Lord Beast
Page 4
An intruder!
Her heart nearly jumped out her chest. What good she was against a burglar was probably minimal, but at least she had the advantage of surprise on her side. She knew someone was trying to get into the cottage, specifically her window which was on the upper floor. The thief did not know that she would be prepared for his entrance. He probably had to scale the vine covered wall or the old oak tree to the left of her window in order to get to her room. Conveniently, a long limb extended just a few metres short of her room.
Trying to lurch upright was too painful so she remained where she was and searched for some sort of missile. The only objects heavy enough to hurl would be the pile of books she had culminated during the day spread over her bed.
She clutched the closest copy- Keats’s works- and armed herself, prepared to throw, when the window swung open and a hand appeared at the top of the sill. Followed by another, then a low growl as a form hefted the rest of his body over and into her room.
Dani lobbed the book.
It collided with his shoulder and the figure winced as Dani reached for another book, willing to sacrifice another voluminous tome consisting of Chaucer’s poetry. “Thief!” she screeched, hurling the book at his chest with as much strength as she could muster from her disadvantageous position.
“Jesus, Danielle, stop!”
She gasped. It was him!
“Lord Ashcroft?” she hissed, lowering her arm.
“Who bloody else?” he growled, straightening his cloak and pulling it tight around his face.
“W-what are you doing here?” she demanded, somewhat in shock and at a loss for words, even what to do. Her numbed brain was slowly beginning to process the fact that for someone who had managed to avoid scandal most of her life, she was just about to create one.
“So it’s alright to barge into my home in the middle of the night but I-”
“My lord, this is highly inappropriate-”
“This whole bloody acquaintanceship is inappropriate, Danielle! But you persisted regardless!”
That quieted her and she stilled, watching him closely from where she lay on her side in the bed. He was silhouetted against the window where light from the cloudless night sky streamed in, big and foreboding and cloaked in shadows. The man emanated masculine strength and ferociousness, coldly aloof and distant and constantly shrouded in infernal darkness. A beast. Her eyes took in the length of him, the incredible height of him, drifting down his broad, cloaked shoulders and further until… flowers?
“Are those for me?” she squeaked, unable to believe her eyes or the sight presented to her. She didn’t think she’d ever forget this moment- a tall, dark stranger looking forbidden and dangerous and then a posy of colourful flowers held tightly in one fist. Her heart lurched poignantly.
“Uh…”
“They are, aren’t they?” she demanded, pointing at the arrangement in his hands.
He was silent for a long moment, apparently studying the bouquet clamped in his fist. “Yes,” he said finally, his voice reluctantly gravelly. “I, uh, picked them from the garden. Your garden.”
She smothered a smile. It was the thought that count, wasn’t it? “Thank you,” she murmured before gesturing to a vanity on the other side of the room. “Would you mind putting them in the vase over there for me?”
She couldn’t see whether he nodded or not, but she sensed that he did as he stalked over to where she indicated and stuffed the flowers into the small, white vase.
“It seemed like a good idea at the time,” he muttered, turning back towards her. “You were supposed to be asleep.”
Again she had to stifle a smile. “I don’t sleep when my back is like this,” she explained to him. “It’s a bit too painful.”
He considered this thoughtfully, a heavy silence settling between them for a moment. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled, as if the words were forced from his throat and he was unused to uttering it.
“It’s not your fault,” she brushed off his apology with a negligent wave of her hand.
“It is!”
“Don’t be ridicu-”
“I shouldn’t have treated you so roughly yesterday!”
She studied him quietly for a moment before raising herself on her elbow and patting the edge of the bed with the fingers of her other hand. “Sit,” she ordered quietly as she ignored the inner protestations of her conscience. Her aunt would be mortified beyond belief if she happened to discover her in this most compromising of positions. Yet here she was, gesturing for the man to join her in bed. Her cheeks became hot at the thought.
He hesitated before moving forward and perched stiffly where she indicated he should. The bed sunk with his solid weight, causing her to involuntarily drift towards him.
“When I was eighteen,” she began in a soft voice, “I was riding a horse… my horse, to be exact. A docile mare, quite young and newly broken. Anyway, she threw me and I landed awkwardly. The doctor said I came close to breaking my back or life-long paralysis… either way, I should be grateful that it only aches from time to time and not the other… the other way it could have been, I suppose.”
“Danielle…”
“It’s not your fault,” she told him firmly. “I over exerted myself yesterday with all the walking I did. I don’t usually do so much exercise-”
“Thank you.”
He was thanking her for exonerating him from blame. He was being… amiable. Good God, when had this turnabout come along?
“Why are you here?” she blurted.
“I don’t know,” he barked.
They sat in silence for long moments, he staring into space and she staring at the imperceptible shadows that surrounded his face. A sudden, forceful yearning clamped around her heart. She had to see him. She couldn’t go through her life not knowing what he looked like. It would consume her soul.
Several seconds passed in charged quiet before he gestured to the lit candle by her bedside and the books littered around her. “Do you always keep your ammunition close at hand?”
The man, she thought, was full of surprises and she had to smother a laugh with her hand when she realised that he was teasing her.
“I was reading before you interrupted me,” she admitted.
“Ostensibly, I see,” he drawled, emphasising the sheer amount of volumes littering the bed, the floor, the table.
“Well, I get terribly bored not being able to torment you,” she told him primly. “I can’t embroider to save my life, nor paint, nor play, nor sew or knit, so that only leaves reading for me to while away the time while I’m stuck in bed with nothing to do.”
“Have you read all of these?”
She glanced around. “Some. But not all. Most of the time I’ll pick one up, read a few chapters, and then lose interest so I move on to something else.”
“An annoying habit, to be sure.”
“To whom?” she demanded peevishly. Suddenly feeling at a disadvantage somewhat on her back, she squirmed a bit so that she could prop her spine into a sitting position.
He noticed and abruptly moved closer, his hand swiftly navigating themselves under her arms and hefting her up against the headboard and several pillows.
“I’m not invalid, you know.”
“You’re not?” he remarked dryly.
“No.” She crossed her arms over her breasts stubbornly. “I’ll be all better tomorrow and back to torturing you at Falmouth.”
“The anticipation is killing.”
“I don’t like your tone, my lord.”
He chuckled- a husky, warm and gravelly sound that made her skin very hot. “There is nothing wrong with my tone,” he told her pointedly, “and please call me Rhys.”
“I don’t think that’s proper,” she murmured.
“Nothing is proper between us, Danielle. It hasn’t been since the moment you stepped foot in Falmouth.”
Her eyes widened at that and she peered into the darkness of his hood. “You’re right, of course,”
she agreed. “Although I’m still wondering why you’re here.”
He sighed resignedly. “You’re not going to stop pestering me until I tell you, are you?”
She nodded emphatically.
“If you must know, my housekeeper said you were bedridden and it was your back that ailed you. I couldn’t help remembering how you reacted yesterday-”
“So you came to see how I was for yourself,” she finished for him with a smile, sensing that the words were causing him an insurmountable wave of guilt again. “And you picked some flowers for me on the way over.”
He cleared his throat. “Yes, well…”
“It’s a very sweet gesture,” she told him.
“Don’t get used to it.”
“Oh, most assuredly not!” She threw him a wry grin. “However would you live with yourself? Giving flowers to young country misses. Lord knows you’d probably get a reputation and then all the young country misses would expect it from you-”
He began to laugh again. “Especially because all the young misses trespass on my property on a nightly basis,” he said gruffly.
“I should like to think that all of them were that innovative,” she said.
“No,” his voice soft now, “only you.”
Her heart beat just a little bit faster and her fingers tingled with anticipation. “Was that a compliment, my lord?” she breathed, her voice catching somewhere in her thudding chest.
“Maybe. Perhaps not.”
“I think it was,” she declared confidently. “I think you like me.”
He was on her in a second, his hands pinning her arms into the pillows as he leaned in close, his body’s warmth encompassing her own, infusing her with delirious, wonderful heat. Her skin tingled at his closeness, seared her where their bodies touched.
She stared up at him and she realised she could make out some of his features. The light cast by the solitary candle in her room caught his strong chin and some of his mouth and, God, what a chin and mouth they were! Strong, firm, and unforgiving contrasted with sinful promise in a mouth like that. His chin was adorned with dark stubble as if it hadn’t seen a blade in a long time and his mouth was wide and full, artfully shaped but serious. And there was a lock of his hair resting against his neck; it slipped forward with his movement, catching the light of the candle in its inky strands. Black, she thought. He had black hair and mouth that was deliciously kissable.
She only had a moment to glimpse all this before his face turned away from the light as if he knew that with too much exposure to that candle she’d be able to see him.
“There’s a vast difference between like and want, Danielle,” he murmured seductively as he pressed his lower body against her.
She gasped and wriggled a little bit, although his touch was softer now, as if he were scared of being too rough with her. “I don’t think that’s true,” she told him waveringly.
“No?”
She shook her head. “You said yourself I wasn’t your taste-”
He swore under his breath. “Don’t belittle yourself, Danielle.”
She gave him a dry look. “I know very well what I’m not. I know I’ll never be beautiful or thin or have perfect skin-”
“Your skin is perfect,” he growled and suddenly Rhys forgot what he found so imperfect about her in the first place. She felt quite lovely beneath him and her hair was a rich, lively brown- thick and wavy and luxurious. She smelled damned nice, too, of lilies and honey and everything perfect. Her lips were small, but the bottom one was full and pink and the top- a deliciously shaped cupid’s bow.
She gave him a doubtful look, those gracefully dark brows drawing together gorgeously. “I have freckles,” she grumbled.
“Mmmm,” he nearly purred. “I’ve discovered that I like freckles.”
“You have?” she asked sceptically.
“Indeed.” He felt himself smiling as he leaned down, enveloping them both in the cape’s hood as he kissed one of those said freckles that had situated itself close to her nose just above her lip.
She trembled beneath him and his body was hard, demanding. He’d been hard as soon as he’d climbed through her window, to be exact.
“Why’d you do that?” she whispered tremulously.
“I wanted to.”
“But you said-”
“The devil with what I said,” he growled, leaning down to capture her lips but she began to squirm.
“No!” she cried, then gasped as her struggles brought her pain. Rhys immediately released her and sat back. She was lovely and the fact that she was in pain, pain that he couldn’t fix, made him yearn to comfort her, to hold her until it resided no matter how many days it took and these emotions astounded him. Frightened him? Angered him. And now she was rejecting him? He was unused to rejection. In fact, he had shielded himself against ever facing the possibility of rejection. She hadn’t seen him. How could she reject him without having seen the scars?
“No,” she reiterated, composing herself by straightening a crease in her demure white cotton night gown. She raised cobalt blue eyes to him before continuing. “I meant what I said, Rhys.” He shuddered involuntarily at the sound of his name on her lips. “I’ll willingly kiss you but I want nothing between us.”
He grinned wolfishly although he knew she was unaware of her secret innuendo. “That’s the idea behind it,” he teased huskily.
She blushed. “I meant your cloak.”
“I know what you meant.”
She studied him expectantly and Rhys was surprised to find himself considering her offer. She couldn’t, after all, very well back down on her bargain. She’d said she’d kiss him for the removal of his hood and once that was off, she would not be able to renounce her word. She’d have to do it. But he’d bear witness to the emotions on her face as he did so. He’d see the pity, the revulsion and then the reluctance to kiss him. No, he couldn’t endure that. It was the cruellest sort of torture.
He abruptly rose to his feet. He’d been mad coming here. What was he thinking? The woman was disrupting his carefully constructed equilibrium and he didn’t like where his thoughts and feelings were being led.
“This is foolish, Danielle,” he snarled harshly. “You can’t keep this up. You can’t taunt a man like me and expect to come away unscathed. Stay away from me! Do you hear me?” When she didn’t answer, he lunged for her, grabbed her shoulders and squeezed. “Do you understand? I’m dangerous. I don’t need your permission to kiss you, to want you. I could have you right now if I so desired it. And I do! You’ve made me burn for you. Stay away from me, Danielle.”
“I won’t,” she whispered, her earnest, young eyes boring into his hood.
He groaned. “Why?”
“You need me.”
Angry, resentful, he pushed away from her and marched to the window from which he entered. “You play this little game at your own risk,” he barked. “I’ll not be held responsible for the consequences.”
Chapter 6
“You received a letter.”
“I did?” Dani glanced at Aunt Fiona who had just entered the sitting room with their morning post. A tea service followed her in.
“Yes.” She handed her a white envelope and Dani immediately recognised the handwriting from one of her friends.
“Oh, it’s from Victoria Sinclair.”
Fiona gave her a politely blank stare before taking a seat opposite Dani, picking up her knitting. The loose pile of stitching was looking suspiciously like a pair of orange stockings for Uncle George.
Dani tore open the envelope and pried the parchment from inside. Spreading it open on her lap, she began to read.
My dearest Danielle
It feels like ages since I last saw you but I’m glad to inform you that Gabriel is absolutely wonderful. I honestly do not think he could make me any happier if he tried. As you well know, I had my doubts at one stage but he has proven most suitable as a husband and I can readily confirm that I am very deeply in love with hi
m.
How are you faring in Cornwall? I’m told the county is very beautiful and I shall endeavour to visit you sometime soon in the future. Well, very soon to be precise.
A close acquaintance of Gabriel’s is hosting a fall masque ball in the country for a select few of us. When I say a select few, I mean close to the entire set of the ton. It’s to be quite the thing, I’m sure, and seeing as it is in Truro, I was hoping that you’d accompany us. Gabriel and I would be appropriate chaperones and I shall be arriving in Cornwall within the next couple of days in order to prepare for the event. I’m reserving your company for a shopping expedition at once as well as numerous fittings for our costumes.
I’m so excited to see you and very glad we have this excuse to spend some time together. Don’t even think about replying in the negative, Dani, as I’ll simply drag you off. If you use your poor old mother as an excuse not to go, that simply won’t wash. I’ve devised a costume for you that will have enough black in it to suffice for your mourning period.
Yours fondly,
Vicky.
Dani grinned.
“It seems I’m to attend a ball,” she told her aunt, who glanced up from her knitting and pushed her spectacles up her nose.
“A ball? Heavens, I don’t have to attend, do I?” she asked.
“No that’s quite alright,” Dani reassured her. “Victoria and Gabriel Sinclair will do the honours for you.”
“Oh, lovely. That’s alright then.”
He was waiting for her.
For some reason, that made her immensely pleased.
He was leaning against a tree a few hundred metres away from Falmouth, his arms bunching and crossed over his vast chest. His legs were intersected at the ankles and his cloak was black and, as usual, hiding his face.
“Expecting someone?” she asked with a smile as she came to a halt in front of him.
“Yes,” he drawled. “Perhaps you know her. A stubborn, persistent girl with a gorgeous freckle next to her nose.”
Unconsciously, Dani touched the offending spot he mentioned then lowered her hand. “I don’t know her,” she told him. “I do know a stubborn, persistent girl with unbecoming freckles on her nose?”