Lord of Deceit (Heiress Games Book 2) (16 page)

She arched her back, losing her grip on her skirts. He nearly growled as he shoved her skirts back up. “Don’t give in yet,” he ordered. “I’m not nearly done tasting you.”

It was so wicked, so wild — so beyond anything she had imagined, on those nights when she’d found pleasure on her own. Agnes had told her a little about how to please a man with her mouth, but few women in the
demimondaine
had ever whispered about the reverse.

She moaned as a particularly wicked movement nearly sent her over the edge. He seemed to know, instinctively, how close she was, and he pulled back a little, kissing her inner thigh, leaving the barest trace of abrasion from the stubble on his face.

“Rafe,” she said.

He licked her again. “Is there something you need?”

She answered by wrapping her legs around his neck.

He laughed, low and sultry. His breath against her sensitive skin made her shiver — somehow made her even more desperate, even without his touch. “You’re going to be the death of me.”

This time, his kisses were more urgent. This time, it wasn’t just his mouth that tormented her. He skimmed a hand up over her bodice, finding her breasts. They were still confined by brocade, but he palmed one anyway, staking his claim.

She dropped one hand away from her skirts and covered his hand with hers. “More,” she whispered.

He kept the same tempo, the same pressure. Her need had become a fever raging through her, hotter than anything she could have done to herself. But where she would have touched a bit harder, pushed herself more quickly over the edge, he seemed to know exactly how to keep her suspended there — aching, desperate, nearly crying with the need for release.

“Beg me,” he said.

It no longer felt like a game. She was too far gone to tease him in return. “Please,” she said.

“By name, Octavia.”

His mouth was far too clever. She arched up against him, using her legs to pull him toward her, but even though she surrounded him, he was entirely in control. She couldn’t do anything to change the angle or speed him along.

All she could do was let go. “Please, Rafe,” she begged. “I’ll do anything, my lord. Anything at all.”

She thought she felt him smile, so attuned as she was to his mouth and everything it did to her.

He knew exactly what she needed. His tongue flicked against her, faster than she thought possible. He grabbed her hand and used her own fingers to squeeze her breast, sending another bolt of desire through her. She arched again, thighs trembling, coming off the mattress in her desperate need to be closer to him, to never let him go….

And then everything exploded. She cried out as her body gave in…as everything he’d done to her coalesced into a single, seemingly-unending wave of pleasure. He was relentless, continuing to devour even though she’d already come apart, and it felt like the wave stretched on forever — to the point where her body gave out completely.

She fell back on the bed. The waves subsided, leaving her with a single, blissful moment of peace. No thought, no worry — just an astonishing sense of wonder as her legs slipped off his shoulders and her body quivered with the aftershocks of release.

He joined her on the bed, but he didn’t speak — didn’t move to touch her, other than to shift his grip on her hand so that their fingers were entwined.

Finally, she turned to look at him. He looked entirely self-satisfied — as though he’d gotten almost as much pleasure out of pleasing her as she had.

She grinned at him. “Your promotion is approved, general.”

Her voice was breathless and her body still trembled. He looked even more smug. “That was too easy. You should have made me work for it.”

“Next time,” she said.

There might not be a next time. She shook off that thought, not willing to let anything interfere. He leaned over and kissed her, as though to muffle those words. His manhood pressed against her, insistent but still contained.

Not for long. He pulled his shirt over his head, tossing it to the floor. Then he looked at her dress skeptically. “If I were a pirate I would toss your skirts over your head and fuck you like that,” he said, his casual use of such a forbidden word secretly thrilling her. “But we’ve already abused the dress enough for one night.”

She stood, ready to be done with it. Ready to feel his hands on her skin, not separated by brocade.

It took several minutes to remove her from the gown. There were pins and ribbons fastening everything together, and Rafe kept stopping to kiss her — to kiss or caress each new bit of skin as it was revealed. By the time he pulled her chemise over her head, she was breathless and laughing and completely entranced. She would have begged him again if he’d asked her to.

He’d taken off her slippers, but he left her stockings on. When he was done, he stepped back. She fought the urge to cover herself. A courtesan wouldn’t. And she liked the look in his eyes — the sudden, fierce hunger and the need to claim her.

“God, Octavia,” he breathed. “I don’t deserve you.”

“You’re stuck with me,” she said. It was easy to pretend that she had experience with him — she felt safe, and secure, and able to be her wickedest self.

He laughed, but it sounded like a prayer. “I don’t deserve you,” he said again. “But I would be a fool to let you go.”

He pulled off his boots. He reached for the falls of his breeches, unbuttoning them, then shucking them. He didn’t give her long to look at him, though. She’d already seen the hard muscles of his abdomen, tapering down toward the indentations of his pelvis. His legs were muscular, too, made for long days in the saddle. And his cock jutting out in front of him….

She didn’t have the words for that. Her enthusiasm and theoretical knowledge were suddenly, savagely not enough. He was going to take her, and Agnes had warned that it would hurt, and she couldn’t possibly let him know….

He pulled her back into bed. He kissed her, and she tried to force herself to relax. His tongue had been so clever, and the pleasure he’d given her had been so perfect — surely this would be perfect too.

“What’s wrong?” he whispered, as his hand stroked down her side and embedded in her curls.

“Nothing,” she murmured, pulling him back to kiss her again. Kissing, she could handle. Kissing was wonderful. And his hand was wonderful, stroking her, stoking her need again. He slid a finger inside her, his path made easy by how wet she already was for him.

“Do you have a condom?” he asked.

She couldn’t really think, not with his finger — two fingers — stroking inside her. She’d heard of condoms from other mistresses but never had use for one. “No.”

“I’ll pull out,” he assured her.

Just like that, her anxiety flared up. She wasn’t merely inexperienced — she was a blithering idiot. She could get pregnant.

With Rafe’s baby. A baby with grey eyes and a Briarley nose.

But she didn’t want to stop him. She’d had her courses a few days before — from what Agnes had told her, her risk of pregnancy at the moment was low.

And this moment was going to come with someone…most likely someone she could never marry anyway. She wanted — needed — it to be Rafe.

So she didn’t stop him as he moved over her. He kissed her like it was the only thing in the world he wanted to do. He worshipped her breasts the way he’d worshipped her sex, lavishing attention on them until she was writhing beneath him. He reduced her to a shuddering, sobbing mess again with his fingers and the sweet, dirty, clever things he whispered in her ear.

But still, when he finally entered her, it hurt. She couldn’t hide her wince or silence her sudden cry.

He stopped. He didn’t pull out, but he didn’t push deeper.

“Open your eyes,” he said gently.

She had turned her face away from him without realizing it. She looked up at him, and she couldn’t even begin to guess what he was thinking. There was a question in his eyes — but there was sympathy, too, and the oddest trace of guilt.

“Did Somer…did someone hurt you?” he asked, his voice tight.

Octavia shook her head.

“Then why….”

She touched his face. “I want this. I want
you
. Please. We can talk later.”

He frowned. He started to pull out.

“No,” she said. “Don’t stop. Unless…unless you don’t want me anymore.”

“Never believe that.”

He kissed her again, slowly, even though she felt how tense his body was — it must have killed him to stop. She began to relax again. The pain had already faded. Her body grew accustomed to him.

But it wasn’t as good as it had been. He was too tense, and she was too embarrassed, and it all went wrong somehow. He rocked inside her, settling into a rhythm that promised something delightful — and she felt the stirrings of that delight. If she hadn’t seen the question in his eyes, she might have been able to give in to it.

But the moment was broken. He must have sensed it too. He reached down to where they were joined, stroking her in a way that should have made her climax again — and she did, briefly, but not with anything approaching the intensity of what he’d done with his mouth.

Then, abruptly, he pulled out. He grabbed himself with his hand, pumping once, twice. And then he grunted and came on the sheets.

She watched, fascinated. Too fascinated. A courtesan would have seen this all before.

She turned her head away. He collapsed next to her, his breath heavy and ragged.

She’d had all the confidence in the world before. But she had no idea what to say now.

The silence stretched between them. Finally, he tugged the soiled sheet out from under them, tossing it to the floor. Then he laid down beside her, pulling her back up against his chest and cradling her in his arms.

She sighed as his body surrounded her. She didn’t feel good, exactly — she felt fragile, and awed, and somewhat overwhelmed. But she felt safe again.

Even now, she felt safe with him.

But it was all too much, and she couldn’t handle any of it.

So when he whispered her name, she took the coward’s way out and pretended to be asleep.

S
he was a virgin
.

Or rather, she had been, before his cock and his stupidity had come into her life and wrecked it.

“Octavia,” he whispered.

She didn’t move. She lay lifeless in his arms, surprisingly comfortable with their nudity given what he suddenly knew about her.

Not comfortable enough to face him, though. He guessed that she was still awake. Her breathing was by turns too shallow, and then too even, as though she kept reminding herself to feign calm.

He didn’t push the issue. He was too busy berating himself to ask her why in the hell she hadn’t told him that she was still an innocent.

The most true thing he’d said all night was that he didn’t deserve her. How could he deserve her? She was clever, and funny, and charming, and entirely enthusiastic. When she’d stood before him wearing her stockings and nothing else — except for that smile that felt like it was just for him — he’d wanted to go to his knees and worship her again.

He should have gone to his knees and begged for forgiveness. Not for taking her virginity — that was something that was hers to give, and she’d chosen to give it to him.

But now he realized that that smile
was
just for him. That she’d given that smile to no one else. That the look in her eyes, fey and wild, might have been desire — but it also might have been the first glimmer of love.

And that, frankly, scared the hell out of him.

Her breathing turned shallow again. He wondered what she was thinking — whether she regretted it, or whether she’d enjoyed it.

He knew she’d enjoyed the first part. He was probably an arse for being smug about it, but he knew what he was about.

If she knew, though, that those skills had been honed on a string of meaningless conquests, and then put to good use seducing the wives and mistresses of French officers and Spanish merchants for the information they could give him, and that he had intended to do the same to her….

He didn’t deserve her.

He slid his arm out from under her, slowly, as though he believed that she was asleep. If she wasn’t ready to talk to him, he would let her preserve that illusion. He’d said that they had all night, and he had thought that was true.

But he’d been wrong. They were out of time.

He found his breeches and pulled them on. His shirt was a mess and his cravat was hopeless, but he did his best with both before retrieving his waistcoat. He couldn’t stay there. He couldn’t ask her how she was still a virgin, or what had happened with Somerville — even though that answer, whatever it was, would probably give Rafe everything he needed to hurt the man.

The fact that he’d even thought of ruining Somerville now, when he should have been thinking of Octavia, was even more proof that he didn’t deserve her.

“Rafe,” she said, sitting up in bed and pulling a sheet around her. “Are you leaving?”

“I thought you were asleep,” he lied.

She watched him put on his boots. “I thought you said we had all night.”

He shook out his jacket. “It would be better if I returned to Maidenstone before your servants or theirs catch me.”

She pulled the sheet more firmly around her, holding it with one hand as she tried to tame her hair. She was self-conscious in a way she hadn’t been before.

That was his fault too. He was taking all her confidence and replacing it with doubt.

Her eyes, when they met his gaze, were wary. “You look like you have experience with dashing out of ladies’ chambers before you’re caught.”

He did. But usually it was the militia or a jealous husband he was running from. The women he’d seduced had always been experienced. They had usually been married and had known, because of that, that there was no future for them with Rafe. He’d given them pleasure — he’d made sure to give them pleasure. And they’d given him secrets in return.

It was a messy business, but as far as he knew, he’d never broken anyone’s heart.

And he’d never come anywhere close to breaking his own.

But Octavia was different. She hadn’t made the kind of bargain with him that those enemy wives and mistresses had made. She’d become his partner, somehow, and not merely a target. She deserved more than a quick fuck and a fare-thee-well.

She deserved love, if love was what she wanted.

But love with a man like him? A liar who had used her for his own ends? A rake who knew that love usually ended when the bills came due?

He slid his arms into his jacket. “It’s for the best, Octavia.”

“I don’t agree,” she said quietly.

He should have ended it cleanly, with a swift
coup de grace
. He should have been cruel, perhaps, and told her that he no longer wanted her — that he’d got what he came for, as crude as that was. She would have mourned him. Then she would have hated him. And then she would have let him go.

But for all the things he’d lied about in his life, he couldn’t lie and say he didn’t want her.

“This isn’t over,” he said. “I’ll come back tomorrow night and we can decide what to do next.”

That wasn’t a conversation he wanted to have. But when his mind immediately leapt to thoughts of escape, such as whether he could take Serena and Portia to Brighton in the morning, the truth finally dawned on him, clear and inescapable.

He was being a coward.

But he couldn’t face her, not tonight. Sometime in the middle of all their laughter and all their jokes, and all the pleasure they’d given each other, and all the shock of the aftermath, something had changed.

Something that, if he acknowledged it, could ultimately destroy him.

“You won’t come back,” Octavia said. She stretched, letting the sheet fall to her waist, as though anger brought all her confidence back. “I’ve heard promises before, Rafe. Men love to make them right before they ruin you.”

He swallowed, trying not to let her breasts — her gorgeous, perfect breasts — distract him.

“I will come back,” he vowed. “And we’ll talk.”

She shrugged. “If you say so. Thank you for tonight, though. You weren’t half bad for a pirate.”

The joke stung more than if she’d slapped him. Even now, when it looked like she was being held up by sheer bravado, she could still make him laugh.

He wanted to kiss her. He wanted to take her back to bed and wring another orgasm from her — maybe two or three.

He couldn’t, though. It was one thing to be a coward. But allowing her to hope for something that he could never give her would be far worse.

So he walked around the room, extinguishing the candles and lamps and closing the curtains. He left one candle lit to see himself out.

When he reached the door, he turned to face her. She still sat cross-legged in bed, her arms wrapped around her chest as though hugging herself. She watched him silently, but the angle of her chin was proud, almost dangerous.

“I’m the one who should thank you,” he said.

She waved a hand. “If you want to thank me, you can pay for my carriage when Lucy sends me away.”

It was something a courtesan would ask for. He didn’t like the hard tone in her voice, or the way she resigned herself to a future she shouldn’t have to accept.

But there was nothing he could do to comfort her — not when he didn’t know what she wanted. Especially not when he didn’t know what
he
wanted.

So he left, shutting her door behind him. He walked down the stairs, picking up her reticule in the hallway and leaving it on a side table so her servants would be less likely to guess that she’d lost it in a fit of passion. He grabbed his greatcoat, throwing it over his arm. And he walked back to Maidenstone Abbey in the dark, his heart churning and his thoughts racing.

This was supposed to end when he found the secret that would bring down Somerville. Tonight had given him a major indication of what that secret was and which lines of questioning to pursue.

But could he really use something that he had only discovered because he’d slept with Octavia?

And how, in the end, was he going to walk away from her?