Taming of the Beast (Scandalous Affairs #2) - Christi Caldwell Page 0,81
I came to hate my parents. My father was dead by that point, but I despised him in death. And my mother?” A hardness that he’d never before seen from Faye in all his dealings with her iced her features. “Every day I am forced to look at her. I sit across from her at breakfast tables and dining tables and in carriages. I listen while she bemoans my unwed state and runs on and on about gossip. And every single time she speaks, all I can think is how wrong it is the world doesn’t fully realize the depth of her complicity. How is it fair that she should escape the condemnation and punishment she deserves?” She spoke with a vitriol that met the loathing in her eyes. “How is it fair that any of them should?”
“There is nothing fair about life, Faye,” he said simply. “It is why some children are born in workhouses, and others are born in grand, extravagant, toasty warm nurseries.”
She dragged her chair closer until their knees touched, and they faced each other straight-on. “But surely that means if one is capable of seeing justice done, then one should.” Her voice had grown more strident.
“Is this about revenge on those in the peerage who are guilty of crimes or discovering whether there are more lost children out there?”
“Why can’t it be both?” she countered with a question of her own.
“No, I suppose you are right.” And yet, did she even realize that guilt and the need for redemption drove her? “Do you know, Faye, that your parents’ crimes weren’t yours?” he asked gently.
Color flooded her cheeks. “I know.”
She spoke too quickly for that assurance to be anything but the lie it was.
“Do you, though?” he gently prodded. “Revealing everything you know about your family’s sins and bringing light to others isn’t going to be the absolution you think. Because there is nothing you’ve done that requires absolution.”
She surged to her feet. “But I do. I’ve lived in comfort. I’ve had everything given to me at the expense of a young boy’s suffering.”
He stood. “That you knew nothing about at the time, Faye.”
Faye caught her lower lip between her teeth. “You just want me to give up my plans.”
A rueful smile pulled his lips at the corners. “Yes.” He brushed the handful of curls that had come loose in her struggles behind her ears. Her lashes fluttered, and she leaned into his touch. “I’ve dealt with criminals, Faye. Men who’ve committed the most violent murders. Men who’ve raped women. Women who’ve harmed children. You’re not those people,” he murmured.
They remained there, his palm upon her cheek still, and something changed in the moment. It came to life with a crackle and sent the air around them immediately sizzling.
His throat worked. From the moment she’d stared boldly at him as he’d climbed into a bath, he’d been bewitched by her. Nay, if he were being honest, he’d been bewitched since he’d kissed her on the cobblestones outside of Newgate. Not only had she not wilted, but she’d returned a passion to rival his own. He’d needed another taste ever since.
Perhaps he wasn’t the complete and total bastard he’d believed himself to be.
“You need to give up the remainder of our time together.”
He’d said it. That pronouncement sucked the energy from the room and sent a boulder-like weight pressing down on his chest.
“Tonight was proof of that, Faye,” he said when she still didn’t speak.
“You’re attempting to get rid of me?” She couldn’t have packed more hurt into that whisper than had he kicked her cat.
“I’m trying to save you,” he gritted out. God trust that the one time he attempted to do the honorable thing, he should be met with resistance.
Fire flashed in her eyes. “I do not want to be saved by you, Tynan,” she said with a tenderness that didn’t match that glint of passion in the browns of her irises. Faye brought her palms up, resting them upon his chest.
She lightly stroked those long, delicate digits back and forth in delicate glide. He swallowed hard, the muscles moving under her hands.
“You should leave,” he said hoarsely. Now.
“And if I don’t want to?” she countered in those sultry siren’s tones.
That simplest of touches sent desire rippling through him.
“Hmm?” she urged when he still couldn’t manage to form a coherent response.
With a growl, he encircled her delicate wrist in his larger hand, staying her touch. “I hope you know what you’re doing, kitten.” That warning