I Kissed a Rogue (Covent Garden Cubs) (26 page)

“No. It feels wonderful. More.”

He entered her again, this time resting his forehead on hers. She saw his eyes were closed and his jaw clamped shut as though he concentrated intently. He pushed deeper, and her eyes widened. Perhaps she had been wrong about him. Perhaps he was not so small.

He rocked against her, obliterating the thought with the rush of sensation. She gasped and tried to move her hips to increase the pressure, but she was trapped by the weight of him, the feel of him inside her.

He withdrew again, entered again, and each time it seemed he filled her just a little bit more. The sensation was not pleasant, though she would not have described it as painful. Just as she began to feel discomfort, he’d rock against her and spirals of pleasure would unravel.

He withdrew again, and she wanted to cry out in frustration. Her body hummed with need, throbbed with the feel of him filling her. She wanted more, wanted him to rock against her again.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

Oh, she had been ready for an eternity. “Yes. Please, please.” She was begging. She had never thought she would beg for anything.

He entered her again, not as completely, but when he rocked against her, she didn’t care. This time his fingers slid between their bodies and he touched her, stroked her. She was ready, and at his first touch, she cried out with pleasure.

But with the pleasure came a sharp jolt of pain as Brook slid inside her, farther and farther, stretching her until a burning ache made her vision go dark and blurry. She gripped his shoulders tightly, half sobbing, half moaning with the last vestiges of pleasure.

He didn’t move, but he breathed heavily, and now she realized it was not from arousal but from restraint. She’d thought those shallow thrusts the entire act, but she had not imagined she could be filled and stretched as she was now. It hurt. He was far too big for her to accommodate.

“Lila?” She heard the question in his voice, knew he asked if she was hurt.

“Don’t you dare move,” she whispered. “You are too big for this.”

She thought she heard him laugh. If he was laughing at her, she would kill him.

“You fit me perfectly.”

“No, I don’t. Don’t move or I
will
think you reprehensible.”

He sounded as though he laughed again. “I have to move. Otherwise we’ll be stuck like this forever.”

“Then get out.”

“Not yet, darling Lila. Give it a chance.”

Darling
. He’d called her
darling
. Did he mean it?

He withdrew but not all the way, sliding inside her again. She hissed at the pain.

“I’m sorry. I am trying to be careful, but you feel so damn good.”

Withdraw and thrust. The next thrust was not quite so painful. It still felt strange and she too full, but it was not intolerable.

He moved faster, and she caught her breath because she could see how, if she wasn’t still in some pain, the action might feel good.

“I’m sorry,” he said, sounding as though he spoke through clenched teeth.

“Stop apologizing. It makes it difficult to hate you.”

“Right. In that case, I’m not sorry.” He groaned. “Not sorry at all.” She felt his entire body tense. Beside her ear, his breathing sounded fast and ragged. Finally, he withdrew and rolled onto his back.

She pushed up, but he was already on his feet. “Don’t move.”

Lila lay back down. Why did he want her to lie still?

He padded away, then returned with a towel in one hand. He reached for her, and she squealed when she realized he planned to clean her between the legs.

“I can do that,” she insisted.

He gave her a look of amusement. “It’s not as though I haven’t seen you there. And everywhere.”

She took the towel from him and pressed it between her thighs. It came away tinged with pink. Lila blinked at the evidence of her lost virginity.

“It’s normal,” Brook said. She looked up, seeing only the shadow of him beside her. His backside was illuminated by the fire in the hearth, but she could not see his face or his expression. “Do you still hurt?”

She shook her head, surprised to find her throat too closed to enable her to speak.

“I’m told it will not hurt next time. Here.” He dropped her chemise over her head and helped her pull it on. The feel of it was comforting, and when he knelt to help her tie the strings at the bodice, she allowed it.

If bedding her was supposed to make her fall out of love with him, he should have been less tender, less concerned. His attention and care made her heart swell with even greater love for him.

Which was foolish.

He didn’t love her. He could never love her, not after what she’d done to him. He desired her, nothing more. The fact that he treated her so honorably served to show her what a fool she’d been when she’d refused to run away with him. He would have made her a wonderful husband. He would have cherished her and loved her. What were title and prestige compared to finding the one person who loved you and whom you could love in return?

Of course, she hadn’t known what love was, what it felt like, how much she needed it, when he’d begged her to be his wife. She’d only known vanity and the heady feeling of being sought by so many men. She’d confused popularity with friendship, and when her mother fell ill and Lila had stepped away from public life for a time, she’d realized just how quickly popularity could fade and how few true friends she had.

The tally? Zero.

“You’d better climb under the covers before you catch cold. I’ll join you in a moment.”

Lila nodded and slid under the sheets, still warm from their bodies.

She hadn’t deserved friends before. She hadn’t deserved Brook Derring. She probably didn’t deserve him now, but, oh, how she wanted him.

* * *

Brook stepped behind the privacy screen and leaned one arm against the wall. He needed a moment to himself, a moment to gather his scattered thoughts. He rested his forehead on his arm and closed his eyes. The image of Lila, eyes closed and lips parted, rose in his mind. Brook quickly opened his eyes again.

She’d told him she loved him. What was he supposed to do with that information? Did he believe her? And if he did believe her, what then? It didn’t change the past. It didn’t mean he loved her or wanted to stay married to her. He’d married her to protect her and with the assurance it was a temporary union. He did not have to feel guilty for seeking an annulment when that had been agreed upon from the start.

He hadn’t forced her to do anything. And he’d damn well made sure she enjoyed everything they did together. And still the thought that he’d ruined her wouldn’t leave his mind.

She’d been an innocent.

He’d expected that. He would have been surprised if she’d never been kissed, never danced a little too close, never allowed a man’s hands to stray a bit from what was strictly appropriate. But Lila was no rule breaker. She’d never let a man have her.

Until now.

Because she loved him.

She shouldn’t love him. Not that that ever stopped anyone from falling in love. He should never have fallen in love with her all those years ago, but knowing that hadn’t stopped him from doing so. His heart had hardened since then. He’d seen more of the world after a week in the Saffron Hill rookery than many men saw in a lifetime. Love was an emotion reserved for those like Lila, privileged men and women with the time and leisure to daydream. Love didn’t feed a hungry child or stave off the craving for gin or recover the blunt lost at dice.

Love was a nice, if useless, emotion.

That didn’t mean Brook hadn’t felt anything when he’d tumbled her. Perhaps it was because he had once been in love with her that he’d felt more than he ever remembered feeling when bedding a woman. Every gasp, every breath, every moan seemed imprinted on his brain. He’d wanted to give her more pleasure, even if it meant his was not as great.

He could have taken her fast and hard. She’d been ready for him, and she was no tiny, delicate flower. He would have enjoyed her that way, especially after he’d felt how tight and hot she’d been. He’d almost lost all restraint then.

Instead, he’d been exceedingly careful and proceeded with the utmost care. He’d wanted everything to be perfect for her.

Why the hell had he cared? She hadn’t cared a whit for his feelings when she’d crushed him with her refusal to elope. And tonight, she’d encouraged him to act the reprobate, to make her hate him.

So why hadn’t he done it? He was perfectly capable of all sorts of inexcusable acts. His thoughts swirled, and when they settled, one remained.

He didn’t want her to fall out of love with him.

Brook blew out a breath and pushed away from the wall in disgust. What the devil was wrong with him? He found a dry towel, dipped it in the basin of water, and washed the evidence of her virginity off his flesh. The cold water served to cool his ardor for her. Despite having had her just a few moments ago, he would have liked to take her again. He was a man of stamina and vigor, but usually his interest was not aroused for several hours after release. To want her when he’d just had her perplexed him.

Everything about her perplexed him. Beezle’s capture and this whole affair could not end soon enough. Brook was ready for his old life back—long days and nights in his office on Bow Street, hours spent in the filth of St. Giles, time alone in his flat. This marriage could not end soon enough.

Brook splashed a handful of water on his face, then padded to the bed, where Lila lay. She didn’t move, but he doubted she slept. He could all but hear her thinking. He climbed in beside her, her body heat reminding him how cold he’d acted, and he wondered what she thought about. He’d never once wondered what a woman thought about. He’d often wondered if his sister thought at all, but that was before she’d married Dorrington and ceased to be Brook’s concern.

Since he would not stoop to asking her what she thought about, he did the next best thing. He pulled her into his arms and kissed her temple. “Go to sleep,” he ordered. “Morning will be here soon enough, and it’s a long walk back.”

“Do we have to go back?” she asked with a yawn.

“There’s the cat to think of,” he said, only half joking.

“We should take her and the kittens back to London with us.”

Wouldn’t that be a cozy, domestic scene? What was next? Children?

He supposed that was possible now. She might be pregnant. He hadn’t used any means to prevent pregnancy. Those were risky at best, but at least they were somewhat effective. He might have pulled out with Lila, lowered the chance she might conceive. Why hadn’t he?

That was another issue he preferred not to examine too closely. Perhaps he’d best take his own suggestion and go to sleep.

“Brook?”

Her voice came to him through a haze, and he nuzzled closer to her. She was warm and soft in his arms. Her hair smelled of wildflowers.

“Go to sleep, Lila.” He’d just drifted off and sleep tugged at him like an insistent toddler.

“I will. I just wanted to say thank you for telling me why you still hate me.”

He sighed and opened his eyes. “I don’t hate you. But, Lila, regardless of what happens between us, in bed or otherwise, we have no future. Understand that. There is no hope for you and me.”

He heard her take a shaky breath.

“I don’t say this to hurt you. I say it because it’s the truth.” And because he
didn’t
want to hurt her. “I cannot love you, but I don’t hate you.”

“I’d understand if you did,” she said after a long silence. “I know you didn’t want my apologies. I know they change nothing, but sometimes we must say the things we feel because otherwise it may be too late.”

He stared into the darkness.

“My mother has been gone for almost five years, and daily I still think of little bits of information I’d like to share with her. I have questions I wish I’d asked, conversations I wished we’d had.”

“You never seemed overly fond of her when I first met you.”

He could feel her shrug. “I suppose I wasn’t. When she became ill, when I realized I would lose her, I wished we had been closer. I tried to make that up at the end, but I never truly could.”

He pulled her closer, even as his mind screamed
danger
. Whispered confessions in the dark could lead down alleys he did not want to take. He’d revealed as much of his emotional life—all of it from his past—as he would. He did not want to know any more about her emotions. He did not want to see this soft, caring side of her.

“I’m sorry for your loss. I still think of my father at times.” Which was true. Not because he missed the earl but because there were so many reminders of him at Derring House. He’d been an old man even when Brook had been young. Every tutor he and Dane had ever had talked incessantly of what would be expected when his brother became the earl. His father’s death was almost accepted long before it ever occurred. He supposed losing his mother would have been more of a shock.

“That’s right. You lost your father shortly after I—”

“Yes. It was another blow, but the two of them together made me the man I am today.”

She turned in his arms, the silky skin of her belly sliding against him. “What do you mean?”

“It means I wanted an escape, and I found one. I escaped to St. Giles and Whitechapel and Holborn Hill. I found my true calling. If I’d married you, if my father had lived longer, I would never have become an inspector. I would never have been knighted.”

“Speaking of which, why—”

He put a finger over her lips. They were petal soft and lush, begging to be kissed. He resisted, though his cock rose to attention in protest.

“That’s a story for another time and not nearly as romantic as the ladies like to make it.” He moved his finger away. “Now, go to sleep.”

He closed his eyes, opening them again immediately when she snuggled up against his chest, her soft hair tickling his shoulder. Her mother’s death truly had changed her. He would have to have been a stubborn fool not to see that. Now she apologized, she worried over kittens, she took an interest in someone besides herself.