The Rogue You Know (Covent Garden Cubs) (13 page)

“A-and did that help?”

She could hear him smiling when he spoke.

“It didn’t hurt.” He sat beside her again. “She didn’t feel the spark when I kissed her. I couldn’t make her feel it. It’s either there or it’s not.”

A spark. That was an apt description of the way she felt when he kissed her. Her insides lit up, and her body felt as though it were on fire, burning with heat and vitality.

“Do you—” she began then clenched her fists.

“Do I…?” he prompted.

“Oh, it’s irrelevant,” she said quickly and hopefully lightly. “You were saying about Marlowe? Or should we call her Elizabeth? I never know what to call her.”

“Susanna.” His voice was low and teasing. “Ask me.”

“Ask you what? You mean what you call Marlowe?”

But he wasn’t fooled by her too-high pitch or her rapid speech. He’d known or guessed what she was thinking. Ridiculous that her cheeks were hot and probably bright pink, when no one could even see her blush.

Whatever creature shared the space with them continued scratching in the corner, its movements loud in the growing silence as he waited. And waited.

“Fine.” She huffed out a breath. “Do you feel any spark when you kiss me? I withdrew the question because it’s a foolish one. Let’s not discuss it.”

“But I want to discuss it.”

His thigh pressed into hers as he moved closer, and she felt him twine a long lock of her hair around his finger.

“You do?” There was that breathless quality in her voice again. How did he manage to do that to her every time he touched her? Every time he looked at her—and she couldn’t even
see
him looking at her at the moment.

“I feel more than a spark when I kiss you. I feel a hundred tiny sparks, lighting me up, burning out and sparking new fires.”

“Yes,” she murmured.

“You feel it too?”

“I don’t understand how Marlowe couldn’t.”

He used her hair to tug her closer. “Because Marlowe and I weren’t right for each other.” His lips brushed her cheek, his warm breath flickering on her skin. She tingled inside, felt tiny explosions building.

“Neither are we,” she pointed out. “You’re…”

His lips kissed the corner of her mouth.

“And I’m…”

His hand slid into her hair and cupped the back of her head. “You’re?”

“Dying for you to kiss me.”

“Then I should do so with haste.”

His mouth met hers in a hot tangle of lips and tongues and heat. Shimmering sparks flooded her body and tingled through her. Her head swirled, making her dizzy with desire. Clutching his shirt, she hung on for fear she might lose her grip and tumble away.

Dimly, she became aware he’d taken her in his arms and lowered her down on the chaise. His powerful body, all lean, muscled strength, covered hers. She wrapped her arms around his back, dug her fingers into the hard contours of his flesh, and felt him shiver. His lips took hers more roughly, and his kiss turned deeper and more passionate.

He really did want her. He responded to her touch much as she responded to his. The thought sent more flickers of desire into her belly, and she slid her hand down to explore his body. His back was sleek and hard, his waist narrow and trim. His buttocks—

“What are you doing?” he asked, lifting his lips from hers.

“I’m sorry.” She pulled her hands away. “I only wanted to touch you.”

“Keep touching me like that, and before you blink, I’ll have your skirts up to your neck and my cock buried inside you.”

She should have been shocked by his words. She should have slapped him for speaking to her that way. Instead, she couldn’t resist putting her arms around him and pulling him back to her. This time she kissed him, her mouth taking his, tasting him, exploring the fullness of his lips and the rough stubble on his jaw.

“Do you have any idea how much I want you right now?” His voice was low and thick, and it rumbled through her as she licked a patch of skin on his neck. He tasted like wood and salt and man.

“As much as I want you, I imagine.”

He pulled back. “And what exactly is it you want? I don’t think you even know what you’re saying.”

“I do,” she protested. “I know what men and women do. I’ve read books.”

“Oh, books!” He shook his head, and she felt his soft hair tickle her forehead. “I’ve never read a book about…”

“Copulation,” she supplied, thinking perhaps he lacked a term that was not cant.

“Right. But I can promise you
copulation
in reality is much different than in books. So I ask again, what is it you think you want?”

She might have answered quickly. She might have said,
You
, and kissed him again. Instead, she considered. In the medical book she’d found in her father’s library, it had referred to the man’s engorged organ penetrating the woman’s body. Was that what she wanted? His organ inside her body?

It seemed a strange thing for two people to do, and yet she could not deny everything she’d done with him so far had been far more pleasurable than strange.

“I want to copulate with you. I know I’ll be ruined,” she added hastily. “I’ll be ruined anyway.”

“Give me strength,” he murmured and lowered his head to her shoulder.

“I know what copulation entails,” she said, in case he still thought her ignorant. “You penetrate my body with your engorged organ.”

His body shook, and she realized he was laughing. She smacked him on the back. “What is so amusing, sir? I know I’m correct.”

“Sir?” He lifted his head. “After all this, you call me
sir
?”

“Oh, never mind. Get off.” She shoved at him, and he caught her hands.

“Not quite yet, Strawberry.”

She stilled, held her breath. Her heart hammered as though it desired freedom from the confines of her ribs.

“Then you’ll…”

“Copulate you?”

“I think it’s more accurately said,
copulate
with
you
.”

“I don’t give a…shilling. I won’t do it.”

Her breath huffed out. Her ears were ringing, and she couldn’t have heard him correctly. “Why?” she asked, her voice small and high to her ears. “I thought…you said you felt sparks.”

His hands on her wrists relaxed. “Oh, I
want
to copulate you—copulate with—take you. But you deserve better than a tumble on a stolen couch in a dirty, rat-infested tunnel under Field Lane.”

“I knew that wasn’t a cat.” She shoved at him, her cheeks hot with embarrassment. She’d all but thrown herself at him, and he’d rejected her. She would go home a virgin after all.

“Get off,” she demanded.

“I don’t think so.”

She stiffened. His tone had an ominous quality to it, a tone that said I’m-not-done-with-you-yet.

“I can’t let you go without teaching you something.”

“I read the book.”

“This is better than a book.”

His mouth touched her lips lightly while one hand slid down her raised arms. His other hand held them above her head as he kissed her. When his fingers reached the bare skin of her neck, she shivered, and his caresses changed to feather-light strokes. He stroked down her sensitive flesh until he reached the edge of her bodice. His mouth trailed after his fingers, branding her where her skin already burned from his touch.

“Gideon.”

“You’ll like this,” he murmured. He yanked her chemise down then tugged on her stays, freeing her breasts. They ached for his touch, and she bucked when his mouth settled on her nipple.

He suckled her with his mouth and fondled her with his hand, the tug of his mouth eliciting an answering pull between her legs. She was warm and heavy at the juncture of her thighs. Pressure built, and she squeezed her legs together in an attempt to alleviate it.

His mouth continued to work her, and the urge to move rose until her legs parted and her hips moved of their own accord. She wanted something, needed it. She was close. If he would only touch her…

She was appalled when she realized where it was she wanted him to touch. She’d been pressing against him, wantonly rubbing her body against his.

“Don’t stop now,” he murmured against her bare skin. “You must be almost there.”

His words were incomprehensible at the moment. “What are you doing to me?”

“Do you want me to stop?”

“I…”

He released her wrists and ran his fingers down her arm, over her bare breast and then across her abdomen. When his fingers slid lower, she could not stop a moan. He moaned in response and reached for her skirts. His hand was warm on her ankle. He slid his fingers up, the calluses rough on her soft skin. When he reached her knee, she slammed her legs together.

“Problem?” he asked, his voice sounding light and affable.

“What are you doing?”

“Showing you something you won’t read about in books—at least not the ones you’re like to encounter.” His fingers slid up her leg, and she had to gulp in a breath.

“Do you want me to stop?” His fingers brushed across the tangle of hair at the junction of her thighs, and she squeaked.

“Tell me if you don’t want this, Susanna. I’ll stop if you ask.”

“I…”

His fingers walked down, and her thighs were moist enough that he slid between them. The shock of pleasure made her cry out.

“Open your legs, Strawberry.”

She shook her head. He couldn’t have seen the motion, but he must have guessed.

“I can do this with your knees locked, but you’ll like it better if I have more room.”

“I shouldn’t,” she whispered.

“Oh, no, you definitely shouldn’t. This is the sort of thing you go to hell for.”

His fingers wiggled and slid back and forth. Her knees weakened.

“This is the sort of thing you should slap me for even thinking about.”

One finger dipped inside her, and her muscles clenched in anticipation. Pleasure and desire mingled until she couldn’t help but relax her muscles.

“Open your legs, Susanna.”

She gave in to the demands of her body and allowed her knees to fall open. He slid his fingers over her again, over a spot so sensitive she cried out when he stroked it.

“This is where my… What did you call it? Engorged organ? This is where I’d penetrate you.” He slid two fingers inside her.

She writhed as he slid in and out. She couldn’t hear him any longer. She could only feel.

“And then I’d thrust in and out, like this. And if I do it just right…”

He paused, slowing his movements until she moaned and every muscle in her body tensed.

“…if I slow down. You like it slow, don’t you? And rub my thumb right here…”

His thumb circled her, and the sudden explosion took her by surprise. Her entire body shuddered violently, and she saw actual sparks before her eyes. Pleasure like none she’d ever imagined spiraled through her, wracking her body, until she collapsed like little more than a doll.

When she could catch her breath again, she reached out for Gideon. “What just happened?”

“Climax,” he said.

From his voice, he was still located near her knees. She’d fallen back onto the longue, her head at an awkward angle at the base of the rising arm. She didn’t care. She couldn’t conceive of ever moving.

“That was almost too easy,” he said.

“The book didn’t mention that.”

He chuckled. “No. I imagine not. Let me show you something else the book didn’t mention.”

“Gideon.” She tried to sit and wished, for what felt like the tenth time, she had some light. Then she felt his stubble brush her thigh, and she shrieked.

“What are you doing now?”

“Something no proper lady would ever allow a man to do to her.”

She reached for his head, attempting to grasp his hair. “Then by all means, cease.”

“Are you sure that’s what you want?”

He must have turned his head, because she felt the warmth of his breath
there
.
Between
her
legs.
His day’s growth of beard stung the skin of her inner thighs. Susanna tried to summon shock as she realized exactly where his head was located. She tried to tell him to stop.

But her body was already tensed for more of his touch. She wanted what she knew he could give.

“Shall I stop?” he asked again. She clenched her hands at the laughing tone in his voice. She wanted to tell him to stop just to spite him.

“No!” she flung at him.

He pushed her legs open, and she waited for the sweet assault of his fingertips. Instead, something soft and warm slid against her.

His tongue!

“Why are you doing that?”

“I wanted to taste you.” He licked her again, his tongue flicking against her until she moaned.

“You taste exactly how I imagined. Sweet and ripe, like a strawberry.”

“This is wicked.”

He made a sound of assent and licked her again.

She gasped. “This is beyond scandalous.”

His tongue worked her, finding a particularly sensitive spot and teasing it until she panted with need.

“This is…” She couldn’t think. Susanna tried to tell him to stop, but the words wouldn’t come. Instead, she gripped his hair and threw her head back in ecstasy.

“Yes, yes, yes.
Please.
”

Her world shattered. Her body exploded into a thousand tiny points of pleasure, each sensation sweeter than the one before it. When she slowly drifted back into herself, she stared blindly at the darkness around her. Thank God for the darkness. She could not bear to look Gideon in the eye after what he’d just done. Susanna feared she’d never cease blushing.

“Move over.” He crawled beside her on the narrow chaise longue and gave her a small shove. She didn’t move. Her body was far too heavy to lift. Instead, he fit himself behind her, propping her up sideways, one arm draped over her midsection possessively.

She could smell her scent on him, and she could feel his erection pressing into her bottom. Why had he left her a virgin and himself unsatisfied?

“You’ll have to speak to me again at some point,” he murmured. He sounded completely normal, as though he hadn’t just had his mouth…his tongue…

“Too shocked to speak?” He chuckled. “I told you I’d show you a few things not in books. What did you expect, Strawberry, for me to behave as a gentleman?”

She rose to her elbow. “That’s rubbish. You’re far more of a gentleman than I think you like to admit.”

“Do you think so?” His hand moved up to cup her breast. She hadn’t bothered to pull her stays up yet, and his rough hand on her bare skin caused her to inhale sharply. “Want me to show you, again, how wicked I can be?”

“No.” She removed his hand, placing it back on her abdomen. “I don’t think I can survive any more. And,” she continued before he attempted to disprove her, “I do not want to test that.”

“Too bad.”

How she wished she could see his expression. “You almost sound as though you want to…do
that
again.”

He nuzzled her neck. “Why wouldn’t I? I like the sounds you make. I like how you taste, how you grab my hair and push my face—”

“Do not say another word!”

He laughed quietly, pressing his lips to the sensitive spot below her ear. “There’s nothing to be ashamed of, Strawberry. You’re a passionate woman. That’s fortunate.”

“Fortunate? For whom?”

“Lord Doddering. He’ll want a passionate young vixen in his bed.”

“There is no Lord Doddering, and I cannot ever do…what we did again.”

He rose up, and though she couldn’t see him, she imagined he was looking down at her. “That’s a shame. I haven’t ruined you, you know. You’ll go to your marriage bed innocent. No one ever has to know what happens here. If you wanted me to do it again, I’d keep your secret.”

He was so very wicked, and not only because of what he was suggesting. The problem was he could read her mind. She did want him to do it again. And heaven help her, when his hand slid up to cup her breast and the other slid between her legs, she let him have his way.

* * *

Gideon had never met a woman like Susanna Derring. He barely had to touch her to bring her to climax. She kissed him, moved against him, like she would die if he stopped touching her. She seemed to thrive on his touch.

Her response made him only want to touch her more. He’d finally exhausted her, and she breathed deeply as she slept beside him. He should have been exhausted too, but he had too many erotic thoughts in his mind for sleep. His cock was still hard and none too happy about being ignored.

He could have had her.

She’d offered herself—in awkward, shy phrases. He’d wanted to allow it. Instead, he’d put his mouth on her again and made her scream his name.

He couldn’t have said why he wouldn’t fuck her. He supposed because, even in the dark, even though she wanted him, he couldn’t pretend she was someone other than who she was.

Lady
Susanna.

Who was he to take her virginity? He shouldn’t even touch her. He was a common thief who’d grown up among the refuse of Seven Dials and shouldn’t have dared look at her.

He’d done much more than look.

One day he might deserve more. When he got his necklace back and left Seven Dials and the Covent Garden Cubs far behind. He’d leave Gideon Harrow too. Take on a new name, become a new person. One last act of thievery to make him an honest man. Maybe in a new city or the countryside, he’d find a girl with sweet curves, a pretty smile, and long strawberry-blond hair.

Gideon clenched his fists.

“She’s not for you,” he muttered to himself. “Do the job and get out before your luck runs out.”

Mrs. Cummings had found him. It was only a matter of time until Beezle did. Hell, Beezle might have been sitting in Des’s kitchen that very minute. And if he so much as smelled Gideon nearby, he’d slink away and lie in wait like a hungry cat.

He didn’t know how long he lay there before he heard footsteps on the stairs. Gideon put a hand over Strawberry’s mouth and shook her awake. “It’s me. Someone’s coming.”

She stiffened.

“Do not make a sound.”

She nodded, and he released her mouth. He could feel her work to straighten her dress. He felt the floor beside the couch for the wooden handle he’d found. It felt like the handle for a wheelbarrow or plow and would make an adequate weapon.

The glow of light pierced the darkness, sliding under the space below the door. Gideon used the light to creep across the room, avoiding tripping over any articles, and stationed himself beside the door.

He raised the weapon and met Strawberry’s gaze. She looked terrified and hauntingly beautiful. In the dim light, her hair made a dusky halo around her pale face. Her eyes were impossibly large and dark, while her lips were swollen and red. She looked like a woman who’d been well and thoroughly pleasured.

Gideon wished he could see her thus all the time.

The latch for the door lifted, and the hinges creaked as it swung open. Gideon raised his handle as the intruder lifted the lamp to reveal the assortment of stolen goods.

“Gid?” Des asked.

“Here.” He lowered the handle and blew out a breath.

Des twisted the light to shine on Gideon, and his gaze went immediately to Gideon’s hand around the handle. “Going to do me in, were ye?”

“Never know who might come looking for me.”

“That’s the truth. Mrs. Cummings didn’t believe ye weren’t ’iding in the house. Brenna finally threatened to set the dog on ’er if she didn’t leave.”

“Beauty?” Strawberry pushed her hair off her shoulders. “Is she hurt?”

“She’s perfectly fine. Chewing a bone at the moment.” Des’s eyes swept over her then flicked to Gideon. “I suppose I don’t have to ask how ye’ve been passing the time.”

Strawberry’s cheeks turned as red as the fruit he’d named her for.

“Is it dark yet? I appreciate your hospitality, but I’d like to move on before Beezle comes looking for me.”

“I’d like that too. Still an hour or more before nightfall. Days are long in the summer. Are ye ’ungry?”

“No,” Susanna said.

Gideon ignored her. “Yes. She’s hungry too. I heard her stomach rumble half a dozen times.”

“It did not!” She blushed again.

The swells were strange. Why should something like a stomach rumbling embarrass her?

“There’s a public house across the street. Food is decent. Better than Brenna makes at any rate.”

Gideon patted his pockets. “No blunt.”

Des looked at Susanna.

“She doesn’t have any either. Guess I’ll have to pay you back.”

“Sure you will,” Des said and gestured for them to follow him back upstairs.

Dusk was falling by the time the five of them entered the public house. Strawberry insisted on bringing Beauty with them, and Gideon didn’t have the energy to argue. Besides, the buffer had a way of sensing trouble. If Beezle made an appearance, Beauty would alert them.

Susanna had to be coerced into eating at the public house. Ladies didn’t do such things. Gideon had grinned. “This is no time to start acting like a lady.”