His lips claimed her, but this time he didn’t bother with feathering kisses over her face. This time his lips found her own, undeterred by the darkness. Her lips seemed to be the place where his were supposed to be. He pulled her more tightly against him as if any sliver of air to separate them was outrageous.
Their tongues tangled, and she melted against him.
The world shattered.
Heat surged through her, and she clutched him closer to her, driven by some strange madness that somehow felt utterly, completely natural. His hardness pressed against her, and her center ached.
His hands, those same, strong ones that had ushered her onto the dance floor and changed her life forever, swept over her with a speed that verged on the frantic. Her nerves tingled against his firm, frenzied touch. He explored every curve of her body, and if they weren’t in a moving cargo van, if quietness were not a necessity, he might endeavor to strip her of her attire.
When the delicious sensations stopped, she might have to admit that she shouldn’t be embracing a rogue. When the pleasure halted, he might tell her that he’d seduced her with the same ease that he persuaded countless women to join him in his bed. And Cordelia did not want to think about those chits and courtesans at all.
She did not want to think that once they married, he would send her to his estate alone. No, dwelling on the sensation of lips on hers offered her greater comfort.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Cordelia opened her eyes, but no light illuminated her surroundings.
They were in the cargo van.
She blinked into the darkness and leaned into something delightfully warm, rather like—
Gerard’s chest.
“We’re here.” His voice rumbled against her. “Cumbria.”
She nodded, even though the name signified little. She’d spotted the name on a map before, but she’d never expected to visit.
“We should exit,” Gerard said.
“Yes,” she agreed and tried to keep the disappointment from sounding in her voice. Memories of their kisses soared through her, and she wanted to prolong the inky darkness.
Leaving the cargo van meant normal life. Normal life in which they weren’t married, and in which she was a disgraced woman.
“We’ll find an inn and then return to Scotland tomorrow,” Gerard said.
She inhaled and scrambled from the van, conscious again of his refusal to visit Kent.
Tall buildings towered over her, and a salty breeze flooded her nostrils. Piles of seaweed dotted the dock, and fishermen hauled pungent containers of haddock and trout from their boats. Throngs of slovenly clad people bustled over the unevenly cobbled street. Bedraggled people pushed wheelbarrows, and sailors sauntered over the streets. Some cast lurid glances at her, and she shuddered.
The few women wore drab gowns that they’d somehow managed to make inappropriate, and many donned hats adorned with garish plumes. They marched across the dock by themselves and shouted to the men. The women appeared to be of a moral quality that would not have sufficed for one of her father’s scullery maids.
Ladies of the night.
This seemed like an unlikely location for a good inn.
Cordelia brushed her dress with her hands, hoping to create some semblance of respectability. She whipped the plaid blanket around her as they clambered from the carriage onto the cobblestones.
“Hey!” The portly driver glared at them, and his face reddened as if he were aiming to give them a representation of the fires of Hades himself. “You were hiding in my wagon!”
Gerard bowed. “We are deeply appreciative of the ride.”
“You canna hide there! I’ll call the magistrate!” The driver blustered.
Gerard chuckled and handed him some coin. “I wouldn’t want to ride for free.”
The man glanced down, and his eyes rounded. “For this, I would have let you ride in the front. Couldn’t have been comfortable back there. No place for a lady.”
“I have the distinct impression that the lady was not miserable,” Gerard remarked.
The driver’s eyebrows shot upward, and Cordelia’s face burned.
Cordelia cleared her throat. “What my companion means is that—”
“—she was asleep,” Gerard finished for her. “My wife is most nonchalant. She can sleep anywhere.”
“Ah . . .” The driver nodded. “A most worthy quality.”
“Thank you again,” Gerard said, and offered her his arm.
“Yes,” Cordelia squeaked.
“I’ll see if I can find someone to take us,” Gerard murmured.
They stepped onto the dock, but Gerard halted at once. His face whitened. “Oggleton is here.”
Cordelia’s heart tumbled downward.
“Mr. MacGlashan must have told him,” Gerard said. “The van is not exactly fast transportation.”
They couldn’t just stay here, waiting for Oggleton to approach them. The man was pacing the dock and scrutinizing the ships. In any moment he would notice them.
Gerard grabbed her hand and headed toward the water. “We are not remaining on this blasted dock.”
Gerard dragged her toward a ship, and she allowed Gerard to lead her up the gangway. Seagulls flapped their wings through the air, sweeping into the ocean and gobbling up fish in their orange beaks.
“Tickets, sir,” the steward said.
Cordelia’s heart sank, but Gerard whipped out his purse. “How much?”
“You don’t have a reservation?” The steward asked suspiciously.
“No,” Gerard said cheerfully.
“Should have booked earlier.”
“It was a spontaneous decision.”
The steward narrowed his eyes at them. “Getting on a ship was a spontaneous decision?”
“Er—yes,” Gerard said. “Keep the spark in the romance.”
“She don’t look old enough to be married a long time,” the steward said.
“We’re newlyweds,” Gerard said. “But definitely very, very married.”
“I was unaware that newlyweds worried about the retention of sparks.”
“We like getting things off to a good start,” Gerard said.
“Mm . . . hmm.” The steward’s skepticism seemed to increase, and Cordelia glanced behind her. “Please hurry,” she pleaded.
“Eager for a room, ain’t you?” The steward said. “Suppose you must really be newlyweds. You are in luck. There is a room available for you.”
“Splendid,” Cordelia said weakly, still distracted by Oggleton.
“I wonder why you don’t look more excited.”
Gerard pulled her closer to him. “Just a bit daunted by being out at sea. Scared of getting sea sick and all that.”
“I don’t get sick,” Cordelia declared.
“Worry over!” Gerard clapped his hands together.
“We’ll just stay on the ship for a while,” Gerard whispered. “And wait for Oggleton to leave. He can’t harm us if we’re on a ship filled with lots of other people.”
Something stronger and more foreboding soon replaced the slight sway.
Cordelia widened her eyes. “The ship is sailing!”
Sailors shouted and yelled near her, cursing as if they weren’t in the presence of a lady. They scurried around and one clambered up the mast.
The wooden planks of the ships croaked and groaned as sailors tread over the aged floor. Water sloshed against the bottom of the ship.
Cordelia grabbed hold of the ticket from Gerard. Perhaps they were going toward Scotland. Hopefully not to America.
She stared at the destination, and her chest tightened.
They were not headed to Boston or Calais or Dublin.
They were going somewhere far worse.
Kent.
She peered at the horizon, but all she saw were two gigantic slabs of gray pressing against one another. A cloudy sky merged with the churning grey ocean.
The buildings lessened in size, and other ships, ship
s that weren’t moving, remained in the harbor. If only they hadn’t chosen this one.
“Perhaps we can return in a smaller boat,” she said.
“And risk having Oggleton find us? No.”
“Did you know when you bought the tickets?” She asked gently.
Gerard nodded. “It’s good. You’ll see. The Archbishop will marry us. We’re lucky.”
“But you don’t visit Kent. You haven’t been back, since—” She paused, thinking again of that poor younger boy and the father who killed himself.
He pulled her into his arms. “Perhaps now I will have the strength to do so.”
*
Gerard clutched Cordelia to him, and his lips spread. It didn’t matter that birds were cawing overhead, it didn’t matter that the ship was dipping into murky water, it didn’t matter that everyone around them was coarse and rough as if they’d just emerged from a public house.
Which probably had been the case.
The steward cleared his throat. “Care to see your room?”
“Certainly.”
Gerard slipped his hand to the curve of Lady Cordelia’s back.
“Do you think the steward suspects?” Cordelia whispered.
“That a woman as prim and proper as you could find herself on a ship fleeing a criminal? Accompanied by a man whom she’s not yet married to?”
Her cheeks flushed, and she stiffened, but he took her hand in his, and the tension in her shoulders dissipated.
He pressed open the door, and his stomach sank. He’d worried about the inn, but the cabin was dark and dreary. Wood paneled the floor, walls, and ceiling, and the dark color seemed to make the room more confining, more constricting. He’d already forced dreadful stops in taverns and inns for Cordelia, but the tiny room embodied everything unsuitable.
Cordelia merely settled onto the bed, the only seat available in the room. “I’ve always been intrigued by the idea of being on a boat.”
“I appreciate your sense of adventure.”
She smiled. “My brother was in the navy.”
“I wish I had had the pleasure of meeting him.”
“He decided to fight Bonaparte. He was going to become a duke—he didn’t need to do that.”
“He was heroic.”
Her lips stretched into a wistful smile. “You know, I always believed he was still alive. My brother was always so filled with vitality, it seemed inconceivable to imagine him any other way. I thought he might be captured and he would show up, but now—”
“Now the war has ended.”
She nodded.
He stretched out his hand to her. “Now you are having an adventure for him.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
The ship was nothing like Cordelia had experienced. Life wasn’t supposed to be lived on a swaying concoction of wood, and she discovered a newfound appreciation for windows.
The waves never ceased swirling and swishing against the walls of the ship, the sound more abrasive than any occasional murmurs from the livestock on her father’s estate, or the rumble of carriage wheels on her father’s London townhouse.
And yet, despite it all, there was nothing so thrilling as her experience.
Cordelia’s preferred place was outside, and she found satisfaction in strolling about the deck. She memorized the various ropes that lay on the ground, their exact function mysterious.
The ship tilted and swerved, and yet there was always someone sitting on the mast, and the sailors seemed thoroughly unconcerned, content to continue their jovial cursing and work.
“Let me join you.” Gerard followed in pace with her.
Her lips twitched as the man’s lengthy strides narrowed to replicate her smaller strides. Gray clouds, the color as somber as the ocean, darted above.
And yet—
There was something appealing about the vast view. The sky might be limited to gray tones: esterhazy and slate, and the ocean might be similarly devoid of vibrancy, but at least they were alone on the ocean. No ship, no boat, no coastline reminded her of the rest of the world.
Cordelia pulled her gaze away. Her heart once again thudded, and even though they were on a ship that bounced and shook as it made its way over the waves, she’d never felt such stability.
Something in Gerard’s gaze made her feel safe as if his strength surpassed that of the strongest castle walls.
Except she had no right to feel safe. They might be living as a married couple, but they both knew that once the archbishop married them, they would lead separate lives. The man might be pleasant now, but it was the pleasantness that many expressed when they were thrust unexpectedly with strangers, and they strove to find things in common to make their ideally short time agreeable.
*
His Majesty’s Army might be interested to learn that Gerard had discovered the ultimate form of torture: continued contact with Lady Cordelia.
The width of the cabin’s walls was too narrowly placed, and the short distance to her bed was maddeningly near.
They’d retired early, when sailors started peering at darkening clouds with ever-increasing frequency. Rain pummeled the boat, merging with forceful waves that pitched against the ship. When objects clattered to the floor, and the sailors shouted the word “storm,” he’d declared it bedtime.
They’d retreated to the small cabin with its two tiny beds.
It was good, he told himself. Cordelia didn’t need a repeat of their time on the cargo van. He’d yielded too easily to his desires. Cordelia had never wanted to accept his marriage proposal. Perhaps she never would have done so, had he not stressed that it would be strictly for convenience. It wouldn’t be fair to her to change the rules on her at this point.
Her breath sounded in the bed beside him. Unlike other parts of the day, he couldn’t feign interest in some aspect of sailing, and avoid her.
Cordelia.
An image of driving into her invaded his mind.
The worst thing was, it wasn’t the first time he’d thought of it.
The curve of her hips inspired fantasies with greater force than any of the nine muses. Fantasies of kissing her ivory neck, and the longer, equally enticing curves of her slender body. Fantasies he could never admit to.
The woman would be his wife soon. Not his mistress. Not a bored widow. And not a courtesan paid handsomely for the task of pleasuring him.
One wasn’t supposed to have fantasies of thrusting into one’s wife. Not when the woman had never intended to elope with him, not when she spoke of a marriage of convenience, and not when she assured him that he would be able to bed any woman he desired with a calmness that should have been impossible.
They’d kissed in the cargo van, but the experience had only intensified his longing for her.
He willed his breath to calm.
He didn’t need to contemplate the golden hue of her hair. Not when that thought would lead to other more dangerous thoughts, such as the smoothness of her pale skin.
His fists tightened around the edge of his bed, and he fought the urge to delve into her.
He was not going to her.
It didn’t matter that he’d memorized the willowy shape of her body, the narrow width of her ankles, and the curve of her smile.
It didn’t matter that it took colossal amounts of effort to not rest his gaze on her bosom, and that his utmost act of heroism, more noteworthy than protecting them in England and Scotland, more valiant than any of his past exploits, was lying there in silent agony. His fingers itched to pull her hand toward his, and he longed to brush his fingers against her elegant ones.
Lady Cordelia surpassed Mont Blanc and the Matterhorn with ease.
His cock twitched and blood shot through him. He gripped the edges of the hammock tighter as his whole body seemed to act without his mind’s admonishments.
He ached.
He actually ached for her.
And he had the horrible sensation it wasn’t just his cock guiding him through this agony of want.
He’d experienced desire before.
Yet this urge to possess her didn’t belong to the casual pondering he’d experienced when seeing a particularly charming actress or opera singer. It wasn’t the bored desire that rippled through him when spotting one of the more polished courtesans.
No, this was about Cordelia.
He shifted in his hammock. The rigid rope knots dug into his back, but they could not distract him from thoughts of her.
He pressed his lips together.
His body might fail him, his mind would not.
Nothing could happen between them.
That wasn’t the plan.
It wasn’t—blast, it wasn’t what she wanted.
“Gerard,” she said.
His skin prickled.
He must have imagined the sound.
He shouldn’t have taught her to use his given name. That idea had not been good. He didn’t need her to say the name that was reserved for only his closest family members. Even as a child he’d always been Master Rockport.
He squeezed his eyes shut, but his fantasies leaped with as much force as when they were open.
Blast it.
He swung his legs from his bed.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The waves sloshed against the ship, and the sound roared in Cordelia’s ears.
This was how her brother had died.
Except he’d likely not been in a cabin like this, with a blanket tucked over him to protect him from the worst of the cold, and a friend—more than a friend—as reassuring as the marquess. No, Rupert had probably been on deck, witnessing every foamy wave that pushed him nearer to his grave as cannons and muskets tore apart his comrades.
The ship swerved, and the sailors let out a cacophony of swears she almost welcomed. Anything to halt the noise of the sloshing and splashing of waves against the hull.
She closed her eyes more tightly, but though she couldn’t see the destruction around her, nothing would change her location. She was here. On a ship. With a man—a wonderful man, and now they might both die.
A Rogue to Avoid (Matchmaking for Wallflowers Book 2) Page 15
