It had been a long time since he’d taken such pleasure.

“I would have bothered Bourne with this,” Temple said casually, as though they were anywhere but the owners’ suite of the most legendary gaming hell in London, “but since he is so busy with his lady, I thought perhaps you might step in.”

Cross heard the amusement in Temple’s tone. “I’m a little busy for your games, Temple.”

“Not my games. Chase’s. I am simply the messenger.”

The words sent a tremor of unease through him. With a soft curse, Cross scanned the floor of the club, looking for the founder of the Angel, who, of course, was nowhere to be seen. “I don’t need Chase’s games either.”

Temple chuckled. “It might be too late for that.”

The words had barely been spoken when Cross’s gaze settled on the lone figure at the center of the casino floor below, the only person in the entire room who was not moving. Of course.

She was always on a separate course from the rest of the universe—the planet that orbited in reverse, the sun that rose in the west. And now she stood at the center of his hell, surrounded by debauchery—in its thrall. He did not have to see her face to know that.

Just as he did not have to see her unmasked to know that she was stunning. Not as stunning as she had been in that chair in his office a week earlier, bared to him, finding her pleasure, tempting him with her shape and her sounds and her scent, but stunning nonetheless.

After she’d left him that night, he’d sat on the floor of his office, staring at that chair for hours, reliving the way she’d writhed against it, straining to hear the echoes of her gorgeous sounds, and finally, finally placing his forehead to the cool leather seat with a foul curse and vowing to stay away from her.

She was too much for him to resist.

She had returned, swathed in sapphire, hair like spun silk, porcelain skin, standing at the center of his club, under threat of sin and vice and wickedness. And him. From this vantage point, he had an unparalleled view of the swell of her beautiful breasts, all lovely curves and dark, promising shadows. Enough to send a grown man to his knees.

The hand on the glass clenched in a tight fist. “What in hell is she doing here?”

“Ah,” Temple said, “you’ve noticed our guest.”

Of course he’d noticed her. Any man with eyes would notice her. She was the most fascinating thing in the room. “Don’t make me ask again.”

“Asriel tells me she had an invitation.”

No doubt she did. No doubt Chase found this entire scenario amusing. Chase deserved a sound beating. “She is no more suited to that room than she is to fly.”

“I don’t know.” Temple paused, considering her. “I rather like the way she looks in that room.”

Cross snapped his attention to his massive partner. “Stop liking it.”

Temple smirked and rocked back on his heels. “I could like it very much.”

Cross resisted the urge to put a fist into the larger man’s face. Fighting with Temple was futile, as he was enormous and unbeatable, but it would feel good to try. It would feel good to lose himself to the physical when he had spent so much of the last week resisting just that. Cross felt confident that he could draw blood. Or blacken an eye. “Stay away from Philippa Marbury, Temple. She’s not for you.”

“But she is for you?”

Yes, goddammit. He bit back the words. “She’s not for any of us.”

“Chase disagrees.”

“She’s most definitely not for Chase.”

“Shall I tell Bourne she’s here, then?” Cross heard the teasing in Temple’s voice. The knowledge that Cross would not be able to resist action. “Penelope could take her home.”

He should let it happen. Should let Bourne and Penelope handle their errant sister. Should let someone else tend to Pippa Marbury before she ruined herself and half of London besides.

A month ago, he could have. A week ago.

But now. “No.”

“I didn’t think so.” Temple’s amusement grated.

Cross cut him a look. “You deserve a sound thrashing.”

One side of Temple’s mouth kicked up in a wicked smirk. “You think you’re the one to deliver it?”

“No, but you’ll get it before long. And we shall all have a good long laugh.”

Something flickered in Temple’s black gaze at that. “Such promises tease, friend.” He put a hand to his chest dramatically. “They tease.”

Cross did not waste more words on his idiot partner. Instead, he left the room, long strides eating up the dark corridor that led to the back stairwell of the Angel, then soaring down the stairs to reach his quarry, his heart pounding, eager to find her. To capture her before someone else did.

If another touched her, he’d kill him.

He pushed out a private door, into one of the small, private antechambers on one side of the casino floor and out onto the floor, filled with laughing masked revelers. Not that he would have any trouble finding her . . . he could find her among thousands.

But he didn’t have to look very hard.

She gave a little squeak as they collided, and he reached out to capture her, hands coming to her shoulders to hold her steady. A mistake. He wasn’t wearing gloves, and this dress appeared to have a shocking lack of fabric. Her skin was soft and warm—so warm it fairly singed him.

And made him want to linger.

He did not release her, not even when her hands came to his chest to brace herself, her sapphire skirts swirling around them both, tangling in his legs as surely as the scent of her tangled in his mind, bright and fresh and utterly out of place in this dark, wicked world.

Instead, he pulled her back into the alcove from which he’d come, and said harshly, “Why aren’t you wearing gloves?”

The question surprised them both, but she recovered first. “I don’t like them. They eliminate a sense.”

It was hard to imagine losing any sensation when she was about . . . consuming his. He ignored the answer and tried again. “What are you doing here?” His voice was soft in the darkness—too soft. He meant to scold her. To scare her.

“I was invited.”

Nothing scared Pippa Marbury. “You shouldn’t have come.”

“No one can see me. I’m masked.”

He reached up for the mask in question, running his fingers along the delicate curving piece, all fine metalwork and architecture. Of course, Chase would have considered her spectacles. Chase considered everything. A thread of irritation began to unfurl in Cross’s chest, adding a harshness to his next words. “What would possess you to accept this invitation? Anything could happen to you here. Tonight.”

“I came to see you.”

The words were soft and simple and unexpected, and Cross had to pause for a moment to take them in. “To see me,” he repeated, like the imbecile into which he turned whenever she was around.

She nodded once. “I am angry with you.”

She didn’t sound it. And that was how he knew it was true. Pippa Marbury wouldn’t suffer ire the way other women would. Instead, she would develop the emotion and consider it from all angles before acting on it. And with that uncommon precision, she would take her opponent off guard as easily as if she’d launched a sneak attack in the dead of night.

“I am sorry,” he said, in the interest of self-preservation.

“For what?” she asked. He paused. No woman had ever asked him that. At his lack of reply, she added, “You don’t know.”

Not accusation. Fact.

“I don’t.”

“You lied to me.”

He had. “About what?”

“I take your question to mean that you’ve done it more than once,” she said.

He couldn’t see her eyes through the mask, and he wanted to tear it from her face for this conversation.

No, he didn’t. He didn’t want to have this conversation at all.

He wanted her to go home and get into bed and behave like a normal, aristocratic lady. He wanted her to be locked in a room until she became Lady Castleton and left London and his thoughts forever.

It appeared that he lied to himself, too.

He released her shoulders, loathing the loss of her soft skin.

“You’re an earl.”

The words were quiet, but the accusation in them was undeniable.

“I don’t like to think on it much.”

“Earl Harlow.”

He resisted the urge to wince. “I like to hear it even less.”

“Did you enjoy making a fool of me? Embarrassing me? All that mistering? And when I told you that if you’d been an aristocrat, I wouldn’t have asked for your help? Did you laugh uproariously after I left you that night?”

After she’d left him that night, he’d been utterly destroyed and desperate to be near her again. Laughing had been the farthest thing from his mind. “No,” he said, knowing he should add something else. Knowing there was more to be said. But he couldn’t find it, so he repeated, “No.”

“And I am to believe that?”

“It is the truth.”

“Just like the fact that you are an earl.”

He wasn’t entirely certain why this was such a frustration for her. “Yes. I’m an earl.”

She laughed, the sound devoid of humor. “Earl Harlow.”

He pretended it didn’t bother him, the name on her lips. “It’s not as though it’s a secret . . .”

“It was a secret to me,” she defended.

“Half of London knows it.”

“Not my half!” Now she was growing irritated.

As was he. “Your half was never meant to know. Your half never needed to know.”

“I should have known. You should have told me.”

He shouldn’t feel guilty. He shouldn’t feel beholden to her. He shouldn’t feel so out of control. “Why? You already have an earl. What good are two?”

Where in hell had that come from?

She stiffened in the darkness, and he felt low and base and wrong. And he hated that she could make him feel that way. He wanted to see her eyes. “Remove your mask.”

“No.” And that’s when he heard it. The sting in her voice. The edge of sorrow. “Your sister was right.”

The words shocked him. “My sister?”

“She warned me off you. Told me you never followed your word . . . told me never to believe you.” Her voice was low and soft, as though she wasn’t speaking to him, but to herself. “I shouldn’t have believed in you.”

He heard the addition of the in. Hated it. Lashed out at her. “Why did you, then? Why did you believe in me?”

She looked up at him, seeming surprised by his words. “I thought—” she began, then stopped. Rephrased. “You saw me.”

What in hell did that mean?

He didn’t ask. She was already explaining. “You listened to me. You heard me. You didn’t mind that I was odd. In fact, you seemed to enjoy it.”

He did enjoy it. By God, he wanted to bask in it.

She shook her head. “I wanted to believe that someone could do all those things. Perhaps, if you did . . . then . . .”

She trailed off, but he heard the words as though she’d shouted them. Then Castleton might.

If he hadn’t already felt like a dozen kinds of ass, he would now. “Pippa.” He reached for her again, knowing he shouldn’t. Knowing that this time he could not resist touching her. And he might not be able to resist claiming her.

She stepped away from him, out of his reach, returning to the present. To him. “No.” Before he could act, move, take, repair, she took a deep breath, and spoke. “No. You are right, of course. I do have an earl, who is kind and good and soon to be my husband, and there is nothing about you or your past—or your present for that matter—that should be relevant to me.”

She backed away, and he followed her like a dog on a lead. Hating the words she spoke—their logic and reason. She was unlike any other woman he’d ever known, and he’d never in his life wanted to understand a woman so much.

She kept talking, looking down at her hands, those imperfect fingers woven together. “I understand that there is nothing about me that is of interest to you . . . that I’m more trouble than I’m worth . . . that I should never have brought you into my experiments.”

He stopped her. “They aren’t experiments.”

She looked up at him, eyes black in that ridiculous mask. He’d like to tear it from her, crush it beneath his boot and take a horsewhip to Chase for having it made. “Of course they are.”

“No, Pippa. They aren’t. They’re a desire for knowledge, certainly, a need for it, even. But more than that, they’re a need for understanding of this thing that you are about to do, that you have refused to stop and that terrifies you. They are a desperate ploy to stop yourself from feeling all the doubt and frustration and fear that you must be feeling. You say you want to understand what happens between men and women. Between husbands and wives. But instead of going to any number of those who know better—who know firsthand . . . you come to me. In the darkness.”

She backed away, even as he stalked her. “I came to you in the middle of the day.”

“It’s always night inside the Angel. Always dark.” He paused, loving the way her lips parted, just barely, as though she could not get enough air. Neither could he. “You came to me because you don’t want it. The ordinary. The mundane. You don’t want him.”