Seducing the Rake (Mad, Bad and Dangerous Heroes) (40 page)

Instinct
slammed her into action.

She fell back against the wall and forced her body to relax, while she calculated the point of highest risk for her opponent. He was small, so it would be best to aim low. At his knees, perhaps.

For by now she was certain he was
not
Jeremy, nor anyone who wished her well.

Most likely it was one of the same men who were holding her father. And now her only escape was the far door. She prayed it was not locked from the outside.

Chessy’s fingers tensed. She heard the team gathering speed. It would have to be soon.

She eased closer to the huddled figure. She made her voice no more than irritated, the chiding tone one used to a child.

“What have you done, you silly boy? Running off will help nothing. Certainly not with me. I can hardly join you in your adventures.” With every word she inched closer to the door. Only a little more, and she would be within reach    

She glared at the cloaked figure. “Stop the carriage this instant! If you set me down now, I shan’t tell Lord

Morland about this mad thing you’ve done. But soon I shall have no choice. And then I cannot—”

She was still talking when she pushed hard and slammed her shoulder against the door.

The whole frame shook beneath the force of the impact. The glass pane rattled; the door latch rocked up and down.

But the door did not open.

Wildly Chessy grabbed for the latch. At the same moment the dark cloak was flung back to reveal bent knees and dark boots. Polished boots of fine leather. They slammed to the floor while a tall body emerged from beneath a voluminous caped riding coat.

The tricorn fell to the floor.

“
You!”

Azure eyes faced her in raw challenge. “Let go of that latch, Chessy.”

For answer, she shoved harder, wrenching the door until it creaked in protest.

The team was at the gallop now, and the cobblestones rang out with the thunder of the wheels.

“Damn it, do you wish to be killed? Let go, I say!”

Hard hands bit into her shoulders and wrenched her backward, but Chessy was too experienced at defense to be taken easily. She drove her slippered foot against his ankle and knifed down, struggling to release the latch.

Morland growled a curse, his face going pale.

Chessy forced away a stab of remorse, tearing wildly at the door latch.

Outside, the narrow streets flashed past in a blur.

And then the metal gave way beneath her fingers. The next second, the door lurched open. Chessy caught at the rim of the door as she sailed out of the carriage, her feet jolting against the raised steps.

“As heaven is my witness—” Hard hands clenched on her waist, trying to tug her back inside, but she kicked wildly, clinging with raw desperation to the opened door.

“Stop, Chessy!”

She barely heard. Her whole attention was on fighting free of the fingers trying to haul her back inside.

The carriage hit a bump and cast Chessy up into the air. Her fingers screamed with pain as she fought to hold on.

A wild cry broke out from the driver. “Carriage coming, m’lord!”

Only then did Chessy see the mail coach rocking madly as it careened toward them. Now only a narrow intersection separated them, barely large enough for the two vehicles to inch past without impact.

Chessy’s face bled white. A scream clung in her throat as the huge coach churned up dust, racing ever closer.

“Chessy! Hold still, damn it!”

And then Tony was clinging to the door with her, his hands rough as they slid over her waist. The next minute, she was jerked from her precarious hold on the shaking door. The air whined past and dust churned into her face. Noise … fear … burning like acid in her throat.

With a brutal jolt she hit the floor. Strong arms gripped her as the door crashed wide open against the side of the carriage, and the mail coach smoked past, sparks flying as the wheels cracked together.

Chessy went sheet-white as she saw the horrified passengers staring across at her, mere inches away.

And then the carriage thundered away. Only rows of neat houses and passersby filled the open door.

A shudder ripped through her as she realized how close she’d come to being smashed against the passing coach. Her eyes closed.

What a horrible way to die.

Her breath was ragged, her body like ice, when Tony twisted and caught her beneath him on the carriage floor.

“Are you mad?” he asked. “You might have been killed!”

She couldn’t find an answer. His face blurred before her until all she saw was the hard glitter of his eyes, the angry set to his jaw.

His hands dug into her shoulders. She felt him tense against her.

And then light and sound were blocked out as his lips met hers, angry and punishing.

“Bloody little fool,” he growled. “Do you know just how close you came to dying out there?”

The words were hurled against her face, her cheeks, her eyes. “I could almost hear your screams as you fell beneath the wheels.”

Chessy tried to fight the desperate urgency in his voice, the driving power of his hands, his lips. But the knowledge of his caring hit her like flame, left her week-kneed and hungry.

Driven by a desperation of her own.

“I didn’t think—didn’t realize—”

And then somehow her own hands were driving, urgent upon his shoulders. Tremors ran through her as she felt the heat of him, the angry need of him.

“When are you going to realize that you’re not alone, that you don’t have to fight every battle by yourself?”

The words were a dark, hot flow against her eyelids. She shivered as he moved down her face, and ran his tongue along the edge of her lips.

“Oh please. No more.”

But he didn’t seem to hear. His thighs were against hers, hard and taut as he buried his fingers in her tumbled hair. “What a fool I am. Do you see even now how I cannot fight my need for you? But what if I had lost you? What if we had lost
us
? And all for what? For a few angry scraps of pride and stubborn independence?”

He molded her lips beneath his. His voice caught in a groan.

“Marry me, Chessy. Bear my children. Let me make you blindly, savagely happy.” The words poured over her, smooth and dark as the amethyst quilt upon his big bed.

“I swear I’ll make you happy. You’ll not regret a single second.”

Blinding sweetness. Dark yearning. And worse of all, a yielding. It began vast and deep inside her and stretched away forever.

But how could she yield. Not when so much hung on her staying strong and stubborn and clever. Not when the Triads would kill him if she stayed. Maybe someday…

She closed her mind to the sweet seduction of hope, knowing it would only weaken her further.

“S-stop. I-I cannot—”

He pulled back. His eyes were hard with need and bitterness. “Damn it, Chessy, when are you going to start trusting me? And start trusting yourself?”

Her protests choked at her lips. Trust herself? What gave him the arrogance to think that—

In a blaze of awareness, she realized he was right. It was herself she did not trust. For the need in her was as fierce as in him, and she knew that once freed, she would never be able to tame it again. After only one night together he had torn her to pieces, knocked down all the defenses she had been ten years in the building.

Honesty warred with self-preservation—and lost. No, she could never trust him since she could not trust
herself
when he was nearby.

“I-I don’t want to talk about it.” She jerked blindly at his fingers, trying to push away from him.

But the floor was narrow, and her wrenching only served to drive her thighs against his. Her foot slammed against his knee.

His face went rigid. She felt him shudder.

“I’m—oh, Tony, I’m so sorry.”

He pulled away from her, his eyes harsh. “There is no need to apologize, I assure you. If I am flawed, it is my fault, not yours.”

His face was set in hard lines. He pushed away and sat back slowly against the far wall.

As if he needed to put the greatest possible distance between them.

Chessy felt cold, very cold. Her hand rose. “Tony, I didn’t mean—”

But the distance was written on his face. He turned away. “Of course you did not. My deficiencies are hardly your concern. We need not speak of it again.”

White-faced, Chessy watched a vast gulf stretch between them, saw him shut himself away behind that exquisite, polished exterior that blinded the rest of the world to his unhappiness.

But it did not blind her. For she knew those walls too well to mistake them in another.

Morland turned from the window then. His fingers were hard upon the small sill. “I shall ask you one last time, Miss Cameron. Will you do me the very great honor of becoming my wife?”

Chessy’s eyes were huge pools of violet. She fought for courage. “I-I shall not.”

Morland’s fingers tightened on the curtain, shredding the light muslin. “I see. You make yourself eminently clear.” And with that he turned away, stony-faced.

Tears burned Chessy’s eyes. She found the flat decision in his voice unbearable. Surely
now
he would let her go…

Slowly she began to inch along the seat toward the carriage door.

Morland turned. A gun glinted in his fingers, chill in the light that slid through the shredded curtain. “I advise you not to, my dear. I shall shoot, I warn you. Better a shattered arm than for you to lie trampled on the highway. No matter what lies between us.”

Chessy stared at the gleaming metal.

“Now get some sleep. We have some hours before daybreak.”

Pale with fury, Chessy pulled her cloak around her. Sleep was the farthest thing from her mind.

And in spite of Tony’s rigid silence, she knew that it was the same for him.

~ ~ ~

But Chessy did sleep. Somewhere near dawn, a jolt of the carriage woke her. Her eyes flashed open, and she sat rigid, her heart hammering in the chill gray light.

She shivered as a gust of air swirled about her. Something rough brushed her cheek.

His cloak. She felt the stiffness of the collar. He must have tucked it around her in the night.

She smelled the faint scent of leather and citrus. The sweetness of brandy.

The scent made her body tighten.

No sound came from the far side of the carriage. The tall, dark figure sat with his tricorn slanted over his face, his long legs outstretched.

Chessy inched closer to the door. The Triad warning rang oddly through her mind.

Now. Get it done before he wakes.

She wrenched open the door and pushed out into the racing wind.

The door crashed back loudly.

Dust and twigs slashed at Chessy’s face. And then she felt the iron grip at her waist.

She cried out as she was wrenched savagely back inside and the door slammed shut behind her.

“I thought I made my wishes clear, hellion! No more acrobatics!”

“Let me g-go! My father—”

“Your father does not require your help. You are only complicating matters.”

Chessy stared at Morland’s lean, hard features, barely visible in the half-light. If only she could believe him! “What do you mean?” Her tone was accusing. “What have you found out?”

“Have you so little trust?”

“Tell me!”           

“I have told you enough, woman! And you’re to stay out of it. It’s too bloody dangerous. You will just have to trust me in this.”

“Trust
you?
After you kidnap me like the lowest London cutthroat?” She gave a bitter laugh. “I think not.”