The Rebel Heir (24 page)

“Evie,” he whispered, a plea for more. Tugging at her bottom lip with his teeth, he pulled her back to him with playful kisses. He couldn't take her here on a moving carriage seat, but he couldn't let her go yet either.

A second later, she encircled his neck with her arms, dipping her hand into his shirt to grasp his bare shoulder. His lips slashed over hers, making the demands that coursed through his blood reality. He heard the fabric of his shirt rip but didn't care. Let her tear it from his body. He needed her touch, needed to feel her against him.

He pressed the heel of his hand against the springy hair beneath his palm. Any thought of moving too fast vanished as she whimpered and arched into his touch. He gave her what she wanted. She might not know what to do, but her body certainly did.

Deepening their kiss, he rejoiced when she opened to him, allowing him better access to her body. He stroked her with teasing touches, pulling at the fragile walls she'd placed around her heart. Every pass of his thumb over the small bud of her sex, every circle he made there, tumbled another piece of her guarded exterior to the floor. She was trembling in his arms, exposed to him, flushed and perfect.

She gave a small squeak of alarm as he slipped a finger into her wet heat, but he captured the sound with his mouth. As he brought her to the tipping point, the pleasure unrelenting, she arched into him. Her body was pliant in his hands. He ached to be inside her, but right now she was his—offered up like a gift he could never repay. With every movement, he attempted to return the happiness she gave him.

She clung to him, fingernails digging into his shoulders, and he wasn't much closer to stable than she was. Breathing his name at his lips, she pushed against him, begging for more.

“Come apart for me, Evie. You don't have to hide. Not with me,” he coaxed her.

She stretched for the freedom he promised as he pressed his thumb to her core and drove into her, beckoning her over the steep edge into bliss.

“You don't have to be afraid anymore,” he murmured against her skin. Her body tightened around him, and her grasp pulled her closer to his chest. He pushed into her with one final movement as she pressed her face into his shoulder, burying her scream there. He worked to keep from shaking from the impact of her climax.

It was a beautiful sight. Her dark hair fell around her shoulders, and her dress was a crumpled mess gathered at her waist as she lay over him like a blanket. She pulsed with the warm remnants of desire as she grew languid in his arms. He continued to touch her, drawing lazy circles over her exposed hip.

He was still unbelievably hard, and every bump of the carriage while she sat in his lap made that painfully clear. But she was happy and lounging in his arms, and for tonight that would have to be enough.

Seeming to have the same thought, although a much more innocent version of his own, Evie asked, “Should I? I don't know how to do what you just did, but I could try to—”

“No.” It was too tempting an offer—one that would lead to her naked and straddling him as they rolled through the streets. “Let me hold you. That will be enough for tonight.”

“And tomorrow night?” she asked, a note of hope threaded through her voice.

“We'll see,” he murmured. Another night of this was dangerous—he knew that for certain.

He held her as the carriage continued down the street. He peppered her bare shoulder with kisses as she rested her cheek on his shoulder, then smiled and pulled her closer.

He could stay here forever, circling London with a sated Evie in his arms.

Forever. He'd never thought of forever before. It was a foreign word he associated with death and desolate lands. But when he thought of Evie beside him, that desolate land became lush and hopeful. Love, hope, and forever. He was in trouble. Perhaps one of his love tonics actually worked, and he'd mistaken it for the decanter of whiskey he kept in his bedchamber. He smiled against Evie's skin at the thought.

“Ash?” she finally asked, the warmth of his name blowing across the side of his neck.

“Hmmm?” He didn't trust himself to talk just now. He was likely to blurt out that he loved her, and now was not the time, after what she'd just shared with him.

“Where are we going?”

“We're already there.” He slid his hands over the bare skin of her back, keeping her warm in the night air as he held her to his chest. Her heart beat through his body in time with his own. He wasn't ready to let her go. “I told my driver to keep moving in circles if he must, but not to stop.”

Her soft chuckle reverberated through his body. “I suppose he's accustomed to such directions with your line of work.”

“He is, but not for as good a reason as I had tonight.” He brushed the hair that had fallen down her back to the side. He couldn't stop touching her. Although his body still ached for release, he only wanted to hold her a bit longer. Blasted love.

She straightened enough to meet his gaze in the dim light. “You haven't…offered other ladies…assistance home, have you? You do have quite a nice conveyance. Almost as if it was made for this sort of activity.”

“No, actually. But I'll try that in the next town over, if you think it would be successful.” His voice still held the deep rasp of desire as he spoke. “Imagine the number of ladies I could fit in here,” he said, looking around in consideration.

She shoved him in the shoulder. “I shouldn't have asked.”

“Five? Six if they're on the small side,” he added, still looking around his opulent carriage.

“Ash,” she reprimanded even while she laughed.

“One, only one,” he said a moment later, pressing his forehead to hers. Their gazes locked in the constantly changing light from the windows. Before either could read too much promise into those words, he quipped, “I only got this carriage two months ago.”

“You're impossible,” she said.

And then he was kissing her again. He would have to return her to her home soon, or her parents would know she hadn't gone straight there from the ball. Yet he didn't want this night to end. Returning her home meant giving her back to his lifelong enemy.

“Meet me tomorrow night,” he murmured against her lips, knowing that was the quickest he could see her again once he released his hold on her tonight.

“For another ride in your carriage?”

“No. Tomorrow there will be a destination.”

She made a small sound of complaint and squirmed closer on his lap, making him groan with unfulfilled longing.

“Trust me.”

“I do,” she said in a soft voice.

Perhaps Evie's poor judgment did need to be mentioned after all. But instead, he signaled Stapleton with a quick bang on the roof and drew her into another kiss.

Ian clenched the fist that remained hidden beneath the rough surface of the inn table. They needed to be on the road chasing after this Crosby fellow, but instead they were here—debating if they should be here at all. Far too much time had been spent already gathering the men who sat around him, then nearly a week had been wasted on the road toward Oxford. But they were near London now. With each day he came closer to the man who'd swindled his grandmother, but he also came closer to killing the other gentlemen traveling with him.
Gather the neighboring gentlemen
, Rockwale had insisted.

Blasted Rockwale. What did he know? This was the last time Ian would take advice from a foxed butler. Now he was trapped with these men, swilling ale instead of completing his task.

“Perhaps it's time we turned back, Lord Braxton. We have homes and lives waiting for us, after all,” Lord Feathsly said to the murmured agreement of the other gentlemen around the table.

Ian shifted to keep from tapping his foot in his impatience. “If you wish to return to your families without accomplishing the task we set out to do, by all means return. Lord Feathsly, I believe you invested rather heavily with our quarry. If you want to return home to your wife and inform her of your failure, then go ahead. I hold no ill will toward you.”

“Now see here, Braxton—”

“I'm planning to travel the few remaining miles into London, where I will make further inquiries.” Ian indicated the road outside the Cross Keys Inn where they'd stopped hours ago to water the horses and
rest for a bit
. Rest, ha! Who needed rest? Not Ian. “I will find this Lord Crosby, as he is now known. If you want no involvement in the last of our journey, so be it.” He took a long drink from the tankard in his hand, allowing the underlying taunt to find its mark.

“I suppose we've come this far,” Feathsly muttered.

“Right you are, Feathsly,” another gentleman in their group encouraged. “We know the man's alias now, as well as his direction.”

The youngest of their group—though still older than Ian by at least ten years—chimed in, eager to be on the winning side of the argument. “Think of how celebrated we'll be as the heroes who brought the villainous Crosby to justice right in the heart of London society.”

“I suspect there will be celebrations in our honor,” the gentleman at Ian's side mused.

“No doubt,” Ian agreed with a raised tankard of ale. In truth, he had his doubts about how celebrated they would be for bringing to light the fact that half the ton had bought into the man's schemes. In Ian's experience, gentlemen didn't enjoy admitting their flawed thinking. But he wasn't about to argue when the idea was helping his cause. The other gentlemen at the table raised their glasses and drank.

They would be in London by tomorrow, but then began the trouble of finding the elusive
Lord Crosby
. He had seemed to be everywhere at once in Bath, but that was the nature of Bath, wasn't it? This was London.

A different gentleman in his group had wanted to return home every day of their journey thus far. What would a city the size of London bring? How many calculated statements of persuasion would Ian have to make to these men before he was able to find Crosby? He took another drink and ran his hand over the pocket where he kept that page of the
Times
. The ink had faded and blurred from him unfolding it and reading it again and again.

That blasted man would pay, not only for what he'd done to Ian's grandmother but for Ian's present inconvenience. He'd been under the impression that managing his sisters was difficult. He'd been wrong. Managing six gentlemen in search of justice and their investment funds was far more difficult. Crosby had no idea the storm that was brewing for him.

Ian smiled and stood from the table, unable to sit in these stagnant waters any longer. He needed to move, needed to act. “Let us return to the road. If we leave now, we can reach London by nightfall.”

“Quite the quick pace you've set for us, Braxton.”

Quick? They thought this quick? “I only want to see this matter settled in a timely manner. You can rest once we're in London.”

“We'll have to rest after traveling at such speeds.”

“And I would like to visit my tailor while in town.”

“Capitol idea, Feathsly. I wouldn't be opposed to stopping at my club. It's been some time since I've been to town.”

Ian stopped listening and strode out the door. The other gentlemen in his party could do what they pleased. He was going to town for only one reason—to find Crosby and bring him to justice. Ian would not be
resting
until he accomplished his task.

The afternoon sun filtered down on him through gray clouds. Not too far away, under these same clouds, Crosby was no doubt busy hoodwinking some poor member of good society. Ian wouldn't stop until he found the man.

Evangeline crumpled the short note in the palm of her hand and tossed it into the parlor fireplace before her mother could ask what it was about. She'd already memorized the words anyway. Like a promise whispered in her ear, it made her smile.

Garden gate at eight o'clock tonight.

Yours,

Ash

She blushed at his salutation.
Yours.
Was he hers? After chasing after him for a year, and then having him chase after her, was this it? It certainly had felt like something real in his carriage last night. He'd told her he couldn't stay after his work was done. She knew the truth of their situation, but she also knew the truth of her own heart for the first time. Her decisions weren't steering her astray as her family thought—they were steering her in the unlikely direction she was meant to go.

Tonight, that direction was wherever Ash was going.

After a terribly long afternoon filled with lectures from her mother, quiet plans with her maid, and anticipation for tonight, she was at the garden gate with ten minutes to spare. She'd been taught not to pace; however, she'd also been taught not to climb from her window to meet a gentleman at the garden gate. She turned and had begun walking back to where she'd come from when she heard his voice over her shoulder.

“Leaving so soon?”

“Ash,” she exclaimed as she turned back toward him. He stood on the opposite side of the fence. The street behind him was empty, making him look as though he'd simply appeared at the garden gates without the need of movement. “Where is your carriage?”

“You sound disappointed. Are you using me for my fine conveyance?” A look of mock shock drew his brows together.

“Of course I'm using you,” she teased as she neared him at the fence. “I have a weakness for pairs of strange-looking dogs.”

“Doesn't everyone?” He held the gate open for her.

Glancing over her shoulder, she saw no sign of watchful eyes in the windows of her home as she slipped out onto the dark street.

Ash took her hand in his and led her around the corner to where his carriage was waiting. “Did you complain of a headache again?”

Her plan this evening had been carefully thought through. Jane would make certain she was seen going into Evangeline's bedchamber in another hour. A scripted, one-sided conversation would take place, and at the end of it, Jane would leave, locking Evangeline's door, yet leaving her window open for Evangeline's return. It was a brilliant plan. “Tonight I'm reading in bed,” she said with a satisfied smile.

“Would you like to return to it?” He glanced at her, a grin tugging at his cheeks. “I would happily join you in your bed. Although your book may go unfinished.”

“Where are you taking me?” she asked to cover the deep blush that heated her skin.

“It's a surprise.” He handed her up into the carriage before joining her.

Tonight he didn't pull her into his arms, leaving her somewhat disappointed. Instead, he sat across from her, his long legs stretched across the floor of the carriage, trapping her feet between his ankles. From this position, she was forced to sit straight with nowhere to look but into his blue eyes. Perhaps
forced
was a strong word, as she had only a moment ago considered climbing onto the man's lap for the ride. But there was something quite intimate about sitting in a darkened carriage and staring into a man's eyes. He nudged the sides of her feet with his boots and smiled at her as they began to roll away from her home.

For the duration of the short ride, she guessed their destination while Ash made wild claims of where he
should
take her—to the park to swim in the Serpentine, to the harbor to smell the dead fish, to a brothel to have her cheeks rouged. By the time they arrived in an alley between two tall buildings, she was out of guesses. Where were they? But just as she leaned near the window to investigate, Ash produced the cravat she'd pulled from his throat the previous night.

“Have you decided to move into your carriage now?” she asked as he stretched the length of fabric out between his hands. “If you brought in a few options of coat, you would never need to leave.”

“This is to be a surprise.” He held up the cravat and nodded for her to comply with whatever he had planned for her.

Her heart sped as she looked at him. “You want to blindfold me.”

“Have you never been surprised before?”

“Not with anything pleasant,” she admitted.

“Then I'm glad you're with me tonight.” His smile was warm, easing her fears.

She leaned forward on the seat until she was poised in front of him. He lifted the cravat to her face. His fingers grazed her cheeks in a light touch as he carefully wrapped the fabric over her eyes and tied it at the back of her head.

“It smells like you,” she murmured.

“Hopefully that isn't a bad beginning,” he said with a laugh as he secured the knot behind her.

“No, it's…” Her voice trailed off as she inhaled the scent of his skin. Memories of last night overwhelmed her as she sat in the dark surrounded by the entirely male smell of shaving soap mixed with something that belonged only to Ash.

Without warning, he pressed his lips to hers in a quick but heart-stopping kiss. He gathered her hands in his own as he said, “I'm right here. There's no need to become intoxicated on the scent of my cravat.”

“I wasn't,” she began but stopped, knowing it was a lie.

“Come with me.” There was a smile in his voice as he lifted her from the carriage and placed her in front of him on the ground. “Wait. I almost forgot…” She heard him step away for a second before returning to pull her bonnet from her head and replace it with a different one.

She reached up to touch it, but he grabbed her raised hand and placed a stick of some sort in her grasp. “And hold this just so. Very well, you're ready.”

She couldn't keep the giggle from her voice. She felt completely ridiculous holding some unknown object in her hand while blindfolded and wearing an unknown hat. “Ready to go where?”

“With me.” He wrapped her arm around his and began leading her away into the unknown.

“Where are you taking me?” she asked again as the smell changed from London alley to something lightly floral.

“Do you trust me?” he asked against her ear.

“Yes. But I would still like to know if I'm in the park or the center of a ballroom.”

“You're in neither place.”

“Ash, that isn't helpful in the least.”

“Watch your step.”

She stopped walking and looked toward where she imagined his face to be. “How am I to watch anything at all?”

“That's true,” he mused, his voice coming from a completely different location from where she'd focused her glare.

While she turned, attempting to find him, he slipped his hands around her waist, lifting her from the ground. A second later she was in his arms and he was moving. She buried her face in his neck, hoping they were not in the middle of a ballroom after all. When he was through with this charade, she was going to kill him. He jostled her close to his chest. Was he climbing stairs? Stairs… Where were there stairs? But she gave up a minute later, realizing she'd never been anywhere with this many stairs.

His heart pounded through her body. She enjoyed the feel of it through her hands, but he must be exhausted from carrying her up so many steps. If he'd only remove the cover from her eyes, she could walk. “If you allow me to see, you won't have to carry me,” she muttered against the soft hair that curved behind his ear.

“That's a fine offer, since we've reached the top now.” He released her legs and allowed her to slide down his body until her toes touched the floor.

“The top of what?”

“You aren't going to stop asking questions and simply experience the moment, are you?”

“No,” she replied with a smile, the cravat stretching across her cheeks as she did so.

“Very well. Have it your way.” He pulled the cloth from her eyes.

She blinked as her eyes adjusted from dark to the dim lighting of… “We're…in a hall of some sort.”

“Right you are.” He laced his fingers with hers and tugged her toward the far end of the hall.

Glancing down, she now saw that she held a large masquerade mask on a stick that would make her look as if she were an insect of some sort. “Is this a masquerade ball? Because those don't usually end well for me.”

“No.” He chuckled and took the mask from her. “That was simply for my amusement. You looked like you might sting me the whole way up here—quite frightening.”

Sighing with exasperation, she looked behind them to see a service door that must lead to the steps. Sparse candles held in shining metal sconces cast angled shadows over the floor as they progressed down the hall. It was quite dark, yet it was a fine building, with dark wood moldings surrounding the occasional painting, and a thick rug beneath their feet. It reminded her of the elegance of the British Museum, where Isabelle could often be found, but there weren't enough paintings or sconces for this to be some lesser-used upper room.

How would anyone see the art, even during the day? What type of building was elegant yet shadowed? Voices rumbled somewhere in the distance, but all was empty and silent where they were. She glanced to Ash for answers but he only smiled. As they progressed, she noticed the series of doors they passed were only on one side of the hall. Evangeline squinted at one of the small plaques outside the last door as they slowed.
The Duke of Kilburn
was embossed into the ornate piece of metal that hung there.

“Ash, where are we? And who is the Duke of Kilburn?”

One of her two questions was answered as he opened the door for her, leaving her breathless. Chandeliers piled high with candles hung from an ornately painted ceiling in the center of the large room. Where they stood, in a shadowed box above the gathered crowd, they were almost level with the ceiling. She stepped forward, counting four levels beneath them all filled with people. Gasping, she stepped back again. Someone could see her.

“No one will know you're here,” Ash said, reading her thoughts.

“The theater? I've always wanted to attend. Mother calls it vulgar. How did you manage it? What if the Duke of Kilburn finds us here?” She knew she was blabbering, but she couldn't stop herself.

“I knew this box to be free.”

She narrowed her eyes on him. She was now an accomplice in his crimes. Breaking into a duke's private box at the theater must have some penalty. “Someone could see us,” she said without any heat to her voice. She didn't want to leave. “We shouldn't be here.”

“That is why I brought this.” He tapped her hat.

She shrank to the corner and removed the hat he'd placed on her in the alley to investigate it. It was by far the largest, ugliest hat she'd ever laid eyes upon, adorned with giant faux flowers and bunches of ribbon in a green that reminded her of a muddy bog. “It's hideous,” she said with a laugh.

“I know. No one would believe you would wear something so unfashionable.” He tucked a stray bit of hair behind her ear as he spoke. “Your secret visit to the vulgar side of London is safe.”

“This may become my new favorite fashion.” Replacing it on her head, she murmured a quiet thank-you.

“Thank
you
,” he countered. “I believe we have some time before the production begins. Would you care to sit?” He indicated the row of chairs in the center of the box, but she didn't move from the shadowed back corner.

“What are you doing to me, Ash Claughbane? Breaking into a ducal box at the theater… What's next?”

“That, Evie, is entirely up to you.” He ran his hands down her arms.

Her heart pounded at the look in his eyes, as if she were the only person in the world, only her. “Anything I want?” Her gaze dropped to his mouth. She was staring. She knew it and yet she couldn't stop herself.

“Whatever you want,” he murmured. His voice was soft, rolling over her in waves of warmth with every word. “All you have to do is say it.”

“Kiss me.”

The corner of his mouth quirked up for a split second before he stepped too close for casual conversation. “Here before the prying eyes of society?” he teased, but his hands were already on her, pulling her to his body as he trapped her against the back wall of the box.

The giant hat pushed to the back of her head as her shoulders found the cool plaster wall. He closed the gap between them, kissing her with much more intensity than he had in the alley. This was a kiss of declaration, of direction, and she wanted to follow with all of her heart. She didn't know where this path led, but she knew it would bring Ash closer to her. She reached out, tasting him and seeking more…and he matched her. For every move she made, he upped the stakes as if it was a game—a game he played quite well.

His hands moved over her body in knowing strokes, up her sides, down over her hips to the curve of her bottom, pulling her into a frenzied pool of wanting. Their bodies pressed together, both seeking more.

She delved her hands into his coat, tugging at the back of his shirt until she'd ripped it loose from his clothing. Running her hands up his back, she reveled in the heat of his skin against her wrists, the movement of his muscles beneath her fingers, his body so close to hers.

Just when she thought she was as close as she could be to this man she'd dreamed of for the past year, he nudged her feet apart with the toe of his boot and stepped closer. He lifted her until they were on eye level. He broke their kiss but only long enough to meet her gaze for a second before his lips were on hers again.

There was some emotion in that short lock of their eyes that she couldn't quite define. All she knew was no one had ever looked at her that way, and no one else ever would. She splayed her hands across his back, needing more of him as she deepened their kiss. He matched her desperation and rocked his hips into hers with a small groan—his or hers, she wasn't certain.