The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes (London Highwaymen, #2)(57)

“Summon me anywhere you please.” He meant it, even if he wished he hadn’t sounded quite so fervent about it, and he was pretty sure he was blushing when she glanced up at him.

“I thought we could have our tea in my room. It’s small but nice and warm.” She said this as if he needed any additional enticements.

Marian’s bedchamber wasn’t by any means small, unless you were used to living in palaces, which he supposed Marian was. The ceiling was low and slanted because the room was tucked under the eaves. But that meant that as soon as they got the fire going, the room warmed up almost straight away. Still clutching the fire iron, Marian sat on her heels. Rob arranged himself beside her on the hearth rug, his legs stretched out toward the fire, a cup of tea in his hand.

He tried to believe that they would have more nights like this, more time to be warm and safe, with no questions hanging over their heads. But he had never been any good at convincing himself of falsehoods. Instead he told himself that they had this night, and that this night was what mattered.

“I wonder if you’re going to keep holding that fire iron,” he murmured. “That would make things interesting.” She gave a very unladylike snort and he nudged her leg with the toe of his boot. “Do you want to come over here?”

“I have a plan.”

“Do you?” he asked with great interest.

“You have to lie down.”

He lay down, not wasting any time about it.

She came closer, kneeling beside him. Her hair had come down from its pins and fell over her shoulder. “You shaved.” She moved her fingers along his cheek and bit her lower lip. “I don’t know why I find you so attractive.”

Rob, who had known since he was fifteen that his looks were sufficient to attract just about anyone he pleased, almost laughed. “Is that so?”

“I think I thought you were attractive even before I had seen you.”

“The letters?” When she nodded, he laughed. “You have terrible taste.”

“Well, not the first letter. That one only made me furious. But the other ones. Rob, it was fun. You were fun. And we could be honest with one another because it didn’t matter.”

He caught her hand in his own and kissed it. “I wasn’t entirely honest with you.”

“It doesn’t matter,” she said, and it sounded like she believed it, like she trusted him.

He wanted to tell her that it mattered a great deal. He was tempted to tell her the truth about his parents now, but before he could work up the courage, she bent her head to kiss him.

She kissed him as if she were trying to solve a riddle or do a complicated sum, or as if his mouth contained the answer to a puzzle. He brought his hands to her waist and gave a little tug, just a suggestion, and she followed him to the floor.

Then her thigh slid between his legs, pressing against him, and he groaned. She went rigid.

“I don’t wish you to put that inside me,” she said, pulling away from him.

“I wasn’t planning to.”

She made a disbelieving sound. He sat up, putting a little distance between them but keeping hold of her hand.

“Marian, I know that you mustn’t get pregnant.”

“You do?” She raised both eyebrows.

He sighed. “My mother. Don’t even ask. In any event, I know that your health depends on not getting pregnant. Did you think I’d risk it anyway?”

By her silence, she plainly thought he would. And of course she did; her experience with men was skewed toward abject evil. She looked both sad and skeptical and he felt his heart break a little.

“Sweetheart. Just to be clear, I don’t want to do anything that will harm you. I wouldn’t find any pleasure if I knew my pleasure might kill you. That prospect does not make me feel amorous, Marian. And even if you could bear a dozen children without consequence, I still wouldn’t do anything you didn’t want. I—you must know this, but I love you.”

Her gaze flickered away from his. “The duke said that as well.”

Rob hadn’t thought that anything she said could shock him, but this did. There was nothing he could say; he couldn’t tell her that he was different, that the duke’s love was false—she already knew the latter and he hoped she knew the former. “Have I ever touched you in a way you didn’t want?” he asked.

“No,” she said, managing to sound both irritated and reassuring at the same time.

“Do you think I enjoyed what we did last night and that evening in the stables?”

She sniffed. “I gather you found those encounters acceptable.”

“Marian. Acceptable doesn’t begin to cover it.” He realized what she was really asking and debated how to best answer. “I don’t need to put any part of myself inside you,” he said.

“Well, obviously you don’t need to.”

“I mean that it isn’t even at the top of my list of things I’d like to do with you. Or with anyone, for that matter.”

“Pfft. You’re telling me that you don’t do that with most women you lie with?”

“I suppose I have, not that I’ve kept much track of which specific acts I did and didn’t do with various people. And even if I did that with most of the women I lay with, I didn’t with the men.”