Engaged in Sin (11 page)

Once more, she melted. The sensuality of this—the lush eroticism of it—made her feel like chocolate bubbling in a pot. She closed her eyes and threw herself into it with all her heart. And when she made a sound of pleasure, his tongue slid into her mouth.

At once she understood. He wanted to hear her respond before he gave her more, before he took the kiss deeper into an intoxicating place she didn’t know existed.

She moaned again, and this time his tongue tangled with hers in response. He groaned in pleasure into her mouth. In the shimmer of fireworks that flashed behind her closed lids and thundered in her heart, she knew one thing. This wasn’t a hasty mashing of lips before he got to business. He
wanted
to keep kissing her.

She ran her fingers up into his wet hair. She’d done an excellent job—it was so smooth and clean and smelled wonderfully of sandalwood soap, and she felt a foolish burst of pride. In that heady moment, Anne answered his tempting play by sliding her tongue into his mouth.

Lovely. Hot. Erotic. She loved tasting him so intimately,
tasting the fresh bite of his tooth powder, the delectable heat of his mouth.

His hand stroked down and clutched her bottom through her cloak. He pulled her closer. Instinctively, she lifted her leg, wrapped it around his hip. Now she was utterly off balance, and if he moved or let her go, she’d fall. Yet she didn’t care.

She wanted to kiss him forever. Here. Outside. With the rain streaming down on top of them. She wanted to kiss him until the gray daylight faded away and nighttime fell upon them. Until the rain stopped and the sun rose again. Until summer turned to fall.

He drew back and she surged forward, wanting more. This time, though, he didn’t bow his head to her and seek her mouth again. He cradled her to his chest and pressed his lips to her hair.

How could just a kiss do this? Leave her hands shaking, her legs trembling, and her heart spinning like a top in her chest?

It should be frightening—she’d touched him in the most intimate ways possible, but she’d never felt more weak and quivery than she did now. She desperately tried to force her dazed mind to think back over the last few minutes. Had she moaned for him enough? Kissed him as passionately as she should? Had she pleased him?

Had she shown him she could be a skillful mistress?

Anne had to make herself care, but she simply couldn’t. She couldn’t care less about her performance. All she could think about was how it
felt
. She was sagging against him, and her lips were tingling.

“Look up, love,” he murmured.

She did, and he kissed her cheek. Her nose. She couldn’t help but giggle. Then he found her lips again and kissed her once more.

An entirely different kiss to add to her new repertoire of kisses. He kept his lips wide, forcing her to open her
mouth just as much. It was almost shocking to kiss him with her mouth so wide. It was wet and messy, delicious and naughty. Their tongues dueled. And when he broke the kiss, he was breathing every bit as harshly. It didn’t matter if she could kiss with skill. He wanted this. She did too. Here, now, it was all that mattered.

Devon closed his eyes and buried his face into Cerise’s wet, thick hair. She smelled fresh, like the aftermath of a summer storm. She had given him something he never believed he would have again: a sense of what was around him. He could hear the patter of rain on the leaves of the roses. On the terrace flagstones, the rain made a sharper sound. It spattered against the glass, plinked down from the roof, and drummed against the house.

She was a unique and remarkable woman. What other courtesan would have cared to help him? He’d kept mistresses—each and every one had liked him quite a bit but had loved his wealth more. What woman of his acquaintance would stand in a downpour so he could listen to the rain? Just to say thank you hadn’t seemed enough. So he’d kissed her.

She kissed him like no other woman ever had. She’d kissed him the way she made love—all boundless enthusiasm, as though she was throwing every bit of herself into the sheer joy of it and holding nothing back. Despite being captured into a brothel, she apparently delighted in sex. He’d never had any woman be so open. So artless. So surprisingly sweet.

And when he kissed her, everything around him had vanished. The sounds of the rain, the feel of it. All he could hear were her breathy moans against his mouth. Her little whimpers and groans and squeaks. All he’d felt was her warm body in his arms, her heart pounding
against him. His world, which had suddenly become much larger in scope, had instantly narrowed down to just Cerise.

Even though she was as drenched as he was, she’d kissed him as though there was no rain, as though they had no fears or problems and nothing existed but this one moment.

He cupped her face. He tried to conjure a picture of her from what he felt. An oval face, and wet curls stuck to her soft cheeks. A pointy chin. He imagined masses of auburn waves pouring around a delicate face. He fancied that her unusual dark-green eyes were large and pretty. But when he tried to imagine her expression, he was lost. Sometimes she was wickedly seductive, and he could envision her face sparkling with wicked desire. Then she would be patient and efficient, and he pictured a serious expression. He just couldn’t get a proper image of her. It frustrated him.

Then something clicked inside his head. “You couldn’t have been very young when you left the country for London. I had the impression you’d done so when you were a child. And you speak as though this country estate was your own.”

“Oh. I wasn’t
very
young,” she said in a low voice. “For I did tell you about walking with my grandfather. I didn’t mean to give you the wrong impression. It wasn’t my house, of course, but I loved it very much. My grandfather worked at the house too. He—he was head gardener. He helped my mother find employment there.”

She sounded so desperate to please him, and it made his heart lurch. He did remember she’d said she was young, but regardless of the details she’d had a hell of a past—ending up a prisoner in a brothel. She fascinated him. Could he make her his mistress? She’d seen him at almost his worst and it hadn’t frightened her away.
She’d told him she could avoid him if she had to. Did he dare keep her?

“You’re wet,” Devon murmured finally. “This cloak isn’t keeping off the rain, is it? It feels heavy—it’s soaking the water up.”

Reassurance was on the tip of Anne’s tongue. She could barely even feel the rain. She was all jumbled up—nervous about her mistake, dizzy from his kisses. But the cloak was suddenly whisked off her, dropped on the ground. The duke draped his greatcoat around her shoulders. Thunder rumbled, and before she could say,
Goodness, a storm has come up on us
, lightning flashed. It was as though the fork of light split the sky open and let out all the water at once. Sheets of rain swept over them. The torrent came so hard Anne could barely see through it.

But instead of running for cover, they both reacted in the same way. They stood frozen in surprise. It took only moments before the pelting water soaked through the duke’s white shirt.

Anne stepped back and tugged at his hand. “Oh, no. You are drenched.”

Wet linen stuck to his wide chest and arms. Where fabric touched flesh, it had become almost invisible, revealing his muscles, his skin, tanned to a rich coppery-brown. Heavens, he was going to catch his death outside and it would be her fault.

She heard the creak of a door. “Yer Grace, are you out here?” It was Treadwell.

“Indeed I am,” the duke shouted.

“Are ye—are ye all right?”

“Never better,” the duke called back, and Anne put her hand to her mouth to hold in a giggle.

“But, Yer Grace … ye’re out in the rain.”

“And you fear that means I’m fit for Bedlam,” the duke replied. “In this case, I’m not.”

With a start, she realized what she’d done. The duke feared he was going mad. She had made it look as though he was. “It was my idea,” she called out. “I wished to walk outside in the fresh air, and His Grace very gallantly accompanied me. I will bring him indoors now.”

“Uh … of course, then, miss.” The door closed with a rattle.

“Now he knows to attribute the madness correctly,” she said. “To me.”

“Angel, you aren’t mad.” The duke pressed his forehead to hers. “Thank you for this. Thank you for being so patient with me. I’ve been a fool, haven’t I?”

“No,” she managed to say, perplexed. “Of course you haven’t.”

“I understand what you’ve been trying to do. You are trying to show me I’m a fool for hiding from my blindness. I already know that, but I don’t know how to learn to cope with it, how to live with it. I need you, Cerise. You could help me. Please, love—stay with me.”

She’d done it. He wanted to keep her. “I will stay as long as you want, Your Grace.”

HERE WAS
A
NNE?
Damnation, he was tired of this.

Sebastian Beddington, Viscount Norbrook, ignored the presence of the strapping doorman. He strode past the brute into a foyer that stank of heavy perfume; it was papered a noxious red and was filled with pitiful faux Chinese ornamentation. The garish colors turned his stomach, and Sebastian seethed with frustration. He had planned never to return to this disgusting brothel, but he had no choice. For nearly a week, his private investigators had scoured the Whitechapel stews, searching for his cousin Anne. He’d spent a great deal of blunt on those damned men, yet they had given him no results.

He had believed she must be in hiding close to this whorehouse, the place she had run from five days before. How far could she get with no money, no friends, no resources? He’d been so certain he would find her quickly that he had joined the search himself.

It was foul. He had prowled down dirty lanes that reeked of horse dung. He had searched drafty taverns that stank of urine and sweat. In those wretchedly seedy
places, he had been forced to consort with drunken, gap-toothed whores to ask them questions. Each one had instantly assessed his well-tailored clothing, his aristocratic bearing, and had fawned all over him, blowing their rank breath in his face, leaving their revolting smells imprinted on his clothing. And each and every one had cheated him. He’d handed over too many coins to too many tarts for information that had proved to be nothing more than lies.

In his present state of fury, Sebastian knew he might murder the next whore who promised to give him a lead to Anne and rooked him instead.

“Can I ’elp you, gov’nor?”

Sebastian whirled on the servant who had pursued him to the threshold of the salon. The footman tried to look menacing, with his beefy arms crossed over a barrel chest. A swift slice from the blade secreted in Sebastian’s walking stick would cut this idiot down to size.

“I assume there is a new madam here in place of the murdered Madame Sin. Tell the woman Lord Norbrook expects her to receive him. At once.”

The doorman lifted a brow, obviously preparing to give some excuse. Sebastian moved instantly. Grasping the man by the throat, he used the advantage of surprise to shove his heavier opponent against the wall. A painting of a nude rattled beside the servant’s stunned face. Pleasure surged at the man’s fear as Sebastian barked, “At once! Do you understand?”

All the bulky doorman could manage was a strangled sound, his coarse face turning red. Sebastian released his hold and the servant straightened his clothes, then hared away up the stairs.

Several gentlemen in the salon, and the large-bosomed whores fawning over them, had noticed the disturbance. They gawked and peered. He turned his back on them, pacing at the base of the stairs.

How this disgusted him. Having to come to a place such as this. And still, after what he’d endured, he did not have Anne. A thoroughly annoying thought struck him, as it did each day. His cousin could be dead by now and he would never know it.

He had to get her back.

It had taken him years to trace her to this brothel. Then that witch of a madam had kept Anne from him, had extorted an enormous fee from him before she would hand over the girl. And, when he finally thought it was over, he’d learned the bitch didn’t have Anne at all.

Now the woman was dead and of no use to him.

It had taken him so long to find Anne the first time because he had never dreamed she would turn to whoring in her desperation. He’d assumed her mother would have tried to secure a more decent occupation. Anne’s mother, Millicent, had still been a lovely woman when she’d fled from his house. She could have done much better than she had.

She’d had no right to run away and take Anne with her. He had offered them protection, comfort, and a home. He had even decided to condescend to marry Anne.

Instead, Millicent had chosen to take her daughter away from him. As if
he
was not good enough. Stupid bitch. Now Anne was a whore. Ruined. It made his lip curl. It made him want to vomit. This entire disgusting brothel brought bile into his throat. Yet where had Anne hidden so cleverly this time that he and a half dozen hired men could not find her?