The cad actually laughed. “Mr. Rose?” His long, slim fingers tangled in her hair, crushing the curls in his hand. “If we get that far, Miss Pence, far enough that we are sharing a bed, it would be with a permanent arrangement.”
Before she could make sense out of what he said, he pulled her in for a kiss that had her knees buckling. He wrapped his arm around her waist and dragged her against his hard body. She gripped his shoulders as he swept into her mouth, tasting, nibbling, teasing.
Pulling back, he rested his forehead against hers, the air between them heavy with panting. “No privacy here.” He reached for the latch and opened the door, drawing her inside.
He spun her around. She landed in his arms and he took possession of her mouth, her body—her very soul. Slowly his hand worked its way up between them to cover her breast. He rubbed his thumb over the nipple, bringing a low, soft moan from deep inside her.
“I want to pleasure you.” He kissed her cheeks, eyelids, chin. “To hear you moan my name as you break apart in my arms.” He scooped her up and carried her to her bed, laying her down, then after toeing off his boots, climbed in to stretch out alongside her. He cupped her chin, stroking her cheek with his warm fingers. “I promise I will not take your virginity. Not yet. But I want to give you a taste of what we can share together.”
Still reeling from what had happened so far, she merely nodded, the blood pounding in her head.
Once again, he plundered her mouth as his hand worked its way under her skirts, up her leg, past her calf, above the ribbons holding up her stockings. She inhaled deeply when his fingers reached the soft curls at the juncture of her thighs. His thumb circled a part of her there that came alive.
She gasped. “Oh, my. That feels so good.”
Driscoll gave her a slight, very male-satisfaction smile. “It gets better, sweetheart. Hold on.”
He continued to plunder her mouth as his fingers played with her sex. She grew agitated, restless. She needed more. “I, I feel as if I need something, Driscoll.”
“I know love, just lie back, let me do the work.”
She had no idea what he meant; all she knew was she didn’t want him to stop doing whatever it was he was doing to her body. To her soul. She thrust her hips forward, pushing her mound against his hand, searching, reaching. “Please.”
“Shh, Amelia. Relax. Don’t try so hard.” He kissed her, which distracted her very little from where his fingers were busy. Finally, she groaned and pulled him closer, holding him tight as the most wonderful feeling swept over her, coming in waves that she never wanted to end. Her lips were dry, her lungs gasping for air.
She collapsed back onto the bed, and slowly opened her eyes to see Driscoll staring at her with an expression on his face that terrified her.
Oh dear, what have I done?
14
“I found the bitch.” Daniel Lyons dropped into the chair alongside Randolph at White’s where he was enjoying a glass of brandy with Sir John Devlin.
“Amelia?” Randolph almost spewed out his brandy at Lyons’ blasé announcement.
“The very one.” Lyons signaled the footman to bring a drink.
Randolph was practically speechless. They’d spent weeks scouring London looking for his stepsister and here Daniel just casually drops the information. “Where?”
Lyons took a sip of his brandy and leaned back, a cat-who-stole-the-cream look on his face. “At the Rose Room.”
“The gaming club?” Devlin asked.
“Yes. She’s a dealer.”
If Lyons had announced that Amelia was working as a whore in the stews at Seven Dials, he wouldn’t have been more surprised. How the bloody hell did she end up in one of the most well-known gaming clubs in all of London?
He hadn’t realized he’d mumbled it out loud until Lyons said, “I have no idea, but there she was—wearing a mask I might add—and dealing at the vingt-et-un table.”
Devlin looked between the two men. “What’s this all about?”
Lyons gulped the last of the brandy from his snifter and waved at the footman for a refill. “Just leave the bottle,” he said when the man arrived. Then he turned to Devlin. “Our friend here wagered his stepsister in a card game. He lost—” he grinned at Randolph, “and I won.”
Devlin frowned. “Won in what way?”
Lyons grinned. “She’s now my mistress.”
“You have her?” Randolph finally found his voice after grasping Lyons’s words. He pushed back on the slight feeling of guilt that crawled its way into his thoughts. Since he could no longer afford to keep the girl fed and clothed, and with her dowry long gone, she was better off with Lyons. At least he wasn’t a mean man and would not require her to do things that would hurt her.
Lyons shook his head. “No. It wasn’t possible for me to just lean across the table and grab her. I mean there must be some dignity to this whole thing. Besides, one of the Rose brothers had his eyes fixed on her almost all night.”
Devlin looked back and forth between the two men and leaning back let out a low whistle. “Isn’t there some sort of a law against that?”
Randolph drew himself up in indignation. “It was a wager between two gentlemen.” Bugger it, why did the man have to even be here while they had this conversation? If Randolph intended to find himself a wealthy wife, it would not do to have this information bandied about.
“Between two gentlemen, you say? Clearly your stepsister didn’t agree, or she would not have disappeared.”
Randolph gritted his teeth. Judgmental fool. “No matter. She will do as she is told. She has—or so I thought—no other choices. I have been providing for her since my father died, but with my own funds quite low, it was time for her to pay me back.”
Having dismissed Sir John’s disapproving stance, he turned to Lyons. “Since
