Page 44 of A Remarkable Rogue

“Baroness,” he protested gently, “we have to stop.”

She nibbled at the corner of his mouth and sighed at the taste of him.Delicious. “No, we don’t.”

“We can’t.” His hands tightened on her upper arms. “Ican’t.”

She stilled. Confusion poured through her. She searched his face for answers but saw only the same heated desire she felt herself. “You don’t want to touch me?”

“Of course I want to touch you,” he growled with frustration.

“Then why won’t you?”

“Because I won’t stop with just a touch.”

“Good,” she purred with relief and leaned in to kiss him again, “because I don’t want you to stop.”

He held her away. In the shadows, she saw guilt darken his face and shutter away the desire she’d seen there just heartbeats ago. But it wasn’t guilt at taking her in an alcove instead of in a proper bed.

No, it was guilt over another woman. The one he refused to betray, even now.

Her shoulders slumped in defeat. He’d rejected her before, but this time was different. This time, she knew she’d never be able to win. Even if he surrendered to her, she might have his body, but that other woman possessed his heart. No matter what Sydney did now, no matter how hard she begged or pleaded or seduced…

She would lose.

She dropped her hands away from him and leaned back against the wall, careful not to touch him. If she did, she might just scream.

“I frustrate you, don’t I?” She rasped out the terrible truth, “You want me, and yet you think you’ll be betraying another woman by giving yourself to me.”

She felt every muscle in his body tense even from a foot away. His eyes flickered darkly, and for a moment, she thought he wouldn’t answer—

“Yes.” The quiet admission tore from him.

And ripped straight through her. He might as well have stabbed her with his knife.

Trying not to let the pain of her shattering heart register on her face, she nodded slowly. “I should go home now. We’re done here.” She risked reaching out to fasten his waistcoat, which she’d rumpled earlier in her rush to undress him. “And you must go on to St Giles.”

“Sydney.” The plaintive sound of her name on his lips was a sweet torture. “Please understand. It isn’t—”

“No,” she interjected before he could say something else to hurt her. “I understand far better than you realize.”

She secured the last button but lingered with her hand on his chest, smoothing over the black brocade. Even now she wanted to keep touching him, even as unshed tears stung her eyes.

Reluctantly, she pulled her fingers away.

Leaving him to conquer his own demons was the right thing to do. She knew that. But dear God, why did it have to hurt so much?

“I want you, Nate,” she confessed. Her slender shoulders conceded the truth of that with a small shrug. “And you can have me.”

An alcove, a horse stable, a carriage—she didn’t care where because she desperately craved him, this man who set her world on fire.

Yet she wouldn’t allow him to wound her again.

She dropped her hands away. “But I won’t be second to any woman.”

Thirteen

Sydney sat with her feet tucked beneath her and watched the small fire in her bedroom fade into ashes as the hours drew on.

Outside, the dark sky had given way first to the purples and then to the blues of early dawn. Now even those last remnants had disappeared into the pinks and yellows of full sunrise as the sun peeked over the edge of London and completely banished the night. The city was waking around her, with maids beginning to stir in homes across Mayfair and delivery men and chimney sweeps making their way down familiar alleys.