Page 70 of Gallant Waif
“Not enough.”
“Try and get some sleep, old man. Or worry about young Kate if you must, not Cole. I’ll sleep in the carriage, keep an eye on the horses.”
The cottage fell silent, the only sound the occasional crackling of the fire and the blowing of the wind in the trees outside.
Kate was the first to waken next morning. She came slowly to consciousness, her mind still fuzzy from the drug she had been given. Despite a slight headache and a stomach that was insisting it be fed, she was aware of a tremendous feeling of rightness. Still with her eyes closed, she inhaled slowly, moving her cheek sensuously against its pillow. She stopped. Her pillow felt…odd.
She opened one eye. Her pillow was a naked male chest, lightly sprinkled with dark hair. Good God! Cautiously she lifted her head and looked at the owner of the chest. Jack? She had slept with Jack? Swiftly, with a minimum of movement, she glanced around the room. She had never seen this place in her life.
The last time she had wakened with no recollection of the previous day she had found herself in the hands of the French. But Jack was here. Grimly she forced her mind to recall its last memory. Arguing with Cousin Jeremiah…and drinking that bitter coffee. Had she been drugged? Or had she passed out for some other reason? It was no use. She couldn’t answer. She would have to wait until Jack woke.
She looked down at Jack as he lay sound asleep and her mouth curved in a tender smile. He looked so young and boyish and handsome, the harsh bitterness wiped away in sleep. Gently she stroked the lines of his face, smoothed the tousled thick dark hair. Unable to help herself, she touched her lips to his in the lightest of kisses. She froze as he stirred, then relaxed as his breathing returned to its previous regularity.
She watched the broad chest moving up and down with each breath and marvelled that she had slept all night on it without realising it. She bent and kissed the warm, slightly salty skin. She feathered tiny damp kisses up his chest, over his throat, along his jaw and back to his lips. She spent long moments tasting and caressing him, all in the lightest of gossamer touches so as not to disturb his sleep, revelling in the contrast of texture of his darkly rugged jaw, scraping her soft lips against its harsh texture, then placing her mouth gently against his soft, relaxed lips. Greatly daring, she touched his lips with her tongue, just to know again the taste of him. He moaned and shifted slightly and she froze again, watching him, but he was still asleep, and she returned to her illicit explorations.
Kate’s heart was pounding. She knew she should not be doing this, lying so with a man, exploring his unconscious body like a thief in the night. It went against every principle she had been raised by, every tenet of the proper behaviour for a lady—but she couldn’t help herself. She would never have this opportunity again. This was not simply a man—it was Jack, the man she longed for with every fibre of her being, the man she loved but could never have. Surely God would forgive her this once.
She gazed at his sleeping face, her body tingling all over. Oh, but he was a beautiful man. Gently she ran her hand over his naked torso, marvelling at the smoothness of his skin, the contained power in the relaxed muscles of his chest. Delicately she ran her fingers through the soft curls of his chest hair. His flat brown nipples were ringed with whorls of dark hair. She kissed them and he shuddered under her touch.
She lifted her head, waiting for signs of him awakening. Her eyes ran over his face, his dear battered cheek, his long aquiline nose, the deep grooves that ran from nose to mouth. Her gaze stopped on his open mouth and slowly she lowered her mouth to his, seeking that incredible, wonderful sensation she had experienced before, when her tongue had touched his.
Jack silently groaned as he felt her mouth come down on his again. He couldn’t take much more of this without responding. His body was aflame with the desire to hold her, return her sweet, tentative caresses, to take her and bring them both to glorious crescendo. But he couldn’t, not here, not now, not in silence and stealth, for he was too aware of their situation: the filthy cottage, the sagging ceiling, the hard floor. And Francis could walk in at any moment. No, it would be too sordid.
When he took Kate and made her his, he wanted it to be utterly perfect. But for now he would take what he could. And what he had was the most exquisite torture he had ever experienced.
He had come awake almost instantly, as soon as he had felt her stir, but had not moved, allowing her to escape from their embarrassingly intimate position if she wished to. He had waited for her to move away from him, feeling the cold rush of air as she lifted her body away from his, feigning sleep to make it easier for her to leave him.
He’d been unprepared for the shock of the first feathery caress on his skin. So light, he had almost not believed it was happening, but it had been followed by another and then another, and it had taken all his will-power just to lie there instead of gathering her hard against him in a passionate embrace. Such a thing had never happened to Jack Carstairs before. To lie still, and to all intents placid and unaware, while the little creature that had wound herself around his heart planted the tiniest, most delicately moist kisses all over him.
His pulse pounded with the effort of remaining relaxed under her innocently questing sensual onslaught. He had no choice. He had to lie here in tormented bliss, treasuring each tentative, seductive caress, as if he had no more feeling than a block of wood. It was that or lose the precious moment to sordid reality. No choice at all.
God, but she was sweet. Oh, Lord, she was kissing him on the mouth again. He braced himself for the ravaging temptation as her small pink tongue reached in and delicately touched his. The jolt of sensation swamped him, and with silent anguish he felt his tongue responding, curling around hers. He felt her alarmed withdrawal but he could not help himself and his tongue followed hers. She jerked away in panic. Gently but firmly his hand cupped the back of her head and, blue eyes blazing into hers, he pulled her mouth back to his.
The kiss was long, sweet and intensely passionate.
Outside the cottage, Jack could hear Francis getting the horses ready. He released Kate and after a moment she drew back, a dazed, bemused expression on her face. Jack yearned to pull her back into his arms and kiss her arousal into passion. Instead he smiled, an odd, twisted, tender smile.
“Morning, sweetheart,” he whispered. “That’s the nicest awakening I think I’ve ever had.”
Kate blinked, then blushed rosily. Good God, she was lying full length on top of Jack Carstairs in the most immodest position, legs entwined, her breasts resting on his naked chest and his…his manhood pressing into her. And he was awake!
Hurriedly she scrambled off Jack and stood, tugging frantically at her clothes, desperately attempting to achieve some semblance of decency and composure. Heavens! How long had Jack been awake? Had he known all that she had done?
Deeply embarrassed, she busied herself with tidying her clothes and her hair, unable even to look in his direction, let alone meet his gaze. She wanted to break the fraught silence with words, but could think of nothing to say. Behind her she could hear Jack moving; presumably he was closing his shirt, buttoning his waistcoat, shrugging himself back into the coat she had found herself wrapped in…
“Morning, all. Sleep well?” Francis entered the cottage with a stamping of boots. “Brrr, it’s cold out there. I think we should try to get moving as soon as possible. Kate, how are you, m’dear?”
Kate murmured something unintelligible and slipped outside the cottage, her face flaming. Francis here as well? Who else knew of her shame? Bad enough that she had allowed herself to be kidnapped by her cousin, but to have two witnesses to it—and then to have behaved in that manner with Jack! What must he think of her, to have touched him that way…with Francis somewhere about too? It was all too mortifying.
She went in search of water in which to wash. She could find no well, nor any pump or stream. The night had been a bitter one and the small pond beside the cottage was frozen over. Kate tried to smash through the ice with a rock, but it would not break. She rubbed some icicles over her skin until they melted and dried her tingling face on her petticoat. She tore a ribbon of lace off her petticoat and tied her hair back as neatly as she could. Then she returned to the cottage, shivering in the morning chill.
By the time she returned, both Francis and Jack looked presentable, if not their usual immaculate selves. She avoided Jack’s eyes and knew her face was flaming, but hoped it would be put down, by Francis at least, to the nip of the frigid air outside.
“Good morning, gentlemen,” she said brightly, smiling impartially at a space somewhere between the two of them. “Anything to eat? I’m utterly ravenous.”
Francis chuckled. “The lady is hungry, old man. We can’t have that. Shall we adjourn to the nearest hostelry and obtain some breakfast? I fancy there is an inn in the next village which can accommodate our needs tolerably well.”
“Oh, yes, let’s,” said Kate immediately, beaming at him. She still could not look at Jack.
