Chapter Three
Tremors shivered through Lady Vivien’s slight frame as she held herself rigidly upright in front of him. It was a wonder she could still tolerate a man’s touch at all, much less the close embrace they shared on Ranger’s back. Though Aden had been surprised by her reluctance to mount up, her emotions were obviously seesawing from one extreme to the other. If only he could ascertain how badly she’d been hurt and the price her foul captors had extracted from her lovely body.
Not as much as he’d originally thought, he hoped and suspected. She had panicked a few times, which was perfectly understandable. But she’d also reacted to the challenges thrown at her with a wit and vigor inconceivable in a woman who’d just been raped. In fact, she’d almost made him laugh when she snapped at him after stubbing her toe. But only a few minutes later she was back to acting like a skittish foal, reinforcing his concern that something truly ugly had happened to her in those caves.
But how did one go about asking a gently bred lady such a question? Though Aden hadn’t a clue how to broach the topic, knowing how badly she’d been treated would help him gauge how much more she could take. So far, they’d been lucky, but he couldn’t depend on that luck continuing. They still had to get clear of these woods and make it safely to the hamlet where he’d stowed his coach and left his men waiting for them.
Ranger stepped carefully along the trail, as quiet and precise as always. Aden had taken the horse on a swift reconnoiter at dusk, looking for obstacles and imprinting the way through the woods in his mind. Ranger needed little guidance but Aden kept a firm hand on the reins even as he attempted to keep an equally firm grip on his growing awareness of the woman in his arms.
It didn’t help one jot that the sweetly scented, intensely feminine Lady Vivien was so powerful a distraction. The bruised, vulnerable look in her blue eyes still haunted him, and he finally acknowledged it was partly for his own sake that he needed to know if she’d been raped. If she had, there wasn’t a force on earth that could stop him from hunting down whoever had instigated her abduction.
He was still searching for the correct words to ask so appalling a question when he felt her body start to relax. Up until now, she’d held herself stiff as a hitching post, leaning as far forward as she could. All that did, of course, was push her sweetly rounded arse into his groin. Every motion of his horse’s limbs jostled that lovely piece of her anatomy against him, and his groin naturally approved. Aden had been grinding his teeth for the last twenty minutes, telling himself to ignore the alluring sensations. But Lady Vivien served as a heady inducement to sin. Even dirty and disheveled, sharp-tongued and skittish, she was a dainty beauty whose scent reminded him of long summer days and soft, warm nights and a life he’d forgotten long ago.
Another few hundred yards and she slumped back into his chest, her soft, even breathing signalling she’d dropped into a doze. Her small change in position generated another set of challenges. Her upright stance had collapsed, bringing her breasts into contact with his forearm. When he pulled her up onto the horse he’d managed to get his arm inside her cloak as he wrapped it around her waist. Thank God he was wearing gloves because her silk gown and nearly nonexistent undergarments would have been no barrier against the touch of his hands. But with the change in her position her breasts now jiggled merrily on his sleeve, as if his arm was a nicely placed shelf for those tempting mounds to rest upon.
Aden had gotten a taste of her lushness earlier when he’d captured her body under his to prevent her from exploding off that blasted pallet. He’d been vaguely aware at the time that her slim frame held some enticing curves, but had been too busy keeping her quiet to pay much attention. Now he had all the time in the world to feel her breasts keeping her hips company as they drove his temperature up several degrees.
And wasn’t he the right bastard to be thinking that way? The last thing the poor girl needed was his cockstand poking her in the back as they tried to escape danger and death. Yes, he was a hell of a hero. He didn’t need tonight’s escapade to confirm how far from the truth that notion had become.
A loud crack sounded off to the right, jerking both his and Ranger’s heads in that direction. With a slight pressure on the reins he pulled the horse to a standstill. Lady Vivien startled awake and he had to clamp her against him to keep her from sliding sideways.
“Why are we stopping?” Her breasts rose and fell with a nervous breath. “What’s wrong?”
Aden’s chest pulled tight at the quaver in her voice. Lady Vivien did not strike him as a woman who easily succumbed to fear, but her voice told him she was skating on the edge of it now. He gave her a gentle warning squeeze and listened, peering into the endless gloom and shadows. To her credit, she held herself silent and still although he could feel the effort it cost as she shivered in his arms.
Then again, the shivering could signify she was taking a chill. The night air was mild, but she must have lain in that dank room for hours. A sense of urgency pricked at him. The need to get her warm and safe as quickly as possible challenged his discipline and his need to remain motionless and watchful.
That had never been a challenge before, and it baffled him. Dominic had drummed it into his head that a good agent never let emotion throw him off his course. And when civilians were involved, the agent must think of them as little more than an inanimate package. Lady Vivien was surely a package, but how could he begin to think of her as inanimate when she was the most tempting bundle of femininity he’d come across in a long time? No wonder he avoided women like her. The blasted things played havoc with a man’s good sense. Aden relished a good tumble as much as the next man, but he kept his nocturnal adventures confined to the demimonde, and only to those few women whose discretion he entirely trusted.
Ranger’s ears were still pricked forward, but he evinced no other sign of alarm. After another moment of listening, Aden nudged the horse forward. Every sound out there in the darkness belonged, he felt certain. But he reminded himself that he’d been equally certain in France, and he’d been disastrously wrong.
“Is someone following us?” Lady Vivien asked in a small voice.
Again, anger clawed through him that she could be reduced to a bundle of nerves by a single sound. He tucked her against his chest, murmuring quietly in her ear, “It’s all right, sweetheart. It was only an animal in the underbrush.”
Immediately, her muscles stiffened. She slowly eased herself forward, clutching his forearm to keep steady.
Christ.
Had he really just called her sweetheart? What the hell was wrong with him? His control was slipping. No, in fact his control, for which he was justly famous in the Intelligence Service, had gone straight to perdition. And if all it took was a woman to send it there—no matter
how
delectable the woman—he either needed a long rest or some punishing rounds in the practice ring with his fellow agents. The sooner he got Lady Vivien back to London and out of his arms, the better.
For both their sakes.
Sweetheart?
The impact of that little word shot through Vivien like a cannonball.
The only man who’d ever used that endearment had been Papa when he was ruffling her hair after she’d shown him one of her childish drawings, or when he was sending her off to look after her brother, Kit. But St. George had just called her that, and she had the distinct impression that what he felt for her was far from paternal. It wasn’t merely the way he’d looked at her during that moment in the tunnels when she had almost lost her nerve, or the way he carefully cradled her body on top of his massive horse. No, she might be gently bred and a virgin, but she was far from naïve. On top of the endearment that now hung in the air between them, the bulge poking into her backside was ample proof St. George most decidedly thought of her in a way that left her thoroughly shaken.
Vivien stared ahead into the darkness, clutching the horse’s silky mane and trying her best to ignore the brawny thighs that surrounded her and the muscled arm wrapped around her waist. Not that she was frightened of him, precisely, since she was confident St. George had no intention of acting on his . . . impulses. After all, he was related to the late Lord Thornbury, one of the most rigidly correct peers in the
ton
.
Still, it was hard to ignore her rescuer’s obvious physical reaction. Idiot that she was, she couldn’t help wondering if it meant something about
her
. Probably not, since she understood most men had little control over their baser impulses. That was the reason Mamma constantly lectured her about appropriate conduct, except, of course, when Vivien pitted her skill and knowledge against the most hardened rakes to win the money that kept the bill collectors at bay. Mamma never lectured her about
that
.
Kit, however, had explained all about men’s animal impulses years ago when she was seventeen. Vivien had come across a rather alarming book tucked away on a top shelf in her father’s library. She had no business looking up there, but once having seen the outrageous illustrations in the book she’d been too horrified and intrigued to let the matter drop.
And the only person she could question was Kit. Cyrus would have smacked her or run tattling to their father, but Kit was never shocked. He’d said men couldn’t help the way their bodies reacted to women, and that a lady was best served by ignoring it. Only if she found herself in tricky circumstances that forced her to defend herself did a lady take action. Kit had recommended whacking a pencil or even a stout twig sharply down on the offending appendage. He claimed that to be an extremely effective deterrent to overenthusiastic behavior.
Vivien had spent much of the last twenty-four hours vowing to never leave the house again without a stout pencil in her reticule.
Her rescuer’s deep voice interrupted her ruminations. “Forgive my impertinence, but I must ask you a rather painful question.” He hesitated a moment before continuing. “And please know that I ask this question because I must.”
Vivien blinked. She heard the reluctance in St. George’s voice and wondered if he was embarrassed by his rather forward behavior. Perhaps he wanted to make his apologies, poor man. “Mr. St. George, you may ask me anything you like. I will try my best to assist you in any way possible.”
His hand tightened briefly around her waist. “Very well. Did any of the men who abducted you visit indignities upon your person?” he asked in a tight voice.
Confused, she twisted around to look at him. His features seemed carved from the hardest of stone, and his eyes were but shadows in the night. A muscle in his jaw ticked once, then once again.
“Surely the very act of kidnapping is an indignity, is it not?” she asked. “What exactly do you . . . oh!” She jerked back around, too embarrassed to face him. Humiliation sent blood rushing to her cheeks.
He wanted to know if she’d been raped.
She’d spent hours living with that fear, and hoped she would never have to think on it again. But his serious manner and the entire way he asked the question implied that her answer was of significant import to him.
Vivien swallowed against the sensation of ants crawling up her neck. “No, sir. I was not r . . . raped.” She stumbled over the word, her throat closing around it. A moment later, she sensed a slight easing in the body that enveloped her.
“I am indeed happy to hear that, my lady, and I apologize for the discomfort the question caused you. That was not my intent.”
Vivien nodded cautiously. “What was your intent, if I may ask?”
He paused. She got the impression he was weighing his answer carefully.
“I’ve not allowed you a moment’s pause since we escaped the caves,” he replied. “I needed to assess your degree of injury.”
She frowned. What odd phrasing. “I have a notion you’re not being completely truthful with me, Mr. St. George. What, exactly, worries you?”
He exhaled a quick puff of breath. Not a laugh, really, but something close to it. “Why Lady Vivien, what in the world could we possibly have to worry about?”
She couldn’t help starching up. “As happy as I am to serve as a source of amusement to you, sir, I would appreciate an answer to my question.”
He pulled her an inch closer. His mouth skimmed the crown of her head, and she shivered again, swearing he’d just brushed his lips against her hair. But that couldn’t be right. Perhaps he was simply adjusting his seat, which would not be unlikely given the size of his—
Don’t think about that.
“Forgive me,” he said, all trace of amusement now absent from his voice. “Thus far we’ve been extremely fortunate to escape without raising the alarm. With a little luck, we’ll reach my carriage and be on the road back to London before your abductors track us down. But if something should occur—”
She must have made some kind of noise, because he gave her a reassuring squeeze.
“—if something should occur,” he carried on in a calm voice, “I need to know what more you can tolerate. You’ve been through a grave ordeal already, after all.”
Vivien’s throat grew tight once more, but this time with gratitude. It had been so long since anyone, especially a man, had worried about her. That this stranger’s brave kindness should affect her so deeply surely said something about the quality of her relationships, and not in a way that could mean anything good.
“I’m quite well, sir,” she managed to reply. “Whatever is required of me to complete our escape, I will gladly do it.”
“I have no doubt of it, my lady,” he said.
The approval in his voice brought warmth flooding to her limbs and her heart lifted. On the heels of those lovely sensations, however, came caution. St. George had made it clear they were still in peril and more might be asked of her.