Powder of Sin (28 page)

She managed to wrap her arms around him and hold him
at his narrow waist. His men’s clothing, so thick, heavy, and
exotic compared to her own. Best of all, smelling of Gideon.

He might have tried to escape; she didn’t know. She
wrapped her arms tightly and more purposefully around him. And
then, with a small bound and a ripping of the blue chiffon gown,
she wrapped her legs around him too.

“Hush, hush.” He ran his hands up and down her back
as if trying to soothe a child, but she felt each touch in the
center of her body, where the explosion lurked, ready to suck
everything in and keep it all tightly inside.

“The fever will pass,” he whispered. “You… We must
stop.”

Except she could hear his breath was unsteady, and
he didn’t try as hard as he might to get away. In fact, his hands
cupped her bottom now, supporting her against his body, and she
could feel that he grew and hardened where her legs were spread
wide and he rubbed her.

No soup sloshed through him, but his body betrayed
him. She sent up a grateful prayer, because if she could only get
him to touch her—get inside her—she wouldn’t have to die of desire,
a wretched death of pure need.

“Rosalie.” He groaned. “Your guests. I must attend
to—”

“Yes, yes, but I don’t want them just at the moment.
I want you.”

He let go of her, and she slid slowly down his body,
every tiny bit of her skin delighting in the pressure. Her nipples
were swollen and prickling from the long slide of cloth. She
stopped to press her breasts against his solid head, which was
awake and ready. She didn’t have time to get out of her clothes; it
would take too long.

She wiggled her hand under his waistcoat and tingled
with the pleasure that only a thin layer of starched shirt lay over
the heat of his body.

“Ah.” She gave a long, loud exhalation of triumph.
The warm, taut skin of Gideon’s side. Her fingertips and palm
delighted in the perfect texture. So hard under the living
skin.

She burrowed around, and her fingertips slid over
the warmth and hair and found another trophy. Alive and hard, and
she curled her hand around his overlarge…cock. The word in all
those books of Johnny’s was
cock
, and she loved it. She
whispered it. “I love your cock.”

His breath was uneven. “Rosalie, please.” And he
reached for her arms and tried to loosen her grip while he insisted
on babbling something about how other people required help and he
had to help them.

But no, she didn’t want to let go. “I need you.”

“Please, please.” His rough whisper pleaded with
her. “It’s just the powder, and it’s not real.” His eyes were dark,
the pupils large and reflecting candlelight and hunger.

She twisted closer. “The way you taste, I need it on
my lips. Help me.”

“Jesus.” He held her head between his hands and put
his mouth on hers. Back to the hungry exploration of tongue and
mouth—mmm.

His ragged breath came from parted lips; his body
quivered with tension. Good. He was in anguish almost as great as
her own, so she would make a deal with him. “Take care of me. Then
go. I need you. Gideon, it’s you. I need this.” She squeezed the
swollen part of him. “Your cock again. And your body. In mine,” she
explained in case he didn’t understand.

His muscles tensed, but he was not fighting anymore.
Touching, caressing her without restraint. At last, she could feel
how his body changed and how he shifted into what she needed. With
no more protest or trying to move away, he slid his hands up and
under her gown. She untied and unbuttoned what she could, wishing
she could do more, but he was in a hurry, and at the back of her
mind, under the layers of frustration and need, she knew they
should stop—or perhaps go as quickly as possible.

First this. Then I’ll think. Fill the emptiness that
is so dire, I’ll faint dead away again.

“I need you,” she said. “I’m sorry. Now, Gideon.
Your hands aren’t enough.”

They were good, though, and when he pushed two
fingers inside her body, she cried out and held on to his
shoulders. Had it been so strong before? Slight pain but mostly
frantic pleasure at the hard, foreign thing moving now inside her.
Fingers.

She hiked her gown, widened her legs, and lay on the
floor, grateful for the cool, hard wood under her. A rug; a bed
would be too soft and give too much. She needed all hardness now.
His.

“Rosalie,” he was saying. “I want you but—”

“Please. Inside me.” She writhed, too restless to
lie still as she waited for him.

And at last he covered her body with his, pushing
her down, holding her in place.

“Now,” she demanded and curled her legs up so she
could strike his still-clothed bottom with her stockinged feet.
More scraps of worthless clothing. If only the muting, thin silk on
her legs would dissolve. She’d stroke him with the soles of her
feet, force him to run his hands over the back of her knees.

He fumbled with his fly, and with a muttered
apology—she wasn’t sure to whom—thrust into her. The thick head of
him stretched and filled her slowly, enough she could sense exactly
where he scraped her slick walls as he gradually opened her.

Yes, that was right. Her breath grew ragged. Her
heart beat so fast, it was a whir. With his weight and his hands
and his cock, he was rescuing her from the ache that threatened to
steal her sanity.

“Harder.” She cried out when he obeyed. “Oh,
harder.” She was talking to the floor under her back and to him as
he moved inside her. Too careful. She hitched up her legs so he
could go deeper. The ache from the last time he’d been inside her
was raw and still twinged but turned into bliss as he drove into
her. Solid pushes at last, erasing everything but the growing,
swelling need that couldn’t get any more dire but that did with
each pump of him into her body and each time his hand stroked
between them. One of his hands held her steady at the shoulder. His
body was the only thing she knew. His breath came faster, and he
moved, ramming inside her, thorough and hard. The frantic sensation
curled her toes, her fingers.

More.

She must have said it aloud, because he put her
calves over his shoulders.

That reminded her of a phrase. “Animals. Rutting
like animals.” She gasped as he hit a spot inside her body that had
been aching for him and now welcomed his thrust by sending her into
shivers.

“Yes. Bloody animals.” He snarled, then pressed his
mouth to her throat and neck, teasing bites that had just enough
pain to make her arch up with delight. She wrapped herself tighter
as she rolled toward the explosion she knew was coming.

His breath was hot on her neck and ear. “I’m going
to spend,” he whispered. “I must stop.”

“No no no,” she keened and held tight around him as
a powerful gust knocked her so hard, the dark hit her eyes, and she
was gone.

When she came alive again, he had drawn away from
her and was fumbling with her gown. She was still buzzing with
need, but now could hear other voices too.

“Gideon.”

He glanced up into her face, an unreadable
expression on his. She hiked herself onto her elbows and saw he’d
already managed to draw down her ripped gown, put his cock away,
and properly arrange his trousers. His cock. The word, once
remembered, wouldn’t leave her mind. His neckcloth was ruined, his
shirt untucked. He was a proper mess. And she wanted to reach for
him again, make him even more undone and messy. Naked would be
good.

He rose to his feet and held a hand down for her.
She grabbed it and kissed his palm, smelling the musky scent of her
own body on his fingers.

He grasped her and hauled her up, then wrenched his
hand away, almost too quickly, as if he were disgusted. Or perhaps
only in a hurry, for he was shoving his shirt in as if it were his
enemy and tugging at his waistcoat. “Once again, I gave in to the
chemical,” he growled. “I must—I have a job.”

She eyed him, watched his long fingers expertly
twisting his cloth. She had to see past her yawning need, but oh,
those hands should be on her.

No. She had to understand what he was saying. Anger.
He always seemed so annoyed, though perhaps he had cause, because
weren’t there other people? Out there? She tried a small laugh.
“You have several jobs, as it turns out, just for me.”

He moved to a dark window. At first she thought he
was gazing out into the night, but then she understood he was using
it as a mirror to adjust the white tie at his throat. He gave up
and turned from the window.

“The wretched powder. I hate that bloody chemical.”
He’d found his gloves somewhere and was yanking them on, staring
down at his hands as he shoved.

She wanted him against her body again, but she also
wanted more than physical intimacy. If only he’d look at her, smile
into her face. He wasn’t looking in her direction as he roughly
pushed a hand through his hair, which had taken on its usual
rumpled dark wave.

“I’m so very sorry. Are you all right?” he asked,
still not looking in her eyes. At least he didn’t sound angry.

“Yes. I think so.”
I still need you. Take off
your clothes. Give me your body.

“I didn’t want it to happen like this with us again,
Rosalie, please believe me.”

“It didn’t feel good to you?”

“That’s not the point. I should have had more
control.”

He was walking away from her. “I have to leave,
Rosalie. I must hurry. Please, please stay here. I only hope it
hasn’t got worse out there,” he said and left the room, shutting
the door quietly behind him.

When he left, he took most of the desire with him.
She could still feel the hum of her body’s awareness. Every hint of
a breeze or trail of a scent assaulted her and threatened to
distract her with delight and yearning, but her brain had cleared
enough for her to be able to think.

And she didn’t want to be alone with those
thoughts.

“Of course,” she said softly. “Out there. Worse?”
She’d only eaten some of her soup, and it had ravaged her senses.
Something worse lay outside the door.

She had to calm her whirling brain and awakened body
enough so she could go see what her mother had done.

Rosalie wasn’t certain her social standing would
survive the wreck of this evening, but she would have to be certain
none of the guests invited to her house went down with her.

Reed didn’t have the time or desire to indulge in
self-loathing, but even as he hurried from the library, the rage
engulfed him. The self-control he’d prided himself on for months,
gone like a paper thrown on a roaring fire, gone the one moment he
truly required it.

His behavior had been worse than anything he’d
witnessed in his time with Clermont. He’d taken a woman infected
with the terrible chemical. Reed was perhaps the only clearheaded
man in the house, and he hadn’t managed to keep his prick in his
pants because a lovely woman begged him.

Her face flushed, hot-eyed. Her sweet, cultured
voice begging for his cock.

God forgive him, because he knew if it was played
all over again, Rosalie in that blue gown, her hair in careful
disorder, he’d still have been unable to keep off her.

Only five people remained in the dining room. Two
men and a lady sat at the table. Thank God they were eating. Two
footmen stood nearby.

Under Reed’s instructions, the servants had turned
into grim-eyed jailers. During the few minutes he’d left Rosalie
alone, he’d managed to toss the soup and gather the servants for a
hurried meeting.

The twenty or so footmen and the housekeeper and
maids all stood in the large kitchen.

Reed’s instructions had been simple. “
Don’t allow
them to touch each other. Keep them apart, by force if
necessary
.”

When one of the younger footmen sniggered, Reed had
had to come down hard, responding with anger. In a few brief words,
he described the drug as terrible, perhaps exaggerated its dangers.
He sure as hell hoped so. He’d said, “
If we can’t keep ’em under
control, the police might have to be summoned. Not what any of us
want, hey
?”

Hawes had been in the kitchen then, dressed in the
scarlet finery. Everyone had been drafted for this party, it
seemed. The coachman had stood on a chair and roared at the group.
“
Think how hard it would be to get work in service if word gets
around you were part of something horrid
.”

Reed had left Hawes and Beels diplomatically sorting
the guests as the musicians played on. About half the guests had
eaten the soup, and they, along with their companions if they were
young women, were to remain at the table, encouraged to finish the
meal.

The others were politely, firmly, cheerily handed
their wraps and pushed out the door, confused and ready to spread
rumors. Ah well.

Reed had told Beels to keep the others eating.
“Perhaps the food will help dull the effects. And if they grow
restless, any who wish to may dance. No waltzes.”

After that, Reed went to check on Rosalie. And when
he should have been out in the public rooms, working…he’d been
working in Rosalie.

Yes, the three were eating, and their fingers,
chins, and cheeks glistened with grease.

They were surrounded by plates, serving dishes from
every course.

“Rosemary.” A man moaned, threw his head back, and
closed his eyes. For a ghastly second, Reed wondered if he was
talking about a woman under the table—or to the older lady near
him.

The man brought his fingers to his mouth and licked
them slowly. “Sharp. Mmm. Fragrance that fills the back of the
throat. Rosemary, and I think a touch of French oregano.” The man
mewed happily and opened his eyes. He leaned forward and examined
the plates. After a moment, he picked up a large hunk of white fish
between finger and thumb and shoved it into his mouth.