Too Wicked to Tame (The Derrings #2)(51)

With stiff movements, she marched back to the lambskin rug.

“Portia,” he began, his hand falling on her arm. “I’ll sleep—”

“Unhand me,” she snarled, wrenching free. “I’ll sleep on the rug. You take the bed. No need to make a pretense of good manners now. Your true colors have been revealed. You’re no gentleman.” Clutching the blanket about her as if it were a shield, she looked him over as if he were some bug lying very small and insignificant at her feet. Holding herself stiff with dignity, she tossed down, “You’re nothing. Nothing at all.”

She whirled around, choking down the sob rising from her chest, desperate that he not suspect how that single lie shattered her. Sinking onto the soft pelt, she wished her words were true, wished it didn’t matter what he thought.





Chapter 19


Heath surged upright in bed, blinking against cold blackness. He gazed blindly into the dark, still caught within the tight fist of a nightmare that never fully left him—even when awake. The dream had burrowed itself into his soul with relentless tenacity, surfacing off and on throughout his life, reminding him that he was never in full possession of himself.

Absurd as it was, when the nightmare beset him, he turned into the boy he had been—the impulse to call out for his mother burning on his tongue. Ironic considering she had never responded to his calls when he’d been a boy.

From the moment of his brother’s birth, the curse already had him in its terrible hold. Everyone knew William’s fate—the fate of another Moreton lost to madness. It broke his mother, thrusting her into some dark place from which she never returned.

He dragged a shaking hand through his hair. His heart lodged somewhere in his throat. He fought to swallow it back down. Nothing save the occasional crumble of burnt wood in the hearth could be heard. A faint light glowed there, not enough to suffuse the room, but enough to remind him instantly of where he was. The lodge. His refuge of late when he craved escape. Except his refuge had now become the site of his torment.

He released a shuddering breath, unaware until that moment that he had been holding it deep in his lungs. Almost as if he feared the nightmare real and not a thing of the past. As if he had awakened, twelve years old again, the tormented screams of his baby brother engulfing him and his own fragile sanity. Every keening wail a knife thrust into his heart, driving Heath closer and closer to a madness that lurked like a beast in the dark, waiting to strike and drag him into the abyss.

He rose, dropping his feet on the cold, bare wood floor. Taking care not to glance at the figure asleep on the large rug, he made his way to the hearth. Stubborn female. He would have given her the bed.

Giving the rug a wide berth, he knelt and added some logs to the fire, then stoked it until it crackled and emitted a steady glow of light throughout the room. His downfall—for when he turned around, his gaze sought her, feasting on the sight of her like a man starved.

His feet moved, advancing on her where she slept, curled on her side like an innocent babe asleep. Yet she was no innocent. He could no longer believe her blameless, that she had fallen in so unwittingly with all his grandmother’s schemes. That her sole purpose in remaining at Moreton Hall could possibly be to escape the Season. What a fool he’d been to ever consider it.



He hovered over her sleeping form, hands flexing at his sides. Tension thrummed through his muscles. Anger coursed his blood—anger at himself for being drawn to her despite all he knew her to be.

He didn’t know which urge the strongest: to pull her in his arms or shake her until her teeth rattled in that stubborn head of hers. She thought him nothing? Damned if that didn’t wound him to the core, didn’t leave him staring at the rafters long after her breathing had grown slow and even in sleep. And what was she, the one that had duped him with her pretty denials. He had even begun to feel empathy for her.

She shifted, rolling onto her back, her hair a dark puddle around her. Her shoulders gleamed like pale marble above the blanket’s edge. His mouth went dry at the sight. Only a thin barrier of fabric hid her nudity from his eyes. A few feet separated him from the unhindered sight of her, from total access to the body that had haunted his dreams for nights. And his mind for days.

A soft sound escaped her lips, and her eyes fluttered open. She stared up at him though unfocused eyes. A soft, dreamy smile curved her lips. Then she blinked. The smile vanished, right along with the dreamy look. With a startled cry, she lurched up, forgetting the blanket, forgetting her nudity.

His breath escaped in a hiss as he devoured the sight of her small, pert breasts, the dusky nipples, the gentle slope of her belly. It was too much. The sight undid him, made his legs weaken and buckle beneath him.

He dropped to his knees before her, greedily drinking in the sight of her.

She followed his gaze to her breasts, gasped and made a grab for the blanket pooled around her waist.

A growl sounded from deep within his chest and something hot and primal erupted low in his gut. Without thinking, he tore the blanket from her and tossed it aside, forcing her to lay before him in all her naked glory.

She made a small sound of distress and tried to cover herself with her hands, but he seized her wrists, his fingers flexing around the delicate bones. Bones so fragile the barest pressure would snap them.

His gaze ran the full length of her body, roaming over the sleek lines and gentle curves. She tucked her knees in an attempt to cover her most secret part and the move, so basic, so womanly, enflamed his desire to have her, to give up the fight and fall—to descend into the very depths of the abyss he had spent a lifetime fighting.