The Rogue's Proposal Read online

  So many emotions crossed over his face she couldn’t keep track of all of them: pain, shame, desire, others she couldn’t define. But then he stilled, his gaze clearing and his eyes growing so intensely blue they glittered like sapphires.

  “You’d be bound,” he said, his voice rasping. “On your knees. Or on your stomach, your legs spread, so I could see all of you.”

  Emma’s breath caught and refused to leave her body.

  “I’d blindfold you so you’d be unable to see what I’m doing to you.” His tongue swiped over his top lip. “So you’d feel sensations you’ve never felt in places you’ve never felt them. I would teach you how to pleasure yourself and then I’d watch you do it.”

  He paused. Emma didn’t move. Her breath was still caught somewhere between her lungs and the back of her throat.

  Ever so quietly, he continued. “Most of all, I want to hear you lose that control you hold on to so tightly. I want you to scream for me. I want you to beg for release. Sob for it.”

  Through the roar in her mind, Emma vaguely heard the sounds of the outside world. A carriage rattling over cobbles. A baby crying somewhere in the hotel. A slam of a door.

  “I am bad, Emma,” he said softly. “Bad, wicked, and depraved.”

  Something released in her, and she finally let out the long breath she’d been holding. She gazed evenly into his eyes. “You are not evil, Luke. Everyone has those kinds of desires. They are human.”

  The vehemence of her voice surprised her. And Luke recoiled as if she’d punched him. The glitter in his eyes faded as he tore his gaze from hers. “If you don’t believe my depraved fantasies to be evil, then what about what I will invariably do to you afterward?”

  He’d escape afterward. Leave her debauched and alone. Or at least he thought he would be compelled to do so, because of this evil he believed resided within him.

  But what if he was wrong?

  Oh, Lord, it was an enormous risk. But she wanted him badly enough, she was willing to take it. “What if I told you I didn’t want to think about afterward? That I don’t care if you were to walk away? That I am a grown woman who can make her own choices, and I choose you?” She pressed closer to him. “I want to exist in the present, Luke. I want to stop worrying about the future.”

  His eyes widened, then narrowed. He stepped infinitesimally closer to her. “You say you believe everyone has dark desires? Then tell me about yours.”

  She stiffened. “That’s unfair. I haven’t had the same opportunities as you. I’m inexperienced. I don’t know—”

  “But you still crave something. What is it you crave? Did your husband give it to you?”

  Her chest felt so tight. “No,” she breathed.

  Luke reached up and swiped the back of one of his knuckles down her cheek. “What? When you were lying there on your back and performing your marital duty, what did you crave?”

  She was breathing hard now. Panic swarmed in her chest. There were certain things a person never revealed, to anyone.

  “Tell me, Emma. Tell me what you wanted.”

  “It was only three months,” she whispered. “I was so new to…to experiences of the flesh. I didn’t know, exactly.”

  “But you had an idea.”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Luke,” she breathed. “I’ve never told anyone this. Ever. I’m not sure I can…”

  She’d hardly admitted them to herself. And when she had, she’d pushed them, deep and hard, into the farthest recesses of her soul.

  “Tell me.” His voice was firm and commanding. Her knees felt watery. She took a shaking breath.

  “I wanted…” She stopped. Licked her lips and tried again. “I wanted him to try something else.”

  “Something other than lying on top of you?”

  “Y-yes.” She couldn’t look at him. She was mortified, but there was so much more than mortification swirling through her. Something delicious was unfurling in her belly, and she was flushed and hot—not only on her face, but also all over, inside and out.

  This was the utterly forbidden. These were thoughts she’d never, ever dared allow herself to dwell upon.

  “Like what?”

  “Once…I saw horses in a meadow once…and…and…I wondered what it would be like to be on my hands and knees while—”

  Luke inhaled sharply. Somehow, the sound of the air rushing through his teeth strengthened her.

  “I wanted to be on top,” she admitted, the words coming easier now. “I wanted to be standing against a wall or leaning over the edge of the bed while you—while he,” she corrected quickly as flames leapt to her cheeks, “took me. I…I wanted him to have his wicked way with me. To tie me up and tell me what to do and how to do it. I wanted to please him.” A note of desperation rang in her voice with the final sentence.

  “Bloody hell,” Luke muttered. And then he drew her into his arms and was kissing her, and his lips were strong and soft against hers, his tongue nudging into her mouth. With a little gasp, she wrapped her arms around him and gave in to it, opening and allowing him access, feeling him sweep through her as if her mouth belonged to him.

  Her knees finally gave way, but his arm, that steely band, was around her back again, holding her firm against him.

  His arousal touched her stomach. Flutters trembled through her, starting at the spot where that hard ridge pressed against her.

  He sucked at her bottom lip, trailed his tongue over her top one. His kisses slowed, the urgency softening into exploration. She moved her hands up his back, feeling the hard ridges of muscles below her palms.

  His hand cupped her jaw, moving her face this way and that, covering her skin with languid, soft kisses as though he needed to taste every inch of her. His lips moved up the side of her face, then pressed down on her closed eyelid.

  “Emma,” he whispered on a groan. “God, Emma.”

  He stopped kissing her, his hand dropping from her jaw to join the other hand behind her back. He held her close, and she pressed her face to his chest, feeling the rapid beat of his heart against her cheek, the rise and fall of his torso with each quick inhalation.

  Then there was a knock at the door. Slowly, hesitantly, he pulled away until he stood facing her, arms at his sides.

  “Yes?” he called.

  “Excuse me, sir,” a woman’s voice said softly. “I’ve the washing water and breakfast you ordered.”

  He raised a brow, and Emma nodded, signifying that last night, she had indeed requested these things to be delivered at eight o’clock this morning.

  “Come in, please,” Luke said.

  Three servants dressed in black dresses with white aprons entered, carrying trays of food and a basin of steaming water.

  As the servants bustled about, Emma gazed at Luke. He hadn’t moved from where he stood facing her. He looked shaken.

  She swallowed back the huge lump that had formed at the top of her throat. She glanced at the servants who had finished their tasks and were waiting with downcast eyes for further instruction. “Thank you, that will be all,” she told them. They curtsied and left.

  She turned back to Luke, resolve straightening her spine. “We should eat and dress. Then…we need to go find C. Macmillan.”

  Chapter Seven

  It was a half-hour drive out to Duddingston Parish. As Luke drove them through the village of Wester Duddingston, he slowed the horses. When Emma glanced over at him, she saw that he was gazing at a middle-aged woman who was emerging from behind the church, staggering under the weight of what appeared to be two very heavy baskets slung over her forearms.

  “Here we go.” Luke halted the horses and handed Emma the ribbons. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.”

  Bemused, she held the horses and watched him saunter up to the woman. Emma was too far away to hear anything more than snippets of their conversation, but she could tell by the woman’s quick speech and fretful motions that she was overcome by Luke’s handsome bearing. A
nd perhaps also by the fact that he was English and very clearly of the aristocracy.

  “Do ye mean Colin Macmillan? Oh, aye,” the woman said, and went on chattering in a lower voice, her tone conspiring. She was probably telling Luke everything she knew about the man.

  Emma had to admit that watching Luke flustered her, too. Even now, after spending almost every moment with him over the past several days. She mused over this as she watched him. At first, perhaps, it had been simple lust. A product of her innate and unwise attraction to rogues and scoundrels that she’d been trying to suppress. But now, even though the lust had grown into something so powerful it threatened her control, there was more to it than that. Much more.

  “Och, aye, sir,” she heard the woman say. “’T’isn’t far. Over that hill, yonder, and through the grove of yews.”

  Luke reached down and retrieved the two baskets the woman had been carrying but had lowered to the ground in order to speak to him. “May I help you with these? Where were you going?”

  Emma shook her head, smiling wryly. And the man claimed he wasn’t a gentleman.

  The woman protested, saying it was too far, that he “shouldna fash” himself over her. But Luke gently pressed her until she gestured to the other end of the street, where Luke and Emma had entered the village.

  Luke walked by the curricle carrying the heavy baskets, winking at her as he passed. She grinned at him, then smiled at the woman, who gave her a respectful curtsy before hurrying after Luke.

  Moments later, Luke returned alone. “Well, she told me a little about C. Macmillan,” he said as he climbed up and took the reins from her.

  “Do tell.”

  “He seems to dabble in industry, dipping his fingers in many different pots. He owns a great deal of land along the shore and manufactures salts there. He’s a partial owner of the Duddingston Coal Works and employs most of the workers here in Wester Duddingston. And he owns a soap manufactory nearby.”

  “Goodness. A busy man,” Emma murmured.

  “Yes.” Luke frowned. “I am curious as to why such a man would associate with someone like Roger Morton.”

  “Well, I can think of one way we might find the answer to that.”

  “By asking him,” Luke said.

  “Exactly.”

  Ten minutes later, they rode through the iron gates of a mansion that reminded her of her father’s house in Bristol. But this one was older, its modern design belied by round fairy-tale towers, topped by battlements and arrow slits at each end of the façade.

  Luke pulled the horses short and gazed at the house. “It’s a little early for a social visit.”

  “Our visit isn’t particularly social,” she mused.

  A stable boy ran toward them and took the reins from Luke. Luke jumped down with practiced ease, then came around to help Emma.

  “Ready?” he murmured.

  She nodded and blew out a measured breath. “I am.”

  He smiled at her and led her to the massive entryway. As they approached, a man opened the door. A butler, certainly. He was older, and very thin, and stood straight as he gazed at them impassively.

  “Sir. Madam.”

  Luke looked at him with an utterly bored expression. “Lord Lukas Hawkins and Mrs. Henry Anderson. Here to see Mr. Macmillan.”

  She released a breath. She’d asked him to use her maiden name, afraid that Macmillan would become suspicious if he heard Henry Curtis’s wife had come to see him.

  “Have you a card, sir?” The butler sniffed, and Emma noted that he didn’t have any trace of a Scottish accent.

  Luke rolled his eyes. “No. No card.”

  “Very well, sir. I shall see if Mr. Macmillan is at home. Please excuse me.”

  The butler retreated, and the door closed with a low, resonating boom.

  She glanced at Luke. “What if he refuses to see us?”

  Luke shrugged and spoke without inflection. “My name gets me into most of these kinds of homes.” He grimaced. “Not because it belongs to me, of course, but because it is linked to the Duke of Trent.”

  “Oh,” she murmured.

  “Everyone knows Trent. Of him, anyhow. And everyone wants to wheedle their way into his good graces.”

  “Do you often use your name for the benefit it can give you?” She asked the question without rancor; she was truly curious, because she hadn’t seen him do this before.

  “No.” His voice was flat. “I despise doing it. I did it for your sake today. And for the sake of my mother.”

  She reached out to touch his arm but dropped her hand quickly, because the door was already opening again.

  “Mr. Macmillan was on his way to the manufactory, but he will see you now,” the butler announced with a sniff. “Follow me, if you please.”

  They followed the man into a cavernous marble entry hall. Everything inside was white marble except the glints of gold in the chandelier and the few pieces of gilded furniture placed against the wall.

  Their footsteps echoed ominously as they traversed the wide space. Beside her, Luke shuddered and said under his breath, “Just like Ironwood Park.”

  That surprised her. She’d imagined his childhood home to be grand and imposing but not cold and barren. There wasn’t time to ask him about that now, though.

  They followed the butler through an arched doorway and up a winding oak staircase. At the landing, he opened a monstrous carved door and announced them. “Mrs. Anderson and Lord Lukas Hawkins, sir.”

  He stepped aside, allowing them to gain entry into the room.

  It was an elegant drawing room designed with dark furniture and enhanced by marble tabletops and gilded sconces, not unlike the drawing room where her father had received visitors—back in the day when visitors had come to their house in Bristol.

  A man stood in the center of the room. He was thin, like his butler, but old and grizzled, with a shock of thick gray hair. He grinned and held out his hands in welcome as if they were old friends he’d been expecting for days.

  “Well, good morning,” he said warmly to Emma. His voice contained a soft Scottish burr, but his accent was very slight, as if he had spent many years in England. “Ye must be Mrs. Anderson.”

  “It is a pleasure to meet you,” she murmured, somewhat mystified. She’d expected a very unpleasant man, but his vocal tone was nothing like the tone of his letter to Morton.

  “And Lord Lukas, how fine it is to finally make your acquaintance. I had the honor of meeting your brother the duke at a dinner in London last spring.”

  Luke slid her a glance, and beyond the mocking expression on his face, she didn’t miss the glint of pain in his eyes. At that moment she realized how much he truly hated how people treated him as an extension of the Duke of Trent rather than as his own person.

  “A pleasure to meet you,” Luke said politely. But a muscle worked in his jaw, and she could practically hear him grinding his teeth.

  “I was pleased to hear of his recent nuptials as well. I sent a letter of congratulations a few weeks ago. Do ye know if he received it?”

  “Sorry,” Luke clipped. “No idea.”

  Macmillan didn’t glean Luke’s mood from his tone. “I wrote also about the measure in parliament providing some relief to those of us merchants who lost our salt at sea in last winter’s storms.”

  “Mmm.” Luke’s expression darkened.

  “I hope ye will convey to your brother that it is a start, but no’ enough, if Britain—Scotland, in particular—is to see future growth in its salt trade.”

  “Mr. Macmillan,” Luke growled, “I am not a message boy for my brother. Tell him your damned self.”

  Oh, dear. Emma stepped forward as Macmillan’s eyes widened. “Mr. Macmillan, thank you so much for seeing us today, and for your generous welcome into your home.”

  Macmillan turned his now-wary gaze to her.

  “We were hoping you could be of assistance to us in a very important matter.”

  Macmillan studied her for a
moment, and in his assessing gaze, she found a hint of the man who’d written that letter to Roger Morton. But then he smiled and made a grand gesture toward a cluster of sofas and chairs on one side of the room. “Please, sit down, and we’ll talk. May I offer you some refreshment?”

  “Thank you,” Emma murmured. Luke was still glowering, so she touched his arm and mouthed, Sit, as Macmillan spoke to the servant who’d been standing at attention by the door.

  Luke puffed a breath out of the side of his mouth and gave her a slight nod.

  She lowered herself on a sofa upholstered in rich shades of burgundy and gold. Luke sat beside her, a little closer than would generally be considered proper for acquaintances, but they were so much more than that now. And she didn’t care a whit what Macmillan thought.

  Still, she saw his assessing gaze take in her and Luke’s proximity as he returned from speaking to the servant.

  He sat in a matching chair across from them, laying his forearms over its tasseled arms. He gave them a polite tilt of his head. “Now, then, how may I be of assistance?”

  She flicked a glance at Luke. His clenched jaw told her that he was still annoyed, so she steeled herself. It looked like she would be the one to explain.

  “We are looking for someone who might have information pertaining to the disappearance of the Dowager Duchess of Trent.”

  Macmillan’s brow furrowed. He, like everyone else in the country, must know by now that the dowager had been missing since spring.

  Luke shifted uncomfortably beside her. She wanted to touch him. But she was in a strange man’s house, and he was watching them carefully. Her desire to soothe Luke would have to wait.

  Macmillan’s gaze moved to Luke. “I had heard about the dowager. Unfortunate business, that.”

  “Yes,” Luke ground out. “Unfortunate.”

  “We have evidence that the duchess’s disappearance might be connected to a man named Roger Morton,” Emma said softly. “We have reason to believe you might know this man. That you might know where we could find him.”

  At the mention of Roger Morton, Macmillan went very still. His gaze strayed from Luke to Emma and back to Luke again. His fingers tightened over the arms of his chair.