“Why?”
“I wish I knew.” She shook her head. “Perhaps because next to Beryl, you were the most important person in my life. Because I understood it was not your mistake alone. Because I realized I could have, should have, done something, gone after you perhaps. Instead, I did what I was expected to do. I was too weak or too young or too foolish to do otherwise.” She glared. “In that respect, I have changed a great deal.” She uttered a short laugh. “And you claim
I
broke
your
heart.”
He studied her for a long moment. “If you're quite done.”
“Quite.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “If you can now think of something to say, do go on.”
“I, too, have thought of what I would say when I saw you again.”
She snorted in disdain.
“But it seems I have changed my mind,” he said slowly. “None of the things I had planned on saying to you now seem right.”
“Oh?”
“I had planned to apologize, of course, as I attempted to do when I first saw you.” He shook his head. “It was unfair of me to shock you the way I did or when I did. You had no warning, and God knows, I had done nothing to show my feelings before then.
“Next to Win, you had always been my closest friend, and I thought you always would be. It wasn't until you were betrothed to Harold that I realized I couldâno, I would lose you. I realized as well that I loved you.”
“I was engaged for several months before the wedding, Grayson. You could have said something, done something, at any time.”
“I didn't know what to do.” He shrugged. “So I did nothing.”
“How very clever of you.”
“It wasn't clever,” he snapped. “I know that. I knew that then. It was stupid of me not to act. I was an idiot.”
“Then we are agreed.”
“And I was afraid, I suspect.”
“Come now, Grayson. What on earth did you have to be afraid of?”
“I was afraid that you didn't feel the same, and if I declared myself, I would lose you as surely as if you married someone else. At least, if I kept my feelings to myself, it wouldn't destroy what we had.” He drew a deep breath. “So I did nothing.”
“We have established that.”
“I felt helpless, Camille. I felt lost. I was about to lose the woman I knew in my soul was the only woman for me. And finally I decided I had to do something, or I would regret it for the rest of my life.”
“So you did so on the day before my wedding.”
He nodded. “I told you that I loved you, and you said I was being silly, but you did appreciate my attempt to save you from a marriage without the true love you had always wanted.”
Her breath caught. “I remember.”
“And then I kissed you.”
“And then you kissed me.” She could barely say the words over the ache in her throat.
“And that's when I knew you shared my feelings.” He swirled the brandy in his glass and watched her. “I have never forgotten that kiss, nor will I ever, although you claim you have.”
She shrugged. “It was just a kiss.”
“Not to me.” He studied her closely. “Then I made the asinine comment that you would marry me if I had money. It was unfair of me and not very nice.”
“No, it wasn't.” She swallowed hard. “And I said the first thing that came into my head. Which, admittedly, wasn't very nice either.”
“I knew you too well not to have realized they were just words. I should have ignored them, but I didn't. And that was when my heart was broken.”
She stared at him. “Your heart or your pride?”
“I don't know,” he said sharply. “So I left.”
She met his gaze and tried not to let all she was feeling show on her face. “And never came back.”
He chuckled in a mirthless manner. “It seemed pointless. It seemed, as well, that you had made your choice. I couldn't bear the thought of watching you marry another man, of seeing you as someone else's wife. So I left England altogether and had no intention of returning.” He blew a long breath. “It didn't take me long to understand what a fool I'd been. I should have seen how shocked you were and I should have ignored what you said. I knew you better than to accept your words, or at least I should have. I should have done everything you said you were hoping I'd do. I should have fought for you. For us.”
“But you didn't.”
“No, I didn't.”
She chose her words with care. “If you'd had all these revelations, why didn't you come back after Harold died?”
“Come running back to the woman who didn't want me?” Disbelief rang in his voice. “I had had my heart broken once before. I was not about to allow the same woman to break it for a second time. Although, admittedly, it might well have been pride.”
“I never thought you to be a coward, Grayson Elliott.”
“Love makes fools of us all.” He took a sip of his brandy. “As we are confessing, there is something else you should know.”
“Go on.”
“I tried to put you out of my thoughts, just as you put me out of yours. In that, I suspect you were more successful than I was. Oh, but I did try.” He smiled wryly. “I could go for days, weeks, months, without thinking of you. And yet, somehow, when I least expected it, when I wasn't at all prepared, there you were. In a laugh heard across a theater. Or the first fresh breeze of spring. Or another woman's kiss. Or my dreams.” His gaze met hers. “No matter how far I ran, you were always there.”
“No, Grayson.” Her heart twisted. She ignored it. “I was here. Where you left me.”
“I know.” He drew a deep breath. “I know it may well be impossible, but can you forgive me?”
“Oddly enough, I thought I had,” she said quietly, then straightened her shoulders. “That's it, then?”
“Yes.”
“You have nothing more to say?”
Nothing about the wealth you've acquired? The fortune you've built?
“No.” He shook his head. “I have explained my actions, or lack thereof.”
“You have no additional confession, no revelations, nothing of that nature?” She studied him intently.
“No, nothing.”
“I see.” She picked up her glass, drained the rest of her brandy and hoped he would attribute the slight tremble in her hand to the liquor, and not to her heart. “We always did have honesty between us, didn't we?”
He nodded.
“Then, in all honesty, it might be best if you were not to stay for Christmas. I shall think of something to explain why my cousin has departed, leaving the rest of his family behind.”
He stared at her for a moment. “Absolutely not.” He shook his head. “I left you once before, when I shouldn't have. I'll not make the same mistake again.”
She sighed, abruptly weary of the conversation and the turmoil she fought to keep at bay. “This is entirely different.”
“Is it?” His brow rose. “It strikes me as being remarkably similar. Once again, you are to marry a man you do not loveâthis time for his position, if not his fortune.”
“Come now, Grayson, you know full well marriage is the only way a woman in this world betters herself.” She narrowed her gaze. “But then, that's what we do in my family, isn't it?”
“Apparently.”
“Little better than fortune hunters, wouldn't you say?”
“I know you better than to think that,” he said sharply. “Regardless, Pruzinsky is not the man for you.”
“Why not?”
He hesitated, then shook his head. “He just isn't, that's all.”
“Excellent answer, Grayson.” She rubbed her forehead. “Very well, stay on for the final curtain of this debacle. It will no doubt be worth the price of admission.” She'd had enough of this. Enough of doing battle with her family, enough of Nikolai and more than enough of Grayson. She wanted nothing more than to throw herself on her bed and weep. For what might have been. And for the glimpse of what, if only for a moment, might still be. “You can't make amends for eleven years ago. The past cannot be undone.”
“And no one knows that better than I,” he said sharply. “I would turn back the clock, if I could. If I had that one day to live over again, I would do it regardless of the cost. But I can't. I can only go forward from here.” He stepped toward her. “And I want to go forward with you.”
She stepped back. “It's been eleven years.”
“Eleven years wasted because I was a fool. I have no desire to waste any more.” He took another step toward her. “Nothing has changed for me, Camille.”
“Do you know the biggest difference between the girl I was then and the woman I am now?”
“I can see all sorts of differences.”
“The girl I was then trusted you without hesitation, without question. She never dreamed you might hurt her. And she believed you.” She shook her head. “The woman I am now knows better.”
He stared at her; and for a moment, the years fell away and it was the day before her wedding. The stricken look on his face was the same as it had been when she'd responded to his charge that she would marry him if he had money. And her heart cracked.
“Good evening, Grayson.” She turned to the door and pulled it open.
“Camille.”
She paused but didn't turn around. “Yes?”
“The boy I was then was a fool to let what he wanted most slip away.” Determination sounded in his voice. “The man I am now will not make the same mistake. This is not over, Camille.”
“I suppose that remains to be seen,” she said, and took her leave.
Â
It wasn't until Camille had reached her room, changed into her nightclothes and collapsed onto her bed that she allowed herself to wonder exactly what he had meant. Certainly, he had said all sorts of things since his return that had been, well, romantic and perhaps indications of feelings that were far more than friendship. But he hadn't told her everything; he hadn't been completely honest; he hadn't mentioned his money. And the question she couldn't get past was why.
Surely, he didn't think that made a difference to her. It hadn't eleven years agoâalthough, admittedly, given what they had said to one another, she could understand why he thought it would. But now she was financially independent. She could marry whomever she wished, without regard to the practicalities of finance. Still, he thought she wanted to marry a prince for very nearly the same reasons she had married Harold. Well, if he was so foolish as to believe that . . .
She heaved a heartfelt sigh. She'd never known such confusion. All the anger, all the pain, she'd thought was far behind her now threatened to overwhelm her, as fresh as if it had happened yesterday. And yet it was somehow freeing to at long last tell him exactly what he had done. And how he had broken her heart.
Her mother was right. The past is never over and done with. It would be with her, with them, always. And hadn't she admitted the truth to her family, even if she hadn't quite accepted it yet herself?
She had always loved him, and she still did.
Twenty-one
I
t could have been worseâalthough, at the moment, Gray couldn't imagine how. At the very least, they now understood all the other had gone through.
He exhaled a long breath. It was best he and Camille had not had this talk about the past when he had first arrived. These last days together had given him the chance to work his way back into her good graces and even possibly her heart. If they had rehashed all these feelings in the beginning, they might not be able to get past them. Even if now it seemed they had not cleared the air as much as muddied the waters. Still, it was a beginning.
God, he had been such a fool. Not merely eleven years ago, but every day since then. Even tonight, there were things he should have said. Oh, he certainly had said his feelings were unchanged and that he wanted to go forward with her. But he should have been clearer. He should have said he wanted to spend the rest of his days with her. He should have said he would spend each and every one of those days making amends for his mistakes. And he should have told her he loved her.
Then why hadn't he?
He tossed back the rest of his brandy and started after her. Be the man he had become, she'd said. Tell her why you're really here and what you really want, Beryl had told him. Stop being so nice. He had tread cautiously up to now, but Beryl was right. It was time to stop being Camille's friend. He had said he wasn't the same boy he was eleven years ago. Past time to prove it.
He reached her door and resisted the urge to slam his fist against it. It would be wise not to have everyone in the house know their businessâalthough, with the exception of the actors and Pruzinsky, everyone, no doubt, did. Nor, at the moment, did he care. He pounded on the door.
“Go away!” Camille said from the other side of the door.
“No! Never again. I have no intention of going away. Nor do I have any intention of walking off in a huff.”
She paused. “I did not walk off in a huff.”
“It certainly seemed like a huff. It seemed, as well, like something a nineteen-year-old girl would do. Not a woman who claims to knowâ”
The door jerked open. “Come in, then, before you awaken everyone in the house.”
He stepped inside and she closed the door behind him; then rested her back against it. Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “What do you want?”
She had changed into that dreadfully practical nightgown, a high-necked garment with endless buttons running up the front. Buttons she had failed to close completely, revealing her neck and the shadow between her breasts.
“I said this was not over.”
“I was finished!”
“And I was just beginning.”
“I thought you had said quite enough!” Her breath quickened and her breasts rose and fell beneath the thin fabric with every breath she took.
He shook his head. “I didn't say anywhere near enough.”
His stomach clenched and desire rose within him. There was indeed something to be said for the passion of argument, as well as the lure of sensible nightwear.
“Oh? Then do tell, Grayson.”
His gaze dropped to her breastsâher nipples had hardened beneath her gownâthen back to her eyes. She noted his gaze but made no effort to close the neck of her gown. A flush washed up her face, and he knew she wanted him as much as he wanted her. As much as he had always wanted her.
“What was left to say?”
“For one thing.” He braced his hand on the door beside her head and leaned close to brush his lips across hers. “You lied to me.”
“Nonsense.” She pushed him aside and stepped away. “What on earth are you talking about?” The lamp by the side of her bed illuminated the shape of her body through the gauzy fabric and left little to the imagination.
“You remember the first time I kissed you.”
“Vaguely, perhaps.” She shrugged.
“And you remember the second time I kissed you.”
“Of course I remember. It was the night before last. I could scarcely forget it. Not that it was a particularly memorable kiss,” she added quickly.
“Oh, but it was.” He grabbed her arm and pulled her into his embrace. She stared up at him. “And you will remember this one as well.” He crushed his lips to hers. For no more than an instant, she hesitated; then her mouth opened to his and her arms slipped around his neck. And passion denied for eleven years erupted between them.
He slanted his mouth over hers; his tongue dueled with hers, demanding and insistent. She clung to him and tasted him and explored him in a clash of tongue and teeth and lips. Her breath mingled with his. Her body molded against his, and all he'd ever wanted was his for the taking and hers for the giving.
He wrenched his lips from hers and ran his mouth along the line of her jaw and down the side of her neck. Her flesh beneath his lips was warm and inviting. Her head fell back and she moaned, and desire flared within him. Her hands fisted in his coat and he tightened his arms around her.
She gasped. “You lied to me as well.”
“Never,” he murmured against her neck.
“You led me to believe you had no money.” She could barely get out the words.
“Ah yes, well, about that.” He flicked his tongue over the hollow at the base of her throat and he felt her shiver beneath his mouth. “I have indeed made a substantial fortune in railroads and shipping.”
“Why didn't you tell me?” She pushed at his coat and he shrugged it off and let it fall to the floor. She yanked his cravat free, tugged open his shirt and let her hands roam over his chest. And he fairly lost his senses at the feel of her hands on his bare skin.
“You didn't ask.” He grabbed the edges of her gown and ripped it open, buttons flying, exposing her breasts to his view. He cupped one breast and bent his head to take her nipple into his mouth.
“Oh, God, Gray!” Her nails dug into his skin and her back arched. “I . . . I . . . I assumed . . .”
He sucked and teased until her nipple was a hard knot beneath his onslaught. He shifted his attention to her other breast and continued until she was limp in his arms and his trousers tightened.
“Gray . . .” She drew a steadying breath and pushed weakly against him. “This isn't . . .”
“What?” He held his breath.
She shook her head and took a step away. She struggled to catch her breath. “This isn't fair.”
He stared at her. With her gown ripped open and her breathing labored, he'd never seen a more erotic sight. “If I recall correctly, you said you weren't especially concerned with fair.”
“I'm not usually.” She glanced down at her ruined gown. “These are not usual circumstances.” She moved close, grabbed his shirt in both hands and ripped it open; then she smiled up at him. “There. That's much better.”
He gasped in feigned horror. “You ruined my shirt.”
She shrugged. “You ruined my gown.”
“But this is a very nice shirt.”
“You can afford it. Beryl says you're obscenely wealthy.”
He grinned. “Indeed, I am.”
“Did you think it would matter to me?”
“Ah, we are back to that fortune hunter nonsense.” He pulled away and stared into her eyes. Marriage for position and wealth was what was expected of Camille and her sisters or, indeed, any young woman in their position. Now that he knew her father was still alive, it made even more sense. The precarious nature of Lady Briston's finances through the years was obviously why she had been determined to see her daughters marry well. And who could blame her? “No, but it did matter to me.”
“You are still a foolish man then.” She hooked her fingers in the waist of his trousers and tugged. “I would suggest, if you don't want these to meet the same fate as your shirt, you discard them.” She reached up and tugged at his lower lip with her teeth; his breath caught.
She smiled in a most inviting and completely wicked manner and sauntered toward the bed, allowing her ripped gown to slide off her shoulders and onto the floor behind her. Good Lord. He swallowed hard.
Gray had his clothes off before she reached the bed. He caught her in his arms and they tumbled onto the bed in a tangle of naked limbs and heated desire.
He had dreamed of this, of her. She was all he had known she would be, and he worshiped her with his mouth and hands, with touch and taste. He ran his hands down the length of her, along her sides, over the curve of her hip and along the long length of her leg. Her skin was warm silk beneath his hand.
Her hands explored him as eagerly as his explored her. Her fingers skimmed over his chest and drifted lower over his stomach. His muscles tensed beneath her touch and her hand moved lower, until her fingers wrapped around his cock, and she squeezed. He sucked in a sharp breath and moaned with the sheer pleasure of her touch. She stroked him, and he thought he would surely die with the joy of the feel of her hand. He buried his face in her neck and pushed her hand away. He would never last at this rate. And he wanted to take her to the edge of sanity. He wanted her moaning his name and writhing beneath him.
He grabbed her hands and pinned them over her head; then rained kisses on her neck and trailed his lips lower, between her breasts and over the flat plane of her stomach and lower still. He released her hands and she clutched at the bedclothes. He slipped his hand between her legs and caressed her. She moaned and arched upward, pressing against his hand. She was slick and hot and quivered against his touch. He stroked her again and again; she thrashed on the bed and gripped his shoulders and dug her fingers into him.
“Grayson.” The word was breathless with passion and need. She pushed his hand away, then hooked her leg over his and pulled him onto her. “Grayson . . .”
Slowly he pushed into her. She was tight around him and he pushed deeper. She moaned, angled her hips toward him and wrapped her legs around his waist, pulling him in. She surrounded him, engulfed him, welcomed him. For a moment, he could do nothing more than savor the feeling of being inside her, one with her. She throbbed around him, and it was more than his wildest dreams.
“Camille,” he murmured; then started to stroke, forcing himself to a slow, steady pace. She rocked her hips against him, urging him on, faster, harder. He groaned and responded, losing himself in the feel of her. He thrust into her with a frenzied need and she responded in kind. The bed rocked beneath them, and she whimpered or moaned erotic murmurs, which only heightened his need. She met his thrusts with hers until, at last, she screamed softly and arched upward. Her body shuddered against him. Her release swept from her body into his. He groaned and thrust once more and exploded into her, shaking hard in an endless moment of pure sensation and joy. In his body and in his soul.
At long last, he was home.
Â
For a moment, or an hour, or eternity, they lay together, hearts beating in rhythm, breath coming in tandem. As if they were still one. At last being with Grayson was so much more than she had imagined, so much more than she had thought possible.
“Good God.” Camille buried her head in his shoulder. “What have we done?”
He chuckled. “I think you know exactly what we've done.”
“Grayson, I am not my sister.”
“Thank God.”
She sat up, plumped the pillow behind her and pulled the covers up around her. She hadn't felt the least bit embarrassed earlier when she was completely naked in front of him, but that was during the throes of passion. And dear Lord, she had never known such throes before. Harold had been a gentle and considerate lover, and making love with him had been most pleasant. But tonight with Grayson, well, she had never dreamed of the intensity and the sheer pleasure and the joy.
“Beryl has never had any difficulty bounding from one bed to another. At least, until recently. This is one area in which I have never given into impulse, never found anyone I wanted to . . . I have notâwell, I have not, that's all.”
“I'm glad.” He rolled onto his side and propped himself up on his elbow.
“I've only ever been with one other man.”
“Good,” he said firmly. “I would hate to think you were a tart as well as a fortune hunter.”
“Grayson!”
“And you're not bounding from one bed to another now.” He grinned. “Although I would rather like to see you bound.”
She shivered at his words. “You are a wicked, wicked man, aren't you?”
He grinned.
She narrowed her eyes. “I daresay, you have not been celibate these past eleven years.”
“Should I lie to you and tell you I have thought only of you?”
“I suppose not.”
“And yet it's true.” He smiled into her eyes. “Of course I have been with other women, but no one has touched my heart the way you have.”