The Dark One (3 page)

“But you should learn that not all men are to be toyed with. Me being one of them.”

So, he didn't believe the offer she'd made was a serious one? Of course he wouldn't. Rosalind supposed it was a rare occasion for a lady of good breeding to approach a man and request that he ruin her reputation. Perhaps there was still a chance to rescue herself from the path she'd taken.

“Maybe I should have given the matter more thought,” she admitted. In the darkness, she cut her eyes toward him. “If we return in all haste, our absence might go unnoticed.”

He laughed, but the response did not sound sincere. “No chance of that happening now. You wanted to create a
scandal, Lady Rosalind, and you did. And you used me for whatever gain it is you hope to secure yourself. Although for the life of me, I can't figure out what that might be. Perhaps you will enlighten me upon the matter?”

Rosalind couldn't. It was none of his business really. She'd only given him one task to perform; after that, she need never see him again. But she had approached him with her own gain in mind. The return of her freedom. Escape from her stepbrother and his foul plans for her. Escape from Franklin at any cost.

Her courage renewed, Rosalind said, “I'm surprised that you'd demand explanations, Lord Wulf. I doubt that another man would.” She felt rather than saw him turn to look at her. Even though she knew he could not see her, she raised her chin. “I thought that I could count upon you. You—”

His mouth suddenly found hers in the darkness. She'd been speaking, so her lips were parted. Rosalind tried to clamp them shut, but he captured her chin, holding her in a way that didn't allow her to shut him out. He tasted like champagne and fresh strawberries.

The kiss was punishing, as if to teach her the lesson he'd claimed she needed to learn. Rosalind's natural instinct was to struggle. A small whimper of fear escaped into his open mouth. Suddenly he pulled back, staring down at her.

“You're hurting me,” she whispered.

He released his firm hold upon her chin. His fingertips grazed her cheek, as soft as the flutter of a butterfly's wings. Slowly, his face bent toward her again. The brush of his lips against hers this time was gentle. She found the sudden contrast more disturbing than she had his brute force. Rosalind was accustomed to abuse. She was not schooled in seduction. But he obviously was.

His tongue traced the line of her bottom lip, warm,
moist, seeking. Some instinct uncurled within her and she opened wider to him. His tongue slipped into her mouth, teasing, exploring, evoking shocking sensations that she had never felt before.

“God, you're sweet,” he said against her lips, and the husky timbre of his voice sent heat racing to her most private places.

When he captured her lips again, she let him guide her, followed his example, and reveled in the way their lips merged perfectly together. Rosalind had only been kissed once—the gardener's son when she was twelve. Her first kiss had been awkward and unimpressive. This was nothing like that. This was like nothing she'd ever experienced or even imagined.

He slanted his mouth across hers and deepened the kiss, and her arms crept up around his neck, her fingers twining in his long, silky hair. She had trouble catching a normal breath, as did he, for the sound of their ragged breathing filled the silent carriage. She was suddenly hot all over and she didn't mind what he did to her. She didn't mind it at all.

The carriage hit a rut and bounced them apart. Rosalind landed against the seat on her back, but he was there a second later, nearly on top of her. She couldn't say why the sight of him looming over her, his face hidden by shadows, excited her. Only that it did. He'd unleashed something that had been slumbering inside of her for years, and she had no idea how to call sanity back. He bent toward her.

His teeth grazed her neck, sending shivers down her spine. He paused against the strong pulse beating at the base of her throat. That he should do so momentarily alarmed her, she didn't know why. Then he captured her mouth again, and all thoughts of fear fled.

When he suddenly cupped her breasts, Rosalind regained a little of the good sense he'd stolen from her. She
nearly jerked away from him. A foolish response, she admitted a moment later. If she couldn't allow him to touch her intimately, how in heaven's name could she allow him to despoil her?

Determined to see her reputation ruined, she kept still. He kissed her again—a long, languid kiss that almost made her forget where his hands rested . . . almost. His thumb dipped inside of her low-cut gown and grazed her nipple. She jerked automatically, but the response did not deter him. Slowly, his thumb circled her nipple until the crest hardened into a tight pebble. The sensation drew a soft moan from her lips. Her back arched, as if she could force herself more firmly against his hand.

Her mind fogged by passion, she didn't realize that he slid the straps of her gown off her shoulders until the night air caressed her fevered flesh. She immediately tried to raise her arms and cover her exposed breasts. He anticipated her reaction and captured her wrists, pulling them up over her head.

“Are you afraid of me?” he asked.

“Yes,” Rosalind wanted to answer, but then no, that wasn't entirely the truth. “I'm afraid of what you make me feel,” she answered.

“Do you want me to stop?”

Again, her first response was to answer, “Yes.” His voice, naturally deep, had lowered an octave. The sound of it skittered along her nerve endings and brought a desperate longing. She had longed before, for home, for family, but never for a man. She should tell him to stop, but she had to fight the morals taught to her. Rosalind couldn't stop him if she truly wanted to foil her chances of making a suitable match. What man in his right mind would have her once it became common knowledge that she'd been ruined?

“No. Please don't stop.”

He hesitated long enough to worry her. What if he refused? What would she do then? And how humiliating to offer herself to a man who didn't want her. When he didn't continue, she worried that the problem might not be with her but with him. She'd heard of such things.

“Do you have a problem with your . . .” She wasn't sure what to call it.

“Conscience?” he asked.

She felt exposed, lying half-naked beneath him. The issue needed to be resolved, and quickly. There was no point in barking up the wrong tree.

“Can you not perform?”

He pressed against her. “No. I don't have a problem.”

Armond Wulf might not have a problem, but she suddenly did. His had not been an idle boast earlier. There was nothing short about him. She swallowed down her sudden trepidation.

“Please continue then,” she urged him.

Slowly, he lowered his head to her breasts. He took her hard nipple into the warm, wet recesses of his mouth and sucked. She nearly came up off the coach seat. He held her down and sampled one breast, then the other. His tongue did indecently sensual things to her nipples, circling, swirling, then again, drawing her deep into his mouth to suck.

Her stomach muscles tightened, as if his mouth drawing against her breasts was somehow connected to the response. Even lower, she felt wet, hot between her legs. She arched up against him and would have tangled her fingers in his hair had her arms not been pinned at her sides. He moved back up to kiss her again. As his tongue moved deeper into her mouth, his hips pressed against hers, creating a sensual rhythm that left her breathless, shaken, desperate for something more.

She throbbed for him—ached, lusted, fell into a deep abyss of sensation, aware only of him, of her, of their
heated responses to each other. He tugged at her gown, settling it farther down her waist.

In the darkness, he left her, sitting to struggle with his stock, then tugging his fine lawn shirt from his snug trousers. All the while he tugged, he stared at her. Rosalind couldn't see his features clearly in the carriage's dark interior, but oddly enough, she saw his eyes.

They glowed . . . like the night eyes of an animal. Gooseflesh rose on her arms. Her hand snaked up to shield her throat, perhaps in an unconscious gesture.

The light from a street lamp suddenly threw the carriage's dim interior into stark brightness. She saw him clearly in the flash. He was still breathtakingly handsome, his shirt gaping open to reveal smooth, tawny flesh, but his eyes, they had not changed. They were filled with a radiant blue light. She gasped at the strange sight. Abruptly he looked away from her; then he took his cane and rapped sharply upon the ceiling.

“Cover yourself.”

He practically growled the words at her. Rosalind scrambled up, embarrassed that the street lamp had revealed her half-naked state to him a moment earlier. She pulled her gown up over her breasts, dazed by what had just happened between them . . . and by what had not happened.

“When we return, you are to go directly to your carriage and ask your driver to see you home,” he instructed. “You are to speak to no one. I will have a message sent to your stepbrother. You became ill, understand? You had your driver take you home as soon as I saw you safely to your carriage.”

She paused in her flustered attempts to right her appearance. He gave her an alibi she didn't want. “Are you saying that I should lie about where I've been and what I've been doing?”

Straightening his own clothing, he responded, “Only to those of importance. By all means, share your experiences with your young friends in secret. I hope I gave you what you wanted.”

He had not. She was still as chaste as when she'd left the Greenleys' ball with him. Chaste if not untouched. And Rosalind had no friends to share her secrets with. What did he imply, and worse, why wouldn't he finish what he started?

“You don't want me,” she suddenly understood. Something about her had repulsed him. Perhaps her boldness with him.

Wulf turned to look at her, but she couldn't see his eyes this time in the darkness. She wondered if she'd seen them glowing oddly to begin with. Maybe it had been a trick of the moonlight.

“The game is up, Lady Rosalind.” His tone was cold, though she still felt his body heat curling around her. “I played along. I've given you gossip to tell your spineless little friends. I've made your debut into society a memorable one. Be glad that I didn't give you more than you bargained for.”

The carriage came to a halt. He jumped out and held the door for her. Rosalind let him assist her down, too confused to do anything but follow his lead. Her knees were, weak, a reaction from either the passion they had shared or dread of facing the consequences of her actions. Armond steered her along the line of waiting carriages.

“Which one is it?”

Still dazed, Rosalind merely nodded to a coach directly ahead. He escorted her to the vehicle, opened the door, and helped her inside. She thought he would simply slam the door in her face and leave, but he paused, looking up at her from the ground outside.

“Good night, Lady Rosalind. The pleasure was . . . well, mostly mine anyway.”

He slammed the door. Rosalind heard him instruct her driver to take her home. The carriage lumbered forward. She scrambled toward the window, threw back the drapes, and stuck her head outside. Armond still stood where she'd left him, watching the coach depart.

Their gazes locked. She saw the fading embers of desire still burning in his eyes, the rapid rise and fall of his chest, as if he still battled with himself. She might be innocent, but her innocence was fast fading. He wanted her. Then why had he stopped when he did? Why hadn't he taken what she had offered him?

Despite the rumors about him, did he indeed have a sense of decency? Had he stopped because he still followed a code of ethics a society that had all but deserted him had laid down? If so, she'd chosen wrongly tonight. If so, he had been fooling the ton for a good long while. Anger replaced her confusion and the passion still burning beneath her skin.

He had toyed with her. Worse, he had ruined her plans and she would face serious consequences for her actions tonight. But not serious enough to see her sent back to the country in shame, as she had hoped.

“There was one rumor that I didn't hear about you tonight, Lord Wulf,” she said to herself. “No one told me that you were a coward.”

The force of the slap made her stumble backward. Rosalind brought a hand to her stinging cheek. Tears of pain and humiliation burned her eyes.

“How dare you behave as you did this evening!” Franklin Chapman thundered. “You were supposed to be securing yourself a rich and titled husband, not creating a scandal with the likes of Armond Wulf!”

“It was only a dance,” Rosalind whispered. What would Franklin do if he knew the whole of what had taken place between her and Lord Wulf? Despite the consequences, she would tell Franklin if she had for a fact been successful in her plans, but she had not been and saw no reason to suffer her stepbrother's wrath without good cause.

Franklin had been banished from her life when Rosalind was a child. He'd been a nasty young man; he was a nastier adult. Now her father was no longer alive to protect her from Franklin. Her stepbrother considered it Rosalind's duty to restore a family fortune that he had recklessly squandered . . . her own inheritance.

Marrying her off to a wealthy man for a high bride's price was the easiest solution . . . at least in her stepbrother's eyes. Rosalind didn't mind the thought of marriage so much, but she did mind being forced into it, and all because Franklin had accumulated enough gambling
debts during the past few years to see him in debtor's prison.

“Only a dance?” he repeated. A pulse throbbed in his smooth forehead and he took a menacing step toward her. “You left with him! Everyone saw it! I told you to stay away from him. Any affiliation you have with the damned man will greatly jeopardize your reputation. Besides, he'd eat you up and spit you out. Armond Wulf is dangerous!”