To Wager the Marquis of Wolverstone (4 page)

She drew a steadying breath at his blatant
insult. He’d made it perfectly clear this was about revenge. She
was simply another woman to bed before he moved on. She was no one
special, merely a woman with whom to slake his urgent desire for
retribution and nothing more.

Never again would she see him smile at her
with tenderness and devotion. The thought of it sent pain coursing
through her. Over the years she’d learned to shelter her heart from
loneliness, with Alfredo giving her only the will to live on. But
to give herself to Marcus, the man she loved, knowing it meant
nothing to him, that if anything it was his means of revenge, a way
to punish her for the past, would be almost too much too bear.

“You must hate me so very much,” she offered
in a quiet voice.

Marcus shrugged his shoulders. “I hadn’t
thought of you at all until today. Why so reluctant? You don’t have
to behave like a chaste virgin. I doubt you were one when we first
met and I’m positive, Lady Orsini, you aren’t one now. Sharing my
bed will bring you pleasure. I’ve learned a few things since I last
knew you, as I’m sure have you. Unlike ten years ago, neither of us
will be satisfied with just a few kisses.”

She refused to rise to his taunt. She was a
virgin when they first met. But none of it mattered now. All that
mattered was making Gower pay. She was determined to exact revenge
for the lives that were stripped from her, Marcus, and her parents
by this one evil man.

She would get her revenge, she vowed
silently. She’d sworn it as she lay next to her elderly husband and
shriveled up inside each time he had touched her. A man she did not
love but to whom she belonged. A man who knew how she felt but
still came to her bed. Not only that but a man who had tried to
make her love him—and had failed. For that she felt forever guilty.
Roberto Orsini had been a good man. He was a man who had deserved
more.

“I have a son.” She saw him blanch at her
words and he moved uncomfortably in his seat. His gaze lowered. She
went on, determined to make him understand. “Alfredo, the future
Conte Orsini. I don’t want any scandal. I have to protect him until
I return to Italy.”

Marcus’s eyes glinted with triumph as he
returned her stare. He lent forward in his chair. “I assure you I
can be very discrete.”

“Like you were tonight, slipping away with
the hostess of the ball,’ she said sarcastically, claws slipping
free of her self-imposed sheath.

He ignored her barb. “So, other than
safe-guarding your reputation, you have no objections? You accept
my terms then?” His voice held a hint of victorious excitement.

She nodded but her show of bravery faltered.
“I accept your wager. After this we will be even. I hope it gives
you the peace you seek. My brothers will be turning in their grave
at
your
behavior,” she said flatly.

His eyes filled with respect. “Touché!” Then
in one swift move he was on his feet pulling her into his arms.
“Good, then we will seal out wager with a kiss.”

She placed her hands on his chest, feeling
the heat of his body through the thin linen of his shirt. Panic
flared and she pushed at his chest. “No! You have not earned my
favors yet.”

Chapter Four

It was too soon. She couldn’t… her stomach
plummeted sickeningly. Sabine swallowed hard. She couldn’t let him
overwhelm her in case she gave far too much too soon. He had to win
the wager first. Besides, she didn’t want her first taste of him to
be in Lady Somerset’s bedchamber, where he’d been about to bed that
wanton woman. He could not expect her to simply walk into his arms
as if the past had never happened. But then he didn’t know her true
feelings. He thought she’d tossed him aside as callously as a
farmer shoots a cart-horse with a broken leg.

Her legs suddenly felt weak. They wouldn’t
support her weight and the room swam. Two strong arms gripped her
tightly for support.

“I didn’t realize my touch held such
revulsion for you,” he said harshly in her ear.

“It’s not that. Whatever you may think of
me, I am not a courtesan used to kissing men I don’t know on
command. It’s been ten years, Marcus. You no longer know me and I
certainly no longer know who you are.”

He didn’t release her as she expected,
instead he stroked a finger slowly down her neck.

A seductive smile curved his mouth and he
arched an eyebrow at her. “Then by all means let us be
reacquainted. If I recall, you loved it when I nibbled your ear,”
and he bent his head and she felt the soft press of familiar lips
against the skin of her neck as he nuzzled closer to her ear lobe.
She couldn’t stop an inhalation of breath. A familiar sensation
streaked across her skin and her heart suddenly seemed too big for
her chest. She breathed deeply and his scent flooded her lungs.
Dark and spicy, it was intoxicatingly unforgettable.

His words mirrored her thoughts. “You smell
just like I remember,” he murmured against her skin. “You’re
trembling. I remember that too. How you pushed against me in your
eagerness. We both know that I could have taken you many times in
the garden where we used to meet.” His hands roamed down her sides
and her body quivered in his arms. He cupped her bottom and drew
her in tight against him. “I was a fool not to. Then I would not
have spent the last ten years dreaming of how you would feel with
me buried deep within you.” His words were said with such derision
she gasped with suppressed pain, awash with regret at what they’d
lost all those years ago.

She could feel his erection bulging against
her stomach. She’d dreamed of him—of this moment—for many years but
in her dreams he’d wanted her because he’d forgiven her, vowing
that he still loved her.

She’d never dreamed he’d want to make love
to her to satisfy his thirst for revenge, nor that his desire was
driven by hate. She knew hate was as strong an emotion as love. She
knew hate intimately.

Marcus’s lips moved down to the hollow at
her throat. She tried not to allow it, but her body sought comfort
from his. She pressed closer. He growled against her skin. He
seemed to want to punish her. He didn’t need to. She’d been
punished enough.

She’d wished for his arousing touch almost
every day. However, she hadn’t expected him to ever want to make
love to her, and especially not this evening. Not here. Not
now.

Make love
, at these words her heart
clenched. This was not making love. She felt a tear slip from the
corner of her eye. But even so, her body craved the idea.

He drew back suddenly and wiped one of her
tears from his face. His eyes opened in astonishment, “If anyone
should be crying over the past it should be me.” His voice held a
wounded tone and she longed to tell him the truth and appease his
pride.

Then the image of her gorgeous boy, Alfredo,
stopped her.

She’d allowed Marcus to fall in love with
her—and then she’d broken his heart.

Could she make him fall in love with her
again and this time perhaps they could find their happy ever after?
It would be dangerous to think so. The only person who would be
devastated by her failure was herself. Could she face that kind of
loss yet again?

For a chance of winning everything she
desired—maybe she just could.

“I’m not as cold hearted as you believe. I
was, for a moment, overcome by memories. It has been a long time
since I have wanted a man’s touch.”

What an actress she would have made. She
could have been on the stage with conviction like that. Yet he bit
down on the inside of his mouth to stop his tender response to her
words. Were they perhaps the truth? He suspected she lied. But then
bitter-sweet memories flooded his mind. He’d fallen for her sweet
entreats once before. He wasn’t sure he could ever believe anything
that passed between her lying lips.

But with her standing this close, the light
fragrance of lemon filling his nostrils, her skin soft under his
hands, he did not have the strength to turn and walk away.

He should have known the effect Sabine would
have on him. Not only was she the most desirous woman he’d ever
met, she was the only woman who had ever left him. She was the one
who, without hesitation, brought him to his knees, before coldly
casting him aside. No other woman had denied him anything before or
since.

He gazed into her eyes, their irises big and
dark, her desire not faked, it would seem. She reached out and
touched his face, the simple gesture a stronger aphrodisiac than if
she lay naked before him.

He needed to regain control. This repentant
Sabine unnerved him.

In a soft voice, so quiet he almost didn’t
hear her words, Sabine said, “Do you think that if you take me here
and now you’ll be able to move on, and help me avenge my
father?”

Move on. She thought one quick fuck would
erase the years of pain and longing, the years of not understanding
why she had crushed him in every respect.

Was she that callous? Was revenge for her
father all she valued? Of course it was. He should have known that
emotions, true heart-felt emotions, very rarely entered into her
plans.

The painful memories were too much for him.
He stepped back to put some distance between them. She was the
devil disguised as temptation. He left her standing by the fire, a
vision of smoldering sensuality. He turned his back on the sight
and struggled to gain control of his fluctuating emotions. For one
moment he wished he’d not offered such a wager. He wanted to say no
to her request, to reject her out of hand in the way she’d rejected
him. Why should he care about her father and mother?

Then a delicate, tiny hand touched his arm.
“Please, Marcus. Do you want me to beg? Because, trust me, I will
do so, if that is your wish. I will do
anything
you
require….I have only ever willingly slept with my husband. You can
believe that or not, but I will let you take me, here and now, if
that is what you need in order to help me.”

The reminder of what Orsini had taken from
him was too much. She should have been his. He should have been her
first and only lover.

He swung around and pulled her against him,
taking her mouth in a bruising kiss, trying frantically to block
the image her words incited, that of Sabine in the arms of another
man.

She stood rigidly but then slowly melted
against him. This he remembered well. The taste and eagerness of
her was as if he could smell the fragrant flowers of her parents’
garden where they used to meet long ago. His senses flared and his
desire bolted as if from a tightly held leash. He couldn’t stop now
even if he wanted to.

And he didn’t want to. He held his dream. He
held Sabine.

His Sabine. His—only his.

Passion roared in his veins, and all
thoughts vanished but his driving need to sink deep within her.

His hands grasped her arms and he pulled her
against his hard body. A small squeak of distress escaped her. She
tried to still the rush of desire that flamed deep within but it
had been too long.

A strong arm curved around her waist,
binding her close.

“I will have you. When I win the tournament
you will come to me willingly….”

The sudden possession of his mouth took her
by surprise. The warmth of soft yet firm lips molding to hers made
her raw nerves scatter. The heat rose and it was like being
engulfed in fire. As his tongue swept into her mouth she relaxed
into the kiss, unable and unwilling to prevent the wild reaction of
her passion starved body.

It was different from the kisses she
remembered. It was raw hunger coupled with possession and mastery.
It was the kiss of a man who knew exactly how to get a response
from a woman. Rough fingers trailed down to the base of her neck,
where a long finger slid under the edge of her bodice.

A wave of familiar desire swept over her.
Her breasts swelled and her nipples hardened, her corset
restricting her breath. Sweet heaven! No wonder women fell into his
bed at the crook of his finger or the taste of his tongue.

His mouth was like a drug. A drug she’d been
without for ten long years.

As he deepened the kiss, it drowned out
every aspect of the past. She found herself clinging to him with
abandon, while clever, knowing fingers undid several buttons at the
back of her dress.

One tapered finger slid its way under her
corset, and she gasped as he gently but expertly eased her breast
free so that her nipple was exposed. Before she could stop him, he
lowered his head and flicked his tongue over the taut bud.
Scorching heat flickered over her, and she could not stop the soft
cry of delight the moment his teeth lightly clamped on her and
suckled at the nipple in a seductive rhythm.

His mouth let her experience long forgotten
memories. The taste of him was better than her soul destroying
imaginings. How she’d missed him….

The pleasure spiraling through her body was
indescribable. Moist heat gathered at the apex of her thighs. For a
brief moment she pictured his hand cupping her there. His fingers
delving…

Shocked by the traitorous way her body was
behaving, she braced her hands on his chest and tried to break his
hold, tried to push away.

His fingers skimmed her exposed breast,
palming her sensitive flesh. The touch made her mouth dry and
longing gripped her. What would it be like to be Marcus’s lover?
Immediately her mind careened to a halt. It would be torture. She
loved him while he held her in contempt. Bedding her would simply
ease a wound he’d longed to heal. Would he celebrate in victory if
she revealed how she felt about him?

Sweet heaven, she needed to keep a reign on
her true feelings where Marcus was concerned. If she exposed the
truth too soon, all could be lost. Marcus could be hurt more than
she’d already hurt him.