As Rich as a Rogue (20 page)

From now on, kissing would be Mari's first choice when she had no idea what else to do.

Too excited from a barroom brawl? Kiss Lord Whitly.

Too surprised by Lord Rimbury's sudden devotion? Say good-bye to the man and kiss Peter.

Too frustrated, too angry, too confused by everything that had happened this night? Kiss Peter until her thoughts stopped whirling and an entirely different maelstrom built inside her.

Perfect.

Especially with the way he was taking hold of her body, pulling her roughly against him while he devoured her mouth. Damn her skirts and this too-tight corset. She wanted to wrap herself around him and do things she'd never ever imagined before. Animal things. Wayward things. Except he was trying to hold her back. His arms were tight, but his mouth was suddenly absent. He pressed his forehead to hers while their breath heated the air between them.

“Mari,” he gasped out. “What are you doing?”

She didn't answer at first. It was too bold—even for her—to say what she wanted out loud. Besides, she couldn't catch her breath or clear her thoughts. Thankfully, the driver thumped on the top of the carriage.

“'Ey now! Where to?”

“Not home,” she said quickly. “Not until you've explained.”

“Do you know what you risk being private with me? Do you know what I want to do right now?” If she had any doubt, he grabbed her hand and pressed it against the hard, hot center between his thighs. It seemed to pulse under her hand, and she squeezed it as much out of curiosity as anything else. But when he groaned and shuddered against her hand, she knew she wanted to do more. A great deal more.

“Not home,” she repeated firmly.

She heard him swallow then nod. “We are going to marry, you and I.”

He was stating it firmly, and she saw no reason to argue with him. She wanted this time with him, and she would risk her reputation for it. A quiet part of her said she was risking a great deal more, but she ignored it. The voice was too small to defeat the hard beat of her heart against her ribs.

Peter called out a direction. She guessed it was to his rooms. She swallowed and touched his face. Only now did she realize that she sat on his lap and that her pins were scattered all over the floor. But it was his face she explored. The rough texture of his cheek, the hard cut of his jaw, and the full delight of his lips.

He pressed a kiss to her fingertips. Then he nipped at them. And then, he sucked her index finger into his mouth. The feel of his wet tongue stroking her had her belly quivering in delight. His arms were still tight about her body, but whereas his left arm wrapped her hips, the right was free to stroke across her thighs and up her waist.

She ached for him to touch her breasts again. Her nipples were tight enough to hurt, but her mind was focused on the slide of his tongue over her finger. The scrape of his teeth against her skin. And the way her heart just kept beating, a thousand tiny throbs throughout her body.

But then he turned away.

“I have to tell you about India, Mari,” he rasped. “You want me to explain. I have to… You have to understand what happened there.”

“Yes,” she said as she dropped her head against his shoulder. His neck was right there, and this close, she could make out the pulse point beating almost as rapidly as hers. She pressed her lips there. Then when that was not enough, she licked the skin, tasting salt and smelling bay rum.

He groaned and let his head drop against hers. “This is too fast,” he said. “You don't know what you do to me.”

“Is it the same thing I feel? The same…” How to describe it? Wetness? Aching? Breathless desperation? “Never before has anyone made me feel this way.”

His hands tightened. A quick grip hard enough to make her gasp. And then he loosened his hold. Just enough to let her breathe. “Yes,” he said, his voice thick. “Yes, but more.”

She didn't think it was possible.

“You're a virgin. You don't underst—”

She kissed him. She didn't want to hear anything about what she lacked as a woman. She knew he didn't mean to insult her when he said that. She
was
a virgin. But his words made her think of all the exotic women he'd been with. Beautiful courtesans who knew what to do. What was she compared to them? Nothing. So rather than face that, she kissed him and did everything she could to erase them from his mind.

She felt him resist. Was she not doing this right? But then a moment later, he surrendered to her. He leaned back, taking her with him until she was sprawled against his chest and straddling his hips. And there, he kissed her a thousand different ways. Slow and teasing, only to be startled by a hard, hot thrust of his tongue. Tiny nips accented by a slow suck on her lower lip.

And while she was lost in his kisses, his hands did a slow sweep of her back and bottom. He caressed her body then squeezed her bum. She lay fully atop him, pressed against that hot, hard length that so fascinated her. Especially when he began to thrust. Not demanding, not even big movements. Just a slow, rhythmic press into the softness of her belly. And how she yearned to explore that further.

“Oy now! Get out!”

The angry words were followed by a hard rap against the top of the carriage. And from the tone, the driver must have been doing it for a while.

Beneath her, Peter let out a soft curse. “This is too dangerous for you,” he said.

“No one will know me. Not dressed like this.”

It was true. With her hair wild and her clothing that of a dockside tavern worker, she looked as far from a pampered daughter of the elite as it was possible to be. She saw the struggle on his face as he fought with his gentlemanly code. It really was quite sweet of him.

“I'm not leaving,” she said. “We might as well get me inside.”

That decided him. It didn't hurt that the driver rapped on the carriage top again. “I'm coming down!” the man called.

“No!” Peter answered as he gently set her away from him. “We're getting out.” Then he frowned at her. “I wish you had a cloak.” He shrugged out of his coat and handed it over to her. “Put that over your head as if it were going to rain.”

He waited while she did as he asked, putting the jacket over her head. Suddenly she was surrounded in his scent, spiced with the tease of bay rum. She breathed deeply and pulled the sleeves of his coat against her nose. And then there was no more time as Peter pushed open the door.

“Thank you for your trouble,” he said as he gave the man several coins. Then he held out his hand for her.

She took it, feeling the expanse of his fingers wrap around hers. She gripped him, holding tight, while excitement popped in her blood, and together they moved quickly up the walkway to his bachelor rooms.

It was a simple home in a quiet boarding house, not something one would expect of the future Earl of Sommerfield. He pulled out a key and quickly opened the front door. Then they tiptoed up the stairs and to the back. He opened his door and pulled her inside before quickly shutting it.

“The old gentleman who runs this house is a genial sort, not one to pry. But he's got ears like a dog.”

She frowned. “Will he be angry that you've brought someone here?”

Peter's lips twisted into a self-mocking smile. “Not at all, but as you're the first female I've brought home, he'll certainly take note. And I'd rather not risk even that.”

She smiled, inordinately pleased that she was the first to breach this inner sanctum of his life. She didn't intend to waste the opportunity. So while he lit a brace of candles, she walked deeper inside and tried to absorb everything she could.

Her first glance told her the place was a mess.

Her second glance told her the place was a mess of papers.

And once there was light, she saw it was an organized mess of research. In truth, looking around, she thought it was very much like her father's office, except in a smaller place and with vastly different interests.

“Agriculture,” she said as she picked up one pamphlet. “Politics,” she said as another sheaf of notes discussed the latest foreign policy debate.

“Tariffs,” he corrected.

Same thing to her uneducated mind.

“Accounts,” she said as she made it to another stack with an open ledger sitting on top of a listing pile of correspondence. There were other notes there as well. A hastily scrawled list of items with numbers beside it and dates going back two years. She picked it up, something burning hard in her mind, but she couldn't place it. There was something unusual about the words, but she didn't understand it. Canal. Sheep. Wheat. Not unusual words, but they meant something.

Beside the words and numbers were endless notations. Large numbers divided three ways, four ways, as much as seven ways, with differing permutations and additions. Most were scratched out.

“What are you doing here?” she asked as she held up the pages.

He had been busy cleaning up. Setting stacks of papers aside as he cleared space on a chair. But at her question, dismay rippled through his features.

“I'm looking for evidence of a crime.”

Well, that was intriguing. She looked back at the paper, but he gently pulled it out of her hand and set it aside. “What crime?”

“Theft. Fraud. I'm not exactly sure. Maybe nothing.”

She looked into his eyes. “You don't think that, though.”

He rubbed his hand through his hair, the gesture distracted. “I'm looking, Mari. So far, I haven't found anything.”

She pressed a palm to his chest, loving the way her hand was so small against his muscle. “But you feel it. You know something's wrong.”

He gripped her fingers and pulled them up to his lips, his eyes drifting closed as he held her fingers there against his mouth. Nothing more, he just held her still.

“Peter?”

“I can only think of you right now. The rest is…” He shook his head. “Too much.”

She smiled. That was what she wanted to hear. Well, not really, she admonished herself. She'd come here to find out his secrets. But now that she was here, she was more interested in his touch, in his kiss, in all those wonderful wayward things he'd been showing her.

She stepped closer to him, she lifted her face toward his, and she gently pulled her hand—and his—aside, so nothing would stop them from kissing.

“If we start,” he said, his voice thick, “I will not be able to stop. And then you will never know what I meant to tell you this night.”

That wouldn't do. “So tell me,” she said as she boldly pressed her body against his.

He swallowed, and even in the muted candlelight, she could see that his eyes burned over her face. He wanted her as fervently as she wanted him. It was a heady thing, this desire. And within a moment, she would give in to it. “I was beaten in India,” he rasped. “Attacked, imprisoned, and nearly killed thirty-seven times. It was so common that it became almost routine.”

She pulled back, blinking the haze from her eyes. She repeated his words in her mind, trying to sort out if she had heard him correctly. “You were jailed?” That wasn't what she meant to ask. It was merely the first word that reverberated in her thoughts.

“Often. But it is not like gaol here. It was simply a way of making me stay put for a time. Not for crimes.” Then he shrugged. “Unless it was for a crime. But I usually didn't get caught.”

She shied a step backward. He didn't stop her, but she knew he watched her—taut and anxious—to see how she would react to everything. He was being dramatic, she supposed. She recognized the ploy from her sister's antics. He was saying things as boldly as possible while watching to see if she'd run. It was a way of getting her truest—worst—reaction before moderating it with facts.

But she'd played that game too often with Josephine for her to fall for it now. So she settled neatly into the chair he had cleared, then folded her hands as a way to keep from reaching for him. She wanted to be clearheaded while they talked. Or at least less distracted.

“I think you need to start from the beginning, please.”

He nodded. It took him a moment to clear another chair and settle across from her. And though she watched his eyes, she was very aware of his hands as they fidgeted at his sides. Of his shoulders starting out tall but slowly slumping as he leaned onto his elbows. And of the way his eyes seemed to look at something very far away.

“I left for India because you were right. I was wasting away doing nothing but arguing with my father. A man can only rebel against his pater for so long before he goes mad. And I was three-quarters gone by the time we danced and you told me exactly what a useless thing I had become.”

“I shouldn't have spoken like that,” she said, guilt a sharp spike in her chest.

His gaze cut up to her. “We started with plain speaking, Mari. Do not run from it now.”

He was right. She had maneuvered and manipulated to get to this moment. She should not have interrupted. Then she abruptly reached forward and touched his hand where he gripped his knee. Gently, she spread her fingers and covered what she could of his hand. “I'm sorry. Please, I want to hear it all.”

He nodded and started his tale.

Peter had not allowed himself to think about his experiences in India. It was over. He had returned to England. But the struggle to speak now told him more clearly than anything that the past was still large and ugly in his mind whether or not he told anyone.

“I wish I could say I went to India to become a man. Mostly, I left in search of change. I was sick to death of who I was and needed to become something else. Except the moment I landed in India, I fought every day to be as lazy and indolent as I'd ever been.” He shrugged. “Fortunately, my immediate superior at the Company did not suffer fools gladly.”

“What did you do for them?”

Her voice was quiet, and her hand a warm balm over his. The two grounded him as nothing else. Whenever his memories threatened to bury him in that wild and exotic land, she kept him firmly anchored in Mother England and all the blessings of home.

“I collected taxes. In many ways, the business there was an occupation of India by England. Decades ago, we invaded, supported our position with guns, and declared ourselves in charge. The maharajas bought peace by promising us taxes and then daring us to come and get them.”

She shifted uncomfortably at his assessment, but when he looked at her, he saw she was simply thinking. “Papa has often said that India is a heathen place that needs our civilizing hand.”

He arched a brow, challenging her to speak her true thoughts. She had spent many years of her childhood there, and he wanted to know her opinion.

“That is what he said, but I simply saw different people. Different ways of thinking and doing. Just…different.”

“You were not allowed in the dangerous places.” India was more than different. In places, it was savage.

“You were captured.” He couldn't tell if that was a question or a statement.

“Not the first time.” He flipped his hand over, needing to grip her fingers. He was trying to be honest, but when he looked back at the idiot he had been, he could see only arrogant stupidity.

“I enjoyed the ledger part of the work. Don't tell Ash. I've never admitted it to anyone, but the numbers line up in my head easily. Always have.”

“That's not something to be ashamed of.”

“Tell that to a young boy judged purely on his ability to swive everything in a skirt.”

She smiled and squeezed his hand. “I promise not to tell a soul.”

He returned the squeeze and allowed himself a moment to focus on her breasts. Sweet, beautiful breasts that fitted so nicely in his hands and responded to the smallest caress. He would touch them soon. He would marry them and the beautiful woman who possessed them. And soon, all these memories would fade in favor of her pillowy softness.

“Peter?”

He forcibly reordered his thoughts. “I wanted to think that my task was a simple one. That because I was an impressively sized man and a future earl that the Indian leaders would bow to my authority. They did not.”

“When you went to collect the taxes they owed?”

He nodded. “I thought the deviousness would be in the ledgers. That they would hide their wealth and not pay what was owed to England.”

“They didn't hide it?”

“They did,” he said with a bitter chuckle. “But that was the smallest of the problems.” He looked up at her. “They simply refused to pay. And there I was, thinking my name and my title were all that was needed.”

“Didn't you have men with you? Soldiers or someone to protect you?”

“Certainly. But even so, we were always few against many. And I was in the maharaja's palace, demanding he pay money to a conqueror.”

Mari shook her head. “But it is a business. A shared trade to England. Why were you collecting money from them? I thought the money came to you first, and you paid them.”

“Sometimes. Sometimes not.” He was impressed with her knowledge of basic business practices. Most women would not understand even that. “I was sent to collect money whenever money was owed. First, I was sent to teach me a lesson. I was an arrogant fool uninterested in learning what was needed. Later, I went because I was good at it.”

“But how did you do it?”

“I studied the ledgers, figured out what was owed, and then asked for the money, and was refused.” He flashed her a smile, not averse to playing to the drama of the situation.

She returned the smile, but her mind was clearly working hard on the problem. How to get money out of a maharaja who had no interest in paying? “Did you steal it?”

“Not the first time, though it became one of my best tactics later.”

“That's how you got gaoled.”

He nodded. “A few times.” He glanced away, unable to express how dangerous prison was. Trapped like a rat in a hole, surviving only by the whim of the guards and the dubious attention of the maharaja. Many times he felt more animal than man.

He hadn't realized he was lost in his memories until he felt her hand on his face. A cool caress across his cheek. At first he flinched away from it. Sometimes the softest touch was the most dangerous. But then he saw who caressed him. He remembered where he was and dragged his attention back to the present.

“It was terrible, wasn't it?” she asked.

“Yes.” He swallowed, needing to rush through the explanation. No longer interested in the fun of telling the story. “Once I realized my mere presence and title were not enough, I fell back on what I understood. What I was good at.”

He waited for her to catch up. For her to figure out his solution. It didn't take her long.

“You were a gentleman well skilled at…what gentlemen know.”

“Which is?”

“Riding, gambling, and swiving.”

He smiled at the way she said that last word. Her chin had lifted, as if she dared him to argue with her use of the word. He didn't, because he liked hearing scandalous words on her lips. “I was also good at wrestling. Hand to hand, like the Greeks.”

She nodded. “You gambled for the money?”

“Yes. Cards, horse racing, and wrestling were my best choices, but I learned other skills.”

“Knife throwing.”

He wasn't likely to forget her surprised expression when he'd thrown his dagger in Hyde Park.

She dropped her hand onto his leg, still leaning forward as she studied him. “And that worked. Betting with the maharajas for the money they owed.”

“For the most part, yes.”

“But did you never lose?”

“I did. Often at first, but I got smarter at it. Better. And then there were my thieving skills.”

“Are you a good thief?”

“Yes. Though there are some who are much, much better.” He shrugged. “I employed a few to be part of my personal guard.”

“Ah.” She was impressed by his cleverness. She didn't understand that he'd had to be clever or die. “So you won the money. And did they pay?”

“Yes. That at least was something we English shared with the Indians. Publicly, they always pay their gambling debts.”

“And privately?” Before he could answer, she had already guessed what had happened. “Did they rob you of it?”

“Often. Which is how I first learned to thieve. I was robbed and had to steal the money back.”

“That's amazing.”

He supposed it was. Given how incredibly unprepared he'd been, it was astonishing that he'd survived, much less thrived. But he'd learned quickly and fought desperately. “I did not do honorable things, Mari.” In fact, his honor had been the first and easiest casualty of his life in India.

She tilted her head. “I suspect you were as fair and honest as possible in the situation.”

He didn't quibble with her words, even though she was very wrong. “There are things I don't fully remember,” he said, barely even realizing he spoke at all. “Times I lost all sense of honor.”

Her fingers danced across his mouth, and he kissed them out of reflex. Like a man gripping his only lifeline in a stormy sea.

“You survived and came out stronger.”

He shook his head. Did she not know how fragile he felt? A scent could drag him back into his memories. Fetid water, heavily spiced food, the manic laughter of a trapped man. It didn't happen often, but when it did, he was caught unprepared, and the experience always left him shattered.

“You have just returned,” she said, her fingers continuing to stroke across his face. “Perhaps you merely need more time to remember who you were.”

“I don't want to remember who I was, Mari. Don't you see? I came home with a purpose. Every moment in India made it all clearer.”

Her caress didn't change, but he saw her eyes widen and her mouth curve with excitement. Here was what she'd been pressing him to explain but the idea was so precious to him he had difficulty voicing it. Thankfully, she knew how to be patient and wait for him, and in time he found the words.

“I saw such abuse in India. The wealthy destroyed the weak. The poor did anything to survive. Terrible things because it was that or die.”

“It can be a terrible country.”

“And so I came home, Mari. I came home to be damned sure that it does not happen here.”

She pulled back, clearly shocked. “Evil maharajas here? Mobs of beggars in the street? Don't be ridiculous.”

He looked at her, seeing her innocence and the blind faith she had in her heritage. He didn't blame her for it. Not so long ago, he had shared her opinion a thousandfold. But not now. Not anymore.

And it wasn't long before she was biting her lip in consternation. “Well, yes, I suppose I will allow that there are thieves and bandits in England.”

“And beggars in the streets.”

She nodded slowly. “Yes, though not like it was in India.”

“Not in the same numbers or the same way, but the desperate poor exist everywhere.”

She took a breath. “Yes.”

“But you have been told to ignore them.”

She nodded. “There are too many and I cannot help one without a thousand—”

“Mobbing the carriage or murdering you in the street for what little you have.” He was merely reciting what he had believed and what the wealthy had been telling themselves for thousands of years. “It is not true, you know. You can help in small ways and it is a blessing.”

She nodded. “So is that what you want to do? Help the poor?”

“Not in the way you mean.”

He spread her fingers open as he traced the creases of her white palm. He noted with pleasure that she had calluses, so she was not completely a lady of leisure. In London, her time was occupied with husband hunting, but in the country, she probably did a great deal. “I saw the evil of men's hearts in India, and it wasn't just in the maharaja's. The English were greedy.”

She winced but did not look away. “I am disheartened that we are not as civilized as we pretend.”

“I want to build a home here. I want to make Sommerfield a place that leaves no room for barbarity. I want to serve the people I protect and be sure that their needs are met.”

She tilted her head. “That is the responsibility of every lord over his land.”

“And yet so many do so little.”

Her eyes abruptly widened. “You mean to force them to live up to their responsibilities?”

He snorted. “I doubt any man has that power.” He took a breath. “I mean to begin with Sommerfield. And when that is a utopia, I will look to my compatriots.” He shrugged. “I hope my example and my voice in the House of Lords will help.”

She rocked back in her seat. Her gaze darted across his features, but steadied as she looked at his eyes. She was a woman who needed only a few pieces of a plan for her to fit much of the puzzle together. So he waited, feeling exposed for admitting so simple a thing.

Yet it wasn't simple. Creating a utopia in the middle of England would be a constant battle against all the smaller vices. And that was nothing against the dread of sickness or natural disaster. Nothing brought out the barbarity in man faster than a few weeks of hunger and a few longer weeks of hopeless despair.

“I need to stand somewhere and have that place be strong and beautiful.”

“Sommerfield and England.” She smiled, and it chased the last of the shadows from his thoughts. “That's a beautiful ambition.”

“Will you join me? As my wife?”

“Yes.” A single word, whispered at first and then repeated louder. “Yes.”

The most beautiful word in the English language.

He kissed her. First her hand that was still on his face. Then her wrist. But a moment later, she tumbled into his arms, her face pressed to his, her laughter filling his soul.

Yes.

Then she gasped against his neck, her breath hot but short with distress. He pulled back to look at her face, seeing her widened eyes while her hands clutched at his shoulders.

“Mari?”

“I'm sorry,” she said, embarrassment pinkening her cheeks. “I must get out of this corset. It's too tight.”

He grinned. Well, if it was a matter of her health, then of course he must oblige.