Ever Yours, Annabelle

by Elisa Braden

  Her head fell back against the wall. Her breath came faster. He was too close. Too big. Too much.

  “Robert,” she whispered. “Why can you not leave me alone? After seven years of ignoring my existence, one would think it would be a simple matter.”

  “You are reckless. You’ve always been reckless.”

  “Do you hate me so much?” She loathed sounding weak, pleading, but she needed the answer. His nearness after so long was torture.

  “Hate is not the word I would use.”

  “Despise, then. Abhor. Resent.” Her chuckle escaped as an orphaned sound. “Whatever it is, no punishment on earth will unmake my mistakes. You must let me go.”

  He crowded into her until his chest pressed her flat. The pressure against her breasts was a pleasure unlike anything she’d imagined. And she’d imagined a great deal.

  “Never again.” His lips brushed her ear, sending swirling tingles down to her toes. “I did that once. It nearly killed me.”

  Another reminder of the accident. Of her guilt. She gripped his coat in her fists, battling both him and herself. “What do you want? Do you want me on my knees?”

  He groaned, long and pained. His head came down to rest upon her shoulder, the cool strands of his hair tickling her bare neck. “Yes,” he whispered. “Yes, I do.”

  “I did that once,” she whispered back. “It nearly killed me.”

  His head rocked to and fro. He grunted, and she felt a hand at her waist. “Not what I meant.”

  “I am tired, Robert. Whatever it is you seek, make your demand and let’s have done with this … torment.”

  Something soft and damp caressed a sensitive spot between her jaw and her ear. “I told you already, I seek a wife.”

  Her hands wadded his coat into fists. “Then find one,” she gritted, “and leave me out of it.”

  “I cannot.”

  “I won’t stand for this punishment any longer.”

  Gentle lips brushed her brow, her cheek, the corner of her mouth. “There is one way to end it.”

  She squeezed her eyes closed, used her grip upon his coat to pull him in tighter. “Finally,” she murmured, breathless and panting. “What is it? Shall I be pilloried? Exiled to Greenland?”

  “I need a wife.”

  She groaned.

  “If you will not help me find one …”

  She waited. “Yes?”

  His grip on her waist strengthened. Pulled her hips into his. “Then you must accept the role, yourself.”

  Everything inside her froze. Surely, he did not mean what she thought he meant. No. He could not. He wanted nothing to do with her. “You are a hard man, Robert.”

  “You noticed.”

  “But I never thought you cruel.”

  Oddly, his breath came fast, now. And, she noted, the hand at her waist had become an arm across her lower back. His thighs were wedging and rubbing in the strangest, most heat-inducing fashion. His lips were wandering from her jaw to her throat and back to hover near her mouth. “You asked for my demands.” Hot breath washed across her lips. “I need a wife, and soon.”

  “But not me, surely.”

  “You’ll do.”

  She shook her head. The motion swept her temple against his jaw. She could feel his whiskers beneath his skin, rasping and causing her lower belly to clench. “No. This is some new punishment. Marry Annabelle and force her to scrub Rivermore’s chamber pots for the rest of her days. Well, I shan’t do it.”

  “Bloody hell. I don’t need a servant, I need a—”

  “Wife. Yes.” She tried to gather her thoughts, but he held her so tightly, was so hard and hot against her that she could scarcely remember her own name. “P-perhaps we could lie. We shall tell your grandfather we intend to wed then settle into a long engagement. That would ease his mind, but neither of us would be trapped—”

  “No.”

  “It is a sound plan.”

  “I refuse to lie to him.”

  “So, instead you will bind yourself to me, the woman you hate enough to punish forever.” She laughed, but the sound was bitter. “Or, perhaps that is the point—a punishment which never ends.”

  Inside the closet’s blackness, the silence was broken only by their breaths, their heat.

  “Give me your answer,” he demanded.

  She opened her mouth to refuse him.

  But he must have anticipated her rejection, because the next thing she knew, his lips had seized hers in a long, sliding caress.

  Oh. Dear. Heaven.

  Kissing.

  Robert was kissing her.

  She moaned as the sensations hit her bloodstream, zinged along her nerves, fizzed out to her fingertips and her bosoms and the very roots of her hair. They effervesced inside her thighs.

  Why had nobody told her?

  How the stroke of his tongue and the heat of his breath and the squeeze of his fingers into the flesh of her hips would tip her upside down.

  How deeply she would want him deeper.

  How badly she would want him closer.

  How vexing it would be that the only way to lengthen and strengthen their glorious kiss would be to kiss him in return.

  Which she did. Oh, how she did. She gave him her tongue. She gave him her arms around his thick, strong neck. She gripped him hard and drew him down and devoured him.

  Dear God, she was burning alive.

  This was no sweet, glancing brush of lips or chaste holding of hands.

  This was lust. Clawing. Raging. It hurt to want something this much.

  She found herself gripping whatever she could reach—his overlong hair, his under-starched cravat, his ridiculously wide shoulders.

  He ground his mouth against hers, his tongue a sleek, pulsing invasion. He gripped her backside, slid her up between the wall and his thighs. She felt it then, the ridge. Sizable. Determined. Hard as heated stone.

  Her feet left the floor.

  He grasped one of her thighs, bent her leg, forced his hips up into hers, lifting her higher.

  Then, he groaned. Tore his mouth away. Cursed.

  She followed blindly. She wanted him back. His sleek tongue and demanding hands.

  “Bloody hell.” It was a growl, and it sounded … pained. He lowered her to the floor. She heard him panting. Shifting his feet in an awkward rhythm.

  “R-Robert?”

  His breathing was harsh, like a horse ridden too hard. “It’s nothing.”

  Her fingers slid from his neck to his mouth. Even through her silk gloves, she could feel the brackets of pain on either side. “It is your leg, isn’t it?”

  There was a long silence while he held himself still and breathed against her. “Sometimes the muscles … seize up.”

  Suddenly, everywhere she’d felt melting heat cooled to a chill. While he’d been giving her pleasure, she’d been causing him pain.

  Wasn’t that a familiar tale?

  To Robert, she’d never been anything but pain. She’d cost him the future he’d wanted. She’d caused him endless agonies. She could not even kiss him without …

  Nausea rose up in her throat. She swallowed it down. Stroked his cheek one last time.

  “I am sorry, Robert,” she whispered.

  “It will pass,” he gritted. “Give me a moment.”

  “What can I do?” She remembered asking the same question years ago, begging him to allow her a path to forgiveness. He’d denied her then.

  Now, he offered her a single chance. Just one. The one that might destroy her.

  “Marry me.”

  Perhaps it was the shock of their kiss or the blackness of their surroundings or the remnants of his pain and her guilt, but when she opened her mouth to answer, she might as well have been cup-shot on liquor-laced orgeat. For, every wise and sensible thought fled, leaving only one: She would belong to him, and he to her.

  In all her life, she’d only ever wanted one thing bad
ly enough to risk everything else—her pride, her pain, her plans. Perhaps he meant his demand as a punishment. Perhaps she deserved to suffer. But in the blackness, she could only see orange blossoms and ivy on walnut pews. Smell the sweetness of their babes cradled against her. Hear the bells of Rivermore’s chapel calling them on Sunday morning. And feel the warm, dry clasp of Robert’s hand around hers.

  “Very well,” whispered her guilty, foolish, besotted heart.

  He went utterly still. Silent. She could not even hear him breathing. “You agree to become my wife?”

  Could he hear her blood pounding? The sound was deafening to her.

  “Annabelle.”

  “Yes.” The word emerged scratchy and near soundless. So she said it again, even though it was likely the daftest decision she’d ever made. Years and years of heartache lay ahead. His pain. Her pain.

  But he would belong to her, and she to him.

  The alternative was to watch him marry someone else. Someone willowy and obtuse like Matilda Bentley.

  “Yes,” she repeated, a bit shaky, but at least audible. “I will be your wife.”

  She could not see him—not his brooding eyes or wide shoulders or heavy brow. But the moment she spoke the words, she felt something of his reaction.

  It reminded her of the day he’d carried her home after she’d broken her toe. He’d been exhausted, arms trembling with strain. Refusing to set her down on gravel or grass or even carpets, he’d taken her directly to her father and insisted Papa lift her from his back and deliver her to her bedchamber.

  Papa had done it, of course—he was the best papa in the world. But, before he’d carried her away, he’d turned to Robert. “You’ve done well, son. Go and rest. We shall take care of her.”

  In a face streaked with sweat and dust, those blue eyes had flashed their defiance. She’d reached for Robert, and he’d taken her hand in his. “I will stay with her, my lord,” he’d said. “She is mine, now.”

  Papa had looked startled, but even as a child, Annabelle had understood. She’d felt it, too—the connection no words could explain. A shimmering, golden thread between them had hummed with power.

  And, after seven years of emptiness, here inside a place with no light, she felt it again. The thread. The power. The hum. Before Robert opened the closet door, before the faint light revealed his usual stoic expression, before he straightened his cravat and grasped his cane and led her into the corridor, she heard the words echoing in her head as clearly as if he’d spoken them aloud: “She is mine, now.”

  *~*~*

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “Do not underestimate the value of a fine head of hair.”

  —The Dowager Marchioness of Wallingham in a letter to the Marquis of Mortlock regarding his grandson’s potential advantages in the marriage mart.

  *~*~*

  Dearest Robert,

  Keeping myself informed about your health has become impossible of late. Why must you constantly dismiss your valets? They make excellent sources, but only when employed.

  Ever yours,

  Annabelle

  —Letter to Robert Conrad dated May 8, 1812

  *~*~*

  As Robert guided Dewdrop along Grosvenor Street, it occurred to him how fortunate he was that John Huxley was currently traipsing about the Pyrenees and not in London.

  He didn’t fancy being beaten to death with his own cane.

  Indeed, a beating was precisely what he deserved. And, if Hux knew how Robert had manipulated Annabelle, kissed Annabelle, groped and nearly debauched Annabelle inside the Bentleys’ hall closet, he reckoned their friendship would meet a swift and bloody end.

  The shame of last evening weighed upon him until he imagined Dewdrop going as swaybacked as Methuselah beneath the burden.

  He drew up outside Berne House, using his left leg to dismount. His right was still smarting from the vicious cramp he’d suffered when he’d tried to position Annabelle for his pleasure.

  He should have taken it for the sign it was. He should have told her the truth then and there—that she was not to blame for his injuries. That she should feel no guilt and had no obligation to let him kiss her.

  But he’d needed her to agree to marry him. It was the only way he could protect her.

  The blasted woman was out of her mind. Over the past ten days, he’d followed her everywhere, just as he’d promised. But he hadn’t confined himself to ballrooms and drawing rooms. He’d followed her to the Strand. He’d watched her enter and exit the plain brick building on Catherine Street, where the publisher of Green’s Daily Informer printed the work of Edward Yarrow Aimes.

  Whose work was just like Annabelle’s.

  Because it was Annabelle’s.

  He’d long known she was reckless, but he’d always thought her impulsive behavior centered upon him—trailing him into danger, leaping to impress him, taking wild risks to remain by his side. This was the entire reason he’d forced distance between them. Annabelle had put herself in harm’s way over and over. The last time she’d done so, she’d nearly died. So had he.

  Their separation had been a kind of death—no other pain he’d suffered could compare—but it had been necessary, he’d told himself. For her sake.

  He’d been wrong. Not about her recklessness, but about its cause. He’d assumed by removing himself from her life, it would disappear. She would be sensible. Measured. She would never risk herself again.

  He wanted to laugh. There was nothing sensible about her producing caricatures scathing enough to make the artist the target of violence. And a female artist? What consequences would she suffer if the true identity of Edward Yarrow Aimes were discovered?

  No, if anything, she needed him far more than he’d ever suspected. Needed him to keep her safe from her own foolishness. And, as Lady Wallingham had observed, if he wished to do it right, he must marry her.

  “For a woman, a man’s useful purposes are few,” the dowager had advised during their barouche ride returning to Mayfair. “Begetting offspring. Occasional gifts—jewelry is preferred. And amusement. Men are most entertaining, often unintentionally.” Her mouth had quirked as though recalling a fond memory. Then, she’d turned stern. “But offering the protection of his name may be a man’s greatest value. Make yourself into a shield, Mr. Conrad. There is but one way to ensure she does not suffer the consequences of flawed judgment. Marry the girl.”

  Lady Wallingham had suggested a scheme in which he insisted Annabelle help him find a bride. In her view, the mutual project would cause marriage and Robert to mingle in Annabelle’s mind and draw them closer so he could reestablish a rapport. At the time, he’d thought the plan reasonable.

  Reasonable. Good God. That alone should have set alarms clanging.

  Annabelle’s reaction to the charade had been rampant hostility. When she wasn’t dancing with other gentlemen or ignoring him entirely, she’d glared daggers and cut him to ribbons with her sharp tongue. After ten days of nonsense, he’d discarded Lady Wallingham’s plan for his own more direct approach.

  It had worked. Annabelle had agreed to marry him, and now Robert must coax her to follow through on her promise. But first, he must tell her the truth about their past. He could not ask her to trust him otherwise.

  The footman who answered the door at Berne House—a pleasant fellow named Ned—showed him into the oak-paneled entrance hall. “If you’ve come to see Lord Berne, I’m afraid he has not yet returned from his club.”

  “Actually, I am here for Lady Annabelle. Is she at home?”

  Ned appeared startled. “Er—yes, I believe … that is, I shall inquire.” The servant bowed and turned toward a set of doors off the entrance hall. He spun back around. “May I ask, sir, do you have an aversion to cats?”

  Robert frowned at the odd question, noticing the disheveled state of the footman’s livery. “Not particularly.”

  Nodding in a relieved fashion, Ned straightened his wig and
continued on his way.

  As Robert stood waiting, he heard several thuds above his head. A door slammed. A female squealed. A male shouted. Feet shuffled and thumped. Then, Ned reappeared looking even more disheveled than before. “This way, Mr. Conrad.”

  He took him to the drawing room, which was directly above the entrance hall. Inside, two of the five Huxley daughters sat calmly in the chairs near the fireplace. One was Jane, whom he still had trouble reconciling with the shy little mite she’d been seven years ago. The other was Annabelle, who held a pencil poised above her open sketchbook. On the sofa near the tall windows, a plain-faced lady’s maid sat wielding a sewing needle on a tattered scrap of linen. Her white cap was askew.

  “Why, Mr. Conrad,” said Annabelle in a theatrical tone. “Quite the surprise. Have you come to see Papa? He is out at the moment. Perhaps you would care to leave now and return later this afternoon.”

  He glanced back at Ned, who hovered nervously in the doorway, then at Annabelle. “What the devil is going on?” He’d been asking that question with disturbing frequency since arriving in London.

  Annabelle’s eyes widened. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  Jane adjusted her spectacles before setting aside her book.

  He nodded toward the young woman’s hands. “Lady Jane, why are your knuckles bleeding?”

  “She scraped them,” Annabelle answered quickly.

  “On what?”

  “Books.”

  Jane snorted. “Not books, silly. What a ludicrous notion.”

  “Well, it seemed the obvious answer,” Annabelle retorted. “Given your preoccupations.”

  He frowned. Looked about the room with its blue silk walls and gold draperies. Came back to Annabelle, whose posture was too stiff for such a casual tone. “I return to my original question.” He moved farther into the room, edging his way around a satinwood table and past the nearest of three windows. “What the devil is going on?”

  Suddenly, he jolted as a creature of claws and viciousness landed upon his nape. With a feral hiss, it dug needles through his cravat and into his skin. He forced himself into stillness. The pain was no worse than being snagged by a bramble. He reached up with his free hand then smoothly grasped the tiny, furred animal.