He set aside his glass and came off the bed.
She went on. “Yes, I wanted to have someone in my life who once loved me and thought I was special. You have legions. Is one person too many to ask for myself?”
When her voice cracked, he started toward her.
“Don’t think I’m wallowing in self-pity! It’s not me I’m thinking about but the child I used to be. I’ve cried often enough for our orphanage children, so why shouldn’t I cry for her?”
He had taken her in his arms, but she strained away from him. “What was wrong with me that no one could
love me, not even my own father? Was I too wicked? What?”
She was ashamed of the tears that were streaming down her face and when he drew her close, she tried to push him away, but he wouldn’t allow it. “Don’t pity me,” she cried out. “Don’t you dare pity me!”
He cradled her in his arms, ignoring her feeble resistance, pressing chaste kisses to whatever part of her face she turned away from him. “You foolish girl,” he murmured, “not to know what is staring you in the face. No, don’t fight me, listen to me. You were never alone. I thought you were special. You don’t know because you can’t remember. Why do you think I was so enraged when I heard that you would become mistress of a gaming house?”
“You loved Bella,” she cried. “It was always Bella with you.”
He gave her a gentle shake. “Was it? I wanted it to be Bella. But when I was soldiering in Spain, it was your image that haunted me. No other woman’s. I need hardly tell you that I was appalled. You were little more than a child, so I told myself. I had an understanding with Bella. I couldn’t get out of marrying her. That would have been dishonorable. And I thought that what I felt for you would pass.”
Startled, she stared up at him. “Dishonorable? That’s an odd word to use.”
“Not to me. It’s how my father raised me. The only way I could get out of marrying Bella was if she released me from my promise. If things hadn’t turned out the way they did, I would have asked her to break our engagement. Oh, I admit, I went a little crazy when you sent your father after me, but I would have come around to it soon enough. I needed time to come to terms with the fact that you were all grown-up, that it was no longer a sin to think of you the way I’d been thinking of you.”
He paused, searching her face. “If you wanted to punish
me, you succeeded. These last three years have been sheer hell without you. I’ve had bouts of despair, ‘black spells’ my friends call them, because I could not bear wondering what had become of you. I knew what would happen when I saw you again at Hawkshill. You’re special to me, Jess. I’ll never let you go. Don’t you know that yet?”
She shook her head. “You married me because you were forced to.”
“That merely hastened my plans. I would have asked you to marry me sooner or later. You’re mine, Jess. Mine.”
A lump formed in her throat and she swallowed.
He nodded. “And now that I’ve found you again, I’ll never let you go.” His voice turned husky. “You were never afraid to take chances, Jess. Take a chance now. Take a chance on me.”
His fingers fanned across her cheeks and he cupped her face. His mouth brushed hers lightly, then with more pressure, parting her lips. Her lids grew heavy. She closed her eyes and leaned into him.
CHAPTER
20
H
e’d made up his mind that when this was over, she was going to know just how special she was. He ached for her, but there was more to it than pity. He was beset by a confusion of emotions. She was right about him. His life had always been easy. Though he’d been a soldier and had had his share of hardship and sorrow, he’d never known real loneliness. He couldn’t begin to understand what Jess must have endured both then and now.
His lips grazed hers. When she opened her mouth to him, her taste and flavor spread over his tongue then raced like wildfire straight to his loins. Every muscle in his body contracted then expanded. He felt as though he were carved from iron. Breathing became difficult.
“Oh Jesus,” he groaned, breaking the kiss, “this isn’t what I want for you. I know, I know … I shouldn’t blaspheme,” and he took her lips again.
He didn’t know why she was smiling. He was shaking. This was important. He didn’t want to frighten her, or do
anything to spoil it for her. And he would spoil it if he didn’t get a hold of himself. He held on to that thought and gradually found his balance.
When she drew away, there was a question in her eyes. “You’re different,” she said.
His voice, though hoarse, held the hint of a smile. “Yes, I know.”
“Why?”
“Because this is different. You’re different.” He shrugged helplessly, groping for words. “I thought I knew everything there was to know about making love with a woman, but with you, I feel like an untried youth. You’re important to me, Jess, and I want this to be perfect for you. I’ve made mistakes with you, serious mistakes. I won’t make them again.”
When her brows lifted slowly, it occurred to him that he’d just made an unforgivable gaffe. A man didn’t go to bed with one woman and raise the shades of his past loves.
Her eyes dropped away and she fingered his shirt. “You didn’t act like an untried youth at Hawkshill when you practically took me on the kitchen table,” she said.
He shifted uneasily. “I wish you would forget about that. As I told you, I’ve made mistakes with you, but I won’t repeat them.”
“Or when you flattened me against my kitchen wall, yes, with the sisters and children upstairs, and gave me a lesson in masculine anatomy. Lucas, that was very wicked.”
Color crept into his cheeks. “I wish you would forget about that, too.”
“Or,” she went on persistently, “on our wedding night, when I was saved from a fate worse than death only because Ellie came to my door and interrupted you.”
“Jess,” he protested, then stopped. Her eyes were sparkling with mischief and her lips were twitching. It was a
look that reminded him of the old Jess. “What?” he demanded.
“Lucas,” she said, “you can’t know how many times I have cursed Ellie for coming to my door precisely at that moment, or how often I’ve thought about that kitchen table and the anatomy lesson, and burned to know your touch again.”
She was so much like the Jess he remembered—saucy, teasing him—that he did no more than stand there and stare.
She looped her arms around his neck and smiled into his eyes. “Lucas Wilde,” she said, “don’t be different or I won’t know you. Just be yourself.”
“Jess,” he said softly. She was coming back to him. The old Jess was still there, just below the surface, and she was coming back to him. With a great whoop of laughter, he swung her into his arms and carried her to the bed. When he sprawled beside her with a foolish grin on his face, just drinking in the sight of her, he thought she might turn shy on him, but she didn’t. Eyes locked on his, she began to undo the tiny buttons on her bodice.
“This seems familiar to me,” she said. “I can’t believe that this is my first time. I—” Her eyes dropped to the buttons she was undoing and her fingers stilled.
“What is it, Jess?”
She looked up at him with a frown in her eyes. “Lucas, tell me the truth. Were you and I ever lovers?”
“Not guilty! No, I swear it, Jess.”
She looked down at her buttons and undid one, then another. When she stopped, her fingers were trembling. He saw the quick rise and fall of her breasts.
“Now what have I said?”
Her hand fluttered to her throat and she said in a shaken whisper, “I’ve done this before. I know I have.”
He frowned. “Done what?”
She gulped. “I’ve been with a man.”
“How could you have been with a man? It’s impossible.”
“You thought so once, didn’t you? You came to Hawkshill and thought me no better than the maids at the Black Swan. That’s what you told me.”
“That’s not what I said! I said that you would
become
no better than the barmaids at the Black Swan. In the future!”
“That doesn’t prove anything!”
He threw up a hand in sheer frustration. “I can’t believe the change in you. A minute ago, you were ready to fall into my arms. Now you’re as cold as ice.”
“A minute ago, I didn’t have this horrid suspicion that I’d done this before.”
He shook his head. “If that were the case, your father wouldn’t have been so angry the night we quarreled.”
“You mean the night you refused to marry me.”
“He said I’d ruined you for other men. That’s why he was so angry. If I’d already had you, you’d lost your value.”
When she winced, he reached for her, but she twisted away from him and came off the bed. He went after her. He put a hand on her shoulder but she shook it off.
“What if,” she said, turning to face him, “my father knew I wasn’t a virgin and tried to palm me off on you? That’s the kind of man he was, wasn’t he?”
“Jess, don’t torture yourself like this.”
She said in an anguished whisper, “Where was I, Lucas, the night I ran away? Who was I with? How did I get to London?”
“I don’t know, Jess. And I don’t care.”
“What if I was with some man? What if I couldn’t help it?”
He writhed inside to even contemplate such a thing. In as calm a tone as he could manage, he said, “I’d kill any man who hurt you. But it wouldn’t change anything. It would only matter to me if it mattered to you.”
“What if I’d been willing? Would you mind then?” “Jess,” he said, “I’m not exactly without experience myself. Do you mind?”
“Yes,” she said vehemently.
He smiled at this, a genuine smile. “Look,” he said, “this is a new beginning for both of us. Whatever was in the past is over and done with. Let it go, Jess. Don’t let it hurt you.” He held out his arms. “Now, come here and let me love my wife.”
Her eyes went wide. “Of course,” she said. “You’ll know whether I’m a virgin, won’t you, Lucas? And I’ll know, too.”
“So?”
She said quickly, “I don’t want to know.”
“What!”
“I don’t want to know.”
“Jess, this is ridiculous. I’ve told you, I don’t care one way or another, and neither should you.”
She stared at him blindly for a long interval, then turned away with a little shake of her head. A terrible dread gripped her. Maybe there was more to her lurid past than Lucas guessed. Now that her illusions about her father had been shattered, anything seemed possible. She’d had a few illusions about herself, too. She didn’t know if she was ready to face the truth about herself, not yet.
He could tell that she was hardly aware of his presence. She was sitting on the edge of the bed, lost in thought, and not happy thoughts either if her hands were anything to go by. She was wringing the bedspread as if she were a washerwoman.
He had to put a stop to this.
“You’ll never be at peace,” he said, “until you know the truth.”
Startled by the sound of his voice, she looked up. He was unbuttoning his shirt. “Lucas, no,” she said.
He ignored her interruption. “Or maybe it’s me. Maybe I’m not the man you want.”
Her lips flattened. “You know better than that. What are you doing?”
“I’m going to show you how foolish your fears are.”
She watched in a kind of awed alarm as he stripped off his shirt and tossed it on the floor. Muscles bunched in his powerful arms and chest; skintight black trousers were molded to his long, muscular legs. He didn’t look like the Lucas she knew. This man was too intimidating. She sucked in a breath when he came down on the bed beside her.
He exerted a slight pressure, bearing her backward. Her eyes jerked up to meet his. His look was searching, grave and, at the same time, reassuring. Her heart slowed a little as the tension seeped out of her. He was the same Lucas she knew after all.
“Don’t look so stricken, Jess.” He fingered her hair, pushing back stray tendrils from her face. “I’m your first and only lover, and I’m going to prove it to you.”
Anxiety began to beat in her. She wasn’t the girl he thought she was and soon he would know it. And in spite of what he said, she didn’t believe it wouldn’t matter to him. Look how it mattered to her.
While she lay there staring up at him, he began to undo the buttons on her bodice. When the backs of his fingers brushed against her breasts, he could feel her heart race in response, see the pulse that leapt in her throat. But panic moved in her eyes, the panic of a cornered wild thing, and he cupped her neck with one hand to prevent her from taking flight.
He smiled when she began to babble some nonsense about wanting to see a doctor to verify whether she’d ever been with a man. That they should delay this. That he hadn’t thought it through. That she wasn’t the girl he thought she was. That this was all wrong. That he would change toward her.
He stopped the rush of words by sealing her lips with a kiss. He held her still by pinning her with one leg thrown over hers. Ignoring her struggles, he began to court her with easy, casual touches, brushing his hand in slow, lingering caresses from breast to waist to thigh. He tasted desire on her lips, but he also tasted the underlying fear. Shifting slightly, he came down on top of her.
The heat of his body overwhelmed her, and still she felt numbingly cold. Pictures were forming in her mind. She wanted her hands on him. She wanted his hands on her. She wanted no clothes between them. She wanted him to pin her to the bed and take her. It was all so familiar, all so terribly, horribly familiar. And it was so wrong, it was so …
He knew the exact moment she lost control. She made a small whimpering sound at the back of her throat, then her breathing changed, became shallower, quicker, and the hands that were pushing him away suddenly clung to him, drawing him closer.
He kissed her eyes closed, he kissed her ears, the pulse at her throat, her lips. He was fascinated by her lips, how they trembled, softened, how sensitive they were, how responsive. Tears kept seeping from under her lashes, and he kissed these away, too. Nothing in his experience had prepared him for the sudden, fierce swell of possessiveness that surged through him or the bitter remorse that came in its wake. If he’d been a better man, more sensitive, if he’d followed his heart instead of his head, things would have turned out differently. She wouldn’t have been alone and unprotected all these years. She wouldn’t be plagued now with the specter of a past she couldn’t remember. He didn’t believe she had lost her innocence, but even if it were true, it didn’t matter to him. As God was his witness, he refused to let it matter to him. Whether she’d had one lover or a score of lovers, she was still the same Jess.