Swept Away (25 page)

He laughed in sheer self defence then kissed her full and hard on the mouth. “No. You are not hurting me. But you are,” he added gently, “killing me.”

“I am?”

“You are a virgin, are you not?”

An instant, hot flush darkened her cheeks and he kissed her again, quickly. “No. No, I...I was not asking, I was...I was clumsily trying to explain why I had to stop. Why I am being... cautious...and trying not to hurt
you
.”

She curled her lip between her teeth and considered what he said, weighing it against the swollen, throbbing presence inside her. “You do seem very...big,” she admitted on a whisper. “And it does feel so...strange...that you could actually fit inside me like this. That it would feel so warm and so...so...full.”

The innocent admission was too much for Emory and he groaned. He slid his hands down to her waist, then around beneath her hips and he lifted her, breaching her so hard and fast she had no time to register anything but a little cry of surprise. A ripple of tension passed through her body, but he only held her closer and buried himself deeper until there was nothing between them but damp skin and crushed curls. Nothing but heat and a rising sense of urgency that bade him whisper reassurances against her mouth, against the strained arch her throat.

He need not have worried. The sting of penetration was all but forgotten as her body shuddered and melted around him. Waves of tiny contractions began to turn all the tension inward so that she gripped him harder and tighter while she adjusted to his size and thickness. The pleasure began to build again, swirling in upon itself, coiling around him in a series of fierce little clutches that had him gasping, shaking like a schoolboy on his first foray into the realm of sin. Her entire body began to burn with an intuitive impatience that made her tilt her hips higher, wriggle herself closer, implore him by her actions if not her ragged breaths to move, to do something to ease the terrible, wonderful pressure.

Emory complied with his hands, his body. He began to move inside her with slow stretching strokes, displaying a level of restraint he did not know he possessed. He slid into the soft, sucking wetness as deeply as he could bear it before he withdrew, judging the impact of each thrust by the way she moved her body to receive him, by the soft sounds of awe that vibrated in her throat. She turned liquid around him, molten and silky, and he started to surge into her with greater speed, greater power, more ferocious hunger, knowing by the way she trembled and pushed herself feverishly into each rhythmic beat that the shattering release of a shared orgasm was just a breath away. It was there, flaring white-hot and brilliant, just a stroke...two...

In unison they rose to meet it. Anna clutched at his body as the spasms began to tear through her, her flesh contracting around his so tightly all the restraint and control in the world could not have stopped the ecstasy from streaking through him in sweet, hot waves. He stiffened and arched, his hips an aggressive blur of movement that halted, suddenly, on a final plunging thrust. Their cries blended together as he poured himself into the deepest part of her, feeling her muscles contract and squeeze until she had wrung every shiver, every throb from his flesh. When the initial wave was spent, he felt an even stronger surge pushing and pulling at his body, driven by the sight of Annaleah's body writhing and twisting from the pleasure.

“Wait,” she cried. “Stop!”

He bared his teeth in a snarl and shook his head, unwilling to stop, unable to stop or to believe she could ask it of him now, not now when he was drowning in her sweet heat.

“Do you not hear it?” she gasped. “
Listen
!”

Blood was pounding through his veins, drumming in his ears, and if he could have made a coherent sound he would have asked her what she possibly expected him to hear when his entire body was screaming like an open nerve. But then it came to him and he blinked the blindness out of his eyes. He turned his head and his gaze flew to the window and with a single fluid motion that was as breathless as any that had gone before, he pulled out of her and was on his feet, moving with catlike speed across the room to extinguish both lamps.

No sooner were they smothered in darkness than the authoritative clumping of a dozen or more booted feet passed by on the street below. Emory went to the window and rubbed a circle in the grime while Anna wobbled to her knees, holding a fistful of crumpled clothing up to shield her nakedness.

“I would not want to wager the fate of my soul on it.” He hurried over to where he had draped his greatcoat over the foot of the bed. While Anna watched in increasing dread, he took a pistol out of one of the deep pockets and checked to insure it was primed.

“What are you going to do?”

“They appear to be starting their search at the far end of the street and with luck, it will take them a few minutes to work their way here to the inn.”

“But what are you going to
do
?”

He glanced at her as he reached for his drawers and breeches. “I am not going to trust the landlord to ignore a thousand pound reward.”

She glanced down, her nude body pale against the shadows. Quickly she separated her chemise from her dress, pulling both garments over her head and fumbling with the drawstrings around her bodice and waist. Her arms were shaking almost too much to accomplish the simple task, although she could see she was not alone in her predicament. Emory seemed to be having difficulty buttoning his breeches and when he saw Anna watching, he frowned and turned aside.

“It doesn’t just go away as easily as all that,” he muttered.

No, it doesn’t, she thought, barely able to keep her teeth from chattering in the sudden chill that swept through her. There was blood mingled with the pearly spill on her thighs, proof that something was, indeed gone, but where she should have felt shame and humiliation, she felt only pride and a newfound awareness of her own sexuality.

She noticed more blood on her hand and wrist and realized that Emory’s arm was bleeding again. A smeared trickle of red ran from the wound to his elbow, threatening to drip onto the floor. She fetched the two large handkerchiefs she had found in the haversack and folded them into a bandage.

“Keep still,” she ordered when he tried to scowl her away. “The shirt you were wearing is ruined, and you only have one spare in your haversack.”

“I did not pack this morning with an eye to comfort.”

“Well,” she wrapped and tied the bandage in place, “I am sure we will be able to manage without extra clothing for a day or two, but how I shall get along with only one shoe is another matter entirely.”

“
We
?”

“And if you try to stop me, or order me to stay behind reading a foolish play about forest nymphs, I shall lean out the window the moment you leave and scream at the top of my lungs.”

“You would not do that.”

“Yes I would. My father knows some very good solicitors in London. If you are innocent, they will be able to prove it.”

He grasped her by the shoulders and gave her a little shake. “This is not a parlor debate, Annaleah. Those are real soldiers with real guns and they intend to kill me, not take me to court, if they get the chance.”

“Then we mustn’t give them the chance, must we,” she said softly. “And besides, at the moment they are not searching for you, they are searching for
me
: A terrified, kidnapped heiress who they believe has been snatched off the street by some nefarious brigand of unknown origin.”

“I don’t--”

“There is no earthly reason they should suspect it was you. Not yet anyway; not until they have searched everywhere and found no one tied to any chairs awaiting the delivery of a ransom note. Was that not your goal all along? To keep them busy searching for a stolen heiress while you slipped away unnoticed? If so, it will be a very short distraction if they find me in the next ten minutes. I doubt you would get farther than the first crossroad.

“On the other hand,” she added, shoving her arms into her spencer, “I would happily wager the fate of
my
soul that we could walk out the front door of this inn, arm in arm like a soldier and his wife and they would not glance at us twice.”

Outwardly she looked calm enough to be convincing--there was even a hint of lift in her eyebrow. Inwardly, she was holding her breath, refusing to acknowledge the more sensible side of her conscience as it shouted at her to pick up the book and tie herself in the chair if need be.

His dark eyes narrowed. “I grant you may be right. But what if you are wrong?”

“If I am wrong...then you will be shot and I will be sent back to London in disgrace and we will be no better off than if we stand here and argue about it for the next hour.”

His fingers tightened a moment on her shoulders. “As soon as we are safely out of Torquay...at the very first town...we will find a respectable hotel and leave you there.”

“As soon as we are safe,” she countered, “I will write a note to my brother telling him that I have
not
been kidnapped and that all will be explained at the earliest possible convenience.”

“Do you honestly think that will make him stop looking? And how will he know I did not force you to write the letter with a knife against your throat?”

“I will word it in such a way that he will know that I pen it willingly and truthfully.”

He continued to stare, to wage his own private war with his common sense, but in the end, the noise out in the streets and the determination in her eyes made him mutter an indecipherable oath. “Why do I have a feeling I am going to regret this? Hurry up then. It would not do for them to get close enough to have too good a look at you.”

When she frowned, he smoothed a handful of tousled curls off her shoulder. “Because at the moment, you look far too thoroughly ravished to be any man’s wife,” he murmured, “and I would not want them sniffing after us for different reasons.”

CHAPTER 15

Annaleah was still fumbling with the buttons on her spencer when they hurried down the steps to the ground floor of the tavern. The taproom was full of thick-limbed men and blowsy women, many of whom turned, gave their neighbour a snickering nudge as Emory and Anna passed through their midst. The air was close with the smell of lamp oil and unwashed bodies and the first thing Anna did when they were out on the street was gulp at a mouthful of fresh air. The second was to expel it again in a rush, for there were soldiers not a dozen paces away, emerging from the establishment next door.

Emory calmly cradled a hand beneath her elbow and started walking down the street in the opposite direction. Ten more paces, twenty added enough distance for them to breathe and for Emory to risk a casual glance over his shoulder. The soldiers seemed to be ignoring them, more intent upon holding their lanterns up to the faces of the three men they had brought out of the tavern with them. The trio were all tall and dark haired. One had a black patch tied over his eye and at a barked order from one of the guards, he lifted it to show a hideously puckered scar over the empty socket.

The street itself was eerily devoid of pedestrians. The regular citizens not sidled up to a jug of ale already had scurried away into the cracks and crevices of the buildings like cockroaches at the first sound of military boots on the cobblestones. The few stragglers who were left, were either too drunk to hear anything or too belligerent to care.

The sound of clopping horses and carriage wheels sent Emory melting into shadowy doorway now, drawing Anna after him. A carriage reined to a halt outside one of the more raucous brothels along the street and two gentlemen alighted. They tossed a coin to the driver and promised another if he would wait, then staggered up to the door and pounded good-naturedly until they were welcomed inside.

The wheels of a second carriage echoed hollowly along the near-deserted street. It pulled around the hackney and rattled past the niche where Emory and Anna stood, the glow from its riding lamp casting a brief flare of light over their faces before leaving them in shadow again. The driver stopped where the three men were being held at musket length by the soldiers. When the door opened, a man in a dark blue uniform disembarked and paused a moment to glance both ways along the street, the light winking off his silver lapel buttons as he did so.

“What have you found?”

Colonel Rupert Ramsey’s voice was abrasively loud and carried easily enough for Emory and Anna to hear.

“These two gentlemen,” said one of the soldiers with obvious sarcasm, “were attempting to scarper out the rear door when we entered. The other kicked over a bench to block our path when we gave chase.”

Colonel Ramsey looked over all three men carefully before dismissing them with a wave of his hand. “Keep looking. The bastard is here somewhere, by God, and I intend to find him. There are another forty men on the road behind me; they should be here any minute to help you broaden the search.”

“Forty soldiers?” Anna hissed. “Should we not move away from here before they arrive?”

Emory did not answer. He did not respond at all except to sag slightly against her shoulder.

Keep looking! The bastard is here somewhere. He has to be. If he has drowned, I want to see the body....

“Oh dear God,” Anna said. “Not now!”

The water was icy cold and the salt stung his wounds, turning his back into a sheet of fire. He had opened his mouth to scream when he first fell over the side of the wharf, but the water swirled down his throat, choking off anything other than the rush of bubbles that were expelled. He sank all the way to the bottom--probably twenty feet, no more--and when his feet struck the soft ooze at the bottom, it was purely an instinctive reaction that made him bend his knees and kick off with all his strength. He came up beneath the stinking planks of the docks, only long enough to grab another breath before he sank again and swam to the next wooden pylon. In truth, it was easier moving through the water than trying to run on shore, and it was almost beautiful to look up and see the lights shimmering on the decks of the ships.