He was only the third man ever to have kissed her. Strange, when he had done that other to her more than a month before. But there had been no kisses to accompany that.
And then she panicked and bent her head back away from him.
She caught sight of the expression on his face before one of his arms came about her and the other behind her head to press it to the folds of his neckcloth. He had looked lost, pained. And it was there in his voice when he spoke.
“Don’t spurn me, Fleur,” he said. “Please. Just for these few moments don’t spurn me. Don’t be frightened of me.”
And yet every part of her body rested against him and remembered—remembered the sight of him, male and powerful enough to crush the life out of her with his hands, the terrible purple scars of the wounds down his left side and leg. And remembered the feel of him, his hands, his thumbs, his knees holding her legs apart. And the feel of him plunging into her, tearing at her, and the repeated thrust and withdrawal until he was done and there had seemed to be nothing of herself left.
But there was the kindness of the inflated payment and this job, the concern for her well-being, the surprising warmth and gentleness of his kiss, the vulnerability on his face and in his voice. And her terrible loneliness.
And it was difficult to take that memory and this present reality and combine them in her mind. It was difficult to believe that he was the same man. It was difficult to feel with her body the revulsion that her mind instructed her to feel.
She made herself relax against him, feel his body against hers without shrinking. And it was not, after all, hard to do.
“Just for these moments only,” he murmured. He was rubbing his cheek lightly across the top of her head.
She did not consciously lift her head. But she must have done so because she was gazing into his eyes again and angling her head for his kiss. And his warm lips were gentle on hers again and moving over them, and the tip of his tongue was moving lightly over her lips until she parted them and opened her mouth, granting him what Matthew had demanded earlier and not been given.
His tongue moved against hers, circled it, explored the soft flesh inside her mouth, the sensitive flesh at the roof.
She heard herself whimper, and stilled both body and mind to the knowledge of what she was doing and with whom. She would not let her nightmares intrude into this waking moment. And it was but for a moment. Just for this moment only. His shoulders were broad and firm beneath her arms, his hair thick and silky between her fingers.
His mouth moved from hers at last to kiss her cheeks, her eyes, her temples. And he wrapped both arms about her, held her arched in to him, and set his cheek against the top of her head.
“God!” he whispered. “Oh, my God.” His arms tightened like iron bands about her. “My good God.”
She felt the breath shudder into him, and he released her.
They stood looking at each other.
“Fleur,” he said. He lifted a hand, and she saw it and knew again to whom it belonged and what it had done to her. She trembled as he cupped one of her cheeks with it. “I wish I could say I am sorry. God, how I wish it. Tomorrow I will apologize to you. Tonight I can’t feel sorry, God help me. Go to bed. Go. I cannot escort you tonight. I would not be able to stop at your door.”
She went, hurrying to the door, fumbling with the knob, running along the hallway, pounding up the stairs, and racing along the corridor to her room as if she thought he was in pursuit of her after all.
But it was not from him she fled. The person from whom she ran was inside the room with her despite her speed and despite the fact that she had locked the door with hasty, trembling fingers.
What had she done? What had she allowed to happen? Her breasts were taut and tender. She was throbbing where he had given her such pain on a previous occasion. She could taste his brandy. Her body was in a turmoil of feeling. And her mind was telling her quite dispassionately who he was and exactly how he had made her into a whore and how much money he had put into her palm afterward. He was a man who paid women for sexual favors. He had paid her.
He had been unfaithful to his wife only once, he had told her at one time. She had been almost inclined to believe him. She was almost inclined now to believe that she really had seen that vulnerability in his face and heard it in his voice. She wanted to deceive herself. She did not want to see their encounter as the sordid thing that it had really been.
She had allowed a married man, her employer, to take incredible liberties with her person. And the encounter had not been all one-sided. She had wanted him too.
It was from herself she had fled. But she had brought herself right inside her room, behind its locked door.