Wicked in Your Arms (Forgotten Princesses #1)(47)

Sev faced Malcolm, pasting a mild smile on his face that reflected none of his inner turmoil. “Have you?”

“Seems the party is coming to an end. The duchess is eager to get back to Town and start spreading the word of Lady Libbie’s sudden departure.”

Sev rolled his eyes. “Of course. That would be of the most import.”

Malcolm chuckled at his sarcasm, then sobered with the sudden realization that Sev had just lost his primary target for a bride. “Oh dear. This does put us back to the beginning of our bride hunt, does it not?”

Sev had realized this instantly, from the moment the earl questioned him early this morning. For some reason the realization did not trouble him. Not as it should have.

He’d wasted a week pursuing the earl’s daughter. Another reason he needed to satisfy this itch with Miss Hadley. Maybe then he could move on—forget Grier and remember what it was he came to England to do.

“Appears everyone is departing tomorrow.”

His cousin’s words sent a bolt of panic through him. “That soon?” he asked, his voice sharper than he intended.

Tomorrow they would all depart.

Tomorrow he would not have Grier beneath his roof and in such ready access anymore.

“Sev?” Malcolm’s reddish eyebrows furrowed. “Something amiss?”

“No.” He shook his head. “ ’Tis our last night in this fine country air. I shall miss it when we return to Town,” he lied.

He slapped the smaller man on the back as resolve swelled through him. “Let’s make our last evening count.”

Every moment of it.

Grier dragged the brush through her hair until her scalp stung from each crackling pull. Most of the dowager’s houseguests had retired early, just after dinner. With a long day of travel ahead of them—several long days, to be precise—they all needed their rest.

Sliding beneath the counterpane, she pulled the heavy covers up to her chin, settling herself deep in the center of the four-poster bed. With a sigh, she turned and punched the pillow beneath her head. She didn’t want to leave the dowager’s estate, and she knew it had nothing to do with her aversion to Town life.

It had everything to do with him.

Her stomach knotted with the realization that she would never be in such close proximity with the prince again. No more sparring words. No more heated glances.

No more stolen kisses.

She sucked in a breath and told herself this was a good thing. Especially considering the relatively new realization that she liked him. Indeed, she was still grappling with that fact. He was more than a handsome face. His aloof veneer was just that. A shield, and behind it breathed a just and magnanimous man with a wicked sense of humor and even more wicked kisses.

Grier stared blindly into the dark, straight and rigid as a slat of wood, her fingers laced tightly over her stomach as her mind mulled through all this.

She hadn’t seen him all day. He’d been absent during dinner, a fact that both relieved and disappointed her.

Lowering her hand, she brushed the swell of her stomach. The linen of her nightgown felt soft against her palm. She thought of them together in his bedchamber, in the stables . . . the sinful way their mouths had devoured each other. What would it be like to succumb? To lie with him?

Misery filled her to consider she would never see him again after tomorrow. She would go about hunting for a husband and he would go about searching for his bride. An ache of longing filled her chest that she could not suppress—could not deny.

I’ll miss him.

The thought entered her head before she could block it out, and then a question swiftly followed that was equally inappropriate.

Why could he not choose to marry me?

A warmth suffused her at the very idea, at the nights they would have, the leisure they could take to devote to each other. Frowning, she quickly tried to suppress the warmth with a cold dose of reality. He was a prince. Nothing would change that. Typically she was no one who should even cross paths with him. She would not permit herself to fall in love with him. She would not lose such power over herself.

The curtains shifted at her balcony, fluttering with a whisper in the wind. The barest creak sounded as the door swung inward.

She bolted straight up in bed with a gasp, her eyes searching the gloom, widening as a large shape materialized. Her heart hammered wildly. She knew instantly.

He had come.

That he had been so bold as to vault the several balconies to reach her room made her almost giddy.

“Sev?” Her voice fell in a whispery hush on the air as her eyes strained for a better glimpse of his face.

Silence. She shoved back the covers and swung her feet over the side of the bed. Her bare feet dropped down silently. She moved toward the robe she’d draped over her footboard, her gaze straining through the gloom, searching for his shape.

A hard hand shot out and gripped her wrist. “Leave it off. One less item we’ll have to remove.”

A secret thrill shivered over her skin at his decadent words. There was no mistaking his meaning or what he’d come here to do.

Grier opened her mouth to deliver a ringing set-down, to say what she should say, but the words never made it past her lips. His mouth crushed hers and her protest died in her throat.

And really, she was done running. She tangled her hands in his hair, pulling his head closer, deepening their kiss and parrying her tongue with his. He backed her up until she collided with the bed.