Page 52 of A Bride By Morning
“Let me bandage these,” Lydia whispered. Gabriel had done this to protect her.
“No.”
Before she could argue, he took his hands from hers and settled his palms to her face, cradling her as if she were a treasure crafted of delicate glass. His expression was soft, but it didn’t erase the ferocity she had sensed before. She shivered at his sudden fixed attention.
Even bruised and bleeding, he was the most beautiful man she had ever seen.
“You asked me what happened in Moscow,” he whispered.
Lydia was afraid to breathe—fearful that even the slightest movement might prompt him to retreat behind that icy shield he donned so easily. It was absent now, replaced with heat and flame. And vulnerability.
She took the risk: “Yes.”
Gabriel’s thumb slid across her cheekbone, the texture of his finger rough. The surface of his hands was proof that his life of leisure ended the moment he’d left her drawing room ten years before. “Ask me again.”
Lydia leaned into his touch, letting her eyes meet his. “What happened in Moscow?”
Gabriel bent forward and skimmed his lips across her forehead. When he spoke, his voice was low, barely above a whisper. “After the Syndicate began targeting foreign diplomats, I was tasked with infiltrating their inner circle in Moscow and finding out more about their leadership. I would send coded messages back to England to root out Syndicate allies planning to target Members of Parliament.” His lips kissed down her cheek, his breath warm against her skin. “My Russian was fluent, but I spent time amongst laborers in Moscow to better imitate their accent. Once I joined the Syndicate, my performance had to be flawless.”
Gabriel fell silent. His affections ceased.
Lydia worried that he wouldn’t continue, that he had reconsidered confiding in her. “Tell me,” she said quietly, resting her hands on his shoulders. She, too, could use her touch.
“The lowest levels of the Syndicate are petty thieves,” Gabriel said. He finally moved again, coasting his fingertips down her jawline. “They’re hardly in contact with Medvedev’s inner circle, except to pay off a portion of their take. To climb the ranks of the Syndicate, I had to do worse than steal. My superiors in the British government told me to do whatever was necessary to gain Medvedev’s trust. So I earned a reputation for violence.”
Lydia slid her hands into his overcoat, grazing the bare skin of his torso. This was no caress of desire but one of comfort. Of reassurance. She wanted him to feel her solidity, the press of her fingertips as his memories drew him back to Moscow. And she wanted to rage over what had been done to him—over what he’d had to do.
He whispered, “They called mezver—the Beast. For years, I was Medvedev’s instrument: seemingly resistant to guilt or softness. I followed the thieves’ code, theponyatiya, and allowed myself no family or vulnerabilities they could exploit. Meanwhile, if I caught word of a diplomat targeted by the Syndicate, I sent a coded warning to the Home Office.” His cheek pressed to hers. “After a while in my position, I requested an extraction.”
“Did the Home Office grant your request?” she asked, gliding her fingers down the firm surface of his chest.
A muscle leaped in his jaw. “No. My life was not in immediate danger, and my cover wasn’t threatened. Nightmares weren’t a good enough reason to surrender the intel that saved allied diplomats and Members of Parliament.”
She stared at the deepening bruise across his jaw as the room’s silence seemed to push against her skin. A part of her was furious at herself for thinking he had forgotten her. That when he hadn’t responded to her letters, it was because he had found a life beyond England—where she no longer suited.
If only she had known that he had been by himself all those years. With no one in whom to confide. Pretending to be someone he wasn’t.
“And what about your life,” she whispered, nuzzling her cheek against his. “Didn’t they care at all aboutyourlife?”
Gabriel let out a breath. “Men like me aren’t given that luxury. Were I extracted from Moscow, I would have found myself with a new name someplace else.”
“But you didn’t go someplace else,” she said, lifting her gaze to meet his. “You returned to England as Gabriel St. Clair.”
His dry, humorless laugh made her wince. “You misunderstand. No one gave a fuck about Gabriel St. Clair. The new Earl of Montgomery was a different matter.”
Lydia went still as her mind made sense of his return. As the new Earl of Montgomery, he would have had to take his father’s seat in the House of Lords. Second sons often went into the civil service or politics—positions of prestige gained through familial connections. But it was the heirs who mattered in English society. Subsequent children might as well have been an afterthought.
She brushed her lips to his bruised skin and whispered, “I give a fuck about Gabriel St. Clair,” she said. She used his language, did not equivocate. There would be no misunderstandings between them.
She heard his breath catch. “I know.” His voice was quiet. “That’s why I turned you away when you came to my door. I wanted you to stop caring.”
Lydia said nothing. She kissed his bruises again, let her lips linger over his skin. His breathing quickened, and she was gratified by the way his hands trembled. She stepped back from him and began to untie her wrapper, casting it from her shoulders. All she was left with was the gossamer-thin night rail that bared the contours of her puckered breasts.
Gabriel made a sound in his throat as his hot gaze fell on that translucent garment. “God, you curse of a girl,” he said, his voice low and rough.
Lydia had been insulted the first time he’d said those words. But now, they left him as an admission of her power and as a confession of his vulnerability. She’d had that influence over him for years and never knew it. Now she did. Now she comprehended that her touch made him tremble—that she occupied his thoughts the way he did hers.
And that was all the encouragement she needed.
