Her Every Pleasure (8 page)

With a low whimper of frustration, Sophia tore her stare away from his too-delectable self. “My duty,” she mumbled halfheartedly.

He let out a husky laugh. “Never mind the bloody housework. We’ve got better things to do. Come on, love. If it’s a question of money—”

“It is
not
a question of money!” she exclaimed, reminded anew of his unflattering misapprehensions. Well, it had been her idea to let him reach his own conclusions about her supposed profession.

She dragged her hands through her hair, still muddled with passion, and cast about for a reason that he might accept. “I am not going to do—
that
with you, after you just accused me of being a thief!”

“Ah, that reminds me,” he murmured with a wicked smile, “I have not finished searching you yet…”

“You think this is funny?” she cried.

“I think you’re gorgeous. Now, come over here and let me help you get rid of that dress.”

She jumped back. “Gabriel!”

“Sophia, angel, I know you want me. You practically said it flat-out in the barn.” His stare smoldered, traveling over her; his whisper was gruff with desire. “Come on, now. Don’t tease a starving man. You’re a naughty thing, but I know you could not be so cruel. Take those clothes off and get in my bed.”

When he reached for her again, she panicked and whipped out her knife. “Stay back!”

It was the wrong thing to do.

Gabriel eyed the knife sardonically, but his response was automatic; he shook his head at her and in the blink of an eye, grabbed her wrist, peeling the tight curl of her fingers away from the hilt of her blade.

She cursed as he disarmed her with ease, then he stepped back, smoothly turned away, and hurled the knife hard across the room.

The blade plunged into the wall and stuck there, shuddering, sunk deep into the old, soft plaster.

When he turned back to her with a look of cold fury, she was staring at her distant knife, her pretty mouth hanging open.

“Any more tricks you want to show me?” he drawled.

She turned to him, wide-eyed with shock.

“Now, where were we?” His voice was still gruff with desire.

When he reached for her, she jolted back with a gasp, whirled around without another word, and darted out of his room.

“Sophia!”

Gabriel strode to the open doorway of his chamber, still clutching his towel around his waist. As he listened, confounded, staring into the darkened corridor, he could hear her rushing down the creaky old stairs.

His frown turned to a glower. Damn it, what the hell sort of coy, thieving tart had his daft brother sent him?

“Sophia, come back here!” he ordered in a full battlefield roar.

But the only answer he got back was the distant muffled slam of the front door.

Sophia bolted away from the farmhouse, her hooded woolen cloak trailing out behind her. Her hastily retrieved knapsack bumped against her shoulder with every wild stride, and the drumbeat of her pulse was nearly deafening.

She could not believe he had taken her knife!

Gabriel had disarmed her as though she were as easy to vanquish as a fly. He had left her utterly defenseless, but she knew it was her own fault. She shouldn’t have done that, should not have attempted to brandish a weapon at a battle-scarred warrior. Unfortunately, his mind-melting kisses had addled her wits, and she had reacted automatically from all of her self-defense training.

It had served her well last night in fighting off her would-be abductors, but she understood now that with Gabriel, it was the worst thing she could have done.

She had realized her error the second she had seen that lightning bolt of rage flash through the indigo depths of his eyes. His reaction to her weapon had been chilling, but if she had not done something drastic to push him away, then she would have given in all too willingly to his passion.

Even now, she could taste his kiss, her chin still tender, chafed from the short scruff of his beard, her hands tingling with the warm velvet texture of his skin. Running down the rocky drive as if she could flee her reaction to him along with escaping the house, it was bewildering to be aroused, insulted, scared, and angry all at the same time.

Well, she had fled her near-seducer, but now she was unarmed. And if she met her enemies out on the road, she knew she hadn’t a prayer.

All the same, she was in a wholly different kind of danger if she stayed.

The autumn chill filled her lungs, and as Sophia ran down the drive, its coolness gradually helped to clear her head.

Where did she really think she was going to go?

Oh, this was a disaster.

She was stuck in the middle of nowhere with a man she could barely resist.

Gabriel Knight turned her world upside down. She had never felt such things. Her desire for him was dangerous.

Both of them had nearly lost control.

Nearing the old barn where she had slept last night, Sophia dropped back to a fast walk, her chest heaving. Her knees still felt wobbly. Twilight was deepening by the minute to a clear, cool blackness, but the white-gold moon illuminated the lonely drive before her.

She glanced around uneasily in the gathering darkness, wondering where in blazes her bodyguards were. She would have thought they’d have found her by now.

Timo particularly had an excellent sense of direction, and after all, she had only gone a few miles.

Maybe something had gone disastrously wrong.

Oh, God.
Sophia stopped walking and looked up at the moon as her vision blurred with frightened tears.

All day, she had managed to ignore her gnawing worries, keeping busy with Mrs. Moss’s endless list of chores, but now, alone, defenseless, not sure where to go, and feeling all too vulnerable, her fears began to get the best of her. The tears flooded into her eyes.

Leon! Where are you?

She had never been without him for so long before. Since childhood, he had been her rock.

What if her masked enemies had wiped out her whole entourage the way that different foes had wiped out her family over the years?

What if her bodyguards
weren’t
coming?

What if they all were dead?

Nothing had been taken.

At first Gabriel had thought there must be some mistake.

Moments ago, the bang of the front door had jolted him, helping to clear the fog of lust in his brain. Slamming the heel of his hand angrily on the doorframe to vent his frustration, he had stalked over to his traveling trunk with a scowl, where a quick inventory of its contents soon revealed the startling truth.

All his belongings were there, confirming Sophia’s claim of innocence.

With a curse, he threw off his towel and quickly pulled on some clothes. The realization that he had accused her unjustly was enough to turn his previous anger at her right around at himself.

Worse, he realized in hindsight that, harlot or no, he had terrified her with his randy insistence, so much so that, for all her pluck, she had seen fit to run for her bloody life.

Damn it, that was not the kind of man he was! He had never
demanded
sex from any woman—he’d never had to—and he was not about to start now. Furious at himself, he stood and hastened to button up his trousers, but winced at the denial as he pushed his long-starved cock down into its proper position to the right. What was the matter with him, anyway? A gentleman did not grope his domestics, no matter what sort of damned sultry temptresses they were. He had given Sophia his word that she would be safe here, that she would not be used, and whatever his faults, Gabriel never broke his word.

As he bent down, hurrying to pull on his boots before she vanished again as mysteriously as she had appeared, it struck him that he genuinely did not want her to go.

It was a sobering moment of self-honesty, and made him pause.

All day long, throughout his chores and his grueling physical regimen, the truth was, he had been anticipating the chance to talk to her again, though he had not wanted to admit it to himself.

Now he had chased her away with his clumsiness, and her absence left him starkly facing the true loneliness of his situation.

It was one thing to retreat from humanity for a time, but quite another to have a beautiful girl run away from a chap for acting like a barbarian.

Maybe I have been out here too long.

Straightening up again, he quickly strode across the room to retrieve Sophia’s knife from the crumbling plaster. She was more dangerous with the weapon, but the dread on her face when he had disarmed her had twisted the very heart in him.

He should have let her keep the weapon, he thought, for in hindsight, he very much doubted that she would have really stabbed him. She had merely been afraid he might actually rape her.

God.

As he yanked the knife out of the wall, his attention suddenly homed in on the feel of the weapon in his grasp.

He was stunned by the sense of pleasure that rushed into his veins, bringing back ominous echoes of the warrior he once had been.

And no longer was.

Refused to be.

Still…it had been months since he had held any sort of weapon. It felt so good, so natural, in his hand.

Dear God, what had that girl awakened in him, that his whole body seemed to come alive again with the feel of the knife in his hand? His mind rebounded to the last time he had grasped a dagger in this fashion. The last time he had been in India…

Bloodthirsty memories churning in his mind, he paused just for a moment to run his fingers down the flat of the blade; wiping it clean of the chalky plaster dust, he caught a glimpse of himself in the cheval mirror from the corner of his eye.

Yes, he thought grimly, that was the real Gabriel Knight, the man they had called the Iron Major.

The icy bastard who had quit counting his kills when they surpassed a hundred.
No mercy.
The memory of his regiment, his fellow officers, and the motto they had coined for him in all their brash esprit de corps jarred him back to the present. He was no longer that man. That cold-blooded savage.

Shrugging off the memories and the dark uneasiness that crept over him with the return of nightfall, he marched out of the room. It was Sophia’s knife, after all. He only wanted to give it back to her. For his part, he had no need for weapons anymore.

Wanting to make amends for his dishonorable behavior, he dashed downstairs and barreled out the front door, chasing after her.

“Sophia!”

His voice echoed back to him in this lonely place. Suddenly, he spotted her dark shape some distance down the moonlit drive. “Sophia, wait!”

The moment she turned and saw him coming after her, she whirled around at once and started running again.

Bloody hell.

“Sophia, come back!” He picked up his pace, striding across the courtyard.

“Stay away from me!” she yelled over her shoulder.

“I’m not going to hurt you!” He began jogging toward her down the rocky drive, even though he knew she might interpret this as threatening. He wanted to reassure her, but first he had to catch up. “Please, just stop for a moment and listen! I’m sorry!”

“I don’t want to hear any more of your accusations!”

She sounded like she was crying.
Oh, God.
He felt like such a heel. Gaining on her with his longer strides, he tried again in a more placating tone. “Sophia, I’ve brought you your knife. Don’t you want it back?”

“Keep it!” she flung out.

“Sophia, don’t go! Enough of this!” he exclaimed. “I’m not going to hurt you!” He ran faster, aware of a very slight pressure around his healing scar as he slowly closed the distance between them. “Would you just
pause
for a moment and give me a chance to apologize?”

“Ow!”

Ahead of him, he saw her twist an ankle on a large stone on the uneven drive.

He winced for her sake, but when her unladylike curse reached his ears, he couldn’t help smiling ruefully. There was something so vibrant, so piquant about her, this strange, unpredictable Gypsy girl.

She could steal his very heart if he wasn’t careful.

Tripped up by the rock, Sophia had not fallen, but she dropped back to a walk—or rather, a dignified limp.

“Are you all right?” he called in concern.

“I’m fine!” Ahead, she stopped—planted one hand on her waist—and slowly turned around, tilting her head to the side. She gave him a haughty look as Gabriel jogged toward her.

“That’s far enough,” she ordered, holding out her hand to halt him.

Still a good ten feet away, he stopped, not wishing to scare her again, but he was a little taken aback by her forcefulness. When she tossed her moonlit curls and lifted her chin, however, he saw through her show of bravado, and his heart clenched.

“Here,” he mumbled awkwardly. “I thought you’d want this back.” He tossed her knife, blade-down, onto the neutral turf between them.

Holding him in a guarded stare, she approached, moving stealthily despite her slight limp, and retrieved her weapon with an almost palpable satisfaction.

At least they had that much in common.

As soon as she had grasped the weapon, she hitched up her skirts and slid her knife back into its sheath, strapped to her thigh.

Gabriel’s mouth watered, but he refused to ogle that beautiful stretch of sleek, feminine leg. Redoubling his will to resist temptation, he dropped his gaze and cleared his throat a bit. “I did not mean to scare you. I’m sorry. I acted like a beast. I accused you unjustly, as well. I saw that you didn’t take anything.”

“No, I did not!” She folded her arms across her chest, but she sounded somewhat mollified. “And yes, you did,” she agreed.

Unaccustomed to making apologies for his usually impeccable behavior, let alone being scolded, however deservedly, by a mere slip of a girl, he furrowed his brow. “I don’t know why you were looking at my things,” he said in a slightly sterner tone. “In all fairness, you were really not at liberty to pry like that, but all the same, you did not deserve to be insulted. I apologize, and I hope you will forgive me.”