A Night Like This (Smythe-Smith Quartet #2)(84)

“What were you thinking?” he persisted when she did not immediately reply.
She considered how to answer this. She certainly could not tell him that she had been pondering his impotence, so instead she said, “The scar is not as dreadful as I think you think it is.”
He snorted and turned back to whatever it was he was doing. “You’re just saying that to get on my good side.”
“I would say it to get on your good side,” she admitted, craning her neck to get a better look at his activities. He seemed to be rearranging everything again, which seemed rather pointless, as there wasn’t much in the hired room to rearrange. “But as it happens,” Anne continued, “I think it’s the truth. You’re not as pretty as you were when we were young, but a man doesn’t want to be pretty, does he?”
“Perhaps not, but I don’t know a soul who’d want this.” George made a grand, sarcastic gesture to his face, his hand sweeping down from ear to chin.
“I am sorry I hurt you, you know,” Anne said, and to her great surprise, she realized she meant it. “I’m not sorry I defended myself, but I am sorry you were injured in the process. If you’d just let me go when I asked, none of this would have happened.”
“Oh, so now it’s my fault?”
She shut her mouth. She shouldn’t have said the last bit, and she was not going to compound her error by saying what she wanted to say, which was, Well, yes.
He waited for a response, and when he didn’t get one, he muttered, “We’re going to have to move this.”
Oh dear God, he did want to move the bed.
But it was a huge, heavy piece of furniture, not something he could move on his own. After a minute or so of shoving and grunting and a good deal of cursing, he turned to Anne and snapped, “Help, for God’s sake.”
Her lips parted in disbelief. “My hands are tied,” she reminded him.
George cursed again, then strode over and yanked her to her feet. “You don’t need your hands. Just wedge yourself against it and push.”
Anne could do nothing but stare.
“Like this,” he bit off, leaning his bottom against the side of the bed. He planted his feet on the threadbare rug, then used his body weight to shove against it. The big bed lurched forward, about an inch.
“You really think I’m going to do that?”
“I think that I still have the knife.”
Anne rolled her eyes and walked over. “I really don’t think this will work,” she told him over her shoulder. “For one thing, my hands are in the way.”
He looked down to where her hands were bound, still behind her back. “Oh, bloody hell,” he muttered. “Get over here.”
She was over there, but Anne thought it best to hold that quip in.
“Don’t try anything,” he warned her, and with a tug, she felt him slice through her bindings, nicking the base of her thumb in the process.
“Ow!” she yelped, bringing her hand to her mouth.
“Oh, that hurts, does it?” George murmured, his eyes taking on a glaze of bloodlust.
“Not any longer,” she said quickly. “Shall we move the bed?”
He chuckled to himself and took up position. Then, just as Anne was preparing to pretend to be trying with all her might to push the bed against the door, George suddenly straightened.
“Should I cut you first?” he wondered aloud. “Or have a spot of fun?”
Anne glanced at the front of his breeches. She couldn’t help herself. Was he impotent? She didn’t see any evidence of an erection.
“Oh, so that’s what you want to do,” he crowed. He grabbed her hand and pulled it to him, forcing her to feel him through the fabric. “Some things never change.”
Anne tried not to gag as he rubbed her left hand roughly over his crotch. Even with his clothes on, it was making her sick, but it was far better than having her face cut open.
George began to groan with pleasure, and then, to Anne’s horror, she felt something begin to . . . happen.
“Oh, God,” George moaned. “Oh, that feels good. It’s been so long. So bloody long . . .”
Anne held her breath as she watched him. His eyes were closed, and he looked almost trancelike. She looked down at his hand—the one holding the knife. Was it her imagination, or was he not holding it so tightly? If she grabbed it . . . Could she grab it?
Anne grit her teeth. She let her fingers wiggle a bit, and then, just as George let out a deeper, longer groan of pleasure, she made her move.

Chapter Twenty-two


“That’s it!” Frances shrieked. Her thin arm jutted forth wildly. “That’s the carriage. I’m sure of it.”
Daniel twisted his body around to follow Frances’s direction. Sure enough, a small yet well-made carriage was parked near the inn. It was standard black, with a gold decorative bar around the top. Daniel had never seen anything quite like it before, but he could see exactly why Frances had said it reminded her of a unicorn’s horn. If one chopped off the correct length of it and sharpened the end, it would make a marvelous addition to a costume.
“We will remain in the carriage,” Lady Winstead reaffirmed just as Daniel was turning to the ladies to issue instructions.
Daniel gave her a nod, and the three men hopped down. “You will guard this carriage with your lives,” he said to the outriders, and then he swiftly entered the inn.
Marcus was right behind him, and Hugh caught up by the time Daniel had finished questioning the innkeeper. Yes, he had seen a man with a scar. He’d had a room here for a week, but he didn’t use it every night. He’d come to the desk for his key just a quarter of an hour earlier, but there was no woman with him.