Rogue in My Arms: The Runaway Brides

by Celeste Bradley

  “You want to make Melody legitimate, of course. Completely understandable. Admirable, even. You would do anything for Melody. As would I.”

  Colin shook his head, confused. “If you know all of this, then why, tonight in the garden—”

  She moved forward, graceful and serene. Her eyes gleamed silver in the candlelight. “Sir Colin, don’t be an idiot. Tonight in the garden was because I love you, of course.”

  His heart thudded. She loves me!

  She mustn’t.

  Yet I love her, too!

  He mustn’t.

  “Oh.” Idiot! Say something better than that! Say what you truly want to say! Ache and longing welled up from so deep inside him, his throat was almost too tight to speak. His vision blurred. “I—”

  In one rustling step, she darted close enough to press a finger to his lips.

  “Don’t,” she whispered, her eyes burning into his, her beautiful voice thick with grief. “Don’t ever.” Then she stepped back, visibly drawing herself together once more.

  Pru lifted her chin and tried to smile at him. “You wished to know who I am. That is who I am.”

  He nodded. “I see now. You and Evan were orphaned and left penniless—”

  Pru shook her head, her smile growing. “Not penniless. Not in the slightest.”

  Colin frowned at her. “Not? But you—the theater—five pounds—your boots!”

  She blinked at him in surprise. “What’s wrong with my boots? They come in very handy when a fellow gets too . . . handy.”

  Colin closed his eyes. “I have had a very long day,” he said tightly. “I would like to know more about this ‘not penniless’ situation, if you don’t mind.”

  Pru smiled at him fondly through the mist of tears she would not shed. Such a darling man. Even when disoriented and exasperated, he never lost his temper. She should be ashamed of herself, but she’d never been able to resist winding him up a bit.

  Lucky, lucky Chantal.

  “Colin,” she said softly. He opened his beautiful green eyes. They were so filled with pain she ached doubly for him. “In six years, Evan will be eighteen years of age. When that day comes, he will inherit my father’s fortune.”

  Moving slowly, she began to circle him as if idly wandering the room. “Until then, his fate was given into the hands of people my parents trusted. They revealed themselves to be vile, evil schemers and we fled them. Since that day, I have worked to keep us safe and mostly fed.”

  He shook his head. “Miss Prudence Filby. Lady gone rogue.”

  “I believe the inheritance totals more than four thousand pounds. Enough to live a gentleman’s life, enough to buy a small manor—”

  Colin interrupted. “Enough to provide his sister with a tempting dowry.”

  Pru ignored the point, taking a few more steps. Colin turned with her, unaware. “He will no longer need me.”

  Frowning, Colin held up a finger. “With you two gone, what’s to keep these people from simply declaring you both dead and taking the money?”

  Pru smiled. It wasn’t a nice smile. “No, if they have Evan declared dead, they get nothing. The entire trust goes to a charitable house, my mother’s work.” She laughed a small, ironic sound. “An orphanage.”

  “So, you are a lady. Someday you will be a rich woman.” He gazed at her for a long moment. “Why tell me this now?”

  She stopped moving and tilted her head, facing him. “Because I don’t want you to worry about us when we go.” She took a deep breath. Don’t hesitate. Don’t contemplate. Life must amount to more than mere survival! “And because I want you to know who you’re making love to tonight.”

  Colin felt his entire body tingle with shock. “I cannot!”

  Pru gazed at him with something frightening and a little thrilling shining in her beautiful eyes. “You can,” she said softly. “You will.”

  “I cannot.” He rubbed a hand across his face. “You will marry someday! You must be pure!”

  Pru gazed at him with that same unbreakable concentration. “I will never marry, Sir Colin Lambert. I will not lack for means or independence—”

  “You cannot say that for sure. You might change your mind in the future!”

  “That is a someday and a perhaps. I will not bank my happiness upon it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that this is not a someday. This is now. Now and here and you. Loving you. That will bring me happiness—or at the very least consolation and solace in the days ahead.”

  She took a step toward him. Then another. It wasn’t until that moment that Colin realized that somehow she’d placed herself between him and the door. Panic jangled through him—panic and eagerness and horror at his endangered honor. He knew Prudence Filby a little too well to think he might get out of this one easily. His cock was already thickening in his breeches, merely from the intoxicating look in her eyes. I’m going to have you.

  “Which do you think you would regret more, loving me or not loving me?” Her voice was husky and low. Sex and velvet.

  Oh, God, he was in for it now. “I am eng—engaged!”

  She was close now, close enough to reach for, close enough for him to see the longing and sadness behind the lust in her eyes. That only made it harder to resist her.

  Lifting her hands, she reached for the ribbon that caught back her hair and slowly pulled the bow undone. The rich, russet fall of her hair fell forward over her shoulders. A thick curl dropped over one eye, turning her instantly from sweet to wanton.

  That hair streaming across his pillow, flowing over his chest. Burying his hands in that hair as he thrust hard into her, making her cry out and toss her head.

  She twined the ribbon idly through her fingers. “Sir Colin Lambert, you may be engaged tomorrow. That will be soon enough.”

  “Pru, stop this at once!”

  She only smiled at him slowly. “I don’t work for you any longer, guv.” Reaching behind her neck, she began to undo the buttons of her dress.

  Colin backed away hastily, stumbling a step as he ran into the arm of the sofa. She followed him mercilessly, making quick work of her buttons. The gown sagged, then slipped away. Clad only in a thigh-length chemise and gartered stockings, she stepped out of the pile of muslin and kept coming.

  God, her figure was stunning. The silken chemise clung to her bountiful breasts—I touched those!—and shimmered revealingly over the rigid points of her nipples—I sucked those!—and floated lightly over the mound between her thighs—I stroked her there until she came apart in my arms!

  The blood abruptly abandoned his brain and made a race for more rewarding areas. His rigid cock stretched his breeches and robbed his mind of sense.

  Touch her.

  Hold her.

  Claim her.

  He closed his eyes, fighting for sanity. Save her, from you and from herself!

  The sofa struck him in the back of the knees but he did not fall. Instead, he pushed off and, twisting, flung himself over the back of it, putting it between him and the advancing goddess.

  She raised her brows at his antics. “That was impressive,” she said. Then challenge lit her eyes and her hands went to the hem of her chemise. “Watch this.” In one motion she lifted it up and over her head, throwing it down between them like a gauntlet.

  She stood there, clad in nothing but rippling red hair and lacy white stockings and a pitiless glinting dare in her eyes. Her pale skin shimmered like ivory in the candlelight and her hair glowed with all the fire that had always been contained within her. She was ripe and rich and powerful. He wanted to worship her. He wanted to conquer her. He wanted to pull her down onto the carpet and spill her hair across his arms and take her until she clung and quivered and screamed his name.

  Colin gasped for air. “Pru, I can’t.”

  For the first time, she truly seemed to listen. A tiny crease appeared between her brows. “You can’t?” A quick glance at his groin seemed to convince her otherwise.

&
nbsp; Trying very hard not to feel insulted, Colin clarified himself. “I can. But I mustn’t.”

  She crossed her arms before her, more in irritation than in a belated effort of concealment, but a voice inside him cried out in protest anyway.

  “I see. You can, but you won’t.”

  He held up both hands in placation. “I want to, I really, really”—her triangle below is as fiery as her hair. Her thighs are like sugar and cream and I’ve never been so hungry in my life!—“really want to.” He had to take a breath and force his gaze to meet hers. “But I simply, absolutely, entirely cannot.”

  Her eyes widened. “Oh.” She looked down at herself. Bending quickly, Colin picked up the chemise and held it out to her. She took it and draped it over her front, hiding herself from him at last. Then she looked up at him with sad eyes. “I suppose that if you can’t, then you can’t.”

  He breathed a sigh of relief. He hammered at the wall between them in a rage—but that was only on the inside. Outside, he smiled hopefully at her. “I’m glad you understand.” I hate my own existence. “I wouldn’t want to part unhappily from you.” It will kill me to part from you. “I should go now.” I need to find a brawl. It is time to get beaten senseless.

  He took a step toward the door.

  “Wait.” She lifted her chin, defiance giving her cheeks color. “I think that before you go, you owe me something.”

  “What is it?” Other than my heart, my life, my home, my everything?

  “You owe me,” she said as her lips turned up in a smile both prim and evil. “You owe me an apology.”

  Oh, no. Swallowing, he gazed at her, desperate and pleading. Yet, in all truth, he could not deny that he did, indeed, owe her the great ancestor of all apologies.

  I can do this. His throat dry, his heart pounding, he opened his mouth. “I’m . . . sorry.” The breath left him in a whoosh. He’d done it!

  Yet she merely tilted her head. “Sorry for what?”

  Diabolical! Nonetheless, it had hardly been a proper apology. She had every right to ask for better. Grimly steeling himself, he inhaled.

  She dropped the chemise.

  It took every scrap of will he had not to look at her sweet, inviting body. He gazed directly into her eyes. “I’m sorry that I kissed you. I’m sorry that I touched you. I’m sorry I allowed you to . . .”

  Pru watched his green eyes glaze at the memory of what she’d done to him in the garden. “Allowed me to what?” she asked huskily.

  He swallowed hard. She lifted her chin and threw her shoulders back, tilting one hip forward in an enticement as old as Eve. She was shaking inside but this was not a battle she intended to lose. Not this man. Not this night.

  “Allowed me to take you with my mouth, Sir Colin?”

  A harsh growl erupted from deep in his chest. In less than a second, the civilized veneer fell away and the inner man filled his gaze. Hot, male lust centered on her and focused. The intensity of his gaze took her breath.

  In two strides he was upon her like a starving beast.

  CHAPTER 38

  Even as Colin gave in to his lust and his need, he hated himself. Love and honor warred within him, not quite drowned out by the pounding of his heart.

  You will walk away tomorrow. Forever.

  I know.

  Then stop!

  I cannot.

  Not yet. Not this woman. Not this night.

  Then she was in his arms at last. He pulled her tightly to him, pressing her soft naked body close, lifting her to meet his descending mouth, filling his hands with warm, thick hair. He whirled her and fell with her onto the sofa, her softness pressed beneath him.

  Pru gasped and shivered to feel his weight and hardness upon her at last. She was naked and vulnerable beneath his clothed body. The contrast seemed naughty and wicked and enticing. She could feel the buttons of his weskit cold against her skin and her nipples rose in response to the silk weskit rubbing against them.

  His groin pressed into hers, hard against her soft, his trapped, hers liberated. The pressure made her squirm beneath him. He groaned and dropped his face into her neck. Hot hands roved over her, sliding, rubbing, pressing, squeezing. Hot mouth on her neck, her breasts, kissing, nibbling, sucking.

  Oh, yes, please!

  Hot man pressing her deep into the cushions, pinning her, conquering her, claiming her at last.

  He slid one hand down her thigh and pulled it high up against his hip, opening her to his grinding pressure. She wrapped her arms about his clothed body and held tight to him as he touched and tasted and teased. He was wild, out of control, a fearsome male animal she’d released from a cage of his own making.

  Just for one night.

  He found her wrists and pinned her hands on either side of her head. “Oh, my God, Pru . . .” For a long moment, he kept his face in her neck, breathing heavily. He was fighting for control, she could tell.

  Experimentally, she ground her hips upward into him. He groaned but did not release her, nor did he return to the ravishing in progress.

  When he lifted his head at last, she was afraid to meet his eyes. If he rejected her now—

  “Pru,” he whispered, his voice achingly gentle. “There is no possibility that I am going to make love to you on the sofa.”

  The battle was over. She’d lost. Biting her lip, fighting off tears, she nodded. “I know. I’m sorry.”

  “So you had better undress me so that we can get into bed.”

  What? Her gaze rose to meet his. His green eyes were filled with tenderness and want. A tiny smile played at the corner of his mouth. He knew he’d gotten her, but she knew she’d deserved it.

  In answer, she merely tugged deftly at his cravat, untying it like a speeding valet. “Sir Colin,” she informed him as she began to swiftly and systematically relieve him of his clothing. “I am the fastest dresser in the entire theater.” His surcoat flopped over the arm of the sofa. “I can strip an actor out of his costume”—his weskit flipped across the room—“in the time it takes a curtain to close and then open again.” His shirt was ripped up and away, leaving him clad only in his breeches and boots.

  Warm hands caught at her wrists again. His eyes were wide and shocked. “His costume? You stripped men?”

  She sent him a saucy smile. “It’s a living.”

  Now he pinned her back onto the cushions so he could lift his body high and look down at her, the heat back in his eyes. “Well, my Lady Rogue, as much as I appreciate your asistance, I think I’ll take it from here.” With that, he levered himself off her and stood, pulling her up with him to stand pressed chest to chest to him.

  He pushed her wild hair from her face with both hands, then kissed her so sweetly that tears welled up in her eyes. “If I release you,” he whispered, “will you behave for two entire minutes?”

  She nodded, her throat tight. This man, this marvelous, gentle, strong man, was hers. Yes, hers for one night, yet also hers forever. He would always be the first man she’d loved, the first man she’d kissed, the first man she’d given herself to.

  He stepped away from her and retrieved his surcoat from the arm of the sofa. He draped it over her for warmth, tucking it closed with a smile. “Keep that warm. I’ll be right back.”

  Bare-chested, he moved quickly about the room. He took the pillows and the coverlet from the bed and spread them in a luxurious bed on the carpet before the fire. He dove one hand into his valise and took something from it. Then he pulled off his boots and stripped off his breeches. His brief drawers followed right before Pru’s fascinated eyes.

  He straightened and moved to the edge of the freshly made love nest. Turning to her with a smile, he held out his hand.

  Pru couldn’t move. She couldn’t speak. She’d seen him bare this and bare that, but the entirety was a completely different kettle of fish!

  Broad shoulders tapered to narrow hips. Muscled chest, rippled belly, hard tight buttocks, long strong legs—Pru nearly inhaled her tongue!

>   And then there was his . . . cock. That brief glimpse in the dim garden had not done it justice. It was strange and thick and beautiful and rigid, a darkened sword jutting out from the nest of brown hair, waiting for her, wanting her. Between her thighs, her own sheath answered that need with a rush of wet heat.

  Stepping shyly toward him, she let his coat drop to the floor as she took his hand. He pulled her slowly into his arms. His cock prodded into her belly. With one tentative touch she gently tilted it up to lie between them as she moved closer still.

  He pressed something into her hand. “What is this?” she whispered. Waxy paper crackled in her fingers. She unwrapped it to reveal a strange soft tube of a translucent substance. One end was open, the other was tied closed in a tiny knot.

  “It is a sheath, to hold back my seed. It will prevent pregnancy.”

  She blinked at him. “You carry this always?”

  “I was not assuming . . .” He shrugged, a little abashed. “When Melody came along, I realized that I had been very careless and selfish. I resolved not to be any longer.”

  Pru looked down at the sheath. This thing was for her benefit, so that he would leave her no bastard.

  His child, green-eyed and thoughtful, but with a ready smile.

  Not for you.

  No. I know that.

  This is a wise and kind thing. Say thank you.

  She raised her gaze to meet his and smiled. “How do I put it on?”

  He showed her how to roll it like a stocking and unroll it onto him. He hardened further in her hands, filling the sheath until it was stretched so thin she could barely tell it was there.

  He took her back into his arms then, holding her close. The room was warm but she shivered as she felt his cock jump as her body pressed into it. Skin to skin they stood as she slipped her hands up behind his neck to pull him down for her kiss. “Thank you,” she whispered just before their lips met.

  They had kissed before. They had never kissed thus—lips soft and gentle, warm tongues slipping and greeting, arms tightening about each other as they made a simple vow without words. This night is ours. This is our forever.

  Lost in his mouth, in his promise, Pru was surprised to find her back meeting the piled pillows and silk. He laid her down beneath him and then rolled closer to the fire, so that she was above him.