Page 44 of The Spy Who Loved Her
“You could tell me,” she suggested, as she set the brush down at last, rising from her seat to meander toward the bed, where he already reclined upon the pillows. “You’ve listened to enough of my troubles. I would be happy to listen to yours in return.”
It was yet another swift strike to his aching conscience that she meantit. Truly and honestly. Despite how their relationship—if it could be called such a thing—had begun, she had grown attached to him. Seeking ever more intimacy between them, inviting with gentle questions, careful suggestions, and subtle prods for him to share more of himself with her.
“I don’t wish to trouble you with such things,” he said, and it wasatruth, if notthetruth. But even such small truths had a way of injuring, and a flicker of hurt slid across her face at the gentle rebuff. He lifted the covers as she approached, allowing her room to slide onto the bed, into his arms.
She settled there like it was a place of peace, of respite. Her cheek rubbed against his chest, and he felt her lungs expand and empty on a sigh. “I’d still like to know,” she said, as her fingertips slid along the taut muscles of his abdomen in a soothing stroke. The fragility of her voice scored him, and he found himself pressing a soft kiss to the crown of her head, over hair so bright he could feel the heat of it beneath his lips.
Emma drew a short, sharp breath. “Rafe, could I ask why…why you have never kissed me?”
“Of course I have,” he said. “I just did.”
“Not that sort of a kiss.” Her shoulders lifted and fell in a hesitant little shrug. “I just…wondered.”
If perhaps he didn’t wantto kiss her, he thought she meant—when the truth was that the smallest thought of it terrified him. There was an intimacy in a kiss that went even beyond the intimacy of sex. While the purpose of sex might be something as simple as to fulfill a primal need, kissingwas an act for the simple pleasure of shared affection.
He’d refrained, more for his own sake than for hers. Some part of him feared that she mightknowif he did. That she might be able to taste all the love he held for her on his tongue, when he had never wanted to burden her with it. And it wouldbe a burden, eventually. A secret kept out of the love from which it had spawned; his cross to bear and never hers.
“Did you wish me to?” he asked.
“Yes.” The delicate motion of her fingertips stalled. “Yes,” she said again, in a slow, wondering tone. “I want you to kiss me. And I want—I want you to tell me the things that trouble you. I want to tell you those that trouble me.” The more she spoke, the more rapidly the next words followed. As if she had been bottling them up a good long while now, and she’d popped the cork on all of them. They spilled out in a tangle, a rush, a reckless admission. “I want to see you for more than a few hours in the evenings. I want more than only sharing a bed with you. I want to share meals and thoughts and opinions and—and—”
Lives, he thought. She wanted to sharelives. And he could not even share with her his surname. Was there a layer of hell deep enough, agonizing enough, to make him accountable for his sins?
“I’d settle for a kiss,” she said, in an aching whisper. “If—if you don’t mind.”
Obligation again. As if she thought it might present a hardship for him. It would be a kindness, he knew, to refuse her. What she might perceive as cruelty or indifference now would inevitably prove itself a benevolent act in the end. At least it would be one less transgression to hang itself upon his conscience, one less sin to weigh against the ever-deepening darkness of his soul.
Her fingertips traced the line of his jaw, and she levered herself up on one elbow to look down upon him, just the hint of a plea there in the stunning blue of her eyes. Every good intention fled, chased from his head by an insidious little whisper: What was justonemore transgression, really? She would never forgive him for those he’d already committed.
She was going to know, and he—he would be wrecked when he lost her. Beyond salvation; unfixable. But at least he would have this.
His fingers slid into her hair, fisting in the soft strands. Her breath whispered across his cheek, his chin. Her lashes lowered over her eyes as he eased closer. A delicate brush, testing the plush softness of her lower lip. She made a small sound in her throat—a plea, he thought, to linger just a bit longer. His hand opened, cupping the nape of her neck through the thick skein of her hair to pull her closer, and as the seam of her lips parted at the insistence of his, the muscles there beneath his fingers went lax and pliant.
She knew. Immediately and completely. Just as he’d imagined she would.
“Oh, Rafe,” she said on a sweet sigh as she laid one hand upon his chest, just over his heart. “I—”
God help him, he could not let her get the words out. Notthosewords.Neverthosewords. So he distracted her from them in the only way he could. With his hands. With his mouth. With his body. With countless minutes of passion that left her—blessedly—breathless. Without the energy or the will to do more than sigh in utter contentment. Every word stolen from a head left spinning with heady delight.
She would recall them eventually, he knew, as her lids fluttered closed beneath the weight of exhaustion, as she curled against his side, one hand resting straight over his heart. She would recall those words she had wanted to tell him. And there would come a point where he could not dissuade her from speaking them. When he could not distract or disengage or otherwise divert her from them.
And he—he could not accept them. They wouldn’t even be meant for him. They would be meant for another man entirely; one who did not exist.
Obligation, he thought again, as he wrapped his arm around her waist. He owed her so many things, but nothing quite so much as the truth. They had kept so much from her, he and Chris, and it no longer mattered if their intentions had been noble.
In her sleep, Emma turned her cheek against his shoulder, and a contented smile tugged at her lips. With a sort of fatalistic sense of inevitability, Rafe looked down upon her and did his damnedest to paint that soft expression into the backdrop of his mind, to memorize the feel of her pressed up against him. Probably, he thought, he would never hold her like this again. She would never again wanthim to. Still, it was her right to make that choice.
He could not conceal the truth from her any longer. Now he had only to inform Chris of it.
∞∞∞
“Punctual as always,” Sir Roger said, lifting his head as Rafe walked into his office, peering over the gold rims of his circular-framed spectacles. “Would that I could say the same of others I could mention.” There was the slightest hint of annoyance in his voice, which Rafe supposed meant that Chris had kept him waiting. But then, Chris had never been known for his punctuality.
“Oh?” he said, keeping his voice deliberately light and even. “Has Chris been by recently?”
“Yes; to report,” Sir Roger said. “I was given to understandthat you have been keeping a good deal of company just lately.” He gestured to the chair before his desk. “Do sit,” he said with an affable smile, and Rafe had to give credit where credit was due—not an ounce of deceit showed upon the man’s face. He had the affect and mannerisms of a kindly old grandfather, every appearance of openness and honesty. “I’ve heard some…disturbing rumors just lately.”
It was so damned easy to forget that the man had been a master spy himself before he’d been charged with the supervision of his own set of underlings.
