The Chase

by Sara Portman

  He dismissed the thought and sternly reminded himself the part of him that wished for seduction was the not the part that should be allowed to make decisions. Her appeal derived from the mystery, nothing more. He had only to unravel it and this irrational attraction would fade.

  He opened his eyes and lifted himself onto one elbow. “Shall we have a bedtime story, Miss Crawley? You still haven’t explained your purpose in London.”

  She twisted inside her blanket to face him, rolling to rest on the opposite shoulder. “You said in the coach that I could keep my secrets.”

  “That was before I discovered you were smuggling wooden spoons,” he teased.

  He watched her pink lips tip up at one corner and he was glad he’d nearly coaxed a smile from her. She had not produced a single smile in all the hours of their acquaintance so far, now that he thought on it. She’d intermittently moved between meek silence and verbal gamesmanship to evade his search for answers, but all the while she’d been deadly serious. The expression seemed even more fleeting in the inconsistent firelight. He found he wanted to coax another smile from her—a laugh even—just to know if he could.

  “What do you think the innkeeper thinks of our odd little party?” he asked.

  She looked at him and for a moment, he half expected her to roll away again or say something along the lines of I’m sure I don’t know, Mr. Rosevear, but then her lips curved and she spoke.

  “Since you bring your dog into your bedchamber and splurge on private rooms for your coachman, I am sure he finds you quite eccentric.”

  Michael laughed. “And not you?”

  She shook her head. “As I’ve not been introduced, nor our relationship clarified, I can only hope he assumes I am your wife. If he believes so, I’ve done nothing for him to consider abnormal.”

  Michael considered this. He had not introduced her, had he? “I suppose that could be true.”

  “Of course,” she said, eyes glinting in the firelight, “yours is a very fine coach, as you’ve pointed out. And your clothes, though rumpled from travel, appear of high quality. So, if I am your wife, you’ve been rather miserly with my allowance,” she said, briefly opening her blanket pocket to reveal her drab dress.

  “Have I?”

  She nodded. “Indeed. That is in awfully poor taste, given how you spoil your dog and your coachman.”

  He laughed aloud. Where had this wit been hiding? “So again, it is my eccentricity?”

  “I am afraid so, Mr. Rosevear.”

  She smiled fully then, a wide smile that rounded her flushed her complexion and set her eyelids fluttering briefly closed as she rested her check upon the pillow.

  Yes. Entirely worth a fleecing.

  He forced himself to lie back and gaze at the ceiling. How had he distracted himself from his purpose? If he did not solve the mystery of Miss Ana Crawley soon, he would be completely enamored of her by the time they reached London.

  Chapter Six

  Michael wasn’t sure what caused him to wake in the night, but the dark and the quiet told him it was still very much night as opposed to morning. He turned his head to find Gelert, upright and alert, sitting on his haunches and staring across the room.

  Michael stilled. An intruder?

  As slowly and quietly as he could, he turned his head and as little of his body as possible to peek at what had Gelert so intent.

  It was her, cast in the dim light of the moon.

  She sat on the floor like a child with her legs crossed, a long, thick braid snaking down her straight spine. She was holding something in her lap, but he couldn’t quite make it out.

  Saying nothing, he rolled his body enough to consider her more thoroughly. Realization dawned. She was sitting up, eyes trained on the door to their chamber, holding the damned wooden spoon.

  For courage, she’d said.

  His eyes quickly surveyed the rest of the room to assure himself only the three of them were present. The door was still shut and locked. The window intact. Nothing was out of order, save her increasingly strange behavior. He sighed audibly and sat up, swinging his legs to the edge of the bed. This gained her attention and she turned, eyes wide in the moonlight.

  “What the devil are you doing?” he asked.

  She swallowed. “I couldn’t sleep.”

  He peered at her. “So you thought you had better sit up all night and watch the door like some unarmed sentry?”

  She only stared back at him.

  He rose from the bed, trying not to wince as he put weight on his leg. He waited a moment to gain his stability then walked stiffly to where she sat. Her eyes, round and uncertain, followed him on his path until she stared up at him from the floor as he towered over her. He held out a hand to help her rise.

  She took it, placing her bare hand in his. It felt small. She rose, in one fluid movement and immediately tugged at the hand he held, but he did not release it. He held her there, facing him, mere inches separating them.

  “I’m only watching,” she said quietly. “You...you can’t know who might be lurking around this place.”

  “And if we are attacked, you will defend us with a wooden spoon?”

  She blushed at his remark and he regretted the tease. The spoon was a poor sword however

  “You don’t need this,” he said, taking the spoon from her grasp. “While you are traveling with me, you are under my protection.” He cast a glance over his shoulder. “And Gelert’s.”

  At his words, the veil of inscrutable expression that seemed to guard her every thought fell away. She looked up at him with the wide wondrous eyes of a child and he was nearly overcome by the naked emotion in them—a startlingly bald combination of relief, gratitude, and hope that made him feel intoxicatingly heroic.

  “Do you mean it?” she asked, her voice a trembling whisper.

  “I always say what I mean.” And because it seemed the thing to do next, he pulled her to him and held her, as his mother had held him as a boy and soothed the fears of a bad dream.

  He half expected her to pull away from his embrace, but she did not. She burrowed her face into his shoulder and clung to the comfort and reassurance he offered. He could feel the tiny quakes in her body as she still shivered from the fear that had kept her on edge and on guard all through the night.

  He ran his hand along her back to soothe her until the shivers began to subside. When she no longer shook with fear, he was left holding a woman up against the full length of him—a mysterious and appealing woman who’d gazed at him like a hero. Awareness of their contact moved gradually through him like a tangible thing—a serpent that slid, unhurried, from his shoulders to his feet, awakening the sensation of each place it roamed until he was alive with the pleasure of having this woman pressed against him.

  He probably should have let her go then.

  No. He should definitely have let her go.

  Instead, he placed his chin atop her hair and allowed his hand to continue stroking, up and down, rhythmically, along the length of her back. Each time he reached the gentle inward curve at the base of her spine, it teased him, tempting him lower. But each time he halted there and forced his hand to slide back upward.

  Then she sighed—a blissful, melting sigh that blew warm breath onto his chest through the thin lawn of his shirt.

  While one hand kept her firmly pressed to him, he placed his other hand beneath her chin and gently lifted her face to his view. He knew the kiss was inevitable the moment his gaze met haunting green eyes and lips parted in question.

  I am going to kiss you.

  He didn’t say it, but allowed his attention to linger on her delicate mouth in such a way his intent could not be mistaken. He waited so she would have every chance to pull away, turn her face, deny him. When she did not, a boyish victory swelled in him and he lowered his lips to hers.

  She didn�
�t pull back from the touch of his mouth on hers. For a moment, she offered neither resistance nor effort of her own. He trailed his tongue along the part in her lips and deepened the kiss, allowing her no choice but to participate.

  She did—hesitantly, at first, and then meeting his fervency with unpracticed enthusiasm as the kiss continued. Slender though she was, she felt very much like a woman—curving and soft—up against him. She tasted like a mystery and, too quickly, he was drunk on the brew. In his intoxication, he gave in to temptation and allowed his wandering hand to dip below that teasing curve in her back and graze lightly over the round of her backside. She made a sound—a quiet mewling sound—and he liked it too much.

  Somewhere in the room, Gelert whined and Michael heard it as a warning. He had to stop. If he gave in to each successive temptation, how far would he go? He was taking liberties he shouldn’t take, barely a moment after he’d told her that he would protect her. He lifted his mouth from hers and stepped back, slowly but firmly putting a pace of distance between them.

  She stared up at him, bewildered, catching her breath as he did. They looked at each other for a long, questioning moment and then she brought a hand to her lips, as though testing that they were the same lips as before. “Why did you do that?” she asked, her voice wavering and hesitant.

  As he had no good answer, Michael answered with a question of his own. “Do you want to know why I kissed you, or why I stopped?”

  Dark lashed fluttered onto flushed cheeks. “The first.”

  He gave the answer for the second. “I stopped because I didn’t have a good enough reason to kiss you. And there are several good reasons why I should not have done it.” He said it firmly, to impress the point upon them both. He was damned if he understood why he had kissed her. And he had lost control so easily. He was not in the habit of being overset by the simple act of kissing an attractive female. Somehow her complete lack of feminine wiles had managed to utterly beguile him.

  She nodded. “Yes. I think you are probably right.” But she touched her fingertips to her lips again, belying her words.

  “Why did you?” he asked. “Why did you let me kiss you?”

  She stared at him a moment, then she shook her head. “I…I don’t know. I think it was because no one’s ever touched me like that before.”

  “No one’s ever kissed you?”

  “No…that is, well, yes, no one’s ever kissed me,”—her gaze lost its courage and fell to the floor—“but I meant before that. When you were…were…holding me.”

  “You’ve never had a man hold you before.” He expected as much. Her response to his kiss had been alluringly sweet, but not practiced. The alternative, he supposed, was that she was extremely practiced, but played the part of the ingénue.

  “I have never had anyone hold me before.”

  He shook his head. She said the most ridiculously improbable things. “Surely when you were a child…”

  She simply stared.

  “Not even your mother? During a terrible storm or after a frightening dream?”

  She gave a small shake of her head. “Not that I can remember.”

  How miserably awful, if that were true. His own mother was not a perfect woman by any means. She had made mistakes in her life. But she had held her frightened child, for Christ’s sake. He was beginning to suspect Miss Crawley had good reason to flee her father’s home. “If your parents never comforted you, they were cold people. Is that who you watch for? Your father?”

  “I am not going back.” The statement was quiet but firm. She had said the same before.

  He considered her. He had many more questions, but his curiosity was a dangerous thing. He was too intrigued by her, this girl who would only be in his life for one more day. Their kiss proved it. He shouldn’t need to know more, and she likely wouldn’t tell him more anyway. Still, he pressed.

  “Is there only your father?” he asked. “You said your mother awaits you in London, but that isn’t true, is it?”

  She shook her head. “No. I’m sorry.”

  He had identified the lie the moment she had spoken it, so it shouldn’t have bothered him to have it confirmed, but it did. They had just kissed, after all. “If not your mother, who will see to your safety in London?”

  Her chin lifted. “I shall do well enough on my own.”

  “On your own?” He shook his head. “If you hope to hide from your father, London is large but may not be large enough. Besides, there are other dangers in town.”

  “I don’t intend to stay in London.”

  “Where will you go?”

  She looked at him and he could see the calculation behind her expression. She was weighing whether or not she would tell him the truth.

  “Boston.”

  “Did you say Boston?” She had clearly decided to no longer tell him the truth. Her decision triggered more anger than it should have, but had he not just comforted her? Had he not just promised her his protection? She was silent.

  “As you did not have the wherewithal to get to London without my help, forgive me if I find it unlikely that you have arranged passage to cross the ocean.”

  “I…I haven’t arranged it exactly, but there is a woman I know, she is married to a shipping merchant…”

  Michael cut her off. “Is that so?”

  “Yes. He sails to Boston.”

  “Oh, how convenient,” he bit out.

  “I’m sorry?”

  He had no patience for her stricken looks. “Does your sea captain know the duchess, by chance?”

  She paled, eyes wide with hurt at his sharply spoken words, but why shouldn’t he be angry? Why should he consider her tender feelings when she disrespected his so freely, continuing to feed him lie after lie? This was no entertaining parlor game in which he tried to tell the truths from the falsehoods. She had asked for his protection this night and he had committed it. One moment she behaved as though she feared for her very life in a rural coaching inn and the next she flippantly declared she would do ‘well enough on her own’ in London—a city teeming with miscreants and criminals.

  He would do well enough to stop worrying a damn about whether she told the truth or what she planned to do after they parted company.

  “He is not a sea captain,” she said, her voice becoming very small, her shoulders once again rounded forward.

  “What he is, Miss Crawley, is a figment of your imagination.”

  “But…I…he’s…”

  Michael lifted one hand to halt her stammering explanations. “Never mind, Miss Crawley. Go to bed.”

  She nodded gravely before bending to retrieve the wooden spoon and crossing the room to lay down on her makeshift pallet. She pulled the blanket over herself and turned her body toward the fire.

  She had obeyed and that made him even angrier, irrational as that was. She did not merely comply, but skulked to her bed the way Gelert would after a reprimand, with his tail tucked between his legs. Of all the strange things she’d done and said, Michael found this propensity of hers the most disturbing. She had been evasive, she had been indignant, and she had been bold enough to approach him in the first place. But between all that, she’d intermittently fallen into moments of what he could only call quiet obedience. When she did, she appeared more mistreated servant than gentleman’s daughter. It had seemed pitiful at times, but in the face of her dishonesty, it seemed nothing more than playacting and he had no patience for it.

  Michael tried to shake his questions from his head. She was his concern for only a few more hours and the only bit of information he truly needed was the location to which she should be delivered in London. She’d already given him that.

  Perhaps he could take a lesson from her style of obedience. He had answered his father’s summons. He was dutifully making his way to London to meet the bride of his father’s choosing. Yet here he
was kissing strange women. Whether he believed she’d maneuvered it or not, he couldn’t go around compromising young misses. Not when obedience would win him Rose Hall. Miss Ana Crawley with her haunting looks and wooden spoon was not part of it. He needed to get her to London and to whatever business she had with Hammersley, Brint & Peale—if they even existed—and then he would never see her again.

  * * * *

  Juliana lay on her makeshift pallet with her back to Mr. Rosevear and stared into the blackness of the corner. She would never, ever marry. She was swiftly learning that there were ways for men to be cruel without whipping or calling names. She would not be lured again into his gentle offers of protection. He was neither her friend nor her ally. If she were found by whomever her father had sent to chase her, Mr. Rosevear would likely be more than thrilled to hand her over and be rid of her. She could not let her guard down again.

  Chapter Seven

  Michael awoke the next morning feeling decidedly unrested. He should have at least been relieved to look out the window and observe not only blue sky, but also Albert in the yard of the coaching inn, already readying the coach. They were both distinct signs that this damned journey would finally be reaching its end and should have buoyed his mood, yet he felt only annoyance at the reminder that he would soon be delivering Miss Crawley to her mysterious fate. She was supposed to have been a distraction from his own inevitable misery, but instead she had been an endless cause of frustration, as Michael had been able to satisfy neither the puzzle of his mind nor the growing desire of his body’s awareness.

  The source of his befuddlement had risen before him and was already prepared for the day, her thick auburn braid once again tucked beneath her simple bonnet and threadbare gray shawl wrapped around her shoulders. She sat waiting in one of the chairs, her small bag of possessions at her side. He grunted an acknowledgement to her before making his way to the ewer and basin and splashing his face with water. He used the remainder in his hands to smooth down his untamed hair.