Hope Tarr

by Untamed

  Kate backed up a step, but there was nowhere else for her to go. The tethered horse was directly behind her, the Scotsman at her front. Though he was of average height, still he eclipsed her.

  “Dinna fight pleasure for pleasure’s sake, Katie. ’Tis said to be what separates us from the beasts.”

  The wild pounding was worsening, her heart threatening to slam through her chest. And then there was the warm, fluttery feeling between her pressed-together thighs she couldn’t explain away as anger or fear or any emotion other than what it was—desire.

  Angrier with herself than him, she lashed out, “I think you are a beast, a great coarse, common beast.”

  He smiled as though she’d paid him the highest of compliments. “If I am, then only think what a challenge it would be to tame me. You fancy a challenge, don’t you, milady?”

  His lips hovered a hairsbreadth from hers, his breath a balmy breeze on her cheek. The latter was cinnamon spiced. Like a fine, oak-aged Scotch, it hinted of intoxicating delights buttery rich and delicious.

  Kate tried catching her breath and then lost it altogether. For once in her life, no ready response came to mind. Words clever or otherwise quite simply refused to come. She was struck dumb, mesmerized. His mouth was a mystery she longed to explore, his darkening green eyes beacons from which she could not look away.

  And yet she couldn’t give up control, not yet, not entirely, not like this. “Step back, sir. You stand too close.”

  Holding his ground and her gaze, he shook his head. “Improperly close, would you say?”

  A trickle of moisture slid down her thighs. Even though it was full winter, her body beneath her riding habit felt feverish, hot. “Yes, I would.”

  He slid a single gloved finger down her chin to the hollow of her throat. “Good.”

  Kate gulped. “Good?”

  His hands slid to her waist, the palms anchoring to her hips. “Aye, for it makes it easier to do this.” He pulled her flush against him and covered her open mouth with his.

  Any thought of the wager flew from Rourke’s mind the moment their mouths met. Her mouth was spiced with mint, her untutored tongue moist and quite simply delicious. Lost in Kate’s kiss, it wasn’t until he touched his tongue to hers that it struck him. He’d won. He might even take pity on that dullard, Dutton, and neglect to collect his winnings. The only prize he craved was Kate.

  He registered the very moment the last of her resistance gave way. Her lips parted on a sigh. She slid her hands up his chest, wound her slender arms tight about his neck, and rose up on her toes. Dutton, the bet, besting his betters, all receded to the far reaches of Rourke’s mind. For the next few minutes, reality narrowed to the small, slender female enfolded in his embrace—the soft hitch of her breathing; the feeling of firm, urgent fingers digging into the tops of his shoulders; her mouth firing off thoughts of how delicious she must taste, not only there but everywhere else.

  He pulled her closer, flush against his thighs, and rolled his hips, letting her feel his hardness, his strength. Her one arm left his neck, her open hand sliding down the front of his coat, fingers plucking at the brass buttons. For a moment Rourke wondered if he hadn’t let things go too far. He’d only meant to kiss her. He hadn’t counted on such rapid surrender, such a beautifully unbridled response.

  Against his mouth, she murmured, “I can’t seem to stop kissing you.”

  He angled his head and nuzzled her neck. “Who’s asking you to stop?”

  She had the front of his coat open. Her small hand found its way inside. Glancing at her, he confirmed her eyes were still closed. If he had one unfulfilled wish to make the almost-perfect moment even more so, it was that she would open them, look up at him, and say his given name—Patrick.

  He pulled her scratchy wool collar aside and nuzzled the side of her neck. “So sweet you are, my Kate, so sweet and soft.”

  Covering her, he slid his hand inside her riding jacket. He found her breast and palmed it through her shirtwaist, bringing the nipple to pebbling. “But, Katie, we canna bide here. We should go somewhere … a hotel.”

  A hotel! The sordid suggestion snapped the spell, bringing Kate back to full consciousness of where she was, what she was doing, and worse still, what more she’d been about to do.

  Shaking, she shoved against his chest and stepped back. “How dare you paw me so in public!” She took a shaky step back.

  Heat fisted him in the face. “Pawing you, is it? I had the impression you fancied the feel of my hands on you, big and coarse though they be. But now I see that those wee moans and hard teats stabbing into my chest werena you enjoying yourself at all.”

  When she didn’t answer, he stripped off his gloves to show her his bare hands. The palms were square and callused, the blunt digits both long and thick. He turned them over to show her the white scars thickening his knuckles. “They’re boxer’s hands, Kate, a railway navvie’s hands, coarse and rough and ridged with scar. And yet it’s gentle they can be when I choose it. It’s gentle I’d be with you.”

  She shook her head, the corners of her kiss-swollen mouth shaking. “Take me home.” As much as she wanted to believe it was the cold air stinging her eyes and making them water, she owned the true cause: tears.

  He nodded. “I can be patient when I must. I’ll take you back to your father’s house—for now.” He slid a step closer and lifted her chin on the shelf of his battered knuckles. With his other hand, he used his big thumb to swipe the wetness from beneath her eyes. “But know this, my wild Kat. I mean to wed you and bed you and make you mine in every way. And once I do, my Katie girl, sure you’ll purr like a kitten in my arms and ne’er think to leave again.”

  Holding back by the stand of trees, the rider waited until Rourke and the tiny brunette remounted and turned their horses toward Hyde Park Corner. Once they had, she walked her rented gelding out toward the open track.

  Lifting off her man’s hat, Felicity Drummond shook out her head of flame-colored hair, sending pins flying. Ah, better. Given her height, dressing as a man didn’t present any undue difficulty, but she’d be damned if she’d cut her hair.

  Raking her bare hand through the tangles, Felicity allowed that for a supposed frosty-tit, Lady Katherine had exuded considerable sexual heat. The wagered-upon kiss had quickly become much more, until Felicity had wondered if the pair wasn’t halfway to rutting in the park. Watching them from her hideaway, the moist mouths and urgent hands and grinding hips, she’d felt her own cunt beginning to cream.

  But before she took care of Mother Nature, she must take care of business. Dutton and his friends wouldn’t like learning they’d lost the wager, but there was one other gentleman whom she knew for a fact would be most pleased. Lord Haversham couldn’t wait to see his crony’s meddlesome daughter married off, and if she was packed off to Scotland afterward, so much the better. Felicity had her doubts. More than doubts, she fully expected Haversham’s scheme to backfire, which was why she was so willing to help. That and because he was paying her, of course. Compromised or not, from what she’d heard of Lady Katherine, the shrew didn’t seem the sort to wed a man who’d made her a public laughingstock.

  Rourke might have come to London trolling for a well-bred wife, but Felicity was determined he would go back to Scotland empty-handed.

  Back to Scotland—and back to her.

  Kate left Rourke standing by the lamppost in front of the town house, the reins of both horses in his hands. He speared her with his determined gaze. “The next time I call on you, it will be to speak with your father.”

  Kate didn’t answer. She wasn’t certain what to say. Her brain bade her act in one way, and her body in entirely another.

  His hands found the tops of her shoulders; his gaze searched her face. He drew her to him, gently this time. It was as though her bones were made of butter, her spine a jellied eel. She had no will or desire to resist. Even after their harsh words in the park, she was as malleable as melting metal on an overheated forge.


  “My actions today may not have been honorable, Kate, but my intentions are. I meant what I said before. I want you for my wife.”

  Kate shook her head, her thoughts still in a fog. “I won’t marry you or anyone else.”

  The words lacked her usual conviction. She sounded almost as if she was trying to convince herself more so than him. But then she wasn’t herself, not really. The fever that had broken over her once they’d begun kissing had been unlike anything she’d ever before known or imagined. It wasn’t as though she’d limited herself to a brief ladylike peck. Like a child tasting her first chocolate treat, one small nibble hadn’t been nearly enough. The feel of his firm mouth moving upon hers had been an exquisite sensation, as had been the breadth and pressure of large, warm hands anchored to her hips, the heat from him searing the wool. How good his touch had felt, how warm and solid and reassuring to lean in and surrender to his strength. And when he’d stripped off his glove and showed her his scarred hand, she hadn’t felt revolted. What she’d felt was powerfully, wantonly aroused. Imagining those big thumbs flicking over her swelling nipples, the long, blunt fingers doing lovely, unspeakable things to the aching wetness between her thighs, she felt as if her body would burst into flame.

  And then there were her own hands, shameless in their eagerness to lay him bare and explore shape and texture, scent and yes, taste, too. Had his sordid suggestion not snapped her back to sense, who knew how far her wicked touch might have taken them both?

  He frowned. “We will marry, Kate. For the rest of this day I’ll leave you in peace to accustom yourself to the notion.”

  Peace, Kate had precious little of that left. Thanks to him, to his kiss, her world had been torn asunder, her neat, orderly plan for her spinsterhood set at sixes and sevens. She opened her mouth to consign him to the devil from whence he’d obviously come when he angled his face to hers, his breath and body warming the space between them. Dear Lord, he smelled … good.

  His hands found the tops of her shoulders. His gaze softened, and he shook his head. “Ah, Kate, who could have known it would prove so verra hard to let one wee lassie go on her way?” He brushed his lips over her forehead and then dropped his hands and stepped back. His gaze swept her face, settling on her lips. “You’ll like being married to me, sweetheart, I promise you will.”

  Disappointment flooded Kate. Even in the midst of her annoyance, she craved his kiss, the crushing of his mouth and mating of his tongue with hers. And yet even that slight caress had its effect. Trembling, she backed away. Shaken, she turned and stumbled toward the house. Aware of his eyes following her, she stepped inside, pulled the door closed behind her, and then bolted it. Everything she was or knew herself to be seemed to have altered in a scant few hours. She couldn’t be quite sure the soles of her boots even touched the ground. For all she knew, she had floated inside.

  Lost in the maze of her thoughts, she barely had time to change back into her gown when Hamilton and his mother arrived. The visit was pleasant enough, and Bea behaved with perfect decorum, but still Kate found herself distracted. Her thoughts kept drifting back to the morning. Patrick O’Rourke was the hands-down most arrogant, infuriating man she’d ever met—and the most compelling. Up until the confusing kiss, it had been one of the more pleasant outings she’d had in a very long time.

  As soon as their guests took their leave, Kate seized the chance to go to her room. Hattie could handle the dinner. Even if she burned it to ash, Kate needed time alone to think. She’d just sat down on the bedside when the knock sounded outside her door. The determined rapping announced her visitor as Bea, of course.

  The door cracked open, and her sister poked her blond head inside. “Kate?”

  Kate swallowed a sigh. The morning, which had started out so pleasantly, had shaken her badly. The experience of kissing Mr. O’Rourke—Rourke—had challenged everything about herself she had assumed to be true. She’d never before considered herself to be a wanton or even close, but she was beginning to wonder how much further matters might have gone had they had been in a more private place. She needed time alone, a few minutes at the very least, to sort out her muddled thoughts and tangled feelings.

  “The point of knocking is to seek permission to enter, not to simply barrel in.”

  Bea rolled her eyes, the same china blue as their mother’s, and entered anyway. Pulling the door closed behind her, she asked, “Who was that man you went riding with?”

  “So you’ve been spying again?”

  Bea shrugged. “I may have chanced to glance out the window.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Well, don’t keep me on tenterhooks. Who was he?”

  “His name is Patrick O’Rourke.”

  Kate hadn’t expected the name to mean anything to Bea, but it seemed she was mistaken. “The Patrick O’Rourke?” She stared at Kate, bug-eyed.

  Kate nodded. Lord help her if there was more than one. “How do you know him?”

  Bea shook her head. “I know of him. They say he has buckets of money and a castle somewhere in Scotland. A castle, Kat, can you imagine?”

  “A lady does not remark on a gentleman’s assets. It is vulgar.”

  Bea rolled her eyes again and huffed. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Kat, we’re in your bedroom with the door closed. There’s no one to hear us. Papa went out hours ago, and you know what that means. Besides, it’s not as though you don’t talk about money. You talk about it all the time.”

  “If I do, it’s only because of the need to impress upon you and Papa the necessity of not frittering away what little we have left.”

  She plopped down beside Kate. “If you married Mr. Rourke, we wouldn’t need to fret about money at all. We’d all be rich as Croesus.”

  “His surname is O’Rourke, by the by, and it is he who would be the rich one. We’d still be poor as church mice, only I’d be leg-shackled to him for life. At any rate, it’s a moot point as I have no intention of marrying him or anyone else.”

  Bea crossed her arms. “Very well, then. I suppose I shall just have to marry him.”

  Kate was unprepared for the jolt of jealousy that announcement brought about. Dear Lord, was she … jealous?

  “Don’t be absurd; you’re not even out yet, and even if you were, I’d lock you away myself before I’d let you marry that coarse, conceited, ill-bred Scotsman.”

  Bea stuck out her chin. “I don’t think he’s coarse. From what I saw of him through the window, I thought he was rather dashing and … virile.” Bea punctuated the pronouncement with a sigh.

  Kate snapped her head about to her sister’s dreamy-eyed profile. “Where on earth did you happen upon such a word? No, don’t tell me. You’ve been reading those penny dreadfuls again, haven’t you?”

  Knights in shining armor and Prince Charmings were best left to fairy tales. In the real world, a woman had only herself to rely upon. The sooner Beatrice accepted that decidedly unromantic fact, the better it would be. In light of the earlier episode in the park, Kate would do well to remember it herself.

  Bea turned to face her. “They’re romantic novels, and there’s nothing dreadful about them. You should borrow one sometime, sister dear. You might learn something.”

  Kate privately considered she had learned quite enough for one day. Regardless, she did not greatly care for her sister’s tone, even less for the unflattering implication that she was in want of romantic tutelage—even if that was indeed the case. Thinking of her enthusiastic but clumsy response to what had been a most smoothly executed sensual assault had the tips of her ears heating.

  “Beatrice, I’ll not have you talking like a light skirt.”

  Bea rolled her eyes again. “Beatrice, is it? I must have touched on a nerve, indeed.”

  Kate only called her by her full name when trouble was brewing, and they both knew it. They exchanged looks, and all at once burst out laughing.

  The bedroom door swung open, crashing against the wall and bringing both women to thei
r feet. Their father stood on the threshold, his coat unbuttoned, his cravat askew, and his eyes wild. It was obvious to Kate he was not only drunk, but furious. Her heartbeat quickened to a canter. To give the devil his due, he’d never before raised a hand to them, but there was always a first time. She slid a protective arm about Bea’s shoulders.

  His red-rimmed eyes narrowed on Kate. “I never thought I’d live to see the day when a daughter of mine would so disgrace the Lindsey name.”

  Heat fisted Kate in the face. She’d been found out. Someone must have seen her kissing Mr. O’Rourke in the park and reported back. She’d thought they had Rotten Row to themselves, but apparently that was not the case. One of the “stragglers” must have watched them with an avid eye.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she slid a look to her sister. Now which of them was the light skirt? What sort of example would her bad behavior set? Were it not for her father blocking the door, she would send Bea off beyond earshot.

  “I’ve just come from White’s. There is quite a flurry about the betting book.”

  White’s was a sore subject on any day. Even had the exclusive gentlemen’s club not presented yet another opportunity for her father to game, membership was a luxury they could ill afford. Ordinarily Kate would have seized on yet another opportunity to make that point, but the ferocity in his gaze had her holding her tongue.

  “Apparently a certain Scotsman by the surname of O’Rourke wagered Lord Dutton and several other gentlemen a thousand pounds that he could seduce you into forgetting yourself and submitting to a public embrace. The conditions of the wager gave him five days to do so, but it seems he required but two.”

  To be the subject of a wager, and one inscribed in the betting book of White’s, was beyond humiliating. Horrified, Kate dropped her arm and moved away from her sister.

  My actions today may not have been honorable, Kate, but my intentions are. I meant what I said before. I want you for my wife.

  His show of earnestness had moved her. She’d been halfway to believing he might actually care something for her beyond the challenge of bringing her to heel. But now she saw him for what he was: a heartless manipulator, a devious seducer.