Tonight or Never (2 page)

Usually making sport of you
!
an
annoying inner voice spoke up.

Chloe chewed on her bottom lip. Yes, but he could be extraordinarily sweet…

When it suits him
!
the
voice reasonably pointed out.

Chloe pictured the way John always moved; irresistibly smooth, sure, fluid…

Unpredictable and predatory! Like a targeting beast!

She squelched the annoying opinion.

Yes, John was often like honey: sweet, smooth, rich, fluid, with a somewhat unpredictable flavor. One could only wonder if he might actually taste the same…

Lord of Sex.

The play on his name that the ton found so delightfully humorous.
Even at sixteen, the age he was when she had first met him, he had been sampling the pleasures of the flesh. It only got worse over the years.

From the beginning, they had formed a close and enduring bond. A lump rose in her throat. Oh, she wanted to kill him!

When she was six, she hadn't understood why women watched him so. He was simply the older boy who picked her up and swung her onto his shoulders and always made her laugh.
The one who held her and dried her tears and murmured soothing little phrases to her.

The fist of her hand uncurled and she placed her palm against the windowpane, as if the simple action could bring him closer to her.
John
…

Rider and horse took a reckless leap over a stone border wall and continued charging forward, the horse's hooves kicking up great clods of earth. Lord John was in a hurry to get to his uncle's. In a few minutes he would arrive. After all those endless months away from him—her self-imposed exile—she would see him in the flesh once again.

Chloe closed her eyes as they filled with moisture. It had been so difficult to stay away this long! But the exile had been a very important part of the plan.

She recalled the exact look on John's masculine face when she had told him her decision to go to the Colonies with her friend, Aubrey, who was visiting an older sister in
Charleston. For an instant John had seemed stunned.

"You're going
where
?"

Then he had tried to talk her out of it, but finally quit when he realized she would not be dissuaded.

"Maybe I shouldn't let you go," he had grumbled.

Chloe had laughed.
"As if you have a say in what I do."
That
had made the handsome face glower.

For as long as Chloe could remember, John had fancied himself a cross between her best friend and knowledgeable guide.
The realization that in fact he did not have any say whatsoever seemed to give him pause.
However briefly.

Of course, she had fueled his fire when she set sail, by whispering to him that she intended to do every naughty thing she could think of during her stay in the Colonies, leaving him to wonder just what she meant. His face had gone absolutely white as the ship sailed out of the harbor. It had been immensely satisfying.

Horse and rider scaled another wall.

Surely the speed with which he came to her now indicated more than their usual friendship? Surely he would realize that things would be different between them now that she was a grown woman of nineteen?

He
must
realize how much she… how she always…

Chloe swallowed in an effort to hold at bay the reckless, emotional French side to her nature, which had a tendency to land her in trouble. She had wanted John all of her life and had waited so patiently for this day.

Didn't that deserve a reward of some kind? Of course it did!

Surely his beautiful, low voice was about to whisper her name just as she imagined in all her girlhood fantasies—

"
Chlo-eee
!"
The front door opened with a crash and slammed shut with a force that shook the rafters. The deep male voice boomed throughout the house.

Chloe winced. Well, maybe not quite a whisper. Apparently that little mischief she had played on him when she had sailed had not set too well with him. She squared her shoulders.

Well, if that had unnerved the rogue, wait until he saw what else she had in store for him!

John was in trouble.

He didn't know it yet, but he was in deep trouble. His days of debauchery were over! For Chloe—determined little Chloe—intended to have him for her very own.
Now and forever.

After she killed him.

Lord of Sex
! Tales of his exploits had managed to reach her even in the Colonies.
Snippets in letters from
Grandmere
alluding to his myriad grand passions.
Merde
.
It made her ill!

Unfortunately, she had missed the rakehell too much to execute him before the noon meal.

She sighed.

It would just have to wait until later in the day.

John stood at the foot of the stairs and roared.

He was dead tired, having stopped only briefly at an inn to refresh himself with a cold bath and feed his poor horse. For some reason, there was a compelling need to get here as quickly as possible. Just to ensure that the little
piddlehead
was all right.

He still hadn't forgiven her for taking off like that to the Colonies. Leaving him for eighteen long months to wonder what that unpredictable ginger-pate was devising in the way of trouble!

Then again, he hadn't had to rescue her from some mischief she had gotten herself into, either.

Despite himself, a grin curved his sensual lips. Until he recalled her mysterious last words to him.

He bellowed out her name again.
"
Chloe
!"

Now where was the hellcat hiding?

A smidgen of red hair poked between the upstairs banisters. It was followed by two enormous violet eyes.

"John?" She spoke his name haltingly in that sweet voice he remembered so well. No one said his name quite like Chloe. Despite all of her years in
England, she still softened the
J
slightly in the French way. Something stopped in his chest. He hadn't realized how much he had missed the sprite until now.

"John!" Chloe stood up and began to race down the steps toward him, her
slippered
feet barely touching the rug beneath her.

The thought
She's
changed
scarcely had time to register before he found himself dashing up the steps to meet her halfway. She leaped into his arms in an act of blind faith, almost sending them both crashing downward.

John threw back his head and laughed, spinning them both around.
She's not changed that much! Thank God
.

"John! John!" Chloe wrapped her arms around his neck and began quickly kissing him all over his face. John called it "Chloe's Chicken Pecks
Français
." It was something she had always done when they hadn't seen each other for a while, and it never failed to make him laugh.

And it didn't fail this time either.
At first.

John, arms wrapped tightly around her, lifting her up to him, abruptly stopped laughing. A frown marred his smooth forehead as his hands cupped her bottom. It was fuller than he remembered and more… well, shapely.

He pulled his face back from her free-roaming lips. "What are you wearing under here?" His hands hefted the portion of anatomy in question, bringing her closer to him.

Chloe raised her magnificent eyes slowly to his. He wondered where she had learned that bit of coquetry.

"Nothing," she whispered to him in a throaty voice.

John's green eyes widened a fraction. He blinked once,
then
dropped her like a hot baguette. He studied her as if he had just turned over a rock and something "Chloe" had crawled out from underneath.

Oh, dear
, she thought, dismayed.
This could be crucial. Well, he needs to stop seeing me as a child and begin regarding me as an adult woman in order for my plan to work
! It was a risk, but one she had to take in order to proceed; otherwise her long exile in the Colonies would have been for nothing.

Knowing he was watching her suspiciously from under those thick black lashes of his, Chloe threw back her shoulders, put her hands on her generously curved hips, and cocked her red head to the side. It was a calculated pose, designed to show her blossomed figure to perfection.

Let the games begin
. Strength had never been a weakness to her.

John took his time observing Chloe. He was thinking that the mite had changed considerably since last he had seen her. Where had that—that
curvaceous
figure come from? Full breasts, tiny waist, rounded hips… She had been all youthful angles the last time he had seen her. Eyes that had once seemed too large for her heart-shaped face were now spellbinding.
And her hair…

Where had the
carrottop
gone?

Instead of the orange mop-top he was accustomed to, there was the most magnificent red hair he had ever seen. Chloe was breathtaking.
Different
.
An incredible beauty.

With as much experience as he had in choosing women, John knew it would be more than her looks that would take
London by storm.

There was a fire in her that would be evident to every court card of the beau monde.

It wouldn't be long before word got out and the mansion was under siege. Add to that fact that Chloe was an heiress…

This was bound to be trouble.

And he knew for whom.

He already had a busy season planned; he didn't have time for this. John scowled. "What have you done to yourself?"

Chloe pursed her lips. This was not the reaction she had hoped for. "Whatever do you mean, John? And you can take that
scowly
-bear look off your face right now!"

Scowly
-bear
?
Chloe always had a strange way of turning a phrase. He didn't think she realized that she always mixed up questionable adjectives with descriptions of the animal kingdom whenever she was angry with him. He always thought her attempts at categorizing him when she was upset most adorable. And he had a delightful way of teasing her with it.

So his lips twitched.

Momentarily.

"I have grown up,
John,
in case you have not noticed!" The violet eyes flashed lightning at him.

Yes.
White-hot fire.

Despite himself, he grinned slowly. "Oh, I noticed," he drawled.

Mistaking his meaning, Chloe's felt her face break into a delighted smile.

"The question is—how much trouble is it going to cause me?" He stroked his chin in what was to Chloe an insufferably arrogant gesture. The smile died on her face.

Her delicate brows slanted down.

So that's where the rascal thought to go, did he? Going to play his long-suffering, I'm-responsible-for-you routine. I don't think so, Viscount.

For some reason, John had always considered himself accountable for her. Why exactly was a mystery to everyone, including Chloe. No one had ever remotely suggested the possibility to him. Mystery or no, she was not above using that inexplicable quirk of his to her advantage.

She spoke the words she knew would rattle him. "Whatever does it have to do with
you
?"

John eyed her suspiciously, green eyes narrowing slightly. "And I suppose you're not going to embroil me in one of your schemes the next time you get yourself into hot water? Which, knowing you, should be in about, oh, say, an hour and fifteen minutes?"

Chloe swallowed. Actually that was just about the time she was thinking of springing her trap on him. It was uncanny how well he knew her.

"What's the matter, Chloe-rabbit, cat got your tongue?" His deep voice teased her.

The corners of Chloe's generous mouth turned down at the silly sobriquet, one of many he irked her with. John had a habit of tacking animals onto her name. She could never figure out the reason.

"Stop calling me Chloe-rabbit; it is just not done, John! After all, I am a woman now."

John looked up at the ceiling,
then
settled his mocking gaze on her. "Are you really?"

She nodded, her soft mouth curving in an enigmatic half smile.

John didn't want to believe what he was thinking. He bent toward her, bringing his face level with hers. "And tell me, just what did you do in the Colonies that has brought about this change?" The mocking lilt in his voice did nothing to disguise the mercuric glint in his eyes.