He couldn’t bring himself to sit in the chair for it brought an intimacy to the moment, a level of civility, he was trying desperately to avoid.
“And so you escaped the smugglers,” he said to distract his thoughts, “and found work in Paris.” Fabian would want to know the details.
“Madame Bonnay died. Not long after, her husband was found dead in the woods. With both of them gone I had no choice but to escape, though I doubt I shall ever stop looking over my shoulder.”
“But you’ve not seen the smugglers since.”
“No. After that, I spent two years working as a maid but—” Her eyes suddenly filled with tears. A few drops landed on her porcelain cheeks. She shook her head and sucked in a deep breath. “After leaving there, I moved to—” A choking sob escaped.
Vane saw a multitude of emotions pass across her face: grief and shame and sorrow. He closed the gap between them, took her hand and brought her to her feet.
“Sometimes it is better to cry than to bury the pain inside.” He was a hypocrite. Every negative emotion he’d ever felt lingered in the hollow cavern of his chest.
Tears came in a constant stream now. She seemed so small and helpless, not at all the wicked vixen he’d painted her out to be. The sight of it tore at his heart. He cupped her cheeks, wiped away the evidence of her misery with the pads of his thumbs.
“Oh, Ross, I cannot tell you how dreadful it has been.”
“Hush now.” Against his better judgement, he drew her into an embrace. Almost instantly her essence penetrated the fine fabric of his coat. The strange energy that had always bound them together flowed between them as though the last eight years had never existed. “You’re safe now. You’re home.”
“I will never be safe. I have no home.” She wrapped her arms around him, pressed her forehead to his chest and cried until there were no more tears left to shed. It was the sound of someone devoid of all hope.
No matter how many women he’d taken in his arms, no matter how many he’d taken to his bed, no one touched him like Estelle did. Despite the gravity of her situation, despite all that had happened, the urge to hold her and never let go almost knocked him off his feet.
And then she looked up at him, all lost and forlorn, those wide doe-like eyes swollen and red.
He bent his head, brushed his lips once across hers and whispered, “I’m sorry for all you have been through.”
She looked into his eyes, yet it felt as if she’d found the secret door to his soul, opened it and stepped inside. When she came up on her tiptoes, he froze.
“I’m sorry, too.” For what, she did not say. But she closed her eyes and kissed him. One chaste peck led to another and another, each one more daring than the last. Her breathing grew short and shallow. Small hands skimmed his waist and drifted up over his chest to clutch the lapels of his coat. “Oh, Ross,” she gasped against his mouth. “I have been alone for so long.”
The comment resonated with him. Yes, he had kissed women but never truly tasted them. He had entered their willing bodies but never made love to any of them. A man could count a hundred lovers and still be lonely. He could lie next to a warm body at night and still be frozen to his core.
“Won’t you kiss me?” she whispered. “Just once, like you used to.”
He wanted to deny her and yet found he could not. She wanted the sweet, tender kiss of a young man but she would get the sinful kiss of a scoundrel.
Vane crushed her to his chest, covered her mouth and devoured those plump wet lips. She tasted as he remembered: of rightness, of hope, of something infinitely addictive. The carnal need for more, the need to satisfy the clawing hunger, led him to tease her lips apart and enter the only place in the world he’d ever wanted to be.
Estelle met him with equal enthusiasm, letting her tongue tangle with his. Her pretty moans conveyed delight in the erotic dance. Their desperation to explore, to sate their lustful urges was yet another thing they had in common. A whimper resonated in the back of her throat. One of pleasure, not pain.
Liquid fire burst through his veins. Dangerously hot. Wickedly sensual. His pulse galloped. His desire spiralled. Their passion ignited like a blinding fury: wild, intense, uniquely satisfying.
With his large hands settling on her buttocks, he shuffled forward until she had no choice but to collapse on the bed. He followed her, covering her body as he’d always planned to do.
They were lost in their heady kisses, panting as their bodies writhed to an ancient rhythm.
Years of practised skill in the steps of bringing a lover to a bone-shattering climax abandoned him. While his fingers fumbled with the hem of her dress, dragging it up past her thigh, his mind rushed to the denouement. They were fully clothed, but he imagined them naked, pictured the moment of bliss when he entered her body.
Good God, he was liable to spend himself long before then. The thought was sobering as was the sudden banging and moaning again from the occupants next door.
Was this what he wanted?
To take his dream and turn it into something soiled and sordid. Eight years of pining, of heartache, reduced to a quick fuck in a coaching inn. Everything he touched bore the Devil’s mark. Would he ruin the one thing he’d always held sacred? The only truth in his life: his feelings for Estelle.
He tore his mouth away and scrambled to his feet. His hard cock throbbed against the material of his breeches, the ache for satisfaction muddling his thoughts. The need to dominate surfaced, too. He could kneel between her legs, taste her arousal with his tongue. Suck and lick her into submission. Give everything, take nothing. Show her the pleasure she had denied herself long ago.
Vane looked down at her — the angel of his dreams, the devil of his nightmares. During all the solitary moments when he had played out this scene, he was strong, commanding, knew his mind. But in reality, he did not know what the hell he wanted anymore.