First Season / Bride to Be (25 page)

Richard grunted his agreement as he deposited the groom on a pile of hay. Emily had wrapped her arms around herself, still visibly shivering. “I have no means to make a fire. There may be a house nearby, but to find it in this…”

“You mustn't go out there again,” she objected.

“I don't intend to. We will have to cover ourselves with the hay.”

She turned to it immediately, surprising Richard at the lack of argument. Burrowing into one of the piles, she started to create a nest for herself. After a moment, he bent to help her pile the hay on top. He could not see her face, but his hand encountered hers and paused. “You're freezing,” he said. Her fingers were like ice.

“I am cold. The hay will help.” She nestled down into it.

Richard turned to throw some of it over the groom, then made his own place in the cramped shed. When he was done, there were scarcely six inches between him and Emily, and little more separating him from the servant.

He lay there in the darkness waiting for the chill to fade. The rain beat on the slanted roof. The groom snored. He could hear Emily's teeth chattering, the rustling in the hay caused by her shivers. She made no complaint. She didn't cry or moan or accuse. She was simply lying there, quietly freezing, not asking for anyone's help.

An unfamiliar pressure arose in Richard's chest. He had never experienced anything like it. Did it have something to do with the new Richard Sheldon? Was it something he'd acquired during his ordeal?

It was almost painful. It pushed him, without words, to act.

Reaching out, he pulled Emily into the crook of his arm. She fit neatly under his open driving coat against his side.

She made a small sound of protest.

“You must get warm,” he said.

She didn't reply, but neither did she draw away. She was shivering violently now. But as heat began to spread between them, the shudders lessened, and finally faded. She relaxed slightly in his embrace, though he could tell that she still wasn't completely at ease.

How could she be? It was not a situation that encouraged nonchalance. He could feel the soft curve of her breast against his ribs, the pressure of her thigh on his own. Her breath ruffled against his cheek, and the beat of her heart made a counterpoint to his accelerating pulse.

He remembered the kiss in Vauxhall Gardens, and the way she had responded to his touch, with an innocent eagerness that had driven him wild. The feel of her lingered in his fingertips, on his lips. He could recall every nuance of those moments—the delicate, yielding texture of her mouth, the slender suppleness that nestled against him now. Making love to Emily would be glorious. She was such a beguiling mixture of inexperience and wisdom.

Her contours softened into his, and Richard almost groaned aloud. His body was demanding the pleasures his mind had visualized so clearly. It was all he could do to keep his hands still, to discipline the drive of desire.

Emily's breathing grew more regular. She had fallen asleep.

Richard clenched his jaw. She trusted him. She had little reason to do so, but she did. She snuggled closer, and this time Richard caught his breath. He was unbearably aroused. He wanted her as he couldn't remember ever wanting any woman. And he wasn't going to do anything about it.

The thought made him smile slightly. How the old Richard Sheldon would jeer at this restraint. Nothing had been allowed to interfere with his desires. He would have found Emily's trusting openness laughable.

Of course, no one had trusted him, Richard acknowledged. It was different, seemingly, when one had to deal with such complications. Because there was more going on than simple physical arousal, compelling as that was. He felt odd. When he considered Emily, he felt—pity, or no—that wasn't it.

Her reaction to their plight had impressed him, he reasoned. She had been brave, astonishingly uncomplaining. He admired that.

She turned slightly in his arms, and Richard let out a quick breath. Her hands were curled on her breast. They would only have to move a little to caress…

He stopped himself. This was not acceptable. He was losing his grip on himself. And that was a thing he no longer allowed. If he had learned one thing in his fight for survival, it was control.

He'd taken a sharp pummeling in the accident, he told himself. That was it. Perhaps he was slightly delirious. He would take more care.

He looked around their crude shelter, then down at Emily, curled so confidingly against him. He had a sense of consequences rippling out from this night, already far beyond his control. He ought to have gone on searching for a house or…something.

The sound of the rain contradicted him. He had done what he could. And now he would simply have to endure. He would hold her, keep her safe and warm, until he could get her home again. And he would resist the urge to touch her, to see if he could rouse the desperate need he was feeling in the exquisite body pressed against his. It couldn't be any harder than slogging through a steaming swamp for days on end. It had to be easier than facing a jungle cat with little more than his teeth and nails to defend him.

But it wasn't. The heat they'd generated burned through him, and the soft caress of her breath drove him mad. It was hours before the rhythm of the rain and the rush of wind finally lulled him into a restless sleep.

Around dawn, the groom stirred. He sat up, holding his head as if it might split in two, then staggered out into the long grass. He squinted at the daylight, spat, and reeled off in the direction of the pond like a desert wanderer spotting succor.

* * *

Emily woke to the sound of voices. Her aunt was calling her, she thought groggily. Perhaps she had overslept. Aunt Julia equated early rising with virtue and steadiness of character. Why hadn't the maid brought her tea? She moved, and was rewarded by a whole medley of aches and strains, a prickle of hay in her face, and a sudden stunning awareness of another body pressed close to hers. She blinked to clear her vision and found herself gazing at Richard Sheldon's face from a distance of inches. She was folded in his coat. His arm was draped over her. So was one of his legs. Even as her face flamed, Emily realized that the position was not precisely unpleasant. It was unprecedented in her life, of course, and very unsettling. But the pounding of her heart and the shortness of her breath were…stimulating.

An earsplitting shriek cut through these ruminations. It also caused Richard to jerk awake just as Emily was struggling up out of their cocoon. When she managed to sit, she found herself facing her Aunt Julia, her cousin George, and two of the duchess's footmen. All of them looked profoundly shocked.

“Emily,” cried the duchess. “What…?” Her mouth opened and closed, but she appeared unable to find words.

Emily struggled to escape the hay. It was clinging to her clothes and no doubt her hair as well. She must look like…well, she didn't want to think about it.

A strong hand helped her rise. Richard came to his feet beside her. Emily tried to gather her wits.

“What are you doing?” her aunt managed finally.

“The curricle overturned,” said Richard.

The duchess gazed at him with horror.

“I…we were all thrown. It was some time before we recovered, and then…with the rain and…we were forced to shelter here. My groom was…ah…injured.”

“What groom?” asked George belligerently. He was tapping his stick against his thigh.

Richard looked around the empty shed.

“This is dreadful,” moaned the duchess. “This is disastrous. Olivia will…” She turned even paler. “Alasdair! He will have an apoplexy. He'll kill someone.” She looked at Richard as if in no doubt of the victim.

“But Aunt, we only…”

“Don't tell me what you did!” She started to wring her hands. “Lady Jersey will make such a story of this.”

“Not if Lord Warrington is a man of honor,” said George. He looked thunderous.

Richard looked worse, thought Emily. He looked murderous. Muscles shifted in his jaw as he stood rigid. His hazel eyes burned. She worried suddenly that he would go for George's throat.

“I will call on the duke as soon as I am able,” he said, spitting out the words.

George gave a curt nod. His mother wrung her hands a final time, then clasped them tight together.

“Miss Crane should be taken home,” Richard added.

The duchess surged forward to gather Emily. George ushered them both out of the shed. “I will tell my father to expect you,” he said over his shoulder.

“Count on it,” was the clipped reply.

Emily stumbled a bit as she was helped over the rough ground. She still felt disoriented. She couldn't seem to think. It seemed an endless way to her aunt's carriage.

“But will it do?” said the duchess to her son.

“I've left Ned to find that groom. We should be able to hush it up.”

“Nothing…improper occurred,” stammered Emily.

Her aunt looked scandalized. “Nothing? Do you call lying in a man's…? I can't even speak of it. What would your parents say to me if they heard?”

Her father wouldn't say anything, Emily thought. Aunt Julia had been right before. He would kill someone. She wasn't sure about her mother. “No one will know.”

The duchess shook her head. “We will do our best. But such things get out. The servants will gossip. If Warrington doesn't…”

“He would never tell anyone,” interrupted Emily.

Her aunt and cousin stared at her as if she had lost her wits.

She remembered their opinion of Richard's sharp tongue and tendency toward malice. But it wasn't true. He wasn't like that at all. Was he?

“He won't if I have anything to do with it,” answered George grimly.

She didn't believe it, Emily decided. He had never maligned her parents, after all. Despite what nearly everyone said, she found she trusted him.

Exhausted by her ordeal, Emily climbed into the carriage and sank back on the cushions. Things would be clearer when she was rested.

* * *

Emily was sitting in the morning room the next day when her aunt entered with Richard in tow.

“Lord Warrington has something to say to you.” The duchess looked strained but resolute. “Your uncle and I have given him our consent.”

“Consent?”

Her aunt merely slipped back out of the room.

Richard came closer. His gaze was cold and his expression grim. “I've come, of course, to ask you to be my wife,” he said without preliminaries.

Emily had been half expecting this, half rejecting the idea as ridiculous. “Of course?”

Richard waited in icy silence. His expression was forbidding. He might have been carved from stone.

She wasn't going to go along with this. Her aunt had arranged the scene, but no one could make her follow the prescribed steps. “That carriage attacked us.”

He blinked, startled.

“It was absolutely blatant.”

Surprise made Richard look a little less intimidating.

“And I have been wondering if your groom was given some drug. The way he was sleeping,” she pointed out. “It was unnatural.”

One corner of his mouth twitched.

“And the traces were cut, weren't they? I could see that.”

“Could you?”

She nodded, pleased to have elicited a reaction. “They had to befuddle the groom to do that.”

“They?”

“Whoever did it,” she added impatiently.

“Ah.”

At least he was looking a little more human, Emily thought, not so frightening. “You must admit now that someone is trying to harm you.”

“I am not required to admit anything.” He grimaced. “Except stupidity that goes beyond all bounds.”

She chose to ignore this. “Whoever was driving that carriage deliberately ran you off the road.”

“If they did, it is no business of yours.”

“You do admit it!”

He brushed off the statement with a gesture.

“The urn, the footpads, it is all…”

“An odd series of…occurrences.”

“Occurrences? They were plain murderous attacks!”

“Whatever they are, they are my affair. I will deal with them.”

“But you must—”

“I will judge what I
must
do,” he interrupted angrily. “Indeed, I already have.”

Like come here today and offer for her when it appeared to be the last thing in the world he wanted to do. A tremor of unhappiness shook her, and she closed her fists against it. He wasn't going to listen to sensible advice. He wasn't going to take steps to protect himself. Would he even try to discover what was behind the attacks?

“You have not answered my first question.”

He was going to let himself be killed through sheer stubbornness.

“I don't imagine you've forgotten it.”

He needed help. But he would never admit it. On the contrary, he would act like a fool to prove he didn't.

Richard raised his eyebrows. His gaze was stony.

It would be much easier to watch over him if they were engaged, Emily realized. Later, of course, she would break it off. She would never entrap a man into marriage.

“Well?”

She took a shaky breath. It was all for his own good. She cared…she cared only that a fellow human being was in jeopardy. She swallowed. Her heart was beating very fast. “Yes,” she said.

Richard winced. “Yes?”

“I…I accept your proposal.”

He looked like a man who has received dire news and is just apprehending the full extent of the disaster.

Stricken, Emily swallowed again. It would only be for a little while, and then she could explain to him that she had never meant to go through with it. He would be safe by then, and she would be…she would have figured out the puzzle. She struggled to pull in some air.

“I see.” He stood straighter. “That is clear then.”

The coldness of his tone and the anger in his face were too much. Emily opened her mouth to retract everything.