The Music Box (32 page)

The refusal hovered on his lips—and died as he gazed into those bottomless blue eyes. “All right,” he heard himself say. “But only for a minute. Then you must promise to go to sleep. It’s already after one.”

“Very well. I promise.”

With a quick glance along the deserted hall, Bryce entered her chambers and shut the door.

He commanded himself to stare at the dressing table, but his gaze was immune to the order. Instead, it focused on Gaby, shifting from the anticipatory glow on her cheeks to the sparkle in her eyes to the delicate curves of her body, accentuated by the fine material of her nightgown and wrapper.

Every fiber of his being reacted—physically, emotionally. Warning bells pealed their censure, as the stern voice of propriety issued an alert.

Coming in here had been a flagrant mistake.

One he couldn’t seem to reverse.

“Gaby,” he began, unable to stop staring at her, drinking her in from head to toe. “Let’s wait until morning. I think—”

“When can I go?” Still engrossed in her thoughts, Gaby rushed forward, clutching the lapels of Bryce’s coat, a thousand questions in her eyes. “Soon? With whom?”

“With me,” he heard himself say.

“With you?” she repeated carefully. A pause. “What about Miss Talbot?”

Who?
Bryce almost found himself asking. “She’s not interested in returning to the symphony.” Bryce threaded his fingers through Gaby’s hair, knowing damn well he shouldn’t be touching her and finding he was unable to stop. “And I’m not interested in taking her.” He cupped Gaby’s face between his hands. “Will you accompany me?”

Awareness had begun to dawn in Gaby’s eyes, followed by a sparkle of exhilaration. “Alone?” she breathed without a shred of reticence.

God help him, he was drowning. “We’ll take Marion along. She’ll serve as your chaperon. She can keep Goodsmith company on the ride to London. If Hermione’s up to it, she can join us, too. If not, or if the staff becomes too unnerved by the thought of her absence, she can remain at home. Either way, you’ll have both an escort and a chaperon. How will that be?” He didn’t give a damn how it would be. In fact, he was having a hard time remembering what they were talking about.

Gaby’s cheeks were flushed with pleasure, and now she rose up on tiptoe and kissed Bryce’s jaw. “Thank you. Your solution is ideal. I can hardly wait.”

Bryce didn’t answer. He simply pulled her to him, tugged her head back, and covered her mouth with his. “Gaby,” he breathed against her soft, willing lips, “kiss me.”

She did, without pause or question, her arms gliding up to twine about his neck as if she understood his turmoil, sensed the rawness of his emotions.

The kiss began slowly and deliberately, their lips moving together in exquisite harmony, touching, tasting, then blending like two perfectly contoured pieces of a puzzle, only to break apart and begin anew. Again and again, they repeated the kiss, each time longer, hungrier, their mouths clinging more fully as they sought a deeper joining.

Bryce’s hands shook as they clenched in Gaby’s hair, his lips hardening, moving more insistently as they urged hers apart, issued a silent command—or perhaps it was a plea.

Gaby responded instantly, her lips parting in unwavering invitation. With a shivery sigh, she pressed closer, her fingers tightening about Bryce’s neck, sharing rather than yielding to the intensifying embrace, fusing their mouths more completely.

Their tongues touched, Bryce’s stealing inside to meld with hers, to claim the sweetness he’d sampled earlier that day. Gaby’s breath caught, her entire body trembling as she savored the new, heart-stopping sensations this deeper joining aroused. Bryce indulged her—and himself—his tongue stroking hers in slow, heated movements meant to awaken the budding sensuality hovering just inside her.

He awakened himself instead.

With erotic innocence, Gaby reciprocated his caress, her tongue gliding into his mouth, tentatively stroking his, her breasts flattening against the hard wall of his chest as she strained to get closer.

It was as if a dam inside Bryce had burst, releasing a torrent of need, revealing an empty, famished stranger whose entire soul craved fulfillment. His arms tightened around Gaby like steel bands, locking her against him, and his lips seized hers, possessing her in a series of endless drugging kisses. His tongue plundered her mouth, gliding over every tingling surface before withdrawing and plunging again, desire exploding within him like cannon fire. Again and again his tongue captured hers—melding, mating, parting, beginning anew—his urgency so fierce he could taste it.

Gaby shivered, and Bryce savored her whimper of pleasure, lifting her from the floor and molding her entire body to his.

For the barest of seconds, she tensed, their first explicit contact making her blatantly aware of Bryce’s hardening contours, despite the inhibiting confines of their clothes. A heartbeat later she relented, melting against him, her warm, soft body fitting his so perfectly that it was staggering.

This time Bryce couldn’t stifle his groan, and it rumbled from his chest into Gaby’s open mouth. His hands were shaking violently, one anchoring Gaby against him, the other caressing her as they kissed: her hair, her face, the silky column of her throat, the delicate curve of her shoulder. His lips followed suit, leaving hers to blaze a trail of hot, hungry kisses down to the neckline of her gown.

“Bryce.” She whispered his name, and the sound was an exquisite blend of profound emotion and newborn desire. She threaded her fingers through his hair, pressing his mouth against her skin, and Bryce responded to her need, branding her with his kisses, blazing a path along the hollow between her breasts. Her wrapper had fallen open, the thin muslin of her gown providing little barrier between Bryce and his goal. He could clearly make out the perfect swells of her breasts, flushed with need, their nipples tight with desire.

He lowered his head, surrounding one taut peak with his lips, tugging it into the warm cavern of his mouth.

Gaby cried out again, this time in wonder, and Bryce repeated the caress, drunk with longing, wild to taste more of her—all of her. He shifted to her other breast, frustrated by the interfering garment that hindered his quest. With that thin scrap of cloth between them, he was unable to savor her as he craved to do—deeply, totally—to fulfill the burgeoning need that surged through his veins, pounded through his loins. He needed her naked, clinging, reaching for him, and taking him inside her melting warmth. He needed her urgent, wild, as desperate for him as he was for her.

He needed her now.

Raising his head, he gauged the distance to the bed, then gazed into Gaby’s eyes, recognizing the wonder and longing that mirrored his own.

“Bryce,” she breathed, stretching up to kiss his throat, “make love to me.”

It was her words—the meaning they conveyed, the essence of which he was only now discovering—that stopped him, shattering the aura of unreality that had governed the past few sequestered minutes, leaving the truth staring him in the face: he was on the verge of taking Gaby to bed.

With a harsh groan, Bryce took hold of his senses—whatever fragments of them still existed—and set Gaby on her feet, shaking his head as he denied her, denied them both, the fulfillment they sought. “Ah, Gaby …” His voice was raw, hoarse, rough with unquenched desire and unimaginable feelings. “I can’t. Not now. Not here. Not like this.”

Not ever
, his conscience ordered reflexively.

His conscience was dead wrong.
That
Bryce knew—suddenly, unequivocally, and with every fiber of his being. This union was as inevitable as that of dawn melding with day, as natural and irrefutable as it was right. He’d just been too blind, too stubborn, too terrified, to see it.

Still, the timing, the location, the circumstances—
those
were all wrong. In fact, the very idea that he’d almost allowed this to happen—
caused
it to happen, here, now—was totally insane.

“What in God’s name am I doing?” he muttered, fighting desperately to regain rational thought and control. In one purposeful motion, he drew Gaby’s wrapper together, then tugged her into the circle of his arms, as if the very warmth of her could shed some light on this madness. “I’m seducing you,” he supplied. “In Hermione’s house, no less. Under her roof—the fine woman who kept me alive, made sure that I became all that I am. A woman who trusts me. Whose family trusts me. And Hermione notwithstanding, I have no right to be doing this. Not now. Not when you deserve so much more. Dammit. What in the name of heaven was I thinking? More apropos, why wasn’t I thinking at all? Gaby”—he framed her face between his palms—“I can’t begin to explain—”

“
Why
have you no right?” Gaby blurted out, confusion and uncertainty clouding her features. “And why did you stop? Was it because of me? Am
I
the one you’re protecting?” As always, her heart was in her eyes. “If so, don’t. I want to be with you, desperately. What’s happening is not an impulsive act, at least not on my part. I’ve dreamed about our making love since last week when you kissed me good-bye. I’ve prayed it would happen. Bryce, don’t you understand?” She laid her palm against his jaw. “I love you.”

Gaby’s pronouncement sank in, its impact heightened by the delicate strains of “Für Elise” playing softly in the background.

“My beautiful Wonderland,” Bryce murmured at last, his voice husky as he turned his lips into Gaby’s palm. “That’s the most magnificent declaration I’ve ever heard, much less been offered. Thank you.”

“I don’t want your thanks. I want your love. Or do you still not believe such love exists?” She stepped away, crossed over to shut the lid of her music box.

Stark silence prevailed.

Bryce sucked in his breath, grappling with feelings he couldn’t fathom, couldn’t assign words to, still reeling as reality crashed into place. “Gaby.” He came up behind her and gently turned her around to face him. “We have a lot to discuss. And, yes, our feelings—yours and mine—are among those things. But tonight is not the time. Your bedchamber is not the place.” He swallowed. “I’ve already betrayed Hermione’s trust as it is.”

“What about Miss Talbot?” Gaby asked softly, her eyes searching his. “Have you betrayed her trust as well?”

“Yes.” Bryce never averted his gaze. “I have. Far more extensively than you mean, more extensively than I could begin to fathom.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Nor did I. But now I do.” Bryce’s thumbs caressed Gaby’s cheeks. “The fact is, I started betraying Lucinda’s trust long before I took you in my arms tonight. I started doing so nearly a fortnight ago—the morning Crumpet brought you rushing up to my carriage. I’ve been dishonest with Lucinda since that moment. And I’ve been dishonest with myself as well.”

“I see.” Hope shimmered in Gaby’s eyes. “Does that mean—”

“Not tonight,” he interrupted, laying a forefinger across her lips. “There’s too much to say and not enough time in which to say it. Tomorrow. After I’ve had a chance to collect my thoughts, come to terms with the deluge of emotions that are churning inside me—emotions I never even knew I possessed.”

“All right,” Gaby whispered, her breath warm against his skin. “When tomorrow?”

Her impatience made him smile. “I’m meeting with Thane and Hermione right after breakfast. How about the instant we’re finished?”

“Can’t you delay the meeting?”

“I wish I could.” Staring into those magnificent blue eyes, inhaling the fragrance of her hair, Bryce was tempted to do more than postpone his meeting. He was tempted to carry Gaby to her bed and damn the consequences to hell. Determinedly, he subdued that impulse. “Gaby, I’ve got to walk out of here, take up my post outside your door. Now. While I still can.”

Reluctantly, Gaby nodded. “Bryce?” She caught his wrist, staying his departure. “I appreciate everything you just said about trust. But, with regard to Aunt Hermione, I hope you realize that, caring for us both as she does, she’d be delighted if we happened to begin caring for each other.”

“I don’t think she’d regard what just happened as caring for each other,” Bryce returned dryly. “She’d regard it as my taking advantage of you. And she would be right. In fact, this was the very type of behavior she begged me to protect you from should I be called upon to oversee your future. Little did she suspect that when the situation arose, I would be the offender rather than the protector.”

“Oversee my future?” Gaby frowned, her expression puzzled. “I don’t understand. Why would you be called upon to oversee my future?”

Bryce wanted to kick himself. Damn his muddled state of mind! Hadn’t it compelled him to do enough damage for one night? Now he’d made a stupid, irreversible slip—one that couldn’t have come at a more vulnerable time for Gaby.

“Bryce?” Gaby pressed. “Why would you have to oversee my future?”

The harm was done, Bryce realized, silently berating himself once again. Now he had to face the repercussions.

Catching Gaby’s shoulders in his hands, Bryce braced himself for her reaction. “Because Hermione asked me to. In the unlikely event that she isn’t … able to do so, she wants me to ensure that you are brought out next Season, shielded from the wrong men, introduced to the right ones. She wants to feel secure that you—Oh, Gaby, don’t.” Bryce caught her arms as she tried to twist away from him.

“Are you saying that Aunt Hermione asked you to act as my guardian in the event of her death?” Gaby’s voice trembled with emotion.

“Gaby …”

“Is that what you’re saying?”

“Yes.”

“I see.” Gaby’s whole body tensed, and she backed as far away as Bryce’s restraining hands would allow. “And you agreed. Is that why you’ve spent so much time with me? Why you were so worried about my questions with regard to intimacy and passion? Why you came here tonight to stand vigil? Has all this been about duty and principles, about your responsibility and commitment to Aunt Hermione? Is that why Miss Talbot has been so understanding about your comings and goings—because she knows I represent no threat to her? Did you tell her I was—”

“I told her nothing.” Bryce hauled Gaby back to him, refused to let her go. “You can’t possibly believe what you’re saying, nor can you possibly believe that what happened here tonight had anything to do with duty or responsibility. Gaby”—he tilted her face up to his—“don’t do this—especially after what just happened between us. Don’t doubt me. Not now.”