Powder of Sin (8 page)

The lust twisted inside him and grew dangerous. He
would show her what “bad enough” meant. No, he’d demonstrate how
good it could be. That laughter in her eyes would turn into alarm,
but then melt into sweet, helpless longing. He’d touch her with his
hands and mouth until she begged him. Screamed for him.

Shit.

He was as bad as—no, he was
worse
than
Clermont.

She was speaking again, still in a light, smiling
voice, as if they were having a real conversation. Chitchatting.
“It is terrible. When I touched the box, all I wanted was to undo
my stays and—”

“God. Stop.” He moaned. “I am managing to contain
myself, Miss Ambermere, but it is requiring effort on my part.”

Her eyes widened, and her mouth—that delightful
mouth—opened slightly. “Oh,” she said faintly. “Do you mean I’m the
object of your—”

“Yes.” He hissed the word explosively, as if it
could offer the release he needed.

“When I touched the box, I was in the room with Mr.
Dorsey, you see, and never felt the slightest interest in him,
but—Never mind,” she spoke hastily. “I wonder what we should do for
you.”

Rosalie knew she’d said the wrong thing again when
pain or something glazed his eyes. “I can tell you are in
discomfort. Should I leave?” she asked.

“No. Yes. No!”

She brushed back a curl that had escaped her
elaborate pompadour and felt the hard concentration of his gaze
that followed her every motion. A slavering wolf couldn’t have made
its intentions clearer.

She sank back deep into the chair and crossed her
arms over her chest. When other men, like Mr. Clermont, examined
her with that avaricious gleam in their eyes, she experienced a
variety of sensations: repulsion, amusement, sometimes pride. A few
times in her life, she’d felt her pulse quicken and a queer, eager
alertness she now understood was lust.

This was something more intriguing—and
frightening.

He wanted her, and his desire was out in the open,
so to speak. She knew she wanted him. And they were alone. Had she
ever been alone with a male for more than a few minutes? There was
Robert in the gardens. He’d stolen a kiss. And Geoffrey during the
dance—they’d retired to a balcony for fresh air…

“Miss Ambermere, I beg your pardon. You’re
frightened. I shan’t. I-I will not allow this to control my
behavior.” His voice was gruff, but now she suspected the anger was
directed at himself.

She
was
afraid, and it wasn’t entirely his
actions she feared. The way she felt when his intense stare drank
her in…

It kindled the response in her body.

“I know. It’s just that I’m not certain what I
should do. I mean…” She caught her lower lip between her teeth—a
nervous gesture—but quickly stopped when she saw his hungry gaze
fixed on her mouth.

He flinched, groaned, and shifted sideways in the
chair, turning away from her. He stared down at the list of names
he’d brought as if he would devour it.

If he could make his feelings clear, perhaps she
might do the same. “Mr. Reed, when you look at me, I feel so queer.
It is as if you were undress—”

“Stop,” he shouted, then passed his hands over his
face.

“I wouldn’t advise touching your face,” she said.
“It seems worse when the powder gets on more of your skin.”

He shuddered. “You. No! No. You are playing with
fire. You—I will sit in this chair and behave like a gentleman and
not an animal. But you must
stop
.”

The intriguing thought of allowing him to kiss her
was momentarily nudged away by annoyance. “You needn’t raise your
voice. And I wish you’d explain what exactly I should stop?”

“Mentioning…things,” he snapped. “Undressing. Skin.”
He pressed his lips tight. “Bodies.”

She rose to her feet. Clearly if she allowed him to
touch her—which unbelievably, she still wished he would do—he’d
resent her. No doubt he’d claim she’d unmanned him, whatever that
meant. She gave the sweetest smile she could muster when her heart
beat so quickly. “What would you have me do, Mr. Reed?”

His chest rose and fell in obviously ragged breaths.
The long silence filled the room. “I think it best if I am left
alone in peace. Until I might recover.”

His hands, which had been formed into sizable fists,
relaxed. He moved them restlessly over the arms of the chair, as if
feeling the quality of the cloth. “And I must tell you…Miss
Ambermere.” He sounded as if he was in pain as he said her name,
and he would not look at her.

It had to be mortifying for the man to be in this
state in her presence, and she knew from years with her father that
an embarrassed man was an angry one. She straightened, ready for
another onslaught of words.

He twisted in his seat and glanced up at her with
dark eyes aglow, only for a moment before he looked away. “Ma’am, I
apologize. I tampered with your property and then commenced
carrying on as if you were a Jezebel.”

She wished he wouldn’t do that—behave rudely and
then apologize and smile so sweetly. The man’s physical presence
befuddled her enough as it was; his behavior needn’t be so
confusing.

“I’m not a Jezebel,” she said, trying to convince
herself as well as him.

“No, of course not. I am. Or whatever the male
equivalent might be.” She thought she heard him mutter, “Clermont.”
His hands stilled. “The symptoms. Perhaps they aren’t as bad. I
can—I can nearly think.” He drew in a deep breath and brushed his
fingertips over the knot of his dark cravat.

“You weren’t thinking? What were you doing
before?”

“Wanting. Craving,” he whispered and shut his eyes.
“Needing you.”

“Oh.” Again the bottom of her stomach seemed to
drop, and her heart sped up. “And that’s very bad, isn’t it,” she
said with only a hint of a question in her voice.

He gave the tiniest nod, eyes still shut.

“Do you think perhaps it would help if I laid a hand
on your forehead?” The words were out before she could stop them.
But she recalled how she would have liked for someone to run
soothing fingers over her when she was under the influence of the
chemical. It might have helped ease the ache she’d felt.
Particularly if it had been his strong hands soothing her, erasing
that restlessness somehow.

He froze, and she could tell he even held his
breath. “No.” She could barely hear him. “It wouldn’t be enough of
a touch. I want all of you.”

He opened his eyes and glared at her, once again
blazingly belligerent and angry. “I would rub and taste every last
inch of your skin. I would commit the ultimate act again and again,
and I wouldn’t stop until I was satisfied. But this hunger is so
huge, I might never be sated.” He licked his lips. “Forgive me,” he
whispered.

The naked back writhing in her garden at night,
flexing and pushing. Only it would be this man and her. Yes, she
understood. She moved toward the door. “I was quite wrong to
suggest touching you. My turn to apologize, and I’ll leave now. Do
ring if you need anything. Beels will be at your disposal.” She
took the key from the lock. “I’ll check on you in an hour or
so.”

“I wouldn’t object if you locked me in.” He sounded
almost calm for the first time since she’d reentered the room. “But
I pray it is not necessary.”

“Pray?” She took a step closer to him.

He raised a shaking hand, fingers bent as if he
wanted to grab at her. He seemed surprised by his outstretched
fingers, and he frowned at them. “Please. Miss Ambermere,” he
whispered. “Lock the door.”

“One hour,” she said. And she was surprised by her
hope to find him still caught in the fever, though to a lessened
degree, perhaps. If he couldn’t stop himself, if she had to comfort
him—he was her guest, after all—well, they might touch and perhaps
even kiss. Surely it would harm no one if they kissed.

But then his voice, harsh and full of need, echoed
in her mind, and she knew she fooled herself that they’d only
indulge in a few light kisses. They would fall on each other like
starving animals. He, at least, had the powder as an excuse for his
hunger.

She walked from the room without allowing herself to
look back.

Rosalie closed the door behind her. She absently
fingered the shank and rough head of the key, then locked the door,
knowing that wouldn’t accomplish as much as Mr. Reed had hoped,
because she’d still be able to get in and was entirely too aware of
that fact.

An hour. She must distract herself from the weight
of the key in her pocket. The dark promises behind all those words
he’d uttered. They should have frightened her, and they did, but
something dark deep in her core thrilled to his voice and what he
had said.

She reminded herself there was no powder in her
system, but still she couldn’t stop the shivers of longing that
twisted her belly. She rubbed her arms, but that brought no relief,
for she imagined his strong fingers on her.

She forced her steps from the library and walked to
the parlor, where the evening mail delivery sat on a silver tray.
As she slit envelopes and tossed them aside, she wondered what he’d
be doing in that room alone. Pacing?

She paused for a moment, recalling some of Johnny’s
words of how a frustrated man could take the unhealthy action of
easing the tension. Amazing how many details she recalled of his
conversations. Especially because of the endless number of times
she had told him and herself she was not listening to his wretched
talk of bodies.

Perhaps that was what Mr. Reed did behind the closed
door. He’d open his fly, remove his stiffened organ—she had seen it
was engorged under the dull tweed of his trousers. He’d use his
hands or perhaps just one hand. “
A light touch is all that is
required for some men
,” Cousin Johnny had said. “
Pay
attention, for many men do not want to do this for themselves. They
consider it self-pollution. They would gladly allow you to perform
the task
.”

Rosalie realized her breasts tingled and her whole
body felt swollen with desire. She gave a snort of amused disgust.
Perhaps lustful sensations were contagious. She must force her
thoughts to something dull to prevent herself from walking into
that library and demanding he show her all the details that Cousin
Johnny had described. Would his organ discharge in pulses of white
liquid? The thought had seemed comical at the time, but not at all
now. The moment of release. She’d love to see the cool Mr. Reed
lose himself in that ultimate pleasure.

She went to the desk to sort the bills, the job Miss
Renshaw usually insisted on doing. Shifting the mail over to the
stack of letters she hadn’t answered yet, she found the letter from
her mother she’d got two days earlier.

Her mother wrote that she was ready for a jaunt to
the city and promised to pay her yearly call soon. Rosalie stared
down at the slightly smudged letter and for a moment was distracted
from the yearning that roiled in her belly.

A ring of dried liquid; she recollected she’d put
her glass on it when she went after Miss Renshaw that first night
she’d possessed the dreadful, amazing powder. Rosalie wondered what
her mother would have thought if she’d witnessed the soft-spoken,
reticent lady, who’d only touched the chemical and less than an
hour later welcomed a coachman into her body.

Thank goodness Lady Williamsford would never know
about Cousin Johnny’s powder. She must write a letter at once to
put Lady Williamsford off until this problem was solved.

She sat in a chair and, instead of writing the
letter, imagined going back to that library and allowing Mr. Reed
to touch her. He had such a controlled manner, but under that was a
raw energy she saw glowing in his dark eyes. The powerful
shoulders. He might allow her to run her hands over his arms, his
wrists. Touching those limbs would not be such an obscene
gesture.

He had such obvious strength of character as he’d
fought the effects of the chemical. Certainly he could control
himself from committing that final intimacy that brought two bodies
together. Two bodies plunging. No. She only longed to feel the
quality of his skin, perhaps the unfamiliar roughness of a male
face and the touch of his calloused hand—nothing more. Except she’d
have to test the softness of his rumpled hair.

Come now. She was a young lady of moral fiber, and
it was time she steer her thoughts to more temperate zones.

Though she did not share Miss Renshaw’s horror about
the matters of flesh, Rosalie had seen firsthand the trouble
created by giving in to base desires. Cousin Johnny was not the
only member of her family who’d enjoyed the decadence of flesh and
lost too much with the pursuit of pleasure.

She would not be drawn into the recklessness. And
that reminded her, she must write that letter, putting off her
mother’s visit as soon as possible.

An hour passed, slowly. She wished her heart
wouldn’t race as she walked back to the library to check on her
prisoner. A maid gave her a curious glance. Perhaps the girl knew
who was in the library, and even in the fringes of polite society,
young ladies did not lock men away. Rosalie swallowed a nervous
laugh.

She gave a light knock. “It is Miss Ambermere,” she
announced. “May I come in?”

“Yes. All right,” he said, gruff, as if granting
something painful.

As she pushed open the door, she saw him scowling up
at her. Once again she was struck by the thought that Mr. Reed
didn’t seem to particularly like her. His condition brought on by
the powder meant he had some need of a body, and there she was. She
had to admit that except for the moments when he smiled or said
something surprising, she wasn’t sure she liked him either, but she
was absolutely certain she wanted to touch him.