Chapter 15
The woods were thick, deep, and inconveniently quiet, which made Charlotte’s head ring even louder.
Oh look, there’s an alder, she said to herself, staring up into the trees and trying to ignore the clamor inside.
I suppose that means there must be water nearby.
Perhaps there’d be a pond to dunk her head in, or a stream where she might splash cold water on her wrists to stop her hands from shaking.
So she’d come face-to-face with a highwayman? So she’d stared down the barrel of his pistol and felt her heart spasm when it turned on Gran and Warrick? So what?
There was no need to go weepy over it.
There was also no need to hie off into the woods, especially as—oh good God, were there more robbers ready to pop out from behind the trees?
Charlotte shook her head to clear nonsensical thoughts from it.
She’d gone in the opposite direction from the highwayman, she had a pistol in her reticule, and, most important, she refused to let one incident convince her that the Kent countryside was riddled with thieves.
Deep breath, she told herself sternly. You had an adventure!
You handled yourself brilliantly! One day she’d climb under the sheets and thrill her grandchildren with the tale, adding more highwaymen and a splash of blood, presuming her grandchildren were the ghoulish type.
See? If only her hands would stop trembling, she and her future progeny would all be perfectly fine.
“Lady Charlotte!” called Warrick from behind her.
Blast.
Charlotte walked faster. What if she cried? In front of Warrick? She’d rather call the highwayman back and plonk Gran’s best tiara on his head.
“Lady Charlotte!”
Charlotte broke into a jog. Warrick’s stride was at least double the length of hers, but she was wilier and—
Two enormous hands landed on her shoulders and he spun her around. “Lady Charlotte, please don’t run off. Your grandmother—”
One look at her face and Warrick hauled her into his arms. “Christ! You’re all right. Don’t you know I’d never let anything happen to you?”
Charlotte held herself rigid, but only for a moment.
Warrick was simply too large, warm, and familiar, and she couldn’t resist crumpling against him and letting him rest his chin in the bramble of her hair.
She burrowed deeper into his chest, and that seemed to encourage him to whisper comforting nonsense at her, rumbling something male and satisfied as she pressed her cheek against his jacket and let the thump thump thump of his enormous heart roll through her.
Why was fear so cold? But it melted away to nothing against Warrick, with his hot eyes and blazing hot chest. He generated such incredible warmth, and it amplified his earthy scent until it curled in the air and filled her lungs. She became aware of the delicious stretch of muscle beneath—
Charlotte pushed herself out of his arms. “I’m much restored! Thank you!”
For an instant he looked startled, almost bereft, and Charlotte’s heart gave a queer little hop.
“Here.” He reached into his pocket. “Put this in your mouth.”
“Pardon me—”
“God’s teeth, must you argue?” Warrick drew out a candy and unwrapped the paper. “It’s only a peppermint.”
Charlotte’s hands quivered as she took it, but she schooled her face. She’d hate for Warrick to think that she remembered his peppermints, let alone that they still held meaning for her.
“You’re aware that most men keep snuff in their pockets?” she said as the taste hit her tongue. “You and Julian are both so mad for sweets, it’s no wonder you’re friends.”
But Warrick was in no mood for distractions.
“Damn it, I should have chased the highwayman off at once. You looked so calm—I had no idea you were afraid.” He studied her, and for the first time in ages, there was no thunder in his gaze. “Why did you give him your earbobs when you didn’t have to?”
Charlotte looked up at him and found it difficult to look away. It would set an ugly precedent to explain herself to Warrick, and yet his face was free of judgment for once.
“He was young and he had an army pistol—did you see? I wondered if he was back from the war. Now he has enough for a proper start, if he wants one. Still, I liked my earbobs.”
Especially as she had so little jewelry left.
“I don’t understand you,” he said.
Charlotte could almost taste his frustration.
“Better not try.”
The words were meant to be tart, but they softened as they hit the air, becoming breathy and almost yearning.
Warrick’s gaze fell to her lips and lingered, lighting little fires in-side her.
The air between them thickened and pulsed, and Charlotte wasn’t sure if he was the first to step forward or if it was she.
It’s Warrick, she warned herself. But her arms, as disobedient as the rest of her, looped around his shoulders anyway. His palm slid up her waist and slowly down again, as if he couldn’t help himself. As if his hand had waited for years to learn her shape.
She hardly noticed as she pushed up on her toes and his head lowered slowly, so slowly, giving both of them plenty of time to back away.
This kiss had built for three years, which was perhaps why Charlotte gasped when Warrick’s lips touched down, light as a damselfly, on hers.
Everything fell away—the breeze on her neck, the coolness of the forest, even the thick loam beneath her feet—leaving only this one man and the slight feathering of his breath as it met hers.
“Christ, Charlotte.” Warrick’s voice slurred, and he caught her fat bottom lip between his teeth.
She gasped and his kiss grew bolder, almost relentless, as if her mouth held secrets and he was determined to lick them from her.
When Charlotte made a small noise low in her throat and licked him back, his whole body shivered.
Warrick.
Why does it have to be Warrick?
Her mouth drifted over the wide, salty column of his neck, so strong and yet vulnerable. He pressed her against a mossy tree trunk and his fist tightened in her hair as her fingers wrapped around the lapels of his coat. With a ragged, pained breath, he—
“Christ!” Warrick stepped back, his lungs going like bellows. “Christ. Lady Charlotte, my apologies!”
Charlotte’s brain whirled drunkenly and her body swayed toward him. Even her hair seemed to quiver with longing, as if it might shoot across the sudden divide and pull him close again, tying his miraculous mouth down against hers. But her brain, thank goodness, staggered back to life.
“No need to apologize!” Her voice was high and tight, pulled taut like a string on a violin.
“I forgot myself entirely. I ought to make clear—” Warrick dropped his gaze to the ground, then raised it again to stare fixedly over her shoulder. “I’m not a suitor, of course.”
“No, of course not. Quite!”
He frowned. “I don’t want you to think—”
“Quite!” she said again, with emphasis.
Warrick gave a jerky bow and gestured in the direction of the road, and the two of them started back to the carriage in silence.
Charlotte said nothing, not even to herself.
Not even when her foolish hand dipped and fluttered, as if the silly thing couldn’t understand why he wasn’t holding it.