“I just don’t like to see squandered possibility,” she muttered.
“A missionary at heart,” he said, wry.
If that’s what he believed, she wouldn’t disabuse him. Better that than him thinking she had more than a professional interest in his welfare.
A faint noise sounded in the corridor outside, the creak of floorboards beneath carpet as someone made their way down the hall. Both she and Dalton stiffened, exchanging glances with each other. From beneath the door, light gleamed. Something jingled. The housekeeper’s keys.
Dalton dropped the curtain immediately, throwing the chamber into darkness. Both he and Eva raced for the shelter of the folding screen. The screen itself wasn’t particularly large, but Dalton was, so they had to stand close together, her back pressed against his front. His arm wrapped around her, beneath her cape, and his hand spread across her stomach.
The moment they settled into place, the door opened. More jingling and footsteps as the housekeeper walked into the room. A small glow spilled upon the walls—she must be carrying a lamp.
Eva tensed and felt Dalton do the same. Had the housekeeper heard her and Dalton and come to investigate? If so, behind the screen would likely be the first place the housekeeper looked. Talking their way out of the situation wasn’t possible, and Eva didn’t want to subdue and tie up the poor woman—though if it came to that, she was prepared.
The footsteps stopped, and the housekeeper sighed. Yet she didn’t look behind the screen. More light filled the room.
Cautiously, Eva peered around the edge of the folding screen and saw the housekeeper standing exactly where she and Dalton had been moments earlier. The older woman gazed out at the ballroom across the way, a wistful look upon her face.
“My, isn’t that lovely?” She sighed again, then hummed along with the faint music, swaying slightly.
Eva edged back. She and Dalton hadn’t been seen. And so long as they stood behind the screen, they wouldn’t be. Yet she couldn’t feel calm, not until the housekeeper left. From the expression on the older woman’s face, rapt with attention, it appeared that might be a while.
She kept herself still, willing her breathing and heartbeat to slow. But as she did, she became aware of Dalton’s nearness. With so little room behind the screen, their bodies pressed against each other. Knowing that she was going to be in and out of a carriage all day, she’d worn a small bustle, and it now kept a minor distance between her and Dalton. Yet her back leaned fully against his chest. His heat spread through her, and the hard, broad muscles of his torso formed a living wall. She caught the scent of soap and wool and … him.
Her every part was aware of him—his size, his strength, the potency of both his body and his will. Her own flesh felt tight, sensitive, and when his breath curled warmly over the back of her neck, she fought a shiver of burgeoning arousal.
His palm was large and hot against her belly. She shifted, adjusting her footing, and his thumb brushed against the underside of her breast. Heat streaked through her. Such a simple, light touch, yet it spread through her in quivering waves. She was half afraid, half desirous that his hand would move higher, cupping her breast.
His hand stayed where it was. She felt and heard a slight catch in his breathing. He was as affected as she.
She could sense that his mouth was barely an inch from her nape, and had a powerful urge to lean back even more so his lips could touch her flesh. What would his lips feel like? Rough? Soft? Or both? Yet, despite her desire to find out, she held herself motionless.
It was all she could do to keep her eyes open. She felt both languorous and inflamed, conscious not only of Dalton but also the fact that they had to remain quiet and still. They couldn’t be discovered by the housekeeper. They couldn’t take this attraction any further.
After what felt like ten lifetimes, the housekeeper sighed again and let the curtain fall. She walked back to the entrance to the chamber, paused for a moment at the doorway, then closed the door behind her.
Both she and Dalton waited as the housekeeper’s footsteps faded down the corridor. Another minute passed, yet neither she nor Dalton moved. Eva told herself it was merely to ensure that the housekeeper didn’t suddenly return.
Finally, when a suitable period of time passed, she stepped—stumbled—from behind the screen. Her legs felt unstable, her head light.
She heard Dalton’s muttered curse behind her. It sounded as though he were making adjustments to his clothing—specifically, his trousers.
Immediately, she went to the window and pulled the curtain back to look into the ballroom.
“Rockley’s still there,” she said in a low voice. “We’re safe.”
“Wrong about that, love.” Dalton appeared beside her, his face hewn into hard angles. Dark stubble lined his jaw. He was the embodiment of uncompromising masculinity.
“You and me,” he continued in a rumble, eyeing her, “we’re dangerous as a loaded gun.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
The night yielded nothing. Nothing useful, anyway.
At two in the morning, Rockley had finally left the ball and gone home. No other side trips. No late-night secret meetings in riverside warehouses. No visits to one of his preferred brothels. Just home.
Far as Jack could tell, all he’d gained was an even greater hate—if it was even possible—for Rockley. The bastard continued on with his life just as he’d always done. Protected, privileged, Society’s untouchable ideal. Finding a way to ruin him would be one hell of a miracle.
The other thing Jack had gained tonight: a fierce hunger for Eva.
As he lay in his narrow bed at Nemesis headquarters, staring up at the patterns of light on the ceiling and listening to Lazarus snoring in the room down the hall, he still ached with wanting her. Having her pressed up against him, smelling so sweet, feeling her curves … it had been a temptation almost no man could’ve resisted. Somehow, he had, but it didn’t help that she’d shown him far more empathy than anyone ever had before.
Through the whole of that day, dragging back and forth across London, stuck in a small hackney, his awareness of her kept growing. Like a weed, poking through the stone wall of his anger.
She seemed cold as frost on the moors, but beneath that was a woman of determination, of passion. What would it be like, stripping away all her layers, thawing that frost? What kind of woman would be underneath?
A hot-blooded one. And damn him if he didn’t burn to uncover her.
Lying in his bed, he let his mind travel down the path he hadn’t taken behind that folding screen. He pictured it: his mouth on the back of her neck, kissing, biting her silky skin, his hands cupping her breasts, feeling their shape and softness. He pretended that her corset didn’t cover her breasts, so that when he played with her nipples, he’d feel them grow hard beneath his fingers. She’d lean into his touch.
Jack closed his eyes, allowing himself to fall deeper into his fantasy. He reached down and took his aching cock into his hand.
His hands would pull up her skirts as she continued to stand in front of him, and he’d touch her legs until he found where her stockings ended and her bare skin began. There’d be her drawers, too. Little frilly things, he decided. He’d find the opening in her underwear and then he’d find her sweet, hot pussy, glossing his fingers with her wetness.
He stroked himself now, imagining what it would be like to dip his fingers between her lips, feel her heat and response. She’d fall back against him as he touched her, her head turning to the side so he could take her mouth with his. He’d slide his fingers inside her. Hell, she’d be deliciously tight, and his fingers were thick. She’d squirm against him, her hips pushing into his hand, but they’d have to be quiet, so quiet. Not a word or sound to give themselves away.
He thrust harder into his hand, brutal, as he pictured her twisting and silently gasping with pleasure. She’d reach back and undo the buttons of his trousers, then grasp his cock and stroke him, just as he touched her. Faster, now. She’d be a little rough, just the way he liked it, the way he touched himself now, but her hand would be so much better, slim and soft. They’d stand like that, behind the screen, pleasuring each other, moaning noiselessly into each other’s mouths, until she tightened around his fingers and gasped as she climaxed.
Jack snarled as he and his imaginary self came. He bent up from the bed, body stiff, as his seed shot from him in a hot arc. But in his mind, his come didn’t splatter on his stomach and chest, but over Eva’s fingers. And then she licked them, one by one, her eyes on his.
He fell back onto the mattress, panting. Looked down at himself. He’d never come this hard before, not from his own hand.
“Christ,” he muttered. He used a corner of the sheets to clean himself off, before lying back in bed.
Usually, when he had himself a nightly wank, it took him only minutes to fall asleep afterward. It had been a long day, too, exhausting him with its frustrations and anger. But now he found himself wide awake, wondering if Eva was thinking about him, too. If she was in her own bed, remembering how he felt against her. If she also pictured what might have happened between them, and if she touched herself, too.
At the very thought of her hand drifting beneath the covers to nestle between her legs, Jack was hard again.
“Fuck.” He tried to ignore it, but it was like ignoring a telegraph pole sticking up from his groin. No other choice, then. He took hold of his cock once more and pumped it, knowing it was going to be a long, frustrating night.
* * *
“Did you learn anything?”
Sitting at the table in the parlor, Jack glanced up from hunching over his cup of coffee. Simon stood in the doorway, throwing his hat and coat onto a nearby chair as he glowered at Jack. After the rubbish night he’d had, Jack had the strongest need to hit the toff right in his pretty face.
Just as he was about to open his mouth and tell Simon to piss off, Eva came up the stairs. The day outside must be a raw one, for her cheeks were rosy and she carried the scent of wind and rain on her.
Or maybe her cheeks were pink for another reason. She looked at Jack and more color came into her face.
If he thought he’d wanked her out of his system, he was wrong. He couldn’t stop staring at her, not as she also took off her hat and coat, not as she bustled into the kitchen to pour herself some coffee. And when she came back into the parlor, his gaze refused to go anywhere else.
He caught Simon’s dark frown and curled his lip in response. Let the nob try to do something. Jack wouldn’t mind a good, healthy brawl right now.
Lazarus and Harriet also entered the parlor. The swarthy-looking bloke, Marco, hadn’t appeared all morning. Had another mission, Jack supposed, or he could be floating in the Serpentine. Jack didn’t much care.
Cradling her cup of coffee, Eva sat on the arm of a cushioned chair. Pale purple smudges ringed her eyes. Had she been thinking about him last night, and that’s what had kept her awake? Or was it the fact that their operation against Rockley had stalled before it’d truly begun?
The fact that they hadn’t made any progress soured Jack’s mood further. “Didn’t learn bollocks,” he rumbled.
“Not entirely true,” Eva said. Her voice shivered over him, and he tore his gaze away from her to glare into his coffee. Inconvenient, this attraction. Bloody inconvenient.
Continuing, she said, “We saw that he spoke with two high-ranking parliamentarians, and they clearly weren’t under his thumb. None of Rockley’s usual haunts have additional security, either. Which means that wherever he keeps the evidence of his embezzling is not part of his standard schedule.”
“Unless it doesn’t exist,” Harriet noted.
“It does,” Eva said, confident. “He’d be certain to keep documentation in case any of his collaborators try to turn on him.”
“And if Rockley knows that Dalton’s on the loose,” added Lazarus, “he’d be sure
not
to go where the evidence is stored, so he doesn’t lead Dalton right to it.”
Jack had to admit that the old soldier spoke wisely. Still, “That don’t help us one bit,” he growled. “We can’t track down all the places Rockley
doesn’t
go. It’d take a bleeding eternity.”
“Perhaps,” Eva said, thoughtful, “the answer isn’t with Rockley, but his collaborators. They might not be as cautious as Rockley in covering their tracks.”
“We’ve already been through the public records of those involved with the government contract.” Simon spoke from where he stood next to the mantel, arms crossed over his chest. “Only Rockley’s name was mentioned. If anyone else had been listed, we would’ve investigated them already.”
The highborn gent’s peevish tone rankled Jack, especially since it seemed directed at Eva.
“The other chaps in the deal could’ve been involved on the sly,” he fired back, “outside of public record. Rockley dealt with lots of blokes. They’d come to his place all the time. Any one of them could’ve been part of the contract.”
Though Simon scowled, the other members of Nemesis nodded thoughtfully, including Eva. A flicker of satisfaction glowed in the center of Jack’s chest.
“The contract with the army was consigned six years ago,” Eva said to him. “Exactly when you were still working for Rockley. Whoever was also involved with the contract must have been to see him during that time. So you would have seen the collaborator, as well. Maybe heard him, too, talking to Rockley about the contract.”
“Lots of gents met with that bastard. He’d be at home once a week in the afternoon for private business. Didn’t want to go to anyone’s office or have meetings at the club.” Despite his tiredness, he felt edgy and restless, and got up to pace. “But there were too many blokes who came and went. Ain’t possible for me to remember them all. And I sure as hell don’t know what they talked about. They’d go into Rockley’s study. I just stood outside and kept guard.”
“You never listened in?” Simon looked disdainful.
Jack wheeled around with a snarl. “They didn’t pay me to eavesdrop. I earned my coin by beating men until they soiled themselves.” He gave Simon a mean smile. “And I was good at my job.”