Page 32 of The Smuggler & the Society Bride

If during the kiss, he forgot himself and became overzealous, she was perfectly capable of slapping a sense of propriety back in him.

And if she didn’t…

The reasons he’d previously enumerated against taking her here and now were growing dimmer by the second.

Suddenly he realized, as his eyes traced lovingly down the line of forehead, nose, lips, that he’d unknowingly leaned so close that his face was mere inches from hers. He continued to watch her, mesmerized by the play of light and shadow over her lips.

Sunlight gave their perfect rounded surface a sheen like the satin of a lady’s gown, while when the sun retreated behind a cloud, the appearance changed to a velvet plush.

Which texture would their touch more resemble?

He felt the warmth of her breath on his cheek and realized he’d placed a hand on her shoulder.

Her eyes opened in a flare of surprise, then comprehension—before she leaned up to receive his kiss.

As his mouth touched hers, cider and sweetness and warmth exploded upon his senses, sending a stab of desire straight to his loins. Groaning, he deepened the kiss, his hand clutching her shoulder while he wrapped an arm around to bind her closer, intoxicated by the feel and taste of her, wanting more.

Suddenly, she was pushing violently against his chest. It must have taken a few seconds for that reality to penetrate the rampaging lust dulling his brain, for when he finally realized her invitation had changed to resistance and he let her go, she leapt away from him as if scalded.

She landed on the sand and stumbled a few steps backward, hands to her lips, trembling all over.

The sight of her retreating from him dispelled the warm sensual haze like a slap of cold seawater. After promising himself he’d make no attempt at seduction, had his impetuous action made her fear he intended to force himself on her? The idea filled him with horror.

Before he could order his incoherent thoughts enough to apologize, she burst out, ‘Sorry! I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to tease! But when you pulled me close, it brought back memories. D-disturbing memories.’

Her eyes focused on the distant horizon and a tremor went through her. Shaking her head, she laughed a bit hysterically. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she said again. ‘You must think me a complete bedlamite.’

‘Not at all,’ he assured her, concern and regret pulsing through him. ‘’Tis I who am sorry. Never would I wish to frighten or repulse you!’

Her attempt at a smile didn’t convince him, given the distress that still clouded her eyes. ‘You didn’t. Indeed, it is my fault entirely. I wanted you to kiss me! I’ve been wanting you to kiss me practically since the afternoon we met. And when you did, at first I was ecstatic, but then…I never expected…oh, forg-give me!’ Her voice breaking, she turned and walked away from him.

While she gave her garbled explanation, Gabe’s mind, finally cleared of the last foggy bits of lust, had been racing faster than the Gull in a fresh breeze with her topsails set. All that he knew of Miss Foxe—her beauty, her innocent yet knowing allure, his suspicions about the reasons behind her sudden arrival at such an odd time of year in such a remote place, coalesced in one dismaying conclusion.

In two paces he reached her, halted her with a gentle touch to the shoulder. He swore under his breath as she flinched before turning back to face him.

‘Did he hurt you?’ he demanded, the anger flaming up from deep within him making his voice rough. His rage intensified as shock, then shame, filled her eyes, telling him he’d guessed right.

For a long time she didn’t answer, merely stared at him as if unable to break away from the fierceness of his gaze.

Then, after swallowing hard, she said, ‘N-no. Not really.’ From the moisture welling at the corners of her eyes, a single tear spilled down her cheek.

This time he couldn’t restrain an oath. ‘Damn the man!’ he cried. ‘I’d kill him for you if I could.’

She uttered a shaky laugh. ‘That’s very chivalrous of you, but as the damage done is irrevocable, it doesn’t really matter any more.’

‘If remembering him makes you recoil at my touch, it matters to me,’ Gabe answered hotly.

She gave him a short nod, as if in thanks. ‘Sometimes I think about killing him myself,’ she said in conversational tones, strolling back from the waves toward the lichen-covered crags beyond.

She paused to pick up a driftwood stick; he trailed behind her. ‘Some moonless night,’ she continued, ‘out the dark of some dim alley, I’d strike—’ she brought the wood up like a sword and jabbed it against the rock ‘—like this. And this and this and this!’

Her voice rose as she jabbed the stick at the unoffending rock again and again, until the soft wood splintered into fragments. Letting go of the shattered hilt, she put her head in her hands, dropped to her knees in the sand and began to weep.

His first, masculine instinct was to retreat and give her time to compose herself. But the sheer anguish in her sobs stopped him in his tracks before he could flee.

Fury engulfed him at the thought that, indifferent to the consequences, some bored or unprincipled or careless rogue had lured her to some secluded place and forcibly seduced her, frightening and wounding that proud, fierce spirit, sending her into shame and exile. As deep and intense as his anger, but more unexpected, came an overwhelming need to offer comfort.

Halfway expecting her to strike at him, gently he gathered her in his arms. To his gratification, though, instead of resisting, she clung to him.

The warmth and scent of her plastered against his body was like the beginning of his favourite daydream, the one that concluded with him removing her garments one by one and gradually acquainting himself with her lips and limbs and breasts. He was rather proud that, except for the inevitable male response to the so-long-anticipated feel of her pressed against him, desire to console continued to triumph over desire of a more carnal sort.

To take advantage of her distress, regardless of whether or not his caresses ultimately gave her pleasure, would be an unforgivable violation, placing him on a level with the reprobate who’d trifled with her. Though while she was still too lost in weeping to notice, he couldn’t restrain himself from stroking the silk of her hair and kissing the top of her head.

He wanted her no less than before. Indeed, after clasping the soft curved length of her against him, he wanted her all the more. But if he was to feel the touch of her lips or the intimate embrace of her body, he wanted that to be a choice she made joyfully, while in full possession of her usual high-spirited confidence. Not numbly allowing him to offer mindless comfort in the midst of despair.

So, when her wracking sobs eased to shudders and then ceased altogether, regretful but resigned, he let her go.

She rose on wobbly legs and walked away. He watched her, speculating that having admitted her shame and then lost her composure, she’d be embarrassed, his fierce lady. He’d probably need to reassure her that he thought no less of her for what she had revealed.

That speculation was confirmed when she turned back to him, shamefaced. ‘I beg you will excuse me. I suppose females always protest after such a display, but truly I don’t normally weep.’

He thought of her flinging herself into sea, launching off to attack a lecherous drunk. ‘I know you don’t. I feel…privileged that you allowed me to witness how deeply you’ve been wounded.’

‘I expect, after having wetted your cravat and waistcoat, I ought to explain the whole. It will be…liberating to confess it at last, I suppose.’

‘If you want to tell me, I would be honoured to hear it.’

After a sigh so forlorn it made his heart ache, she gestured for him to return to the rock bench they’d shared. Seating herself beside him, she began, ‘I left London so precipitously, as I’m sure you’ve guessed by now, because of a scandal. ’Tis a long, involved story, but I’d quarrelled with my fiancé and, still angry with him, told my elder brother that I intended to show Anthony that if he didn’t care about pleasing me, other men did. But to my disgruntlement, he wasn’t present at the ball we were both to attend that night to watch jealously while I flirted with my other admirers.’

Gabe felt both a niggling sympathy for the erstwhile fiancé—and a ferocious jealousy.

‘Later that night, one of the footman gave me a verbal message, saying Anthony wished to meet me in the hostess’s garden. Confident that he wanted to apologize, I hurried out to meet him. But it wasn’t Anthony I found waiting for me.’

Her lips twisted in a grimace of revulsion. ‘At the far end of a pathway as shadowy and isolated as one of Vauxhall’s Dark Walks stood one of the worst reprobates of the Ton. Thinking I’d stumbled on an assignation, I backed away, but before I could regain the path, he grabbed me.’

She shuddered again. ‘In what seemed like an instant, he’d bound my hands in a noose of silken rope, declaring he was delighted that I’d decided to indulge in a little illicit play before committing myself to my dull fiancé. When I protested I had no idea what he was talking about and struggled to free myself, he…he said if I liked it rough, he would be pleased to comply.’

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