A Lily Among Thorns

Chapter 20


“I don’t ever want you to be anything but what you are,” he said raggedly. He kissed her jaw, her pulse, the curve of her neck; she tilted her head to let him, to silently beg for more. “You can be hateful sometimes, but you’re honest.”

“Is this about my rouge?” she inquired, concentrating so as not to sound breathless, and he laughed, his mouth opening against her collarbone.

“This evening, when I saw you—all I wanted—in the world—was for you to stand up straight—and say something”—his hands were on her waist, holding her steady as his mouth inched back up her neck to suck at a sensitive spot just above her racing pulse—“sardonic—and raise an eyebrow—”

“If I realized it would have this effect, I’d have stopped raising them days ago.”

He pulled back for a moment to look at her. “That would have been a damned shame.” He kissed her birthmark.

She shivered.

“Turn around,” he said, and she did. He undid the buttons on the white gown—she knew he would never have tried to tear the cloth, but she could feel his impatience in every tiny, abrupt pop—tugging the sleeves down as he went and hungrily kissing her shoulders. Soon he had opened all the fastenings on her petticoats and she was standing in her shift and stays.

“I’ve always thought this part was far too complicated,” he said.

“I’ve known men who just cut through the laces,” she offered. There was silence.

She glanced over her shoulder. Solomon’s eyes were narrow with disapproval. For a moment she wondered if this reference to her past would destroy the mood, but he just said, “Good laces cost at least a shilling!” She laughed as he went to work on the knot.

When he had unlaced her stays and pulled them over her head, she turned once more to face him. For a moment he looked bewildered. “Serena, I—”

His voice was rough and throbbing and sad. She’d noticed from the moment they met how expressive his face and body were, how he smiled and frowned with all of him, how the way he leaned forward or scratched the back of his head could convey a world of meaning. Now he could smile and frown with her body, too. The want in his face and voice made her yank the shift over her head and toss it on the floor. He relaxed, his hands hovering for a moment above her skin before he touched her.

Serena closed her eyes. She made no sound, but she trembled and breathed hard as his hands and mouth moved on her breasts and down over her belly, his knees hitting the floor with an impact that jarred Serena from the soles of her feet to her fingertips.

He nuzzled her inner right thigh. “Third birthmark.”

Her throat was tight. When his tongue dipped between her legs, she gave a wordless cry and clutched at him to keep from falling. Oh God, Solomon. When he groaned into her it was like—there were no words for what it was like. She could feel herself crumbling beneath his hands like badly fired clay. She wanted—she had never—she—it had been so long and even then—

He stopped, suddenly, letting go of her and getting to his feet. “Open your eyes,” he said, but she couldn’t. She reached out blindly, seizing his braces and burying her face in his chest. She mumbled something and didn’t even know what—the only discernable words were Solomon and please.

“Serena, do you want this?”

She nodded hastily against his shirt.

“Say it out loud.”

She waited until she was certain of her voice before answering him, even though each second he didn’t touch her was torture. “What part of ‘Solomon, please’ do you find ambiguous?”

He broke away entirely, and she felt cold and naked. Of course, she was cold and naked. She kept her eyes tightly shut. “Not now, Serena,” he said. “I need a straight answer. I need to know you won’t hate me tomorrow.”

She opened her eyes, crossing her arms over her chest instinctively. Did he know how much it would cost her to make that admission? She would regret it, of course, but he was watching her so earnestly, his heavy breathing loud in the silence. The lamplight turned his hair deep gold. It glinted at her from the open collar of his shirt. If he didn’t take the shirt off soon she couldn’t answer for the consequences. And there was something so implacable in his rough voice—he really did care more about how she would feel in the morning, about how she felt, than he did about anything else. He knew what he wanted from her and he refused to settle for anything less.

Something in her responded to his stubbornness, and yet for an instant she wished he were Lord Smollett or one of the others, who wouldn’t ask her to say anything, who would just get on with it. And then she realized what she was thinking and disavowed it utterly and forever, because he was the only person in the world she wanted. Only him, and here he was. She couldn’t quite help smiling. “I’ll only hate you if you stop.”

That seemed to be enough for him. He bounced a little on the balls of his feet, and his dazzling smile made her stomach do flip-flops. Exhilaration tried to climb out her throat as he laced his fingers through hers and yanked her to him.

Then she remembered something. “Solomon, wait.”

“What?”

“I need something from my room.”

He frowned. “You’ll take a chill. Tell me where it is and I’ll fetch it for you.”

“I won’t take a chill.” She reached for her shift.

He caught her wrist. “Don’t put it back on,” he said intently, as if he thought she might not take it off again. “What do you need?”

She gave in. “It’s in the drawer of my night table. It’s a sponge.”

“A sponge?”

She shoved at his shoulder. “Just fetch it. You’ll see.” She sat cross-legged on the bed to wait for him.

He was back in a few moments, staring at the little sponge with its trailing thread. “What’s it for?”

“It’s to keep me from finding myself in an interesting condition,” she explained. “Have you got vinegar?”

Enlightenment dawned. “Of course.” He pulled a small glass bottle from his worktable and, unstoppering it, poured some of its contents into a little dish.

“It is vinegar, and not deadly acid?”

He dipped a finger in the bowl. Before she knew what he was about he was sucking the vinegar off, slowly and teasingly, and heat flooded her even as she made an unconscious noise of protest. But he didn’t scream or blister, so getting off the bed and taking the little sponge from him, she began methodically soaking it in vinegar.

“Why do you still have this?” he asked suspiciously.

She glanced at him out of the corner of her eyes. “I stole it from Sophy that time I tried to seduce you.” She hadn’t needed one since she left her last protector. She had vowed never to use one again. Never to be vulnerable again. Never to let anyone see her naked—never to let anyone see her at all. And now here she was. She tried not to think about it.

“Serena—”

“Yes?”

“Why did you try to seduce me?”

Serena eyed him warily, but he just looked curious. “I didn’t want to sleep alone after my nightmare.”

He stared at her. “But of course you couldn’t just ask to sleep in my bed. No, that would be too easy.”

“I hardly think doing it my way would have been such an ordeal,” she snapped, and a little happy grin appeared on his face that made her want to—

“Can I put it in?”

“What?” she asked, startled.

“Can I put the sponge in?”

She looked at it, and at him. “Why?”

“Because it’s interesting,” he said as if it were obvious. “Does it kill the pox, too?”

“I doubt it. You haven’t got the pox, have you?”

He shook his head. “Well, can I?” He looked so fascinated that for an instant, before her better judgment reasserted itself, she was tempted to give in.

“Perhaps another time,” she conceded, and didn’t even realize what she’d said until she saw the glowing flush on Solomon’s face, and then she could hardly regret it.

In her haste she fumbled with the sponge, and for a moment she was afraid that she wouldn’t remember how to put it in properly, it had been so long—and then it was in and she couldn’t wait any longer. “Take off your shirt.”

She leaned back against a bedpost to watch as Solomon slid off his braces and pulled his shirt out of his breeches, not quite as deft with his own clothing as he had been with hers. She gave him a predatory smile and slid a hand under his shirt. His stomach was hot under her palm and his gasp sent shivers up her spine. She hummed in satisfaction and pulled the shirt over his head.

A quick tug, back and down, left his chest and shoulders bare and his arms trapped behind his back by the inside-out shirt. She ran her hands over his shoulders—they were pale and freckled and broad, and when she squeezed a little the muscles in them jumped and Solomon made a low growling sound in his throat.

Dear God, his upper arms. It was unfair that anyone should have arms like that. She pressed a hand against his chest. His lungs expanded and contracted, and his heart raced beneath her palm. He made no move to free his arms from their tangle of shirt, just watched her hands on his skin as if they were his hope of heaven. She let them wander lower, and finally set about unbuttoning his trousers. He stood very, very still until she slipped her hand inside and wrapped it around his cock. Then he bucked forward, once, as if he couldn’t help it. He shut his eyes abruptly and made a sound that had no voice in it, only breath.

She put her other hand on the back of his neck and pulled him down to kiss her, hard, pressing against him, skin on skin, rubbing her nipples up and down on his chest. She stroked his cock, long, slow strokes, feeling a fierce, primitive satisfaction when he trembled against her.

“Serena,” he gasped into her mouth.

“Take the shirt off,” she said abruptly, letting go and stepping back. “I need you to touch me.”

His eyes fluttered open, crinkling with laughter, and he fumbled to free his arms. Dropping the shirt on the floor and coming at her, he pushed her back onto the bed and dove on after her. They landed in a tangle of limbs, his hands holding her wrists captive above her head, one hard thigh between her legs. “Oh, you need me, do you? Maybe I should make you beg.”

Serena stared at him. Would he really? And could she stop herself from doing it?

He snickered at her consternation and let go of her wrists, trailing his hands down over her arms and shoulders to cup her breasts. The sight of his stained hands on her naked breasts was the most erotic thing she had ever seen. One of his fingers was the exact same shade of blue as her third-best bedchamber. Why did that drive her wild? She arched up against him, unintentionally rubbing against his thigh.

She whimpered, and Solomon laughed softly and squeezed her breasts, catching her nipples between two of his fingers as he did so. She really might die, right here. All her experience, all her expertise, and she was as helpless and clumsy with desire as any green girl on her wedding night. “Do that again,” she demanded.

He raised his eyebrows slightly, looking adorably pleased with himself, and obliged her.

Sliding down her body, he flicked at one nipple with his tongue before taking it in his mouth and sucking, hard. His hands swept down her sides and over her hips and back up again, his calluses catching lightly on her skin, his hands so hot that everywhere they touched felt cold when they were gone. She shivered again, and again, straining against his hands. “Solomon, I’m ready. I’m ready.”

He pulled his mouth off her breast with a little nip that sent tingles of pleasure coursing all through her. His eyes suddenly solemn in the firelight, he raised himself back up to kiss her lightly on the lips. “Are you sure?” Guiding his cock with one hand, he rocked against her experimentally once, twice, three times.

Oh Christ yes now I’m not a virgin what are you waiting for? she thought, but she said, “I’m sure,” and pulled him down for another kiss. And then in one stroke he was in her, Solomon was inside her, moving slow at first and then faster. She tilted her hips up and closed her eyes and met him thrust for thrust, strung so tight that it was hardly any time at all before she felt her release building.

She arched up against him, cursing, and opened her eyes. She met his darkened hazel gaze. He had been watching her face, and she hated when men did that but somehow, right here, right now, the shock of awareness that passed between them pushed her over the edge, her whole body racked with pleasure. She was melting, no, she was boiling. She was consumed like a snowflake falling into a bonfire.

“Solomon,” she said softly. She continued to move against him, languorously, filled with a sense of well-being as the last tremors washed through her. He pressed his face into the curve of her neck then, moving faster. The edge of his shoulder was bright and haloed by the firelight, a sheen of sweat on him, and he too shuddered with release and collapsed on top of her.

“Oh God, Serena, I love you so much,” he groaned.

Suddenly she couldn’t breathe. No. His weight was crushing her. She couldn’t get air into her lungs. “I—let me—” she said desperately, pushing at him with her hands until he moved off her. She rolled away from him, sitting up on her elbow and gasping for air.

“Serena, what is it? What’s wrong?”

“Why do you have to make promises you can’t keep?” she asked him, hating the plaintive note in her voice. “I gave you everything without that!”

When Elijah was sure René was asleep, he cautiously got up and moved to the heavy chest of drawers against the wall. He opened the top drawer and rummaged through it. Nothing. He opened the second one. Running his fingers along the back of the drawer, he found something solid. A tiny box. He didn’t move it, just shoved aside some stockings and took off the lid. What he saw surprised him so much that he didn’t even hear René sit up in bed.

But when René’s feet hit the floor, Elijah had just enough time to return the lid and hide the box again before his wrists were seized from behind. “Just what do you think you’re doing?” René asked in a dangerous voice.

“Trying to borrow a pair of stockings.” Elijah twisted his head to look at him. “Is there something in your drawer you don’t want me to see?” He reached for the drawer again and just managed to scrabble at some folded breeches before René spun him around.

“I want to see what’s in your secret drawer,” Elijah insisted, laughing, and tried to wrestle himself back around. “Let me go!” René started to tickle him, and he wriggled, and soon enough they were back on the bed.

Serena picked her shift up off the floor and pulled it back over her head.

“You don’t have to say anything back,” Solomon said behind her, sounding as if each word were an effort. “But—it’s a promise I can keep. I didn’t know I was going to say it. But it’s true.”

She turned to glare at him. It was a mistake. He was still naked. It was unnatural and improbable, how beautiful he was. He was perfect, and she was—not. “It’s true today. But will it be true tomorrow? Will it be true in three months when you’ve seen me every day and I’ve snapped your head off half the time and you’re tired of it? You think no one’s loved me before?” She knew what love was. Love was belonging to someone else, it was letting yourself become what they wanted. And then when they were gone, because you weren’t what they needed after all, you didn’t even have yourself. All Serena had was herself.

“I’m not Daubenay,” Solomon said sharply.

“Yes,” she said wildly, “you’re exactly like Daubenay. What I have to give isn’t enough. You’ll never be satisfied until you have it all, until I’m yours and I can’t—I can’t—because after all you love me and how could I—”

“I’m yours.”

The feeling of not being able to breathe returned, like an enormous weight on her chest, the weight of a responsibility she would inevitably fail to live up to. “But I don’t want you!” she said desperately.

He closed his eyes as if in pain, and she hadn’t meant it like that, but what could she say?

Then his eyes snapped open. Serena stood stock-still, remembering how those eyes had watched her tumble headlong into orgasm. “You damn well do,” he said furiously. “And not just for this either.” He made a rude gesture toward his groin. “Last time—when you tried to seduce me—all you wanted that night was my friendship, but you were too much of a coward to ask. You’d rather pervert this into something cheap and dishonest and make this—what we have—even if it’s not love, you shouldn’t make it into a lie.” He let out a short, frustrated breath. “I’d ask you what you were afraid of if you hadn’t made it so damned obvious.”

“I’m going to get Jenny’s note and those vowels from René,” she said. “Go back to sleep.”

“Let Elijah do it.”

“If you want something done right, do it yourself.”

His eyebrow only moved a fraction of an inch, but she flushed all over. She’d liked it when he’d done it for her, and they both knew it.

“It’s not safe,” he said, getting up and pulling on his shirt and breeches. The loss of his bare skin felt like grief.

“René won’t hurt me.” It sounded stupid, when René had hurt her.

Solomon obviously thought so too. “I’m coming with you.”

She sneered, but her hands were trembling, which spoiled the effect. “You would make a terrible spy. There are some jobs that are for one person.”

“Some are for two.”

She didn’t feel like arguing. She had to get somewhere where she wasn’t standing next to an empty bed. “Do as you like.”

So he crept down the hall beside her. She slipped her master key from her pocket and slid it into the lock that Sophy had taken care to oil just that morning. It turned silently. The hinges had been oiled, too, and the door made no noise at all as Serena opened it.

Oh God, she thought in horror. How could she have been such a fool?

She tried desperately to back out, whispering, “We should come back later,” but it was too late. Solomon had seen René’s bed over her shoulder.

Sleeping on his stomach under tangled sheets, his head pillowed on René’s shoulder and one arm thrown carelessly across René’s waist, was Elijah.