Page 22 of Unmasking a Wicked Marquess
“I bet I could beat you in a race sometime,” she challenged warmly. “I rode my first horse when I was just three years old.”
“Ho! A challenge indeed. I look forward to that race.” He pulled her up into the saddle. The idea that he would plan that race with her, that this would not be the only time they saw each other again, thrilled her.
She sat side saddle in front of him, adjusting as he moved them to a more comfortable position. She was aware of everywhere they touched, with his back to hers as his arms came up around her waist and his hands took the reins. His lips were so close to her ear that she shivered in a kind of delight.
“Are you ready?” he whispered.
“Almost.” She flicked up the hood of her cloak and pulled it down to hide her face so that no one would recognize her on their journey. If she were seen riding with a man in London, she could only imagine the scandal that would be in the scandal sheets the next morning. “Now, I’m ready,” she whispered.
“Then hold on tight.” For some reason, the words thrilled her. She clung to the saddle beneath her as he flicked the reins, and the horse darted off, carrying the two of them away.
***
“You’re too distracting,” Edward whispered to her as they entered the busy streets of London. He was aware of her flicking the hood tighter around her head, trying to hide in plain sight against the scandal of riding with a man so openly on the same horse.
“Distracting? What did I do?” she asked, her other hand gripping his waistcoat so much that he could think of nothing but those fingers.
Slowing his horse down, he angled his head towards her a little bit, catching those violet-hued eyes with a mischievous smile. He glanced down, and she followed that look.
“Oops.” She loosened her grasp on his waistcoat.
“Don’t apologize for that.” He chuckled. “Believe me, it’s a good distraction indeed.”
She laughed, too, under her breath.
“Which way am I going?”
“Take a left ahead.” She pointed at the road, and he missed her touch, relieved when she placed her hand on his side again and gripped his waistcoat. When he’d first ridden madly with her behind him, his thoughts had run wild.
He thought of other ways that she could grip him, ways that she might moan and gasp as he shed her clothes, moving down her body and adoring each one of those curves in turn, his fingers exploring her skin. He had to reach down and adjust his breeches more than once to cover up what thoughts of her were doing to his body.
“Well, you’re a surprise,” she said after another minute of silence passing between them. “After wondering if I would ever see you again, I hardly expected to find you in a carriage accident.”
“I hardly expected to find you there either. Perhaps someone was looking down on us, eh?” He angled his head around to catch her eye once more and nodded at the clouds. “Someone determined to put you in my path.”
“They went about it in a risky way.” Her wit made him laugh warmly.
He’d had nights with women before. On the continent, the rules had seemed more relaxed in that regard, and such an experience was making him wonder now what this lady would be like alone in his bedchamber at night. With this wit, she would surely be passionate in bed.
Far from a meek flower, merely pretty to look at, he rather thought she’d engage full-heartedly with the activities. A wild image of this woman above him, moving her hips across his as she was now moving them in this saddle, made his mouth dry. He had to jerk his eyes away from her and look forward again.
“You seem distracted,” she whispered as he turned the horse in the road and headed towards her house.
“I am. Very distracted,” he confessed. “Though when I am with a lady, I should not speak of what distracts me.”
“Even this lady? The one who kissed you that night so scandalously?”
“Ha! If you think that is a scandal,” he leaned back a little towards her, lowering his voice even further. At the movement, her hand slid further across his waist, and that touch made his length harden in his breeches. “Then my thoughts might make you shudder.”
“In a good way, I hope?”
“Your wit, My Lady,” he whispered between laughs. “It’s something quite intoxicating.” She smiled and looked forward again, a pink blush spreading up her cheeks.
“That’s home.” She pointed at the house at the far end of the road.
Edward looked towards it. Whatever thrill he had been feeling, the excitement and the tension palpable in the air between them now escaped his body, flying out like an exhaled breath.
“No,” he murmured but rode on towards the house.
