Goddess of the Hunt (The Wanton Dairymaid Trilogy #1)(81)

“No.”

Lucy blinked, obviously surprised by the vehemence of his reply. Jeremy swore. He took a breath and tried again. “It’s in disrepair,” he offered lamely. “It may be unsafe.”

“Oh, I’m certain it’s fine. All fashioned of stone like that? It looks like it’s been there for ages already. I doubt we could topple it if we tried.”

Jeremy summoned his sternest voice and The Look to match. “I said,no.” This time, she frowned. Good. At least the message was sinking in. “There’s nothing of interest up there, I promise you. But if you must see it for yourself, you’ll have to wait for another day. I’ll have Andrews see to its condition first. No one’s been up there in years.”

Twenty-one years, to be exact. Not since he and Thomas had played there as children. Not since the small cottage had been the staging ground for fishing expeditions and military campaigns and the occasional Arthurian quest. Not since the night two boys stole out of the Abbey to retrieve a forgotten treasure from the hermitage, but only one returned.

A sharp whinny drew Jeremy’s attention to the stream bank below. He watched that devil of a black colt go charging off through the woods, dragging the reins behind him. Never to be seen again, no doubt. He turned to his wife. “You rode …that horse … here?”

“Well, I would have ridden Thistle,” she replied hotly. “But it appears she’s been declared unsuitable for a countess.”

“Fiend is eminently unsuitable, and you know it. It’s a wonder you weren’t thrown.” He glared at his wife. Her riding habit gaped in the center, and he could glimpse the smooth globe of one breast overflowing her bodice with each angry breath. The exact sort of observation he ought to avoid. Averting his eyes, he took Lucy by the hand, guiding her back down the slope. “Where are your escorts?” he demanded.

“You mean those two grooms you employed to trail ten feet behind me and drive me absolutely mad? I bribed them to leave me alone.” She gave him a smug look. “I used my pin money.”

“Well, I hope you gave them enough to buy bread all winter,” he replied, helping his wife ease her way around a boulder. “Because you’ve just cost them their posts. Lucy, you willnot go riding—or walking, or driving, or anything else—unescorted. You willnot saddle horses other than those I’ve approved. Or you will not go out at all.”

She made an indignant gasp as he lowered her to the riverbank. “You can’t just keep me locked up in that Abbey, like the villain in some melodrama!”

“Oh, can’t I?” He whistled through his teeth, and his horse splashed through the river to his side. “I’ll stop playing the villain, Lucy, when you stop playing the fool.” She winced, the fire in her eyes doused with dismay. A small stab of guilt caught him between the ribs, but he wasn’t about to stop now. Not when he was finally getting through to her. Lucy needed to understand that he was not jesting, and he was not going to chase her down from cliffs every day of their marriage. His heart just couldn’t take it.

He grabbed his mount’s reins and looped them over the pommel. “Can’t you do something … somethingfeminine for once? You’ve unlimited funds, a whole staff of servants. Plan the dinner menus. Redecorate the house. Embroider a cushion or two. Take the carriage into the village and buy something you don’t need. Learn to be a lady, for God’s sake!”

Silence.

Those green eyes trained on him like two flintlock rifles. Twin patches of crimson blazed on her cheeks. Her lips parted—no doubt to deliver a scathing retort—and in the instant before he lost himself completely and silenced those lips with his own, Jeremy wrapped his hands about his wife’s waist and heaved her up on his horse. Then he swung himself into the saddle behind her, took the reins in one hand and his wife in the other, and dug his heels into his horse’s flanks.

“I’m taking you home.Now.”

Lucy was numb with shock.

Well, not completely numb. She would have liked to have been completely numb—and then she might have conserved all her concentration for anger, instead of being so annoyingly distracted by the sensation of Jeremy’s arm lashed about her waist, or his chest pressing warm and strong against her back.

She hadn’t realized how much she’d been craving his touch.

Lucy couldn’t even decide whether she was more angry with him, or with herself. He hadn’t said anything new or surprising—he’d only said it all a bit louder than he had in Henry’s study. He wanted her to change, to become a genteel lady. It angered her, even saddened her, but this much she already knew.

No, she was definitely more angry with herself. Because she couldn’t help but lean against him. Closing her eyes, she melted into his strength, breathing in his masculine scent and cursing her body for the traitor it was. Each rolling equine stride stoked her desire, and when the horse’s sudden change in gait caused her to slip, he gathered her to him roughly. Now wedged firmly between his thighs, Lucy could not mistake the hard ridge of his arousal pressing against her bottom.

Well. Evidentlythat part of him found her sufficiently feminine.

She wiggled against him and heard his breath catch in his chest. Heat swirled through her body. One word, one touch—even a suggestive glance thrown over her shoulder, and Lucy knew she could take the reins in this struggle, alter their destination entirely. And it was powerfully tempting to just give in, to satisfy the hot, liquid wanting that coursed through her veins.