see him. The light in the carriage was designed to unbalance. To empower only one side – the side in the darkness. But he heard the emotion when she finally spoke. “It is not like that tonight.”

“But other nights?” He hated the idea that this moment was a repeat of another. A dozen. A hundred.

Her hands spread wide across her skirts, silk rustling like nerves. “There are nights when the information is payment. And others when it is given freely.”

“It is payment, though,” he said. “It is payment for the articles in my papers. For every dance you’ve had with Langley. With others.”

“Fortune hunters,” she said.

“Every one,” he agreed. “I never promised otherwise.”

“You promised acceptance.”

“And social acceptance you shall have. But a husband who is not a fortune hunter? You’re not likely to find that. Not unless —” He stopped.

“Unless?”

He sighed, hating the deal they had. Hating the way it tempted him. Hating the way it whispered pretty possibilities in the darkness. “Not unless you are willing to show them the truth.”

“What truth?” she said. “I’m an unwed mother. Daughter to a duke. Sister to one. Trained as an aristocrat. Bred for their world like a champion racehorse. My truth is public.”

“No,” he said. “It isn’t near public.”

She gave a little huff of humorless laughter. “You mean Anna? You think they would be more likely to have me if they knew that I spent my nights on the floor of a casino?”

“You are more than all that. More complicated.”

He didn’t know how or why, only that it was true.

He made her angry. He could hear it. “You don’t know anything about me.”

He wanted to reach for her. To pull her into the light. But he kept himself at a distance. “I know why you say you like the darkness.”

“Why?” she asked, and the words sounded like she was no longer certain herself.

“It’s easier to hide there,” he replied.

“I don’t hide,” she insisted, and he wondered if she knew it was a lie.

“You hide as well as any of us.”

“And what do you hide from? What are your truths?” It was a taunt as much as it was an admission. He wished he could see her eyes, which never seemed to hide as much as the rest of her.

Because she was not entirely this woman, queen of sin and night. She was not all the confidence she played at. She was not all the power in her poise. There was something else that made her human. That made her real.

That made her.

But they played this game nonetheless, and he did not dislike it.

He simply liked the glimpses of her truth more.

He set the parcel aside. Leaned forward. Down. Lifted one of her slippered feet from the floor of the carriage, up into his lap. He ran his fingers up over her ankle, enjoying the way the muscles tightened beneath his touch. He smiled. As still and calm as she pretended to be, her body did not lie to him.

He wrapped his hand around her ankle, slid the black slipper from her foot, revealing pretty black stockings. He traced his fingers along the bottom of her foot, loving the way she flexed against the touch. “Does that tickle?”

“Yes,” she said, on a breath that tempted more than it should.

He continued his exploration, letting sliding fingertips along silk, over the top of her foot and along the ankle. Hinting at her calf before retracing his path. “Here is a truth; the first time I saw your slippers – outside the Worthington Ball – I wanted to do this.”

“You did?”

There was surprise in her words. And desire.

“I did,” he confessed. “I was drawn to your pretty silver slippers, all innocence and beauty.” He played at the ball of her foot with his thumbs, and she sighed at the sensation. “And then I was drawn to something entirely different – those stunning heeled slippers, all sin and sex.”

“You followed me?”

“I did.”

“I should be angry.”

“But you aren’t.”

He slid his hand to her ankle again, and up her calf, loving the soft silk there, fingering the pretty white stitching on the stockings, wanting to lift her skirts and see her legs, long and clad in black. Wanting them open. Around his hips, his waist.

Wanting her.

“Are you?” he prompted.

She sighed. “No. I am not angry.”

“You like that I know you. All of you. The two halves.” His touch reached the back of her knee and the caress there seemed to unstick her.

She shifted, lifting the other leg, pressing her other foot against his chest, pushing him back. Staying his touch. “Tell me another.”

“Another?” he asked.

“Another truth,” she said.

He captured the foot at his chest, lifted it, pressed a hot kiss to the inside of her ankle, letting his tongue lave the soft fabric there until she sighed. “I want to take these stockings off you. I want your skin, softer than silk.”

He nipped at her ankle, loving the gasp she let loose in the carriage, suddenly hot as the sun. “It is your turn.”

She stilled. “For what?”

“Tell me your secrets.”

She hesitated. “I don’t know where to begin.”

He knew that. She was filled with shadows, each one protecting some piece of her. Each one in need of light. “Begin with this,” he said, sliding his hand up her calf to her knee, following it with a swirl of his fingertips. “Tell me how it makes you feel. Without artifice.”

She laughed as the he tickled her. “It makes me feel —” When she stopped, he did, too, pulling his hand away from her. She stretched her leg after him, as though she could catch him. Return him. “It makes me feel young.”

He did return to her then, surprised by the word. “What does that mean?”

She sighed in the darkness. “Don’t stop.”

He didn’t, stroking again. And again. “What does it mean, Georgiana?”

“Just that —” She stopped. Her foot flexed against his chest, and he wished they were at his home. He needed more space. He needed to see her – touch her – at will. She took a breath. “It’s been a long time… since…”

He knew the way the sentence ended. Since she’d been with another man. Since she’d been with anyone but Chase. He didn’t want her to finish the thought. Didn’t want the man’s name here, in the darkness, with them.

But she finished it anyway. “… since I’ve felt this way.”

And, like that, he was unlocked. There was something about this woman, about the way she spoke, the promises she made with simple, ordinary words, that made him thoroughly desperate for her. But when she confessed her feelings, with utter honesty, surprise and a touch of wonder in her beautiful voice, how was he to resist her?

How was he to ever give her back once he had a taste of her?

How was he to walk away, eventually?

Christ.
 

What kind of mess was he getting himself into?

He released her, setting her feet to the floor, and she resisted the loss of him just as his body resisted the loss of her.

“Wait,” she said, leaning forward, her beautiful face coming into the light. “Don’t stop.”

“I have no intention of stopping,” he promised her. Himself. “I just want to make a few things clear.”

Her brow furrowed, “How much more clear must I be? I propositioned you in Hyde Park. I met you outside your office dressed like a…” She hesitated. “Well, like the kind of woman who does those things.”

It occurred to him that she often dressed in such a manner. “I don’t care what you wear.”

When she spoke, the words were dry as sand. “You certainly seemed to like the stockings.”

The memory of black silk with silver piping took over, and what would have been a laugh became a growl. “I like the stockings very much.”

She blushed, and he marveled at it. He leaned forward until he was inches away from her face. Her lips. “I wonder,” he whispered, “Do other bits of you go red when you are embarrassed?”