The Secret Love of a Gentleman (14 page)

He shut his eyes and let his head fall back.

What had he done? Kissed her…

Bastard.

His blood hummed. Even now, the thought of that kiss made his groin heavy. He was thirsty, but not for the liquor, or any other liquid. It was a thirst to learn more, to find out how things might feel with Caro. He had always had morals. Always.

But God! I am tempted
.

Would she be horrified if she knew what he thought?

He lifted his head and opened his eyes, then sipped the whiskey, seeking to regain the reins on his feelings. He’d never found it hard before; he’d never even been tempted. He’d been kissed by the barmaids, but no more. Their brash attitude had never appealed to him, and unlike Harry he’d never sought sexual experiences as trophies of his manhood.

But Caro had not kissed him out of the need those women felt, or for any other reason than their lips had come together. It had merely been a response to a friendship and closeness, which had been weaving about them for weeks. He’d asked for friendship, and he’d called her a friend, but he had known for days that it was becoming more than that. He did not feel a softness in his chest, or a tightness in his gut when he was with his friends.

When they’d waltzed he’d felt the muscle in Caro’s back shifting with her movements and her smaller hand in his with a sense of awe.

The door swung open. He looked up. All of the servants ought to be in bed.

It was his phantom. Caro. An apparition in a silk robe that was a deep red. Her blonde hair was plaited and hung across one shoulder. But there were wisps of golden curls left about her face. They gave her a halo.

His gaze dropped to her toes, which peeked from beneath the hem of her white nightdress, that hung lower than the red robe which she wore over it.

Something lanced through his groin. Was it lust? An emotion Harry spoke of that Rob had never felt.

“Caro?” He rose, although he half-expected her not to be real—he’d drunk more than usual tonight as he’d watched her.

But she was real. “Rob.” She came further into the room, her hands clasped together at her waist, and stood a few feet away. “I could not sleep and I heard you tell the footman you were coming downstairs. I wanted to say thank you.” She gave him a smile that made her glow.

“It is yourself you have to thank. You found the courage to break the invisible walls around you.”

“But I would not have done it without your persuasion.”

Her eyes shone in the light of the candelabra, looking at him through pale eyelashes.

He could not help himself. He lifted a hand, morals and self-discipline deserting him. He wished her closer. “Caro.”

She walked towards him, seeming to float like the phantom he’d first thought she was, and then his hands were at her waist and hers lay on his shoulders.

He was a little in his cups, the whiskey burned in his blood and heat clasped at his groin.
Thirst
. For more than liquor. “I think you ought to go back to your room.”

“Why?”

He shook his head. “You do not wish to know.”

“Tell me.” She was speaking as though this was the same as her fear. It was not.

“Caro, go back upstairs, please. I’m feeling very weak tonight.” His words urged her and yet his whiskey-guided hands still gripped her waist.

He was a bastard.

“Weak?” she breathed, looking at him with confusion.

He did not warn her again as lust reared its head and roared through him. Yes, he was weak tonight and now he understood what Harry spoke of.

This time, undoubtedly, the lead came from him. His lips touched hers as his hand braced the back of her head, while his other slipped to the curve of her lower back. His tongue pressed into her mouth in a firm, bold stroke.

Her mouth opened wider, compliant, and her hands told him she was willing as they slipped into his hair, bracing his head as she’d done in the churchyard.

He drew her closer, so her body pressed against his as his tongue danced with hers. His blood pulsed, heavy in his veins, as lust clutched in his groin, hardening as she pressed against him, rather than pushing him away.

The hunger inside him pulled and thrust, fighting for him to hold her more tightly, to be as close as he could come to her.
Lust.

She broke the kiss. “Rob.” Her fingers combed through his hair.

“Caro.” He did not understand this, and his conscience cried out when she pulled his lips back to hers. But he did not heed it, he did not care for it any more. He wanted to be closer still.

His hands clasped her bottom, sinking into her soft flesh through the material of her robe and her nightgown as his erection pushed against her stomach, trapped between them. It throbbed to do far more than touch. “Caro,” he breathed into her mouth, perhaps for permission, he hardly knew; he’d never done this, had never been like this.

His breathing became rapid as he slid one hand back up across the thin silk of her robe to grip her breast. It filled his hand, the weight of it resting in his palm. She had full, round breasts.

She broke the kiss, but probably because he’d stopped kissing her. Her fingers came forward and cupped his cheeks, cradling his jaw as his gaze met hers, her eyes saying,
it is all right, you may touch me
.

Giddy from the lust and the whiskey in his blood, his hazy gaze held on to the amber in her eyes as his fingers tightened and kneaded her flesh. Her nipple protruded into his palm.

“Why do you not speak?” He wanted her to stop him, because he’d drunk too much to stop himself.

“I do not wish to shatter this.”

His gaze fell to the hollow at the heart of her clavicle, where he could see her pulse flickering. The amber cross that hung below it lifted when she breathed in. Surely she ought to be panicking, but she was not.

Damn it. Damn conscience and morals, and doing right.
He let go of her breast and lifted his hand, then touched where her pulse flickered. It rose in tempo.

His fingers crept beneath the loose fabric of her silk robe and her cotton nightdress.

A breath left her lips and stirred his fringe when his fingers pushed her robe and nightdress off her shoulder. They hung a little down her arm when his fingers dipped within, cupping her warm flesh gently. The weight and texture of her breast gripped at his soul, and the peak of her nipple was a call to his senses, soft like velvet and yet hard. She shivered when his thumb played with it, brushing across it.

God help him. With other women he’d had resilience like iron, but Caro.

She was his vice.

Her fingers slid to the back of his head and urged him to bend down.

Temptation and longing flared through his blood as if she had knocked over a lantern and the oil had spilled out, in full flame. He lowered his head and lifted her breast to his mouth, exploring, discovering the texture. He cradled her nipple on his tongue and sucked, then bit it gently with his teeth. Then he let his tongue dance with it, sweeping about the silk and velvet textures.

Her fingers ran over his back, her touch brushing over his thin cotton shirt. Then she began pulling it from the waistband of his trousers.

It was as though a fever burned between them. He was not alone in his new addiction.

Her fingers touched his skin and lust yelled. No woman had ever touched his skin beneath his clothes. He straightened up to kiss her once more, his tongue pressing into her mouth as his hand kneaded her breast and hers swept across his back underneath his shirt.

A soft sound of pleasure seeped from her mouth into his.

Every nerve, every sinew in his body ached to do much more than they were. Instinct screamed in his ears. He wished to press her back, lay her down and lift her nightdress. Both his hands returned to grip her buttocks, holding her against him and her warm, soft breasts pressed against his shirt, moist from his adoration, as his erection pressed against her stomach.

She was pliant and supple.

She broke the kiss. “Rob.” His name asked for more, it asked for everything his instinct willed.

Yet he had not run that mad.

She is Drew’s sister!

Damn it
! What was he doing?

He released her instantly, as if his hands had been burned. Perhaps they had. Most vices he’d learned to keep away from because he’d been burnt by them once. His gaze fell to the beautiful ripe curve of her breast, and her deep-pink nipple, which protruded above the white cotton of her nightdress.

He swallowed back the lump of longing in his throat. He refused to regret what he’d done—what they’d done. He lifted the cotton over her breast, then lifted the silk too and covered her.

She was breathing heavily, her bosom rising and falling with each breath. Her hands gripped his waist beneath his shirt. “Why have you stopped?” Fear hovered in her eyes.

Rejection
.

It was not rejection.

He gripped her head, so she could not look away from him. “It is not what you think. I should not be touching you. Yet I warned you I was weak. The kiss, earlier… I am a man… I have instincts. I am sorry… I have been drinking and this should not have happened.”

She stepped back, slipping from his fingers as colour flushed her face. Then she turned and fled.

Damn!
“Caro.”

~

The mist of lust was swept away.
This should not have happened…

As Caro had walked downstairs, she’d told herself it was only to say thank you. Yet in her heart she’d known that was a lie. She’d hoped Rob would make love to her. The night had been so wonderful. She’d wanted someone to share her happiness with, to feel close to. She wished to renew the experiences of her marriage bed.

Yet now.
Oh Lord.
She could feel her blush, even though she was in the dark, alone, as she climbed the stairs back up to her rooms.

“Caro!” She heard Rob call from below.

People might stare, but it would only be because you look beautiful… I am a man…

Had she misread everything? Had he really not wished to kiss or touch her?

“Caro!”

I have instincts…

Albert had spoken of a man’s appetites. A man’s instinct was to crave. Albert had said his desires were crafted by nature and not even choosey. He’d claimed he was unable to control his physical urge for women.

She’d gone to Rob in her nightdress, flaunted herself and teased his instincts, and he had felt unable to control his response.

Oh, she was a fool. Rob would think badly of her.

Yet Albert had been wrong in one thing—some men could say no.

“Caro!”

But how mortifying. She had offered him her body and he’d rejected it.

“Caro, come back here!”

Her bare feet brushed on the wood as she hurried up the last few steps to the second floor, her fingers slipping across the wooden banister.

Chapter 12

Rob came down to breakfast late. Caro looked up. They had finished eating; she was now simply talking to Mary while she drank a second cup of chocolate. Drew was reading his paper.

Rob’s absence had been a gaping hole in the start of her day. She’d missed him smiling at her from across the table, and Mary had missed him too. She’d looked at the clock several times, a frown creasing her brow, and Drew had glanced at the door every time one of the footmen entered as his fingers had tapped idly, and impatiently, on the tablecloth.

They would all miss Rob when he left and now they all smiled at him. Life after he’d gone would seem very bleak. She could feel that, even as she noticed the heat of a blush touch her cheeks.

She had kissed him twice last night and the second time he’d bid her stop.

Her gaze fell to her cup of chocolate.

Perhaps she ought to go to the nursery, but then she had so little time left with him she did not really wish to hide away again.

“Are you feeling unwell?” Mary asked.

“I could not sleep, and I probably drank more of the punch than I should.” Rob sat down.

“And my whiskey decanter had to be replenished significantly this morning,” Drew mocked.

“That too.”

Caro looked up. He was pale.

“Coffee for my brother-in-law,” Drew ordered, “and bring up a fresh pot. That must be cold.”

When a footman offered Rob bacon, he lifted a hand. “No, thank you.” Then he smiled across the table at Caro, colour tainting his cheeks.

He was embarrassed by their encounter too.

She wished to laugh suddenly. He had not rejected her. His eyes still held their warmth. Of course he had not. He’d said he had not.
It is not what you think. I should not be touching you…
He had merely been righteous and a gentleman. She thought of how many times he’d called her name into the darkness, asking her to go back.

She was judging him by Albert’s standards and he was not Albert.

He’d stopped her out of common-sense and kindness.

Rob was a sensible, good man, and if he’d let her continue, this morning he would not feel ill from an over-indulgence of drink, but from remorse and shame.

Last night, when she’d spoken of her glass gaol, he’d said,
Then break it.
He’d made it seem so simple. She had built the walls and last night she had smashed them. She could choose to sulk now and hide in her rooms again, or she might simply forget that she’d given in to lust for a handsome young man, and continue regardless.

She chose the latter.

She was going to apologise to him and forget her foolishness, but not forget her courage.

“You are looking green, Rob.” Drew teased him.

Rob rejected the kedgeree with another lifted hand.

“You have to eat,” Drew said, “the after-effects of an excess of alcohol must be fed. Ham and eggs, William. My brother-in-law needs a hearty meal to fill his tender stomach.” Drew waved the footman off to fetch it.

“I am unused to this,” Rob answered. “I think all I need is silence and I admit I am at fault.”

Rob’s gaze caught on Caro’s and apologised. His words had not been about drink.