Page 38

Chapter Eighteen

D o you regret making love to me?

The carriage slowed as it rumbled downhill and entered a tunnel of trees. The coach’s interior went dark despite the fact it was barely one in the afternoon, and, facing aft, Caden and Anna both lurched back into the cushions.

Anna yelped and reached for Caden. He took her small, gloved hand and tucked it into the crook of his elbow. She turned her head to face him.

His eyes had adjusted enough to make out her anxious expression. “Not to worry. The road will soon level out,” he assured her.

Meanwhile, he could only thank the heavens for the seconds the changing terrain bought him to consider how best to answer her question—a loaded one if ever he heard one, and one he had not anticipated.

He’d assumed Anna would stay true to form and avoid any and all topics that might put her on the hot seat. He ought to have known. With Anna, he never could keep his footing .

The coach leveled off, though they remained shrouded in shadow.

“Regret? Not a term I would use, precisely.”

Beside him, her body went rigid, and she gave him her most haughty profile.

“What I mean to say—” He broke off. He wanted to reassure her. However, he had no intention of giving away his entire hand. Not yet.

He took a bracing breath. “There are certainly regrettable aspects to what transpired. The fact of your virginity, for one, your current marital status for another.”

Her shoulders rose and fell in deep sigh, and her chin dropped. “I see. I did ask, didn’t I?”

The coach shifted again, starting up another slight incline. Caden’s grip on her hand tightened, locking her beside him. He didn’t want to risk her toppling off the bench, he told himself.

She turned to face the opposite window. “You dislike lying with virgins?” she asked in a small voice. “Or was it how I…what I…”

His resolve to hold his cards close crumbled. He crooked a finger under her chin, urging her to face him.

“I disliked hurting you. That is all. Aside from that, I can say without a moment’s hesitation…” His voice lowered seemingly of its own accord.“Making love to you was…”

The trees surrounding the carriage thinned, diffuse light spilling into the carriage to light-up Anna’s heart shaped face. Gods she was beautiful.

“Yes?” Her voice held an unmistakable note of hopefulness.

He could withhold nothing from her. “…Everything I could have hoped for and more.”

Her rose-colored lips parted briefly in surprise. “I see,” she said again. Same words, different meaning entirely .

A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. How inordinately pleased with herself she sounded.

“What of you? Do you regret what happened between us?”

She didn’t hesitate. “No.” A tremulous smile curved her lips, despite her obvious attempt to staunch the grin. “Last night was…” she swallowed.

Unable to refrain from touching her face again, he traced his fingertips over her cheek. “Did you enjoy my lovemaking, Anna?”

“Yes, I did. Very much.”

He’d battled a simmering arousal all morning—nothing new where Anna was concerned. Everything about the woman seemed to ignite his carnal appetite.

Now, hearing her softly spoken admission, he went instantly hard. The need to feast on her plump, inviting lips, toss her skirts up, and take her, right here, right now seared his senses.

Feigning an interest in the surrounding area, he released her hand and shifted to face away from her. Closing his eyes, he laid his forehead against the sun-baked window panes. Christ .

“Not much longer now,” he ground out.

“Caden?” A tone of uncertainty laced her voice.

He prayed she didn’t require any further proof of her desirability. He could not withstand further temptation.

Bracing himself, he glanced at her over his shoulder. “Yes?”

“I assume you’ve given some thought as to what you’ll tell your family? About me, I mean, and why I’m traveling with you, unchaperoned.”

“I plan to tell them the truth.”

She lowered her gaze, but not before he saw the flash of alarm. “I see. ”

Everything in him wanted to take her in his arms. He could not risk it. “Trust me?”

She lifted her eyes to meet his. “I do trust you, Caden.”

The constant desire he felt for her was hard enough to manage. But this. This hot sensation flooding his chest at her gentle assurance stole his breath.

It also felt unreasonably, intoxicatingly good. He wondered briefly if this was how Kitty made Zeke feel during their courtship. If so, it explained a lot—and served Zeke right.

***

The coach had been moving at a steady clip for the better part of an hour, during which blue skies gave way to a cloud dappled dome and the summer sun eased lower in the western sky.

Now, the slowing jostle of the cabin had Anna pulling aside the velvet curtains to ascertain what the musty scents of damp vegetation and slight tinge of garlic in the air had already told her.

They’d reached the Derwent riverbank. Just ahead and below, the wide expanse of gently rippling water reflected the late afternoon sun.

The coachman guided the horses onto the old, three-arch stone bridge marking the eastern perimeter of the Claybourne estate.

Soon the coach crossed through a thicket of forest, then turned onto a cobblestone road. Anna could only stare unblinking at the vista unfolding before her.

Rolling green hills bracketed by miles of forest announced the pièce de resistance centered on the hilltop like a crown, the castle known as Chissington Hall .

Bathed in the fading sun’s rays, the imposing limestone fortress radiated a fearsome bronze as if it shone with a light all its own. The sight of those achingly familiar towers and parapets pinched her insides, making it hard to breathe.

She’d always loved Chissington Hall. She was gratified to see it was every bit as beautiful as her memory held. As a girl she fantasized about living in one of the towers with Caden, she a princess and he, her own Prince Charming.

She was no longer a child, and was certainly no princess. Caden, however took on the part of her rescuing prince like he was born to it. Some things never changed.

She shot him a searching look. Over the last hour, he had shown a marked disinclination to converse beyond monosyllabic replies to her every attempt to draw him out.

She couldn’t know precisely how the sight of his familial home affected him, but the muscle, rapid-fire ticking in his jaw said his thoughts were far from placid.

He’d told her of his bitter argument with Zeke and the earl before he’d departed for Femsworth Manor. Was that where his thoughts had gone? Or was he simply concerned about the earl’s unknown illness?

Another possibility existed which Anna could hardly bear to contemplate. He might be worried over his family’s reaction to her plight and its potential to bring scandal down upon them.

Caden had asked her to trust him. She did trust him. It was what the rest of his family might do that gave her qualms.

The coach rumbled to a halt in the wide, graveled forecourt. After so long on the road hearing the clatter of the wheels, the relative silence felt like a breath of fresh air.

Caden waggled his brows at her, vaulted out of the vehicle and placed the stoop. He reached for her hand, helping her down.

Her legs trembled like jelly as she descended .

Here she stood outside Chissington Hall, about to enter the forbidding walls for the first time in her life. She wrapped her arms around herself and waited in silence as Caden and the coachman carted their luggage to the wide front steps of the castle’s entrance.

He returned to her side, neither speaking as the travel coach set off in the direction of the stables.

Their eyes met.

Suddenly she found it hard to breath. “Caden, I’m not sure you—we—thought this through properly. What if the earl—”

“—Shh.” He shifted to face her, his back to the castle.

Gripping her shoulders with gentle hands, he gave her a reassuring smile. But it was his guileless blue eyes boring into hers that somehow calmed the hysteria trying to well up inside her.

“What’s this? My bold girl who single-handedly thwarted a mad woman, fought off a villain, and braved the streets of London now trembles in fear of meeting the gentlest of men?”

“Gentle or not, he is the Earl of Claybourne,” she muttered. “What if he sends me back to Bolton?”

“That, my darling, will never happen.”

“And what of your sanctimonious brother?”

He looked over his shoulder and squinted at the solid stone walls as if he could see through to the man himself. “You need not concern yourself, Anna. My brother may possess an overinflated view of his own judgement in all matters, but his loyalty to family knows no bounds.”

“Family being the key word.”

He shifted his attention back to her. One corner of his mouth crooked upward. An odd expression lit his sky blue eyes. He seemed on the verge of speaking when one of the massive front doors swung open wide .

Brows arched, Caden turned. “Ah.”

He tucked her fingers into the crook of his arm and, led her, unhurried, toward the broad front steps.

Looming in the open doorway, a tall, powerfully built man with the bearing of a demigod stared down at them—Lord Ezekiel Thurgood in the flesh. The similarities in his appearance to Caden would mark him as none other, even if she had never met him.

A bemused, pleased, and still somehow arrogant expression animated his ruggedly handsome face.

“This is a surprise, brother. I had the impression we’d not see you…” he broke off, arching his brows meaningfully. He cast a quick glance at Anna before finishing with, “anytime soon.”

He trotted down the flight of stairs, then reached his arm to squeeze Caden’s shoulder. “Welcome home.”

Caden frowned in evident confusion. “I’m gratified by your warm reception, but my arrival is hardly unexpected. You did send a messenger to Femsworth Manor, did you not? About the earl?”

“Messenger? What about the earl?”