She slammed her heel against his shin.
“Damnation,” he muttered.
Her teeth caught at his hand. He yanked it away. She had scarcely an instant to draw breath for a scream before his knife was out and resting lightly upon her throat. She stilled.
“That’s better,” he said. “Now listen to me, damn you.”
“Bastard,” she breathed.
“I love you,” he said. “I’ve loved you from the moment you jammed your elbow into my belly. I loved you that night in Calcutta and after, on the ship. I loved you after you stole back your sandalwood princess, even while I hated you and wanted to strangle you. I loved you the whole time in Yorkshire while I plotted to get it back. And I loved you when you held a gun to my heart and stole the pearl and your princess away again.”
She made a slight movement. He pulled his arm more tightly against her waist to mould the length of her back firmly to him. She gasped, but subsided against him.
“I have always loved you,” he continued angrily. “I can’t help that I’ve behaved like an unscrupulous, dishonourable, obstinate swine the whole time, because that’s what I am. Damn it, Amanda, can’t you understand? You understand everything.”
“I understand,” she answered breathlessly. “I just wasn’t sure you did. Will you please put away the knife? It makes me nervous.”
“If I put it away, I’ll be nervous.”
“You? The Falcon? You’re not afraid of anything.”
He sighed. “Except closets. And you. I’m scared to death of you, Amanda. I’m terrified you’ll say ‘No’.”
“To what?” He heard laughter in her voice.
His eyes narrowed. She was a deal too much like her cousin, he decided as he took the blade away and let it fell to the ground. He turned her to face him then gathered her close. She didn’t struggle. Why should she? She knew he’d never hurt her. She knew why he’d come. She’d been waiting for him, waiting to get even. The little she-cat had tormented him... deliberately. Yet she’d forgiven him, and that was all that mattered.
“I want a wife,” he said. “A Lady Falcon to come with me to Derbyshire to make the great, lonely area I’ve inherited a home. And fill it with disobedient, insolent, deceitful, thieving little brats.”
“My children,” she loftily informed him, “will not be bratty little thieves.”
“Why not? Their father’s a thief. Their mother as well.”
She shook her head. “I refuse to live in a menagerie of wild beasts. I have books to write. I need order and peace. Quiet, angelic children. And a very good secretary.”
“I’m an excellent secretary,” he pointed out, “nearly as good as I am a thief.”
Slowly she raised trusting golden eyes to him, and his heart ached with tenderness.
“The thief is a dreadful man,” she said. “But the secretary is a superior being. I can’t finish my book without him. I’ve tried, Mr. Brentick. It’s no good.”
“I’m not Mr. Brentick.”
“You’re everybody to me, Falcon. All the world. My tassel-gentle,” she added softly. Her hand slid up his chest, then farther up, to stroke his cheek.
He turned his face to kiss her palm. He’d never been gentle with her before, it seemed. He meant to, this time, but the scent of her skin sapped his reason. Silk rustled under his hands, and beneath it moved a warm, beckoning body. He pulled her closer and hungrily captured her mouth. He tasted sweet fruit and smoke. That was she. Light and shadow. Innocence and sin. Joy and madness.
The taste of her raced through his veins like sweet, hot honey. The more he drank of her, the more he burned with thirst. A long moment after, he broke away to rest his cheek against hers. “I want you,” he said thickly. “Now. You can come willingly... or I’ll steal you.”
He heard her low, throaty chuckle. “The Falcon must do what he does best,” she murmured.
He grinned. Then he swept her up in his arms, and carried her deep into the shadows.
In the carved vetiver doorway, a man and a woman stood. The man’s arm circled the woman’s shoulders. Her dark head rested serenely upon his breast.
“I’ll have to put a stop to it,” Lord Hedgrave said. “He can’t ravish Lord Cavencourt’s sister in the garden.”
“Indeed, he cannot,” the Lioness agreed composedly. “My cousin will not permit this. She will merely torment him and send him away. And he will return for more torment. Men,” she said with a sigh. “Like children.”
He smiled. “Women,” he returned. “Like devils. Perhaps I was wrong to bring him with me.”
“He would have come regardless.”
“Yes, and I didn’t trust him alone in his state. Not a vessel was to be had that day. If I hadn’t taken him in hand and quieted him down, I daresay the poor devil would have rowed to Calcutta.”
“He left it late enough,” the princess said.
“What was he to do, with a half-dead peer on his hands? Though I rather suspect he remained with me primarily to keep me from dashing off after his darling,” the marquess added with a chuckle.
“Perhaps his heart understood your fate was linked with his. In any case, he has found the jewel his heart sought. Her love will fill his life with joy.”
“But a thief, Nalini?” he teased. “Don’t you think you might have done better by her?”
“He was for her,” came the confident answer. “It was meant to be. I saw it in his eyes, just as I saw through his false garb. Tall, strong, and passionate, as I had promised her.” She glanced up at her long-lost lover. “Like you.”
“Ah, yes, me. A feeble old man. I wonder why you bothered.”
The rani shrugged. “Young lovers are tiresome. So hasty.”
He laughed. “Well, you are in luck, my wicked love.” He turned and drew her into his embrace. “This decrepit old fellow is devilish slow.”
“Then we shall love but once,” the princess softly answered. “Once, but very, very slowly... through all the time remaining until we die. And then... ”
“And then?” he breathed against her lips.
“And then I shall find you in your next life and plague you again.”
Discover Loretta Chase
Scandal Wears Satin
Silk is for Seduction
Royal Weddings Anthology
Last Night’s Scandal
Don’t Tempt Me
Your Scandalous Ways
Not Quite a Lady
Lord Perfect
Mr. Impossible
Miss Wonderful
The Last Hellion
The Mad Earl’s Bride
Lord of Scoundrels
Isabella
The English Witch
The Lion’s Daughter
Knave’s Wager
Viscount Vagabond
The Devil’s Delilah
The Royal Bridesmaids Anthology
About the Author
After a heroic attempt to be an English major forever, Loretta Chase stoically accepted her degree but kept on reading and writing. As well as working in academe, she had an enlightening if brief life in retail and a Dickensian six-month experience as a meter maid. In the course of moonlighting as a corporate video scriptwriter, she succumbed to the charm of a producer, who lured her into writing novels -- and marrying him. The union has resulted in what seems like an awful lot of books and quite a few awards, including the Romance Writers of America’s Rita. Heralded as “…the long awaited successor to Georgette Heyer” by Library Journal, Loretta Chase’s historical romance novels have been published all over the world.
To learn more, please visit www.LorettaChase.com.
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The Sandalwood Princess Page 23