The Jacobite's Return (The Georgian Rebel Series) (13 page)

Jack sprang down from his horse and reached up to help Rosie dismount. Too tired to maintain her pretence of masculinity, she slid gratefully from the saddle. So intense was her weariness that she was content to be briefly held in his arms and to rest her cheek against the hard sinews of his chest. They stood like that for a few long moments, and Rosie even imagined the feather-light touch of his lips against her temple before he spoke.

“Tom has gone to bespeak dinner and rooms for the night. Get yourself inside while I see to the horses.”

Rosie wrinkled her brow as she gazed up at him in the half-light. “You cannot intend for us to halt here. We must press on. I know it will mean pushing the horses hard, but we can reach Sheridan Hall before morning if we do.”

Jack shook his head firmly. “No amount of pushing will do it. The horses need rest.” He touched her cheek briefly with one long finger. “And so do we. You are exhausted, sweetheart.”

For the first time since they had met again, he used the endearment. Her mind flew back two years. It was what he had always called her. Resolutely, Rosie swallowed the annoying lump that appeared in her throat. Why should his gentleness overset her in this way? Overcome with exhaustion, she nodded her agreement and went inside to discover Tom in a private parlour, deep in conversation with the landlord. Casting off her cloak and hat and running a hand through her tumbled curls, Rosie sat on a settle close to the fire and wondered if she would ever have the energy to get up again.

Jack, apparently untouched by any trace of fatigue, strode briskly into the room, and the landlord instantly bowed low. Jack had an undeniable air of command that proclaimed his status in life. Explaining that dinner would be ready in fifteen minutes, the landlord frowned when Jack asked to be escorted to their rooms so that they could freshen up before eating.

“Sir, I have already explained to your companion here that we have only one room available tonight.” He glanced at Rosie, who was swaying with tiredness. “But if you and this other gentleman would care to take that room, perhaps your young relative would consent to share my son’s room?”

The son in question lumbered in as he spoke, muttering under his breath and smelling of the stables. Crashing a full coal scuttle down next to the grate, he glanced at the assembled group from under jutting brows before giving a loud guffaw of laughter, for which his father reached up and clipped him sharply round the side of his head. The lad shuffled out again, grumbling and holding one ear.

Rosie glanced up at Jack. Despite her tiredness, she smiled her recognition of the humour in the situation, and his lips twitched appreciatively in response.

“My cousin”—he indicated Rosie—“sleepwalks. To prevent any nocturnal rambling on his part, he and I will share the room you have, and Mr. Drury here will keep your delightful son company.” Mr. Drury cast him a look of intense dislike.

The landlord bowed himself out of the room, and Rosie went off into a peal of laughter that brought tears to her eyes. “Oh, I’m sorry, Tom, but it was the look on your face!” She rummaged in her capacious cloak pocket for a handkerchief. Recovering her composure, she added, “And Jack, you were so clever to think up that story about me sleepwalking all on the spur of the moment. But it will not do.
We
cannot share a room.”

He regarded her thoughtfully for a moment, and she blushed, wondering if he, too, was remembering that one night in the past when they
had
shared a room, a bed and much more besides. “It is a little late to be thinking of the proprieties, do you not think?” He indicated her masculine garb. “You need not concern yourself. I will do my best to control myself, if you promise to do the same.”

Rosie, her laughter banished by his indifferent tone, turned away to contemplate the fire. At that moment the landlord reappeared, announcing that dinner was served, and Rosie was able to hide her chagrin. She hadn’t meant to imply he would be unable to resist her! Why would that be the case when his beautiful mistress was the most notoriously skilful and sensual woman in London?

Tom’s angry undertone broke in on her thoughts. “What the devil do you mean by consigning me to a night closeted in a room with that lumbering buffoon?” He turned to Jack with an expression of outrage. “If you do not find me with my throat cut on the morrow, it will be nothing short of a miracle.”

“Nonsense,” Jack replied serenely. “I anticipate the start of a beautiful friendship, a meeting of minds, a melding of ideas…” His face took on a wounded aspect as Tom, in an expression of his extreme exasperation, forgot the difference in their social standing and dealt him a resounding blow to his upper arm.

Once dinner was over, Rosie announced her intention of retiring to bed. Her companions bade her goodnight before returning to the serious business of sampling the very fine port offered by the deferential landlord.

The bedchamber was small but comfortable, and the bed beckoned invitingly. It seemed she was destined to share it with Jack, since there was no alternative item of furniture for him to sleep on. It was most unlikely he would consent to sleep on the floor. In the circumstances, she kept her shirt and breeches on. It would look too much like an invitation, she decided, if she removed them. Placing the large bolster down the middle of the bed, she created a makeshift barrier. It would have to do. It was nonsensical to imagine that he would make any sort of advances towards her, but she wanted it to be absolutely clear that—even if he should choose to do so—they would not be welcome.

Would they really not be welcome?
She asked herself the question and almost laughed aloud at her own hypocrisy.
If he touched me, I would melt into his arms. My husband and his mistress would matter not one jot.
Her fickle body threatened to betray her every time Jack glanced her way.
I would have no pride, no strength to resist him. Dare I admit it? Even the thought of Xander and Harry in danger would fade from my mind.
She drew in a shuddering breath.
Because I love him more than I love life itself.
So, yes, the bolster was necessary, less as a barrier and more as a message.
Stay away.
But it was a reminder to herself rather than a message to Jack.

Her thoughts were a jumble of emotion and apprehension. She was so tired she would probably have agreed to share a room with the landlord’s son after all. Anything to be able to get her head down and rest. Sliding between sheets that had been thoughtfully warmed by the chambermaid, she tumbled instantly into a deep sleep.

Chapter
Eleven

When Jack entered the bedchamber, the light from the candle he carried threw his shadow eerily onto the ceiling. He pursed his lips thoughtfully as he took in the room’s meagre furnishings. The bed looked too inviting to refuse, and Rosie lay with her back to him on one side of a large bolster. Removing his jacket, stockings, shirt and shoes, he tiptoed over to the side of the bed.

“Rosie?”

She didn’t answer, but he was fairly sure she was awake. The bed dipped as he sat on it, and Rosie rolled closer to the middle, her body connecting with the bolster as Jack settled down in preparation for sleep. What sort of hellish torture was this? To be so desperately tired and yet have the woman he went to sleep dreaming of each night mere inches from his touch? Forcing himself to ignore the longing that surged through his veins with every breath he heard Rosie take, Jack eventually managed to fall into the deep, dreamless sleep of utter exhaustion.

At some point in the night, he awoke, gasping for breath in the middle of his usual nightmare. Struggling to dismiss the bloody images of Culloden, he was pleasantly surprised to find Rosie’s warm body pressed up against him, her soft curls tickling his chin. There was no sign of the bolster, although he had no memory of either of them discarding it during the night. Jack considered the situation for a moment or two before sliding an arm around her and drawing her still closer. Her weight against him felt right, as though she belonged there, and he closed his eyes briefly, savouring the moment. Rosie murmured appreciatively in her sleep, and Jack smiled into her hair before closing his eyes once more. For once, the bloodbath was banished.

Later again, Rosie opened her eyes, blinking as the light from the dying fire threw the unfamiliar room into focus. Jack watched her face, awaiting her reaction. When she realised she was in his arms, with her head resting on his chest, she promptly closed her eyes again. After a moment, she cautiously risked opening one eye.

“Oh! I thought it was a dream.” She attempted to wriggle away from him, but he clamped his arms more tightly around her.

“Do you dream of this often?” His voice was husky with desire. When she didn’t answer, he blundered on. “Because I do, and I am tired of pretending I don’t want you. Kiss me, sweetheart.”

From the way Rosie’s eyes narrowed briefly, it seemed she was debating whether to object to this high-handed conduct. Giving her no further choice in the matter, he hauled her across his chest and, catching hold of the back of her neck, drew her mouth down to meet his. For a moment or two, Rosie remained unresponsive. Cursing his misjudgement, Jack was about to release her when, with a soft sigh of surrender, she relaxed against him and her lips parted. With a sound that was somewhere between a sigh of relief and laughter, Jack caught her tight against him, plundering her mouth with his. His tongue explored her mouth in an achingly intimate caress. Eventually, after a kiss that slowed the seconds to hours, he withdrew his lips from hers, and his tongue traced the curve of her bottom lip before dipping lower to find the exquisitely sensitive spot at the curve of her neck.

Rosie pressed hard up against him, her hands tracing the ridges of his abdominal muscles so that he drew in his breath with a sharp hiss. It was such a longed-for moment that they both trembled, passion igniting as Rosie’s soft moans mingled with Jack’s ragged sighs. Nothing that had gone before or was to come mattered, there was only now. Tangling one hand in her hair, Jack slid the other down her body and over the adorable buttocks which had been the focus of his attention since he first saw her in her boy’s attire. Last night’s untimely interruption had only increased his longing.

Rosie sat up and, keeping her eyes fixed on Jack’s, slid her ruffled shirt over her head. Turning on his side, Jack reached out and traced a finger down between her naked breasts, all the while demanding eye contact from her. As she shivered at his touch, he hooked another finger into the waistband of her breeches.

“I never thought to hear myself say this”—there was a hint of laughter in his voice—“but if I don’t get you out of those breeches this instant, I may explode. Take the blasted things off.”

Obediently, Rosie slid from the bed while Jack sat up, his hands bracketing her waist, pulling her to him so that she was trapped between his thighs. He bent his head to press a flurry of light, teasing kisses against the soft curve of her stomach, and she gasped. His smile deepened, and he lightly flicked one proud nipple with the tip of his tongue.

“All this time apart, I’ve thought of nothing but you.” The whispered words seemed to act as a catalyst, jolting Rosie abruptly into a different mood.

“No you haven’t!” It was an outraged gasp. “You have been kept very well entertained in Lady Kendall’s bed. I’m not going to be a brief distraction just because you can’t have her
.
” A deep blush bloomed in her cheeks as she attempted to reach across him to retrieve her shirt.

Perplexed by the swift change of atmosphere, Jack regarded her antics in surprise. “What
are
you talking about?”

He didn’t know whether to be angry or amused as she twisted and turned to get past him. When he made a movement to rise from the bed, Rosie pulled away from him. With a strangled sound of surprise, she promptly lost her footing, stumbled and landed face down on the bed. Seizing his opportunity, Jack tipped her unceremoniously over so that she lay on her back and pinned her down with an arm on each side of her. Rosie thrashed about in an ineffectual attempt to escape.

“Am I to construe from your words that you are jealous of Louisa, my sweet?”

Fury blazed in the grey depths of her eyes. But there was something else there as well, and it was the something else that interested him most. He had seen it once before on that never-to-be-forgotten night before Culloden. “No! Why would I care what you do?” The words were punctuated by panting that caused her breasts to rise and fall in a most distracting manner.

“I merely wondered if perhaps you imagine me doing this to her ladyship?”

Jack bent his head and nuzzled her breast, unerringly finding the hardened crest with his lips and circling it with his tongue. The fight went out of Rosie instantly, and she lay back, arching her back in something that looked suspiciously like enjoyment.

“Or this?” He slid a hand down her body and inside the waistband of the offending breeches. “And I can assure you that I have
never
before done this
.
” He unfastened her breeches and tugged them down, throwing them unceremoniously on the floor.

His gaze skimmed over her stomach and down to the dark triangle of curls between her legs. Reaching out one finger, he lightly ran it inside her folds, his breath catching in his throat at how wet she already was. “You want me as much as I want you.” He kissed along the jut of her hip bone, savouring the sweet taste of her skin against his lips, his finger returning to probe further. “Admit it.”

She squirmed against his questing touch. “Yes, I want you, Jack.” The words were little more than a sigh. “I’m tired of pretending too.”

With a masculine purr of triumph, Jack moved his lips up over the gentle curve of her waist and along her rib cage until they reached her breasts. Lingering with soft, teasing caresses on the tops of her breasts, he moved on to claim her mouth. His tongue teased the seam of her lips, and she opened them for him. As his tongue slid inside her mouth, a jolt of pleasure shot through to his nerve endings. A raw hunger, the like of which he had felt only once before—that night before Culloden—burned through him. Rosie’s tongue waltzed in time with his. It was a rhythm they both recognised, one they had made their own two years earlier.

“I’ve waited two years for this. I can’t wait any longer.” Jack shrugged his clothing aside swiftly and pulled her down on the bed next to him, his hands roaming over her body, caressing and claiming every part of her. Tracing the taut sinews of his back and shoulders, Rosie stroked the hair of his chest, following it as it descended across his flat stomach and lower until she could grip the pulsating rod of his cock.

“See how you make me feel, Rosie? How hard you get me?” Her eyes widened, and a shudder thrilled through her as she nodded.

Jack teased her nipples lightly with his fingertips before closing his lips around first one and then the other and sucking hard. His hand moved between her thighs again, and he drove two fingers in and out of her. Rosie’s whole body jerked in time with his deft movements. Almost immediately, he felt her tense as she came, her muscles clenching around his fingers.

Positioning himself between her thighs, he rammed himself into her welcoming heat, feeling the spasms that still trembled through her. Her tightness gripped him, and he drove himself hard into her, over and over, unable to take things slowly. He had waited too long to be inside her again. Had believed this moment would never come. Desperately, Rosie matched his movements until he felt another orgasm tear through her, making her cry out and throw her head back, her eyes wide with shock. He filled her with his climax and held her tightly to him, kissing her nose, her face, her neck as he called out her name.

Memories came flooding back as they lay entwined in the sweet aftermath of passion. Rosie’s fingertips traced his hard muscles while Jack delighted in the honeyed warmth of her scent and the way her body moulded itself so perfectly to the contours of his own.

“You are an addiction,” he murmured against her lips. “Every time I try to forget you, you invade my dreams as well as my every waking thought.”

* * *

Rosie was woken from her slumbering state by the warmth of Jack’s mouth on her breast. His lips were leisurely and tender as he sucked her nipple. When she opened her eyes, his arms, strong and corded with muscle, turned her so that she lay with her back against his chest. One hand moved over her abdomen, travelling lower until he parted her folds and slid a finger into her. Slowly, he moved the finger in and out, making her wetter with each stroke. Rosie stretched languorously before reaching a hand behind her. Jack sucked in a breath when her fingers closed around his rock-hard shaft.

He lifted her and held her open, so that she could feel him pressing at her entrance. Gripping her hips, he gently lowered her as he pushed up, until he was fully, throbbingly inside her. Holding her buttocks apart to increase the feeling of him pressed hard up against her, Jack began to make tiny grinding motions. His movements caused Rosie to moan and writhe. She was pinned tightly against his muscular chest by the position of their bodies. Controlling her every move, Jack lifted her up and down on his deeply embedded cock, impaling and then releasing her. The friction of their bodies rubbing intimately together was maddeningly good.

“Oh, dear God, Jack, what are you trying to do to me?” She gasped the words out.

“I want you to feel everything I have imagined doing to you for the last two years.” His breath scorched the back of her neck. “Every single day.” He punctuated the words with harder thrusts. “But nothing came close to the reality of this. Of being inside you again.”

Rosie was glad he couldn’t see her face at that moment. Even through the delirium of her passion, his words touched her, and tears briefly burned her eyelids. Jack had pictured making love to her every day? The thought was fleeting. She was too lost in sensation for coherent thought. His finger moved to her clitoris, coaxing and rubbing the tiny nub until she was incapable of thinking of anything but his touch.

“I dreamed of making you come so hard you wouldn’t be able to remember your own name.”

“Yes.” Her head fell back against his shoulder.

“Yes, what?” There was a hint of mischief in his growl. His movements stilled, and Rosie squirmed against him.

“Make me come, Jack. Do it now. Please.” Desperate for release, she drove herself up and down his length. This time it was Jack’s turn to cry out in ecstasy as he matched her furious rhythm. Pounding wildly, their bodies slammed together. Rosie was panting by the time the first spasm hit her. Jack groaned. She knew he could feel her orgasm building and it pleasured him too. Another spasm shot straight from her core, making her buck and jerk in uncontrolled rapture. In response, Jack’s pace picked up further. He dipped his head to the side and bit her neck. The pain shimmied to her nerve endings, increasing her euphoria. Jack’s hips surged twice more and then slowed, his body jolting every few seconds with aftershocks.

After he withdrew from her, Jack turned Rosie to face him, cradling her head against his chest as their breathing calmed. Rosie lay still, listening to his heart pounding beneath her ear, peace sweeping over her as she tried not to think about how right this felt. Even if you didn’t love your husband—and might actually hate him—shouldn’t adultery bring with it a tiny trace of guilt? She examined her conscience. No. There was happiness and a sense of belonging at being back in Jack’s arms. And an inevitable touch of sadness because it couldn’t last.

Gradually it became fully light, and, reluctantly, Rosie slid from Jack’s embrace. Shivering at the contrast between the warmth of his body and the cold air, she pulled on her clothing, conscious of Jack’s appreciative gaze following her every movement. She hesitated, wanting to find the words to explain herself to him. To at least begin to tell him why he could not know the truth. Why, after the intimacy they had just shared, this was all there could be. Even so, her instinct was to blurt out how it felt to be back in his arms, to feel alive once more. It didn’t matter. None of the words she searched for—whether of rapture or caution—would come. All she could do was gaze at him.

“Let us find Xander and Harry and get them safely back where they belong.” Jack seemed attuned to her distress. “This is not the time for angst. Besides—” His wicked smile gleamed, and he rose from the bed, coming to stand before her. Rosie’s eyes widened at the sight of his glorious nakedness and blatant arousal. “—if we don’t talk, we have time to do something far more interesting.” He whispered a suggestion in her ear, and Rosie gasped, blushed then nodded her agreement. “I am afraid I have to remove those damnable breeches again. ’Tis fast becoming my favourite pastime.”