Page 26 of Sloth: The Fallen Earl (Seven Deadly Sins #4)

C ressida had spent most of her life carrying the weight of shame—shame for who she was, for the family she came from, for the choices she’d made just to survive. But when she was with Benedict, that burden lifted—if only a little. If only for a moment. Because when he looked at her, when he touched her, when he spoke of her as though she were remarkable…she could almost believe it.

And now, lying beside him in the quiet hush of his kitchen, their limbs tangled, the table beneath them still warm from what they’d done—what she might’ve once believed should be her greatest source of disgrace—there was no shame. Not this time.

Instead, there was a stillness, a peace, a bone-deep rightness. Not just in being with him, but in being her —the woman she had become, the woman her choices had shaped. In his arms, she felt safe. Wanted. Known. And for the first time in her life, entirely unashamed.

“Forgive me,” he said. “This isn’t comfortable.”

He shifted, and her heart cried out at the loss.

Then, in one fluid motion, Benedict drew her so that she lay draped over him, his chest, and his hard, muscular body. Now he was her mattress.

“Better?” he asked with a teasing glint in his eyes.

“Infinitely,” she lied.

Being next to him, around him, under him, in whatever way she’d been with him, brought with it an all-consuming warmth. It was the kind of closeness she’d never known before—and suspected she might never know again. Not like this. Not with anyone else. But the memory of it—of him —would live on, vivid and golden-edged, even when she was an old woman lying alone in her bed, her bones aching and her hair silvered with time. The warmth would remain, she was certain of it. As real as it felt now. As whole.

In this moment—this quiet, perfect moment—Benedict gently swept a damp curl from her cheek, tucking it behind her ear with a tenderness that turned her insides to velvet.

“Why so serious?” he asked, his voice low and teasing.

“I’m not,” she murmured, her lips curving just faintly. “I’m just…happy.”

His brow furrowed with playful concern. “If this is you happy, love, then I’ve clearly got work to do. I’ve yet to see a proper smile from you.”

“I’m not smiling?” she asked with feigned innocence.

He shook his head, their foreheads nearly touching.

“If it’s any consolation, I am smiling inside.”

She huffed a breath of laughter, and he leaned in closer, his tone turning soft and solemn.

“But I’ll not call the job done,” he whispered, “until you’re smiling—inside and out.”

Her heart gave a treacherous little lurch. Oh, God.

She fell in love, deep, hard, fast, and profound. It was not an unfamiliar state where she and Wakefield were concerned. She’d fallen for him before. Then, however, she’d fallen for who he was and how he treated her and other people.

She’d fallen for him because he was good and honorable and carried a love for his sisters. That fact was talked about amongst Polite Society, where the majority of lords ultimately were more like Cressida’s brother, Stanley, when it came to their female kin. This time, however, Cressida fell in love with him for how he treated her, how he was with her.

Now, she was the complete and total recipient of his charm and regard, and nothing would ever be the same. He stretched a finger up and brushed the tip along the right corner of her mouth.

“So serious,” he murmured, “all the time, you are. I’ve spent hours and days wondering at the cause of it. Life?”

It was the easiest answer to offer—the first and most obvious. But she wouldn’t say it. She wouldn’t court his pity. Because if she told him the truth—told him the full measure of what her life had been—it would change everything.

Benedict, the Earl of Wakefield, with his open heart and fierce compassion, would see her differently. She was certain of it. And she would rather have him curious—wondering after her in quiet contemplation—than looking at her through the lens of sorrow.

“I’ve noticed your smile doesn’t come quite so easily these days,” she said softly.

The effect was immediate.

His expression went still. Shuttered. As though she’d pulled aside a curtain and glimpsed too much. He turned from her, sat upright, and in the next breath, placed a careful bit of space between them.

So, he didn’t like being seen.

He didn’t care to have someone read him—not the parts he kept hidden, not the shadows behind his charm. And for all the things she hadn’t said, hadn’t shared, she understood that. Too well.

But still, she didn’t regret the words. Not for a second. She would have said them again, just the same, even knowing they would shift the air between them. Even knowing he’d retreat.

Because in that moment, he had been the one under her gaze. He had been the one studied, the one unsettled. And for once, it wasn’t her being laid bare.

Cressida stood and made a show of adjusting her skirts and her hair. “It doesn’t escape me that I’ve left you uncomfortable with my observation.”

“I’m not uncomfortable.” His piped tones said differently.

“I understand, Benedict,” she said soothingly. “You’re a private man.”

“What about you, Cressida?” he said. “Tell me, what does your silence mean? What does your unwillingness and inability to speak up about your life and circumstances and why the hell you ended up at The Devil’s Den say about you?”

A coldness invaded her breast. How easily she’d let herself forget his earliest suspicions and response to her.

“Is that what this is?” she asked, solemnly trailing her gaze over his face. “This reason for you suddenly being warm and kind and charming. Is it merely an attempt to get me to spill whatever secrets that you think I carry, whatever dark duplicitous plans I have for you?”

Pain struck like a lash against her heart.

A gape in his shirt revealed the stark telling heat that climbed the light patch of tight golden curls that covered his chest to his neck and then the sharp lines of his cheeks.

“The fact remains, Cressida. I’m the only one of the two of us who’s been honest and up front about my reason for being at The Devil’s Den. As vile and dishonorable as my actions were that night bidding on you at that auction, lust was what drove me. You, on the other hand…”

His vicious but undeniably accurate charge ripped a hole square through her heart.

Cressida hunched her shoulders in a bid to escape that searing agony. His kindness of before gone, he wouldn’t let her.

“Why won’t you bloody tell me?” he demanded.

“There’s nothing to tell you!” she cried out.

He scoffed. “You expect me to believe you were just a young virgin, curious about carnal acts and willing to sell yourself to the highest bidder?”

Tears blurred her eyes.

“Because I don’t believe it, Cressida. You stand here knowing information about me, about who I am and my family, while remaining content to be an absolute fucking riddle to me, a mystery.”

A single tear slipped free. She recoiled as that warm moisture slipped down her cheek. When was the last time she had cried? Her life had become so impossible. She’d ceased to be affected by the lash of cruel words and insults hurled by her brother or the painful sting of slaps and blows he’d landed upon her skin. Only to now find herself still capable of crying from nothing more than words leveled by Benedict.

The fight went swiftly out of him. His gaze went over her face. He balled and unballed his hands at his side.

“No doubt, you take me for cruel,” he said woodenly.

Cressida gave her head a small shake. “I don’t.”

“Do I have wonderings and questions? Absolutely.” He didn’t deny suspicions even. “But when I ask you about your past and why you were at that club, I don’t do that solely for those reasons.” He spoke through gritted teeth. “I am bloody intrigued and want to know about you. Do you know how bloody terrifying that is? That I do not likely even know your real name.”

He waited.

She knew what was expected of her here. He wanted that actual identifier. Cressida, however, could not give that to him. She remained tightlipped.

Benedict stared at her for a long moment more and then released a long dark curse.

Cressida flinched.

“My lord?”

Caught unawares, Benedict and Cressida both spun to face the doorway.

A concerned Burgess alternated a concerned stare back between his master and his master’s mistress.

“What is it, Burgess?” Benedict asked.

Burgess cleared his throat. “My apologies, my lord, company has arrived.”

A brief haze of confusion lit a spark in his eyes that had previously been angry and impatient. Then swiftly came understanding.

“I’ve shown him to your office, my lord.”

“Very good.”

When Burgess had gone, Benedict looked back to Cressida.

“My apologies for earlier,” he said. “It was unforgivable for me to speak—”

“You needn’t apologize,” she swiftly interrupted.

“ I do .”

Cressida inclined her chin. “We shall agree to disagree then, my lord.”

He lingered. Once a gentleman, always a gentleman. It was as much a fabric of the fiber of his layers that made him as Cressida’s jaded, pessimistic outlook on life was hers.

He bowed and took a step to go, then his gaze landed on the copy of The Times that stared damningly up at them. He skimmed the front of the page at the very center that contained mention of his name. Benedict appeared as though he wished to say more, but then he dropped another bow and left without another word.