Page 17 of A Remarkable Rogue
“An understatement, I’m certain, from a woman who keeps knives at her fingertips.” He nodded toward the seat. “Do you keep a knife tucked beneath that cushion, too?”
She smiled sweetly. “Come closer, and you can find out.”
He laughed, and the rich sound wrapped around her like warm velvet. It was the first unguarded reaction she’d seen from him, and in response, a nervous tingle fluttered low in her belly.
Oh, this man was dangerous. Not just because he thought she was complicit in assassination and sedition, not just because the blackmailers might see them together and know why he was pursuing her. Shamefully, it was arousal for him, pure and simple. Years had passed since she’d last been touched by a man and been held in protecting arms, and the longing that rose inside her for Nate Reed to do exactly that stunned the daylights out of her. Just looking at him, she could tell that surrendering to him would be wonderful.
It would also end her.
“I know why you’re bothering with me, Captain, but your concerns are misplaced,” she said bluntly. “I am simply taking an afternoon drive. Lord Liverpool has nothing to fear from me unless you think I’m capable of skewering the man with my parasol.” To make her point, she banged it again on the side of the barouche to signal to the driver to go even faster. “Good day, Captain. Wouldn’t want to delay you!”
Instead of falling back as the barouche rolled away, the well-trained gelding increased its gait without any noticeable command from Captain Reed.
“Not at all, my lady.” He tipped his hat with all the grace of a blue-blooded gentleman. “It would be my pleasure to escort you across the park.”
Oh, she was certain of that…and right out the other side. Was he mad? To think that a lady in muslin was capable of assassinating the prime minister in broad daylight in the middle of Hyde Park—ludicrous!
“Especially since you’re alone,” he added, his hazel eyes shining as they studied her. “A beautiful woman like you…”
Her lips parted at the compliment dropped so easily that she wondered if he’d noticed he’d given it at all.
“I would have thought you’d be mobbed by admirers.”
He was wrong. No one mobbed after her. The ladies avoided her as competition for the men, andsheavoided the men, who wanted her only for her money or her body.
The gossips thought her a merry widow, but that was the farthest thing from the truth. She didn’t have it in her to take a string of lovers or spend time engaged in scandalous acts of any kind. In the seven years since Michael died, she’d been intimate with only one man, only once, and had regretted it since the night it happened. Oh, he had been sweet and kind, yet the protection and solace she sought in his arms eluded her, and she left his bed feeling just as lonely as when she’d arrived. She hadn’t had the heart to give herself to another man since, although none had really captured her attention.
Until him, the strikingly handsome captain keeping pace with her.
“I don’t need admirers, Captain. I have you,” she teased wryly. Then lowered her voice so her driver and groom couldn’t overhear. “My own personal guard who follows me everywhere I go.”
“Not everywhere,” he returned in a deep rumble nearly as soft as the crunch of gravel beneath the carriage’s wheels. “I didn’t have to follow you to St James House. You went there on your own to spy on me.”
“I wasn’tspyingon you,” she countered, although that was exactly what she’d ended up doing. “I needed to speak to St James, so I sought him out in his study and peered into the room to see if he was alone before I entered. You happened to be there. I was impatient to speak with him, that’s all. You think impatience proves guilt?”
“You know what they say. A bird in the hand”—his hazel eyes flickered hungrily as they moved tantalizingly over her as if he were imagining her naked body beneath her dress, and God help her, her skin tingled everywhere he looked—“gets outflanked by the enemy.”
Blast you!She’d had enough of his torment. It was time to put an end to his intrusion into her life and to the confusion he brought her. If she didn’t stop this madness now, in only a few minutes her hands would be on him, although whether to throttle his neck or to rip off his clothes she couldn’t have said.
She reached forward and thumped her parasol against the back of the driver’s seat. “Jenkins, please stop!”
“Aye, m’lady.”
Her driver pulled up the team, and the barouche slowed to a stop. Angrily, she turned toward Captain Reed so quickly that her hand went to the top of her bonnet to keep it in place as she glared at him.
His black gelding stopped immediately beside her. Well, that figured. Even the horse was against her.
“Walk with me, Captain.” She rose from her seat. “I believe we have things to discuss.” Her eyes darted toward her driver and groom. “Privately.”
He dropped to the ground in a fluid motion. “I would be honored, Baroness.”
He ignored the glare she gave him, opened the little carriage door, and held out his hand to her. Giving up on any chance of convincing him to properly address her, she grudgingly placed her gloved hand in his.
As soon as her shoes touched the gravel, she popped open her parasol and nearly took off his ear if not for his well-timed duck.
She spun on her heel and headed toward the path meandering alongside the water. Nate fell into step beside her, his long strides slowing to match her shorter ones, and he took her elbow in his hand as if he were a proper gentleman accompanying her on a walk instead of the man who believed her capable of treason.
His horse followed obediently along behind them.
