Chapter 28

28

It was a sweet kiss, as much a reaction to the shock they had both suffered as anything else, and as she kissed him Sophie relaxed into the knowledge of his decency, his openness; how much he had shared with her, and how little she had told him in return. He knew what she had been once, and what she was now, but he did not know who she was, not really, and she was possessed of a great desire to tell him. She was teasing him with little kisses, he was letting her set the pace, and she moved away to put her head on his shoulder, saying against the comforting warmth of him, ‘You didn’t seem shocked when I told you I had had a lover.’

‘Well, I assumed you must have.’ He was choosing his words carefully, she thought. It was a delicate topic, after all, her past, with many traps, both obvious and hidden, that they could easily fall into. ‘I didn’t want to assume anything else. If it was a happy experience – and I thought it must be, given your confidence when you were with me out there on the roof – then I can only be glad for you. I know nothing of your life, but I would be honoured to know, Sophie, if you care to tell me.’

‘I would like to. I don’t want to dwell too long on the bad things that happened to me, though I cannot help but mention them if I am to make you understand. I was lucky, really – I could very easily be dead. I was destitute, alone, and faced with only one way of making a living. My landlord had already made it clear to me precisely how my arrears of rent could be paid. I was frightened, grieving, but most of all I was angry, like a cornered animal. I knew that sooner or later I would have only one choice, which is no choice at all, or some man would overpower me without even the illusion of choosing. It seemed inevitable, but I resolved at least to make that man pay for it. It was probably foolish and dangerous, but I wouldn’t submit willingly and accept the value they all placed on me.

‘And then a stranger came to me and said that he had heard of my plight – people tell him things, to win his favour, I found out later – and that we might help each other. I thought he wanted what they all seemed to want, but I was wrong, he didn’t. He still wanted to use me, but in a different way – to make me into a thief, a weapon of sorts – and that seemed better to me. It was better.’

She saw his expression and said, ‘He’s not my lover, he never has been. His name is Nate Smith, and though I’m sure you’ve never heard of him he is a very dangerous man, but we’re friends, or something of that kind, as far as that is possible in his world. I know after all these years together and the way he treats me, people think I’m his mistress. That’s useful in a way, because it makes them frightened of me, because they’re so frightened of him, and I have sometimes thought that he quite likes them to believe it too. For his own complicated reasons, he has protected me. No one who knows him would ever dare lay a finger on me to hurt me. We’ve been so close for so long, people fear he might kill them for harming me, though I don’t know if that’s true or not. He has shared some of his secrets, but not all of them. He hates your father, I am certain of that, though I have no idea why.’

‘After all, lots of people do,’ he said drily. ‘It would be much harder in all honesty to find people who are even slightly acquainted with him and don’t loathe him. But go on.’

‘I felt safer, you see, under Nate’s protection, and I was learning all sorts of things, good and bad, that I’d never have dreamed of in my previous life. Doing things Clemence de Montfaucon would never have done in a thousand years. After a while I realised how much I had changed, and I thought that I should take a lover.’

He smiled, though she could not tell exactly what he was thinking of what he had heard. ‘And why should you not?’

‘Perhaps you’re teasing me, but really it was a sensible decision. I wanted to give my body to someone I chose, rather than be taken against my will as could so easily have happened, and also, I suppose, I needed to remind myself that I was no longer Clemence de Montfaucon, and never would be again. My virginity began to seem – a useless sort of a thing. A mockery, almost. I thought, if by some miracle my old life was restored, nobody would ever believe that I was still an innocent, given the way I had been living. So I might as well not be, in practice as well as in theory. I wanted some pleasure for myself – I understood from all that I had seen around me that it could be pleasure – and some company, some comfort, I must admit that too. And I chose Bart.’

‘The artist.’

‘Yes. He was very poor – he’s richer now, I hear – living in cheap lodgings and drinking in Nate’s tavern. This was some years ago. Bart told me he wanted to paint me, and I thought, That’s not all he wants. I’d been saying no to everyone for a long time, and then I decided to say yes. I liked his looks, and let him know I did.’

‘You seduced him.’

‘It wasn’t very difficult.’

‘I don’t suppose it was. But you aren’t together any longer.’

‘We were happy for a while, for a year or more, but in the end he wanted to marry me. Or thought he did. He was from a good family, just playing at being a romantic starving artist, and he was getting tired of the cheap lodgings and the cheap wine and living like a pauper. He wanted to be respectable. He was very talented, and people were starting to buy his pictures, to pay more for them. If he knows your father has one, he’ll be delighted. He’s very ambitious.

‘He had some idea, because I’d carelessly let something slip, that I am – I was – of noble birth, and he thought we could be respectable together. He liked the idea that I was a French aristocrat’s daughter, and so he was prepared to be very generous and forget I’d been his mistress, and that I’d chosen him as my first lover. But I thought actually he never would quite forget it. And I didn’t want to be forgiven. Why should there be one rule for him and another for me? He wasn’t a cruel person, and I don’t regret what I did. We enjoyed each other. But I’d lost sight of my purpose for a while, and as we started to argue and grow apart I remembered it again.’

‘And here you are.’ He might have said, in danger of losing sight of your purpose again.

‘And here I am.’ They were still lying very close, his arms were still about her, and she was glad she’d told him. There was no future in this, she knew that as well as he did, no more than there had been with Bart, but it was so tempting, here in Rafe’s embrace, to relax into the novelty of having someone she could really talk to, even setting aside the other temptations that he offered. She’d never shared half as much with her artist – her body, certainly, but not the details of her past or her deepest thoughts.

‘Just one lover?’

‘One and a half, counting you.’

‘I’d like to be more than a half. You must know that.’ He wasn’t caressing her, except with his voice. He scarcely needed to.

‘I would too, but… I’ve always been careful – you know women have to be. I can’t stop now. I dare not.’

‘So have I. I’ve had an example of appalling irresponsibility set in front of me my whole life, Sophie. Wilfully destructive behaviour, a total lack of concern for others’ safety and one’s own. And my grandfather was no saint either; it appears to be a family tradition. I was always going to choose one extreme or the other – to become exactly the same and spread chaos all around me, or to be very different. You know that I have made love to just one woman in my life. Perhaps I needed to prove to myself that a Wyverne could be faithful – well, I was. We were together for many years and I would have married her if she hadn’t already been tied to another. But we made sure we did not bring a child into the world that I could never give my name to.’

If one was honest, one couldn’t complain when receiving honesty in return. ‘And is she still…?’

‘We parted a year or so ago. Her husband came back into her life unexpectedly after many years of separation, and she felt she needed to accede to his wish to live together again. He spun her some story that she chose to believe. I don’t think she’d ever fully recovered from his desertion of her – I was always second choice. And she did desperately want a child. I had begun to think, even before her husband reappeared, that she gave herself to me because when he left her she didn’t really care what happened to her. Once such a thought has occurred to you, it makes it rather difficult to continue together with any self-respect – or it did for me. Perhaps that was really why she left me, in the end.’

Sophie had a strong desire to ask him if he’d loved her, whoever she was, and if his heart was broken still, but was not sure if she truly wanted to know the answer. And what good did it do to talk of love? They shouldn’t. It was a foolish indulgence she could not afford. Love was for girls like Clemence de Montfaucon, girls who deserved the best of everything, not for Sophie Delavallois. She’d never spoken of love with Bart, and now she was glad she hadn’t. And she wouldn’t now. She would not put Rafe under the awkward obligation of pointing out to her that he was a viscount and she was a thief.

‘We are both a little bruised, are we not?’ she said. She felt as though this room, though it was only a temporary and precarious refuge, was a precious haven, a tiny bubble where the world didn’t matter and couldn’t intrude. But it wasn’t true. She wouldn’t let the illusory sense of safety seduce her. ‘I’m very tempted to throw caution to the winds. But I won’t. I don’t want to risk bringing a child into the world either.’

‘Never, or just because of our particular circumstances?’

What a question to ask her. She looked up at him, desperate to make him understand the nature of her life, so very alien to all he knew. ‘Rafe, I’m a thief. You know I am. More than that, I’ve stabbed people and told myself they deserved it. I’d do it again if I had to. I’m not an assassin – it’s not quite as bad as that – but there have been occasions when I’ve been cornered by men much bigger and stronger than me, and the only way out has been by means of the blade you know I carry. And I’ve used it.’

‘Were any of these people officers of the law?’ The question showed the true size of the gulf between them, she thought.

‘No, but if they had been, I can’t swear to you I’d have done anything different, if the choice was escape or be taken and hanged. And Rafe, I live – in so far as I live anywhere – in a room above a sordid tavern. How could I even contemplate making a child? Should I get Fancy Fred, Nate’s tapster, to mind the baby for me while I go out picking pockets? Or maybe one of the whores – One-Eyed Sally, or Daisy the Dasher? You spoke of appalling irresponsibility earlier – well, I won’t live like that either, or inflict it on a helpless child. I won’t. There are too many suffering innocents in the world already.’

He didn’t try to argue with her. ‘Eight years ago,’ he said a little sadly, ‘Lord Drake might have wooed Mademoiselle de Montfaucon. One dance could have led to more. It would have been an eminently suitable match in anyone’s estimation.’

‘You know it’s far too late for that.’

‘It may be. But we can still take comfort from each other. I have been taking comfort, lying here, and I think you have too. I’d never do anything you didn’t want, Sophie. If you say I mustn’t touch you, I won’t, however much I desire you. Need you.’

‘What do you want?’ She felt weak for asking, but she couldn’t help herself. His honesty pierced her to her core.

‘I want everything. I want things I can’t have. But just now I’d settle for tasting you again.’

She hesitated for a moment, as if she might refuse him, but she was fooling herself, she knew. ‘Yes,’ she whispered.

‘You’re sure?’

‘I’m not sure of anything. But I do want that too. I’m not strong enough to resist completely.’ She’d known when she lay down in his arms that sooner or later passion would flare between them once again.

‘May I undress you?’

She could not help but laugh. ‘Such a typical man – you say you’ll settle for one thing, but then immediately ask for more.’

‘It’s only a fraction of what I want, but I haven’t seen you naked, and I need to. I warn you, Sophie, I want to make this last. I aim to undress you very, very slowly, and then take hours to drive you crazy. I was too eager last time.’

He was irresistible. Wordlessly she offered him the prim cuff of her gown where it closed at the wrist. First he kissed her palm, very gently and softly, and even that innocent caress made her shiver and close her eyes against the sweetness of it. Then he undid one tiny grey button, pressing his lips to the blue vein that was revealed. It was the lightest touch, the merest brush of contact, but her skin was thin and sensitive there, where the pulse beat, and she whimpered. Another button, another tiny kiss. By the time he had undone every fastening on one sleeve and kissed his way with exquisite tenderness up to her elbow, her breath was coming fast and her breasts were heavy and aching for his touch. Heat was uncoiling deep within her, and she moved restlessly on the bed. But he would not be hurried.

He turned his attention to the other cuff, the other sleeve, and worked his way just as slowly, just as carefully up to her elbow. She heard herself moan softly – what was next?

‘Turn over,’ he said, his voice very deep and low, and she hurried to comply. He started at the nape of her neck, taking his sweet time with the tiny buttons, kissing each inch of her skin as it was bared to him and murmuring soft endearments, and by the time he had reached the edge of her chemise she had half a mind to beg him to rip it off her. In fact, she wasn’t sure she had so much as half a mind any more. She was a quivering mass of need. She rolled over and lifted herself eagerly so that he could pull her gown away and discard it, and then he turned his attention to her petticoats and her stays. By the time they’d been peeled from her with tantalising deliberation and she was left in nothing but her chemise and stockings, she was writhing shamelessly and arching her back to present herself to him. The abrasion of the fine fabric upon her sensitised nipples was close to unbearable. He pulled the flimsy garment over her head and she thought, Now! But he occupied himself in unfastening her hair, unravelling each plait and pulling out each pin with a maddening slowness, then combing his fingers through it where it lay across his pillow.

When he shifted down the bed she thought again, Now! But he was engaged in very slowly untying her garters and rolling down each stocking, kissing his way down each leg in turn, heading in entirely the wrong direction as far as she was concerned. He explored her with his lips, his tongue, but hardly at all with his fingers, and how desperately she wanted his hands on her, and firm touches that satisfied instead of tormenting.

And then at last she was naked and exposed to him, and he, fully clothed and booted, immaculate, sat back on his heels and looked at her with smouldering intensity. His dark eyes ran over her body as his lips had, and with much the same effect. His gaze was a caress, and she felt gloriously wanton under it. Her nipples were hard pebbles, and every hair on her body stood on end in delicious, near-painful anticipation; she was shivering with desire. ‘Do you want me to beg?’ she almost moaned.

He considered the matter seriously, his eyes dark with desire. ‘No,’ he said at last. ‘I want you to be far beyond begging. Beyond speech of any kind. I want you to forget your own name. I want the room to spin around you and the heavens reel.’

‘Fine words!’ she managed. And then he was working his way up her body again, and she could say no more. His big hands were on her now, holding her just as she needed to be held – how did he know? – and when he reached the junction of her thighs and commanded her to spread herself for him she was trembling, already dizzy, thrusting her hips up at him in mute appeal. When at last the tip of his tongue claimed her swollen nub, she cried out and surrendered to the waves of pleasure that overwhelmed her with shocking suddenness.

He was devouring her suddenly with hungry urgency, all restraint abandoned, and she did forget her name, she forgot everything except the feel of his tongue and his fingers on her, in her. When he moved to worship her breasts with the same fierce focus, she spasmed again, but he was merciless in drawing the last quiver of arousal from her, and when she came back to herself it was dark outside. Hours had passed, or days.

‘Good God,’ she said weakly. Her own voice sounded foreign to her. He’d destroyed her – if he lays so much as a finger on me again, she thought, anywhere, or blows on my skin like he just did, I’ll come again, and then I’ll die of it. It’s too much. But I don’t care. Her body was so relaxed with the aftermath of glorious release that she felt she was melting into the bed. She hadn’t known a man could be so ruthless in his determination and so selfless in his disregard of his own physical satisfaction.

‘I’d like to please you,’ she whispered. ‘I really would. God knows you’ve earned it. And I want to. But I don’t think I can move. If I try to sit up, I’ll probably faint.’

‘Good,’ he said, and though the room was shadowy she could hear that he was smiling. He’d done all he promised and more, and he was touchingly pleased with himself. He pulled up the quilt, which had been pushed aside long since, and covered her tenderly with it, tucking it around her. ‘Why don’t you sleep a little? I’ll go and get you some food – you must be ravenous. I’ll take the key with me so that you can be sure you will be undisturbed.’

She thought of saying, Your self-control is barely human. But she was fast asleep before he had closed and locked the door behind him.