It had not stopped the second man.

He buried his face into the nook of Victoria’s neck, seeking solace in the wet slickness of hair and flesh;

the back of Victoria’s head ground into his shoulder.

“Oh . . . my . . . God!” She gasped in agonized pleasure. “Gabriel. Gabriel. Please . . . don’t... stop!”

The truth would not be denied.

“I couldn’t stop it,” Gabriel said, lips sliding against her hair, her neck, sliding inside her body.

Crimson stained the darkness behind Gabriel’s eyelids.

He had slit the accomplice’s throat. His blood had been hot and slippery.

Like the shower water.

Like Victoria’s body.

Like .

“I couldn’t stop it,” he repeated.

And pumped his hips in pleasure and pain. Unable to stop the flow of memories.

Of black hair. Of violet eyes.

Of love. Of hatred.

Gabriel’s left hand blindly sought comfort, smoothing up Victoria’s water-slick waist, over sharp ribs,

curving around soft, round flesh, fingers convulsively closing over her left . Her heart hammered

against his fingers; her stabbed his palm, passion both balm and scourge.

She could so easily be destroyed. By the second man.

By Gabriel.

He pressed his lips behind Victoria’s ear. It did not silence the words that erupted inside his chest and

exploded out of his mouth. “I... couldn’t... stop it.”

Not the pain. Not the pleasure.

Not the loss.

Love was not innocent. No matter how badly Gabriel had wanted it to be.

The second man had taught him that.

A low cry burst out of Victoria’s throat. It vibrated against Gabriel’s lips. She suddenly strained

backward, body opening, grasping, milking his flesh until Gabriel’s knees buckled with the truth and he was

slipping, falling ...

Hard copper impacted his knees.

Victoria fell with Gabriel, body gulping an angel’s release.

He had not been able to stop it.

Chapter
20

A shock of water blasted Victoria in the face, and then it was gone, the that had brought her to

her knees, the water that had brought her to , the internal heartbeat of the man who had taken her

into his world and shown her the pain and the pleasure of .

I
. . .
couldn’t
.. .
stop it,
reverberated inside the copper grotto.

An angel’s cry.

The copper was hard; Victoria would have bruises on her kneecaps. Electric aftershocks danced inside

her bottom and her pelvis and her s. Five fingers seared her stomach; her heartbeat drummed against

the palm of a hand.

Gabriel’s hand.

tightened, remembering her pleasure, his pain.
They chained me. I couldn’t
move. I couldn’t

fight.

In her eagerness to free an angel, Victoria had deprived Gabriel of the very choice the second man had

deprived him of: she had forced him into carnal relations.

An apology rose to her lips; “The water stopped,” came out instead.

It was too late for apologies.

“Yes,” Gabriel said tonelessly, his voice a fleeting caress against the base of her neck and her shoulder.

Victoria stared at the copper-skinned woman imprisoned inside the shower. Five copper fingers imprinted

her stomach; her left was protectively cupped by a copper hand. Copper-blond hair blended into

water-blackened hair.

Tears stung Victoria’s eyes. She had to know.

“What happened when they finished with you?”

“They left me.”

But not to die.

Gabriel’s words were muffled by Victoria’s hair and skin; his implication was not.

They had not wanted Gabriel to die. But he had wanted to.

“Who released you?” she asked, voice unsteady, knowing the answer.

“Michael.”

The chosen one.

A boy with hungry eyes who had not begged.

“He’s not French.” Water crawled down her cheek. “How is it that he was in Calais?”

“He had stowed away on a boat from Dover when we were thirteen.” Gabriel’s voice was distant; his

lips moved against her hair and, beneath that, the crook of her neck. The hair covering his chest and

stomach pricked her back; the wiry hair covering his groin tickled her buttocks. “I watched him steal a loaf

of bread through a baker’s window; it was obvious he had never stolen before. I pounded on the window to

distract the baker so he wouldn’t get caught; then I followed him. Michael shared the loaf of bread with me

on a road to Paris.”

And once in Paris they had both been trained to be es.

Victoria listened to what Gabriel did not say as well as that which he said. If Michael had not known how

to steal, then he had not been born on the streets.

Michael was what Gabriel was not, a boy who had not been raised in a gutter and been labeled filth.

Gabriel had named himself after an angel in order to be worthy of Michael’s friendship.

Long seconds passed; steam dispersed into wispy gray tendrils of mist. Beads of water streamed down

the copper man and woman inside the shower grotto.

Her bottom ached from Gabriel the man; her heart ached for the boy who had wanted to be an angel.

Hot breath caressed Victoria’s left ear. “I begged Michael to let me die.”

But Michael had not let him die.

Gabriel’s words seared Victoria’s skin with the truth: Michael loved Gabriel, just as Gabriel loved

Michael.

He didn’t deserve to hurt.

“You killed the first man.” Anger suddenly resonated inside the copper grotto. “Why didn’t you kill the

second man?”

Six months earlier Victoria would have been aghast at her blood-thirstiness. She had not known then how

pleasure could become a weapon.

“I couldn’t find him.”

Victoria’s heart pounded against five fingers. A man had destroyed Gabriel, and . ..

She tried to turn her head, to see Gabriel; her hair that was caught between them stayed her. “You did

not know his name?”

“No.”

“And now?”

“I still don’t know his name.”

But Gabriel knew something about this man who had systematically hurt him. Something that he was not

telling Victoria.

Something that had come between the love two angels bore each other.

Victoria’s knees ached; the heat of Gabriel’s body bound her.

She wanted to touch him; she was afraid to. She was afraid she would cause him more pain.

“How long have you been a proprietor?” she asked, wanting to distract him, wanting to hold him.

Wanting
to
give him the comfort he still could not take.

Gabriel shifted. He sat on his heels, pulling Victoria back with him so that she sat on hard, hairy thighs

instead of kneeling on hard, ungiving copper.

Equally hard flesh prodded her behind.

Victoria’s heartbeat quickened.

Gabriel’s breathing deepened. “Fourteen years.”

I
have not touched a woman in fourteen years, eight months, two week s and six days,
he had told

her the night she had auctioned off her ity.

“You built your first house”—Victoria grappled for the truth— “in order to lure this man?”

“Yes.”

But he had not been lured. And Gabriel had burned down his house. Only to rebuild it.

“Why did he come back, after all these years?”

Gabriel released Victoria’s . “For revenge.”

“But it was he who hurt you.”

Gabriel released Victoria’s waist. “For money.”

Black mail is the price of sin . . .

“Did he try to blackmail you?”

Gabriel lifted Victoria to her knees. “For sport.”

Instantly the copper-skinned woman inside the grotto was free and once again Victoria could feel the

cold metal tub, the wetness of her flesh, the burning discomfort where Gabriel had penetrated her, the

slipperiness of the cream between her buttocks.

The utter aloneness of the man behind her.

She could sense Gabriel standing, a stir of air, a slight pop of a bone. A copper-skinned man towered

over Victoria inside the shower grotto.

Gabriel stepped over the tub. Victoria stared at a tautly muscled thigh, a hair-studded testicle, pale marble

buttocks.

Silently he padded across blue-veined marble, halted in front of the satinwood cabinet that encased the

wash basin. Mist clouded the mirror; all she could see of Gabriel were his strong shoulders slick with water,

sleek back, narrow hips, tight buttocks, long, long legs and the dim reflection of his bowed head.

Water splashed; steam roiled. Buttocks tightening, Gabriel his hips forward.

Victoria did not have to see his actions to know that he washed his s.

Her bottom burned and throbbed.

Her pain. His pain.

Gabriel grabbed the washcloth off the wooden towel rack and plunged it into the basin.

Planting her hands onto the satinwood cabinet encasing the copper tub, Victoria clumsily pulled herself up

to her feet.

Gabriel turned, washcloth in hand. His face was pale, remote. Apart from her instead of a part of her.

“Nothing has changed, Victoria.”

Victoria
would not
cry, not for herself, not for a fallen angel.

She stepped over the satinwood cabinet encasing the copper tub, slipped on marble, grabbed satinwood

paneling to keep from falling. Cold, wet
hair slapped her cheeks.

“The man will try to kill you,” Gabriel said tonelessly.

Instantly the heat of humiliation chilled.

Gabriel’s voice was closer.

Victoria’s head snapped up.

He stood over her, male flesh erect.

A single drop of moisture glistened on the bulbous tip of his manhood.

He had been a part of her—front, back.

She wanted him to be part of her still.

Victoria straightened. Her oris that he had gently pumped swelled.

More acutely aware of the slickness between her buttocks and the moisture that pooled between her

thighs than she was of her next breath, she riposted, “He will try to kill you, too.”

Gabriel did not skirt the truth. “He will try to hurt me by hurting you.”

Victoria’s heart skipped one beat, two.
Who was this man who hunted Gabriel, even as Gabriel

hunted him?
“Would it hurt you ... if he hurt me?”

“Yes.”

Her chest tightened. “Why?”

“Because I want you, Victoria.”

Her eyes burned.

“I want you to touch me.”

Her breath stopped.

“I want you to love me.”

Her heart halted.

“Yes, it would hurt me if you were hurt.” Silver light danced in the gray shadows that was Gabriel’s past.

“It would kill me to see you die, because you have touched
me
and not just my . You’ve touched me

with your passion and your honesty.

“You said you didn’t want to feel desire; neither do I. But I do feel desire; I need you to share that

desire. He showed me that by bringing you here. He will see you in my eyes and smell you on my skin. And

he will stop at nothing to kill you. Simply because you touched me.”

As he had killed Dolly, the e, simply because she had guided Victoria to the House of Gabriel.

Victoria’s bravado haunted her.
If you compel me to stay, sir, I will seduce you,
she had threatened.

Then you will pay the consequences, mademoiselle. As will I.

Gabriel had known the danger of her desire. He had lived with the knowledge of what the second man

was for almost fifteen years.

Have you ever loved anyone other than Michael, Gabriel?”

“No.”

I
loved him as a brother.

Victoria’s chest tightened to the point that it was difficult to breathe. “I do not regret touching you.”

Gabriel stepped closer, alabaster skin pale, blond hair water-darkened. Hard flesh prodded her stomach.

“You will, Victoria.”

She inhaled sharply. “What do you want in a woman, Gabriel?”

Warm breath her cheek. “You feel compassion for a thirteen-year-old boy who wanted to be an

angel.”

It was not a question.

Victoria wouldn’t lie. “Yes.”

“And when you look at me”—a callused fingertip traced her bottom lip—”you see the face of an angel.”

Victoria’s bottom lip quivered. “What do you see when you look at me, Gabriel?”

Dark eyelashes veiled Gabriel’s eyes. Slowly, he traced a trail of fire up her face: hard flesh cupped

Victoria’s right cheek. “I told you my name isn’t Gabriel.”

Victoria moistened her lips, tasting his breath, the lye residue of soap on his finger, the pleasure he had

given her. “You said you named yourself after Gabriel, therefore your name
is
Gabriel.”

Slowly his eyelashes lifted. “And you still want to touch me.”

Victoria could not lie. “Yes.”

“I cried, Victoria.”

Would you cry for an angel, Victoria?

Tears welled up inside her eyes; a single tear leaked from the hard flesh riding her lower stomach. “

There’s no sin in crying, Gabriel.”

No sin in living.

No sin in loving.

“No, there isn’t.” Cold, wet cloth abraded Victoria’s left cheek; it was instantly warmed by hot, hard

skin. Gabriel cradled her cheek as if she were made of precious glass. “Crying is natural. When there are

no tears,
Victoire,
there is the danger.”

Victoire.
French for Victoria.

Victoria held perfectly still underneath Gabriel’s touch, breathing his breath, inhaling his scent.

“I sent a man to the Hundred Guineas Club,” he murmured, as if the club held some significance.

It didn’t.

“What is the Hundred Guineas Club?”

Hot breath scorched her lips. “It’s a men’s club.”

“A club where men congregate.”

London abounded with men’s clubs.

“It is a club where men assume the personas of women,” Gabriel said. Waiting for her shock. “Some of

the men dress as women.”

Victoria had seen a woman’s severed hands stuffed inside leather gloves. She refused to be daunted by

a man’s choice of clothing. “Why did you send a man to the Hundred Guineas Club?”

Gabriel gently cradled her face between his hands. “I sent a man there to for me.”

To ... for
Gabriel?

“Surely he did not have to do so if he did not want to,” Victoria replied unevenly, heart pounding inside

her body, outside of her body.

“He hated it.” Gabriel’s breath filled her nostrils and . “Now he hates me.”

Yet Gabriel had sent him to
the club, knowing that he would hate it.

Victoria fought to keep her hands at her sides and not to touch his body that was so tantalizingly near.

There was danger in touching an angel.

Gabriel would fight the very love he wanted.

“Why did he ... e himself... if he hated it?”

Gabriel’s manhood slickly skidded across her stomach. “He did it out of loyalty.”

“You asked him to e himself, knowing that he would hate you for it,” she breathed into his mouth.

The washcloth was slightly cooler than Gabriel’s hand. Rougher. More abrasive. “Yes.”

“Why?”

Why had Gabriel deliberately sent someone into a situation that demeaned him?
Knowing
firsthand what

emotional damage it would do?

Gabriel’s breath stoppered Victoria’s lungs; the head of his manhood stoppered her navel. “The second

man was not alone when he bid on you.”

Victoria’s stomach somersaulted.

The second man killed everyone with whom he came into contact. If he had been with someone that

night, perhaps the hands inside the gloves had not been Dolly’s .. .

“Was the man he was with dressed as a woman?”

Hot breath seared her lips; equally hot flesh scalded her stomach. Slick fluid threaded down her inner

thighs; a matching thread of fluid meandered down her lower abdomen. “No.”

“But he was a member of the Hundred Guineas Club.”

“Yes.”

Victoria’s fingernails dug into the palms of her hands. “And now he’s dead.”

“Yes,” Gabriel agreed imperturbably. As if death were an everyday occurrence.

On the streets death
was
an everyday occurrence. The women he had earlier referred to—the crawlers

who begged from beggars—sat on the steps of the poorhouses, too weak, to walk, waiting for it to release

them from poverty.

Gabriel’s heartbeat pounded against her cheeks and her stomach, timing the seconds until she

understood.

“This man who would kill—”
us
“—you ... Does he impersonate a woman?” Victoria asked, surrounded

by the heat of his body and his breath.

“Sometimes.”

Images of the women Victoria had seen during the auction flashed through her mind. She had seen no

woman who looked as if she were a man in women’s clothing.

London streets were more simple than London clubs. On the streets men fought men to inflict the pain

that had been inflicted upon them.

There was no rhyme or reason to the man Gabriel described.

There was no sense in the cold and the heat that alternately pulsed inside her veins.

Fear. Desire.

They should not go hand in hand.

“You said he would hurt me . .. ually,” Victoria said, struggling to understand what Gabriel

understood. “He does not prefer men over women, then.”

Gabriel lightly kissed her left eyelid, lips like gossamer. “It is the power of that he enjoys, not the act

of .”

Victoria blinked, eyelashes fluttering against silky smooth skin, the wet flick of a tongue. “You are saying

that he is removed from the act of ual release.”

“Yes.”

As Gabriel was removed from the act of ual release.

She skittered away from the comparison.

“And when he kills?” she asked. “Is it inflicting pain that he enjoys, or the power of being able to inflict

pain?”

Gabriel kissed her right eyelid, lightly tasted her lashes, a wet of heat. “The power.”

“So by sending someone to the Hundred Guineas Club,” Victoria calmly reasoned, heart pounding, pulses

racing, “you hoped to find a clue to lead you to this man who would kill—us.”

Us
reverberated between them.

“That is what I planned,” Gabriel agreed, a gust of hot breath.

“You sent one of the men who let me inside your house.” Dawning comprehension flowed through

Victoria. Her right eyelash fluttered against his lips. It did not stop her accusation. “You sent him there to

punish him.”

“I sent him there because he is a former club member.” Gabriel’s lips skidded off of her eyelashes; he

stared down into Victoria’s eyes, firmly cupping her face, forcing her to face the truth. “You asked what I

wanted in a woman. I’ll tell you what I want, Victoria Childers.”

But Victoria suddenly did not want to hear.

“I want a woman to touch me, knowing what I am,” he said, a lash of hot air, silver gaze relentless. “I’m

a beggar, a thief, a , and a killer. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to get the second man. I want you to

want me, knowing what I am. I want you to look into my eyes when you take me into your body, and know

what it is that you’re taking, a beggar, a thief, a , a killer. I told you I want you to love me, but I can’t

promise I can love you in return. I can’t promise I can save you. I can’t promise you won’t die. But I can

promise you that I would give my life to save yours. I can promise you that I can satisfy your every desire.

There’s no act I haven’t done, no act I wouldn’t do to please you. You were excited by what you

saw through the transparent glass. I won’t share you with another man, but I can show you what it would

feel like to be with two men. All I ask in return is that you let me touch you, that you let me take care of

you. And that you share your pleasure with me. Make me see light when you , Victoria. It’s the only

light I’ll ever see.”

Can’t promise I can love you . . . Can’t promise I can save you ... Can’t promise you won’t die.

Won’t share you . . .

Victoria couldn’t breathe for Gabriel’s breath; couldn’t feel for Gabriel’s heat; couldn’t move for the

anchor of his manhood.

He had been a successful e because he had learned as a child to disassociate himself from

hunger, from cold, from emotional involvement.

But one man had touched him.

It
would tak e a brave woman to love a man such as Monsieur Gabriel,
Madame René had said.

But Victoria wasn’t brave.

She had become a governess rather than expose her father as a misogynist who hid his hatred of women

behind moral righteousness. She had taken care of other women’s children rather than marry and discover

she was a who lusted for a man’s love over the fruit of his seed.

Victoria had come to the House of Gabriel to survive, not to die.

She had not come to the House of Gabriel to learn to accept herself by accepting a fallen angel. But she

had.

She was not brave.

“I don’t need you to take care of me,” she managed.

Victoria didn’t want to rely upon a man.

Gabriel’s hands tightened, hard flesh squeezing, cold cloth abrading. “You wouldn’t survive the streets,

Victoria.”

“You did,” she quickly rejoined.

His silver gaze would not let her escape the truth. “I was born on the streets; you were born a lady.”

Victoria’s past rose up between them, the head of his manhood pulsing against her stomach an acute

reminder of a woman’s weakness. “My mother ran off with another man.”

“You’re mother left your father, just as you did,” Gabriel said bluntly. “Just as he forced your brother to

leave.”

“I don’t understand what it is that you want from me.”

“I told you what I want from you.”

He wanted her to accept him, all of him. Beggar. Thief. .
Killer.
All he asked in return was that

she share her pleasure.

Victoria her lips, a slick flick of her tongue on chapped lips. “You are asking me to ... live in your

house.”

“Yes,” he said bluntly. Silver eyes guarded.

“Providing we survive.”

“Yes.”

But for how long?

How long would Gabriel be alive? How long would
she
be alive?

Reality was an unwelcome intruder.

“That is not necessary,” she said stiffly, suddenly, painfully self-conscious of her too sharp bones and

tautly stretched skin and her s that jutted out from her chest. “I gave my ity willingly.”

“I didn’t take you because you were a .”

How difficult it was to admit the truth.

“You were aroused because I flaunted myself in front of you. You would not have been tempted if I had

not paraded in front of you ... . Or propositioned you, in front of the transparent mirror.”

“I am nightly surrounded by women who do more than flaunt their ness, Victoria.”

Uncertainty twisted inside Victoria. “But this is different...”

“Yes.” Gabriel would not let go of her face, her gaze. “It is.”

Victoria did not glance away from the starkness inside Gabriel’s gaze. “Are you sorry you bid on me?”

The heartbeat that thrummed inside her backside and her and her stomach drummed inside her

ears, waiting for his answer.

“No.”

Victoria read the truth inside Gabriel’s eyes.

Beautiful eyes.

“I didn’t see light when I reached inside the shower, Gabriel.”

Pain.

Victoria had hurt an angel.

Steam aureoled his water-darkened head. “What did you see?”

Victoria looked into Gabriel’s silver eyes and saw his face reflected in the shower, copper instead of

alabaster. “I saw you.”

She had seen his pain. She had seen his pleasure.

Memory flashed through Gabriel’s eyes: the circling of his flesh; the blossoming of her flesh. The cry of

her pleasure.

The endless s he had given her the night before.

The endless s he would give her this night.

But she had not known last night what she knew tonight.

No man had ever wanted to care for her.

Words rushed up into Victoria’s throat. “My hair is wet.”

The hands cupping her face tightened. “I’ll dry it.”

Hot tears pricked her eyes. “It’s tangled.”

“I’ll comb it.”

Desire trickled down Victoria’s thighs; the slickness between her buttocks reminded her of how

intimately this man knew her desires.

“I was a last night.”

Victoria swallowed. Now where had that come from?

Carnal knowledge glittered inside his gaze. “I know you were a .”

“But I didn’t bleed.”

Darkness banished the silver light inside his eyes. “I didn’t want you to bleed.”

Victoria remembered the bulbous crown of his manhood sliding inside her, inch by inch, by

. .. The rising heat inside her would not be contained. “Did you see light when I reached my first

?”

“Yes.”

“But you only put three fingers inside me.”

And not the five he had inserted inside the woman whom he had sought to be a part of.

The heat inside Gabriel’s gaze took Victoria’s breath away. “You’re not ready for that kind of

penetration.”

“But I will be ... someday?” she asked uncertainly.

If
he
survived.

If
she
survived.

If
he wanted her when danger was no longer an aphrodisiac.

“Someday, Victoria, I will give you five fingers.” His face was marble-hard. “Someday I will touch you

so deeply and fill you so completely that you will never regret touching me.”

Victoria fought for oxygen that was not heated by his breath. “You already have, Gabriel.”

Heat engulfed her.

She was going to drown in his gaze. “Please let go of me.”

The silver fire glittering inside Gabriel’s eyes stilled. Warm breath feathered her lips. “Why?”

“Because I think I am going to ,” Victoria said frankly, voice ringing in the misty air.

Light and darkness shimmied inside Gabriel’s gaze.

The knowledge of her desire. The knowledge to appease her desire.

Lowering his head, Gabriel lightly rimmed her lips; his tongue stabbed through her womb. In the next

heartbeat he was gone. While Victoria’s body throbbed on the brink of .

As it had throbbed inside the shower, his stomach and chest plastered against her back and buttocks, his

bite
buried so deeply inside her they had been one body.

A towel caught up Victoria’s hair—Gabriel gently dried it, each sensuous rub a palpable caress. She

stood stock still while he dried her buttocks—skimming over the crevice that still bore the remnants of his

penetration—patting dry her legs . . .

A dull thump resonated inside her ears. Coldness abruptly abraded the sensitive area between Victoria’s

buttocks.

Her eyelids shot open—when had she closed them? “What—”

“I hurt you, Victoria.” A muscled arm circled her waist, held her securely in position. Gentle, firm

pressure washed away the remnants of the cream, circling around and around. “Let me take care of you .

..”

Victoria forcibly relaxed her muscles. “I would prefer that the care be mutual.”

Gabriel washed her and washed her until she squirmed for him to stop, and then she squirmed for him to

do more than wash her. Victoria reached behind her ...

Only to grasp empty air.

She fought down a surge of frustration. “Gabriel, I
will
touch you.”

Gabriel’s voice came from the vicinity of the washbasin. “You already have, Victoria.”

Victoria pivoted. Gabriel turned, comb in hand.

“I will touch more than your”—Victoria hesitated briefly, raised her chin a notch, defying the society that

forbade women to use anything but the most harmless of platitudes, chicken bosom for chicken ,

gentleman cow for bull, unmentionables for a man’s trousers—”your .”

Silently Gabriel stalked her, an ivory comb in his right hand. Long, pale fingers extended toward her. “

Then take my hand, Victoria.”

She stared at the long, fingers that had been a part of her the night before. She stared at the long,

that had shortly before been a part of her, and would soon be so again. A tiny heartbeat pulsed

in the bulbous, purple-hued head.

Gabriel’s desire.

Knees suddenly weak, she took his hand.

Victoria opened the bathroom door and stepped ahead of Gabriel into darkness.

Blinding light pierced her.

Victoria blinked.

The solid warmth of Gabriel’s fingers disappeared. “Sit down on the bed.”

Victoria mutely sat on the edge of the bed, mattress dipping, springs squeaking, feet firmly placed

together on the wooden floor.

Her bottom was tender.

Stooping, shoulder muscles flexing, dangling, Gabriel grabbed three logs from the brass scuttle

and threw them onto the fire that still miraculously burned. Black ashes and gray smoke billowed up the

chimney.

It seemed a lifetime since she had stared at that same fire.

“I will try to let you touch me, Victoria.” Gabriel’s voice was muffled, words directed at the flame that

slowly curled up the fresh logs.

He would try to let her touch him.

He would try not to let her die.

But he could not promise either.

“I would enjoy giving you pleasant memories to replace the painful ones, Gabriel.”

Gabriel turned toward her. “Every time you , you give me another memory.”

She
would not cry.

Victoria watched Gabriel as he silently padded toward her, long legs eating up the distance, engorged

bite
battling the air. “I had never seen a man prior to my unemployment. Five months ago I saw one on a

street corner. I didn’t realize his trousers were open. I thought he had a sausage dangling out of his pocket.

”

Gabriel halted in front of her. There was no mistaking the flesh that stabbed the air in front of her for

anything but what it was. “There is a French term called
andouille a col roule.”

Victoria threw her head back. “What does that mean?”

“Sausage with a rolled down collar,” Gabriel said solemnly.

The twin leathery pouches beneath his manhood were tight.

“What are a man’s”—Victoria swallowed, recalling English street slang—“a man’s ballocks called in

French?”

“Noisettes.
” Hazelnuts.
“Noix.”
Nuts.
“Olives.
” Olives with an accent.
“Petite oignons.”

Victoria’s eyes crinkled in sudden laughter. “Little onions?”

An answering laugh glimmered inside the depths of Gabriel’s silver eyes.
“Croquignoles.”

“Biscuits,” she translated.

The laughter abruptly leaked out of his gaze.
“Bonbons.
”

Victoria’s glance involuntarily sought out the twin objects of their discussion. “I enjoy the flavor of

bonbons.”

Tentatively she reached out a curious finger. Gabriel’s were ridged, as rough as the hair-studded

leather they resembled.

Pure, raw energy slammed into Victoria. It did not come from her.

Slowly Victoria lifted her hand. Holding Gabriel’s gaze, she tasted her fingertip, a deliberate swirl of her

tongue. “You do not taste like
petite oignons,
sir.”

Victoria had never before seen need inside a man’s eyes; she saw it now, in Gabriel’s eyes.

“What do I taste like, Mademoiselle Childers?” he asked hoarsely.

Victoria tasted her finger again. “I would say you taste of...
les noix de
Gabriel.” The nuts of Gabriel.

The laughter immediately sprang back into his eyes, light dispelling the darkness.

Immediately she dropped her hand, feet primly together on the floor, s hot and heavy. “Thank you.

”

“For what?” Gabriel asked tautly, every muscle inside his body tensing as if to ward off pain.

“For allowing me to be a woman.”

And not calling her the that every gentleman would have called her.

One second Victoria sat before Gabriel, the next second she was airborne. The squeak of springs

surrounded her. A bounce of mattress found her sitting between Gabriel’s legs, muscled thighs gripping her

hips.

“Don’t ever thank me, Victoria.”

Gabriel’s voice was harsh.

Victoria opened to retort. Ivory teeth tugged through a knot of tangles.

Deliberately she grasped hard, hairy thighs, fingernails digging into muscled flesh, sharing her pain. The

ivory teeth of the comb worked through the knotted tangles.

Victoria did not move, overcome by sudden recall. Her mother had brushed her hair.

But she didn’t want to think about her mother.

Heat radiated from the V of Gabriel’s legs.

“What are a woman’s s called in French?” she asked abruptly.

“Melons.”

“Melons,” Victoria translated. “That’s very . .. quaint. Much better than apple dumplings, I’m sure.” A

popular slang on the streets of London.

Tears abruptly pricked her eyes. The small hurt inflicted by the unknotting of another tangle instantly

disappeared in a glide of ivory.

“Miches,”
Gabriel murmured.

Victoria smiled wryly. “Loaves of bread.”

The staple of every diet.

“Ananas.”

“What is that?” she asked with a catch in her breath.

“Pineapples.”

Victoria’s nails dug more deeply into Gabriel’s thighs—he did not flinch. “I’ve never eaten pineapple. Is

it sweet?”

“Sweet.” The knot in her hair yielded to ivory teeth. “Tart. Prickly on the outside. Juicy on the inside.”

The governess in Victoria surfaced. “A woman’s s are not prickly.”

“Your s, Victoria, are very hard. They prick my skin.”

So, she imagined, did her nails. She unsheathed them.

The comb glided effortlessly through her hair. Victoria’s head fell back.

“I used to burn and throb between my legs.” She stared up at the white enameled ceiling. “I didn’t know

that the button of flesh between my thighs was called a oris, I only knew that it was wrong to touch

myself there. But then, when I had no place to go, I did touch myself. I didn’t see light when I touched

myself, Gabriel.”

Victoria waited for condemnation, confessing what no lady should confess.

“What did you see, Victoria?” Gabriel’s voice was hot and moist, there against the side of her head, her

ear . ..

“I saw darkness, Gabriel.”

The gliding ivory stopped; hard fingers found the top of Victoria’s thighs. A single finger worked

between her legs, her lips ...

“I saw cold and hunger and loneliness . ..” Lightning bolted through Victoria’s oris, the seesaw motion

of Gabriel’s finger; she bit back a gasp. “But I didn’t see any sin.”

Prickly skin nuzzled aside her hair—Gabriel’s cheek. Scalding heat her ear—Gabriel’s tongue
.
“

Remember, Victoria.”

The bedroom tilted.

Victoria lay on her back, mounded velvet indenting her buttocks, linen sheets smooth against her spine.

Brass glinted out of the corner of her eyes, the bed rails.

The mattress shifted; Gabriel reached for the tin on the night-stand, his hip abrading her hip. Metal

scraped metal, thudded against wood.

Victoria tensely waited, unable to breathe past the scent of his heat and the closeness of his body.

Mattress dipping, Gabriel straightened, a rolled up sheath of rubber between his thumb and forefinger.

Anticipation squeezed Victoria’s lungs.

Dark lashes shielded Gabriel’s eyes.

Victoria stared at the jagged shadows gouging his cheeks, at the thick stalk of blue-veined flesh he held

in his right hand, glanced back up at the shadow of his face, down again to the engorged purple crown that

was swallowed by a cap of rubber. He pinched the tip of the . And then there were no blue veins,

no gradation of skin color, only a long, thick rubber sheath that ended in a curly thatch of brownish-blond

hair. A tiny —the end of the —protruded from the bulbous head of his sheathed .

Victoria raised her eyelids.

Gabriel was prepared for her. “I am just over nine and one-half inches long when fully erect.”

Gabriel read Victoria’s thoughts inside her eyes. He waited for her to ask the question.

To pit one angel against another.

Victoria did not ask it. She did not need to know how Gabriel compared to another man. Instead she

asked, “Why did you leave space at the end of the ?”

“For my .”

Victoria had felt his seed spurt inside her other orifice, a hot jet of fluid. She wondered what it would feel

like spurting inside her , bathing her womb.

Gabriel leaned over her and grasped her hands. “Remember...”

Victoria’s arms stretched over her head, fingers guided to cold metal. Closing his fingers around hers,

Gabriel locked their hands around the brass bed railing.

“Remember, Victoria. . .” Gabriel murmured, a whisper of breath caressing her cheek, manhood lightly

nudging her femininity.

“I remember, Gabriel.”

Slowly he sank down on top of her, a prickly blanket of human flesh, chest compressing her s,

stomach molding her stomach, hips sinking between her thighs.

Victoria remembered .. . how cold and barren her life had been. Because of one man’s hatred of

women.

Victoria remembered ... the pain Gabriel had experienced. Because of one man’s ... what?

She did not know why the second man had hurt Gabriel.

She did not know why he had not killed Gabriel when he had been chained and helpless. Begging to die.

She did not know how love turned into hatred. She only knew that it did.

A husband’s love for his wife.

A brother’s love for his sister.

The love between two angels.

Cold air surrounded her right hand—her knuckles, her palm. With his left hand Gabriel found the core of

her vulva. d rubber seared her, stretched her, penetrated her, filled her.

Gasping, Victoria convulsively grasped the brass rails in both hands.

“Don’t ever forget what I am”—scorching breath filled her lungs, a scalding tongue rimmed her lips— “

or what I can do ...”

Victoria could see every pore in Gabriel’s marble-perfect skin, could count every dark, thick eyelash

framing his eyes, could feel every nerve inside her body stretched to
accommodate the rubber-sheathed

that pulsed inside her.

A pale circle shone inside his eyes—her face. Did Gabriel see himself inside her eyes? “I remember

everything you’ve ever said, Gabriel.”

You have hungry eyes.
Like
Michael’s.

It wasn’t that made me what I am, it was loving.

There were two angels . .. I didn’t
k now they were angels.

I wanted to have eyes that hungered. ..

How could Gabriel not see the hunger inside his own eyes?

“And knowing where I came from”—hot breath filled ; her was gorged on his manhood

—”knowing what I am, do you want me, Victoria?”

Victoria did not have to pause to think about her answer. “Yes,” she said, and cried out at the tunneling

flesh that lodged inside and knocked the breath out of her lungs.

Gabriel swallowed Victoria’s cry. The mattress dipped, and then his left hand swallowed her right hand

and he was her soul into his mouth, groin grinding into her groin, manhood knocking at the very

heart of her, mattress a squeaky symphony. He her tongue; he nibbled her tongue. He led her

tongue as if it were all that kept him alive. Gabriel and nibbled and led Victoria until his breath

became her breath, his flesh her flesh, and she didn’t care if she died; there was a pleasure beyond death.

A light beyond darkness.

The light was Gabriel—his tongue, his lips, his hands, his manhood that slickly pistoned between the lips

of her and the walls of her .

Victoria’s back bowed, legs climbing hair-studded thighs, yawning wider, taking him deeper . ..

“Look at me, Victoria.”

Victoria with difficulty opened her eyes.

Silver eyes were waiting for hers.

Slowly the silver shrank until all Victoria could see was Gabriel and a pale-faced woman reflected inside

his eyes. The images exploded in a burst of internal light.

A woman cried out; it was not followed by the cry of a man.

Slowly Gabriel’s face swam back into focus. Sweat beaded his face; agony laced his voice.
“J’en vous

encore.”

I need more.

Words filled , her soul. “Give me more, Victoria.”

More pleasure. More s.

“Show me the light.”

Victoria opened her body and gave Gabriel what he needed.

More pleasure. More s.

Memories to lighten the darkness.

Chapter
21

Gabriel’s eyelids snapped open, heart pounding. Darkness blinded him; it smelled of and sweat.

Liquid heat pooled on his left thigh.

Instantly he remembered .. . pounding hot water. Suffocating steam. Victoria.

She had touched him.

She touched him still.

Her body lay curled in a ball against his left side, head pillowed on his shoulder, leg riding his thigh. The

liquid heat of her satisfaction saturated his leg.

His scalp tightened.

He could feel the second man; smell him over the scent of Victoria.

Gabriel had no weapons in either the nightstand or the armoire; his cane, along with the derringer, bowie

knife and Adams revolver were in his study.

He was Victoria’s only means of protection. And he was unable to protect her.

Rage chased fear.

Victoria had shown him light again and again; he would not let her die.

Gabriel carefully eased out from underneath Victoria’s head and her knee. Cold air evaporated the wet

heat that pooled on his left thigh; icy wood impacted his feet.

The darkness was his ally. If Gabriel could not see the second man, then the second man could not see

him.

Stealthily, he padded toward the study door.

The sensation of being watched dissipated, as if a door had closed.

Gabriel halted, every sense alert. He filtered out the smell of , the soft, rhythmical sound of Victoria’s

breathing, his heartbeat...

There was no one inside the room save for him and Victoria.

Now.

There was no doubt inside his mind that just moments earlier they had not been alone.

Gabriel had designed the bedchamber door to open into the study, so that no one could use the door to

hide behind inside the bedchamber. Someone could very well be hiding on the opposite side, however,

someone who waited for Gabriel to enter the study.

Someone armed with a knife or a gun.

Gabriel was not afraid to die. But he was suddenly, heart-stoppingly frightened for Victoria.

Inside the shower he had shown her how easy it was to
make a woman—or a man—beg for release; he

did not want her to learn how easy it was to make a woman—or a man—beg for death.

He flung the bedchamber door back, catching it just before it slammed the wall so as not to awaken

Victoria.

There was no one behind the door.

There was no one inside the study.

But there had been. The second man’s presence lingered in the air like cheap perfume.

The silver cane leaned against the couch; the Adams revolver and holster were draped over the blue

leather couch arm.

They were undisturbed, like Victoria’s sleep.

There was only one way to enter—or exit—his suite.

Gabriel yanked the Adams revolver out of the holster and strode across the carpet. He jerked open the

satinwood door.

Allen leaned against the wall, black hair gleaming with moon-silver highlights, black eyes alert.

Immediately, he straightened.

He was neither surprised nor embarrassed nor alarmed to find his employer standing before him

with a revolver in his hand: , pimps, beggars, cutthroats and thieves were not easily discomfited.

Whereas Gabriel was all too aware that Allen wore a holster underneath his black coat.

Had it been Allen instead of the second man who had entered his suite?

“Good afternoon, sir,” Allen said politely.

Afternoon.

“What time is it?” Gabriel asked sharply.

“After four, sir.”

Gabriel had instructed Gaston to find out everything he could about Mitchell Delaney, and to report to

him promptly.

Dread knotted his stomach. The killing would continue as long as the second man lived. “Where is

Gaston?”

“He tried waking you earlier, sir,” Allen said easily.

Gabriel’s eyes narrowed. No one had tried to wake him ...

Immediately he remembered where he had slept.

Gaston would have knocked on the study door, or perhaps not. But finding the study empty, he would not

have entered Victoria’s bedchamber.

Had it been Gaston whom Gabriel had sensed in the suite?

“When did Gaston try to wake me?”

“He has been here several times, sir.” Allen’s black eyes did not waver. “Most recently he was here an

hour ago.”

So it had not been Gaston who had awakened Gabriel.

Allen outwardly showed no interest in either Gabriel’s ness or the fact that he came from a

woman. But there was no mistaking the smell of .

Allen knew he had been with Victoria. Gaston, too, would have known where Gabriel slept, else he

would have awakened him.

The rumor that Gabriel had purchased a woman had already spread throughout London. The fact that he

had ed her would spread even more rapidly.

Perhaps it was already spreading.

Gaston was the only other person with a key to his suite.

He could have given it to Allen. Gaston trusted the men and women whom Gabriel employed.

“Were you inside my suite today, Allen?”

Allen did not blink. “No, sir. I do not have a key, sir.”

The fewer keys to his suite, the fewer people who could be killed—or bribed—to obtain them. But there

had been someone ...

“How long have you been on guard?” Gabriel asked.

“Since noon, sir.”

“Where were you ten minutes earlier?”

“Here, sir.”

Gabriel could not afford to trust his employees as Gaston trusted them.

“That is impossible, Allen,” Gabriel said silkily, dangerously.

“No, sir, it is not impossible.” Allen’s gaze did not waver from Gabriel’s. “I was here, guarding you and

the woman as I was instructed to do.”

“Then how do you explain the fact that a man was inside my suite only minutes earlier?”

“I cannot, sir.” Anger glimmered inside Allen’s black eyes— anger and hurt. “Begging your pardon, sir,

but an intruder would have to enter your suite through this door. The only way he could do that was if he

killed me. We are loyal to you, sir.”

Allen’s anger could stem from the fact that Gabriel did not trust him. Or it could stem from the fact that

Gabriel had outwardly dismissed John and Stephen—no one knew that they were still in Gabriel’s employ,

not even Gaston.

Or Allen’s anger could stem from the fact that Gabriel had burned down his house six months earlier.

Anger, like a conscience, could be preyed upon.

Fear, too, could be preyed upon.

Gabriel had eaten, slept, pissed and these past years for the sole purpose of killing the second man.

The smell and the sight of him had tainted Gabriel’s every waking thought, his every dream.

The feeling of being watched when he awoke could have stemmed from a dream. The scent of him in

the dark bedchamber could have been conjured from memory.

Gabriel’s concern for Victoria
could be
making him
paranoid.

He could not afford to trust. To feel. To want.

To need.

But he did feel. He did want.

He did need.

History was repeating itself.

Six months earlier Michael had allowed his feelings for a woman to interfere with his judgment. Michael

would have been killed if Gabriel had not interfered.

Michael would have died because of a woman.

Michael might still die because of a woman.

Because of Victoria. A woman who had become a servant rather than be dependent upon a man who

belittled women; a woman who had sold her ity rather than succumb to a man who victimized her

because of her ity.

And now she was dependent upon Gabriel; victimized because of a man she had never met.

We do what we must in order to survive.

“Send Gaston up.” He hid the fear pumping through his blood behind the mask that was Gabriel. “I will

watch over the woman for the time it takes you to get him.”

“Yes, sir,” Allen said.

Gabriel remembered the feel of Victoria’s body pressed against his. She was so thin he could snap her

bones like twigs.

“Have Pierre prepare breakfast
à deux,”
he said abruptly.
I’ve never eaten pineapple. Is it sweet?
“

Tell him to include fresh pineapple. I will ring when I want the tray sent up.”

Gabriel did not wait for Allen to respond. He closed the door.

Victoria drew him toward the bedchamber.

Light from the window in the study sliced across the wooden floor. The scent of and sweat and

satisfaction permeated the air.

Hers. His.

Gabriel’s flesh immediately hardened.

Victoria lay as Gabriel had left her, damp hair spread over the pillow instead of his shoulder; leg

sprawled over the sheet instead of his thighs.

He remembered the silk of her skin, slick with water in the shower, slippery with sweat in his bed.

He remembered the wet silk of her hair and the heat of her buttocks between his thighs as he combed

through the tangles of their past.

He remembered the touch of Victoria’s finger on his . The sight of Victoria tasting her finger

flashed through the darkness of his life, dark hair blackened by water, cheeks flushed with excitement, blue

eyes glinting in the electric light.

I would say you taste of. . .
les noix de
Gabriel.

No woman had ever played with him. They had ed for him, but they had not played with him.

They had not touched him.

They had not loved him.

Victoria’s eyelids popped open.

Blue eyes studied silver eyes, color blackened by darkness, need shadowed.

Victoria had witnessed his . And not once had she asked the question he could not

answer.

Gabriel had thought himself impervious: to pain, to pleasure.

To a woman.

Once again the second man had proven him wrong.

Gabriel tensely waited for Victoria to regret touching a homeless
fumier.

“I got your pillow wet,” Victoria said in a small voice. She sounded far, far younger than the

thirty-four-year-old woman Gabriel knew her to be.

“I’m not concerned about my pillow.”

“I got you wet.”

A sudden smile creased Gabriel’s face, secure in the knowledge Victoria couldn’t see the smile or the

vulnerability that lay behind it.

“Yes, you did,” he agreed solemnly.

“I’m wet now,” Victoria said guilelessly.

Gabriel had had two s only hours earlier. He should not be hard. He should not want Victoria so

badly that his ached.

She was everything he had ever wanted in a woman.

She was death in disguise.

“Show me,” Gabriel said silkily, knowing the danger of playing games but unable to resist the

temptation that was Victoria Childers.

“It’s dark,” Victoria reasoned. Gabriel pictured her teaching a silver-haired child; she would speak in

that same tone of voice. “You can’t see.”

“I can see.”

Gabriel could see the trap that was Victoria.

Gabriel could see that he had seriously underestimated the second man.

Victoria flipped the covers aside, bed squeaking, cloth rustling.

Her skin glowed like pale, polished marble. She had long, slender legs.

Gabriel had felt them wrapped around his waist; he wondered what they would feel like thrown over his

shoulders.

He could not help himself. He sat on the bed and touched Victoria, the perfect bait.

The wet heat of her fisted inside his groin.

Her oris was swollen with need.

Gently he slipped his finger between her lips and stared at the shadow that was her . The lips of her

furled around his middle finger, as they had furled around his only hours earlier.

She was so wet he could drown in her. She was so responsive that he wouldn’t mind dying inside her.

But there were more lives at stake than his own.

A tentative hand grasped his .

Gabriel stiffened, bracing himself. The expected memories did not come.

Gabriel would pay for the reprieve; he just didn’t know how.

He didn’t know when the second man would come to take away the gift of Victoria Childers.

A padded thumb swirled around the crown of his ; the touch vibrated inside Gabriel’s chest.

“You’re wet, too,” Victoria whispered, unable to hide her excitement.

She was too new to games to draw out the arousal. Gabriel had been trained in games since he

was thirteen.

He concentrated on the changes he had created in Victoria’s body instead of the vulnerability she

inspired.

Her plump flesh was hot and swollen, from both his use and her desire. Her was an open ring

instead of a tiny fissure. It easily accepted his finger.

Gabriel was instantly gripped by molten silk-Victoria drew in a deep breath; at the same time her fingers

tightened around his .

He hurt her. The ache of his penetration dully throbbed inside Gabriel’s chest.

She parted her legs to give him better access. So that she could take away
his
hurt.

Gabriel wanted to reach inside Victoria and feel her womb convulse around his hand; instead, he

withdrew his finger. It was coated with slick heat.

The essence of Victoria Childers. A woman who feared passion, only to embrace it.

Just as she would embrace an angel.

Gabriel smeared her essence onto her lips.

Victoria jerked back, “What—”

Gabriel took her lips, her words, her breath, her essence.

He had told Victoria that sharing his pain and his pleasure inside the shower hadn’t changed anything.

He had lied.

It had changed everything.

The second man had given him Victoria, knowing that Gabriel would want more than an hour or a day or

a week with her. He had known Gabriel would die to get more of her.

Victoria tasted of salty-sweet satisfaction.

Using his tongue and his teeth, Gabriel took more from her—a tiny nip of pain, soothing of pleasure.

He used every ounce of his expertise to take Victoria’s soul with his kiss, because that was what he had

been trained to do.

Not enough.

Gabriel lifted his head up, lips teasing instead of devouring, and whispered, “Taste yourself, Victoria.”

Gabriel did not give her time to agree or to disagree; he inside and transferred her

essence onto her tongue.

She held still, unresponsive.

Gabriel made her respond. He the roof of .

Victoria in his breath.

He wanted more.

He had the ability to make her give him more.

Taking her between his fingers, he gently pinched and pulled, knowing that with each pinch, each

tug, her womb contracted.

Her fingers that gripped him squeezed and pulled his in time to his fingers that squeezed and pulled

her . Victoria’s tongue gently at his tongue, underneath his tongue. Giving as well as taking.

Gabriel squeezed his eyelids shut and concentrated on the feel and the taste of Victoria instead of the

rhythmic squeezing and pulling that squeezed and pulled his very .

A soft, short knock interrupted the pounding of his heart.

Gaston had arrived.

Gabriel did not stop pinching and tugging Victoria’s . He did not stop her.

He did not stop wanting what he could not have.

A home.

A woman.

A soft preic moan vibrated his tongue.

A sharp preic tingle shot up his urethra.

The outer door to
his suite opened.

It could be Gaston.

Or it could be the second man.

Gabriel imagined Victoria’s womb contracting about his hand while he mentally followed the man inside

the suite.

A soft thud sounded, leather impacting marble.

Victoria agitatedly moved her head from side to side. Gabriel grasped the nape of her neck with his right

hand and ruthlessly followed her, mouth glued to hers, tongue , fingers pinching and tugging.

She was almost there.

Victoria squeezed Gabriel harder, taking him with her.

A soft swish erupted through the open bedroom door; the man inside his study had sat down in the

leather chair facing Gabriel’s desk. At the same time Victoria’s body bowed; fingers knotted in Gabriel’s

hair.

Pain. Pleasure.

Hungry blue and violet exploded the
blackness behind Gabriel’s eyelids. Victoria’s convulsing womb

briefly fluttered around his fingers and then he came inside Victoria’s hand and the feel of her was

gone, replaced by the presence of the man inside his study and the awareness of the information he

possessed.

Slowly Gabriel eased the pinching, tugging rhythm that had for one brief moment become his .

The apparatus that was his spurted three times, four times, five times .. .

Victoria collapsed, sobbing for air that he finally allowed her. His subsided; his need did not.

Her fingers clutching his hair was an intimacy he had not allowed in almost fifteen years.

Gabriel wanted more Victoria, more intimacy.

Gently he released Victoria’s and caressed her cheek, reaching too high. Her eyelids fluttered

against his fingertips like the tantalizing flutter of an .

Cocooning Victoria, Gabriel kissed her eyelid. It fluttered against his lips.

The knot inside his groin spread to his chest.

“You . . .” Victoria gulped air. “My ... it was . . .”

“Shh ...” Gabriel pressed his lips against hers: he did not want Gaston to overhear how vulnerable

Victoria was in her passion. “Go back to sleep, Victoria. I have to go. I’ll be back later.”

He sat up.

The fingers fisted inside his hair tightened; at the same time Victoria released his quiescent flesh.

Gabriel did not see the hand that reached up until it touched his chin. It was cold and sticky.

Before he could react, warm fingers smeared cold, sticky fluid onto his mouth—his .

Victoria smeared his onto his lips. And then she his off his lips.

And then she the seam between his lips.

Gabriel didn’t want to taste himself. He wanted nothing to do with his body that had betrayed him.

He opened his mouth for Victoria. And did not know why he did so.

Gabriel allowed Victoria to share with him the taste of his seed. And did not know why the mechanical

release of a male tasted like hope.

The butterfly flutter of Victoria’s satisfaction resonated inside his chest.

And Gabriel knew ...

Slipping out of Victoria’s kiss and the fingers that held his hair, Gabriel stood up and flipped the covers

up over her body, darkly silhouetted against pale sheets. Blindly he grabbed a coat, trousers and a

pair of boots from the armoire; he took socks, a shirt and a handkerchief from the chest. From the floor by

the bed, he scooped up the used .

... Gabriel knew that the second man had won. He just did not know at what.

Chapter
22

Victoria listened to familiar sounds, an opening drawer, a drawer closing ... Gabriel rifling through the

armoire.

Silver glinted; Gabriel approached the bed.

Her calming heartbeat accelerated.

Gabriel reached down, quickly straightened, an elongated rubber sheath in his left hand, his clothes

bundled up underneath his right arm. He stepped into black shadow. The bathroom door quietly closed

behind him.

Victoria’s fingers were sticky. Her lips and tongue burned.

She had tasted herself; it had been surprising, certainly, but it had not been revolting. Then she had felt

Gabriel’s swell inside her hand as her had swelled between his fingers.

Faint sounds penetrated the bathroom door—the splatter of water on water, the decided flush of the

toilet, water splattering marble, a quick, sharp tap—an ivory toothbrush impacting the edge of the marble

basin?

Her chest tightened.

It was endearingly intimate, listening to Gabriel perform his morning toilet.

Victoria reached underneath the covers and touched her left .

It was hard and swollen. As Gabriel’s manhood had been hard and swollen.

She had not known that a woman could by having her squeezed. She had not known how

sticky a man’s ion would be or how quickly the thick, viscous fluid chilled or how salty it tasted.

She had not known that a woman’s body could ache yet be replete with satisfaction.

A soft swish interrupted her thoughts. Gabriel exited the bathroom, silently padded out of the

bedchamber.

She bit her lip to keep from calling him back.

He would be back, he had said.

Victoria believed him.

The man who had written the letters, she thought on a note of contempt, was a poor excuse for a man.

Muted voices penetrated the bedroom door. Gabriel had a visitor.

He had told her to go back to sleep. But Victoria didn’t want to sleep.

She wanted more of Gabriel.

Victoria threw back the bedcovers. The sheets smelled of Gabriel, of her, of their combined sweat.

The hard wooden floor was an icy awakening.

Gabriel could die.

She
could die.

Victoria stepped into the bathroom. And remembered the sight of Gabriel’s piercing the steam.

Victoria stepped into the copper tub. And remembered how Gabriel had utilized the Liver Spray.

A grin hitched up her lips. Every household should possess a combination shower and bath.

Immediately her thoughts returned to Gabriel.

Was he eating breakfast?

Deftly she twisted off the shower . There was no resemblance whatsoever between it and Gabriel.

Gabriel, unlike the brass apparatus, felt both pain and pleasure.

He could reject touch, but he had not rejected her touch when she grabbed his hair to pull him closer. He

had not rejected her touch when she smeared his onto his lips—petal-soft lips— and tasted him.

He had let her share the taste of his pleasure with him.

Gabriel had hung up the damp towel. Victoria patted herself dry with it.

He had rinsed out the washcloth he had cleansed her with the night before and hung it up to dry beside

her worn silk drawers.

There’s no act I haven’t done, no act I wouldn’t do to please you.

She hadn’t told Gabriel that she didn’t want another man.

She hadn’t told Gabriel... so many things.

The comb—it was still in the bedroom. Victoria hurriedly brushed her teeth.

The flip of a wooden switch turned blackness into a lit bedchamber.

There were the brass rails that Gabriel had laced her fingers around. He had clamped his fingers over

hers and held on to her while the bed beneath them shook and quaked.

The logs Gabriel had stacked the fireplace with the night before were a pile of black-and-gray ashes.

Time was slipping away.

Rummaging inside the boxes neatly stacked beside Gabriel’s chest, Victoria retrieved silk drawers. A

pair of buckled kid slippers. The corset—it had garters sewn into the front and back panels—silk stockings,

petticoats, chemise—no, the corset had no whalebones that required protective covering. Putting back the

chemise, she lifted up the golden brown dress out of its rose-petal printed coffin.

All the while she strained to hear Gabriel: she did not. Victoria did not have to open the bedchamber door

to know that he was not inside his study.

The front of the corded silk dress fastened with tiny eyelets. Victoria’s wool gowns had been simple

shirtwaists with front buttons. Her fingers were painstakingly slow with the unfamiliar closure. Ruthlessly

she combed her hair.

Stockings ... Stockings . .. What had she done with the stockings?

Brown silk gleamed on the back of the satinwood valet chair.

Securing the stockings to the bottom of the corset took considerably more time than it had to locate

them. The elastic clasps weren’t as elastic as they should be; or perhaps the stockings were not as long as

they should be.

Victoria thought of Gabriel choosing the corset, the stockings, the dimity bustle .. . The garter clasps

snapped over the top of the stockings.

The kid slippers, dyed to match the wine-colored garniture on her gown, fit her feet like a glove. Forcibly

she aside the cost of such luxury.

Globular stains darkened the edge of the sheet where Gabriel had ed.

She lightly touched the largest stain. It was still damp.

The taste of Gabriel lingered underneath the bite of tooth powder.

Victoria swung open the bedchamber door, silk rustling, air swooshing.

The study was empty.

Like Victoria’s body.

The overhead chandelier battled the coming sunset.

Or perhaps the sun had already set. In the winter months it was difficult to tell when foggy day became

foggy night.

Gabriel had promised he would die in order to save her life. But Victoria didn’t want him to die.

She didn’t want fear to diminish the pleasure that still pulsated throughout her entire body.

A silver tray sat on the black-marble-topped desk. Victoria smelled—she picked up the lid—sausage and

egg omelet. She did not recognize the thick, meaty slices of fruit in the small, translucent china bowl. She

did not need to.

Tears clogged her nose.

Victoria had said she had not tasted pineapple. Gabriel now provided her with the opportunity.

She picked up a yellow slice of the exotic fruit between her thumb and forefinger, juice dripping.

It was tart yet sweet. Exactly as Gabriel had described pineapple.

She her fingers.

Drowning in silk and satin—how quickly she had become accustomed to ness—she sat down in

Gabriel’s chair.

Victoria remembered the taste of his kiss; she a drop of pineapple juice off her lips, and tasted

Gabriel. She held up the sausage—it was far smaller than Gabriel—and bit off the end.

Abruptly her appetite perished.

Victoria could die; Gabriel could die.