Anne Stuart (24 page)

The moment the words were out of his mouth he could have kicked himself. The only place to sit in the tiny room was his narrow, rumpled bed. He didn’t want her there. He wanted
her there more than life itself.

She was wearing her nightgown, a long white lacy thing with layers of fine trim. The shawl she’d pulled around it provided warmth but not much covering, and her hair was loose down her back. In all, she looked like she’d look if she were sharing his bed. Except that she’d be naked.

She sat down gingerly, keeping her shawl pulled tightly around her, her eyes averted as he pulled on his breeches. “I haven’t seen her since early evening,” she said in a muffled voice. “It’s completely unlike her—I’m afraid some harm might have befallen her.”

“
Did she say where she was going? What her plans for the evening were?” Brennan asked, pulling his shirt on.

She blushed. Even in the dim candlelight he could see the color staining her face. “We didn’t have much conversation.”

“
Were you fighting?”

“
I was... distressed. She was attempting to comfort me.”

It wasn’t guilt he felt twisting inside him, he told himself. Just simple pain that he’d had to hurt her.

“
All right,” he said briskly. “Even so, that would suggest she’d be even less likely to take off. She’d be concerned about you, wouldn’t she?”

“
Yes. She has a tendency to worry, and to hover.”

“
Do you have any idea where she might go? Has she made any close friends, or any enemies, among the guests here?”

“
She and Ermintrude have never gotten along.” She was calmer now, relaxing under his businesslike demeanor, and she pulled her feet up under her on the bed, tucking her bare toes beneath her nightrail. The sight of those small, bare toes almost undid him. “But I doubt Ermintrude would do her any harm. I thought perhaps she might be assisting Mr. Clegg...”

“
Clegg’s asleep,” he said flatly. “Dead drunk, and I expect he’s alone. Has she said anything about a man? Do you suspect
she might be carrying on an assignation?”

She blushed again. He’d taken the candle from her and set it in the deep windowsill, and it threw strange shadows about the room.

“
I don’t know. She’s been keeping something from me, and I haven’t wanted to pry, but I suspect it might have something to do with the Earl of Glenshiel.”

It was all he needed for it to fall together. His faint suspicions had had no basis—now they did. “Is she in love with him?”

Fleur lifted her head and stared him straight in the eye. “I didn’t know you believed in love, Mr. Brennan.”

It was a challenge, flung down like a gauntlet, and he took an instinctive step toward her, when Clegg’s thick voice tumbled loudly down the hallway.

“
Who’ve you got in there, laddie?” he demanded, crashing against the door. “Having a bit of tasty pie, are you? Why don’t you share with your mates, eh?”

Fleur leapt up in utter panic, and Brennan moved swiftly, pulling her against him and clapping a hand over her mouth. “Go away, Josiah,” he called out in a sleepy-sounding voice. “You’re drunk, man, and hearing things.”

“
Takes more than the likes of Sammy Welch to drink Josiah Clegg under the table.” He pounded against the door once more. “Come on, Robbie, let me in,” he wheedled. “You’ve got a lass in there, I know it, and me John Thomas is in need of snug nest for the night.”

Brennan could feel Fleur shudder in his arms, and he held her more tightly, wishing he could stop her ears as well as her mouth. “You’ll wake the others, man,” he called out. “You don’t want the quality being disturbed by the likes of you—think what Sir John would say.”

“
Bugger the quality. And bugger Sir John,” Clegg muttered
in a slightly quieter bellow. “Are you going to let me in?”

“
No.”

“
Bugger you too, then. I’ll find out who you’ve got in there. See if I don’t. And then I’ll have a taste of it meself. I’m not a man who takes no for an answer. Had each of me sisters by the time they were twelve, for all their tears and pleading.” His voice trailed away, his footsteps as well, but Brennan made no move to release Fleur.

He’d forgotten he had his hand across her mouth. Forgotten, until he felt the faint pressure of her lips that might almost have been a kiss. He slumped back against the wall, and she sank against him, soft and pliant, seeking warmth and comfort.

Ah, he could comfort her well and truly, he told himself. Love her so well her life would be ruined, and all he could offer her was a hard life in Yorkshire in the mud and dirt and dales.

He caught her face in his big hands, letting his thumbs gently caress her mouth. She was so young, so foolish, so giving. He’d hurt her time and again trying to drive her away, and she still looked at him with love and trust in her eyes.

“
Lass,” he whispered, “you’ll be the death of me.” He kissed her very gently on the lips, all he would allow himself this time, and then set her away from him with regret and determination. And she didn’t fight him, simply pulled her shawl more tightly around her.

“
The servants said Glenshiel’s got the stomach grippe,” he said in his most prosaic voice. “That’s not the time a man uses for flirtation, but things aren’t always as they seem. Let me make sure Clegg’s gone back to bed, and then you run along to your room while I check on his lordship. I’ll try and be discreet—we don’t want the entire household knowing if your sister decided to slip the traces for one night.”

“
She wouldn’t do that,” Fleur said staunchly.

He sighed. “Lass, I could have you on that bed in two
seconds flat if I wanted. Are you telling me your sister’s any different?”

She flinched as if he’d slapped her. “No, Mr. Brennan. We’re both whores at heart when we think we’re in love.”

She didn’t say another word, watching him silently as he pulled on his shoes and stockings. It felt oddly domestic, and yet he wondered what else he could do to drive her away, to give her a total and permanent disgust of him. He’d given her as grave an insult as he could imagine, and yet he sensed that she saw through the deliberate cruelty and lies to the truth of matter: That he loved her with all his heart, curse him. And would for the rest of his life.

The hallway was deserted. He took the candle in one hand, put the other around Fleur, and ushered her out into the shadows, shielding her smaller body with his. But as they turned the corner leading to the main section of the house, he thought he heard the quiet closing of a door.

Jessamine kept sliding off the leather seat. There may have been straps to hold on to, but in the darkness she couldn’t find any. All she could do was try to brace herself as the coachman called Nicodemus Bottom drove them at a hellish pace toward London.

She wondered whether her companion had fallen asleep. She wouldn’t have put it past him—he seemed to have nerves of steel, and the riotous rocking of the carriage probably had little effect on him.

“
What would you have done if the bullet had actually hit me?” she asked suddenly. “It was dark—you couldn’t have been that sure of your target.”

“
I see perfectly in the dark,” he said in a tranquil voice. “And I’m an excellent shot.”

“
Still, you couldn’t be certain.”

“
Life is never certain, thank God. One of its few pleasures.”

“
What would you have done?” she persisted.

“
I’m not quite certain. I may have cradled your wounded body in my arms and sat there in the dirt, howling my despair and remorse at the moon.”

“
There is no moon tonight.”

“
Well, scratch that notion. Perhaps I might have rushed you back to Blaine Manor in search of medical aid, confessed my sins, and allowed your friend Clegg to carry me off to the hangman.”

She shuddered silently, glad he couldn’t see her. “I can’t see you being quite so self-sacrificing.”

“
Can’t you? You’re probably right. If it were a mortal wound, I probably would have had Nicodemus drag your body into the underbrush and cover you with leaves. A slight wound gives me too many unpleasant possibilities,” he said with a drawl. “I am a practical man, you know.”

“
I believe you.” She leaned her head back against the hard cushion. “Don’t you think our hostess will wonder where we are?”

“
I’m in bed with the grippe. As for you, I’m afraid you overestimate your importance. In the scheme of things you are more than expendable.”

“
My sister...”

“
The thief-taker will look after your sister, I expect.”

“
No!” Her sudden panic was absolute, and ignoring the reckless speed of the carriage, she lunged for the door.

He stopped her, of course, with his hard hands, and when he thrust her back against the seat, he came with her, crowding her there, too big, too warm, too strong. “Not Clegg,” he said, having read her reaction. “Brennan will see that she’s safe.”

“
I’m not convinced that’s an improvement,” she muttered.

“
You can’t control everything, Jessamine,” he said with a
low purr. “Your sister is young and foolish, and she doesn’t give a rap about position or money or any of the practicalities of life. She’d toss them all away for her handsome Bow Street runner, and you won’t be able to stop her.”

“
What do you know about it?”

“
I’ve done my poor best to further the match. You want her to marry a worthless aristocrat like me? She deserves much better.”

“
Damn you.”

“
Indeed. If you want to save your family from ruination, you will have to sacrifice yourself on the marriage altar, not your little sister.”

“
No,” she said flatly. “I will never marry.”

“
Then you can become some rich man’s mistress,” he said. “Someone who will keep you in diamonds and not much else. Someone who will teach you to appreciate the pleasures of the flesh.”

“
No,” she said again, cold and certain.

“
No marriage, no mistress? Are you planning on becoming a nun, then?” he murmured, sounding no more than casually interested. But he was too close, she could feel the warmth of him, and his long legs were too close to her own breeches-clad ones.

“
In a manner of speaking.”

He laughed then, a soft, infuriating sound, and his hand caught hers before she could slap him. “You weren’t made for celibacy, my pet. Allow me to demonstrate.”

She wasn’t expecting his sudden strength as he pulled her into his arms, across his lap. She struggled, but the rocking, jarring motion of the coach only flung her back against him. His hand caught her chin, holding her face still as he kissed her, but the more she squirmed, the tighter he held her.

He lifted his mouth from hers, and in the darkness she could
see the cool glitter of his eyes. “The more you fight me,” he murmured, “the more you excite me. Might I suggest passive acquiescence for a while? After all, there’s a limit to what I can accomplish in such cramped and active quarters, and if there’s no challenge, I might grow quickly bored.”

It sounded reasonable enough. Not that she was about to trust him, but how he could manage to lie with her in this tiny space was beyond her limited comprehension. Besides, fighting hadn’t worked.

“
Go ahead,” she muttered gracelessly. “Do your worst.”

“
Oh, no, my love,” he said, reaching for the front of her borrowed shirt. “I intend to do my very best.”

His fingers were warm against her chilled flesh as they slid inside the front of the shirt, inside the loose neck of her chemise. She opened her mouth to protest, but he put his lips against hers as his warm hand covered her breast, and the jolt of the carriage sent a strange, unnerving tremor through her body. Through her belly.

“
No,” she whispered when he moved his mouth down the side of her neck, nibbling lightly, pressing his teeth against the sensitive skin at the base of her throat.

“
Yes,” he growled, an animal sound of pure hunger, and she tried to will herself to be utterly still. Not to respond to the things his mouth was doing. Not to respond as his fingertips slid over the tight swell of her breast, teasing the nub, so that a strange, burning ache began to spread from where his hand touched her, caressed her, down between her legs.

She shifted, squeezing her knees together, and in the darkness she heard his soft laugh. “It won’t do you any good, darling,” he said. “I’ll get there in a little while.”

She didn’t know what he was talking about, and she didn’t want to. His sensitive fingertips were drawing concentric circles around her breast, and she found she was having faint trouble
breathing. It had nothing to do with his mouth at her collarbone, nibbling its way downward. Nothing to do with the muscled legs beneath her, with no thick layer of skirts and petticoats. She might as well have been naked—there were only two thin layers of cloth between them, and she could feel his body heat, his muscles, his...

She tried to pull away as the realization hit her that he was fully, frighteningly aroused, but he wasn’t about to let her go. He’d somehow managed to unfasten the tiny pearl buttons, and the ribbons of her shift had already come loose. It was simple enough to bare her breasts to the cool night air. Simple enough for him to bend his head and close his mouth over her.