Seducing the Rake (Mad, Bad and Dangerous Heroes) (41 page)

“You have no choice in the matter, Chessy. Now sit back and enjoy our ride. We should be nearing our destination very soon.”

“Beast! Where are you taking me? I warn you, as soon as you put me down, I’ll make a scene. I’ll tell everyone what you’ve done! I’ll make you rue the day you—”

From outside came the creaking of carriage wheels and the neigh of a team. The driver leaned down to shout into the window. “White Hart Inn, m’lord.”

Chessy’s glared at her impassive companion. “No, I don’t trust you. and I’ll never trust you again!”

Morland’s face was unreadable. “A pity. For that is going to make our descent rather messy, I’m afraid.” He moved closer. “And you are going into that inn with me, Chessy, my love. Willingly or unwillingly.”

Without warning he hauled her against his chest. His mouth came down upon hers, open and hot. He tongued her lips apart in a long, slow slide and eased into the honeyed recess beyond.

Chessy shivered. And the next moment, to her infinite fury, she found herself touching and tasting back. His tongue. His lips.

“Ah, Cricket—” His hand went rigid on her back. With his other he spanned the aching peak of her breast.

She barely heard her own whimper of protest. Of desire.

“How do you do this to me, temptress? Make me forget everything and everyone while you’re in my arms.”

He moved again. Suddenly cloth gave way and flesh met taut flesh.

“T-Tony…” She was on fire. His fingers were hard, demanding. And somehow they were not hard enough. They made her want more.

“Chessy.” Her name rolled dark and fierce from his throat.

Her hands slid to his neck. Shivering, she arched back in his arms, opening herself like a perfect flower to the blinding force of his pleasure.

With a groan he buried his fingers in her hair and brought his head down.

His lips circled the rim of the pouting, crimson nipple. They nipped and tugged with tormenting skill. Chessy twisted her head and cried out in pleasure. And then—teeth. Hot, moist breath. The velvet slide of his restless, hungry tongue.

Until she felt fire uncoil through every inch of her body.

“You see—” His voice was ragged. “Even now you blind me, enslave me.” He took the whole velvet curve of her, crimson peak and dusky nimbus. He smoothed her in heat and then left her gasping as he arched her even farther in his arms, skin to straining skin. His lips closed around her, suckling her fiercely.

“Give me more, Chessy. Give me the sound of your passion. Give me your sweet, ragged whimpers.”

She was close to yielding, to giving him all he asked. His hands slid deeper into her hair, cupping her head with fierce protectiveness.

With infinite need.

While his mouth drove her straight to paradise.

A dark paradise, rich with sound and a thousand lush textures. Hard lips. The jut of his chin. The hot slide of his fingers.

“Marry me, Chessy.” His voice came raw and hoarse. “Now. Today.”

Chessy stiffened. Dazed by desire, she could only stare at him.

“Yes. Just say yes.”

“N-no.”

“Damn it, don’t be a fool!”

Reason and reality returned in a slow, chill flood. So this was his game. She caught back a sob. “I cannot marry you. I
will
not!”

With a little moan, she tore away—but not quite soon enough.

His eyes burning, he caught her up and slung her over his shoulder. With his boot he kicked open the coach door and descended the stairs that the groom had hastily let down.

Chessy began to twist and scream, her feet beating at thin air.

She pounded at his back.

Still his pace did not slow.

Wildly, she fought, her legs hammering as she struggled to break his grip on her straining bottom.

Morland tipped his tricorn hat at two wide-mouthed hostlers, who stared in amazement as he and his sputtering captive moved past.

“I’ll murder you, Tony Morland! I’ll stake you out and—”

“Promises, promises, my darling! And if you keep lurching about like that, you’ll show even more of your shapely ankles to those hostlers than you already have.”

Chessy bit back an oath, trying to tug her skirts back down on her legs.

The earl chuckled and winked at a staring groom. “Too much to drink, you know. The wench has never had a head for wine. But she will insist on drinking, no matter the aftereffects. And it makes her so very amorous that somehow I never can find the heart to deny her.”

“I’ll slit your throat!” Chessy hissed, as the groom gave her a speculative leer. “Oh, just you wait, you—you beast!”

She twisted and called out to a stunned lady in somber black kerseymere. “Help me! He’s not my husband!”

Morland gave the matron a shrug. “Of course I’m not. The baggage is already married. Unfortunately, her husband, though rich, is advanced in age and not quite what she expected. Physically, you understand. So she comes to me to supply the things he cannot give her. Ah, but what is a gentleman to do when beseeched by such a baggage? Especially such a comely one?”

The matron sniffed and turned away, scandalized.

“Murder will be too good for you!” Chessy rasped. “It will be slow torture. I’ll find a knife. No, I’ll use my largest needle. Oh, I’ll make you sorry for this, Tony Morland. Just see if I d-don’t!”

Chessy was still sputtering when the earl carried her inside the elegant hostelry and hammered up the stairs to the private suite of rooms he had engaged on the second floor.

And there he threw her down onto a vast four-poster bed and kicked the door shut behind him.

He shrugged off his elegant jacket of chocolate brown velvet. His hands went to his cravat.

“What—what are you doing!”

“I am removing my cravat. And after that I’ll remove my shirt, and my—”

“You wouldn’t dare! I saved your life!”

“And I am going to save yours, Chessy. By marrying you. I have a cleric downstairs and a special license in my pocket. And you, my sweet, are not going to leave this room—this
bed
—until you consent to become my wife.”

Chessy’s face set in a mutinous frown. “I
won’t.”

 
“Very well.” The cravat came free and went flying. His hands fell to his breeches.

“I’ll scream.”

“Oh, yes. With passion.”

“I’ll kick! I’ll—I’ll bite you!”

“So you will.” His eyes went smoky blue. “When I bury myself inside you. When I drive deep and take you with me to st
unning
pleasure. Just think about it, Chessy. About how good it will feel.”

Mesmerized, she stared at his long fingers, his lean, powerful thighs.

And found herself unable to think of anything else. But her face was hard with determination. “I-I can’t. Don’t ask it of me. You don’t understand.”

Morland’s fingers stilled. “Why? You’re not married already.”

“No, of course not. But—”

“Then nothing else matters,” he said harshly. “You’re wrong. You don’t know—”

“Know what? What can be important enough to drive us apart?”

Chessy’s face drained of its color.

“Well?”

She swallowed. Her fingers dug restless patterns in the feather quilt.

“Answer me, Chessy.”

At that moment boots echoed along the corridor. The next moment, a tap came at the door. “Beg pardon, your lordship, but the cleric is growing restless. He wonders—that is, will you be wishing for the ceremony to begin soon?”

Morland smothered a curse and strode to the door. “Soon enough! Tell him that the, er
—bride
is at her toilette. She will not be much longer, however. Meanwhile, give him some of that claret you keep hidden in your cellar. The good bottles, this time. And don’t water it. That should put the fellow in a better frame of mind.”

Morland did not wait to hear the landlord’s answer. Slamming the door, he resumed his argument with Chessy. “Now, stubborn one, tell me—”

The order died in his throat.

When he turned around the room was empty.

 “Damn and blast!”

Had he been less irritable, Morland would have seen the irony in
him,
rake confirmed, trying to force a woman he had ruined into the protection of marriage.

But at that moment his leg was throbbing and his shoulder was on fire, and he was furious at the way his whole plan had spun off course. Worse yet had been the tormenting carriage ride with the occasional brush of her hands, the soft slide of her thighs and hips.

All of which had evoked haunting memories of her passion, so honest, when he had loved her through the long night.

And he would have that passion again, Morland swore. But only when she was his
wife.

He gave the room a swift glance, then ran for the window. Yanking up the pane, he bent out and surveyed the rooftops.

His face paled.

She was climbing along the gable above his head, her skirts swept up in one hand. He started to cry out, then bit back the words, afraid in her distraction she might slip.

Smothering a curse, he wrenched off his boots and socks, then lunged over the sill after her.

His eyes narrowed against the gleaming sunlight. He saw her edging along the intersection of two deeply slanting roofs. Even then, burning with fear and fury, Morland marveled at her exquisite grace and sureness of step. He would have to be fast and silent.

He studied the adjoining roofs, looking for a rear approach that would hide him.

And then he froze.

On the roof beyond her, black against the setting sun, he saw a figure hiding behind a chimney.

He plunged forward in the same second that he shouted a warning: “Down, Chessy! Now!”

She swung her head, then jerked sharply, stru
g
g
ling
to regain her balance. Only then did she look up and see the man crouched on the roof.

Golden sunlight flashed upon the barrel of a gun.

Morland lunged forward, his bare feet shredded by the sharp tiles. His eyes narrowed against the sun as he saw the gun rise and then slowly level.

Sweet lord, there was no time.

He bent down and clawed a heavy tile free.

With a prayer on his lips he hurled it toward the figure at the chimney.

A shot rang out, harsh against the
whoosh
of the soaring tile.

And then a shout of pain. The desperate scramble of arms and feet. But the fellow had not fallen. Somehow he had managed to push back to his feet and now was advancing on Chessy.

And this time, his pistol lost, he was holding a knife.

Morland scrambled along the crest of the adjoining roof, oblivious to the blood on his feet. With a shout of rage, he reached the crest, then plunged down.

But even as he watched, the man’s foot struck an uneven tile. For a moment he went rigid, then began to claw at the air.

His struggle came too late, however. His body twisted and
he
lost his footing. The next second he went hurtling down over the edge of the roof and out of sight.

There were angry shouts from the inn’s yard, and then the wild neighing of horses. A woman screamed.

Morland heard none of it. All his attention was on the slender figure at the crest of the roof, her hands locked, her body rigid.

Her black hair whipped out around her as she stood trembling, frozen with fear, unable to move.

“It’s all right, my beauty. Just wait for me.”

She turned wild eyes upon him. “T-Tony, help me. I-I—can’t.”

“Hush, love. I’m almost there. Just a few more steps.”

He could see her face now. It was sheet-white against the wild amethyst of her eyes. Morland realized she was frozen in shock.