Oh, yes. Dear Lord in heaven, she knew.
She ought to feel embarrassed or something equally virtuous. She oughtn’t feel this delirious happiness, this…this urge to wheel about the room in drunken delight.
How awful of her not to feel ashamed at having a man between her legs, nuzzling her bare thigh inside her drawers, planting openmouthed kisses on the sensitive inner skin. He was stroking places only a husband should be allowed to touch.
A husband. Her eyes went wide as her curiosity got the better of her. “Danny?”
“Hmm?” he murmured.
“Is this what happens between men and women when they…make love?”
He went still, then rose up on one elbow and drew her chemise down over her legs. “Sometimes.” He avoided her gaze. “Depends on what you mean by ‘make love.’”
“Rosalind said when a man makes love to a woman he puts his thing—”
“Yes. Generally he does.” He slid back up her. Briefly he hovered over her, pressing himself against her again, letting her feel the bulge in his breeches. “That’s why it’s firm like this.” He stared down at her, his features as rigid as what lay between his legs. “It’s meant to be put inside a woman, the way I put my tongue inside you.”
Her face flamed. “I-it’s hard like that all the time?” She tried futilely to imagine men walking around with a pole in their breeches. Why had she never noticed it before?
He smiled faintly, but behind the smile shone a rapacious hunger that made her breath catch in her throat. “Not all the time. Only when a man is in a state of unrelieved arousal.” He rubbed against her, eyes darkening. “Like this.”
Unrelieved? Did that mean what she thought it did? “So we didn’t actually…I’m still…a virgin.”
A muscle tightened in his jaw. Lifting himself off her, he rolled away to lie on his back and stare up at the ceiling. “Yes. I haven’t ruined you, if that’s what you’re asking.”
But he’d wanted to.
Or had he? Abruptly he rose and left the bed, as if he couldn’t escape her quickly enough. Even in her inebriated state, she had to wonder at that. She watched, relieved, hurt, as he strode to the mattress on the floor with seeming nonchalance and dragged his shirt over his head, then slipped out of everything but his drawers.
Had he wanted to make love to her? And if so, was it only because she was a woman near to hand? Because she’d behaved so wantonly that he couldn’t help himself?
She
had
behaved wantonly, to be sure. If he’d pressed her, she might even have done the unthinkable.
A sob rose in her throat at the realization. She’d wanted him to ruin her, hadn’t she? Until now she’d refused to acknowledge how truly joyless her life was, how devoid of passion. Tonight—with her brain not nearly fogged enough by liquor—she admitted it freely. Ruination suddenly seemed infinitely preferable to her old life of lonely pride.
She was so far gone she nearly asked him why he’d stopped. The bulge in his unmentionables made it perfectly clear that she’d roused his desires. But not enough to prod him into making love to her. Why not?
He caught her staring at him and scowled. “Go to sleep. You’ve only got a few hours. We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow and much to discuss in the morning.”
She swallowed back her question. No, she wouldn’t show herself to be so foolishly besotted with the man that she’d beg him to bed her. He’d indulged her dangerous requests for kisses and touches and…things she should never have asked for. If he could get aroused by it yet still not be tempted to “ruin” her, then he must find her a dull companion indeed.
Not that she could expect otherwise when he had
women as obviously well-versed in seduction as that Sall begging to leap into his bed. A tear leaked out, and she swiped it away viciously.
Turning over, she drew the blanket up to her ears and squeezed her eyes shut. She should be glad that he’d spared her, that he’d left her a virgin. But all she could think of was the low tingling in her nipples, the heat simmering between her thighs, the incredible excitement she’d felt when his mouth devoured her breasts and his tongue drove inside her most private place.
A pox on you, Danny Brennan,
she thought as she lay there quivering with need.
Why am I not woman enough for you?
There came a knight from over the sea
And stole my sister away
O shame on him and his company
In the land where e’er they stay.
“Fair Annie,”
anonymous English ballad
J
uliet shivered and rubbed her arms beneath her cloak. In the dead of night, the sea air bore the chill of early autumn, making the flimsy velvet useless. Dampness crept under and around her, as insidious as her unease.
She peeked around the edge of the massive Pipewell Gate, a structure left from the days when Winchelsea had been a walled town, to where Will stood waiting near the road to Rye. He was more warmly dressed than she, but
then she’d had little time to dress when she’d awakened to hear him leaving the cottage. All she’d known was that he was sneaking out, and she’d decided then and there to find out where he was going.
Two days they’d stayed in the tiny stone cottage, two days awaiting the arrival in nearby Rye Harbour of his friends who owned the ship. The time had passed pleasantly enough, she supposed, though he’d kept her in the cottage, saying he didn’t want to risk her being seen by anybody looking for them.
Still, they’d played chess and he’d brought her several books. He bought her anything she asked for. Indeed, except for in the bedchamber—which she inhabited alone while he slept on a bedroll in the other room—they carried on almost like husband and wife. It ought to have overjoyed her to be settled for a short while, to be living with him in every way but one.
So why was she lurking out here in the middle of the night, spying on him?
Because something was wrong. She didn’t know what, but something. He’d been different these past two days, as courteous as ever, but tense and edgy, too. Sometimes she caught him deep in thought, as if contemplating serious matters. Could he be regretting their elopement? Was that why he wouldn’t even kiss her?
The possibility of his refusing to marry her would be too awful to endure. Still not married after nearly a week away from home, she’d finally begun to realize the enormity of what she’d done. If he
did
change his mind, she’d be ruined for life, even though he’d never touched her in anything less than a gentlemanly manner.
Suddenly she heard hoofbeats up the cobblestone street, though they came not from Rye but through town. Watching from behind Pipewell Gate, she saw a shadowy
figure on horseback emerge from the darkness and halt beside Will. Could this be his friend who owned the ship and the cottage? But if so, why meet in the middle of the night in such stealth and secrecy? And why here?
“Hello, Jack,” Will said.
The man dismounted and glanced furtively around. “Hello, Pryce.”
Juliet froze. Who was Pryce? Did he mean Will? She wrapped her cloak more tightly around her with growing unease.
“So you’ve got the girl, do you?” Jack asked.
“I’ve got her.”
“Did you have any trouble getting her away? It’s the eldest, ain’t it?”
“No. I tried for her, but she’d have none of me. I had to take the youngest.”
The cold practicality of Will’s words struck panic in her. The eldest? Did he mean Helena? Helena had claimed that Will was a fortune hunter. Good heavens, could she have been right?
“But she still thinks it’s an elopement?” Jack asked.
“Yes.”
Fear exploded through her. No, no, she couldn’t have been that wrong about Will, could she? She circled the gate’s brick tower, trying to get close enough to hear better, hoping she’d misheard or misunderstood.
“Good, it’ll be easier if she keeps on that way,” his friend Jack replied. “Better for her and better for us. How long do you think you can keep up the pretense?”
“As long as it takes. She’s a sweet girl, very innocent. She believes what I tell her.” Will’s low voice was remote, emotionless. It struck a chill to her heart. “Just make sure that Crouch holds to his end of the bargain, or I’ll bring
her back to her family before he’s got what he wants, do you hear?”
What did he mean? And who was Crouch?
“He’ll hold to his part, never fear,” Jack answered. “Keep the girl quiet and occupied until the ransom money comes, and you’ll have what you asked for.”
Ransom! She sucked in a breath. This wasn’t an elopement at all, but a kidnapping! And like a fool, she’d walked right into it. Tears started in her eyes, but she forced them back.
This had to be a nightmare. She would wake in her own bed at Swan Park and laugh at her foolish dream.
No,
a cold voice inside her said,
the other was the dream.
Indeed it was. She’d known it shortly after they’d left Stratford-upon-Avon, when Will had continued to treat her with his curious courtesy, lacking any outward show of love.
I tried for the eldest.
Helena had warned her, but she’d been too much in love to listen.
With this…
this
scoundrel! A man who not only didn’t love her, but didn’t even care about her. Pain tore savagely through her as she realized he planned to hand her over to this Crouch person without a qualm. And for what? Money?
In her distress, she must have made a noise, for the men suddenly fell quiet. Heart pounding, she plastered herself against the brick tower and prayed they hadn’t heard her. As soon as they left, she’d flee in the opposite direction. She must get away. Away!
“Did you hear that?” Jack asked, and she held her breath.
“It was the wind,” Will said easily, and she sagged against the brick in relief. “You might as well go on back to Hastings. I’ll contact you if I need to.”
His friend’s only answer was the creak of saddle leather as he mounted, then the slow clopping of hooves on cobblestone as the horse walked off. Juliet held her breath, her eyes fixed on the corner of the brick tower beyond where Will stood. She’d wait until she was sure he’d gone, too, and then—
“You heard everything, I suppose.”
She nearly leaped out of her skin. Whipping her head around, she discovered that Will had circled the tower on the opposite side and stood a scant foot away. She bolted, but had scarcely gone two feet before he caught her around the waist, yanking her hard against him.
“Let go!” she cried, realizing too late she would have been better off pretending not to have heard the men’s conversation.
Now all she could do was fight, striking out blindly, kicking at his legs. Her boot heel hit his shin, and he swore. Then before she knew it, he’d thrust her against the gate tower and covered her body with his to hold her still.
“Calm down, you little fool,” he hissed. “Do you want Jack to hear you and come back?”
“What does it matter if you hand me over to him now or later?” she cried.
He shoved his hand over her mouth. “It matters a great deal, I promise you. As long as he thinks you haven’t seen him, you’re safe, do you hear me?”
Safe! In a pig’s eye! She struggled against him, but he was hard as steel and twice as relentless.
Yet regret showed in his moonlit face as he thrust it within a breath of hers. “Listen to me, Juliet—you may have made a mistake in running away with me, but you can emerge from this unharmed if you’ll only continue to trust me.”
She raised both eyebrows in mute disbelief, letting her thorough contempt show in her gaze.
His voice softened. “I won’t hurt you or let anyone else hurt you, either. In a few days, a week at most, you’ll rejoin your family—and I promise that when you do, you’ll be whole and healthy and no different from when you left. Perhaps a little wiser, but that’s all. So fighting me will merely distress you for the short time we’re forced to be together. It won’t gain you your freedom any sooner, I assure you”
With a warning look, he loosened his hold on her mouth. “Now I’m going to let go. You can scream and fight if you like, but if you do, you’ll merely force me to bind and gag you for our return to the cottage. And since the town is asleep, I don’t think it will be too hard to sneak you back in, even bound and gagged.”
She swallowed hard, remembering how deserted the streets had been when she’d moved through them.
“Do you understand?” he murmured.
She hesitated, then nodded.
He released her mouth and shoved away from the wall. “Now we’re going to walk back to the cottage, and you’re going to be a good girl until we’re inside. Then you may fight me all you wish, but if you try anything in the street, I swear I’ll tie you up.”
“May I ask you…one question?”
His midnight gaze bore into her. “What?”
“Why are you doing this? For money? Because I’m sure Papa or my brother-in-law would pay you more than this Crouch person if you’ll just return me now.”
“It’s not money, and I can’t bring you back until I have what I need. I can only swear on my father’s grave that you will not be hurt.”
She sniffed. “That’s not much consolation, since you seemed to have been spawned by the devil.”
His soft chuckle took her by surprise, made her heart wrench in her breast. “Will it help if I swear on my mother’s grave instead?”
“Nothing will help,” she whispered as a tear spilled down her cheek. “I wouldn’t believe you now if you swore on a stack of Bibles as high as this tower.”
He reached up to wipe the tear away with his thumb, and she shoved his hand back. A muscle worked in his jaw. “Nonetheless, you have no choice but to trust me. Until this moment, have I mistreated you? Have I hurt you in any way?”
Yes, he’d hurt her—but not physically. And now that she knew what he was, she could hardly complain about his lack of affection and how it had made her feel.
There were other complaints, however. “My reputation will be ruined after this.”