Lady of Pleasure (19 page)

Caroline swallowed, her heart still thumping wildly against her ears. Her mother had told her of the pain she would encounter at the hands of a man, but she hadn’t realized it would hurt
that
much. She had almost sobbed once against it, but managed to bite down her pain by holding onto him. Fortunately, Ronan’s tongue and his fingers had earlier made it all gloriously worthwhile. So worthwhile, in fact, she would do it again.

She tried to breathe her way through the burning sensation between her thighs, still in disbelief of what had just happened between them.

Of what she had allowed to happen.

The clock chimed on the mantelpiece of the hearth on the side of the small room. It chimed a total of twelve times and clicked back into place. Fortunately, the room was no longer swaying and time had lulled her senses.

She blinked, noticing that several candles had flickered out of existence and that shadows were beginning to creep toward where they still lay on the bed. Ever so slowly, she lifted a heavy, port-hazy head up from off the pillow and stared blissfully toward his blindfolded rugged face. He was hers. She still couldn’t believe it. She trailed a shaky forefinger across his soft sunlit hair, down to his full lips, wishing he had allowed for kissing. For some reason, he hadn’t. Kissing, in her mind, denoted more than passion. It denoted love. But surely, he loved her. Surely he did. They had shared in so much. Even well before this.

His long muscled arms shifted as he shoved himself up into a seated position. He cleared his throat, as if now awkwardly aware that they had been intimate.

She awkwardly stumbled up and off the bed and onto her slippered feet, fumbling with the upper section of her gown, trying to shove her bare arms back into the hanging sleeves. She swallowed, trying not to look at his still exposed nether region.

Even though she knew they weren’t supposed to talk, she had never been one to abide by too many rules. She had to say
something
after what had just happened between them. Glancing toward the closed door, she leaned in and whispered barely loud enough for him to hear, “So when do we tell Alex about us? And more importantly,
how
do we go about telling him? I have no doubt it will be awkward, but if we enlist my mother’s assistance, after what happened between us tonight, he won’t be able to say no.”

He snapped his head in her direction, his blindfold still in place.

She nervously added, “I love you.”

He froze. “
Caroline
?”

She blinked. He said it as if he didn’t know it was her. “Yes?”

“Holy fuck, what—” He frantically tugged at the blindfold.

His reaction was far from the one she anticipated.

Feeling as though her legs wouldn’t hold her up for much longer, she sank onto the bed beside him wanting to understand what was happening and dreading she was not about to hear the words she had hoped for.

The moment Ronan ripped the blindfold off and whipped it aside as if it were strangling him, his eyes were flooded with candlelight. Everything snapped his fuzzy, hazed brain and body into focus. He sat up and stared at the woman seated on the bed beside him. His pulse hitched as he wordlessly gaped at the same stunning face he had only moments ago imagined fucking.

Only...he hadn’t imagined it.

He
had
.

She intently held his gaze with soft blue-green eyes and lowered her chin as if she were assuring him that she was more than fine with what had just happened.

Countless frayed golden chestnut curls, which had fallen from their pinned places atop her head, lay scattered around her bare, ivory slim shoulders. Shoulders that had not been properly covered by the lopsided crooked sleeves of her rose-colored evening gown.

A gown
he
had ripped and stripped. He choked, feeling the blood rush to his head. The room momentarily wavered and tipped to the side as he glanced down at his unbuttoned trousers, knowing he was still on display. His eyes widened. For there, right at root of his cock were bright wet streaks of blood. Virgin blood.

By the mercy of heaven and hell. Since when did fantasies turn into realities?

Ronan frantically shoved his cock into his trousers and buttoned himself in a pathetic effort to shield her from looking at him. This couldn’t be happening. This couldn’t be happening. Blindfolded or not, partaking in too much champagne and cognac or not, there was absolutely
no
excuse. How did a man, a man of his years, deflower a virgin and not even know it?

“Ronan?” Her somewhat concerned voice brought him back to reality.

She was calling him Ronan. And they had just— “
Shit
!” He launched off the bed and stumbled onto his feet. “
Shiiiit
! How did you—” He froze and quieted his voice, knowing the silence around them was too vast to disguise their conversation.

Anyone could be listening.

He whirled back toward her. He had fucked her. Savagely. A virgin. His Caroline.

She stared up at him hazily from where she still sat on the bed, her rose-colored muslin gown spread out and about her in a puddle of cloth. The backside of her dress, which he had ripped, was still wide open, exposing a pale blue corset and a few glimpses of pale, smooth skin swathed in a chemise. She hiccupped and winced.

For the love of God, she was drunk. He could smell the port.

Caroline raised her skirts from around her legs and pushed away from the bed.

Ronan’s lips parted as one shapely leg encased in a snowy white stocking appeared in full view. A perfectly tied pale pink garter held her stocking into place just above that delectable slim knee. A knee he thought he would never see.

Perish and plague his uncivilized thoughts.

She settled up and onto her feet from off the bed. Fully facing him, she dropping her muslin skirts back into place and whispered, “I thought you wanted this.”

He grabbed his head. “No. I…no. No, no, no. I…I…” He could barely speak.

She stared unblinkingly and then scrambled to retrieve a small parchment tucked within her corset. She unfolded it and wordlessly held it out.

He snatched the missive from her and stared at the words, ‘
I acquiesce to being yours and look forward to our first night together. Come to me. I will be waiting.
’ He choked. It was indeed a missive he had written, yes, but a missive he had written to Theodosia almost three years ago when he had first submitted to their association. Theodosia had actually used his missive and his own words to—

Jesus Christ. “I didn’t write this to you.”

Her eyes widened.

If he had it in him, he would have cried. “I wrote it to someone else. Almost three years ago.”

Her lips parted and her features twisted. “Who did you…who?”

Knowing he had to say it, he managed, “Lady Danbury.”

Tears now streamed down her face. Her gigot sleeves slipped down the length of her slim arms. The front section of her evening gown sagged forward along with it, fully exposing the straps of her chemise and a pale blue corset which pushed her more than generous rounded breasts up and into full view.

He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to block out the view. He couldn’t breathe. Jesus. She had given herself to him. She had thought this is what he wanted from her all along. To be taken in the house of the Whipping Society in silence and no mercy.

A sob escaped her. “So you didn’t want me,” she brokenly said. “You came here for…for Lady Danbury. Not…not me.”

Holy God. He squeezed his eyes shut even tighter. “Cover yourself,” he begged, refusing to open his eyes lest he see breasts or nipples. “And keep your voice down. For God’s sake, keep your voice down. Anyone could be listening. I need to get dressed and so do you. Get dressed.”

He turned away. Opening his eyes, he gritted his teeth and savagely ripped apart the missive in riled annoyance, wishing it were Theodosia’s throat he was ripping. Tossing the pieces of the note he wished to God he had never written, he scrambled toward his pile of clothes on the floor. He no longer felt the effects of cognac and champagne. Only the effects of his pounding heart.

He frantically put on everything he could. Shirt. Waistcoat. Cravat. Coat.

Caroline’s skirts rustled slowly from behind him as she arranged everything back into place as best she could despite her torn apparel.

Letting his hands fall to his trousers, he realized – damn it – he hadn’t properly buttoned them. His hands violently shook as he quickly attempted to rebutton the front flap of his trousers. He deserved death for this. A slow, agonizing death.

Which he was quite certain Hawksford would gladly provide.

Hawksford
. Aw, hell.

“Ronan?” Caroline’s voice was smeared with tears.

Ever so slowly, he allowed his eyes to drift over toward where she lingered.

She had already turned toward him, tears still streaming down her face. And as those grief stricken blue-green eyes met his, he knew everything he had hoped to keep sacred between them was sacred no more.

Theodosia had changed
everything
with a flick of a malicious finger.

The clock chimed, announcing it was a quarter past midnight. Then, there was nothing but the sound of his heart beating against his ears.

Caroline swiped at her tears with both hands and finally gasped out, “I don’t ever want to see you again.” She turned, stumbled and bustled toward the locked door.

No! Ronan sprinted toward, then around her. He slid to a rapid halt. Or what should have been a halt. The soles of his boots skid across the remaining length of the wooden floor until his backside slammed against the door with a loud thud.

He winced and stilled his large frame against the door, trying to appear calm despite the fact that he was anything but. He crossed his arms over his waistcoat to keep his hands from trembling and eyed her. “You can’t just leave. Not after— We need to discuss this.”

She didn’t meet his gaze. Instead, she glanced toward the door behind him and sobbed, “Discuss what? That you came here to debauch another and I was somehow used for entertainment?” She reached around him, trying to sloppily grab hold of the key sitting in the lock.

Ronan shifted his body farther to the left and set himself hard against the key, almost jamming her hand, which she quickly withdrew. “It isn’t like that. It isn’t. I only came here tonight because…” He couldn’t say it.

She held his gaze, her lips trembling. “Because what?”

A part of him shriveled. He would no longer be what he had always wanted to be in her eyes: perfect. Oh, God. “I had to pay your father back the money I owed him. Then there was still the remaining three thousand I owed Wharton, which I couldn’t get out of. The only way I was able to do it was to forge an association with a widow who was lonely and wanted my company. Lady Danbury paid my remaining debts and I…I felt obligated toward her ever since. Tonight was supposed to be our…last night together.” He tried to soften it.

Her trembling hand jumped to her mouth as more tears streamed down her face and onto her hand.

He swallowed, unable to breathe knowing he was making her cry.

She jerked toward the door and frantically tried to reach around him to escape through the closed door.

He grabbed her arms, refusing to let her go. “No,” he ground out as calmly as knew how. “Out of all the people in my life who ever mattered to me, surely you know that you are one of them.”

“
Liar
!” she choked out, her features twisting. “If I meant anything to you, anything at all, you would have told me who Lady Danbury really was to you that night in the alcove. Instead, you made a mockery of me. A fool. You made me believe you and she were ‘friends.’ And even worse? You made me believe you were in that alcove waiting for me. You made me believe those touches were for me. But it wasn’t
me
you were waiting for, was it? It was Lady Danbury.
Your
lover
!”

He felt as if she’d stabbed his soul. “I feared you would hate me if you knew. In the way you are hating me right now.”

Her voice grew quiet. “I’m tired. Take me home.” The port was bringing out the child in her.

“How much did you drink?”

Caroline dubiously stared him down, although her cheeks were steadily flushing. “Not enough to make me forget how humiliated I am.”

Ronan struggled to remain calm, even though all he wanted to do was grab her and shake her senseless. “Why did you come? Regardless of the missive, why did you come knowing what men and women do here? Did you honestly think that I would reduce you to this? That this is what I wanted for you?”

She glared. “You needn’t worry about what I think anymore.” She frantically fumbled to try to open the locked door again. “Because you and I are done.
Done
!”

No. She was his now given what had happened.
His
.

Ronan grabbed hold of her arm, spinning her back around and shoved her backside hard up against one of the doors, causing them to jolt against their hinges.