Chapter 8 #2
Garret lowered his head. “I’m so sorry, Archer.”
“Words mean nothing. Papa’s body is at the bottom of the ocean somewhere. I can’t even visit his grave.”
“For what it’s worth, and I know it’s not worth much, I never impressed any man. I’m against it and always have been.”
“Are you saying all of the sailors on your ships were there voluntarily?”
Oh no. He hadn’t been saying that at all.
She’d be even more horrified if she realized just how many men had been forced to serve in the navy for five years, seven years, or even longer.
Most were dead within the first couple of years.
Some captains were notoriously cruel, and the impressed men bore the brunt of their anger.
“No. I would have freed them if I could, but the truth is, Archer, I couldn’t even free myself.
” Some nights he awoke in a sweat, gasping for breath, and he wondered if he wasn’t still trapped in an airless berthing deck, all these years later.
“I’d like to take you home, but if you’d rather walk, I understand. ”
He walked the rest of the way to the curricle.
The rain had stopped now, and the sun was making brief appearances from behind the clouds.
He started to untie the reins, and as he struggled with the wet leather, a hand covered his.
Tamsin stood beside him. “That’s my job, guv,” she said in that ludicrous Cockney accent.
That was Garret’s cue to say something amusing and untie the reins anyway.
Instead, he turned his hand and closed it over hers.
They were both wearing gloves, so he couldn’t feel her skin, but he could imagine the feel of her.
She shivered, and he felt the tremor pass through him.
Slowly, he circled her waist with his free hand and pulled her against him.
Her hand went to his chest, grasping hold of his coat collar and yanking it so his head bent to hers.
“I don’t want to kiss you.” Her voice was little more than a murmur. “But I need to.”
He nodded, understanding completely. He needed to touch her more than he’d ever needed anything in his entire life. “It’s a really bad idea,” he said, his voice low.
“Because I’m dressed like your groom?”
“Because if I kiss you now, I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop.”
“I won’t want you to,” she whispered and closed the space between them.
Her hand went to his neck, and her lips claimed his in a kiss he should have expected but found himself wholly unprepared for.
She was no meek lady he kissed in an alcove at a ball.
This was a woman who knew what she wanted and wasn’t afraid to take it.
Her mouth claimed his, hot and needy and intoxicating.
He made a sound in his throat, indicating he wanted more, and she plastered herself against him and gave more.
Her way of kissing was not skilled, but he appreciated the lack of artifice.
He could feel how much she wanted him, and there was nothing so arousing as being desired.
He pushed her against the tree, slanting his mouth over hers.
He was vaguely aware they were on a public lane, and now that the rain had ceased, anyone might walk or drive past them.
Somehow none of that mattered. He couldn’t think of anything but kissing her, holding her.
“What are you doing to me?” he murmured as he dragged his mouth down to kiss her jawline.
Damn this livery she wore. He couldn’t kiss her neck for the collar of the coat.
He settled for licking her earlobe and was rewarded with a low moan. So she liked that. He did it again.
“What are you doing to me?” Her voice was husky, and she turned and took his mouth again.
He pressed his hands on either side of her head and kissed her back.
Finally, he felt her hands on his chest, pushing him away.
As he withdrew, she caught his lower lip between her teeth before releasing him.
“You’d better take me back to the pawnshop. ”
“I’d rather take you to bed.”
“I’m sure you would, but I’m going home.”
He drew a breath and tried to force his mind to think about anything other than stripping the livery off her, laying her down on a bed, and exploring every inch of her body.
She pushed past him, and he rested his head on the tree trunk.
He’d lost his hat at some point during their…
exchange. The wet bark felt cool against his burning flesh.
Finally, he finished untying the horses’ reins and moved back to the curricle.
Archer had already donned her hat again and was sitting on the platform behind the driver’s seat.
He hadn’t thought twice about putting her there earlier, but now he was keenly aware of the power difference between them and how he’d added to it by putting her in servant’s livery and behind him on the coach.
He wanted to ask her to sit beside him, but not only would that draw attention, he knew she’d refuse.
Garret called to the horses, who began to walk again.
As he turned the curricle back in the direction of Covent Garden, he wondered if Tamsin knew what he didn’t want to admit even to himself—despite all his efforts to avoid it, he was completely under her control.
He’d do anything for her, was doing anything and everything for her.
She hadn’t asked him for anything, and somehow that only made him more eager to give her everything.
· · ·
Kildare insisted on stopping at a street market and buying Tamsin piping hot rolls, apples, various vegetables, and half a dozen meat pies.
Then he bought her a basket to put it all in.
Nothing she said seemed to dissuade him, so she took the bounty and carried it into the pawnshop as Kildare drove away.
No one was in the back of the shop, and she set the basket on the table and leaned against the door, catching her breath.
Her heart had been racing since she’d pulled him close and kissed him.
She’d been wanting to be close to him for so long that she still couldn’t quite believe it had finally happened.
Her hands slid over her hips and settled on her waist, tracing the path his hands had taken on her body.
She didn’t have to try very hard to remember the feel of his fingers pressing into her skin, even through the layers of fabric she wore.
And that kiss. The first time they’d kissed, he’d been taken by surprise and simply stood there.
Today he’d seemed to want the kiss as much as she.
He’d kissed her back, his lips soft and full and intoxicating.
And when he’d pushed her against the tree and pressed his hard body against her softer one, she had just about ignited into flames.
She’d desperately wanted to agree to his plan to go somewhere where they could tear each other’s clothes off and tear into each other.
But she hadn’t lived this long without learning a few tricks of survival.
First of all, she did not want to fall pregnant.
She could barely take care of herself. She could not care for a baby.
Second of all, no matter how much Kildare seemed to want her now, that feeling would pass.
Then he would remember that he was the son of a lord, and she was no one.
That would be the end of things. She suspected that right now he found the search for Charlie and Joanna a welcome distraction from his usual pursuits or obligations.
Eventually, he would go back to his life, and if she thought for one moment that he would include her in that life, she was the biggest fool in London.
She’d sat outside his family’s town house, peering through openings in the curtains long enough to see that his world was one where she didn’t belong and never could belong.
He’d have to give it up to be with her, and who would voluntarily give up the love and affection she’d seen through those slivers of light shining in the darkness where she sat?
“Tamsin?”
She started at her mother’s voice and pushed away from the outer door just as her mother entered from the shop. “Mama, I brought dinner.”
But her mother’s eyes had gone wide. “What happened? You are soaking wet! You’ll catch your death.”
Tamsin had completely forgotten that she’d been out in the downpour. She looked down and noted her soggy, wrinkled livery.
“I knew you shouldn’t have gone out with that man!” her mother said, beginning to strip off Tamsin’s livery. “Move closer to the fire. I’ll put in more coal.”
“Big John won’t like that.”
“Then he can tell us to leave. At least you’ll be warm.”
“To be fair, Kildare can’t control the weather, and he did stop and allow me under the hood with him when the rain started in earnest.”
Her mother’s sharp glance told Tamsin that Mary Archer missed nothing. “Now I know why this livery is so wrinkled.”
“Mama, nothing happened.”
“Nothing?”
“I kissed him. Nothing more than that.”
Her mother blew out a breath and handed Tamsin a shift as she shook out the livery. “Tamsin, I warned you where this would go.”
“And I don’t need you to warn me. I know there’s no future with him. I know I’m just a distraction to him.” She dropped the shift over her head.
“But you want him anyway.”
Tamsin allowed her shoulders to rise and fall as the warmth from the stove seeped into her chilled skin.
“I want him anyway,” she admitted. Even though he was too good for her.
Even though he’d once been a sailor, and she hated the navy to the very core of her being.
But she hadn’t been able to stop herself from going to him when his voice had begun to waver at the memory of his time in the navy.
“That doesn’t mean I intend to do anything about it,” she told her mother.
“Right now he’s interested enough to help me find Joanna and Charlie.
Maybe we’ll find them before that interest fades. ”