Secrets of a Runaway Bride (33 page)

Annie frowned. “But I don’t want to—”

“It was not a request.”

Glaring at him, Annie hastily retrieved her bonnet and pushed it back onto her head. She stuffed the quilt into her satchel and Jordan pulled her by the hand over to his mount and unceremoniously hoisted her up. Then he swung up behind her. The horse took off at a brisk pace toward the house.

“I don’t see why we can’t—”

“Which is precisely why I’m taking you home,” he replied.

He wrapped one arm around her waist and Annie smiled a smile he couldn’t see. Oh, it felt so good to have him behind her, solid and strong, touching her. His blasted morals were keeping him from doing more. She sighed. The man might be a rake, but unfortunately, he was a rake with honor.

She turned her head and rubbed her cheek against his shirtfront, breathing in the familiar welcome scent of him. “Tell me. Why do you want to spoil all the fun?”

He groaned. “Annie. You tell me. Exactly how do you think this will play out? You won’t allow me to tell Devon and Lily but you want to continue this … this—”

“Affair,” she offered helpfully.

“No. Not an affair.” His voice was sharp.

“Very well.” She faced forward again. “What do you suggest we call it?”

“Madness?”

Annie laughed. “How about a liaison?”

“Not that either.” Jordan pulled her closer against him.

“Rendezvous?”

“What? Have you been reading a book of scandalous French words?”

She clutched at his strong arm. “No, but if you have one I should very much like to borrow it.”

Jordan sighed.

“Jordan, I told you. I’m perfectly content with this being nothing more than a … tryst.”

He glanced down at her. “Annie, you don’t really mean that.”

“Yes I do. What happened last night was my choice. I knew what I was doing. I remember your speech from that night in the Roths’ library. You were right. I’m not going to throw myself at a man ever again. If you don’t want me, you don’t want me.”

His arm tightened. “Don’t want you? Are you mad? All I do is want you.”

Her heart flipped. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Promise me something, Annie.”

She forced her voice to be nonchalant. “Depends upon what it is.”

“You are an unholy temptation and I’ve no desire to be murdered by my own closest friend. Promise me you’ll stay away from me, far away, until we make some decisions.”

Annie sighed. Jordan didn’t know it, but she wasn’t about to make any such promise.

They galloped up to the back of the house then. Devon’s housekeeper, Mrs. Applebee, was standing on the terrace. No doubt seeing to the tea that was to be served there later.

Jordan dismounted quickly and pulled Annie down. He quickly dragged her over to Mrs. Applebee and foisted her off to the housekeeper’s arms. “Get her upstairs before someone sees her with her hair down,” he said.

Mrs. Applebee’s eyes were wide as moons but she quickly curtsied. “Yes, my lord.” She dragged Annie into the house quick as could be.

Annie gave Jordan one final parting glance. He didn’t know it, but he’d just sealed his fate. Unholy temptation, he’d called her. And that’s exactly what she intended to be.

CHAPTER 43

Dinner the next evening was excruciating. Annie was seated several chairs away from Jordan but she couldn’t keep her eyes off him. The tone of his voice, the melody of his laughter. Pictures of their night together kept flashing through her mind. Images of his hands on her thighs, his mouth on her neck.

He’d managed to avoid her all night last night just as he’d warned. Tonight she was having none of it.

Retiring to the salon with the other ladies may have been more excruciating than the dinner, simply because Jordan wasn’t there to see, hear, smell. She smiled through all of the endless chitchat and tepid tea and finally returned to her room with a sigh of relief.

Mary helped her off with her evening dress and Annie tossed on a flimsy white chemise. She crawled into bed and attempted to read a book. A book. Did Jordan really have a book of scandalous French words? Where was Jordan? What was he doing? He was determined to ignore her, and fine, she’d
seemingly
promised not to fling herself at him anymore. She snapped her book shut. And she would not.

Just as soon as the house party was over.

She counted to one hundred to ensure Mary had had time to retire and then she tiptoed to the door of her room. This time, she was going to Jordan’s bedchamber. She slipped out the door and down the hall, keeping to the shadows. Medford and Jordan had switched rooms after all. His new room was five doors down from hers. She’d already stopped by Devon’s study before she’d retired to ensure Jordan and Devon weren’t staying up late drinking. The study had been empty. Apparently, Devon had retired already too. Best not to think about what he and Lily were up to.

Annie raced down the shadowed corridor until she came to a stop in front of Jordan’s room. She drew a deep breath before she knocked. What if he’d gone home tonight? It was possible. He’d already been there once today. Lily and Devon had planned another ball for the following evening as the final event of the house party, but perhaps Jordan had left and planned to return tomorrow. Or worse, perhaps he’d left for good. Annie’s stomach dropped. He wouldn’t leave without saying good-bye, would he?

She closed her eyes and took another deep breath. He had seemed eager to escape her yesterday after their encounter in the woods. She raised her chin. There was only one way to find out, wasn’t there? She turned the knob and nudged open the heavy wooden door.

She moved quietly into the darkened room. Only two candles were lit, one by the bed and one by a washstand in the corner. She shut the door with a soft click, locked the bolt behind her, and leaned back against it. She expelled her breath. Her eyes adjusted to the dim light and soon she heard the swish of … water.

Jordan was taking a bath? Yes, he was. She focused on the copper tub that rested near the washstand. Jordan sat in the tub, his back toward her. He obviously hadn’t heard her enter the room. Thank goodness. She smiled to herself. She had the upper hand at the moment and she wanted to keep it that way. She slipped her chemise over her head and tossed it in the corner. Then, completely nude, and feeling oh-so-bad, she tiptoed over to the tub.

“Enjoying yourself?” she asked in the most seductive voice she could muster.

Jordan’s head swiveled around. He nearly leaped from the tub.

“No. No,” she said. “Relax.” She wrapped her naked arms around his shoulders.

His voice shook. “Annie, what are you doing here and … why are you naked?”

She laughed softly at that. “Do I really need to explain it?”

She entwined her arms around his neck and bit his earlobe. Jordan shuddered.

She kissed his jaw, his cheekbone, the side of his mouth.

“Annie, you shouldn’t—” He made a move as if to get up. Annie slipped her hand down into the steamy water and let her fist close around him. He was already hard.

He clenched his eyes shut and slid back into the tub. “Don’t do this to me,” he begged. “You promised to stay away.”

She stroked her hand up and down and he kept his eyes closed, a pained look on his face.

“I didn’t really promise,” she whispered huskily against his rough cheek. “I just let you think I did. Besides, this is more fun. Isn’t it?”

Without letting go of him, she slid around the side of the tub and slipped into the water on top of him.

Jordan groaned. “Annie, why?”

She rubbed him up and down and he stopped talking. “I want you, Jordan,” she whispered.

Jordan’s jaw was clenched, sweat broke out across his brow, his eyes were tightly closed. “You must stop.” He pushed himself up in the tub to try to move away from her but it only served to push their bodies closer in contact in all the right places. She wrapped her other arm around his neck.

“Kiss me, Jordan,” she whispered.

“God, Annie, I can only ask you one more time. Please get out of this tub and go. For your own good.”

“I can’t do that.”

He shuddered.

She shifted atop him and guided him into her. Jordan grabbed at her hips, trying to pull her away but failing. “Oh God,” he groaned. “Please.”

“That’s what I was just about to say to you,” she murmured.

She slid her hips up and down and Jordan’s head fell back against the rim of the tub. “Damn it, Annie,” he ground out between clenched teeth.

He grabbed her then and pulled her to him, kissing her fiercely and moving his hips under her to take control. Annie moaned with delight. His hands braced on her hips, he pushed into her again and again before he finally murmured against her neck, “Not here, I want you on the bed.”

“By all means, my lord.”

He pushed himself from the tub and carried her to the bed in his arms. He laid her down there, water dripping all around them, and braced himself atop her. He was just about to enter her again when a knock sounded at the door. Jordan fell to his side and rolled over; Annie quickly moved atop him. Her eyes were wide.

“Ashbourne?” Devon’s voice filtered through the door.

“Don’t say a word,” Jordan warned in a harsh whisper, and Annie nodded rapidly.

“Yes,” Jordan called back in a thunderous tone.

“Ashbourne, I came by to see if you were interested in a drink. Meet me in the study?”

Annie squelched her giggle against Jordan’s chest. Now this was an interesting turn of events. Oh, what would her big, strong brother-in-law do if he knew his innocent little sister was lying naked atop his best friend on the other side of the locked door? It was downright scandalous. Would make for an interesting pamphlet, really. She bit her lip to keep from laughing again.

“I … um…” Jordan’s breath caught in his throat, for Annie hadn’t kept still. Instead she was wiggling her way down his chest and her mouth was perilously close to his cock. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think straight, sure as hell couldn’t talk to his friend who would castrate him if he knew what was going on at the moment.

“I—” Jordan repeated, sweat popping out on his brow.

Annie’s hands were braced on either side of his hips and when she brushed her mouth against his tip, his hips bucked. “Oh God. Don’t,” he warned in a whispered half growl, half plea. “Not now.”

She glanced up at him with dark mischievous eyes and whispered, “I think now is the perfect time, actually.”

Jordan squeezed his eyes shut.

“What’s going on in there, Ashbourne?” came Devon’s voice just as Annie clamped her soft pink lips around Jordan.

He
could not
stop his groan.

“Ashbourne, are you all right?”

“Yes. Yes. I’m … so … good,” Jordan managed through tightly clenched teeth. “I’m bloody perfect, actually,” he whispered for only Annie to hear. His hands moved through her luxurious dark hair, and looking down at her tiny pink tongue darting across his cock, he got even harder.

She looked up at him through half-lidded eyes and removed her mouth from him momentarily. “Aren’t you going to answer him, my lord?” she whispered just before sliding her lips back down him again, making him insane.

“If I live through this, I swear I’m going to torture you endlessly,” he ground out in a harsh whisper.

Annie fluttered her eyelashes at him and pulled him from her mouth. “Promise?” Her mouth descended again.

Jordan clutched at the bedsheets on either side of his hips. “I’ll meet you down there in say, fifteen”—her mouth moved again—“uh, half an hour,” he called.

“Good, see you then,” Devon replied, and the clip of his boots on the marble floors signaled his retreat.

The minute Devon was gone, Jordan snatched Annie up into his arms. He rolled over on top of her and pulled her hands down so they were pinned on either side of her hips, then he started his own slow descent. “That was unfair,” he said.

Annie shuddered with delight. “So?”

“So, now it’s my turn. And when I said torture, I meant it.”

He moved slowly, steadily down her body. Annie closed her eyes and moaned the moment his tongue found her. Oh God, she’d never felt anything like it. It hadn’t even occurred to her that Jordan might use his mouth on her. Only sheer instinct had led her to do it to him. But oh my, had it been fun.

She looked down at his perfect countenance and his tongue brushing against her, licking her, owning her. His tongue boldly stroked, controlled, and Annie moaned again, burying her face in the pillow to the side so no one would hear. She tried to pull her hands from his grasp, to tangle them in his hair and hold him to her, but he held them fast.

“No, no, love,” he whispered against her thigh.

“Why won’t you let go of my hands?” she asked, a sly smile on her face.

“Because,” he answered, his mouth hovering near her trembling thigh. “You’re about to discover how good being bad can feel.”

CHAPTER 44

Annie hurried to Jordan’s room the next day, intent on saying good morning to him and ensuring that he no longer had those silly concerns about them avoiding each other. After last night, how could he want to avoid her? They’d done things that were not only indecent, they were probably against the law. And oh, but how she’d love to do them all again. The place between her legs ached just thinking about it.

She raised her fist to knock on the door, but her hand remained frozen in the air at the sound of two male voices drifting from the room.

“We’ve been over this before, Charlie.”

“Yes, and I just want to be clear about your answer.”

Annie’s brow wrinkled. What were they talking about?

“My answer remains the same,” Jordan replied.

Charlie’s voice was harsh. “You’re sure you have no intention of marrying her.”

“Absolutely none,” Jordan replied. “Whatever her fantasies about marriage are, they will not include me.”

Annie sucked in her breath. Her chest pounded, ached.

“And you intend to tell her so?” Charlie asked.

“Absolutely. At the first opportunity.”

Annie had heard enough. Tears clogged her throat. She whirled around. Picking up her skirts, she just ran. Her slippers slapped against the marble floors and she didn’t stop until she reached the safety of her bedchamber and her bed. There, she sobbed, sobbed as if her heart would break. Oh, how had she been such a fool? She hadn’t wanted to speak of marriage with Jordan because deep down she hoped he’d fall in love with her. She’d been determined to make him fall in love with her.