Silent Revenge (20 page)

Jessica slammed her fists against her hips and took a confrontational step closer. “You promise not to leave my side?” She gave a harsh laugh. “I can’t wait to see that, Simon. I’m sure the Earl of Milebanke will enjoy dancing with the two of us.”

A smile broke out on her husband’s face, and Jessica had the biggest urge to wipe it off his handsome face.

“Well, perhaps I will let the earl dance with you alone.”

“No!”

“Have no fear, Jesse. Poor Milebanke is so overweight and out of shape he’ll be lucky if he can finish the dance, let alone carry on a conversation while he maneuvers the steps.”

Jessica gritted her teeth. “I don’t care about that. I cannot dance with him.”

“Yes, you can. And you will. You’ll be facing him the entire time. You will not miss one word he says.”

“But…”

“You’ll be fine.”

“No!” she cried. “No, I will not be fine!”

“Why?”

“I do not know how to dance.”

The shock on his face was evident. Jessica had never been more ashamed in her life. She’d never felt more exposed. More deficient. She fought the tightness in her chest and glared at him with all the hostility she could put in her gaze.

Damn him.

“You did not marry a pampered debutante, Simon. Someone who spent her younger years learning how to pour tea and carry on polite conversation.” She couldn’t look at him any longer. “Or dance.”

Damn him.

She turned her back and held on to the corner of the new wardrobe he’d purchased for all the party dresses she didn’t own. “You did not marry a proper somebody who spent years learning to organize parties and balls and entertain the
ton
. But an impaired nobody who spent every waking hour of her youth watching people move their mouths, studying their lips, trying to guess what they were saying. Someone who couldn’t carry on even the smallest intelligible conversation until she was seventeen years old. A flawed, less-than-perfect—”

He clamped his hands around her arms and spun her around to face him. “Stop it. I will not have you talking like that.”

Every muscle in her body froze, and Jessica stared unblinking at the angry look she saw on his face. “Please, leave me alone. I don’t want you to touch me.”

Jessica fisted her hands at her sides and stiffened against him. She would not give in to her body’s desperate cry to be held. She would not allow herself to lean on his strength. She’d had only herself to rely on since she was fifteen years old, and she was not about to let her traitorous body ruin everything now.

Even though he’d given her his name and promised to protect her, she would never be foolish enough to think that Simon Warland, twelfth Earl of Northcote, could ever really care about her. When society found out about her deafness, she would see how quickly he turned his back on her. And she would have only herself to rely upon again.

Jessica swallowed past the lump in her throat. “Please leave. It’s late and I’m tired.”

His grasp loosened, but he didn’t remove his hands from her arms. He applied a gentle pressure, rubbing up and down, easing away the tenseness. Her knees trembled beneath her, and she squeezed shut her eyes. Please, let him leave, she prayed.

He turned her in his arms and held her. Jessica could not bring herself to look at his face. She didn’t want to read one excuse that came from his mouth.

In one fluid movement, he ran his hands down her arms and grasped her by the fingers.

A white-hot bolt of lightning raced from the tips of her fingers where he touched her, warming her whole body with an uncontrollable shudder. He placed her right hand sideways in his, palm to palm, and wrapped his fingers around hers. With practiced grace, he lifted her left hand to his shoulder, wrapped his arm around her waist, and pulled her toward him.

“What are you doing?” Her naked body tingled beneath her thin muslin nightgown, and the loose-flowing robe was not barrier enough to protect her from the fire his touch burned on her skin. His hand rested against her back, searing her flesh, robbing her lungs of the air she needed to breathe.

“Don’t, Simon.” Jessica pulled back, trying to escape his grasp. “It will do no good. I cannot dance. I cannot hear the music.”

“You don’t need to hear it.”

“Yes, I do. This is not like reading lips.” She pulled at her hand and swallowed past the breath that caught in her throat. He had no intention of letting her go. “You don’t know what it’s like. I cannot hear the music.”

Blood pounded in her head, crashing in waves against her ears. He could not expect more from her. She refused to attempt the impossible.

“I will hear the music for you.”

Jessica clamped her teeth on her lower lip and turned her head away from him. Didn’t he know? Didn’t he realize she could never be normal? Didn’t he see that no matter how much he forced her to do what was easy for everyone else, he couldn’t change the facts?

His wife could not hear.

Her heart slammed in her breast when she felt his finger beneath her chin, raising her gaze until it locked with his. The determined look in his eyes bound her to him. “Trust me, Jesse. Follow where I lead you.” He moved. Slowly to the right. Then back to the left. Again to the right. Then back to the left.

Jessica tightened her grip and shifted her startled gaze to her feet. His finger raised her chin.

“Look at my face, Jesse. Move with me. Follow my lead.”

Jessica moved her right foot, then her left. Every muscle in her body trembled. She couldn’t do this. But she was. And heaven help her, what an amazing feeling.

To be held securely in his arms. To move with him as if they were one. Her gaze drifted back to her feet, but Simon’s fingers tightened on her hand in warning and she quickly looked up.

“Relax. I will lead and you must follow. To dance, you must rely on your partner to show you where to go.”

He pulled her closer and executed another series of simple steps—first to the right, then to the left.

His hand wrapped around her waist like a tightened vise. Each movement caused her to brush against his muscled chest until her breasts ached. A consuming heat swirled deep within her stomach and moved lower.

Jessica breathed a fluttering breath and tried to let her shoulders drop. How could she relax with his arms around her? How could she relax with a whirlpool of turbulence spiraling to her stomach? How could she relax when she couldn’t even think?

Right. Left. Right. Turn, left. She closed her eyes and let her body do whatever he led it to do. Right. Left. Turn, right.

Who would have thought moving around the room in a man’s arms would be such a wondrous experience? Surely it was not at all proper to feel this way.

His fingers tightened around her hand again, and she looked up. His lips parted. A gentle smile lit his face. “You are a fast learner, wife.”

Jessica swallowed and then took a deep breath. For some reason her breathing was much more labored than usual. “It’s only because you’re holding me. You leave me little choice but to move as if my body is one with yours. I doubt if Lord Milebanke will hold me so.”

“He won’t live to see dawn if he does.”

Jessica frowned at him. She must have misunderstood what he said.

Simon cleared his throat. She could feel his chest rumble beneath her hand.

“To waltz, you will execute a series of similar steps. Start with your right foot, and the pattern is slow-quick-quick, slow-quick-quick. Like this.” Simon demonstrated the steps and then pulled her into his arms and moved across the room.

Jessica stumbled on the first two quick steps, and he stopped and began again.

His patience gave her confidence. The second time was better, and by the time they’d done the series a few more times, she was moving in his arms as if she’d danced forever.

A slight pressure to her hand brought her gaze upward. He greeted her gaze with a brilliant smile. “Don’t look down. Keep your eyes open and a smile on your face.”

Around and around the room they twirled, her one arm resting on the bulging muscles across his shoulder, the other outstretched with her fingers nestled securely in the palm of his hand.

Jessica held on to him as they moved across the floor, unable to take her gaze from his face. Her husband had such a beautiful face. He could make her feel things she did not want to feel. Ache for things she did not understand. Suddenly, an explosion of shivers raced through her body.

She let her hand roam over his shoulder. His thin lawn shirt hid very little. The open lacing down the front revealed much. Never before had she experienced such power. Such overwhelming strength. The breath caught in her throat.

She brought her gaze back to his mouth. The same mouth that had kissed her until she could barely breathe. A kiss that still lingered in her memory. That still caused her to shudder.

“I’m dancing, aren’t I?”

“Yes, Jesse, and you are dancing beautifully.”

He held her tight and circled with her around the room again.

This wasn’t dancing. This was heaven. On a real dance floor, being held in someone else’s arms, it would not be like this. She would make a fool of herself, and the whole world would know she couldn’t hear.

She closed her eyes and pressed her body hard against him. A blast of heat raced over every inch of her skin. The chilly night air no longer seemed cool but hot, as if it were the middle of summer. And they were barely moving.

Jessica opened her eyes. “Simon?” She struggled to find the strength to speak.

“Yes?”

“Do all waltzes move this slowly?”

“The one I’m listening to does.”

“But there’s no music.”

“I told you, we don’t need music.”

They barely moved. Only swayed back and forth. Back and forth. They stood in one spot and moved back and forth while his hand…Oh, God. His hand. Jessica bit her lower lip.

His hand moved over her back, blazing a path wherever his fingers touched her. Up to her shoulders. Cupping her head. Threading his fingers through the loose waves. Then moving down again to the small of her back. And lower.

She wanted to look away from him, but she could not. The penetrating gaze in his eyes bound her to him while his hands worked a strange magic on her flesh. She couldn’t breathe. Every inch of her body tingled in response to his touch.

In a single movement, he pushed the robe from her shoulders.

It fell to the floor at her feet. Only her thin muslin gown separated them. It seemed far too revealing—yet far too Confining. A violent churning swirled deep in her stomach, and she could not make it stop.

What was happening to her? She wanted nothing, except his hands to touch her. His lips to kiss her.

He rested his hands on her hips and moved upward ever so slowly. He touched the side of her breasts and moved inward.

She should make him stop. She’d die if he did.

The room suddenly darkened and she blinked. “One of the candles went out.”

“We do not need light, Jesse.”

“I will not be able to see what you’re saying in the dark.”

“It doesn’t matter, wife. I will not be talking.”

Simon blew out another candle, then pulled her to him and covered her mouth with his own.

She was drowning. This kiss was nothing like the first kiss. Before, only his mouth had turned her weak-kneed and helpless. Now she could not even begin to describe the chaos his hands caused.

She wanted him closer. She wrapped her arms around his neck and held on as if she were in danger of falling. Heaven help her, she was. Simon had taken her to the precipice of a tall mountain and leaped with her in his arms. He had flown with her high into the sky as if they both had wings, then soared back to earth. Only they had yet to land. Their feet were nowhere near the ground.

He kissed her again. Deep. Hard. Completely. His mouth opened atop hers, and Jessica followed his lead. She knew what he wanted, and she welcomed him. The moment his tongue touched hers a thousand tiny fireballs exploded inside her.

She’d been lonely for so long, ached for something so long and never understood what it was. Now she knew, but wasn’t sure she could live with the knowing.

It was Simon. She ached to have his arms around her, his lips against hers, his hands touching her.

She couldn’t understand what was happening to her. She couldn’t stand on her own. The sensations he caused with his touch, with his kiss, were a thousand times greater than anything she had ever imagined.

She dug her fingers into the corded muscles of his shoulders and held on.

His mouth lifted from hers, and he framed her face with his hands. A glazed look stared down at her. “This was not supposed to happen yet, Jesse. I promised myself it would not.”

He brought his mouth down on hers again, his kiss even more intense than before. More demanding. When he blazed a trail of kisses down her throat, Jessica tilted her head, amazed at the raging fire spreading through her limbs.

He touched his lips to the hollow spot at the base of her throat, then kissed a path over the rise of her breasts while his fingers worked at the ribbons of her gown. The material parted, and he pushed it off her shoulders until she stood naked before him.

She shuddered a sigh. Oh, the feel of his mouth against her skin. Jessica squeezed her eyes shut tight and held him close as he moved his kisses lower on her breast. The sensation was tantalizing. She was powerless to do anything but anchor her hands on his shoulders and hold him to her.

She had never experienced anything so wonderful. So agonizing. She was positive she could stand no more. She wrapped her arms around Simon’s neck and nestled her head against his chest as he carried her across the room. He laid her down in the center of the bed, and she opened her arms to welcome him.

Chapter 12