Except Bredlebane had gotten to her first. He didn’t want to think about her former husband igniting that inferno of desire. Yet he would have rather died than to witness the manner in which her passions had been extinguished. If he had gotten to her earlier. If he had ridden harder, pressed the horses to give him more. Then maybe…
How had she come to be in his townhome with him? No doubt caring for his sorry arse was bringing back memories of that horrid day. He was a testament to every reason why she should not be here…at his deathbed. Her life had purpose. She was kind and giving and everything that was good. Everything that he was not, and now she was somehow stuck caring for the one man who made hell a reality for her. Perhaps if he just let go, and got on with the business of dying, she could go on with her life. Start anew.
He’d dictated the letter to his superior with his last bit of strength, trying to make it as ambiguous as possible, yet…
Bloody hell. He’d saidsixchildren.Six. Her pen hadn’t hesitated, at least he didn’t think it had. Would she question his superior? Demand to know why in God’s name an earl was writing a letter to the head of the War Office on his death bed about six children—the exact number of Blair sisters who had been left orphaned and penniless upon their father’s death?
Their father’s death had not been an accident, despite having been ruled the drowning of a drunkard, almost a decade earlier.He prayed she wouldn’t understand the meaning behind his insistence she write his dying testimony to Sir Williamson at the War Office. If only he hadn’t mumbled,six children were orphaned.
Bloody fool. Even on his death bed he was mucking things up. Six children were orphaned, indeed.
He couldn’t even claim it was his own family he’d been referring to. He had six siblings—not children. He should have made her promise to take his son, Sébastien, to his mother when he died.
“Don’t you dare die,” she whispered.
“When did you return?” He tried to ask, but somehow failed.
“Don’t die!” Charlotte cried.
“We will beat this fever if it’s the last thing we do. Do you hear me?”
He did, yet he couldn’t seem to open his eyes. He felt her touch once more, and was amazed when the cool caress of the cloth in her hands didn’t cause him to flinch. Perhaps he was just too weak to respond to anyone’s touch.
He wished it were the other way around, him touching her. His hands slowly running across the creamy white column of her neck. He’d always longed to touch her there. Caillen’s neck was everything he never realized he desired. How could the long, graceful curve of her nape make him want to touch her, caress her, run his lips over its length and taste her?
Last spring, when he’d gone to her brother-in-law’s home to break his fast after a ride in Hyde Park, he’d snatched a scintillating hint of her scent in the guise of reaching for a biscuit over her shoulder. It had been rude and unseemly, yet he hadn’t been able to resist provoking her and had, in turn, driven himself to distraction.
“I know how much you love to vex me,” she said. “You’re probably prolonging your illness just to raise my hackles.”
Was he doing that? He wished he had that much control over his body. He hadn’t controlled any part of his limbs in so long.
“Remember how you used to sneak up behind me and pluck a hair pin from my hair? You always managed to make my entire coiffure surrender to your will. With just one pull, my hair would tumble down my back. I was forced to retreat to my bedchamber and have my maid rearrange it.”
He’d adored seeing her golden locks cascade across her shoulders. Waves upon waves, dropping across the feminine grace of her back. She had the most erotic curve of a spine he had ever seen, ever desired, and yet he had never had the pleasure of gazing upon it in that manner.
But, oh, how he longed to.
“Or the countless times you stole my novels right from my hands and would hold them above your head just to laugh at me when I attempted to jump and take it back. You truly are a vexing man.”
No. Vexing was watching the most enchanting creature he’d ever seen turn the pages of a damned book while he was in the room attempting to gain her favor. He’d never been so thoroughly ignored by any woman. From the blushing virgin debutantes to the most experienced whores on the streets, women noticed him to a fault. They dropped handkerchiefs and packages and parasols, batted their eyes while standing in artful, seductive poses that put their breasts on provocative display. The more shameless women would grope his thigh, or more, at a dinner party. They would pinch his arse and sigh on the dance floor as they exclaimed how tight and strong his buttocks were and then asked him if he’d gained his physique by thrusting his hips back and forth. All of it performed in a shameless attempt to catch his attention. He was a veritable slab of meat to be devoured in their pleasure parlors.
And to Caillen, he had been invisible from the moment they’d been introduced, or at least immediately after she’d broken his nose. At first, he had suspected it was his origin of birth that had turned her head in the opposite direction. After all, she would not be the first to believe his ancestry made him less than other gentlemen of the ton who were of pure English stock. Many a lady had confessed she couldn’t help but be drawn to the animal magnetism of such amagnificent beast. Those were the ladies he used in the basest of manner and made certain they understood he was there for his own pleasure, not theirs.
Of course, he had always brought them to their peak numerous times, but there were never any gentle caresses or words of endearment during the act of sex. When it was over, he made certain they knew their encounter had brought the lady to his level of pure animalistic carnality—nothing more. He left them craving more of what they would never again experience in the bedroom, parlor, study or garden because he would not look for an encore performance nor be reduced to their particular level of lust ever again.
“How did I not see the kindness in your eyes, or the teasing, loving heart in your chest when you sat at the breakfast table and entertained five young girls? It is beyond my comprehension.”
Her hand moved across his chest as if she were cataloging his every wound, every scar. “What did you endure and why were you working for the War Office?”
Shite. Now, he’d done it. She would start asking questions after he was gone. Demand answers no one would give and put herself in danger of discovery when she knew nothing of the risks she would be taking. Bloody hell, he couldn’t die now.
“How can such a magnificent specimen of God’s creation not rise from this bed and shake my world as he used to every morning at the breakfast table?”
Shake her world? Had he really had more of an effect upon her than just being like an irritating bee, buzzing around one’s head to swat at and run from in the opposite direction?
Her hand went lower on his abdomen and his body stirred. Holy hell, was he truly going to show her just how much her touch affected him? If he died, which he damn well couldn’t do after he’d raised her curiosity about his letter to Sir Williamson, she would be at risk. He had to rise from this bed. Yet, try as he might, his body wouldn’t listen.
His cock was listening.
