Cocky Earl: A Regency Cocky Gents Novel

by Annabelle Anders

  He dropped onto a bench across the room and after flicking her a sardonic look, began tugging at one of his boots.

  “What?”

  She wasn’t sure what that look had meant.

  “You.” He sent her a rueful smile before going back to work on his boots.

  Charley wasn’t sure if his frustration was toward her or the stubborn footwear. She crossed the room and dropped onto the floor in front of him. Already the hem of her gown was covered in mud, so she didn’t mind getting a little more on it.

  “I like you.” His statement had her looking up from what she was doing. “I like things about you that I never imagined I would like.” It was an odd sort of confession to make, and it had her biting back a smile.

  “I like you, too.” She slid the boot off his stockinged foot and set it to the side. “I didn’t think it possible that I would find myself liking an English earl, but your character and…” She studied his broad shoulders and chest. “Other things, have proven to be… tolerable.”

  He tugged at one of the many curls that had escaped her coiffure. “Tolerable, eh?” His smile was more of a satisfied smirk.

  “Barely,” she clarified.

  But he was more than barely tolerable, and the extent to which his tolerability was turning into adorableness complicated her life considerably.

  “So, whiskey, horses, archery, and now fire-building. Tell me, what other talents have you been withholding from me?” The edgy quality in his voice along with his nearness set her heart hammering against her ribs all over again.

  By the time she peeled off his other boot, she barely had the strength to stand. Uncertain as to what would happen next, she stepped around the puddles and he followed her.

  “Do you cook?” Charley stood at the hearth and practically held her breath when warm hands settled at her waist. “Are you a crack shot with a pistol?” He drew her against him and although their clothing was wet, his chest felt warm against her back.

  Her mind had gone blank and rather than answer him, she tilted her head to the side to give his mouth better access to the sensitive skin on her neck. She was left dazed, however, when instead of embracing her from behind, he loosened her gown and stepped away.

  “We need to get out of these wet clothes.” He was removing his jacket as though it was the most natural thing in the world. “We might be here for a while.”

  Chapter 23

  WARRIOR WALLFLOWER AND WANTON?

  Jules opened a chest he kept handy and withdrew a long shirt. Having slept in the building on more than a few occasions, he’d left a change of clothes here. She’d need something to wear while her gown dried. He wouldn’t be the cause of her catching ill.

  He’d brought her here to ask her opinion about operating a distillery after they married, hoping it might further his cause in winning her hand. He hadn’t foreseen the rain. He hadn’t considered the possibility of the two of them being caught in such an isolated location for most of the afternoon.

  Alone.

  After today, there would be no turning back for either of them. Their absence would be noted. And remarked upon. The only way to settle the wagging tongues would be to announce their engagement.

  Before discarding his coat, he remembered to remove the flask form his pocket. Not that he needed warming—she’d managed to take care of him in that area.

  “Wear this.” He offered her the shirt.

  She was clutching her gown to her chest, her green eyes looking larger than normal against her skin, which, as he was becoming accustomed to since their acquaintance, was flushed a delicate pink.

  “What about you? You’re more soaked than I am.”

  “I’ve dry breeches in there as well.” At his assurance that he wouldn’t be waiting the storm out in damp clothing, she accepted the garment from him.

  He could go upstairs. He could step back outside. “I’ll turn my back.” He grinned. “That way if you require my services as your lady’s maid, I’ll be right at hand.”

  Did all redheads flush so easily, or just Charley in particular?

  “I believe I can manage, thank you.”

  Jules pivoted and averted his gaze to the window to provide her with some privacy. He hadn’t bargained, however, for the thick clouds blocking out the sun so that it was almost as dark as the night, nor for the fact that the glass showed her reflection almost as clearly as any mirror.

  Unable to look anywhere but her reflection, he mindlessly undid the buttons to his waistcoat and tossed it aside. She took her time, moving hesitantly at first. When she slid the gown off her shoulders and onto the floor, his cock hardened. Her dampened chemise was almost transparent and it clung to plump breasts pushed up by her stays. Her delightful bottom and lovely hips flared out just below the tight garment.

  “I…” She lifted her hands and covered her breasts and at the same time her gaze met and held his in the glass. “I’ll need your help after all. I hadn’t realized my corset was soaked through.”

  Jules tugged at his shirt until it lifted free of his trousers and then pulled it over his head before facing her again. She knew he’d been watching her, and she hadn’t scolded him for it.

  As she stood at the hearth, the firelight dancing on the classical lines of her face and warming her skin, Jules felt his restraint slip.

  She was going to marry him. She would be his wife. They were alone, and she seemed quite unafraid.

  Her own expression conveyed similar thoughts and emotions as her gaze traveled over his abdomen and chest. There was nothing he could do to conceal his arousal.

  “There will be no turning back.” He approached her in stockinged feet.

  She gave no indication of misunderstanding his meaning, just turned and presented her back to him. The laces posed no trouble, and he could almost feel her sigh of relief when it loosened and slid to the floor.

  He swallowed hard and lifted his hands, sliding her chemise to the side so he was touching her bare shoulders. When he leaned down to press his mouth against her smooth, cool skin, he noticed no discernible perfume. Only clean, fresh woman. His gaze dropped to her hands. And—

  “God’s eyes, Charley!” A violent red welt extended from her wrist almost all the way up to where her arm bent at the elbow. The string yesterday had caught her. He’d thought so at the time, but she’d given no indication and then had encouraged that damn competition.

  He’d done it to himself as a boy and knew how painful it was. This welt was his fault. He’d been assisting her and should have protected her.

  She glanced over her shoulder at him, looking almost apologetic, but he would have none of that. He lifted her arm, cradling it with both his hands, and then dropped the softest of kisses onto the tender skin.

  “Does that hurt?” He was a heel for not realizing it earlier. When she shook her head, he allowed his lips to barely brush the tender skin again. It was warm.

  “My fault.”

  “It isn’t your fault.” Pride swelled his heart. Or was it adoration? She was so damned independent. So damned headstrong in certain matters.

  “I should have realized.”

  She was shaking her head again before he even finished. “You had no way of knowing. You are not a person who can read minds. I didn’t want anyone to know.”

  Of course, she wouldn’t want any attention.

  “I know now,” he whispered as he turned her around to face him and then lifted the chemise over her head. Not moving his gaze from hers, he assisted her into the overly large shirt. “I want to protect you, Charley. When will you realize that?” And then she was in his arms again. Her hands around his neck and meeting his tongue thrust for thrust with his own.

  She broke free and leaned as far back as she could with him still holding her against him. “But who protects you?” The question was an innocent one, and her eyes were filled with concern.

  “I guess you will.” What in the hell was he saying? Had she cast some sort of spell over him?
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  He walked her backward until she bumped into the table, and he lifted her to sit on the surface. “That’s what two people do. They take care of one another.” He drifted his hands along her legs, from the tops of her thighs to her knees.

  Perhaps that was what he would do. He would take care of her so that she was too spent to allow him the ultimate liberty. Jules pulled the wooden chair over and dropped into it so that she sat atop the table, a feast served up special for him.

  And only him.

  She leaned back, resting her weight upon her hands but watching him intently. She didn’t resist when he nudged her knees apart. Her breaths hitched and beneath the linen of the shirt, he watched as the tips of her breasts tightened into excited nubs. Glancing at them, and then up into her eyes again, Jules grasped her ankles, just above her boots.

  Of course, she would still have her boots on. A lightness that he didn’t quite recognize danced in his chest, perilously close to his heart. He slid his hands up her calves, meandering to the outer edge of her leg, and edging back in again, and then pausing to draw lazy circles when his thumb reached just above her knee.

  “I want to take care of you.” He fixed his gaze on hers, which was hooded and innocently sensual. He knew that look. He’d seen it on practiced courtesans but never on a lady. And never had it affected him as much.

  Just as she could be a warrior but also a wallflower, right now, she was a wanton innocent.

  Her desire for him wasn’t practiced, and he doubted she was even aware of the invitation she sent. But she wanted him. He was so damned hard, just from knowing that she wanted him as much as he wanted her.

  “How?” She licked her lips. “How do you want to take care of me?”

  “I’ll show you.” Jules skimmed his hand higher. “Tell me if you want me to stop.”

  Her breasts rose and fell but she nodded and then blinked slowly. “Keep going,” she commanded.

  “I want to know every inch of you.” His voice came out husky. He didn’t care. He wanted her to know what she did to him. “I need to touch you everywhere.”

  When he reached the plump petals at her apex, she closed her eyes and dropped her head back, exposing her slim, graceful neck and thrusting her chest higher. Long curls had escaped their pins and dangled over the surface of the table.

  His blood, which he was certain had all pooled in his cock, roared in his ears. Or was that the rain thrumming on the rooftop? He drew one knuckle along warm, slick flesh, unable to move his gaze from her face, and located her swollen nub with his thumb.

  “Jules?” she half-whispered, half-whimpered.

  “Do you want me to stop?”

  “No. Don’t stop.” Her mouth parted and Jules wondered if the flesh of the lips beneath his hand was as rosy as the lips he’d already tasted. Or were they a duskier scarlet like the warm wet flesh inside her mouth?

  He had to stop himself from imagining too much or he’d never get through this without embarrassing himself.

  Unable to resist, he trailed his other hand up her other leg, past her hip bone, past the softer flesh of her belly to cradle the weight of her breast.

  She was even wetter now, pulsing beneath his hand. And still, he couldn’t stop watching her expression. With each breathy gasp she made, he learned more of what she wanted. With each moan, he took special note.

  “It’s all right. Let go,” he urged her, sensing that she was afraid to give in.

  “I don’t know how.” Her eyes squeezed closed, but tears of frustration had escaped, nonetheless.

  Jules’ throat thickened and in one quick motion, he scooped her up and carried her to the cot. She kept her eyes pinched together and didn’t open them until he lay down beside her.

  “Do you know how beautiful you are?”

  The doubt he saw as she stared up at him only made him more determined to convince her. How had he ever imagined he could marry anyone but her?

  He threaded his fingers into her hair, carefully removing the few remaining pins. “Look at this. Under the sun, it’s like fire. In the shadows, it’s the color of a sensual dream.” He smoothed some curls on the pillow around her and along her face, hypnotized by the different shades of the strands in the flickering firelight.

  “You hated it when you first saw it,” she half-teased; half-accused him. “Do you think I wasn’t aware of your disapproving scowl that first night?”

  “You sneaky little minx.” But he continued stroking her hair and explaining the wager he and Stone had made on the moth. The smile on her lips was no longer sad by the time he finished regaling her with that story and some of the other ridiculous antics he and his friends had gotten into. At some point, he’d retrieved the flask and they took turns sipping from it.

  Facing each other, lying sideways on top of the thick quilt, she dropped her lashes and studied a thread she’d been worrying. “I didn’t want you to stop, you know, but I didn’t know how to… let go?”

  Jules watched her closely. “What was going on in that brain of yours? When I was touching you?”

  Her teeth worried her bottom lip. “I thought I ought to be embarrassed. That even though it was one of the most amazing feelings in the world, surely I would do something wrong.”

  Jules placed his fingertips on her chin and tilted her face up so she could see him. “Never. If you knew how I felt as I watched you, you’d flush an even deeper rose than normal.” He had her full attention now.

  “I couldn’t stop staring at your lips, the flush on your cheeks, your neck. Knowing that you looked like that because of me—because of how I was touching you—” The sound of his heart grew louder in his ears as he remembered. “Even telling you now fuels my desire for you.” He took her hand and placed it over his heart. “Do you feel that?”

  “It’s the same as mine,” she whispered.

  “But I want you to know, Charley, my sweet little American, that I will never do anything you don’t want me to. I promise you that.”

  “I want it,” she said. And then more forcefully. “I want to know all of it.”

  In the time he’d come to know her, short though it had been, she’d been true to herself in a way he’d never known in a woman. Honest with herself—and honest with him.

  He owed her the same.

  “There is no going back after this. You will marry me then?”

  Already he was fairly certain their absence had put an end to any doubt that they would marry. It was not the way he’d planned it, but now more than ever, marrying her was exactly what he wanted.

  She tilted her head to one side and offered him a sad smile. “How can I ever know your reason? If you did it to fulfill your debt to my father or because you wanted me?”

  Did he have an answer for that?

  “The wager was the reason I sought you out. And for that reason alone, I cannot regret it.” Honesty. “I don’t know that I would have courted you for marriage so quickly, or so enthusiastically. But it allowed me to end the so-called agreement my family had made with Felicity’s.”

  Her throat moved and she nodded, looking away from him. “So, it was the wager…”

  Obviously, he wasn’t saying this very well. “No. Yes. No. But it forced me to know you sooner. And as I came to know the woman you are, the more I wanted to know you.” He stared down at where she’d twisted the quilt into a wrinkled knot. “I can’t stop thinking about you when I’m awake, I’ve dreamt about you when I’m asleep. It’s right. Whatever this is between you and I.”

  Climbing off the bed, he lowered himself to one knee and grasped her hands in both of his. “Charley Jackson, will you make me the happiest of men and consent to be my wife?”

  Injecting all the feelings that he couldn’t express with words, he stared into her eyes and willed her to understand.

  Chapter 24

  NO TURNING BACK

  Charley rolled the question around in her mind, much the same as if she were savoring a perfect whiskey—the taste, the body, the
fragrance. Convinced of his sincerity, she swallowed, and warmth rising inside of her.

  Everything she’d held in, all the pent-up emotions she’d fought during the past week, released as though the storm had forced them out of her.

  When he’d kissed her, touched her most intimate places, she’d trusted him implicitly.

  Julian squeezed her hand, waiting for her answer. Her heart screamed at her to tell him what he wanted to hear, but her head reminded her of all that she would be giving up if she became his wife.

  Her country. Her father. Her dreams.

  But what were her dreams? Were they the same ones she’d had when she’d stepped onto the ship nearly two months ago?

  “It is right.” She couldn’t help but agree with him. No one had ever made her feel the way that Jules did. Cherished. Desired. Protected.

  Like she mattered.

  And even more importantly, overwhelmingly compelled to ensure that he felt the same.

  “Yes, Jules.” Her heart celebrated by sending bubbles of happiness dancing in her chest. “I want to marry you.”

  “You will?”

  She nodded.

  He was back on the bed, kissing her as she fell back onto the pillow. Energy swept through her, causing her to feel weightless and yet utterly grounded at the same time. This was what happiness felt like. She wanted everything. She wanted all of him. He’d settled between her legs, protected her from feeling squashed but not so much that she didn’t feel the evidence of his need pressing against her belly.

  She’d stopped him before. He would be hers. She would be his.

  Feeling bold, she slid her hand between them and fumbled with the closure of his falls.

  Jules drew back and smiled down at her. “Are you trying to tell me something?” His hand joined hers and he easily slipped the button free. He guided her hand to the second one and together they loosened it as well.