chapter 20
He pushed her off him. She tried to hang on, but he was stronger than she was. He scooted across the bed, taking a part of her heart with him. Sobs wrenched out of a deep place inside her as if powered by volcanic fury.
“I’m sorry. I’ll stop. I don’t know what’s wrong with me-e-e.” She sniffed again, which was completely unladylike, but so was a runny nose.
He sat on the edge of the bed, the firelight casting a golden glow over his skin. He leaned and grabbed his crutches. The muscles in his broad shoulders shifted, stealing her breath away.
“I’m s-sorry. We can con . . . tin . . . ue.” Did he even want to or had she repulsed him with her outburst? She didn’t know what was wrong with her that she couldn’t stop herself. Well-bred ladies weren’t supposed to carry on like spoiled children deprived of their toys.
He leaned the crutches back against the bed as he pulled on the smalls he’d retrieved from the floor. His voice low and tight, he said, “You’re killing me, Caro. I’m a man, not an animal that can ignore your bawling.”
Bawling sounded so crass, but she supposed that was as good a descriptor as having the vapors. She brushed his shoulder with her fingertips. He shrugged away as if her touch scorched him.
A fresh sob erupted, and she tried to will it away. She couldn’t even form the words to beg him not to be angry. She curled on the bed feeling as if she was broken into a hundred pieces.
She’d ruined everything. She didn’t even care if he got her with child. She wanted Jack inside her, staring up at her as if she were the most wonderful woman in the world. She wanted this man who had exhausted himself getting her an ointment she didn’t even know existed, so she wouldn’t feel pain. She wanted more than this stolen illicit affair, yet she knew it could never be anything more than a brief fling to get her pregnant.
Even if she weren’t married, their stations were too far apart.
“Go ahead and cry. Lord knows you probably need the release,” he muttered. “Just give me a minute.”
“I don’t normally do this,” she whispered. “It has been the most horrid day.”
“Yes, it has,” he said tightly.
More tears flowed, and she swallowed hard trying to regain control.
The bed rocked as he stood. He must want to get as far away from her as possible. His crutches thumped across the room. If he had two sound legs, he’d probably be in the next county by now.
Then the thumps grew louder. Her breath quivered. He was returning to her. She risked peeking at him. His smalls rode low on his hips, the tie loosely looped in front. A line of dark hair ran down from his navel. Her breath hitched. The material hid little, but clearly he was no longer in a state to finish. She should have felt relief, but instead a hole gaped inside her.
He flapped a worn white handkerchief in front of her face. “I hope it doesn’t reek too badly of coins.”
Even when he was impatient with her, he was still concerned about whether a handkerchief might offend her overweening sensibilities. She held out her hand. He pressed the handkerchief in her palm, then pulled back to grip his crutch. She came undone all over again.
He seemed as if he were a thousand miles away, and she didn’t dare reach out to him again.
Her shoulders shook as she mopped at her eyes and wiped her nose. Pressing her lips together, she tried to hold back the words bubbling up and frothing out. “I didn’t know what happened to you this morning. You were gone, and I thought something horrible had befallen you. I was so worried. I thought Mr. Broadhurst found out about us. Oh God, Mr. Whitton is dead, and I think my husband is a murderer.”
Saying it out loud meant her suspicions were no long nebulous things to be dismissed to the back of her mind. She’d seen the man in the overcoat. The man Mr. Broadhurst had hired and spoken to secretively the night of Mr. Whitton’s departure. “It is all my fault Mr. Whitton was shot. And I thought you . . .”
The thought was so awful she couldn’t finish it, and now Jack would know how dangerous it was for him to be with her. Surely, he would want to get out now, while he still could.
If she could only be with Jack. Run away with him and live with him. Except, she’d make him a horrible companion. She couldn’t cook. She had no idea how to clean a house, wash clothes, or grow vegetables in a garden. What she could do—plan a menu, summon the correct servant, and lay out ordered flower beds—were useless skills. She couldn’t do half the things she would need to do if they didn’t have money. Assuming Jack would even want her with him.
God, why did money have to matter at all? He was the epitome of a gentle man, and wasn’t that where being a gentleman started? With a better start in life, he would have achieved a great deal. He was smart, he was ambitious and willing to learn. And because of the stupid mill, he was a cripple.
He slid her dressing gown from the bottom of the bed and tossed it over his shoulder. Tilting his head, he said, “Come with me.”
“Where?” she hiccupped. They were in a small bedchamber and he wasn’t decent.
He turned his head and sighed. “We’re going to sit in front of the fire. We won’t be in bed. We won’t be engaged in the act, I don’t have to adhere to the rules of our bargain, and I’m going to hold you.” A dark stain spread across his cheek as he stared at the solitary wing chair in front of the fireplace. “I’d carry you, but I don’t think I’m ever going to carry anyone again.”
He crutched across the carpet. Gingerly, he lowered himself, wincing as he sat. And he was worried about her pain. Her eyes dropped to his cast. The material below it was dark.
Her chest squeezing, she slid off the bed, pulling her nightgown down. “You’re bleeding, Jack.”
“It’s not fresh, and you can’t do a thing for it anyway.” The crutches clicked together as he leaned them against the wall. His face was haggard.
“You should let me look at your leg.” She should leave and let him sleep.
“Not now, Caro.” He turned toward her and patted his good thigh. “Come here.”
She bit her lip. He shouldn’t have missed the doctor today, but the reason he had sent a warm wave of affection through her. She wanted to fly to him, but forced herself to take mincing ladylike steps. “I cannot sit on you.”
He caught her arm and yanked her down so fast her breath whooshed out of her. Then he tucked his arm under her legs, pulling her onto his lap the way one would seat a small child.
Pushing against the chair arms, she lifted her weight. “I will hurt your leg.”
“I’ll make a bargain with you.” Jack shifted her dressing gown off his shoulder and wrapped it around her, tugging her down in the process. “I will let you know if anything you do causes me pain, if you will promise the same.”
“It didn’t hurt. I didn’t know I could ever be free of pain.” Her lower lip quivered and she tried to stop it, and ended up tucking her face into his shoulder. “I didn’t think men cared if a woman was hurting.”
Jack snorted.
For a minute Caroline didn’t know what to do with her hands, but holding them clasped in front of her felt ridiculous. She tentatively put one hand on Jack’s shoulder. His skin was warm and seemed charged.
He splayed his hand against her back and shifted his arm under her knees until it rested along her thigh. “Most men prefer a woman to be comfortable if not downright enjoying things.”
Her cheeks heated. She didn’t know the first thing about enjoying. Tolerating, sending her mind away so she could endure, that was what she knew.
“Is Whitton the man from the library?”
Caroline squeezed her eyes shut. “No, I was with Mr. Whitton the night I was drunk.”
“Did he hurt you?” Jack stiffened.
“No.” She grimaced, remembering the cool night and her disgraceful behavior. “I got sick.”
The corner of Jack’s mouth lifted. “The man from the library?”
Caroline lifted a shoulder. Mr. Berkley had been rough and disgusting, but she couldn’t say he’d truly hurt her. “Not really.”
Jack’s hand slid on her leg a little, leaving a wake of tingles. “Any others?”
Lord Tremont had only kissed her, so he didn’t really count. Caroline’s face burned. “Only you.”
“In the library man’s defense, he probably thought you were eager and would tell him if anything bothered you. Not that I am of a mind to defend him, but you should know that all men aren’t beasts.”
Just her husband. “Mr. Broadhurst tried to make me like in-intercourse, but I preferred to get it over with.” His pinching and mauling had only made it worse. She was incapable. Some women were and she must be one of them.
“I’m not him,” said Jack. His thumb moved in a tantalizing circle on her hip.
She felt loose and tense all at the same time. “I know.”
He shifted, repositioning her. Concern about his leg flooded through her. She bit back her worry.
“This sin thing.” Jack sighed. “My sin must be far worse than yours because I have to experience pleasure to give you a child.” He found her free hand and laced their fingers together. He let their joined hands rest against her stomach, which made flutters stir.
“You are not the one who took vows.”
He rubbed his thumb across her wrist. “You were a child.”
Tingles radiated up her arm, connected with the flutters in her stomach and moved lower as a growing force. “I was nearly fifteen, not a child.”
Although, as she said the words, going on fifteen seemed very young, too young to make decisions affecting the rest of her life. The marriage had been whirlwind fast. Mr. Broadhurst wanted children right away.
Jack brought her tighter against his chest and rubbed his hand down her back. Her bones turned soft.
“Caro, the real sin was selling you to that evil old man.”
She tensed thinking of the insult to her father, but she couldn’t work up any real offense. Jack only spoke the truth. She had been bartered, but brides had been bartered since time immemorial. Women of her class had a dynastic duty to uphold. They were brokered for power, for land, and for money. Her upbringing had prepared her for that. Only those with nothing to gain or lose could choose freely. She envied the simplicity of his world, where he could marry for love.
She flattened her palm against Jack’s chest, relishing the feel of his heated skin.
He sighed again. “And don’t you think God would overlook the sin in what we are doing, given that he wanted us to go forth and multiply?”
“I don’t know.” Would God look so favorably on her when she wasn’t thinking of a child? When all she wanted was to be in Jack’s orbit? Of course she still wanted a baby, otherwise why would she be here risking everything?
Jack shifted them again, turning more catty-corner on the chair.
She pushed away from his chest. “I am hurting your leg.”
“No.” He rolled his eyes, but the deep vee between his brows and his squint betrayed him.
She looked down at his leg. His bleeding should be checked to make it sure it wasn’t coming from a rupture to the sutures under his cast. “I have to look at it.”
“Caro, I’m fine.”
He didn’t sound fine. He sounded impatient and angry. He had rather quickly agreed with her assessment of a horrid day. Had something happened when he went to his father’s house? Or had he just been frustrated at his physical shortcomings? Or her crying?
“It’s going to bother me if I don’t,” she said.
He tilted his head back against the chair and looked heavenward. “The weight of the plaster just rubbed my foot raw.”
She should have checked on him earlier, but unlike the doctor, she didn’t have an injection to give him to ease the pain. “Would you like some laudanum?”
“No more laudanum,” he said in a resigned voice.
She slid off his lap. Putting his hands on the chair arms, he let her go. His lack of resistance left a bitter taste in her mouth. Kneeling in front of the chair, she pushed back the stained cotton under the plaster splint. With the sporadic loss of feeling he had in his foot, he might not have known how badly the plaster had dug into the top of his foot. Around the oozing sore, his flesh looked clean and smelled of soap. He must have washed it as best he could.
A sigh of relief left her as a strange tightening began low in her belly. Jack had been exhausted, yet he’d taken the time to clean before she came to his room. She couldn’t be certain the effort was for her, but most other men would have gone straight to bed.
Reaching down, she grabbed the hem of her nightgown and twisted until she found a seam. Holding the two edges fast she ripped them apart and then with her teeth started a slit so she could tear off a strip all the way around.
As she started to wrap his foot, Jack leaned forward and caught her chin, tilting her head back. “Just so you know, this does hurt, but do what you need to do.”
She pressed her lips together and concentrated on pulling the wrapping tight as the doctor had done. “I cannot like that this happened to you, but I am glad it brought us . . .”
“Together,” Jack finished for her. “I had rather different plans to bring us together.”
Her heart beat faster. “Plans?”
Jack winced. “Yeah. I had lots of plans.”
Finished with wrapping his foot and stuffing material into the gap so the heavy cast wouldn’t cause further damage, she tentatively put her hands on his thighs. “Jack, what happened today?”
He shook his head, but the corners of his mouth turned down. He glanced toward the fire and then after a moment back toward her. Threading his fingers in her hair, he whispered, “You’re so beautiful.”
Her eyes were swollen and her nose was probably red. She lowered her gaze. “I’m not. Especially not now.”
The compliment was probably meant as a distraction. A vague disappointment crawled through her.
He leaned forward and slipped his thumb under her chin. He slid his fingers along her jawline then tilted up her face. His brown eyes searched hers. His breath whispered across her lips. Her pulse surged and her lips parted.
This time he would kiss her, and if he didn’t she thought she would die. Her lashes fluttered down, the intensity almost too much for her to bear, and then his lips brushed against hers.
“Caro,” he murmured. “I planned to go to London and make a fortune . . . so I could come back and be worthy of you.”
A whoosh of yearning poured through her. Her eyes popped open. She searched his face for sincerity.
He touched his forehead to hers. “You’ve always been inspiration for me to be the best man I can be.”
Her heart opened. How could she not love this man? Holding her gaze, he closed the distance between them and drew her into a kiss so gentle it made her ache. His tongue touched her upper lip. Her lips parted and their breath mingled. This was normally the time she wanted to turn her head or push away. Instead she strained toward him.
Jack deepened the kiss, sliding his tongue against hers and coaxing hers into a sensual dance. Her lips tingled and her breath grew short. Her body felt liquid and soft, yet tightened with anticipation.
Jack pulled back.
Feeling bereft, she whimpered. She opened her eyes to find him watching her with his head tilted.
“Was that so horrible?” he asked.
She shook her head and looked away. No, it was wonderful. He was wonderful. Their situation was not wonderful.
She couldn’t love him, couldn’t be with him other than for the next few days. She was married to a man who would hunt them down if she and Jack ran away together. With his cast, Jack would be too distinctive to disappear into the world. Mr. Broadhurst would find them. He had unlimited funds to track them. She couldn’t even tell Jack the way she felt. It wouldn’t be fair to him and might give him hope for a relationship that could never be.
What she needed from him was a baby. To yearn for anything more would only break her heart and maybe his. She slid her hand up his thighs, feeling the muscles jump under her touch. Her thumbs brushed the male parts of him.
He gasped.
The thin layer of his smalls couldn’t disguise the throbbing hardness. She ran her fingers over him. He would be able to continue.
He cupped her face and gently nudged her around to look at him. She watched his eyes darken with passion and a question that pulled her toward a path she knew was fraught with pitfalls. She was too fragile to hide her feelings, too uncertain.
Possibly in the harsh light of day she would realize this feeling was just gratitude for his gentle consideration. Or that she wanted to persuade herself she had finer feelings toward Jack to make this less wrong. Only as she called up reasons she could be in error, she was at the same time trying to build a scenario where she would never have to let him go. A way to hide him in the attics or a cottage to keep him.
Suddenly unable to bear his scrutiny, she rose to her feet and reached for his crutches. She leaned them against the chair.
“Come to bed, Jack. I am truly ready this time.”
Jack stared into the fireplace. He had been so close to getting through to her. Now Caroline had moved to the side of the bed and waited for him.
He supposed she was more ready than she ever had been before, but she was still a long way from the sated state he wanted to take her to. He, though, was caught in a welter of desire. He had tasted the beginnings of passion on her lips. Her budding response was a more powerful drug than the morphine.
He wanted to spend hours seducing her, showing her the pleasure to be found in her body, but she was too impatient to accomplish baby making to allow herself to savor the moment. He hovered on a knife’s edge of desire. His erection was rock hard. His stones were drawn up so tight they almost hurt. He wanted to get on with it, but then, he didn’t want to allow her to shut down her body’s response.
Wearily he gathered the crutches and scooted to the edge of the chair. He didn’t know if the rules were still in force, but until Caroline released him from his promise, he had to keep his word. No touching, kissing, hugging while engaged in the act. Men of honor always kept their word, and he wanted to be honorable. He wanted Caroline to respect him. He at least wanted that much from her.
He pushed up, positioned the crutches and made his way toward the bed, which seemed far away, even though it was only a few steps. Caroline watched him, and he wanted to tell her to turn around, to not look at him like this.
She was exasperating. When he wanted her to look at him, she wouldn’t. He’d been trying to maneuver her on the chair to get both hands free and to watch her face, and she’d taken it as a sign of his discomfort.
“You look tired, Jack. We should finish so you can sleep.”
He sighed. The day had been impossibly long. He didn’t have the energy to fight her and his desire. “If that is what you want.”
He never should have allowed her so much control over their encounters, but then they might not be having any encounters at all if it weren’t for his agreement. Why would she choose a poor millworker over a polished gentleman to father a baby?
She glanced toward the door and then back at him. Her eyes glittered in the low light.
“You aren’t going to cry again, are you?” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them.
She seemed to gather herself, straightening her shoulders and lifting her chin. “I shall endeavor to not make such a ninny out of myself again.”
“Caro, it is just us. If you must cry, don’t hide it from me. I have sisters, I understand the need for a good cry.” He frowned. His sisters went so far as to say they felt much better after a long spate of tears. “Well, I don’t exactly understand, but I’ve seen it enough times to know women cry.”
She gave him a tremulous smile and it knocked the wind out of him. She would probably assume his breathlessness was due to the exertion of walking five feet. He never should have let her look at his leg. How could she see him as an object of desire when he was disfigured?
Jack stopped beside the foot of the bed. “You really are beautiful. I’ve thought so since the first time I saw you insisting on being handed down from the curricle.”
Her brows drew together.
“At church.” He may have been the only one who was close enough to see her dismay as her husband walked away, the flash of fear on her face and then her resolve. “The first time you attended here.”
“I don’t remember seeing you there.”
He’d been lugging a baby, probably David, who was now sixteen. If he hadn’t had his arms full, he would have stepped forward to hand her down. He hadn’t really understood at the time, because he’d barely decided he was interested in females, but she, the girl who was not of their kind, intrigued him.
“I thought you were brave.” And foolish to be so demanding with Mr. Broadhurst, but the man had turned around and helped her down. At the same time, the exchange sparked something in him.
Jack crutched the remaining distance and leaned his crutches between the bed and the nightstand. Caroline had already put the lid on the crock and placed it on the far bed table. Using the post, he started the awkward struggle to get on the bed.
He wanted to show her the world, to be one together, to simply share the wonder that could happen between a man and a woman. She wanted a baby.
But he had made progress, and there would be tomorrow night, and the night after, because he sure as hell wasn’t going to make it to his appointment in London without any money.
He succeeded in getting his backside on the edge of the bed, and from there he used his good leg to push back. He almost groaned from the effort it took. How in heaven’s name could he expect her to desire a man who was lame? “Tasks will get easier as I figure them out.”
“I have no doubt you will achieve anything you put your mind to,” she said softly.
He wasn’t sure she was talking about everyday tasks challenging him or if she meant in a larger sense. But he couldn’t keep her interest focused. He didn’t feel capable of much.
He pushed his drawers off and moved to the center of the space, pulling the sheets and coverlet over his lower half. He turned toward Caroline, who stood beside the bed, gnawing on her lip.
Her hesitation stirred hope.
He lowered himself to his elbows, all the while watching her face. “Caro, if you are ready to release me from the conditions of our bargain, you have only to say the word.”
She didn’t, though. Her shoulders lifted toward her ears.
“Or not,” he added softly, trying not to be disappointed.
“It is late, and you are tired.” She stepped onto the rail and then put a knee on the bed. She made climbing in look easy. She knelt beside him, her knees brushing his hip.
Her forehead crinkled in a worry pattern and her eyes darted to him, down to his body, and then away.
He supposed it was to be the businesslike affair she wanted. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t think of the taste of her lips, or the sweet yielding of her mouth. Next time he wouldn’t give her time to think. Next time, when he sensed her resistance waning, he would press his advantage. In spite of his failure to lure her into a more equal pairing tonight, anticipation tingled in him.
Sidling closer, she put her hands on his chest. His skin leaped. Her eyes widened as if his response surprised her.
“I love when you touch me, Caro.”
Her gaze jerked to his. Offering silent encouragement and reassurance, he met her wide blue eyes. Then she shuttered her lashes and turned her attention to where she was touching him. She lowered her bum to her heels and traced the lines of delineation on his chest.
Her cool fingers slipped lower and his abdomen quivered under her touch. She splayed one hand and slid it down. His heart raced as her palm caressed his length. Then she curled her hand around his member and rubbed. Desire pounded in him. He watched her slender fingers as she stroked his length. Her hands were white and so soft, the hands of a lady—on him.
His breathing quickly grew ragged and urgency burned through him. Yet, he wouldn’t stop this sweet stimulation for the world.
Her lips parted. Her chest rose and fell rapidly. Had he been going about this wrong? Was the best path to awakening her desires to show her how aroused she could make him? Certainly his partner’s pleasure always served to send him to new heights.
Yet, he couldn’t ever remember wanting a woman so badly or wanting her to feel pleasure worse than he wanted his own release. Having her and feeling she was holding herself apart was driving him insane.
She drew her hand away and shifted back onto her knees. Bunching her nightgown with its ragged bottom edge at mid thigh, she hesitated. Her nostrils flared and her lips pressed together as if she were gathering her resolve to press on. As she had earlier, she seemed more like she wanted to bolt than to join with him.
He had to remember not hurting was the oddity to her. He tilted his head back and stared at the canopy. He didn’t want to rush her, but his need for her was making him ache. Waiting for her to join them together had to be one of the hardest things he’d ever done.
“You know, I would never intentionally hurt you.” He couldn’t even say he wouldn’t hurt her, because he had last night. He’d made her sore and swollen. And tonight he couldn’t be sure that the honeymoon ointment would be enough. It was soothing, but not a miracle cream.
She shook her head and straddled him. “It wasn’t you.”
He tensed. If it wasn’t him, who the hell was it? He caught her hips because he had to touch her.
Leaning forward, her hair brushed his chest and the heat of her feminine core settled against him. His head spun, caught between sexual desire and wanting to know who had hurt her.
“Caro,” he growled. When he left, had she returned to one of the gentlemen?
She made a small sound and wiggled on him.
Heat flashed through Jack and made him shudder with need. He fought to find sanity. He just had to focus on any one of a dozen aches in his body, but all he could think about was her leaning toward him, engaging in his kiss, her fingers stroking his cock, and the desire he’d been so close to stirring in her.
“What are you saying?” he sputtered out.
She tensed all over and stopped trying to seat herself on him.
He fisted a hand in her hair at the nape of her neck and pulled her head back to look at him.
She bit her lip.
He let go, ashamed that he’d just promised to not hurt her and then yanked her head back by her hair. He gentled his voice, although it was lower and rougher than normal. “Caro, what are you saying?”
“When I was in the library,” her voice was high and breathy, “I got through the encounter by imagining I was with you.”
A wave of tender dismay swept through him. When she emerged from the library, he’d been so disappointed in her. Yet, she’d been thinking of him. But that was neither here nor there. As much as he liked knowing she had been thinking of him instead of the man she was with, it was a distraction. He worked to keep the anger from his voice. “If it wasn’t me who made you sore, who was it?”
“I didn’t mean to say anything,” she said on an unsteady voice.
“But you did. And I know I hurt you last night.” Had it only been last night? It felt like a lifetime ago.
She lifted a shoulder. “I didn’t want you thinking you had really hurt me. I was only a little tender when I left you last night.” Her voice ended on a barely audible squeak.
He knew who had hurt her before he cupped her shoulders and pushed her up to where he could see her face. Blackness fisted in his gut. The man deserved to be drawn and quartered, even though that punishment had been done away with as too inhumane. “Broadhurst.”
She refused to meet his eyes. “He’s my husband. He has the right.”
“No, Caro, he doesn’t have the right to”—mark her with his scent as a dog marks its territory—“rape you.”
Jack closed his eyes and saw red. Drawing and quartering was too mild a punishment for the man. He should be boiled in oil and fed to the lions in the queen’s menagerie. If it was the last thing he did, he would rid the world of that evil man.