The Heiress Effect (Brothers Sinister #2)(86)

The rain really wasn’t helping.

The storm came on faster than their horse would go. One minute, there were a mild drizzle; the next, it felt as if they’d been enveloped in a sheet of water. It poured over them in a cold wave.

So why was he not chilled? Why was he still holding her, caressing her, kissing away the water drops that collected on her ear? Why were his hands exploring her curves?

Light sizzled across the sky in a jagged arc.

It highlighted the silhouettes of buildings, not so far away now. This interlude was already coming to an end. He couldn’t let go of her, though. Couldn’t stop his lips from tasting her neck again and again. Couldn’t take his hands from her thighs—especially not now, with her gown plastered to her skin.

He took her to the inn.

There were a thousand ways that a man and a woman arriving at an inn, drenched, in the middle of the night, might finagle a room together. If he were a different man…

He handed her down. “Go in,” he said. “Tell whoever’s in charge some story about how you…” He really couldn’t think of a story right now. He couldn’t think of anything but her. “Make up something. Whatever you like. I’ll wait half an hour and come in with a different tale. We sent our luggage over by different paths, requested different rooms. There’s no need for her to associate the two of us.”

“Oliver.”

He didn’t look at her. If he saw her eyes, if he looked at her gown, clinging to her wet skin, he’d never let her go.

He swallowed. The next words were harder to say than he had imagined, but he managed to choke them out.

“Sleep well. I’ll see you tomorrow at the train station at seven.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

Jane could not wait calmly. Time passed, and she watched the door, waiting to see the results of her subterfuge. It took forty-five minutes before Oliver strode in, still wet, but possessed of one of the towels that Jane had asked to be left for him.

“Jane.” His voice was rough.

He ran his hands through his hair, ruffling it into wet, auburn spikes.

She lifted her chin and met his eyes. There was no lamp in the room, just a fire. The dim flicker of flame made his eyes seem dark and dangerous.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he growled.

“You told me to tell the innkeeper a story,” she said, managing to keep her voice calm even when her heart was beating at twice its normal rate. “I did.”

“A story about how you came to be alone and wet and bedraggled to an inn! That’s what I meant. Not a story about—about—”

“About how my lover, a duke’s son, would be coming along shortly?” Jane raised an eyebrow. “About how we would be sharing a chamber?”

He tossed his towel over a chair and advanced on her.

“Yes,” he said, “I want you. Yes, I’ve thought of having you over and over these last few months. Yes, I lost my head out there, Jane. But I didn’t expect you to pay for my help with your body.”

She stood. She’d changed from her sodden gown into a warm chemise with an embroidered robe over it. She could hear the beat of blood in her ears.

“Is that what you think? That I’m offering myself to you in payment for services rendered? Don’t be daft, Oliver.” She took a step toward him. “Do you think you’re the only one who has been wanting these last months? The only one who lies awake, watching the ceiling, wishing for more? Look at me. I’m not a sacrifice.”

Her heart slammed, but she reached up and undid the tie of her robe. He watched that piece of silk slide to the floor, his eyes hungry.

“Look at me,” Jane repeated. She slid the robe off of her shoulders—she could scarcely breathe—and let it flutter down. Her skin prickled in the sudden coolness, but it wasn’t cold she felt. “I’m not a gift,” she said. “Or a prize that you’ve won. I’m a woman, and I want you because it will give me joy.”

He was looking her up and down. She knew how sheer her shift was—translucent enough that he’d be able to see the form of her body silhouetted with the fire behind it.

He licked his lips. “I had every intention of being a gentleman. Of sleeping on the floor, or…or something.”

“Is that what a gentleman would do?” Jane asked.

“Probably.”

“Then gentlemen are idiots.”

He laughed. “Jane. God. You are the bravest woman I have ever known.”

She took a step closer. “I scarcely have the wherewithal to be brave about this.” Another step, until she was close enough to set her hands on his chest.

“Do you know what to expect?”

“Only in the vaguest terms. The specifics…” She reached out and gently, very gently, took hold of his cravat. “The specifics,” she repeated, “I’m looking forward to discovering.”

“Then discover.”

She undid his cravat, winding the fabric from around his neck.

“See?” She looked up. “I didn’t know that—the look of your throat.” She leaned forward and placed a kiss in the hollow there. The points of his shirt brushed wetly against her cheeks.

“Jane. You’re killing me.”

She hadn’t understood what to do until she heard his voice—that hard rasp, so clearly indicating he was on the edge of his control. This, this was what she wanted. To kill him with every brush of her fingers, and to have him love it.