Ashlyn Macnamara (23 page)

She opened her mouth to protest but managed no more than a squeak, more frightened mouse than admonition. And she was frightened—of her body’s demands. For her fingers itched to trace the solid planes of his chest, to feel the leap of muscle beneath her touch, to chart the places on his body that would elicit a groan or a tremor of pleasure.

His low chuckle pulled her back to reality. “Perhaps I should light the fire.”

He knelt beside her, damp tendrils of hair flopping into his eyes. He could not possibly be cold. Heat radiated from his body and settled over her, not enough to halt her trembling, but enough to change its character. She wrapped her arms about herself to mask the reaction. Water from her gown moistened her hands.

He struck the flint and ignited the tinder. Crouching closer, he blew encouragement at the base of the flame. Firelight soon gilded the planes of his chest and the muscled delineation of his arms and shoulders.

And heavens, the magnificently firm backside encased in nothing but breeches. The way the wool fabric molded to taut curves was positively indecent. The small amount of moisture lingering at the back of her throat evaporated. Good gracious, if she had an extra shilling to her name, surely she could bounce it off that steely flesh.

He sat back on his heels, hands flat against his thighs, and eyed her sidelong.

She looked away, straight into the dancing flames, and hunched over, hoping the small blaze might ease her shivering.

“I believe there’s a bedchamber of sorts.” George nodded over his shoulder at a door in the opposite wall.
“We might find blankets to wrap about ourselves while we wait.”

“That sounds like a perfect solution to our predicament.” Perfect indeed.

While he plodded to the other room, she scrambled to her feet and began working at the fastenings of her dress. Heaven forbid he decide to play lady’s maid with her, now that she was awake to remember it. To experience his touch once more. Out of necessity, she had learned to manage even the intricacy of stays without help, but now when she was in a hurry before George came back, the knots of her laces quite defeated her efforts. Water had caused the cord to swell, and her shaky fingers only added to her difficulty.

“Do you need help?” His voice rumbled just beneath her ear. How did he manage to move so soundlessly?

“I’ll be just fine.”

“Of course you will.”

His warm fingers pushed hers aside. She held herself rigid while he tugged at her laces. God help her if he touched her, but he couldn’t possibly undo her stays without his knuckles brushing her back. At the glancing contact, her knees threatened to give way, and she remembered the previous night when he’d caressed her with purpose. She wanted nothing more than to melt against him, to rest her back against the breadth of his chest and allow him to support her for an hour or two.

His breath feathered along her neck, rhythmic little wafts of warm air that increased in tempo as he worked. Something deep inside clenched at the realization. He was reacting. He wanted just as badly. Perhaps needed … Any moment now, he might give in to the temptation and press his lips to the pulse that fluttered just beneath her ear.

Oh, please
.

Her stays loosened and fell to the floor in a sodden heap. She stood, clad only in her chemise, and waited. The back of her neck burned at the thought of what he must be staring at. The thin cotton of her undergarments must be all but transparent.

She breathed. In. Out. If she concentrated on something so basic, she might keep control. Might not turn and run her hands over his flesh like some brazen trollop.

A scratchy weight settled over her shoulders. The blanket. She drew in a long lungful of air. Relief and frustration mingled as she let it out again. When she opened her eyes, he’d moved to stand before her, a dark swath of wool shrouding his bare chest. He watched her from beneath half-lidded eyes as if waiting—waiting for her to set the pace.

A current streaked through her at the thought, as if a stroke of lightning had taken up residence inside her. He was handing her the power to decide. If she wanted him, she need only make a move, and he would restrain his passion no longer. And if not, if she hesitated, then …

He tore his gaze away and moved to the bench. “I’m sorry this trip has been a loss.”

“It’s hardly your fault.” She pulled the blanket more tightly about her shoulders, shocked she could even reply in a coherent fashion.

He settled his weight on the plank of wood, leaving space beside him. Space for her, if she so chose. “Over and above hoping we’d get some word on Jack and Biggles, I thought we could make some sort of outing of this.”

She met his gaze. Heavens, he was serious. “An outing?”

“Well, yes. I suppose it’s a novel concept, but such
things are all the rage in Town. Getting away, doing something different, like strolling along the beach.”

Strolling along the beach—just as she and Jack had done the day she’d met George.

“A pity the weather decided not to cooperate,” he went on, “but we still might make the best of it.”

As if he were courting her. A ridiculous notion. He was merely attempting comfort. No respectable man would court her. Despite the fire, a chill passed through her, and she drew the blanket more securely about herself.

Eyeing her, George patted the empty space next to him. “Why don’t you sit? You’ve been walking half the day.”

Unlike his words to her earlier, he kept his tone and expression deliberately neutral, all hint of seduction vanished. He’d read into her actions, then. Even if they were alone and likely to remain stranded here long past nightfall, she would not step heedlessly into his arms, no matter what her body demanded. Not again. Not when she knew the pleasure he was capable of granting her.

She dropped to the seat next to him, and he made no move to touch, no move to embrace her. Awareness of the action—of what he
could
try—arose from the very absence of the attempt. A silence fell between them, during which her mind filled with a single thought:
He’s so good to me
. He was. All his actions, from rescuing Jack to last night to paying for Peter’s stomach remedy and her meal at the public house, were selfless. She found herself shuffling her feet, the worn soles of her shoes a mere whisper against the wooden planks.

“I don’t suppose anyone’s spirited away a pack of cards or some such,” she said, to fill the space between them. She needed to fill the silence with words, to fill the emptiness with pointless amusements, anything to hold back the reminder of their circumstances.

“I doubt it. This place doesn’t see much use.” His voice
cracked on the final syllable, and he broke into a fit of coughing.

She angled herself toward him to find his face red, as he hacked into his fist, an odd, false cough, one she suspected might have been a laugh under different guise. “What is it?”

He cleared his throat. “Naught but a memory.”

“Of this place?” She glanced at the layer of dust on the mantel. “If you’ve a memory to make you react like that, you must have been here to some nefarious purpose.”

“Oh, I was. Not the most nefarious, mind you, but bad enough.”

When he didn’t clarify, she prompted, “Are you going to leave it at that? If you’ve a story to tell, out with it. We may as well fill the time.”

“I couldn’t possibly.” He leaned into her until she felt the ghost of his breath warm on her neck. “It’s far too scandalous.”

A wicked gleam sparked in his eye—or perhaps it was a reflection of the firelight. Either way, that flash dared her to prod. “I expect no less of you. What did you do? Lead some poor girl astray?”

He drew himself up slightly, surprised, no doubt, that she’d hint at her own situation. And why had she? If he was a seducer of innocents, she was better off remaining ignorant. But part of her already insisted he’d done no such thing. He could have seduced her last night, if he’d chosen, when he had her open and willing on the table. Yet he’d denied himself the ultimate pleasure.

“That wasn’t me,” he said. “That was Revelstoke.”

“What?” She couldn’t fathom the notion. The man she’d met appeared so upright and staid.

“Of course, the poor girl in question is now his wife, so it worked out in the end.”

“And what did you have to do with that?”

“He dispatched me to bring a special license.”

“Your scandal is becoming more respectable by the moment. I’m beginning to think you nearly entered the church.” She couldn’t resist the gibe just to see his reaction.

“Oh, now they definitely wouldn’t have me.” Not with a grin that promised all manner of sin, no.

An answering smile stretched her lips. And yet she wanted to dispute his statement. He might fancy himself sinful and unrepentant, but beneath that front lay an inherently good man. She opened her mouth to tell him so, but a blinding light bathed the cottage in white for an instant. The clap of thunder that followed shook the roof. Her heart jumped a mile or more, and the stab of fear cut the bottom out of her stomach.

George reached for her and pulled her against his chest. “All right there?”

She swallowed her racing heart back into its usual spot. “I will be.”

He settled his arms about her, his fingers tangled in the wisps of her hair. “It’ll be over soon.”

She inched back. “Will it?”

“The storm, yes.”

“But we’re still no closer to finding Jack. The riders won’t have got far. Any clue will be washed away in this deluge.”

He swept his hands to either side of her face, fingers splayed across her cheeks, and forced her to meet his gaze. Sincerity and intensity entwined in the gray depths of his eyes. “We will find him.”

“You cannot promise me that.”

He leaned closer until his breath wafted across her lips. “It’s not a promise. It’s a vow.”

A vow. George caught himself before he shook his head. What the hell had he just done? Sworn to an impossibility,
perhaps. Not only that, he’d laid his own plans aside to focus on Isabelle’s difficulties.

He ought to know better, but something about her moved him. Something about her aroused a need in him to protect, and at the moment, she needed protection from her own thoughts and fears. She needed her son back.

She stared at him, unblinking, eyes huge and round beneath the shadow of her brow. When he put his arms about her, his only intention had been comfort and support. Seduction was out of the question. She’d sent him a clear message on that score, and damn it all, he’d respect her wishes.

Still, he couldn’t prevent his fingers from testing the softness of her cheeks, a gentle caress of affection, not arousal.

Her lips parted, and she emitted the tiniest gasp. Good God, she was skittish. Skittish yet vulnerable to his attentions. Try as she might, she couldn’t completely hide her reaction. Images of her response to him the previous night filled his mind. Like a dream, they unwound before him, and he experienced once more her cries, her movement against him, her body’s salt taste, the way she’d opened to him. Trusted.

What he wouldn’t give to witness that again. Here. Now.

“Isabelle.” He touched her again, more boldly this time, the pad of his finger tracing her cheek to skate across her lower lip. “If I kissed you now, would you allow it?” Another pass with his fingertip. The flesh beneath it was warm and moist and invitingly pink. “Would you allow it or would you slap me?”

She did not shrink away. Thank God. “I shouldn’t allow it, but I’d be discourteous to return all your kindness with a slap.”

He inclined his head until his brow rested against hers. “You should allow it.”

“I should?” She wanted to, certainly. Her unwavering gaze, the husky note to her voice, her utter focus on him all indicated he held her in thrall.

He inched closer until his lips were a hairsbreadth from hers. “I believe it’s customary to seal a vow with a kiss.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

T
HE WAY
he’d been looking at her, she was expecting an assault to rival what she’d lived last evening. But he kept this kiss light and easy, a simple give and take of his mouth against hers. A dance, but not a waltz. No, this kiss was more akin to a reel, meeting and pushing away, together and back again. Not demanding, yet arousing.

Arousing because she now knew what he was capable of.

But then he eased away to tuck her into an embrace. One palm fitted to the back of her head, he pressed her into the crook of his shoulder. Her cheek stuck to his dampened skin.

She breathed in his rich scent and listened to the steady rhythm of the rain drumming on the roof. The fire crackling on the hearth scattered the shadows of the deepening evening and lent warmth. But the true heat in this room emanated from him. It penetrated the thin layer of her chemise and set her nerves aflame.

Her breasts felt heavy pressed against him, heavy and full and sensitive almost as they had when she was expecting. He drew in air, and his hand skimmed along her neck, tracing a deliberate caress to her waist. She quivered.

He shifted slightly, and she raised her head to find him contemplating her. His eyes caught the fire’s glow
and reflected it with hunger. The air about them thickened, and her lips parted. He’d lent her comfort, but the atmosphere between them had become charged with a different energy.