Learn exactly what he was about.
~~~
Rose paced the library on the ground floor, hands wringing, awaiting an appropriate amount of time after Gabriella and Rebecca’s departure before dashing out into a sloshing October day. She had every intention of storming Ten Manchester Square despite what the etiquette books insisted were ruinous, as she’d read to the Hope House women.
Ten minutes crawled by.That’s it.Adventurous Rose could wait no longer.
She started for the door, but the windows crashed back. Blowing rain slashed inside. Rose’s hand flew to her chest, her mouth opened, poised for a scream to bring down the house at the caped fellow pausing on the threshold.
Heart in her throat, she cursed herself for the stuttering that shifted from fear to anticipation. “Emerson?”
He stepped inside and shed his coat, draping it over a table near the windows. “Damn you, Rose. I’ve been trying to talk to you.”
The fury was fast, a ferocious jolt through her body. “You had your chance yesterday.” She brought her arms up to fold over her body, but that felt like…defeat. She steeled her spine and drew on her anger like a shot of potent whiskey, placing her arms to her sides in a deliberate move. “Leave at once,” she bit out, completely having forgotten her need to speak to him. “Your days of crawling through windows ends now—”
Like a jungle cat, he stalked her across the room. It seemed an eternity crept by before his hands whipped out and latched on to her shoulders and yanked her against his chest.
Broad. Warm.
This was no gentleman pampered by a valet to dress him, a servant to draw his bath, a tiger to run his errands. This was a man who lived by his own hand, his own rules—one who expected no other to bear the weight of his world.
“Rose?” he whispered.
“What?” she whispered back.
“Look at me.”
She shook her head, doing her damnedest to remember her anger, her hurt, his disregard.
His thumb brushed at the corner of one eye. “Look. At. Me.”
“No.” But unable to resist, she opened her eyes, and to her abject horror, a few drops escaped.
“I’m sorry,” he said. The words cracked from him as though he’d never uttered them before, breaking through her ice-encased heart. “There was an urgent matter to attend in Sussex.”
This was not what she wanted to hear. He didn’t mean it. They never did.Never.
“But you—you—demanded the meeting yesterday morning, and you never showed up. Without. A. Word.” She hated how it…hurt.
“I know, darling. It was remiss of me in not apprising you of my change in plans. I was set to head to Buckinghamshire after you, but then I learned you’d returned.”
“You did?” She also hated how her heart lifted at his declaration. She compressed her lips.
“I came straight here once I returned and then learned that you had left town.” He moved to her side, going down on one knee. “You drive me…wild. Do you realize?”
“No. No, I don’t.” She brought her hands up as if to protect her heart from his words, yet rested them on his shoulders.
He framed her face within his large hands. “I don’t understand myself these days. It’s quite unnerving what you do to me.” He leaned in and took her mouth. No sweet caress in that of a nobleman, but a demand, harsh and unrelenting—one that stole her very breath, the bone and muscles that supported her ability to stand. His tongue stroked hers with a purpose that turned her brain to nothing but a bowl of…of watery porridge.
Any recollections of her late husband’s mealy, half-enthusiastic attempts were obliterated by Emerson’s searing touch. She clutched his shoulders and jumped full body into the fray, applying what tutelage he’d offered the night of the masquerade. The fullness of those firm lips that appeared at first glance so stern, so…unrelenting. But, oh, how they tasted so right. Her fingers curled…andher toes. It seemed as if her head—no, her body—floated.
On air.
She didn’t even require her knees…
He’d lifted her, carried her to the settee, dropped her, left her in an undignified heap.
He tore open his waistcoat, jerked his shirt from his breeches.
