Chapter 46

He swallowed his surprise. The most awkward creature he had ever had the damned misfortune to meet, saying fine?He bent his head and kissed her.She didn't want him, but it would be his pleasure to make her. This hussy was full of it-indignation that was, although she was pretty full of something else as well. Something he recognized because he was too.
It was only another reason he wanted her. Another reason he needed to exorcise his inconvenient fascination for her, when everything resulted in him running after her today and now suffering this nonsense,not to mention agonies about what Tilly had told him. This was goodbye.
"Lord Hawley, I must ask-"
"Shhh." Recollecting himself, he edged his mouth back, creating a tiny inch of space between them. "Tonight I'm doing the asking. Besides you did say it was fine."
"But-"
"And you're doing the listening." Ignoring her protests, he reached to unhook her gown, working his hands fully inside, so his fingers splayed her back, so his fingertips touched welted flesh--unfortunately. "Unless you're still annoyed at me for driving you around and around?"
"I was beaten." She lowered her eyelashes, so close against his face they brushed his skin, although noticeably she never lowered her eyes. "Even that first day. The time I returned without the Wentworth emeralds was the worst. Starkadder threw Matthew into the gutter, where he perished. He perished in my arms. I am only explaining something."
Christ. He closed his eyes.Revenge? Remember?
"Then don't right now. I didn't fetch you back in here so we could compare scars."
"Fine."
"So you keep saying."
She disengaged herself and walked to the bed with her face set. Sitting down, she fixed her eyes on him like showering sparks burning particles of skin he wished he didn't possess. Even when she bent to remove her shoes and then began unpeeling her gown they didn't budge. She didn't take her nose out of the air either.
He emerged from tugging his shirt over his head to see she was in the process of peeling off her stockings. Obviously she'd not just seen, she'd examined his scar. It meant he could remove his trousers freely. What was more he intended to, while keeping his gaze fixed on her, after first removing his boots and socks. He had already determined to look bored, to look controlled. It was hard to look what he didn't feel. But it was written in his cold blood, he was going to win here.
He set the trousers on the chair, walked to the bed and sat down beside her. Of course she didn't want him to kiss her. Those lips had haunted his dreams though. He leaned forward. She set her jaw harder.
"Uh. Open."
"Or what?"
"I could stop you seeing these papers. Or ... " He teased the long length of black ribbon that held her chemise shut. Christ, what was she doing wearing such a thing as a black chemise? "I could remove this, seeing as you've conspicuously failed to."
If looks could kill he'd be dead, although her iciness and the bored look she mustered was admirable.
"Fine."
The iciness and the bored look she mustered were not going to put him off.Her lips tasted cool. In his time he'd kissed many women. He'd even kissed this one. How the hell was it though, that her lips were so delicious they spoke to his soul? The tiniest brush, the slightest taste and he wanted more. Because she kept her jaw set and her eyebrows raised?
Easing his fingers inside her chemise, he cupped her breast. Its round, succulent fullness made him breathe his satisfaction. In spite of his resolution to remain unmoved, he was moved. Ridiculous. But that black chemise did things to his head. And now he inched it apart so her breasts were exposed to his touch, she did things to his head too.He lowered his mouth to the soft, creamy skin.
"Lord Hawley, please, I really must insist that you desist from-"
"What?" He raised his head. Christ, he wished she'd shut her mouth, except when he kissed her, although perhaps it was as well she didn't, what thrummed in his blood at the sweet taste of her nipple. "Kissing you here?"
"If you don't mind."
"Why?"
"I'm your mistress. And as your mistress I must insist on not being treated like a play thing."
"That may be, but who says that I am treating you that way?"
"Me." She clamped the chemise shut. "If you must know."
"Is this out of bounds too?" He edged his hand between her thighs.
He hoped not although he wasn't certain, when his head swam like this, that he wasn't getting in to the kind of physical debt with a woman he'd never been in. Had no desire to be in, the worst thing being that he'd no desire to stop it either. He slid his fingertip inside her. Just the slightest bit. Anticipation washed over him in waves. For something he'd already had too.
"Obviously not if I'm your mistress," she said.
Damn her, doing everything to put him off his mark. Well, she was in the hands of the wrong man that way. She could stick her nose in the air as high as she liked. He knew by the feel of her, by the hot, potent, scent, he was going to win here.
"Who doesn't want to act like it?"
"You said it first." She shrugged.
He slid his finger further. "That's because you don't seem very bored to me."
"Only because you're so addicted to opium you wouldn't know the-"
"But I do." He bent his head and kissed her. Thief or not, woman who had wrecked his life or not, he wanted to drink her. For pure, warm pleasure to unfurl beneath his lips, beneath his fingertips. For her to want him in that bold questing way she'd delved into that box and wanted these papers in the library.
"-difference." She closed her mouth against him. "But if you want I can yawn if that will convince you."
"Why should you do that when you don't want to?"
"I do."
"Well, I don't think so."
He eased his mouth down her body, her soft breasts, the hollowed arch of her stomach. Thieving magpie or not, she was delicious.Especially the way she tensed when his lips found their mark. Probably tried to look even more bored too.
He smiled. Slowly he eased her backwards onto the bed. Slowly he pushed into her. Christ, Jesus, and all the saints, maybe she was tight, but she was also slick as soft velvet. The feel of her had him close to release. As for the way she lowered her eyelashes? Or rather the reason? She wasn't as immune to him as she'd like to be, or him to think. In fact he swore he cracked ice here. It was all delicious. He didn't know about her, but he soared, leaving the world behind, especially when he felt her throb of pleasure ripple around him. Only with the greatest of efforts did he remind himself to pull free and spend on the sheets.
He was shocked by how badly he didn't want to. How badly he wanted to gather her into his arms too. How shocked he was that he did just that.
In over his head. He was getting in over his head. But so long as he got back out again and found dry land, there was no danger of drowning.
This was goodbye, wasn't it?