You Only Love Once (13 page)

She sank down, sliding one finger inside the neckline of her gown, dislodging it even more. “I cannot breathe,” she said fretfully. “My corset, it is too tight…”

“Let's see about that.” His hands were at her back, loosening her bodice. Then he was bearing her down onto her back, quietly shushing her murmured protest, easing down the front of her dress. Angelique closed her eyes as cool air wafted over her breasts, and let her arm fall limply to one side. She made herself lie motionless as he breathed heavily over her. Hurst made a crude noise in his throat, guttural with victory. He squeezed her breast with one hand and caught a handful of her skirt with the other.

Then he slumped heavily across her, unconscious from the blow she had struck with a rock on the side of his head.

T
he bad thing about being agreeable was that it sometimes left one in a very disagreeable position.

Nate had seen Angelique with a man who must be Davis Hurst and he played his part, merely nodding to her. He knew she meant to flirt and cajole information from Hurst, and he knew that Hurst would probably fall for her ruse without a thought. Really, what man would be able to resist her when she looked like she did tonight, in a rich purple gown that barely contained her breasts and somehow managed to cling to her slim waist and hips. Her dark curls spilled from the knot on top of her head to fall around her shoulders, a startling contrast to her fair skin. She seemed to glow with a gauzy, sensual aura that caught the attention of more men than just Hurst.

A ripple had gone through the circle around him when Nate nodded to her. “Your wife, Avery?” asked one man, awe apparent in his tone.

“Yes,” he said carelessly. “How delightful that she seems to be enjoying herself.” He made himself look away from her as a shocked hiss went through
his companions. Angelique didn't look like she was enjoying herself, she looked tipsy and receptive to whatever Hurst was saying to her. She was acting, of course. She didn't need his help. His job was to stand here and let her lure the man out of the ballroom to see if she could tease Dixon's name or location from Hurst. His job was not to charge across the room and break several bones in Davis Hurst's body, even though his hand curled into a fist where it rested on his hip. His job was to be a bloody fool, as she had so pointedly reminded him in the hackney, and he hated it. If anyone should be tracking down Dixon by quizzing slime like Hurst, it ought to be Nate. Instead he was left to stand here and wait while Angelique did it, by God knew what means.

But after a while he quit caring about his part in this masquerade and what he had promised to do. She left the pavilion with Hurst—all according to plan—and then she didn't return. Neither did Hurst. Nate resisted the urge to pull out his watch and see how long they had been gone, but the minutes ticked by and still there was no sign of either. Hurst wasn't an exceptionally large fellow, but he still outweighed Angelique by a few stone. No matter how she assured him she could take care of herself, Nate couldn't root out the last bit of chivalry in his mind; after all, if something should happen to her while he stood idly drinking wine and discussing the finer points of horseracing, he would never forgive himself. Nor did he fancy telling Stafford.

He excused himself from his companions and strolled through the well-lit pavilion. At the punch table he paused to help himself to a glass of the nasty stuff, then walked out into the Grand Walk
as if he had no more pressing interest than getting some air. A few couples stood chatting nearby, and not far away a woman sat on a bench, fluttering her fan at a pair of men who looked bewitched. Nate went past them, nodding politely as he passed the trio, and sipped his punch without tasting it. His eyes scanned from side to side as he walked. Where was she?

Instinctively he headed for the darker part of the garden, the shadowy recesses where no lanterns glowed. There was no sign of Angelique or Hurst. He glanced down the wider, better lit path and saw nothing there, either—not that he had expected to. His hand was stiff and tense from not folding into a fist at his side. The moment he turned a corner and was out of sight of the other guests, he gave in to the urgency roaring inside him. The punch glass landed with a faint thump on the grass. Without a sound Nate melted into the shadows and went in search of Angelique.

It took his eyes a moment to adjust to the darkness away from the lanterns, but there was a sliver of moon in the sky, and soon he could see well enough to move silently but still quickly. The gardens were a maze of twisting paths, and every now and then he passed a couple engaged in various private activities. The soft sounds of passion and seduction made his gut twist; God help him if he came upon Hurst and Angelique in such a position. If she was willing to seduce Hurst, even fake a passionate response to the man, Nate didn't want to know about it, let alone witness it. Just the thought made his muscles tense with fury—and even worse, jealousy.

His vision sharpened and caught a glimpse of
white, and he heard a quiet moan, then a thud. He paused, listening, then turned in that direction and ran. No longer wary of being quiet, Nate tore through the shrubbery with his hand on his dagger hilt, expecting to see Hurst holding Angelique's unconscious body under him, his hands—or worse—under her clothing. Raw rage burned his every nerve. If the bastard had touched her, even without harming her, he would be dead before he ever saw Nate coming—

Instead he saw Angelique on her knees, calmly searching Hurst's waistcoat pockets as the man lay sprawled on his side on the grass. Disconcerted, he froze, checking what he saw. Hurst was out cold. She was fine.

Thank God.

He shoved the knife, already pulled out an inch, back into the sheath and scowled. Now pain burst forth in earnest in his calves and side, and he inhaled a deep, raspy breath. Thank God she was unhurt. And she apparently hadn't needed his help in the slightest. He rested his hands on his hips and glared at her. “You should have waited for my help.”

For the first time she glanced up at him. Her eyes, those deadly calm dark eyes, flicked from his face to his just-replaced knife. “I did not need it.”

That only inflamed his temper, not only that she would say it but that it appeared to be absolutely true. “You should have waited anyway, damn it.”

“Why?” With that carelessly cutting word she turned back to her task, rifling the contents of Hurst's pocket. “He does not seem to have anything of interest. Imbecile!”

“I presume you learned something to warrant…
this.” He put his foot on Hurst's shoulder and shoved the man over onto his back. A fist-sized rock lay near Hurst's head, and Nate guessed it was the felling weapon.

“Of course,” she said evenly, turning out the rest of Davis Hurst's pocket. “He knows Dixon, and helps him invest his money. I told him you were anxious for new investors and tried to persuade him to bring Dixon to you for advice.”

“You did what?” Shock immobilized him. For a moment he felt as though she had clubbed him in the head, as well as Hurst.

“It might encourage him to bring Dixon to us. How much easier it would be, if the man would come to us instead of hiding like a rat afraid of sunlight.”

“He won't,” said Nate grimly. “Dixon
is
a rat. He won't come out.”

She shrugged. “I don't expect him to. I merely said it would make things easier, and thought it worth trying. I have learned never to trust in that happening, though.”

He stepped over Hurst's supine figure and leaned down to take hold of the man's shoulders. “What did you plan to do with him, after you knocked him out?”

“What you are doing,” she said, sorting through the various things she had taken from Hurst's pockets. “Take him over there, onto the grass.”

Nate closed his mouth into a thin line, but did as she said, although none too gently. Angelique followed, slipping something from Hurst's things into the valley between her breasts. “What did you find?” he asked.

“His latchkey.” She went down on one knee over
her victim and unbuttoned his trousers, then tugged them down a few inches. She pulled Hurst's shirt out and undid the lower buttons of his waistcoat. Nate caught on to what she was doing and helped, roughing up Hurst's clothing in a few efficient moves, grinding dirt onto the knees of his trousers and slipping one shoe off. Angelique returned some of Hurst's pocket contents to their places, then just scattered the rest on the ground.

“He knows your name,” Nate said as he dusted off his hands. “You invited him to call on us. How will you explain this?”

She just gave him a look as she hiked up her skirt. To Nate's astonishment, she had quite a large dagger strapped to the side of one thigh. He had expected there was a weapon on her body somewhere, but he hadn't expected to see it on her slim leg, the leather sheath buckled right over the lace of her garter. She drew the dagger with a soft hiss, and pulled up a section of her skirt hem. The dagger made a clean rent, slicing through the magenta silk with hardly a whisper of resistance. She tore it the rest of the way, then stuffed the long strip of cloth into Hurst's lax hand, closing his fingers around it.

Nate watched her in mingled awe and alarm. This was the woman he had thought incapable of doing what was required. He had feared he would have to look out for her. He had suspected…But now he realized that he had fallen for her appearance just as Hurst had—not so literally, but just as completely. For all that he had seen the steely determination in her, he had also felt her tremble in his arms after Barings accosted her in these very same gardens just one night before. That had spooked her
and exposed a deep vulnerability within her, and he had been filled with protective rage on her behalf, ready to cut out Barings's liver. He had told himself that she might be a spy, but she was still a woman at heart.

Then tonight she had coldly lured Hurst out here, discovered what she wanted to know, knocked him out, and was now setting him up to wake with a blinding headache and no memory of the debauchery he appeared to have enjoyed. Nate was surprised, unnerved, and deeply, deeply impressed.

“Will that do?” she murmured as he watched in silence. She circled the unconscious man, pausing to pick up the rock and place it strategically near his head. “What will make him believe…? Ah.” She ran one finger across her lips, then smeared the lip paint across one side of Hurst's mouth. She gave Nate a glance simmering with mischief. “Pull down his trousers some more.”

Nate's eyes narrowed, but he knelt and did it. She leaned down and rubbed another bit of lip color across Hurst's lower abdomen, just inches from the man's groin.

Nate sat frozen on his haunches, staring at the pink streak across Davis Hurst's skin. In the normal course of things, there was one principal way a woman's lip color would end up there on a man's belly. It was brilliant, though devious, and it sent all the blood in his body flooding to his own groin. God almighty—just the thought of her deep pink lips closing around his flesh was making him hard, while she was calmly wiping the color from her fingers with the hem of her ruined gown.

Carefully he climbed to his feet. He should be
glad they had learned something useful; he should be glad they had confirmed a link to Jacob Dixon. He should be relieved that Angelique hadn't been injured, and that they were about to walk away from Hurst with no outcry and little chance he would seek them out again. But all he could see was that pink streak, moist and warm from her lips.

“Let's go,” she said quietly. She saw him staring down at Hurst. “He will be fine,” she added with a trace of impatience.

Hurst would wake thinking he'd had her luscious lips around him. Nate swallowed. His pulse beat like a drum in his ears. Hurst would be more than fine, aside from a brutal headache. He, on the other hand…

“Right,” he muttered, and turned on his heel to follow her out of Vauxhall.

N
ate said little on the carriage ride home. Angelique could feel the tension humming off him, though, and wondered what had set him off. Surely his manly pride couldn't be that offended, that she hadn't needed his help; he was the one who had said he wouldn't be saving her pretty little neck, as she recalled. She stole a glance at him, tempted to remind him of that, but changed her mind when she saw his face, hard and set in the waxing and waning light from streetlamps they passed.

She turned to look out her window. Dealing with Davis Hurst, no matter how unpleasant, had restored her equilibrium after the disastrous other night with Barings. That caught her unaware, unsettled her and upset her. Tonight she had regained her composure, never dropped her guard, and succeeded as much as was possible. Nate was probably right that Dixon would never come to them under any pretext, but she knew where Hurst lived and she had his key. A discreet search of his home would probably provide all the information they needed to find Dixon. If Nate were in a better mood, she would do it tonight, while Hurst was still lying unconscious in Vauxhall.
Perhaps she still could, if Nate closed himself in his room to sulk. She darted another glance at him. He didn't seem like he would sulk, but one never knew with gentlemen.

“What would you have done,” he said suddenly, when they were only a street or two away from the house, “if he hadn't gone down so easily?”

“Easily?” She snorted. No sulking, but a patronizing scolding. Men and their pride. “You think I do not know where to strike a man to make him fall?”

“I didn't say that,” he said, staring straight ahead. His hand, resting on his thigh, was curled into a white-knuckled fist. “I asked what you would have
done
if he hadn't fallen senseless at once?”

“I would have hit him again.”

Slowly he turned to face her. Something hot and dangerous burned in his eyes. “He outweighed you by five stone. Don't even tell me you would have had time to get your knife out if he suspected you were trying to kill him—which is not an unreasonable assumption for a man to make, when struck in the head with a large rock.”

Angelique sighed. “I know what I am doing. Did the plan not work?”

“It might not have!”

“But it did!” she lashed out scornfully. “You appear to think I have never done anything dangerous before. This is not the first time I have been charged with getting something from a man like Hurst. Unlike you, I am not on this adventure for revenge or gallantry. This is my
profession
, sir.”

He seemed to be having difficulty mastering his breathing. “Then you are accustomed to fucking men to achieve your purpose.”

“I did no such thing,” she snapped, then realization dawned. He was furious with her, but also unbearably aroused. And now that she knew it, she seemed unable to let it slip away unnoticed. “Does that offend you? That I wanted him to think he had enjoyed every sinful pleasure I can give with my mouth, instead of that I hit him before he could do more than squeeze my breast?”

His gaze veered to her bosom. Angelique looked down. Her gown had slipped again, only a little, but enough to show the swells of her breasts almost to her nipples—which were tightening as he watched, growing hard and aching. She was horrified at her own reaction, but didn't pull up the bodice, even as he continued to stare. And then was equally alarmed by that omission. It was one thing to notice he was aroused, and another to heap fuel on that fire because it aroused
her
.

“I knew that gown was trouble,” he said in a harsh growl. “Thank God it's ruined.”

“Oh?” She smoothed one hand down her stomach, drawing the silk taut enough to slip another fraction of an inch down her bosom. Her nipples would pop out above her low-cut corset in a moment. “I thought I would have Lisette repair it.” Nate's face was hard, his flush visible even in the darkness, and his eyes were fixed on her like a starving animal's on his prey. She was flaunting herself before a man in the grip of ravenous desire, and instead of turning her back on him, she only wanted to taunt him more. To provoke him. To let his desire meet her own, flowing hot and fast beneath her skin…

The hackney stopped before their rented town house with a jerk. Angelique flinched, realizing
where she was, who she was, and most importantly who he was. She must have lost her mind. “I'm going inside,” she said in a rush, and threw open the door to leap out before he could stop her. She hurried up the steps, leaving him to pay the driver. Lisette had left the door unlocked for them, and she was at the top of the stairs before Nate appeared in the doorway.

“Don't run from me,” he warned, closing the door and shooting the bolt with a crack. “I have more to say to you.”

“Don't you tell me what to do!” she fired back, leaning over the railing to glare at him.

“You are not in this alone, goddamn it,” he replied furiously, coming up the stairs after her. “Don't you dare do anything like that again!”

She made a rude gesture with one hand, and then stalked to her room, twitching her ripped skirt behind her. If she didn't walk away, she might do something far worse. Nate had flirted with her, but always in a laughing way that made it easy to dismiss; he would have said the same thing to any woman, she told herself. He had kissed her, but sweetly, as if to let her lead him. This was different. There was a feral, possessive hunger in his gaze tonight, not for any woman, not for the tipsy wife of easy virtue she had pretended to be with Hurst, but for
her
. He had worried about her. He had run through the garden looking for her, ready to draw his knife in her defense. Then he had listened to her instructions and done what she asked of him to conclude the business, and only after that had he turned to her with unchecked desire in his face and anger for the danger she'd been in. Even after what she'd
said. A tiny voice inside her mind whispered that he was answering every criteria she had wanted in a man, and that little voice scared her most of all.

He followed her, even though she ignored him. He pushed the door back open when she tried to close it in his face. He barged into her room when she tried to bar it with her arm. She backed away from him as he closed the door and turned the key in the lock behind him. Lisette had left a pair of lamps burning, and she could see the controlled focus in his expression.

“Go away,” she spat, turning her back to him and walking away. “I am very tired.”

“Then you should go to bed,” he said, following her. She whirled to tell him to get out, and he put his hands on her shoulders and shoved her onto the bed. Off balance, Angelique sprawled on her back, then fell again when he grabbed her foot as she tried to scramble backward away from him.

“Tsk, tsk. You must undress first.” He pulled off her slipper and tossed it over his shoulder. She kicked at him, but he just smiled, his eyes lit with a frightening expression as he easily caught her ankle before she could injure his sensitive areas.

Her stomach clenched, not at his expression, but at her reaction to it. The white-hot desire in his face reflected an answering desire in her belly. Oh God, she wasn't supposed to want him. He took advantage of her distraction to flip off her other shoe and throw it aside, then climb onto the bed atop her. “Still tired?”

Angelique bucked, trying to get enough leverage to drive her knee into his stomach. “I am certainly tired of your company!”

He caught one arm, then the other, as she slapped him full across the face. He balanced his weight just over her, not enough to crush her at all but enough to hold her in place. It had been a long time since Angelique felt the weight of a man above her, felt the shimmering heat of his desire for
her
, not for whatever part she played. It had been a long time since she had wanted a man so badly. Heat pooled between her legs, and hunger surged through her veins. God, yes, just a quick tumble to get over this insane urge, this weakness…But she was afraid; a quick tumble might not be the antidote she wanted. It might be the first taste of addiction.

“Are you really?” he murmured, looking down on her.

“Yes!” But her body betrayed her. Her knees rose alongside his hips, and when she tried to twist free of his grip, she only managed to rub her breasts against his chest. The friction made her tremble and want to writhe against him again.

“Indeed.” His eyelids dropped as his gaze turned hot and speculative. He lowered his head, his lips whispering down the side of her neck. Once, twice, he moved his hips, slowly grinding his erection against her. Oh God, he wanted her as much as she wanted him. She could feel the swollen length of him pressing against her; he would probably be inside her already if not for the layers of cloth between them. Angelique inhaled sharply and arched her neck as she imagined his trousers gone, her dress gone, his flesh sliding hard inside her, her flesh wet and ready for him…

“Then good night.” Abruptly he was gone, rising to his feet and leaving her there, trembling with
lust. Angelique raised her head in astonishment as he turned toward the door as if he hadn't nearly had her right there on her own bed without so much as a gentle word. She struggled to sit up and then threw the first thing her fingers touched.

The knife made a dull thunk as it embedded in the door, mere inches from his head. He paused, his hand still on the key in the lock, then turned. “You might have taken off my ear.”

“If I had wanted to do that, it would be on the floor right now,” she hissed. He was coming back toward her. The pulsing between her legs grew harder.

“You play a dangerous game.” He stripped off his coat and let it fall to the floor.

“I never play,” she taunted him. A strange sort of smile crossed his face as he tossed aside his waistcoat, and she somersaulted off the other side of the bed, rolling to her feet and facing him across the mattress. Slowly he paced around the bed, still watching her with that odd expression.

“You should,” he whispered a second before he lunged at her. Angelique was ready but he was faster, and he dragged her back when she tried to leap over the bed. He pulled her closer, into his arms, holding her despite her attempts to push him away. “No more weapons,” he murmured against her neck. “Just this.”

Angelique's hands, braced on his shoulders to shove, tightened and gripped as his lips sucked at her skin. Her nails dug into his flesh and in reply his teeth sank into the tender skin at the curve of her neck, just hard enough to make her shudder. His hands flexed and squeezed around her bottom, pulling her tightly into him as he rocked his hips.
Angelique's shudders only grew harder. Dear God, she had been too long without a man if her body reacted this way to him.

He tipped up her face to his and brushed his lips against hers. It was an oddly tender kiss. She rebelled against the wave of feeling it caused, not even wanting to name that feeling. She wasn't a naive little virgin, ready to lose her heart to the first man who kissed her with such tenderness, as if he cared for her as a woman. He was just as much a liar and imposter as she was. Angelique knew how this game was played; she was a master at playing it herself, and the heart was the one card she never played. People went all to pieces when they thought their hearts were at stake. They became stupid, careless, and rash, which could easily lead to far worse. She wasn't about to risk it, not for a quick tumble, not for him, and not for herself.

She turned away from his kiss and sucked in deep, steadying breaths as his mouth moved down her jaw, onto her neck. She tried to turn her thoughts coldly inward, away from the burning pleasure his lips were leaving on her skin, away from the desire that raged through her blood. Not him. Not now. Not like this. She couldn't give in to this madness, this unguarded lunacy. And if she didn't break the spell now, he would have her completely bewitched, no matter what her good sense said.

Her palm struck him across the cheek with a loud crack. Unprepared, he recoiled, his eyes flying to hers in shock, but when he spoke his voice was even. “That's three times you've struck me tonight.”

Angelique clenched her teeth, glaring back. She would much rather hate him than want him, at least
for this moment. “Make it an even four.” And she swung her other hand.

He caught her wrist, and when she tried to pull free he twisted her arm, bending it behind her until she gasped. The shape of her hand was printed on his face, dull red against his tanned skin. “Not tonight.”

Still holding her arm behind her, he bent his head and pressed his lips to the back of her jaw, right below her ear. Angelique choked on her moan of desire. This was wrong, all wrong, she thought wildly as his kisses wandered over her neck and face, even as she tilted her head to let him. So very, very wrong…but so very, very good.

His hand pulled the neckline of her gown from her shoulder a moment before his mouth moved there. She shuddered again, unprepared for the fierce need that roared to life inside her. When he bore her down onto her back, onto her bed, she didn't have the strength of body or will to stop him.

In a matter of minutes he had stripped her bodice down from her shoulders as far as it would go, just low enough to free her breasts. His hands circled her breasts, cupping their weight in his palms, and he groaned in unmistakable male appreciation as his thumbs swirled over her tight nipples. Angelique acknowledged the battle was lost, if only because her body had already surrendered to his touch.

Without a word she grasped the back of his shirt and pulled, sliding her hands beneath to his solid flesh, hot and firm under her palms. He reached over one shoulder and yanked the shirt over his head, pulling his arms free even as she twined herself around him. Her skin seemed to burn where it
touched him, and she squirmed closer, wanting it to consume her and burn away every last trace of rational thought. He was helping considerably with that wish. His hands were everywhere on her, one sliding up her thigh to curve around her bottom, squeezing her hip and holding her against him. She raised her leg, hooking her knee around his waist so she could raise her hips into his, rolling her spine to rub herself shamelessly against the erection straining at his trousers. His breath hissed between his teeth, and his eyes glowed like jade as he loomed over her, braced on one elbow, and yanked up the tattered hem of her gown. He ran his fingers between her legs, through the folds of her sex, pausing to swirl over that spot where all her longing was knotted, then sliding lower. She caught her breath at the first pass of his fingers, gasped in giddy shock as his finger pressed hard and deep inside her, and all but screamed as he laid his thumb against that aching spot and stroked.