Regency High Society Vol 2: Sparhawk's Lady / The Earl's Intended Wife / Lord Calthorpe's Promise / The Society Catch. Miranda Jarrett

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СКАЧАТЬ lord because his wife had asked him. For Davy, yes. He’d do anything for a friend like him.

      But not for a woman. And never for love.

      “I can say it because it’s true!” she cried, her words shaking with emotion. “Whatever you do, you do for yourself, because you’re the blessed American Captain Jeremiah Sparhawk!”

      “Damnation, Caro, I’m doing this now because I love you!” His mouth crushed down on hers, stopping her words as he kissed her long and hard and deep. He felt the instant when her struggles subtly changed, when she stopped struggling to free herself and instead clung to him, when her anger, too, was channeled into the same desire he felt racing through his body. He let her hand go and she curled it around the back of his neck, her fingers tangling in his hair as she drew him closer.

      He pushed her back the last few inches against the bulkhead, lifting her higher until her hips were level with his. He held her there with the pressure of his body, suspended, her toes grazing the floor as she steadied herself with her hands on his shoulders. The lacing of her bodice snapped through the eyelets as he hooked his fingers in the bow, tugging the neckline lower over her breasts.

      She gasped as his open lips found her nipple, drawing it deeply into his mouth and suckling hard. Even through her petticoats she could feel the heat of his arousal, and instinctively she rocked her hips against his, her back arching against the rough timber of the bulkhead and thrusting her breast more deeply into his mouth. As much as he gave her, she desperately craved more, more that only he could offer.

      His hand plunged beneath her petticoats, following the sleek length of her thigh above her garters to her bare hip, and she whimpered as she moved against him. Rapidly he unfastened the fall on his trousers, freeing himself as he swept away the last barrier of her skirts and shifted her long legs around his waist.

      She was open and ready for him, her need shameless, and when he guided himself into her aching flesh, she raggedly cried out his name. With her legs crossed over his back she drew him in deeper, intoxicated with the way he filled her as he drove into her so powerfully that he lifted her against the wall.

      She didn’t care; she didn’t care about anything except the feverish, spiraling ecstasy that was coiling in her body, making her limbs shake and her heart pound, her breath hot in his ear. Passion swept them both beyond sense, beyond reason, until at last their self-made world of pleasure exploded, and with a final sob of release she melted in his arms.

      They stayed there joined together as their heartbeats slowed and their breathing grew more regular, her eyes closed and her cheek resting against his shoulder, his face buried in the damp silk of her hair, relishing the languid, animal fragrance of her satisfaction.

      Finally, slowly, he lowered her to the deck, but even as her skirts dropped between them he still could not bring himself to let her go, touching her gently, caressing her, kissing her eyelids and the little dimples that framed her smile.

      “You are so precious to me, love,” he murmured. “Can you wonder that I’d want to keep you safe?”

      She smoothed his dark hair back from his forehead. “But not if it means being apart from you. As soon as you’d said goodbye, Jeremiah, I thought I’d go mad from missing you.”

      “Ah, sweetheart,” he said sorrowfully. “Did you think it was any easier for me?”

      “Then you will understand.” She reached up to brush her lips across his. “I followed you because, inside, I had no choice. I loved you too much for that goodbye.”

      He sighed wearily. “I’d still send you back if I could.”

      “But you can’t.”

      “No.” With one finger he traced the bow of her lips, thinking how she was at once both impossibly fragile and strong as steel. “You must promise me that you will do what I tell you.”

      She opened her mouth to protest, and he laid his finger across it. “Hush, and hear me out. You must do as I say because to stop and argue with me may cost both of us our lives. This isn’t England, or even Naples.”

      “I could help you,” she offered eagerly. “The way we fooled the captain of the French frigate.”

      “Don’t even consider it, sweetheart,” he said firmly, though touched by both her offer and the innocence behind it. “I admit that I’ll be inventing this as I go along, but I won’t expect you to exercise your charms on my behalf. In Tripoli, it plain won’t work. You’ll be a heathen, an infidel. Nor will anyone give a damn about you being a countess, except, perhaps, if they stop and consider how much of a ransom they could ask for you.”

      “I’m not sure there’s enough money in Frederick’s coffers to redeem us both,” she said, striving to be playful and failing. With a troubled sigh, she searched Jeremiah’s face as her own expression became uncharacteristically serious. “Tell me truthfully,” she asked. “Do you still mean to find Hamil?”

      “I must, love,” he said softly, cradling her face in his hands. That much of the truth he could tell her. The rest, that which frightened him most, wasn’t death itself at Hamil’s hands, but that he would meet Hamil and be too much the coward to do what he must. “If I don’t, I’ll never be the man you deserve.”

      She nodded, knowing how futile arguing would be, and told herself that it was the smoke from the little lantern that was making her eyes sting.

      “And what will you do when we find Frederick?”

      Silently she thanked him for that when, not if. Already she did not deserve a man this fine, this noble. “I don’t know,” she said, her words barely audible. “I must see him first, and decide then.”

      “I will not let you go, Caro,” he said with quiet determination. “No matter what, I will not give you up.”

      But before she could answer, he suddenly pulled away, every muscle tensed. “Something’s wrong.”

      She shook her head, bewildered. “Wrong?”

      “We’ve hauled aback. Stopped. Can’t you feel the difference?” He was shoving his shirt into his trousers, his head cocked toward the louvered cabin door as he strained to listen. “I can’t think of a single good reason for Tomaso to order it, but there must be a dozen bad ones.”

      Matching his haste, Caro laced her bodice and tugged her shift back into place. “Whyever would he stop now? We must be in the middle of the Mediterranean, quite in the middle of nowhere!”

      “Doesn’t sound good, does it?” He checked the powder in the pistols, hesitated a moment, thinking, then held one out to Caro. “Do you know how to use this?”

      She stared dubiously at the offered gun and shook her head. “Frederick wouldn’t countenance firearms at Blackstone. He wouldn’t even allow hunting the deer from the park when they came and ate my roses.”

      “We’re not talking about deer, love.” He put the butt of the pistol in her hand and arranged her fingers over the catch and hammer. “First pull back this, then this, and don’t be flustered by the smoke. Aim along the barrel as best you can, and don’t be fancy. Just aim for the broadest part of a man—usually his belly—and you’ll bring him down.”

      She nodded, determined to prove that she wouldn’t be a СКАЧАТЬ