Chapter 9 #4
Her legs threatened to buckle beneath her weight. When he caught her by the shoulders to steady her, then released her just as quickly, shame suffused her cheeks with scarlet.
Too late, much too late, she realized how far she’d gone. And that he’d been the one to stop it, not her. Yanking up her chemise, she fumbled awkwardly with the ties. “Good Lord in heaven, you must think me the most wanton creature—”
“No.” He laid his index finger against her lips to silence her. “No, I don’t. But you’re the last woman on earth I should have touched like this.” His thumb outlined her lips in a sensuous stroke that made her heart race.
Her fingers stilled on the ties of her chemise. She stared up into his unreadable face, hoping shamelessly that he’d kiss her again. When he dropped his hand instead, the intensity of her disappointment surprised her.
“Yet I cannot regret it,” he added, almost as an after-thought.
Nor could she. All those times she’d railed against men for using women to satisfy their passions, she hadn’t dreamed women had passions, too, that could be as powerful, as devastating as this. It cast new light on all her assumptions.
When she dropped her gaze to where the ties of her chemise still lay half-knotted in her hands, he extricated them from her numbed fingers and deftly finished tying them.
“One thing is for certain,” he said in a low voice. “This time, you have every right to complain of me to Sara.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” she whispered, hurt that he could even think it.
“Why not? Nothing has changed.”
“Everything has changed.” At least for her. She didn’t know why, but the entire world was different now. He was more moral than she’d expected, and she wasn’t moral in the least. Indeed, she’d become a creature she didn’t recognize, all in the space of a few heart-stopping kisses and caresses.
He tipped up her chin, his gaze boring into hers. “You don’t think I’m a snake for trapping you in your room and taking liberties with you?”
She shook her head. “You stopped yourself, even though you could have done as you wished with me and I would have ... would have ...” She turned away from him with a choked sob, unable to finish the shameful statement.
When he’d kissed her on the balcony, she’d convinced herself that her dreamy capitulation had been a momentary and understandable reaction to a rake’s charms. He’d kept her there by force, she’d told herself. He’d taken her off guard.
But although tonight had begun as before, it hadn’t ended the same. She’d reveled in her sin, had allowed, even welcomed, each caress. In short, she’d behaved like a wanton. Only his presence of mind had prevented her from giving herself to him.
Lifting her head, she caught sight of her image in the mirror. She even looked the part—her lips were reddened, her hair mussed, and she wore only her chemise and her drawers. With an anguished moan, she snatched her dressing gown off the floor and shoved her arms back through the opaque sleeves.
“It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” he reassured her, laying his hand on her shoulder.
“Everyone has desires, and women can control them no easier than men. If anything, it’s harder for women.
Society expects men to sate their desires at will, but respectable women are expected to suppress theirs, even with their own husbands.
It doesn’t make for easy relations. Or fair ones. ”
The penetrating observation astonished her so much she forgot her guilty thoughts. She faced him with widened eyes. “That’s a very progressive opinion, you know.”
“I’m a very progressive man,” he said dryly, “despite what you think of me.”
Her gaze locked with his. Yes, she’d begun to realize that.
Certainly, he wasn’t the dissolute rake she’d thought him to be.
But what was he? What kind of man restrained his urges when he had both the opportunity and the motive to take advantage of a woman?
Lord knows she wouldn’t have stopped him.
She’d been too swept up by his expert seductions to quibble over niceties like reputation, honor, and chastity.
“You are progressive,” she acknowledged. “And you’ve shown me mercy when I didn’t expect it. Or ... deserve it.”
“Mercy?” He gave a hollow laugh. “Is that what this is? Strange, but it feels like insanity.” He cupped her cheek in his hand. “No man in his right mind would turn you away when he could bed you. I must have lost my wits.”
This time she couldn’t doubt his sincerity, and his fervent words made hot desire bubble up inside her once more. She forced it down firmly. “No. You simply exercised restraint, which demonstrates that you’re indeed a gentleman.”
With a curse, he dropped his hand and pivoted away from her. “Don’t fool yourself. I didn’t do it out of any gentlemanly impulse, I assure you. I merely can’t afford too many more of your damned articles in the paper.”
She didn’t believe him. Maybe she was fooling herself, but she doubted he’d drawn back out of fear of her articles. The man feared nothing, and certainly not her.
He stared across the room at the closed door, tucking his thumbs in the waistband of his glove-tight pantaloon trousers.
“So are we even now? Or shall I expect more reports of my activities in the Gazette?” His face was rigid, expectant, as if he wouldn’t be surprised to hear that she intended to continue her attacks on him.
It shamed her that he could think she’d go on writing about him after what they’d done. “Shall I expect more of your attempts to expose my identity to your friends?”
He shot her a solemn glance. “I’ll keep quiet if you will.”
“Then we’re agreed. Lord X no longer has any quarrel with the Viscount St. Clair and vice-versa.” Nor any reason to speak to him, she thought, an inexplicable pain gripping her chest. Nor any connection to him whatsoever.
As if that thought had occurred to him as well, his jaw went taut.
He faced her fully, trailing his gaze down her trembling body, then back up to her face.
He now wore an expression of resigned acceptance.
“That’s probably best. After all, it wouldn’t do for the viscount to quarrel with his fiancée so publicly. ”
She gaped at him. “Fiancée?”
“Our encounter here this evening has brought me to a decision.” He cleared his throat, his gaze sweeping over her once more. “Felicity, you and I should marry.”