Page 16 of The Finest Print

15

Secrets of the Old Bailey, Vol 1., No. 5

The Fallen Hero

“As this is my Confession, I suppose I should begin with how I became a woman smearing rouge on her cheeks not five minutes after smashing half of her good teacups with her husband’s heirloom sextant. I was close, you see, so close to having it all.

And if it weren’t for that terribly clever, tragically heroic young Samuel Porter, I would have got away with it altogether.”

It was true the headaches were unpredictable, but not always. Her mother believed they stemmed from tension, an assessment confirmed by the random, angry flares of the strained muscles in her right shoulder. Conditions of Belle’s own making could bring them about—too much writing, poor posture, fitful sleep.

She hadn’t fared well this week, and she shouldn’t have come to the shop halfway to a headache and fully ill-tempered.

And now…

She groaned, digging her fingers into her hair, kneading a spot in her scalp where pain bloomed like a rose.

Bloody hell .

She should have left as soon as Ethan stepped out. Her parents departed for the assizes yesterday, but she could have gone home to the care of Mrs. Bowers or to Fordham House and her aunt. She could have taken a spoonful of laudanum and hoped to wake with a clear head and a reasonable heart.

But now she couldn’t leave. She’d been determined to finish her revision, and the revision was going badly, and somewhere around page five, she realized her head was in her hand, a band steadily squeezed her temples, and she was two pages past the point when she could have managed to get herself home.

She whimpered, lowering her forehead to the desk. Her pen rolled to the floor with a splatter of ink, but she couldn’t be bothered to care. The wood felt cool—that was good—but the surface pressed cruelly against her brow. Imagining her skull collapsing like a sad little soufflé, she queasily turned her head, resting her cheek on the desk instead.

Better .

She drew a breath, willing herself to sit up, to gather her things. She couldn’t bear the thought of Ethan finding her in this state. He was already in a beastly mood with her, and that was before she’d ordered him out of his own shop.

For the sake of her fragile feelings, she needed to leave before he returned. She couldn’t absorb any more pain tonight.

Stand up…lock the shop…find a cab…

She closed her eyes.

One more moment…

A scrape, a click, a key turning in the front door.

Please be Tobias.

Her heart leaped with sickening hope at the tinny chime of the bell. She took stock of herself—her hair was loose, her cheeks streaked with tears and ink. But Tobias wouldn’t judge her.

“Belle?”

Ethan’s voice carried through the office. There was a series of scuffles, then the flare of a lamp. The light surprised her. She must have fallen asleep at some point, for she hadn’t realized how dark it was, how many pages she’d strewn about.

“What the devil are you still doing here?”

“I’m sorry.” Her mouth felt heavy. “I meant to finish…before you returned.” She tried to swivel away from him and nearly cried out at a searing spasm in her neck.

“Hell.”

“I think you will need to find a cab for me.” She rubbed her forehead, desperate for counterpressure. “Please.”

“Are you…” His tone had changed, the earlier challenge bleeding first to surprise, now to something different altogether. “Belle, what’s wrong?”

Heavy footsteps, a long shadow, the scent of soap and ink.

“Are you hurt? Did something happen?”

“My head…”

She thought he might dismiss her, but when she managed to look up, Ethan’s face was drawn. He sank to his haunches, kneeling beside her. She closed her eyes against the scald of the low light.

A tug on her bicep, gentle but insistent. “ Shh . Come here, sweetheart.”

She weakly protested into her own forearm as he pulled her chair away from the desk. His arm came around her, gathering her against him, and then she was on the floor, in his lap, and he was so warm, and she hadn’t even known she was cold.

“My God, you’re limp as a rag.”

He lifted his hand to her brow, sweeping away the mess of tangled hair. Somehow or another, she’d loosened the pins, but the pain wasn’t in her scalp. Her right shoulder burned, and she reached blindly behind her, digging into the taut stretch of muscle along her neck. She moaned faintly, trying to find the deep-seated knot of tension.

“Is that where it hurts?”

“Yes,” she half whimpered.

And then— oh mercy —his hand was there too, stroking gently along her temple, down behind the curve of her ear, all the way to the sweat-damp hair at her nape. She pitched forward, curling into an ecstatic swell of relief as his thumb pressed hard at the base of her skull. Her forehead hit his shoulder, nestling instinctively into the broad, solid shape of him, and she drew her knees into his lap.

“ Shh .”

His thumb worked in widening circles, and she twisted her fingers into his shirtsleeves.

“ Shh . There we are…”

“You’re angry with me,” she weakly tried to remind him. “I told you to leave.”

“Furious.” But his voice was soft against her brow. “You’re wildly inconvenient, Belle Sinclair.”

“I’m sorry,” she murmured.

“Don’t you dare apologize,” he said grimly. “Not when it’s my turn.”

The center of pain moved with each press of his thumb. She closed her eyes, imagining the force of his hand blunting the ache, smoothing it away until it was small, smaller, smallest.

“I am though,” he whispered. “I’m sorry. I know you aren’t dabbling, Belle. I know how hard you work, how much you care. You pushed yourself tonight—for weeks now—because of me. I’m so sorry I dragged you into my mess.”

She mumbled into his shoulder.

“What’s that?” he asked, ducking closer.

“I said you didn’t drag me.” She swallowed thickly. “I leaped.”

His laugh rolled across her cheek. He found a spot that markedly dissipated the pain, kneading deep, relieving strokes. Her sigh was nearly carnal, so hungry was she for the gradual slack of tension, the way it funneled to her shoulder before ricocheting through her skull.

“God.” She buried her pallid cheek in his neck. “Don’t stop. Don’t ever do anything that’s not this.”

His arm tightened around her waist and halted her restless shifting.

“I know you’re in a world of hurt,” he rumbled in her ear. “But I need you to be fractionally less vocal about it.”

Her pitiful laugh was muffled by his shirt. The fabric was soft and thin, a frugal mask for the warmth of his skin and the springy mat of hair blanketing his chest beneath her cheek. She nuzzled into the hard wall of soft linen, and her eyelids grew heavy, lulled by his firm caress.

“Breathe…that’s it…” His hand moved to the tight muscles between her shoulder blades. As he descended, the immediacy of his fingers was blunted by the thick cotton of her corset. “Is this bothering you?”

“A little,” she admitted, rolling her forehead against his collarbone. “It doesn’t usually, but…”

He found the buttons on her bodice and hesitated.

“It’s all right,” she murmured. “You can loosen it.”

He slipped free the fastenings until her bodice gaped. A swift series of tugs, his palm beneath the busk of her corset, lifting it free, leaving her only in a chemise.

“Oh God…” She exhaled shakily. Her corset wasn’t usually painful, but right now, everything was painful, every measure of relief more profound.

“There,” he murmured. “That’s better, isn’t it?”

His hand moved easily now, pushing deeply on either side of her spine. Up and down, steady and soothing, and like everything else he did, exactly right for her.

“You’ll put me to sleep.”

“That’s fine.” His free hand drew lazy circles on her arm. “You can sleep a little. I can’t send you home in this state—you’d topple over in the street.”

“Or retch all over a cab,” she admitted. “It will pass soon, I think. Then I can take my medicine.”

“All right,” he reassured her. “We’ll take care of it in a bit.”

She hummed a soft assent, already drifting.

“Belle.” His voice was warm at her temple.

She loved his voice. She loved that nobody else she knew spoke the way he did.

“Mmm?”

His lips brushed her ear. “I missed you.”

She tried to look at him, but her head was heavy on his shoulder.

“I hated you being away. I should have told you sooner, but I’m telling you now. You, sitting in that wobbly chair at the damn wobbly desk—it’s the steadiest I’ve felt in my life.”

She exhaled a soft, sad laugh. “Me in the wobbly chair?—”

“You anywhere .” His nose moved against her temple. “Anywhere, Belle. It’s not our work. Our work is not what’s vital. I made an excuse. I let my guilt take the reins, because I’m so goddamn unprepared for this.”

The wound in his voice pierced her mounting fatigue. She took a deep breath, bringing the scent of him inside her.

“You shouldn’t feel guilty for wanting something good, Ethan,” she murmured. “I want something good too.”

He was quiet for a long time. She finally lifted her head, and her heart fractured at the raw yearning on his face.

“Wanting is not the same as having.” His green eyes burned in supplication. “At least not in my experience.”

“It could be.” She dropped her forehead back to the warmth of his shoulder, his vulnerability beckoning hers. “For once, it could be. We could want each other. We could have each other.”

She felt close to tears, and she wasn’t certain why. Her pain was easing, but she wanted him to keep holding her.

“Now’s not the time, Belle,” he said quietly. “You need rest. Can you sleep for me?”

His arm tightened around her, bracketing her securely against him, and she was flooded with a heavy sense of relief.

“What…about you?”

She found his hand, and he braided their fingers together.

“I’m fine, sweetheart.”

He always called her that.

But this time, it sounded different.

Belle awoke sometime before morning. A cool gray shrouded the shop, casting everything in shadow. She blinked, woolly-eyed and warm.

She was still on the floor, still sideways in Ethan’s lap, her head burrowed between his shoulder and his neck. In the night, he must have eased them back so he could lean against the wall, twining them in an easy embrace.

From her vantage, nested within his arms, she felt her headache had lifted. A dull twinge radiated from the back of her head, the pain no more than a shallow discomfort.

She drew a long inhale, her body singing with relief, and his breathing changed with hers.

Ethan was awake.

His thumb moved very slowly along the small of her back.

She was afraid to move; she was afraid not to move.

In her half-roused state, it all floated back to her, golden and hopeful, and so like a dream, it took her a moment to realize it hadn’t been.

Last night, a new bridge had formed between them, crafted of soft whispers and careful hands—and so long as it wasn’t fully daylight, Belle sensed they needn’t look ahead or below or side to side.

They only needed to cross it.

She shifted, just a bit, feeling the solidness of his lap, the hard expanse of his chest.

And then, in the dusky margins of the breaking day, she pressed her lips to the warm skin of his open collar and kissed his neck.

His thumb stilled on her lower back, and she did it again. Soft, insistent kisses along his neck, the hair dusting his collarbone. Gently seeking his jaw, the brush of his beard on her face. She opened her mouth, trailed back down, and she felt all her rising tension slacken and go into him, for he was now holding her tight as a vise, his body reacting to her, his breath growing shallow.

“Belle.” His voice was deep and gravelly, and it was doing delicious things to her. “Your head?—"

“My head is fine.” She nuzzled his throat. “My head is clear.”

His groan vibrated against her lips. He raised his hand to her hair, smoothing the tousled curls.

“I’ve been trying to be careful with you,” he rasped. “I’m barely hanging on. Do you understand why this shouldn’t happen? There’s not a single promise I can make to you. My future is entirely uncertain?—”

“I’ve lived with uncertainty for years,” she whispered. “Uncertain is hardly the worst thing a future can be.”

He swore, very soft. His gaze was soft too.

“I promise, Ethan.” She pressed her cheek to his palm, willing him to climb over the blasted wall and come to her. “I don’t need anything, except for you to want this too.”

All the things he told her of his life. A legacy of leavings.

Those leavings brought him here, to her —a woman who did, in fact, know her own mind.

“Tell me to stop,” she murmured, opening his collar wider. She pressed an openmouthed kiss to the hollow of his throat. “I’ll stop. I’ll do whatever you tell me to.”

Another kiss. Another. Everywhere but his mouth.

His body was taut all around her, one hand still tangled in her hair, and she numbly realized her breath was catching, her lashes were wet.

She felt dreamy and brazen and so deeply sad. This was it. This was the farthest she could go without him.

“You never lie to me, Ethan.” She touched his bottom lip. “If you tell me you don’t want me, I’ll believe you. If you tell me I’m alone in these feelings, I’ll believe you?—”

“Stop.” His voice grated in her ear. “ Stop .”

She froze instantly, her fingers still twisted in his collar.

His hands fell to her waist, and with a strong pull he guided her to straddle him.

“Belle.” He put his lips right against hers, slowly pressing each word upon her. “Sweetheart. You were never alone.”

He prolonged the last kiss, and at the sound of her pleasured sigh, the last vestige of his sleep state crumbled away. In an instant, her mouth was opening, his tongue stroking hers, exactly like she wanted. She closed her eyes against the burn of tears, losing herself to him, unable to believe it was happening again, unable to believe how good it was.

He hummed low in his throat and planted his palms on either side of her face, breathing as hard as she was.

“It stops now , Belle,” he muttered. “This torment, we’re ending it.”

“Yes.” She gripped his wrists.

“I mean it.” His voice was husky with untold emotion. “I’m done—I’m finished withholding from you. I’m not a saint, and there is no benediction in this world or the next worth allowing you to think I don’t see you, to think I don’t want you.”

He pressed his forehead to hers. “If your eyes are open, so are mine.”

He kissed her again, again . She accepted the onslaught, she relished it, digging her fingers into his shoulders, helping him want her.

An ache was building between her thighs, and he found it, lifting his hips until she felt a muted rising beneath her skirts. He was growing hard for her, she was affecting him. And then he was rocking her slowly against that length.

Hard and soft, the tender, searing press of his kiss, the dizzying friction of his arousal working against hers.

His hand slipped into her bodice, still gaping where he loosened it last night. He dragged his knuckles against her chemise, drawing beneath the small, plump curve of her breast. She gasped, willing his fingers to move higher, to find the sensitive bud of her nipple.

“Ethan…”

“I’ve wanted to touch you for so long.” He closed his eyes, hissing a moan that sent her heartbeat pulsing between her legs. “So long. My God.”

He tugged her bodice down and pressed his face to the soft linen covering her breasts. She whimpered and arched her back, desperate for relief.

“Yes,” she urged him. “ Please .”

“Belle…wait.” He groaned, seeming to master himself. “Wait.”

“What is it?” She was hot, everywhere—but now a little cold too.

No more waiting. Please, no more waiting.

“I don’t know what you know of this. When you were engaged…” He looked over her, his gaze dark and glassy. “Have you been with a man?”

She froze, suddenly fearful of the real cost of her choices. She hadn’t slept with Duncan, but she’d let him go further than she should have.

And now she was ruined; everyone said so. Ethan might think so too.

It was unbearable to think he might not accept what she so badly wanted to give him.

“No.” Her eyes glittered. “I haven’t, but Ethan…I’m not entirely innocent. I would understand if you?—”

“I don’t give a damn who’s had you before,” he breathed. “I’m having you now. But I’ll take you easy this time. Is that all right?”

“This time,” she repeated, feeling faint.

He smiled his slow, slow smile, the one that made her follow him from the garden and hand over her plans, her pages, her heart.

“The thing about letting a wanting man have…” He stole another drugging kiss. “He doesn’t easily reverse course.”

He finally brought his hand to her breast. He unhurriedly circled her nipple through her chemise, drawing a tight, eager pucker to his fingertip. The featherlight touch seemed to reach every part of her. A moan caught in her throat, a ragged sound she hardly recognized.

“Lay back,” he murmured. He reached for his discarded coat, balling it beneath her head. “Shh…there. Are you certain your head is all right?”

“Yes.” She pulled him down by the loose ends of his tie. “That’s not where I’m aching.”

“Poor thing.” He stretched above her, bracing himself on one arm as his thumb stroked a smile to her lips. “You’re having a hell of a time, aren’t you?”

“Terrible.” She gasped as his hand slid beneath her petticoats.

He played with the hem of her drawers, tracing the crease of her hip through the flimsy layer, stroking her thatch of curls, and then— oh God —he firmly pressed one long finger along the damp split seam. Her eyes fluttered closed with the thick, relieving pressure.

“Mmm…” She squirmed, he swore. Perspiration beaded between her breasts. She was impatient and needy, knowing he would be good to her, knowing it was coming.

Oh, please, please, please …

“Lift your skirts,” he muttered, helping her raise her bottom. She tried to gather the heavy swaths of fabric for him, then his thigh was separating hers. In one fluid motion he dropped his head and raised his knee.

And there was nothing but the wet tug of his mouth on her cotton-clad nipple, nothing but the hard line of his thigh pressing her aching sex.

Belle cried out; she’d never felt so thoroughly mastered. She rocked helplessly against him, her drawers sticking, the pressure divine, and it wasn’t until he was answering her that she realized she’d been asking.

“Shh, shh…I’m going to give you more.” His eyes were hooded. “I’d say nothing could be as lovely as this, but I’ve yet to see you come apart.”

In a fog, she looked down, treated to the obscene view of him bent over her straining breasts. Her skirts were twisted around her waist, and his dark trousers looked so good between her splayed thighs, it set her pulsing anew.

She rose to her elbows, pulling the ties of her now-sheer chemise. Ethan groaned, yanking the useless garment down her stomach. He cupped her breasts and again drew his tongue over the stiff peaks, nudging her nipples tighter and pinker until her back arched in a responsive curve.

His beard tickled; his teeth scraped. A guttural, bitten-off sound hit her ears.

If he touched her between her legs, if he parted the slit in her drawers and traced her wet cleft with his fingertip, she would unravel. She’d touched herself enough to know; she thought of him as she did it.

But this— this was frightening, how fast, how forceful, how wild, the strength of her feeling.

“I’m—so—close,” she panted, putting her thumb to his bottom lip.

“I know.” Ethan stroked her hair away from her face. “I don’t mean to tease, but you have no idea what a luxury it is to savor .”

And then—yes, yes , he was loosening her drawers, he was tugging them down and shifting her, baring her as much as he could with half of her dress still between them.

He put his hand around her knee, a slow squeeze up her thigh, his palm curving so close to where he’d turned her aching and slick.

“Please…please…” She lifted her hips, faintly hysterical. “ Please , Ethan—I’m begging you…”

His hand moved higher, pressing her wider, and he was dropping between her spread knees, the span of his shoulders forcing her wider still. Everything was laid open. She was sore for him— oh God, yes —he was right, it was its own terrible luxury, to want and want and want again.

He kissed her thigh, his lips warm and tugging, his beard keeping her on the wrong side of tender.

“Never beg me,” he murmured. “You’ll have everything you want. Tell me you know that…that I can give it to you.”

She mumbled something crumbling, incoherent.

“Belle.” There was no reprieve. “Tell me you know.”

“I know.” She wove her fingers tightly through his hair. “Ethan, I know.”

He looked up at her—then, finally, yes —he laid his tongue to her heated flesh. Her breath caught at the first teasing lash, then he was nuzzling her, finding a firm, melting pressure that had her digging her heels between his shoulder blades.

He groaned, the sound moving against her. He yanked her close, desperation in the bruising force of his fingerprints, as if he were as ransacked as she was. His tongue worked relentlessly—now stroking, now circling—and Belle half sobbed, her hands over her face.

“Are you with me?” He dragged his cheek up and down her thigh. “If you don’t care for this, I can use my hand?—”

“Your mouth,” she managed.

He grunted his agreement as he cradled her bottom. The air burned around her. He was lifting her hips to his mouth, her back sliding against the floor. She wondered what she must look like right now—her breasts bared, her thighs spread, her hair everywhere, her skirts everywhere, and Ethan’s head between her legs. She nearly pleaded again, but instead, she bit her fist, understanding he wanted to provide…

But oh God— oh God ?—

“That’s it,” he praised, building bliss beneath his tongue. His fingers flexed into her bottom, helping her rock against his face. “Take what you need.”

“Yes,” she moaned. Her nipples tightened, a tingle ignited at the base of her spine. He shifted, and then— oh , unspeakable pleasure—his tongue entered her, moving with small strokes.

She hazily imagined it was his finger, his cock, all the ways she wanted him to take her, a series of hot and half-formed fantasies, born entirely of the ache between her legs and the steady lave of his tongue.

“I need…” Her words lifted on a gasp, floating between them. “You.”

He moaned, lush and low, then his finger was inside her. He pushed hard, filling her in a stretch so exquisite, it had her crying out—his tongue pressed flat, and the white-hot glow finally consumed her, taking her apart in a long, hard rush. Ethan was ruthless, pushing her further, extending the wave until her throat hurt, her thighs hurt, and her legs fell closed around his head.

“So good,” he murmured, sagging back and pulling her to him. “So fucking gorgeous. My God. Belle, sweetheart.”

He kissed her mouth, her temple, her wrists. His shirt was loose, and she buried her forehead in the damp hair of his chest, both of them breathing heavily. She could still feel him, how hard he was beneath her, but Ethan seemed completely at ease. He rubbed his palm up and down her spine.

It was ridiculous he thought he couldn’t care for her, that he had nothing to offer her.

But before she could tell him, there was a shout, followed by a pummeling fist at the door.

“Fletcher! Mr. Fletcher!” The voice belonged to a young man, and then, just as suddenly, another voice joined.

She froze, Ethan’s arms still tight around her.

“Is he in yet?”

“I don’t know.”

Slowly, Belle lifted her head. They were behind the desk, at the back of the office, and thankfully, the windows were grimy enough to provide cover.

Bloody hell .

“We’re out already at Roberts’s.”

“Nelson’s as well. He sent me straight away for more. Fletcher?”

Nelson, Roberts .

Numbly, she pieced it together.

Newsagents .

Another voice, another.

“Have you seen Fletcher?”

“Not yet, but Roberts wants at least a hundred more, if he has stock.”

“Ethan.” Belle scanned his face, her heart crashing in her chest. It was Saturday. Publication day . “What’s happening?”

His hand stilled in her hair, his beautiful green eyes widening in something like shock.

“I don’t know.” His voice was scratchy. “But it sounds a hell of a lot like a sold-out serial.”