“Not dissembling this time, my dear?” His smile turned wolfish. “How intriguing.”
Her cheeks prickled with embarrassed heat.
How could this man read her so well? Was she so affected by him she had lost her ability to gird herself?
The pad of his thumb brushed over her lower lip then, and she could not stop her reaction. She inhaled swiftly, swaying toward him against her will. One step forward, and her skirts were crushed between them, her hands no longer laced together, but on his chest. She did not even mind the twinge of pain in her healing arm as she moved, for he was solid, muscled heat, and she was helpless to do anything but absorb him.
One of them moved. Perhaps it was him. Perhaps it was her.
She could not be certain, and her mind could not be bothered to decide, for the Duke of Carlisle had sealed his lips over hers. She forgot why she should extricate herself and run in the opposite direction. Some faint voice of alarm within her cautioned this too could be a tactic. A means to seduce her and make her vulnerable to him, to lower her guard so he could gain the answers he wanted.
But she told the faint voice to go to the devil, because the Duke of Carlisle had not kissed her in days, and now that she had his lips, she was going to revel in them. She kissed him back, ravenous. Enemies they may be, but here was the one manner in which they came together in utter perfection.
He nipped her lip. She bit him back. His hands were in her hair, undoing every intricately woven strand of her braid, each loop and pin wrought by the lady’s maid she had been given that morning to prepare herself for her wedding day. She shoved at his coat, sending it to the floor. Her fingers found the cold buttons of his waistcoat, and these too she undid while running her tongue against his.
She had no notion of what she was doing. All she did know was she could not stop. Did not want to stop. The waistcoat fell, and she felt the kiss of cool air at her back as her bodice gaped. He dragged his lips to her ear, down her throat. One by one, her buttons opened. Her bodice inched lower and lower. It was only when she shifted to aid him in removing her arms from the sleeves of her gown that a reminder tore through her.
Pain, radiating from the place where he had shot her.
She cried out, stiffening.
Recalling.
His mouth was on her throat, hot as a brand, but he had stilled. “Where in London?” he asked again. His fingers brushed over the skin he had bared between her shoulder blades, playing over her spine.
She shivered, wrenched herself away from him before she succumbed to any further folly, and forced herself to look him in the eye once more. “I do not know.”
His lips were darkened from the effects of their bruising kisses, and Lord have mercy on her, but she liked the evidence of their frenzied connection. “Shame on you, Duchess. You give yourself away again.”
Duchess.
Lord have mercy on her all over again, for she also liked the sound of that title on his tongue. The realization threw her. She was not meant to enjoy his kisses or his touch. She certainly was not meant to grow accustomed to the notion of being his wife. Or to be tempted to share his bed.
And then something else occurred to her. Perhaps he had only kissed her to gain the answers he wanted. “Do not dare to kiss me again,” she told him coolly. “Ours is not a true marriage, and you have no right to take liberties.”
“Your recollection of which one of us is the aggressor continues to be misguided.”
Had she kissed him first once more?
Mortification sent a fresh wave of heat to her cheeks, but she refused to acknowledge it. “I think not, Your Grace.”
A smile teased his lips. “There is the flare once more.”
She glared at him. “Take your flare to the devil.”
“But if I do, I must bring you with me. Would you care to begin again, banshee? Where in London were you meant to take the lad, and what was the name of the man who assigned you the villainous task of abducting an innocent child?”
“I already told you his name was Thomas O’Shea. I was meant to meet him at the rail station with the boy, and he was going to gather him from there.” Half lie, half truth.
Carlisle rubbed his hand over his jaw, watching her intently. “Damn you, Bridget O’Malley, I will have the answers I require from you, or you will suffer for it. Until you answer me truthfully, you will remain locked within this chamber. You will only leave when I come to collect you. If you attempt to escape or cozen a servant into allowing you egress, I will not hesitate to deliver your troublesome hide to prison, where I should have taken you immediately upon our return to London. Is that understood?”
“Perfectly.” She was to remain his prisoner, and it did not surprise her. She would use her time alone to study the weaknesses of those around her. She had, by her best guess, little more than a fortnight until Cullen was tried. The newspapers she had last read had been clear in the timeline of the trials of the conspirators. She had already lost far too many weeks in her failed attempt at absconding with the young Duke of Burghly.
“Excellent. I have important matters requiring my attention. I shall leave you alone to reflect upon the wisdom of cooperating with me.” He paused, giving her a sinister look. “And cooperate with me you shall, madam, or I promise you that you will not like the consequences.”
Chapter Eleven
The Duke ofCarlisle had forgotten her existence.
