Chapter 4
Damien woke to the sound of a scream in the night. He was out of bed and into the hall before he even thought to put on a shirt. Another scream rent the air—a woman shouting, “Get out!”
Adrenaline sped through his veins as he ran to Adele’s door and jiggled the knob, but it was locked. He slammed his shoulder against it, again and again, until it gave way and opened, smacking against the inside wall and bouncing back.
Damien crossed the dark room in two swift strides and took hold of Adele, who was flailing on the bed. He wrapped his hands around her upper arms. “Adele, it’s me. It’s Damien.”
She sat up and shoved him away and began to slap at him, smacking his face and arms and shoulders until he had to restrain her.
“You’re dreaming. Wake up!”
She fought him for a few more seconds, then stopped suddenly. She sat very still, staring at him, and it was only then that Damien noticed the sound of footsteps in the hall and raised voices.
He watched her face in the bluish moonlight that beamed in the window and recognized the look of terror in her eyes. She bowed her head and covered her face with her hands. “It was just a dream.”
His body began to ache with the most unsettling desire to draw her onto his lap, cocoon her in his arms and press his lips to hers to kiss away the terror. Then he sensed the presence of others in the doorway behind him.
“Are you all right, miss?” a male voice asked. “Do you know this man?”
Damien quickly stood while Adele nodded and sat back. She wiped the sweat from her face. “Yes, I know him. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to cause such a disturbance.”
“Do you need assistance?”
“No, thank you.” She looked into Damien’s eyes. “This man is my protector.”
There was a curious silence, then whispers as the spectators returned to bed. Adele’s breathing slowed, and she wiped the perspiration from her face again.
“I should leave you now,” Damien said as he made a move for the door, but Adele grabbed hold of his hand. Her grip was tight, her palm clammy.
“Please don’t go yet.”
He gazed down at her in the moonlight, and his chest heaved with dread. There was some truth to his reputation, after all. He enjoyed making love to beautiful women, and Adele was, in no uncertain terms, beautiful. More than beautiful. She was exquisitely lush and fresh and innocent. She was nothing like Harold’s terribly deficient description.
He glanced down at her slender hand on his arm and felt the warmth of her fingers. He was glad she had stopped him because he didn’t want to leave.
But pleasure turned quickly to concern as he found himself speculating again about Harold’s true feelings for her. Would he be all that disappointed to lose her?
It was a selfish thought. Things would get complicated if he didn’t soon smother this attraction and leave the room.
Adele gazed up at him with pleading eyes. “Please stay for a while, until I fall asleep. I’m frightened. I don’t want to be alone.”
Damien shook his head. She had no idea what she was asking and who she was saying it to. He was a man of questionable repute. A man who could desire her. She should not be so trusting.
His gaze fell to the top of her shift and the smooth expanse of her neck, and he imagined how he would explain an indiscretion to Harold. He imagined Harold’s reaction. Then all at once, Damien was overcome with shame. It came out of the past, from a day when he was only nine.
Damien remembered the look on his father’s face when he’d told him what his wife—Damien’s mother—had been doing and where she had gone. He remembered his father’s sobs and tears at the betrayal. Then he remembered his own tears, not long afterward, when his mother and father were each lowered into the ground.
No. Seducing Adele was not something Damien could ever do.
Then he noticed she was squeezing her hands together in her lap, and he knew she was still afraid of the nightmare. He felt a stirring of compassion and tried to focus all his attention on that.
He told himself he would try to ease her fears, but he would make it clear that he could not, under any circumstances, spend the night in the same bed with her. Neither his conscience, nor his integrity, would allow that.
Moonlight streamed in the windows and gave the room an unearthly glow as Adele waited for Lord Alcester’s reply. She gazed up at him standing shirtless before her.
A strange mixture of fear from the dream and memories of statues of nude men she had seen in Paris stirred in her mind. She recalled the muscular curves that had mesmerized her, the width and breadth of the shoulders, and the finely chiseled faces. Damien was no less magnificent standing before her now. He could be a god. A great work of art.
For a few awkward seconds, he stared down at her. When he finally spoke, his voice was deep and quiet. “It wouldn’t be right for me to stay, Adele.”
She wasn’t sure if he referenced the strict code of behavior they both lived by, where an unmarried lady such as herself would be irreparably ruined if the people in the inn discovered she’d had a gentleman in her bedchamber at night—or if he referred to something else more specific. More personal. Something unspoken. Something to do with the open way they had interacted at dinner.
“I don’t care,” she said, thinking only of what she needed urgently: Him. His protection. His calm.
She took hold of his bare arm and found his skin was smooth and warm. She wanted to run her thumb over the tight bands of muscle, but she resisted the urge. It was only the second time in her life she’d had to fight hard against something she wanted, something she knew she shouldn’t have—something that would be wrong.
He sat down and gently pried her fingers off his arm, then set her hands on her lap, away from him. He was going to tell her she would be fine if only she would lay her head down on the pillow and draw up the covers. That’s what her mother used to say when Adele had nightmares as a child.
But he didn’t say that. “What was the dream?” he asked.
She wet her lips. “I dreamed he came back.”
“Your kidnapper?”
“Yes. He took me out of my bed on the ship, and since that night, I haven’t been able to sleep.”
“He won’t be coming back,” Damien assured her. “You can be confident of that.”
Looking down at her hands on her lap, she nodded. “I know. At least my mind knows it, but when I dream, it feels real. How will I ever feel safe enough to fall asleep again?”
“You’ve been through a terrible ordeal and it’s only natural to feel the way you do, but it will pass. Your peace of mind will return a little more each day, every time you wake up safe in your bed.”
“How long it will take?”
“It’s difficult to say.”
“But I’m exhausted,” she replied, and her voice broke.
Damien’s hand came up to rest on her cheek. Feeling as if she were floating in someone else’s body, she closed her eyes, while he stroked her cheek with his thumb and stirred unfamiliar longings inside her body.
She didn’t want him to stop, but she knew, any second now, he would. Because this was wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong, and they both knew it.
When he tried to draw his hand away, she took hold of it and clung to him.
“Adele,” he whispered, “we shouldn’t.”
It was a gentle but clear warning.
“I’m sorry,” she replied, feeling as if a glass of water had been splashed in her face. She shouldn’t have clutched at his hand like a woman starving for affection. He had meant to offer her comfort and understanding, and she had tried to take more.
She forced herself to think of Harold. She was engaged to Harold. She wanted to marry Harold.
“I’m just upset,” she said. “That’s all. And scared.”
“Y
es. You need to get some sleep.” He said it as if it were an explanation for her behavior just now.
She knew he was about to leave—which was of course what he had to do. He couldn’t stay with her all night.
He continued to stare at her as if he were struggling with what to do, then he laid a hand on her upper arm. “Try to get some rest. No one is going to harm you.”
Anxiety pooled in her belly. “You’re not going to stay?”
“You know I can’t do that.”
“But you stayed with me last night.”
He regarded her with unease. “Last night was different.”
She wanted to ask why, but she knew why. They hadn’t just spent an entire evening together enjoying a delicious dinner at a private table and drinking wine and talking and discovering things about each other, and he hadn’t been shirtless.
“You’ll be fine,” he said, standing. “I’ll be right down the hall, sleeping with one eye open.”
She nodded because she had to, but her hands were still shaking.
He walked to the door and took hold of the knob to close it behind him, but the knob fell off. He tried to move the door. One of the hinges dropped to the floor with a noisy clang.
Adele sat up on her heels. “It won’t close?”
“No.”
Practicalities sank in. “I can’t sleep here without a lock on the door.”
He glanced back at her briefly and she could see he was not pleased. He returned his attention to the broken door, swinging it to and fro, then shook his head. “It’ll need a new hinge.”
“A new hinge?”
His voice was low and controlled. “You can have my room.”
“But—”
“No buts. Come.” From across the room, he held out a hand to her.
She had no choice but to comply and was reminded of the way she had felt when she’d first seen him at the kidnapper’s cottage. He was not to be reckoned with then, and he was not to be reckoned with now. He was tense and in no mood to argue with her.
Adele climbed out of bed barefoot and went to him. With his hand at the small of her back, he escorted her down the hall to his room. He opened the door for her, and she slowly walked in and looked around. Her gaze drifted to the bed, where the sheets and covers were tangled and spilling over the side, onto the floor. There was an indentation in the pillow. His clothes were tossed over a chair in the corner. There was an empty brandy glass on the bedside table. She could see the remaining traces of liquid in the bottom.
“You’ll be safe here,” he said, moving past her to pull the blankets up and tidy the bed. “The lock on the door works, and so does the one on the window. There’s no one under the bed.” He checked, just to be sure. “And I’ll be listening.”
He moved to the chair and picked up the shirt he’d worn at supper, and quickly shrugged into it. He relaxed a little after he did that, though he still seemed tense and a trifle impatient with her.
“Thank you,” she said, not wanting him to think she didn’t appreciate everything he was doing for her. But still, she wished he did not have to leave.
He crossed to the door and paused there a moment. “You’ll be fine here, Adele. I promise.”
Without another word, he walked out and left her alone.
She crossed to the door and turned the key in the lock. Struggling to remind herself that Damien was still nearby, she moved to the bed and pulled the covers back. She gazed down at the sheets in the moonlight—wrinkled and billowy in places from having been slept on. She swallowed hard and climbed in, pulling the heavy blankets up over herself and resting her arms on top of them.
She lay flat on her back and stared at the ceiling for a moment, then turned onto her side and closed her eyes. Damien’s musky, masculine scent permeated her consciousness and swirled through her senses. She pressed her face into the soft feather pillow and breathed deeply, filling her lungs until she could hold no more of him, then she did it again and again and again, squeezing the pillow until she felt satisfied, and fell asleep.
But only for a little while. The rest of the night was a stressful affair filled with many swift, frightful awakenings.
Chapter 5
Adele descended the stairs the next morning, her eyes burning from lack of sleep, and went to the dining room. Lord Alcester rose from the table they’d shared the night before and crossed the room to greet her.
She remembered with a shocking jolt to her senses how he had looked the night before in her bedchamber—shirtless and surreal, like a god in the moonlight.
“Good morning, Miss Wilson,” he said coolly, with a slight bow. He escorted her to their table and as soon as they sat down, he asked, “Did you sleep at all?”
“Not much.”
His chest rose and fell with a sigh, as if he felt he had failed her somehow.
“You will no doubt be relieved to join your mother soon and reach Osulton Manor,” he said. “There was a telegram from her this morning.” He reached into his breast pocket and handed it across the table. Adele read it quickly:
Overjoyed to hear you are safe stop
Will celebrate soon stop
Love Mother stop
Adele’s heart relaxed a little as she read the words. It was a small connection to her reality—a reminder of her real life. She read the telegram two more times, then looked up to see Damien watching her, his brows drawn together with concern.
“What is it?” she asked.
“I’m sorry if I was short with you last night. It was inexcusable of me.”
His apology surprised her, and she had to struggle to manage an appropriate reply.
“You weren’t short with me. You were only trying to be helpful.”
“You’re being polite, Miss Wilson. The fact is, I shouldn’t have left you alone when you were distraught. Last night you said I was your protector, but I was hardly that when I walked out on you like an irritable dog.”
She inclined her head and spoke without thinking. “Why were you so irritable, Lord Alcester?”
He stared at her, speechless, from across the table.
Adele knew she shouldn’t have asked that question—and with such an air of innocence, as if she had no knowledge of the fact that there was something improper budding between them.
Which was why she suspected he had been bad-tempered.
The server arrived and poured coffee. Damien leaned back in his chair, appearing relieved to be spared answering the question.
As soon as the server was gone, however, the question continued to dangle in the air between them. It could not go completely unanswered. That in itself would have revealed something was amiss.
Damien’s gaze swept restlessly around the room, and she sensed he was displeased with her again.
“You did nothing wrong,” he finally said. “I was the one who behaved badly. I was tired. Like you, I haven’t had much sleep over the past few days. That’s all.”
Adele picked up her coffee cup and took a sip. It was probably best if neither of them acknowledged a mutual attraction. At least he was loyal to Harold, and she respected him for that. If he were not loyal, she would think him the worst human being in the world, and despite what she knew about his reputation, she did not think that of him. He had been nothing but a gentleman since the moment they’d met.
Though she herself had not always had the heart and mind of a proper, virtuous lady. A part of her had wanted something very improper, and she wasn’t sure she would have the strength to put the candy back if she ever went so far as to take hold of it again.
All morning, the coach lumbered jerkily over moors and dales and hilly green pastures, stopping around noon to change horses in a quaint village inn, where Adele and Lord Alcester had a bite to eat.
In the afternoon, she dozed off a few times in the coach, but the
slightest bump or jostle awakened her with a start, and each time it would take a good ten minutes for her heart to settle down again. When they stopped late in the afternoon, Adele sipped some wine, hoping it would help her sleep. She filled Damien’s flask with a little extra to take with her as well and sipped it slowly for the next leg of the journey.
It was early evening when the vehicle rumbled into another little village and pulled up in front of an inn. As soon as they slowed to a halt, Damien opened the door of the coach and peered inside, offering his hand. “We’ve arrived. How are you?”
Adele took hold of his hand and felt the coach spin as she stepped unsteadily onto the dusty lane. “To be honest, I think I’m a little drunk. I slept a little though. Did it rain? I seem to recall raindrops pattering on the rooftop, but maybe I was dreaming.”
Still holding her hand, he stopped in the street. “It didn’t rain. But at least you slept.”
“Small mercies,” she replied, and found herself struggling to focus on the texture of his coat collar, and the details of the seam at his broad shoulder. She loved the way his thick black hair curled in a large wave at his neck.
“Your speech was slurred just now,” he told her discreetly as he offered his arm.
She felt the heat of his breath in her ear, and it sent the most delightful array of gooseflesh down her left side. She closed her eyes and imagined what it might feel like to wrap her arms around his neck and just dangle.
“Slurred?” she asked, feeling rather giddy.
He held a finger to his lips. “Shh, my dear,” he whispered. “You’re shouting. I believe lack of sleep has given that wine some extra kick.”
My dear. That was all she heard.
The next thing she knew, she was blinking up at him, feeling dim-witted and completely unable to remember what he had said after My dear. His voice was like sweet syrup. Sweet and yummy. She would like to lick it.
He glanced over her head, up and down the street. “You need a bed, Adele, and it is imperative that you close your eyes when you get there.”
In Love with the Viscount (American Heiress Trilogy Book 3) Page 6
