Lorraine Heath - Midnight Pleasures with a Scoundrel

He wanted to believe her, he wanted to forgive her. He wanted what they’d somehow managed to capture that last night, but he knew it was in the past.

“You’re going to take us back to London, aren’t you?” she asked.

“I have no choice.”

She gave him a resolute nod. “I don’t think the storm is completely over. We’ll probably have a bit more rain.”

“We’ll go when I’m finished with the journal.”

Drawing the blanket more securely around her, she worked her way out of his embrace. “I should go to the house now, change into some dry clothing.”

“I’ll stay and put out the fire.”

She gave him a tremulous smile. “There’s so much I want to tell you, but I’m not certain you’d trust the words. You might think I’m trying to sway you from your duty, but I’m not.”

“Then don’t say them.”

He saw the hurt in her eyes, but at that moment he was struggling with his own demons, not certain that he could trust himself to do the right thing.

She rose gracefully and strolled out of the cove. He sat by the fire and stared out to sea. She was wrong. It was never completely quiet here. He could hear the thrashing against the cliffs, the water tumbling into the cove, splashing against the shore. But it was rhythmic and peaceful. Gave a man leave to think.

Yet all he could think was that no good options remained to him.

Emma had been correct concerning the weather. The wind picked up in the late afternoon and the rain began to fall. They were enclosed in the house. Following dinner, the three of them retired to the front parlor, the ladies with their needlework and Swindler with the journal.

Although he was reading Elisabeth’s words, he could clearly see Emma in each of them. Gathering seashells, feeding the seagulls. And he saw things that weren’t written. He imagined her running barefoot to greet their father when he returned from town. He could see her chasing chickens and laughing on a swing.

“How did you come to work for Scotland Yard, Mr. Swindler?” Eleanor asked, never lifting her gaze from her needlework.

“I would report those who committed crimes in the rookeries, give the policemen descriptions so they could arrest the offenders.”

Her fingers stilled as she lifted her gaze to his. “I see. So you’ve made it your life’s work to see the proper people punished.”

“I believe in justice, Miss Watkins.”

Nodding, she returned to her embroidery.

“Exactly how did you do it?” he asked.

Her head came up so quickly that he heard her neck pop. “Do what?”

“Kill Rockberry.”

Emma’s eyes widened with alarm. “Don’t force her to go through it again.”

“If you don’t want to hear, leave, but I have questions and I want answers.”

Emma reached across and wrapped her hand around Eleanor’s. “I’ll not leave my sister to suffer alone.”

Swindler’s gut clenched with the knowledge that she’d gladly go to the gallows with her sister-and in doing so, she’d leave him alone. She was as courageous and reckless as he’d always believed. He turned his attention back to Eleanor. “You enjoyed a glass of wine with him.”

“Yes. I caught him as he was going into the residence. He invited me in. Said I reminded him of Elisabeth, only more beautiful. No gentleman had ever told me I was beautiful before. To my everlasting shame, I began to succumb to his charms.”

“But you didn’t finish your wine.”

“No. He jerked me out of the chair and tried to kiss me, all the while saying horrible untruths about Elisabeth. I had the dagger and I used it.”

“Only one stab.”

“Yes.”

He took comfort in the fact that she wasn’t gloating. He had a feeling she was caught between remorse that she’d taken a life and satisfaction that the man who’d trifled with her sister was no longer breathing.

“Did he die immediately?”

“Must you put her through this?” Emma demanded.

“It’s all right, Emma,” Eleanor said. “No. He writhed around for a bit, then went still. And I left.”

“You should have taken the dagger with you.”

“I thought of it later, but I just wanted to leave. And I certainly didn’t want to touch him.”

Something about that crime nagged at him, something that hadn’t seemed right at the time. He was certain it would come to him.

“If you had it to do over-” he began.

“I’d do it again,” she said succinctly. “Finish reading the journal, Mr. Swindler. Quite possibly you’ll wish you’d had the opportunity to use a dagger on him.”

He returned to his reading. Rather than returning to their needlework, the ladies went to prepare themselves for bed. Based on the sounds he heard coming down the hallway, he could only assume those preparations included bathing.

How could he concentrate on the words when his mind was suddenly filled with images of Emma soaking in the tub, drops of water rolling over her skin? Lord help him, he wanted to join her, wash her, dry her, hold her.

He fought to clear his mind of everything except the journal. Each page painted a portrait of a young girl growing into womanhood with dreams of love, family, happiness. There was an innocence in her descriptions, a joy for life, and excitement awaiting each day. Elisabeth Watkins had been purity. Sweetness.

She’d been very much like Emma.

Long after the ladies went to bed and the house had grown quiet except for the storm raging outside, Swindler indulged in another bath for himself. It wasn’t unusual for him to bathe several times a week. He had a childhood in the rookeries to constantly wash off.

He thought of Eleanor’s hands. Some things, no matter how often or how hard you scrubbed, were always there, just below the surface waiting to come forth.

Following the ritual he’d begun the night before, he grabbed a lamp and checked the house before climbing the stairs to the bedchamber.

He knew Emma was there the moment he opened the door, before he’d stepped fully inside and the lamp illuminated the room. He’d detected the presence of roses as though the petals were unfurling, not a lingering scent, but full and strong. His stomach tightened with the heady fragrance filling his nostrils.

Turning in its direction, he found her standing by the window, dressed in a night rail, her pale hair loose, inviting his fingers to comb through it. He imagined if there were no storm, she’d be limned by moonlight, but the wind and rain continued to thrash about.

“How long do these storms usually last?” he asked quietly.

“We can never predict the storms. Shut the door.”

If he were a gentleman, he’d have shut it with himself on the other side. Instead, he pulled it closed, the snick of it blocking out the rest of the world reverberating through the room like a bullet fired from a pistol. With two steps he placed the lamp on the table beside the bed. With four more he’d joined her at the window and was cradling her cheek. “Emma.”

“How do you know I’m not Eleanor?” she whispered.

“Because it’s not Eleanor who holds my heart.”

He heard her small gasp, saw her eyes widen as they filled with tears.

“Damn you, Emma, for not trusting me in London.”

Anger and frustration drove him to pull her into his arms and slash his mouth across hers. Something stronger than affection, something he didn’t want to truly acknowledge or give name to, forced him to gentle his plunder of her mouth. She’d taken possession of his heart slowly, with smiles and laughter and a touch of innocence such as he’d never experienced.

He’d known then that she was unlike any other woman of his acquaintance. She’d intrigued him. Even if he hadn’t been ordered to follow her, he’d have followed her-to the ends of the earth if need be. He could claim all he wanted that he’d searched tirelessly for her in order to bring her to justice, but the truth was that he’d been obsessed with finding her because he was obsessed with her.

After she’d been in his apartment, it had suddenly become incredibly lonely without her presence there. After she’d become part of his days and nights, his life had hardly seemed worth living without her in it.

Greedily he trailed his mouth over her chin and along her neck until he reached the sweet shell of her ear. “Leave now unless you want to end up in my bed.”

His voice was harsh, his breathing ragged, his body straining beyond endurance to claim her again, to fill her, to be surrounded by her.

“It’s my bed,” she said shakily, and he heard the same raw need in her voice that quivered through his.

Laughing, when he’d never expected to laugh again, released some of the tension in him as he dipped down and lifted her into his arms. “Then allow me to take you to your bed.”

As she stroked her fingers over his bare shoulders, as his mouth returned to hers, as his long strides took her to the bed, Emma felt joy spiral through her when she’d never expected to feel joy again. She’d waited until Eleanor drifted off to sleep before slipping from the bed and coming to this room. She’d been waiting nervously for his arrival. A dozen times she considered returning to Eleanor’s bed, but if her life was to be cut short or if it was to take her on a journey to the far side of the world where she’d never again be in James’s company, then she wanted this time with him, and so she’d waited in anticipation.

And she’d not been disappointed when he walked through the door bare-chested and masculine, larger than life, bold and confident. He was everything she wasn’t. Never doubting what he wanted. Never questioning his actions. She’d seen it in the graceful way he moved through the room, the heated awareness in his eyes as he’d neared.

Her heart had nearly burst with overwhelming gratitude when he rasped her name as though he understood how much she needed to hear her name on his lips at that precise moment. Every moment spent with him in London had been bittersweet, his whispering her sister’s name painful to hear. Her deception adding to her misery. In London she’d been masquerading as Eleanor.

Here, for the first time, no shadows of deception eased between them. It was her name that he whispered. Now within her bedchamber, honesty reigned. He was hers and she was his, completely and absolutely. Regardless of what heartache tomorrow or the day following might bring, tonight would be as uncomplicated and as breathtaking as either of them could make it.

Without removing his mouth from hers, he lowered her feet to the patterned rug beside her bed. She thought she should step away, should remove her gown, but she seemed unable to stop running her hands over his bare chest, shoulders, and arms. His muscles quivered with anticipation. She did that to him, had power over him. She watched his face as his gaze followed the movements of his fingers as they quickly worked to release one button after another on her gown, the material parting of its own accord. Meanwhile, beneath her fingers, she felt his muscles growing taut, could feel as well as hear his breathing becoming more ragged.

His hands slid inside her gown, bracketing her ribs, his thumbs enticingly skimming the underside of her breasts. Stepping forward, he placed his open mouth on her throat where her pulse fluttered wildly. She relished the heat of his tongue swirling over her flesh as he nudged the material aside until he reached her breast and closed his mouth over it. Rising up on her toes, wrapping her arms around him, she pressed her lower body toward his while arching her back, lost in the sensations he managed to bring to the fore with seemingly so little effort.

He slowly moved his mouth across the valley between her breasts before giving the same attentions to the other. His low, throaty growl of satisfaction echoed between them, and she moaned in response, before straightening. He lifted his head and his eyes captured hers. With only the low flame in the lamp to provide light, the green was lost but not the intense desire glittering within their depths. She skimmed her hands down his chest, felt the muscles of his stomach quivering in anticipation as her fingers glided over them until she reached his trousers. His eyes darkened and the muscles in his face tensed. Ever so slowly, tormenting them both, she freed one button. She watched his eyes slam closed, the muscles of his throat work as he swallowed. When he opened his eyes, she could see the strain trying his patience.

“Emma,” he rasped, “for God’s sake. Move a bit more quickly. You’re torturing me here.”

“Say my name again.”

“Emma.”

She freed a button.

“Emma.”

Another.

“Dear sweet Emma.”

The last button released him and his torment. She wrapped her fingers around the velvety heat. With a low groan, he bracketed her face and brought his mouth back to hers, kissing her with a fierceness that matched the storm beating against the cottage. She was barely aware of them discarding what remained of their clothing before falling together onto the bed.