Page 61 of The Steel Rogue
“It is what it is, Roe. Tell me you would think differently if it had been you in my shoes.”
His chin jutted out for a long breath, his steel grey eyes storming clouds. A statement he couldn’t refute.
He exhaled a long sigh. “The man truly responsible for it all, Molson—I understand he died long ago?”
Torrie nodded. “Lachlan took care of him months after the fire and he had killed the other brutes there that day when he arrived to help us. Too late to save my family, but he was there in time to save Sloane and me. We would have died had he not shown.”
“Did the vengeance of it help any of you? Sloane, Lachlan…you?”
She shook her head. “No. I should have known then how empty vengeance was, but I didn’t. I still had so much hatred and all that fury had no target, so it all funneled onto you. Lachlan and Sloane took care of the men responsible for the clearing, so you were all that was left to hate.”
His look centered on her. “I don’t mind it.”
“How can you say that?”
“I’ve been hated by a lot of people in my years, but there’s only been one that’s hated me just as much as I loved her.” He paused, his mouth pulling tight before he continued. “For her—you—I can take all the hatred in the world. My shoulders are more than that strong.”
She grinned, poking at his right shoulder. “Especially now that your shoulder is back in place.”
He laughed. “Especially now.”
Her look drifted off of him, taking in the room around them. “I must admit, I thought I was above the mirrors when we first came in here.”
“You’re not?” An impish smile came to his lips. The bugger already knew the answer.
She laughed. “No—and I’m not even ashamed to admit to it. I like watching the muscles along your shoulders flexing as you’re holding up my weight. Your shaft thrusting up into me. Your hands strong over my breasts. My fingers deep in your hair—I like it all.”
He groaned, burying his face into the top of her head. “Hell, my little minx. You’re making me hard again and my shoulder can’t take another round.”
“Then you need to lie back.” She lifted herself up and crawled on top of him, her hands on his chest holding him flat to the scrolling curve of the chaise. “And you get to watch on the ceiling this time.”
He laughed, grabbing her neck and pulling her down to him to kiss her until her breath dissolved. “I’m going to enjoy this show.”
A wild grin came to her lips. “If I’m doing it right, then yes. Yes, you will.”
{ Chapter 15 }
The crunching of the gravel drive under the coach they had hired to take them across the land to Berkshire faded into the night as it made its way down past the line of carriages parked along the main drive to Culland Hall.
Blast.
The bloody ball.
Of course his luck would have him arriving at his brother’s Berkshire home the night of the Rising Giles Gala.
Roe looked up at the sky. In the darkness the moon slid behind a puffy cloud, sending the white of it into an eerie yellow glow, yet he could still see his hand in front of his face. Full moon. He should have remembered.
“You said that London wasn’t safe for either of us at the moment, but you won’t tell me why. You said that we were traveling to your brother’s home and now we arrive at this…this…this thing.”
His gaze dropped to Torrie. Her eyes were trained on the symmetrical Georgian mansion, a glowing beacon in the night, the large white stones of its facade reflecting the torches that lined the front of the hall. Large and impressive and designed to intimidate. It’s where his brother conducted all of his London business, making associates travel to him from the city.
“I did tell you that. And now we are here.”
Her head swiveled to him, her eyes wide orbs reflecting the moonlight. “Then you have avoided telling me far too much, Roe. Who is your brother?” The words seeped out of her as if all air had left her body.
“The Duke of Culland.”
Her jaw dropped. “How—how did I not know this? The man I hired to follow you, he—”