Much Ado About Rogues by Kasey Michaels Page A

breast and now he was sealed against her, hot and wet and drawing her nipple into his mouth even as his fingers continued to play and pinch her other breast through her nightrail.
    But playing fair was for other people, not for them. If he saw an advantage, he took it. If she saw an opening, she exploited it. That’s just the way they both were made, just as they’d seemed fashioned to fit together like the puzzle pieces of that rosewood box, until it would take a very discerning eye to see the seams where they might be split open, separated.
    Her father had seen where the pieces were joined and taken them apart like the master he was.
    Now, he had put them back together.
    Why?
    Jack didn’t believe her thought that Sinjon Fonteneau was setting himself up as some sacrifice in order to protect and assure Jacques’s future, or even as some twisted penance for putting René in danger for his own ends.
    Maybe she didn’t believe it herself. Maybe she still needed to see her father as good, a hero, a man to be admired, emulated. Not a man who would take his candles and sit in the middle of a damp room, admiring his collection, risking everything for things he found more important than his own family.
    Maybe it was simply time she gave in…surrendered her will to Jack’s. Believed what he believed. If just for tonight.
    She arched her neck, pushing her upper body forward, her mind swimming with disjointed thoughts, her blood singing in her veins as Jack took and took from her.
    Here there was complete agreement. When he touched her there were no questions, only answers. No regrets could stand between them when they wanted, when they needed so badly. When all there was in the world was the two of them, the two halves of that single most perfect whole in the entire world.
    She ground her lower body against his arousal. “I want you,” she told him. “Take me.” It was a demand, a plea, a whisper, a shout to the heavens, all in one. “Take me now, Jack.”
    He picked her up and carried her to the bed, sitting her on the edge of it while he quickly rid himself of his clothing. Pushing her nightrail up over her thighs, he spread her knees and pulled her toward him, his eyes dark as he guided himself into her before capturing her mouth with his own.
    She wrapped her arms and legs tightly around him, feeling him deep, deep inside of her, their tongues dueling, keeping time with his strong, hard thrusts.
    Later, he would love her, as he’d loved her last night. Later, she would give him what he’d given her and thrill at his release, his temporary surrender to her hands and mouth. Later, when they were both too exposed, too vulnerable to hide from each other, at least not in the dark in the middle of the night.
    He’d hurt her, yes. But she’d hurt him, as well. They were both very good at what they did, and they both knew where to aim to inflict the most damage to the other.
    And the most pleasure.
    At some point they had to find a way to stop hurting each other. At some point they had to forgive, and to trust.
    But for now they would simply take what came most easily to them. Just as they had last night, the years stood between them now. So much time lost, so much need to make up for. This wasn’t making love. This was mating. Pure and simple and primeval.
    And good. Ah, so very— “Jack.”

CHAPTER SEVEN
    “G ENTLEMEN ,” J ACK SAID , slipping into the empty chair at the table Dickie Carstairs and Will Browning shared inside the anonymous-looking tavern at the bottom of Bond Street the first evening after his arrival in London. “How wonderful, if predictable, to find you together. Too early for the theater? No invitations tonight, Will? No, that couldn’t be possible.”
    Dickie looked at him in surprise. “I’ve been haunting Half Moon Street all day. You didn’t give the signal. Shade up, you’re in residence. Shade down, you’re not. Half up—or half down, I suppose—meet you here. No signal, but we