"You"ll go your way. I"m sure that you will accept Trant"s proposal in a few weeks as well. Be a fine lady and leave the room as messy or clean as you entered it." He started flicking cards again.
"I think you grossly overestimate my impact."
"For your sake, let"s hope so."
The door opened, and she knew Roman entered, but her eyes were still frozen on Andreas.
"I"m promoting Peter. That"s all there is to it," Roman said, and she could hear the door close.
Andreas"s eyes held death and destruction, then he looked down at his fingers, blinked, and only boredom remained in his expression as he finished dealing.
"What did I miss?" Roman plopped into his chair, hands pulling his cards toward him, quick eyes taking in everyone at the table, narrowing in turn. "Everyone"s getting along well, I see." Pinning Bill, whose eye slid from his. Charlotte wondered if the man would spill the conversation later, or if Andreas would get to him first.
She wasn"t sure she wanted Roman to know.
The hand played quickly. No one spoke much, as everyone seemed quite eager to avoid Roman"s eyes.
Surprisingly, she easily won, her cards clear winners.
"Milady wins this hand. Good game," Bill said more cheerfully.
"Did you think she would be the one to lose?" Andreas asked, as if it were an insignificant question, only the darkness in his eyes stating otherwise.
Silence met the p.r.o.nouncement and stretched uncomfortably. Roman"s quick, narrowed eyes took in the players, trying to piece together what had occurred.
"Another game of Commerce?" he asked, almost casually, concentrating on Bill.
"Think it"s time to turn in, Boss," Bill said, chuckling uncomfortably, not meeting his gaze. "Milt? See if the boys have things in hand downstairs? I"ll even come with ye on the rounds."
Milton shrugged into his jacket, sc.r.a.ping his chips into a cap he pulled from the sleeve. "Can"t turn that down. There was some trouble at the highway last night. Gent murdered. Be good to have three eyes there for a few minutes tonight."
They said their farewells, adding more gentlemanly ones for Charlotte, then slipped from the room more quickly than she imagined they normally would.
Andreas tapped his tricks on the table, then threw them into the center. He made a dark noise and rose, grabbing his jacket in one smooth motion. He turned and walked to the door.
"I"ll speak with you later," Roman said evenly at his departing back.
Andreas didn"t halt, just signaled something over his shoulder. Something that she guessed wasn"t exactly a kind gesture. The door slammed behind him.
Silence stretched over Charlotte as Roman"s eyes remained narrowed on the wood.
"What an a.s.s," he finally said.
She cleared her throat. "Your brother doesn"t approve."
He made a little hand gesture. "He doesn"t approve of anyone."
"No." She laughed without humor. "You shouldn"t have brought me here. It will just cause you trouble."
"What did he say?" The question was casually asked, a thread of coaxing beneath.
She pressed her lips together.
Roman sighed and pushed his chair back, obviously confident that he would find out later. "Don"t pay whatever it was any mind. It"s just his nature. He"s overbearing. Especially with recent events."
She stared at him, disbelieving, as he rose, stretching. "Overbearing?"
Roman stretched farther, his s.h.i.+rt lifting a bit to show a peek of skin beneath. "My G.o.d, I was just up, and still, how do people sit in those k.n.o.bby, wooden chairs for so long?"
"You are spoiled."
"I know." He grinned widely, his eyes lighting with that rare boyish charm that was so odd on such a sinful face. "It"s brilliant, no?"
She shook her head but couldn"t stop an answering smile, trying to fully push away the lingering unease Andreas"s words had caused. "You are a menace."
"Also brilliant." He swept forward and suddenly lifted her up and over his shoulder.
She let out a surprised squeak. "What are you doing?"
"Being a menace." He strode forward, kicked the door to his bedroom fully open, and plopped her down on the bed.
"This is hardly proper," she said breathlessly, antic.i.p.ating his next movements already.
"There is nothing proper I want to do to you anyway." A finger stroked down her throat.
"I can"t stay all night," she whispered.
He smiled and leaned forward. "We"ll see."
Chapter 19.
L oose hair fell across her eye, and she had the strangest urge to blow it from her view. Emily did that, but Charlotte had never dared.
She touched his collarbone, tracing it down to his sternum. There were old and plentiful wounds there. She circled one at the top, then moved to the next.
"Cataloging my imperfections?"
"From where did you get them?"
"Here and there."
She circled a third that undoubtedly had been made by a knife, then pinched him in response to his nonanswer. He caught her hand and flipped her. Her hair spread in all directions, leaving her free to observe him. He pinned her hands above her head with one hand, and her breathing sped back up. One bent leg pressed her hips to the bed.
"I"d rather examine you." His free fingers traced down her collarbone and followed the same path she had taken but veered off when he reached her left breast, tracing the perimeter, watching it with a lazy smile as her chest rose more rapidly, pus.h.i.+ng it higher toward him.
He leaned down, his roughened cheek resting on the edge of one breast, his lips breaths away from the other. "You realize"-every puff of warmed air hit her-"I could do anything to you right now. Anything I want."
She squirmed, strangely aroused by the thought. Then again, she had given complete trust to him in this arena weeks ago. "You do realize you already did things to me?"
One finger traveled up the inside of her thigh, and the tip curled slowly into her. She arched against him, still pinned beneath. He withdrew the touch and began making lazy patterns on her thigh. Her breath came quickly now, for at any moment he would repeat the motion. She knew it. Could feel him smiling against her chest. His amused breath against her exposed nipple.
"There is your perfect thigh."
She tensed at the word.
His finger slipped over her thigh, then just as easily slipped into her, her body once again ready, curving in a little more, brus.h.i.+ng against the shockingly potent place that he"d already overcome her with.
"And your perfect smoothness."
She clenched around the digit, body trying to lift up. His palm cupped her, and his thumb rubbed between. She panted out a breath, then another, all calmness and coolness erased.
"And your perfect reaction."
"I hate that word." She breathed the response.
"I know you do," he whispered against her ear.
"Who are you?" And unlike earlier, this time she purely meant it as a question to him.
He pulled back and met her eyes steadily. "Simply a man."
"I know so little about you," she whispered. "Sometimes I"m not even sure you are real. While you know everything about me."
"What flowers you like, what time you rise in the morning, how you take your tea? Hardly things that others don"t know or can"t learn."
"No." She kept her eyes locked with his. "Not those things."
"How you like to be touched?" He pulled a finger over her thigh, the sensitive inner flesh that always made her s.h.i.+ver. "How your body responds best? What makes you moan?"
"Not just those either." She shook her head slowly, tilting it back on the pillow, something choking and fearful and overwhelming taking hold of her.
"What you hope for? What you need?" He leaned forward and whispered in her ear. "What you fear?"
Everything she feared. Things she didn"t want to admit to herself. Foolish, vain things. And things she both wanted, and needed, him to know. That terrified her far worse than anything else ever had. For this man to have her secrets-what would that mean? She couldn"t have anything lasting with him. She would be married. This would come to an end. And even if she went the way of the ton -affairs and liaisons after the production of heirs-he would undoubtedly lose interest. Men always did once they put the trophy away.
And yet, it whispered between them. That he knew her secrets. That he held them close. That he might always do so.
"Yes." The word barely emerged, and in fact she thought she might not have spoken it at all, except that she could see the reflection of it in his satisfied expression as he leaned back again.
"And you?" she whispered. "What do you fear, Roman? You, who seem fearless."
His satisfied expression immediately turned blank. He released her, his leg retreating, only his tapping fingers on her hipbone remaining.
She didn"t think he would respond, but she kept silent, not wanting to fill the silence. Hoping he would start speaking.
For how long had she let him give her what she wanted and needed yet not asked after him in return? Something of their conversation from earlier, before they"d come here to play cards, echoed between them, unspoken. Unresolved.
And he could so easily say nothing.
"A cage. No exit," he said.
Her throat clenched. "A confirmed bachelor?" she said lightly.
"Mmmm."
His tapping fingers began drawing lazy patterns again. "A raven, a dove or rabbit . . . life extinguished."
Her heart beat faster. She wanted to ask- "No choices." He sucked suddenly at her throat, at the beating pulse there. "Choices taken away."
Her eyes closed. When they reopened, he was drawing patterns once more-across her chest and down her stomach.
"There are so many things to fear, aren"t there, Charlotte? Silly things." He touched a lock of her hair, pulling it over her shoulder. "Real things." He touched her hand, fingers circling her fourth finger from the right. "Dangerous things, and things that make no sense." He smoothed his hand down her stomach and over her hip. "Better to live now than fear what is to come."
His eyes met hers, and her breath caught. As if he were asking her to rid herself of all her fears. Fingers touched her cheek.
"Are you playing other games with me, Roman?" she whispered. "Are you playing with me for sport?"
Was any of this real?
One finger drew down her cheek. "Yes. No. Yes."
She hadn"t asked three questions aloud though. Which corresponded to which?
"Charlotte, who asks for everything. Charlotte, who asks for nothing in return for herself."
She opened her mouth to speak, to deny, but he gently pushed his fingers to her lips.
"My parents died when I was ten," he said absently, as if speaking of the weather. "Half of London seemed to perish that winter."
She swallowed as his fingers moved down her throat. She knew of what he spoke. She"d been too young to remember it herself, but they had not visited the city for an entire year.
"There was no one else. No money left once the creditors came through. We didn"t have much to begin with. And I was too stupid to understand that I should have taken what little money was lying around and fled." He laughed, an old laugh. "Like the debt-ridden aristocrats fleeing to France."
He traced the curve of her breast.
"Took to the streets instead-nowhere else to go. The orphanages were far too crowded-then the sickness swept through them faster than in the rookeries. I found Andreas a few months in. Patched him up. Made him tolerate me."
"His parents also perished in the sickness?"
"Mmmm . . ." He drew a pattern underneath her breast, then circled the tip, not coming too close, but teasingly coming just close enough to make her body tense.
"Tried to work as chimney sweeps for a while. Stupid, terrible job. And Andreas wasn"t cut out for it."