Chapter 30

As he stepped forward to open the coach door, Devorlane Hawley fought the urge to wipe his hands down his thighs. Burning ears didn't trouble him. Nor did Tilly stomping about threatening to pack her bags. But he was troubled. He knew it as he twisted the handle, by the fact it felt sticky in his palm.
Ridiculous, when by tomorrow morning he'd be considering his boiled eggs and bacon with more interest-which spoke volumes. He abhorred boiled eggs and bacon. Yet there it was.
The rain-slicked glass of the window obscured his view from what was inside. It would be entirely like the captivating damned jade to send the coach back empty, to now be God knew where.
No matter the icy frost of her self-containment and despite losing it ever so slightly earlier, she was the queen of jewel thieves. Was he meant to believe she wasn't equally skilled in the bedroom? Of course she was. That was why relief flooded at the sight of her, fanned by lantern beams. When one night was as much as this was going to be, he didn't want deprived of it.
Opening the door he extended his hand. Why not? People thought he had no manners. Unlike the perfect Ardent. If it was the choice between humiliating her and being like the perfect Ardent, though, thinking of what was in store for him with this treasure, he'd be the perfect Ardent.
"Thank you, Lord Hawley, but are you not concerned I might steal something from your noble person?"
He sighed. He sighed deeply. Being like the perfect Ardent was going to be well nigh impossible with this impertinent strumpet. Still he kept his hand extended. "Let's get this straight, Miss Armstrong-"
"Cassidy."
"Cassidy. I find anything missing from my person, this house, or any of the people in it, I will have no hesitation in setting the law on you. Do you understand?"
Her eyes glinted with a mountain stream's coolness. So she must have although she still didn't make any move out the coach. "This is another condition?"
"I have counted the household silver. I have counted everything. You should know that before you venture any further."
"Bravo, Lord Hawley. I'm glad to see we're starting as we mean to go on. With perfect trust and honesty."
Her touch, even the feel of her glove as she settled her hand in his, was something he wasn't unaware of. In fact his skin might as well have not been there, the way in which she immolated it.
"Trust and honesty? A thief speaking of such things as that." He was forced to say it-to breathe at any rate-against her hair, exotically perfumed ambergris, so delicious the scent clogged the back of his throat before slithering over his tonsils and winding its sensuous way down into his lungs. Did she notice? He prayed not.
"Oh, you would be surprised what thieves speak about in their spare time."
"I doubt it. This is Charlie by the way."
She paused, one sturdily booted foot staying firmly planted on the coach step. Now what, when his desire for her, his thirst, was like a raging torrent, one that threatened to blow his balls apart? The downcast summation of his waistcoat was her usual.
"Lord Hawley, I believe we agreed restrictions."
Had they? Unless she counted him giving her ten minutes to leave the area if she didn't agree, a restriction? Unless of course the tiresome creature thought he meant what he said about m閚ages.
"Maybe we did, Cassidy, unless there is one on him taking your bags. He's my man. My friend. You met him the other night."
Now her other foot rooted as well. "You mean the servants wouldn't-"
He sighed somewhat in exasperation. Such indignation, indeed the airs of a duchess in a damned gutter-snipe, who came here prepared to sleep with him in exchange for poring over a pile of papers, was unexpected. But then a lot of this was.
"I never asked them. All right? I've always found the less the servants know about the damn goings on in a house, the better. I mean, you must have been in a few houses like that in your time."
"I see. It is just you did say you would show me the papers first. Until you do, the bags stay here. The coach does too. I haven't agreed to sleep with you, and ruin myself in the eyes of the county, for nothing. Certainly, I haven't agreed to sleep with him."
What? After all this, all the trouble he had taken on his return home here today, the place in an uproar because Mephisto had cantered back without him, and then all that hell to pay with Tilly, who should just have been thankful not to be finding herself sewing a seam in some garret by now, the snit dared get awkward?
"Show you the papers? That may take all night."
"Nevertheless."
He tilted his jaw, his eyes narrowing. The standoff was ridiculous. Who the hell was this woman, defying him like this? He just hoped no one bar Charlie was watching, or if they were they thought it was the weather they discussed. It was raining after all. Not heavily, but enough to make her take her time about getting out the coach. "You may see I have them, Miss Armstrong-"
"Cassidy."
"That's as much as you will damn well be seeing for now."
He didn't mean to swear, or to reach into the carriage either. Another mistake. He had at least reckoned on getting her inside Chessington first, before he got inside her, and not on taking her on the coach floor. But the body to body contact, the impression of ruffled indignity, even the swish of her black skirts made his skin tighten, as he yanked her out the coach door and down the step. Christ, she was delicious, especially when she set her jaw like that and eyed his waistcoat with a thief's cold calculation.
The most notorious jewel thief in London in his bed? He'd no wish to be deprived. Already the chills that swept him left him with the distinct impression a fever lay on his skin. Of course he should have remembered that unlike his whores and his married women, she wasn't here, about to enter into this indecent pact, for him.
It made her more attractive. He hadn't felt anything quite like this in years. Usually he didn't want to know a name. But then her lips had haunted him, hadn't they?
Before the night was out he hoped to feel them on his body, although that too, inhabited the realms of a damnably boyish respect. Hunger-yes. Of the carnal sort-absolutely. Nothing he leered about, nothing he would force though. Given how he could humiliate her for what she'd done to him, it penetrated his consciousness in terms of being astonishing, as far as anything could penetrate it. Or he'd release her instead of sweeping his gaze over the entirely too bold contours of her face.
"Supper awaits us, Miss Armstrong. If you don't want it, I can just as easily tell Carson to take the coach and you back to Barwych, and you can leave-"
"Supper? Lord Hawley?"
The thought of food wasn't just highly appealing to this boldly provocative brigand, it was the reason the coral lips set in that compelling fashion and her eyes gleamed, wasn't it? And he'd heard it said food was the fastest way to a man's heart. Well, well.
At least it stopped him resorting to the cheapest of threats to keep her. Ones he would have no compunction about carrying out if she now turned tail. Although the thought of her turning tail, before he'd had the opportunity to experience her, dried his throat. The knowledge of her so close, in this mysterious black coat too, filled him with such a fire, and the scent of her hair, a little damp, a little cold, but unmistakably her, slowed his brain.
"Yes." He fought not to grimace. "Or maybe you thought I was somehow going to starve you?"
"Well, it happens I am hungry. So? Supper first is it?"
First? Fortunately, when it came to hearts, he wasn't here to find a way to hers because that cool appraisal suggested she'd none. She drew up her chin. This new boldness-oh, she had been bold before, but then there was at least the veneer of attempting to appear serene-this new boldness was appetizing, dazzling. This new boldness was something he couldn't take his eyes off. How had she blended into the background as Sapphire with a manner like this? Eyes like these?
"In the rush to pack, and bring myself here for your edification,I am afraid I forgot to eat," she added.
His eyes narrowed. Rush to pack? And yet she only brought one bag. That he could see anyway. The coach roof was bare. Of course, he hadn't looked around the back. But a woman who traveled so light? He'd never known one. Not in his vast and intimate acquaintance with womankind.
Deliberately he released her. Then he strode around the back of the carriage. Then he stepped back. All right, so Carson had fastened the trunk there. After her performance with the emeralds, and then with Lord Koorecroft, he hardly needed reminding she was cunningly manipulative though, and she might steal the papers from under his nose and waltz off into the darkness leaving him unfulfilled.
"There ... there is something wrong, Lord Hawley?"
He jerked his chin around. She was. But the fact was he wanted her. More than revenge. More than he'd wanted anything in a long time. Yes. He'd have blamed the opium had he taken any. He'd been too busy making a play of letting the servants think the key to the door linking her room to his was missing, and organizing supper, to dose himself up.
Anyway he wanted his mind clear. He'd waited a long time for this. Maybe the coat wasn't his idea of heaven-that black silk peignoir she'd kissed him in that night was something, wasn't it? If she was wearing that beneath the coat, he'd be a happy man.
By the time the evening was out they would be doing a damn sight more than eating.