His Wicked Kiss (47 page)

As he listened to Lord Alec entertaining them all with some risqué gossip about one of his bachelor friends, Jack seemed to be asking himself the same question.

The table was soon cleared for the third course, coffee, port, and claret served alongside apple tartlets sprinkled with raisins and brown sugar.

They separated after the meal, the women retreating to the drawing room as was customary while the men remained at table for cigars and port. They reassembled within the hour, the gentlemen joining them in the drawing room, but by that time, it was growing quite late.
Eden
was happy but feeling worn out. Jack suggested they take their leave, and she agreed.

After this very warm reception, they were sent on their way with the whole party’s insistence that Eden and Jack accompany them to the theater tomorrow night. Jack hesitated until he saw
Eden
’s wide-eyed look of eagerness. He accepted the invitation graciously, then they went on their way, trundling back to the Pulteney Hotel.

After a few idle remarks, they sat in silence—but it was a very different silence than the one between them on the way there.

“How are you?”
Eden
asked him in a soft tone after a while.

He looked at her intently and shrugged. “All right, I guess. It wasn’t so bad.”

She smiled faintly. “I thought you were very well behaved.”

“T
hank
God you were there.”

The acknowledgment pleased her. “Your niece seemed to like you.”

“Pippa?” He chuckled in the darkness as the carriage rolled along smoothly down
Pall Mall
. “I may have to steal her.”

“I know.”
Eden
paused, watching the dim orange glow of the streetlamps they passed sculpting Jack’s face in shifting shadows. “I worried about you when we parted.”

“I worried about you, too. I’m sure the ladies grilled you for information.”

“Of course.”

“What did you tell them?”

“Only as much as you and I agreed upon. What about your brothers? Did they grill you?”

He smiled wryly. “Mostly they were busy praising you, and saying what a credit you were to a blackguard like me. Of course, they’re right.”

“Oh, Jack.” Her stare intensified. “I miss you.”

Sitting in the seat across from her, he leaned closer. “It doesn’t have to be like this.” He took her hands. “I’m trying,
Eden
.”

“I know. You hurt me, Jack.”

“I won’t do it again, I swear to you.”

“You say that, but you made me believe a lie before, so how can I know that you aren’t deceiving me now?”

“I’ve told you everything,” he said angrily, then checked his frustration. “Give me another chance.”

She felt so fragile as he crossed the space between them, moving onto the seat beside her, and gently tucking a stray curl behind her ear.

“I miss your body,” he whispered. “I need your love.”

She shuddered when he bent his head and kissed her neck, but she wasn’t sure she was ready to let him inside her again—in either sense.

Their coach rolled to a halt presently in front of the hotel, for the drive wasn’t far.

Jack gazed hungrily at her as the groom hurried to open the carriage door for them. He got out first and handed her down, escorting her inside without another word.

They walked through the lobby, side by side, drawing glances from the other guests here and there. With her silk wrap thrown over her shoulders once more and her reticule dangling from her wrist,
Eden
picked up the hem of her skirts and climbed the grand stairs to their rooms. Though Jack moved in silence beside her, her physical awareness of him was keen.

When they reached their suite, Jack unlocked the door and let her in.
Eden
brushed past him, her heart fluttering with desire; she knew he wanted her, but she was torn. She put her reticule on the console table just inside the door and began removing her long white gloves. She heard him close and lock the door behind her, and then she pulled in her breath sharply as he came up behind her and slid her wrap off her shoulders in a very sensuous fashion. She closed her eyes when he bent his head, his silken lips nuzzling her ear.

“You look so beautiful tonight,” he breathed. He ran his fingers slowly down her arm. “I can’t believe you’re mine.”

She moaned his name in a voice that was barely a whisper.

He kissed her shoulder, molding his hands to her hips. “Let me make love to you.”

She did not refuse him. She couldn’t say a word. His touch commanded her full attention. She closed her eyes and licked her lips slowly as his smooth mouth nibbled at her nape.

He was too much.

“We need each other,
Eden
. You need me as much as I need you.” Turning her gently to face him, Jack drew her into his arms and kissed her with drugging passion. She clung to him, so entranced with the deep, slow glide of his mouth on hers that she barely noticed him backing her toward the luxurious striped satin chaise over by the white fireplace.

The next thing she knew, he was easing her down onto it, and she was trembling as he cupped her breast through her bodice. Her body felt so tender all over, her skin acutely sensitized. She writhed with his caress.

“Jack.”

“Come,
Eden
, this has gone on long enough. Let’s make up, darlin’. You know I love you.”

She caressed his face, at a loss; on his knees before her, he turned his head and captured her finger in his mouth. In rising lust, she watched him sucking her fingertips, his eyes closed. They glittered with feverish want when he dragged them open again, and turned his attention to the task of loosening her bodice.

She withdrew her fingertip from his wet mouth and leaned forward to kiss him anew, holding his face between her hands. Within moments, his touch ran all over her, clutching her greedily under her gown. His kisses traveled up her thigh as he knelt, worshiping her body—when all of a sudden, a knock sounded at the door.

“Jack! Jack! Are you in there?” It was Trahern’s voice. “I need to talk to you! Now!”

He hissed a hot curse against her skin, then lifted his head.

“What?” he yelled back none too gently.

“We’ve got a problem, Jack.”

Eden
’s heart was pounding. “Oh, dear.” She laid her hands on his broad shoulders, pushing him back a small space. “You’d better go see what it is,” she panted.

“Give me a minute!” he called back, then looked at
Eden
in bitter disappointment. “One of these days—” He shook his head.

She chuckled and tousled his hair, giving him a smile full of smoldering affection.

“Hold that thought,” he whispered to her.

“No, husband. I’m going to bed.”

“But—”

“I need my beauty sleep,” she informed him. “Especially now that I’ve met my sisters-in-law. I don’t want to be the ugly one.”

“Never.”

“Besides, I don’t feel so good.” She’d had quite a bit of an unsteady stomach of late. Leave it to her to get seasick once they had come onto dry land.

“Are you all right?”

“Nerves, that’s all.”

“I could help you relax,” he whispered.

“Jack?” Trahern pounded the door again.

“I’m coming! Only not in the sense that I’d hoped,” he added under his breath, adjusting his hardness with a pained wince. “Look what you do to me.”

Eden
arched a brow in the direction of his groin, shot him a pitying smile, and then closed her chamber door.

Jack couldn’t say he cared for Trahern’s timing, but he soon learned the reason for his urgency. The intrepid lieutenant had taken it upon himself to do some discreet snooping around the Spanish embassy, and had discovered that the man newly assigned as attaché to the ambassador was none other than Manuel de Ruiz, head of the deadly team of assassins who had pursued Bolivar to Jack’s very doorstep on Jamaica a few short years ago.

“We should have killed them when we had the chance.” Trahern poured himself a drink from the liquor cabinet.

“Easier said than done,” Jack murmured, declining the whisky as he rested his hands on his waist and stared at the floor, mulling over the news.

Ruiz was a man to be reckoned with, and now it appeared he had moved up the ranks despite having let the Liberator slip through his fingers. Even if Ruiz never found proof that Jack was the Venezuelans’ agent in
London
, the former assassin would be keeping an eye on him, Jack could be sure of that.

Well, he did not expect that he could keep his presence hidden from Ruiz, nor did he care to try, for he did not hide from any man. All he could do was to cling to his pretense for being in
London
, remain vigilant, and in his dealings with his recruits, continue to emphasize the need for secrecy.

Trahern remained for an hour discussing various concerns pertaining to the mission. When he left, Jack checked in on
Eden
, but she was fast asleep.

Damn
. He let her rest rather than push his luck, and closed her door with a regretful smile.

The next day, he attended to more business, visiting the Exchange with Peter Stockwell to meet with a few of his investors. He was very pleased to see his stock prices climb by twelve percent as word spread about the acquisition of Abraham Gold’s company by Knight Enterprises. He accepted bids for the rare tropical hardwoods he had brought from the torrid zone, and gave a nod of approval on the price for the sugar, indigo, rum, and other goods from the
West Indies
.

Later that night, returning to the hotel a considerably richer man, he took his wife out to the theater.

Robert maintained one of the best-situated boxes in the house, and with Strathmore and Lizzie having bowed out on account of their newborn at home, the theater box held all twelve of them quite comfortably.

As luck would have it, Shakespeare topped the bill of fare and the Dramatis Personae inevitably listed the villain as “Edmund the Bastard.”

Jack let out a disgruntled sigh to read it, shifted in his seat, and tried to comprehend why anyone would want to watch a tragedy, anyway, life being tragic enough as it was. Then again, the performance on stage was hardly the point of a Society night out at the theater. The point, of course, was to see and be seen.

The Knight ladies were up to the task, of course. All looked ravishing. Alec declared that, seated as they were along the railing, they looked like a row of posies planted in a flower box.

“Very droll,” Damien’s wife, Miranda, had teased him, while their sister gave him a small kick with a slippered toe and told him to behave.

During the silly pantomime on stage, meant to warm up the audience before the main play, everyone was marveling at how easily
Eden
had learned to tell the twins apart.

“It took me forever,” Bel declared. “How did you do it?”

“Simple,” Eden said with a grin. “Damien marches; Lucien glides.”

Both twins had laughed aloud at that.

Before long, the pantomime players scurried off stage and it was time for
King Lear
.

The audience quieted down somewhat, but there was still muffled noise and plenty of motion throughout the theater as the ladies waved their fans and the men talked about the day’s horse races in what they considered muffled tones.

Down in the pit with the lower orders, orange girls hawked their wares, so that, every now and then, a piece of orange peel went flying through the air to hit some unsuspecting playgoer in the head, much to the hilarity of the one who had thrown it.

Higher up where the rich kept their boxes, Jack noted the winking lenses of countless opera glasses trained on the Knight family’s box. Oh, yes, they were being watched.

Jack watched Eden watching the stage, sweetly unaware that at this very moment, the whole ton was watching
her
, passing judgment on her—and trying to figure out what to make of him, as well.

He put the watchers out of his mind and instead savored the pleasure of looking at his wife. A true beauty. She looked wonderful in dark blue silk with the double string of pink pearls around her neck that he had brought her just today. He was glad she was feeling better this evening, and wondered when the hell she was going to sleep with him again, but just then, the soliloquizing fellow on stage—the villain, of course—spoke a line that grabbed his attention.

“ ‘Why bastard?’ ” poor Edmund demanded from center stage. “ ‘Wherefore base, when my dimensions are as well compact, my mind as generous, and my shape as true as honest madam’s issue?’ ”

Jack and his brothers exchanged a wry glance.

A few of their ladies looked at them and suppressed giggles, but
Eden
looked shocked.