Until You

Stephen complied, letting the mindless pleasure overtake him again. Wrapping his arms around her, he took her mouth in a stormy demanding kiss and felt her hands shifting softly over his shoulders, gentling him at the same time her melting body was welcoming him, sheathing him, offering them both release… offering and offering and offering…

Every nerve in his body was screaming for release and still he held himself back, driving deeply into her, while the muscles in his arms strained with the rest of his body, refusing to deprive her of the same pleasure she was going to give him any second now. She was whimpering, eyes closed tightly, desperate for something she didn't understand, afraid to have it. Afraid not to. Sobbing with desire, needing reassurance. He gave it to her in a hoarse whisper. "… Any second now…"

She went up in flames before he finished the sentence, her body clenching his, and Stephen heard himself groan with the extravagant splendor she was somehow making him feel. And then he gave himself over to it, driving toward it… and then past it, climaxing, his body jerking as he poured himself into her.

Whatever thoughts of revenge and wounded pride had driven him to bed her, they were forgotten as he wrapped his arms around her back and hips and pulled her with him onto his side. She was too magnificent to be used for vengeance, too exquisitely soft in his arms to be anywhere else. From the first moment his mouth touched hers, he'd known they were an oddly combustible combination, but what had just passed had been the most wildly erotic, satisfying sexual encounter of his life. Lying there while she slept in his arms, he marvelled at the heady, primitive sensuality of her. Whatever she'd felt during their coupling had been real-that was one of the few things about her he did not doubt. That at least was real and uncontrived. No woman on earth could have feigned those responses, not without a great deal of practice, and as he now knew, she'd had no practice at all.

Sheridan awoke alone in her bed, which seemed normal enough and yet… not. Her eyes snapped open, she saw him sitting in the chair beside the bed, and sweet relief flooded through her. He was dressed already, his shirt open at the front, his handsome face unreadable. Self-consciously, she drew the sheets up to her breasts and sat up against the pillows, wondering a little desperately how he could look so utterly casual after the things they had just done. Somewhere at the edges of her mind, she was begi

"Why don't you let me begin?" Stephen suggested blandly.

Not that eager to bring up the matter of Charise Lancaster when things seemed almost cozy, Sheridan nodded.

"I have an offer to make to you." He saw her eyes kindle with happiness at the word "offer" and could not believe she thought him stupid enough to actually suggest marriage. "A business proposition, "he emphasized. "Once you've had time to consider it, I think you'll find it sensible for both of us. Certainly, you'll find it preferable to working for the Skeffingtons."

Uneasiness doused Sheridan's momentary happiness at his mention of an offer. "What sort of proposition?"

"It's obvious that despite our many differences, we are extremely compatible, sexually."

She couldn't believe he could sit there and describe the stormy intimacies they had just shared with such clinical calm. "What is your proposition?" she asked shakily.

"You share my bed when I'm wishful of your body. In return for that, you will have a home of your own, servants, gowns, a coach, and the freedom to do as you please so long as no other man is given the use of what I'm already paying for."

"You're suggesting I become your mistress," she said dully.

"Why not? You're ambitious and clever, and it's a hell of a lot better than what you're doing now." When she didn't respond, Stephen said in a bored drawl, "Please tell me you didn't expect me to offer to marry you because of what just happened. Tell me you aren't that naive or that stupid."

Flinching from the sting of his tone, Sherry looked at his hard, handsome face, at the cynicism she hadn't recognized in his eyes before. Swallowing convulsively, she shook her head and answered him honestly. "I did not know what to expect, of anything we did, but I did not expect it would make you ask me to marry you."

"Good. There's been enough deceit and misunderstanding between us before. I wouldn't like to think you misled yourself."

He thought he saw the sheen of disappointed tears in her wide gray eyes and stood up, pressing a perfunctory kiss on her forehead. "At least you are wise enough not to indulge in a fit of ire over my offer. Think about it," he said.

Sherry stared at him in mute misery as he added with a chilling bite in his voice, "Before you decide, there's a warning I feel obliged to give you. If you ever lie to me about anything, ever-just one time-I will throw you out on the street." He reached for the door as he added over his shoulder, "There's one more thing-Don't ever say 'I love you' to me. I never want to hear those words from you again."

Without another word or a backward glance, he walked out. Sherry laid her forehead on her knees and let the tears slide, but she was crying for her own lack of character and restraint when he took her in his arms, and for actually being tempted, for just a few moments, to accept his indecent, coldhearted proposal.

55

The full realization of what she had done last night had set in long before Sheridan dragged herself out of bed and got dressed the next morning. In the bright light of full day, there was no way to deny the awful truth: she had sacrificed her virtue, her principles, and her morals, and now she would have to live with the shame of that until the end of her life.

She had done it all in one desperate gamble to regain his love-if he had ever really loved her-and how had he reacted to the enormity of her deed? The agonizing answer to that question was below her bedchamber window-on the side lawn, where everyone was having luncheon-and it was there for her to see in every humiliating detail: the man she had lain with last night was dining with Monica, who was turning herself inside out to entertain him, and he looked perfectly willing to be entertained this morning. As Sheridan watched from her window, he leaned back in his chair, his gaze intent on Monica's face, then he threw back his head, laughing at whatever she was telling him.

Sheridan was a mass of shame and anxiety, while he looked more contented and more relaxed than she had ever seen him. Last night, he had taken everything she had to give and thrown it in her face with an offer to prolong her humiliation by making her his mistress. Today, he was socializing with a woman who'd never have been stupid enough to do what Sheridan had… a woman worthy of his own inflated opinion of himself, she thought bitterly. A woman to whom he would offer marriage, not some tainted liaison in exchange for her virtue.

All those thoughts and more marched through Sheridan's tormented mind as she stood at the window, staring down at him, refusing to cry. She wanted to remember this scene, she wanted to remember it every single moment of her life, so that she would never, ever soften in her thoughts of him. She stood still, welcoming the icy numbness that was sweeping away her anguish and demolishing all her tender feelings for him. "Bastard," she whispered aloud.