Punish Me With Roses - a Victorian Historical Romance (7 page)

She sipped her tea until it was gone and then put the glass on the table so quickly he was surprised it didn't shatter. But he could see why she'd done it. Her hand trembled so much that she would have spilled hot tea on her lap if had she tried to hold on to it.

Then, also to his surprise, after a moment of silence she picked it up again. This time, the trembling was even worse. It wasn't something he could ignore.

"Is there something wrong, Miss Fyn?"

He wondered if he'd actually broken her. He had never expected a confession so soon. It didn't make sense that he wouldn't be more excited. Was it fear he felt...or anxiousness?

For the first time, Alexander Trevelyn wondered if he secretly hoped she was innocent.

She still looked shocked. He went to sit beside her and the moment he placed his hand on her shoulder, she began to cry. "You don't have to say anything."

"Oh, this is so embarrassing," she said through her tears.

"No, it isn't. I understand."

She pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve and dabbed her eyes. "I haven't done this in so long."

"You mean cry?"

She nodded. "If I let myself give into the pain, it would be too much. I have to be strong, but..."

He patted her shoulder some more and her tears seemed to be less. "But what?"

"I miss them so much!" she cried.

As cruel as it might have been of him, he thought she might be faking. Then, looking at her again, he decided it was actually more like she was exaggerating. But what if she wasn't?

"I don't know what to say. I don't suppose anything could make you feel better."

She shook her head.

"I can, however, give you my sympathy." He wasn't sure at all about what he was about to do. There was a part of him though, that was very sure. "I lost both my mother and my sister."

She looked at him with her mouth partially open. "That's terrible," she said. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"Not really. I just wanted you to know that you're not alone."

"No, I suppose I'm not." Although she was trembled, she no longer cried.

"I lost my mother many, many years ago, and although it hurts, the pain does go away."

"Does it really?" Her expression was one of hopeful questioning.

"I promise."

He looked into her eyes which still glistened with tears she had yet to shed and he forgot what he'd come there to do.

Neither of them said anything for a while, nor did they move. He realized how long it had been when he finally reached for his tea. It was cold.

As they'd sat there, her tears dried and she moved subtlety to the other end of the divan.

He stood up and looked toward the door with a lack of purpose. "Perhaps I should leave."

When she didn't say anything, he turned around. She was looking at him. "If you want to go--"

"No," he immediately replied. Then he smiled and said, "What I mean is...it's up to you."

Suddenly, she seemed to consider it as though it were the most important decision she'd ever made. "It
would
be nice to have some more tea."

He was pretty damn sure that neither of them was interested in the tea.

She poured two more cups.

"Victoria..." He stared at the beauteous stretch of skin her bodice exposed when she leaned over. "What would you say if I declared some interest in you?"

She raised her gaze to him, peering over the silver service that must have once belonged to her aunt. Before she answered, he had time to wonder why Fiona Fyn kept popping into his mind. If she was haunting him, he was curious to know the reason. After another moment of silence Victoria said, "What exactly does 'some interest' entail?"

He stepped closer to her. "We'll call it 'a lot of interest' then."

Her hand fluttered toward her breast, then stopped. "I wouldn't know what to say, Mr. Trevelyn." Her eyes sparkled with some hidden emotion that, try as he might, he could not determine.

"And what if I told you that I find it difficult to stay away from you, no matter how many reasons I have to do so?"

"That is a rhetorical question, is it not?"

He shook his head.

"Hypothetical?"

He shook his head once again.

She stared him down.

He took another two steps towards her.

Her hand fluttered again, and this time, it landed on her bosom with a solid thump.

He knew then--and felt like a fool for not realizing it earlier--why she sometimes handled his queries with ease and other times stumbled over them like a poor man in debtor's prison. It depended on how close he was to her.

What a discovery it was!

He forgot his amorous intentions in that moment and realized it was the perfect time to ask his final question, the one she'd been avoiding, the one that he would get her to answer if he only remembered to stay so close to her that she lost all sense and logic.

"Why did you use a false name?"
Because you were running from your past.

"Why do you keep asking me that?"

"Because I want to know." He thought of approaching her slowly, then decided it would be a waste of time. He seized upon her anxious nature and planted himself beside her on the divan.

Her dark eyes went wide with...fear? "I used the false name because I wanted to. That's the end of the story."

"Why did you want to?" His thigh was pressed against her skirt. If she wasn't feeling nervous, he'd be quite surprised. He could barely stay calm himself.

She took a long tremulous breath. "For safety.  It made sense at the time."

He saw that she was flushed, but perhaps that was the heat in the room. He was feeling quite hot.

"What if a nefarious sort is looking for someone to kidnap and offer back to their family at a high ransom?" she continued, and it seemed as though she did it in order to keep talking. She took another deep breath. "He might be asking lady's names in order to discover who would be a worthy victim."

Using his nearness as a weapon was not entirely unappealing. The longer he sat there, the closer he moved, and the better it felt. The only problem was that he kept losing his train of thought. It must be something about her perfume. It was doing funny things to his memory. He struggled to remember what he was going to say next. "But why would you think that your name would cause any alarms?"

She shivered and he knew it was out of passion. She licked her lips. "For...well, for obvious reasons."

"But your name…" he stared, and found himself whispering, "is quite common." He'd never noticed just how dark her eyes were. He felt his good intentions drowning in their depths.

"I hardly think Clavering is a common last name, considering," she said.

Her last words hardly registered in his head. Alex was too close to her heady scent of wildflowers and spring air. How she carried the aura of spring through the winter, he did not know. But one smell of her permeating fragrance sent his mind into a whirl. He wanted to gasp long, full breaths of her. He wanted to make her breathless and eager for his scent. He wanted her.

Had they been having a conversation? He no longer remembered what it had been about. If it had been important, he wouldn't have forgotten it so easily. Yes, he assured himself, it must have been something frivolous.

He breathed in another incredible whiff of her and took in the whole picture. He glanced down her body, at her pale bosom, at her amazingly tiny waist. Looking at her didn't dispel his olfactory-born desires or even lessen them. It just added to his complete sensory experience. He wanted to take in all of her. With time, he would.

Enigmatically, her beauty was of the cool kind, completely out of sorts with the way she smelled. But somehow, it matched. Somehow, each deepened the appeal of the other.
Lord, how she made his pulse race!

He had been speaking to her all day and could imagine her kind, seductive voice as though he could hear it right then. But he also heard her laborious intakes of breath. She was having a hard time breathing, just as he was. It was awe inspiring. Every sense he possessed had been gloriously satisfied...except for one.

Even though they were only inches apart, they still hadn't
touched
.

He didn't think she could inflame his desires any more, until she did. She moved.

Closer
.

Their lips met with the spark of fireworks. He knew he couldn't restrain himself any longer. While he was hot and calm before, now he was burning with energy. He kissed her with far more strength than gentleness. She responded just the way he'd wanted her to, with little gasps of pleasure and no misplaced arms to bar his progress. He moved on.

The longer he kissed her--and it hadn't been very long at all--the more reason he lost. This wasn't an artful seduction. Or perhaps it was.

He
was being seduced.

She wriggled beside him and he pulled her onto his lap. He opened his eyes and glanced at her through heavy lids. She opened hers as well and gifted him with a look of scorching surrender.
Good lord
, if she didn't move her skirts out of the way, he felt he would die.

He moved his hands down her back and gripped the sides of her waist with hungry fingers. He imagined it bare beneath his touch, silky smooth and prime for his mouth. His breeches became even tighter then. He had to wonder if busting one's breeches was a faux pas.

Right then, it was a serious concern.

Chapter 4

She had never felt so anxious in her life.

She was kissing Alex, responding from instinct more than anything else and loving it. His lips felt so soft and so right pressed against her own. Her entire body was hot, burning for him.

But she also felt a kind of frustration.

A wonderfully pleasant feeling had settled over her body, and while it felt good, it wasn't complete. She thought there was something missing. She
needed
him to keep kissing her or she would scream. She wanted more of him, but she didn't know what else he could give her. Victoria knew what sex was, but Georgia, the only adult who would talk to her about such things, had told her that it was a sinful thing to do if one wasn't married. So that couldn't possibly be what she desired, could it?

There was also a niggling fear at the back of her mind. It was at war with her pleasure, trying to tear her away from the absolute bliss that she was experiencing. What had they been talking about before he'd kissed her?

She almost couldn't believe what was happening to her. It was no wonder that she'd forgotten. She felt so warm, so hot that she wanted to take off her dress and feel his rough clothing against her bare skin. What a naughty thought!

But he was so desirable
...

What had she forgotten? She asked herself the question over and over again but each time she came close to remembering, he'd surprise her with the movement of his tongue or the shifting of his hands. Then she'd be lost in passion once again. It was simply too much for one woman to handle.

His lips left her mouth then and she opened her eyes. His face was flushed and his gaze piercing. Tremors went through her body at the prompting of his aroused perusal. He looked her up and down, and no indication that he was taking anything more than a breather.

If he had wanted to stop, she didn't think she'd be able to restrain herself from begging him to continue.

"Oh, Alex..."

"Don't speak, Victoria," he whispered, caressing her cheek with the edge of his hand. "You don't need to say anything."

And then, in the middle of her tumultuous reverie, she
remembered
. I've made a huge mistake, she thought, suddenly wishing that her mind had remained as blank as an old maid's dance card. She had revealed something from her all too recent past.

He knew her name was Victoria
Clavering
!

The deaths at Blackmoore would likely be in the papers and what if her name was mentioned? He would know that the charming girl he'd seduced in her uncle's drawing room was really an experienced murderess who'd killed two men.

What if he too was realizing what she'd said at that very moment?

She reached around him, gripped his back, and pulled her to him. This time, she kissed him. But she wasn't leading for long. It wasn't difficult to inflame his desire again, if ever it had died down. What she knew for sure was that she couldn't allow it to, because then he'd have time to think. Time to remember.

Even through her haze of ardor, she heard a sound in the foyer. Reflexively, she jumped away from Alex, almost falling onto the floor in her haste. They looked toward the door in sync and saw John Fyn push it open with his foot.

His arms laden with fish, he stared and said, "I thought I heard someone."

Her breathing still shallow, she replied, "We were having tea."

"Right." He turned around. "I'd better get this fish cleaned and salted." Then he left.

"I'm sorry, Victoria," Alex said as he stood, looking in the direction her uncle had went. "I think it's time that I leave."

Although that was the last thing she wanted, she had too much pride to argue. Besides, she told herself, he was probably right. Her uncle hadn't actually
seen
anything, but he wasn't born yesterday. "I'm sure that would be best."

He nodded, then left.

She was left alone with her thoughts, with her questions, and with her fears.

Why had Alex asked her so many questions? She didn't want to think she had anything to fear from him, but that had always been a possibility. Since the first night,
especially
on that night, she'd been careful about what she'd say. She didn't like taking chances with her safety, even though it seemed highly unlikely that Alex could intend to harm her. She had to think about it logically. If he knew anything about what had happened at Blackmoore, would he really be so keen to kiss her?

She didn't think so. She also didn't think that he'd want to spend time with her. If he knew and wanted to turn her in, he would have done it already. If he knew and didn't care, well...that wasn't a possibility.