What a Rogue Desires (17 page)

“I know.” She plucked at a fold of the lovely new gown she wore. “Was this all a fare-thee-well gift, or payment for last night?”

“No,” he said before she had even finished speaking. “It was not payment. I thought—last night—I should not have done, perhaps…”

“Well, good. I didn’t want payment.”

For a moment both were silent. “Where to, then, madam?” David asked softly.

Vivian reflected. She should go. He was offering to drive her to a coaching inn—with fifty pounds! But her old life seemed long ago and far away, and never once had it offered her the prospect of sitting in the sunshine with him, hand in hand. “London, I suppose,” she said.

He turned to face her. Vivian gazed back at him. Lord help her, but she was a fool. He made her laugh and he treated her like a lady and he made love to her like it really was love. For an instant she felt again his body moving over hers, his hands on her skin, and she knew it made her blush.

Slowly he leaned forward, his dark eyes intent on hers. His kiss was gentle and sweet, lingering. “You’re not my prisoner,” he whispered, his lips brushing against hers. “But I want you.”

“Here and now?” She could almost consider it, her blood warming as more memories of last night flooded back. There was no one about, here by this small pond away from the road.

He smiled, drawing back. “But I should hate to see grass stains on your lovely new frock.”

Vivian blushed harder, smiling back at him as he flicked the whip and turned the carriage back toward London. She rather suspected she was still his prisoner, although not as he had meant a moment ago. This drive had not really changed things between them, just made some things more clear and some things less. The only thing Vivian knew for certain was that she wasn’t ready to leave him yet.

David spent the next few days in the happiest humor of his life. He couldn’t recall any other time when everything in his world seemed to be going exactly as it ought. He seemed to have finally gotten the hang of most of Marcus’s business affairs, aided slightly by the nearing close of the Season and the end of Parliament. There was less work, it was true, but what there was, David understood and, miraculously, felt competent to handle. Confident competence was not something David was accustomed to, and he found it oddly exhilarating.

His household began to run rather well. Meals were served on time, everything looked clean, and, most importantly, the servants weren’t quitting at every turn. After Hobbs’s misgivings were addressed, no servants expressed outrage over Vivian’s presence. His house was beginning to look quite nice, and David found he liked it more than he had expected. It was rather surprising to find his own home was a more comfortable place than he had ever thought it.

And there was Vivian. Just the thought of her could bring a foolish grin to his face. He was behaving like a lovesick boy over her, but he didn’t care. For the first time in his life, David was in love, truly, madly, blissfully in love, and it was a wondrous thing to him. He worked all day at Exeter House, then returned home for dinner with her. She would often be waiting in the drawing room, a brilliant smile on her face, ready to fling herself into his arms once the door was shut and they were alone. They dined together, spent the evening together, and then David would carry her off to bed for a night of pure bliss together. Even having to sneak behind his butler’s back to do it didn’t bother him. Every day he concocted some new outlandish explanation why he and Miss Beecham must stay up until the servants went to bed. He rather thought Hobbs suspected something was going on, but thankfully seemed to prefer to believe they were reading Scriptures and practicing elocution.

He thought he would never tire of looking at Vivian. She could convey such a range of feeling with a single glance, a quirk of her brow, a slight twist of her lips. He delighted in exasperating her, just so he could cajole her back into a good mood. He loved to make her laugh, just to see her nose wrinkle. He loved to make her eyes flutter closed and her head fall back as she moaned in pleasure. He loved to watch her pore over some book from his library with that fine crease between her eyes and her lip caught between her teeth. He loved the way her face lit up when he gave her a gift, even something as inconsequential as a single flower plucked from the Exeter House gardens. In every way he could think of, David loved her.

He didn’t know if she loved him. It didn’t seem possible she was feigning her affection entirely. She could have walked out of his house and never come back at any time in the last fortnight, taking half his silver with her, but she hadn’t. Once he arrived home early to find the drawing room empty. For a moment he had stood there, shocked that she had gone and desolate to his very soul, before Hobbs informed him she was sitting in the garden. The relief he felt was akin to euphoria.

She fascinated him. She marveled at things he took for granted, and then showed no surprise at things that shocked him. He wanted to understand her, but thought he never could. He had poured out his guilty secrets to her, discovered that she was not horrified—indeed, she was even amused by some of them—and now found he was insatiably curious about hers.

“Why did you become a thief?” he asked her one night.

“I got a handsome invitation.” Vivian rolled her eyes. She was reclining on the sofa while David sat on the floor, his back against the sofa and his feet stretched out toward the fire. It was rainy and cool, and rather late. “I was hungry, and had no money for food. Why else would a body steal?”

David lifted one shoulder. “Some do it because they have no wish to work.”

“Some,” she agreed. “And some have no wish to work because the only work they can get will kill them, and still won’t pay enough to feed their babes.”

David peeled an orange, separating a slice and holding it out. She put it in her mouth, her eyes closing in ecstasy as she chewed. David had bought a basket full of oranges after discovering she had never tasted them. He was spoiling her, perhaps, but he was enjoying it too much to stop.

“How old were you?”

She licked drops of orange juice from her fingers. “When I started stealing?”

“Yes.”

She thought for a moment. “About ten. When my mum died.”

“And you lived in St. Giles then?”

“Aye. She was honest, my mum. Worked her hands to the bone as a washerwoman.” A sad, distant look drifted over her face. “Her pa was a farmer. I don’t remember where; Derbyshire, perhaps. She followed a man to London. An Army man, she said, an officer. He got sent off and never came back. I don’t really remember him, although I must have known him, and—” She stopped suddenly and blinked. David wondered what she’d been about to say.

“Your father?”

She nodded once. “He married her, he did. He just didn’t leave her much money. She had to find a place to live, but it was hard, what with a small child. And she was never strong again after—after he died. I remember thinking she just faded away.

“When she died, it was the workhouse or worse,” she rushed on. “I was a small brat, with quick fingers, and could get through tight crowds. Mother Tate took me in. She was a fence, but ran a dress shop as well. She’d sell the ribbons and lace, then I’d steal them back so she could sell them again. She dressed me in pretty little dresses, so I wouldn’t be suspected. I was to pretend to be a rich little girl lost from my nanny. More than one person felt sorry for me, and led me around by the hand looking for a nanny. When they did that it was easy for me to nick a handkerchief or even their purse. Mother Tate liked that.” Again she stopped short, seemingly on the verge of saying something else.

“Then I got too big to be a child missing a nanny. Mother Tate handed me over to a gang, because she had no more use for me. A few years after that, it got too hard. Most thieves don’t last long in London. I was caught once and sent to a reform house, where they beat us. I ran away and didn’t stop until London was far behind.”

“Ah.” David felt a surge of pity and outrage, which he tried to hide. She spoke of being “handed over” with calm acceptance, as if she were an old pair of boots one could simply give another person. But she ran away when she was beaten. He felt a stab of pride in her for that. “And took to the highway.”

She snorted with laughter. “Oh, aye; the highway took to me, more like. For a while I went along the roads, picking pockets here and there. Once along the Dover road there was a fair, and I picked a few pockets, hoping to get some food for me and—for my dinner.” Vivian could have bitten off her tongue. Several times now she’d almost gone and mentioned Simon. It was hard not to think of him as she recounted her life’s history: that she had worked for Mother Tate because Mother Tate took care of Simon when he was a baby, after their mother died; that she had gone to the gang because Mother Tate agreed to keep Simon in exchange for a share of Vivian’s take; that she’d run from the reform school not because of the beatings, but because they wanted to send Simon, only ten, to a workhouse. “I took a purse off a man named Flynn, and he caught me. Snagged my hand, quick as a blink. He said he could hand me over to the local constable that day, or I could join his business.”

“Flynn was a highwayman,” David said. “I see.”

“Flynn was a common thief,” she corrected. “He had aspirations. But he’s none too clever. He needed help and he knew it.” She shrugged. “We made an agreement. It was better than starving again.”

“He needed a pickpocket’s help?” David asked with a frown.

Vivian smiled, remembering how Flynn had tried to bully her into working for him, then threatened to make her his doxy. Vivian had stuck a knife into his shoulder for that, and Flynn had kept his distance. “He fancied the highway as more elegant,” she said simply. “He needed help setting up jobs. It’s not hard to find folk who have the nerve, but it’s a tricky prospect to find folk who have the smarts not to get caught.”

“You planned every robbery, didn’t you?” David looked half impressed, half annoyed.

She laughed at him. “Aye, and a perfect target you were! Fine clothes, flashy horses, tossing coins this way and that. How was I to know you’d only a pair of guineas on you?” David’s eyes narrowed. “It was simple calculation,” she explained. “Find a passenger who had funds. We only took small valuables and money, see, so it was best to find someone with both.”

“I regret not being more profitable,” he said dryly.

“Well, I can forgive you now,” she said graciously. David stared at her a moment, then threw back his head and laughed. Vivian grinned.

“Little vixen,” he said, shaking his head. “
You
can forgive
me
?”

“And if you want to beg my pardon for locking me up, I can give it also.”

“Beg your pardon?” He caught her ankle and pulled. Vivian shrieked and tried to scramble back on the sofa. “I’ll beg your pardon, minx. Come here.”

“Nay!” Laughing, she twisted in his grip, flailing about. David ducked her elbow, then sat back on the floor and let go of her. She was beautiful when she laughed. He liked the sound of it too much to be angry that she had deliberately set out to rob him.

“Were you good at picking pockets?” he asked as she brushed her skirts back into place.

“More than good,” she said without a flicker of modesty or embarrassment.

“Show me.” Vivian smiled and shook her head. David turned to see her better, walking his fingertips over her exposed ankle again. “Show me, Vivian, please,” he coaxed.

“You’re daft,” she said with a laugh. “Why do you want to see?”

He lifted one shoulder. “Perhaps I just want you to touch me. Although, I suppose I could content myself with touching you…”

She rolled her eyes, but got to her feet, skipping out of his reach as he made to catch her. “You’ve a wish to have your pockets drawn, have you? Then on your feet, sir. I can’t do it whilst you lie on the floor.”

David got to his feet. “What sorts of things did you steal?”

Vivian inspected him. “All sorts. Anything a man had. There’s a market and a fence for everything. No doubt I’ve lost my touch for it.”

David patted his pockets, and then produced a fine cambric handkerchief. “This?”

“Aye, that would fetch a few pennies,” she said. “Fine cloth, no marks.”

“Only a few pennies?” he exclaimed, remembering the bill for a dozen such handkerchiefs. “It’s worth a pound at least.”

She lifted a shoulder. “Not in St. Giles. A few pennies buys a day’s worth of bread, enough to make it worth a body’s while to steal.”

That silenced him. David tucked it back into his pocket. He’d known she had been hungry, and he’d known she was a thief. It was easy to forget that the latter occupation kept away the former affliction. She stole to survive. And in her place, David wasn’t sure he wouldn’t do the same.

“Walk across the room,” she said then, breaking into his thoughts. “Stuff it down more inside the pocket.”

“Are you sure you can get it?” he asked, pushing the handkerchief deeper into his pocket.

Her lips curled. “We’ll see,” she said with a small smile. “Now walk.”

“Why must I walk?”

“I can’t do it if you just stand there,” she explained. “First, a body doesn’t notice being jostled and bumped as much while walking. And, your clothes move when you do. It’s easier to reach into a pocket that’s open a bit.”

“As you say.” David strolled across the room. Vivian watched him for a second, then walked past him. Their shoulders brushed, nothing more. In a crowded street, he wouldn’t have noticed it at all. She didn’t look at him but kept her face forward, and she walked briskly, yet not too quickly. David reached the end of the room and stopped. He was certain there was no earthly way she could have taken the handkerchief; he’d not felt a thing. He reached for his pocket, and found it empty. “You’ve got it,” he said incredulously.

She turned and lowered her gaze demurely. “Have I?”

He pushed his fingers all the way to the bottom of the pocket, to make certain. “It’s gone.”

“Didn’t you feel it?” Now she smiled at him, her eyes dancing with glee. “I thought sure a great fellow like you would know all the tricks.”

“You only brushed against me,” he said slowly. “I never would have suspected. Where is it?” Her hands were empty, clasped in front of her.

She widened her eyes. “Where is what?”

David knew then how she’d gotten away with it for so long. Who could doubt her innocence, with that open, guileless look on her face? Who would want her to be guilty, when she looked young and almost angelically virtuous? “You little devil.”

Now she laughed, and the innocent look was gone. Now she was a woman flush with excitement and triumph. David started across the room toward her. “I wouldn’t have it anymore, in the real case,” she said. “I would have passed it off to someone within a few steps, to avoid being caught with it.”

“But I know you do have it.” He let his eyes slide over every inch of her, until her cheeks were deep pink. “The only question is…where?”

“You said you wanted to see how it was done,” she said as she dodged his hands. “Don’t you care to know?”

“Now I just want it back.” He caught her this time, wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her close. “Let’s see…I should check your pockets.” He slipped one hand into the side slit of her dress, making a show of running his hand all around, stroking her hip. Vivian laughed, wriggling a bit. “Hmm. Not there.” He checked the other pocket just as thoroughly. “Nor there.” His gaze fell to her bosom.

“Don’t you dare,” Vivian said.

“Dare? I dare anything,” he said softly, as his fingers trailed up her side to skim the swell of her breast. “I’ve been robbed, my dear.”

“At your request,” she said, her breath catching as his finger dipped between her breasts.

“Most certainly,” he whispered, drawing lightly on her skin with his fingertip. Vivian shuddered, unconsciously arching her back and pressing closer to him.