Cross resisted the urge to put a fist into the larger man’s face. Fighting with Temple was futile, as he was enormous and unbeatable, but it would feel good to try. It would feel good to lose himself to the physical when he had spent so much of the last week resisting just that. Cross felt confident that he could draw blood. Or blacken an eye. “Stay away from Philippa Marbury, Temple. She’s not for you.”
“But she is for you?”
Yes, goddammit. He bit back the words. “She’s not for any of us.”
“Chase disagrees.”
“She’s most definitely not for Chase.”
“Shall I tell Bourne she’s here, then?” Cross heard the teasing in Temple’s voice. The knowledge that Cross would not be able to resist action. “Penelope could take her home.”
He should let it happen. Should let Bourne and Penelope handle their errant sister. Should let someone else tend to Pippa Marbury before she ruined herself and half of London besides.
A month ago, he could have. A week ago.
But now. “No.”
“I didn’t think so.” Temple’s amusement grated.
Cross cut him a look. “You deserve a sound thrashing.”
One side of Temple’s mouth kicked up in a wicked smirk. “You think you’re the one to deliver it?”
“No, but you’ll get it before long. And we shall all have a good long laugh.”
Something flickered in Temple’s black gaze at that. “Such promises tease, friend.” He put a hand to his chest dramatically. “They tease.”
Cross did not waste more words on his idiot partner. Instead, he left the room, long strides eating up the dark corridor that led to the back stairwell of the Angel, then soaring down the stairs to reach his quarry, his heart pounding, eager to find her. To capture her before someone else did.
If another touched her, he’d kill him.
He pushed out a private door, into one of the small, private antechambers on one side of the casino floor and out onto the floor, filled with laughing masked revelers. Not that he would have any trouble finding her . . . he could find her among thousands.
But he didn’t have to look very hard.
She gave a little squeak as they collided, and he reached out to capture her, hands coming to her shoulders to hold her steady. A mistake. He wasn’t wearing gloves, and this dress appeared to have a shocking lack of fabric. Her skin was soft and warm—so warm it fairly singed him.
And made him want to linger.
He did not release her, not even when her hands came to his chest to brace herself, her sapphire skirts swirling around them both, tangling in his legs as surely as the scent of her tangled in his mind, bright and fresh and utterly out of place in this dark, wicked world.
Instead, he pulled her back into the alcove from which he’d come, and said harshly, “Why aren’t you wearing gloves?”
The question surprised them both, but she recovered first. “I don’t like them. They eliminate a sense.”
It was hard to imagine losing any sensation when she was about . . . consuming his. He ignored the answer and tried again. “What are you doing here?” His voice was soft in the darkness—too soft. He meant to scold her. To scare her.
“I was invited.”
Nothing scared Pippa Marbury. “You shouldn’t have come.”
“No one can see me. I’m masked.”
He reached up for the mask in question, running his fingers along the delicate curving piece, all fine metalwork and architecture. Of course, Chase would have considered her spectacles. Chase considered everything. A thread of irritation began to unfurl in Cross’s chest, adding a harshness to his next words. “What would possess you to accept this invitation? Anything could happen to you here. Tonight.”
“I came to see you.”
The words were soft and simple and unexpected, and Cross had to pause for a moment to take them in. “To see me,” he repeated, like the imbecile into which he turned whenever she was around.
She nodded once. “I am angry with you.”
She didn’t sound it. And that was how he knew it was true. Pippa Marbury wouldn’t suffer ire the way other women would. Instead, she would develop the emotion and consider it from all angles before acting on it. And with that uncommon precision, she would take her opponent off guard as easily as if she’d launched a sneak attack in the dead of night.
“I am sorry,” he said, in the interest of self-preservation.
“For what?” she asked. He paused. No woman had ever asked him that. At his lack of reply, she added, “You don’t know.”
Not accusation. Fact.
“I don’t.”
“You lied to me.”
He had. “About what?”
“I take your question to mean that you’ve done it more than once,” she said.
He couldn’t see her eyes through the mask, and he wanted to tear it from her face for this conversation.
No, he didn’t. He didn’t want to have this conversation at all.
He wanted her to go home and get into bed and behave like a normal, aristocratic lady. He wanted her to be locked in a room until she became Lady Castleton and left London and his thoughts forever.
It appeared that he lied to himself, too.
He released her shoulders, loathing the loss of her soft skin.
“You’re an earl.”
The words were quiet, but the accusation in them was undeniable.
“I don’t like to think on it much.”
“Earl Harlow.”
He resisted the urge to wince. “I like to hear it even less.”
“Did you enjoy making a fool of me? Embarrassing me? All that mistering? And when I told you that if you’d been an aristocrat, I wouldn’t have asked for your help? Did you laugh uproariously after I left you that night?”
After she’d left him that night, he’d been utterly destroyed and desperate to be near her again. Laughing had been the farthest thing from his mind. “No,” he said, knowing he should add something else. Knowing there was more to be said. But he couldn’t find it, so he repeated, “No.”
“And I am to believe that?”
“It is the truth.”
“Just like the fact that you are an earl.”
He wasn’t entirely certain why this was such a frustration for her. “Yes. I’m an earl.”
She laughed, the sound devoid of humor. “Earl Harlow.”
He pretended it didn’t bother him, the name on her lips. “It’s not as though it’s a secret . . .”
“It was a secret to me,” she defended.
“Half of London knows it.”
“Not my half!” Now she was growing irritated.
As was he. “Your half was never meant to know. Your half never needed to know.”
“I should have known. You should have told me.”
He shouldn’t feel guilty. He shouldn’t feel beholden to her. He shouldn’t feel so out of control. “Why? You already have an earl. What good are two?”
Where in hell had that come from?
She stiffened in the darkness, and he felt low and base and wrong. And he hated that she could make him feel that way. He wanted to see her eyes. “Remove your mask.”
“No.” And that’s when he heard it. The sting in her voice. The edge of sorrow. “Your sister was right.”
The words shocked him. “My sister?”
“She warned me off you. Told me you never followed your word . . . told me never to believe you.” Her voice was low and soft, as though she wasn’t speaking to him, but to herself. “I shouldn’t have believed in you.”
He heard the addition of the in. Hated it. Lashed out at her. “Why did you, then? Why did you believe in me?”
She looked up at him, seeming surprised by his words. “I thought—” sh
e began, then stopped. Rephrased. “You saw me.”
What in hell did that mean?
He didn’t ask. She was already explaining. “You listened to me. You heard me. You didn’t mind that I was odd. In fact, you seemed to enjoy it.”
He did enjoy it. By God, he wanted to bask in it.
She shook her head. “I wanted to believe that someone could do all those things. Perhaps, if you did . . . then . . .”
She trailed off, but he heard the words as though she’d shouted them. Then Castleton might.
If he hadn’t already felt like a dozen kinds of ass, he would now. “Pippa.” He reached for her again, knowing he shouldn’t. Knowing that this time he could not resist touching her. And he might not be able to resist claiming her.
She stepped away from him, out of his reach, returning to the present. To him. “No.” Before he could act, move, take, repair, she took a deep breath, and spoke. “No. You are right, of course. I do have an earl, who is kind and good and soon to be my husband, and there is nothing about you or your past—or your present for that matter—that should be relevant to me.”
She backed away, and he followed her like a dog on a lead. Hating the words she spoke—their logic and reason. She was unlike any other woman he’d ever known, and he’d never in his life wanted to understand a woman so much.
She kept talking, looking down at her hands, those imperfect fingers woven together. “I understand that there is nothing about me that is of interest to you . . . that I’m more trouble than I’m worth . . . that I should never have brought you into my experiments.”
He stopped her. “They aren’t experiments.”
She looked up at him, eyes black in that ridiculous mask. He’d like to tear it from her, crush it beneath his boot and take a horsewhip to Chase for having it made. “Of course they are.”
“No, Pippa. They aren’t. They’re a desire for knowledge, certainly, a need for it, even. But more than that, they’re a need for understanding of this thing that you are about to do, that you have refused to stop and that terrifies you. They are a desperate ploy to stop yourself from feeling all the doubt and frustration and fear that you must be feeling. You say you want to understand what happens between men and women. Between husbands and wives. But instead of going to any number of those who know better—who know firsthand . . . you come to me. In the darkness.”
She backed away, even as he stalked her. “I came to you in the middle of the day.”
“It’s always night inside the Angel. Always dark.” He paused, loving the way her lips parted, just barely, as though she could not get enough air. Neither could he. “You came to me because you don’t want it. The ordinary. The mundane. You don’t want him.”
She shook her head. “That’s not true. I came to you because I don’t understand what all the fuss is about.”
“You came to me because you fear that it’s not worth the fuss with him.”
“I came to you because I thought you were a man I would not see again.”
“Liar.” The word was harsh in the small space, at once accusation and accolade.
She looked up at him, those black eyes empty. “You would know. You’ve lied to me from the very beginning with your weighted dice and your false promises and your Mr. Cross.”
“I never lied, love.”
“Even that is a lie!”
“I told you from the beginning that I was a scoundrel. That was my truth.”
She gaped at him. “And that absolves you of your sin?”
“I’ve never asked for absolution.” He reached for the horrid mask, pulling it from her face, regretting the movement the moment he saw those enormous blue eyes, swimming with emotion.
Not regretting it at all.
Adoring it.
Adoring her.
“I told you to leave me. I told you never to come near me.” He leaned in, torturing them both—so close and still an unbearable distance. “But you couldn’t resist. You want me to teach you the things you should learn from him. You want my experience. My sin. My kiss. And not his.”
Her gaze was on his mouth, and he held back a groan at the hunger in those blue eyes. God, he’d never wanted anything the way he wanted her.
“You’ve never kissed me,” she whispered.
“I’ve wanted to.” The words were so simple, they felt like a lie. Want didn’t come close to articulating the way he felt. About her touch. About her taste. About her.
Want was a speck in the universe of his desire.
She shook her head. “Another lie. You can’t even touch me without pulling away as though you’ve been burned. You clearly aren’t interested in touching me.”
For someone who prided herself on her commitment to scientific observation, Philippa Marbury was utterly oblivious.
And it was time he set her straight.
But before he could, she added, “At least Castleton kissed me when I asked.”
He froze. Castleton had kissed her.
Castleton had taken what Cross had resisted. What Cross had left.
What should have been Cross’s.
Vicious jealousy flared, and six years of control snapped. He caught her to him without hesitation, lifted her in his arms, pressed her to the richly upholstered wall, and did what he should have done the first moment he met her.
He kissed her, reveling in the feel of her lips on his, of the way she softened instantly against him, as though she belonged in his arms—his and no one else’s.
And she did.
She made a small, irresistible sound of surprise when he aligned his mouth to hers and claimed it for his own, swallowing the gasp and running his tongue along the full curve of her bottom lip until surprise turned to pleasure, and she sighed—giving herself to him.
And there, in that moment, he knew he would not stop until he’d had all of her. Until he’d heard every one of her little squeaks and sighs, until he’d tasted every inch of her skin, until he’d spent a lifetime learning the curves and valleys of her body and her mind.
It was the years of celibacy. After six years, any kiss would be this powerful. This earth-shattering.
Lie.
It was her.
It would always be her.
Lifting his lips from hers, he whispered, “You do burn me, Pippa. You enflame me.” He pressed her into the wall, pinning her with his body so he could free his hands to explore, to cup her jaw in one hand and tilt her lips to his and gain better access. He took her mouth again, throwing himself into the fire, stroking deep, wanting to consume her, wanting to erase every memory of every other man from her mind.
He ran the edge of his teeth along her lower lip, adoring the way she sighed and lifted her arms to wrap around his neck. And then, dear God, she was kissing him back—his brilliant bluestocking—first repeating his movements, then improving on them until the student surpassed the master to tortuous, nearly unbearable effect.
She writhed against him—as eager for him as he was for her—rocking her hips into his, the rhythm promising more than she could possibly know. He broke the kiss on a groan—a low, wicked sound that rumbled around them in this small, private place.
He trailed kisses across the line of her jaw to her ear, where he whispered, “He might have kissed you, love, but his kiss is nothing like mine, is it?”
She shook her head, her reply coming on heavy gasps of breath. “No.” He rewarded her honesty with a long lick along the curl of her ear, pulling the soft lobe of it in his teeth, worrying it until she sighed, “Cross.”
He lifted one hand to the line of her dress and yanked the fabric down, baring one perfect, pale breast, tracing his finger around and around her nipple until it went hard and aching. He tore his gaze away to find her equally transfixed by his touch.
Watching her beautiful blue eyes, he moved, pinching
the straining tip, loving the way her head tilted back resting against the wall as she sighed his name once more. He kissed her softly at the soft spot behind her jaw, tonguing the skin there. “His kiss doesn’t make you cry out his name.”
“No,” she said, pressing her breast into his hand, asking for more. As though she had to ask. He dipped his head, taking her nipple into his mouth, sucking until she cried out, the glorious sound muffled by curtains and the din of gamers nearby, who had no idea of what happened mere feet from them.
He rewarded her unbridled response with a deep, thorough kiss, reaching down to lift her skirts, fingers tracing along silk stockings and then silken skin as they climbed higher and higher. Her fingers tangled in his hair, clutching him to her as she gasped against his lips. He returned to her ear, whispering, “Tell me, my gorgeous, honest girl, does his kiss make you want to lift your skirts and take your pleasure here? Now?”
“No,” she confessed, soft and strained.
His hand moved higher, finding what he sought, downy hair and glorious wet heat. He stroked the backs of his fingers along the seam of her, wanting her more than he’d ever wanted anything in his life. “But mine does, doesn’t it?”
He slid one finger deep into her softness, and they both groaned at the pleasure of it. She was wet and wanting, and he couldn’t wait to give her everything she desired. He stroked, long and lush, through the wet, wonderful core of her as he whispered in the darkness, “It makes you want to hold your skirts high as I give you everything you deserve—as I teach you about sin and sex, with half of London a hairsbreadth away.”
“Yes.” She gasped, and he lifted her skirts higher with one hand, working his fingers high against her, making good on his promise, one finger pressing deep into her as his thumb worked a tight circle at the hard, straining center of her pleasure.
“This isn’t a lie, Pippa. This is truth. Wicked, undeniable truth.”
She clutched his arm, moving against him, not knowing what to do.
But he knew. It had been six years, but he had been waiting for this moment.
For her.
“Take your skirts, darling.”
She did as she was told, holding them high as he sank to his knees before her once more, as he had several nights earlier, only this time, he allowed himself access to her, to her heat and her scent and the magnificence of her body.