Chapter 9 #2
He made a soft sound of satisfaction and felt her shiver, the delicate nipple growing taut beneath his palm.
His mouth watered with the desire to taste it, to tease it and worry it with his teeth, but he knew this was hardly the time or place.
There was too much risk of his valet interrupting them, and of some very awkward questions if they were discovered.
Alfie’s identity needed protecting, keeping safe from discovery and he would not risk that.
Instead, he delighted in closing his fingers and thumb over the tiny peak and pinching gently.
She leapt beneath his touch, her breath catching on a laugh as she slid her hands under his shirt and returned the favour. A jolt of electric desire shot from the place where her fingers pinched him, directly to his groin. Aubrey groaned with frustration.
“I wish we were somewhere else, somewhere we did not have to worry about keeping quiet and being discovered.”
“You don’t find the circumstances invigorating?” she asked, a teasing lilt to the question.
He leaned down, pressing a kiss to her neck.
“I think,” he said, trailing his mouth up to the sensitive place beneath her ear.
“That I have had my fill of invigorating circumstances for one day. I’d prefer a quiet room with no threat of discovery, far away from everyone, where I could pleasure you for hours and make you sigh and call my name. ”
She made a choked sound. “You are very sure of yourself, sir. Of me.”
He heard the indignation in the words and drew back, staring at her, one hand cupping her face. “You can be sure of me. Do you know that?”
She shoved at his chest, an expression of annoyance flickering in her eyes. “Don’t say such things.” Though she kept her voice low, it did not diminish the contempt he heard there.
“Why not?” he asked, stepping away and immediately regretting the loss of her.
“Because you and I do not exist outside of this moment, and if you start saying such things, well, it’s romantic nonsense and I won’t have you playing make believe at my expense.”
Aubrey stared at her, taken aback by the sudden shift in her mood. “I am not playing anything, Al—Alfie.” Correcting himself at the last minute he saw her scowl at his slip-up and cursed himself. “Do you think I am leading you on? Making promises I won’t keep?”
Her expression softened, though he did not like the regret he saw there. Reaching out, she pressed her hand to his cheek, and Aubrey caught hold of it, turning his face into the caress and pressing a kiss to her palm.
She let out a heavy sigh, her voice soft.
“I think you are a good man who believes the things he says, but there is no future for us, Aubrey. We both know it. I’m a criminal.
I earn my keep through robbing other people.
There’s a price on my head, for heaven’s sake!
So I will thank you not to make out like anything else is an option. ”
Aubrey stared at her. He knew she was right.
She was not of his class, born in the workhouse, a thief.
She could never inhabit his world, nor he hers.
Though he had enjoyed the thrill of breaking into Hatherley Hall there had been no real danger, and no actual crime committed.
He was too honest to consider for a moment that he could live the life Alfie pursued, besides which he was a rich man, and it would be a ridiculous thing to turn his back on that.
Aubrey almost laughed as he pictured Hawkney’s face if he was ever taken up for burglary.
Yet despite his rational mind agreeing, everything inside him rejected those arguments as unimportant.
If she wanted to, if she was brave enough to try, they could overcome any obstacle, and she was the bravest person he’d ever met.
For a moment he hesitated, wondering why he was thinking like this, why consider the future now at all.
Why rush into something when they had known each other such a short time?
Except he felt instinctively that he had this moment.
She was like quicksilver, melting away before he had the chance to catch hold of her.
If he persuaded her to stay now, at least for a while, perhaps he had a chance to make her stay for good.
If not, she would slip from his grasp and he might live the rest of his days regretting not having tried harder, not having been bolder.
“I like you,” she told him, her grey eyes serious as they met his. “And for you, I… I would be open to-to an affair,” she said, though he heard the nervous quality of her voice.
“An affair,” he repeated, knowing this should be everything he wanted to hear and yet feeling nothing but resistance.
He’d have a taste of her, a few glorious days and weeks, and then he would wake one day and find no trace of her.
Damnation. He’d had no plans to settle down, and the idea of a quiet life and raising a family with Alice, or Alfie, or whoever the hell the frustrating creature was, seemed nigh on impossible to imagine.
But did that mean he did not want it—that it was not possible?
A sound outside the door made them both stiffen, their bodies alert to the danger of discovery.
“Sir? Mr Aubrey, sir?”
Aubrey let out a breath, recognising his valet’s voice. “Go back to bed, Martin. I can see to myself.”
There was a pause, and Aubrey could picture the man’s indignant expression upon hearing this. His supposition was proven correct a moment later. “But, sir?”
“It’s fine, Martin. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Sir, Howard was asking a lot of questions concerning your whereabouts. I told him you was at The Swan, playing cards. I hope I did not misspeak. I think his grace was worried about you.”
“No, Martin. That’s fine. Goodnight.”
“Night, sir.”
Aubrey let out a breath of relief and then frowned as he turned back to the room, noting that Alfie had opened the curtains and pushed up the sash window. She leaned out, looking down and around. Aubrey’s heart leapt as he realised what she was considering.
“Don’t even think about it!”
She glanced back at him. “Too late.”
“I’ll take you back through the house when we’ve finished our discussion.”
“We have finished, and it’s too risky with your valet hanging about. This poses no difficulty. I’ll be gone before you can count to ten.”
The words were delivered coolly and the likelihood that this was entirely too accurate gave Aubrey a hollow sensation in his chest he did not like one bit. “We have not finished,” he said testily. “And that’s a twenty-foot drop.”
She looked down again, pursing her lips. “No. No more than fifteen, I reckon.”
Aubrey resisted the urge to throw up his hands and folded his arms instead. “Oh, well, that’s all right then.”
“It is,” she agreed, ignoring the sarcasm dripping from his words. “Child’s play.”
“Dammit, will you just wait!” he said, struggling to keep his voice down as something that felt too much like panic flooded his system.
He had the horrible feeling that if he let her go like this, with nothing resolved between them, she might just disappear into the night and never be seen again, and he would lose her and the diamonds in one fell swoop.
In that moment, he realised he cared little for the diamonds. He wanted his sister to have them, but nothing mattered more than making this frustrating creature hear him out and believe his words.
“You just asked to have an affair with me,” he pointed out. “Am I not allowed to give an answer, at least?”
“You did,” she said briskly. “Your expression was far too easy to read.”
“Then you are illiterate,” he shot back, his temper fraying.
She hesitated at that, regarding him cautiously. “Oh?”
Aubrey ran a hand through his hair, discovered he was still wearing the appalling hat, and threw it to the floor in disgust.
“Hey, that’s not your property,” she scolded him, reaching over to retrieve the wretched thing and stuffing it in her coat pocket.
“No,” he said, losing the plot entirely now. “Neither is this.” In one fluid movement, he pulled off the shapeless smock and threw it at her, repeating the action with the ill-fitting shirt.
His temper eased somewhat as she stood gazing at him, colour flooding her cheeks, her eyes wide and her mouth a little open.
“Want the rest?” he taunted, gesturing to the ridiculous trousers that barely covered his knees.
Her lips twitched, and she met his eyes, amusement dancing there. “Yes.”
“Then it’s all yours,” he told her, wondering if he’d completely lost his mind.
He barely knew this woman, and she was a self-confessed criminal.
She’d designed her own lockpicks, for heaven’s sake, and he was a lost cause because that fact only made him admire her more.
“Everything. All of me. But I don’t come cheap, and neither do you.
I’m willing to pay the price. I’m willing to try, at least. Maybe I’ll mess it all up, maybe I’ll never understand you, the life that you live, but I want to try.
I can be brave and face all of it. Could you? ”
Any amusement left her eyes, and she frowned, looking so very young and afraid he had to fight the urge to go to her, to take her in his arms.
“I don’t understand what you are asking of me?”
“Just that you give us a chance, that you don’t end whatever is between us before it has begun or cheapen it by pretending it’s worth no more than a brief affair. Let us go forward, together. Let me court you, or try to, and… and just see where it leads us.”
Those sharp grey eyes narrowed and she folded her arms, the stance entirely masculine as she stood her ground, shaking her head emphatically.
“Oh, you’ll court Alfie, will you?” She snorted, curling her lip and he knew she was deliberately pushing at him, pushing him away.
“It will lead us to heartbreak, to embarrassment for you and your family. They’ll never accept me. ”
“You cannot know that,” he replied, though he could almost hear Hawkney’s disapproval ringing in his ears. “Vinnie would. She’ll love you.”
Something that looked very like hope, like the longing for acceptance, flitted across her face, there and gone in an instant, but he’d seen it, and he held on. “Della too, once she gets over being heartbroken over Alfie,” he added with the lift of one eyebrow.
She folded her arms tighter, glowering down at her feet. “That wasn’t my fault.”
“I know. Alfie is very endearing. I am rather fond of him myself.”
He waited as she looked back up at him, that vulnerability she tried so hard to hide from him shining in her eyes.
“Do you mean that?” she asked, and he felt the weight of the question, knew his answer mattered, perhaps more than anything.
“Because he’s not going away. I cannot live solely as Alice.
I would go mad. For one thing you cannot know what it like to be so restricted, by your sex, by your clothing, by society.
I need everything that Alfie gives me, not just the freedom to go where I please and say what I please, to be treated with respect, instead of like I haven’t brain enough in my head to understand the most basic concepts.
I won’t do it, Aubrey. I am as much Alfie as Alice, and I completely understand if that’s too much to deal with. ”
“I know,” he said, hearing the fervour behind the words and congratulating himself upon having figured that much out already.
He spoke carefully, trying to be as honest as he could.
“I can’t pretend I understand it all, not yet, but I mean it.
It’s not too much. At least, I don’t think it is.
I think we owe ourselves a chance to figure it out though, don’t we? ”
Though what that actually meant was something they would definitely need to discuss, for he could not condone more burglary. But one thing at a time.
She let out a breath, her arms falling to her sides.
“All I’m asking for is a chance,” he pointed out.
“A chance to wreak havoc upon our lives, upon the lives of everyone who cares about us, upon our hearts,” she said, shaking her head at him as if he was insane.
“Yes,” he agreed, smiling. “All of that.”
She laughed, throwing up her hands. “Very well, Mr Aubrey Seymour. I will give you—us—a chance. Only one, mind,” she warned.
“Only one,” he agreed, moving until she stood directly in front of him.
He heard the way her breath hitched, though his own fared little better as she lifted her hand and placed it on his bare chest. Her fingers were cool, making gooseflesh prickle over him, making desire spring to life and his ill-mannered libido remember the proximity of the bed.
Dammit, had he just said he would court her?
Idiot.
“You are very strong,” she observed, her hand sliding over the muscle. “Much stronger than me.”
“In some ways, perhaps. Not all.”
She glanced up, appreciation glowing in her eyes and relief flooded him at discovering he’d said the right thing for once. Her finger touched his nipple, circling the flat disc before giving the tip a little tweak, knowing exactly what she was doing to him.
Aubrey gasped, and she looked up at him, a triumphant upward kick to her mouth.
He laughed. “Devil!” Catching her hand before she could do it again, he brought it to his mouth, kissing her fingers. “I am sorely tempted to begin this courtship at the end and take you to bed now, but if you want me to continue being a gentleman, for a little while at least, you had better stop.”
She considered this. “Only for a little while.” She danced out of his embrace with a teasing smile, as the words sank beneath his skin, warming him and making his heart kick with anticipation.
Swallowing down a groan of frustration, he sighed. “I’d better see you out then.”
“No need.” Deftly, she swept up the clothes he’d taken off and threw them out of the open window. Before he knew what she intended, she had sat on the windowsill, swung her legs over, and disappeared.
“No!” Aubrey cried. He ran over, his heart thundering, and looked down, finding a pair of glinting eyes gazing up at him, her smug grin infuriating.
She clung to the bricks with her strong fingers, her feet balanced on a climbing vine that scrambled up the side of the house.
“Oh God. You terrify me,” he said, closing his eyes and trying to convince his heart it did not need to escape his chest.
“Night, night, Aubrey,” she whispered, before jumping nimbly to the ground. She looked up, blew him a kiss, and disappeared silently into the darkness.
Aubrey sighed, wondering what on earth he’d done. He closed the window, smiling to himself, reassured that he did not regret it. Not yet, at least.