He moved his hand from her breast to her knee. Deliberately he eased his palm up under the skirts of the gown, along the sensitive skin of her inner thigh and found the hot, wet place between her legs. She took a sharp breath, shivering in response to the intimacy.
“I was waiting for you,” he said. “I just didn’t know it until I met you.”
“Slater.”
This time she said his name in an aching whisper because she could barely speak at all now.
She slipped her hand inside his partially open shirt and flattened her palm on his chest. She could feel the hard, sleek muscle beneath his warm skin.
He stroked her, drawing forth a response that took her by storm. His touch had a shattering effect on her senses. An unfamiliar tension built inside her. When he tugged on the sensitive bud at the top of her sex, her nails turned into small claws on his chest.
He slipped two fingers gently inside her. She caught her breath, instinctively tightening herself against the sensual invasion. The clenching action only served to ratchet up the tension.
In the early days of her marriage, before she had discovered the weaknesses in Jeremy’s character, she had enjoyed his kisses and thought herself content with the physical side of marriage. Jeremy had been nothing if not charming and he had accounted himself an expert lover. But even at the dawn of their relationship when she had still been in the giddy, hopeful phase of love, she had never experienced the level of excitement that gripped her now.
Perhaps it was the result of having very nearly perished in the fire. Perhaps the doctors were correct—maybe widowhood took a toll on a woman’s nerves. Whatever the reason, her reaction to Slater stunned her.
“I cannot take any more of this torment,” he said against her throat. “I need to be inside you. I need it more than I have ever needed anything in my life.”
He opened the front of his trousers, freeing his heavy erection. She was shocked anew when she looked down and saw the size of the man.
But before she could decide what to do next, he pushed her knees wider apart, gripped her hips with both hands and thrust hard and deep into her wet heat.
Instinctively she clenched herself around him but he withdrew and plunged back into her, again and again until she was breathless and desperate.
Without warning the coiled tension that had tightened her lower body was released in a series of deep waves.
She was not sure what was happening. She tumbled helplessly over a seemingly endless waterfall. She clutched Slater’s shoulders and hung on for dear life.
Slater gave a muffled roar. He thrust deep one last time. But instead of pouring himself into her, he pulled free. In the next instant his climax ripped through him. She felt the hot stream spill across her bare thigh, heard his ragged breathing and sensed the shuddering tremors that pounded through him.
When it was over he braced himself with both hands on the desk on either side of her body and leaned over her, his eyes tightly closed. Perspiration gleamed on his forehead and dampened his chest.
“Ursula,” he said. “Ursula.”
An eerie hush descended on the study. Ursula knew that when reality returned, nothing would ever be the same—not for her.
TWENTY-THREE
Rosemont lurched awkwardly along the fog-and-night-darkened street, a heavy suitcase in each hand.
He was no fool, he thought. He had known from the start of the affair that there were risks—only to be expected in a situation where there was a great deal of money and some very ruthless people involved. He had made preparations for precisely the sort of emergency that had struck today.
He had not breathed easily until he had heard the explosion. He had been several streets away at the time, cowering in a doorway. The muffled rumble had given him some comfort and reassurance. No one could have survived such a conflagration. Mrs. Kern was dead and everyone connected with the Olympus Club would assume that he, too, had died in the fire that had destroyed the shop.
One final transaction and he would be out of the dangerous business he had entered a year ago.
Concocting the drug had made him a wealthy man but no amount of money could calm his nerves. He had been in a perpetual state of anxiety for months now. He looked forward to retiring to a quiet seaside village. If he got bored, he would go back into the perfume and soap business. But never again would he distill the damned drug. His nerves could not take the strain.
True, for years he had done a brisk little side business peddling his own uniquely powerful laudanum products and cleverly disguised arsenic “tonics.” But it had all been quite discreet. His customers had consisted primarily of wives who were desperate to rid themselves of difficult husbands and heirs who wished to speed the passing of a relative who had the misfortune to be standing in the way of an inheritance. He had always been careful to accept only clients who came to him by referral.
But his life had changed after he had agreed to take on the business of concocting the ambrosia. In addition to the dangerous people involved, the chemicals required to craft the drug were highly volatile. He could not wait to put it all behind him.
The clatter of hooves on paving stones behind him made him stop. He turned and watched a dark carriage roll toward him out of the fog. The vehicle looked anonymous, just one of many such hired conveyances on the street. But there was a small white handkerchief fluttering from the whip. That was the signal.
He set down one of the suitcases, yanked a white handkerchief out of his pocket and hailed the carriage somewhat hesitantly. It rumbled to a halt in front of him. The door opened. An intimidatingly large man in a heavy greatcoat, his features shadowed by the brim of a stylish hat, looked out from the dimly lit interior of the cab. He carried an ebony walking stick trimmed in gold. A gold ring set with onyx and diamonds glittered on one hand. He appeared to be in his early forties and not ill-favored. There were likely women who would notice such a man but in Rosemont’s opinion there was something about Damian Cobb that put one in mind of a great beast of prey.
“You must be Rosemont. Allow me to introduce myself. Cobb, at your service. It’s about time we met. We have, after all, been business associates for several months now.”
