Unclaimed (Turner 2)

CHAPTER TWENTY

WHEN J ESSICA AWOKE, Mark was asleep beside her. In the pale light of morning, he looked in

nocent. Young. She was almost afraid to touch him, lest she break the spell that had brought a man like this to her.

It felt like Christmas morning as a child—that sense of unreal anticipation, that feeling that something good might be waiting for her, if only she hurried to meet the day. But it was only in bed that they could be together like this. For all his fine words last night, he had to know that she didn’t fit in his life. He didn’t fit in hers. He was a knight, Her Majesty’s own moralist. He was London’s proper darling. He was Sir Mark Turner—and she was still the woman who had seduced him.

Everything innocent about her was dead—almost literally. She could shut her eyes and remember the obituary her father had placed in the paper. She wasn’t Guinevere to his Lancelot. She was a courtesan. No knight, however skilled he was in the art of war, could take on the field of windmills that had taken her prisoner.

Still, she placed her hand against his chin. His skin was warm and rough with stubble. Whatever had happened that fate had brought her this man? How was she to send him away? And had he really given her five thousand pounds? What an idiotic, absurdly…romantic…gesture.

On that thought, his eyes fluttered open. He blinked twice and looked at her.

“There’s nothing to eat,” she told him gravely.

“Just as well.” He sat up, rubbing his eyes. She waited for him to come to his senses. Surely now, he must have reconsidered.

“Good morning,” he said, and he leaned over and touched his lips to hers.

For one lovely second, she could believe the promise in his kiss: that this would not fade, that she would wake up to him for a thousand mornings to come. Ten thousand mornings.

She pulled back abruptly. It had seemed safe to love him, when she’d believed him far beyond her touch. But she didn’t know what she believed any longer. She only knew that everything she held dear eventually crumbled to dust.

“I wish we’d put some thought into your clothing last night,” she mumbled. “It’s been lying on the floor all evening, and it’s probably wrinkled.”

“I hung it in front of the fire,” he offered. “After you’d gone to sleep.”

She cast him a baleful look. Really. He was too good, sometimes.

“I’m sure there’ll be some wrinkles,” he continued, “but nothing too unseemly. Can you tie my cravat?”

“Tight around your neck,” she muttered.

He shrugged away her foul mood. “Oh, stop worrying. Come. Break your fast with me.”

“I told you—”

“Not here.”

“You want to have breakfast with me, out there? You are mad.”

His eyes glittered at that last word, and she almost called it back.

But he spoke in precise tones. “I want to have an entire life with you, out there. Do keep that in mind.”

She couldn’t even imagine breakfast. She tried to envision Sir Mark entering a public house and asking for kippers and tea. Here in London, he would be besieged within minutes. One look at his wrinkled shirt and his disreputable companion, and his good name would cease to be so good. And once he’d tasted the censure of society, he’d not be so sanguine about linking himself to her.

“In any event,” he said, “I don’t intend to go out precisely. I had in mind somewhere private.”

“But the servants—”

“Will say my intended is beautiful and gracious.” He glanced up at her. “You do recall how to be gracious, do you not?”

Jessica winced and set her hands over her face. She was being uncivil and for no other reason than that Sir Mark had not yet given her up. He was anticipating marriage; she, despair.

“You’re quite right,” she finally said. “I’ll feel more myself once I’ve had something to eat.” After all, it wasn’t fair to punish him for sins he had yet to commit. “Help me dress,” she added, “and I’ll help you.”

It took Jessica too long to get ready—in part because Mark’s help was of dubious value. She had no sooner pulled on her shift than his hands fell on her hips, smoothing the fabric into place. And instead of pulling her corset tighter when she asked, he put his own arms about her, holding her tight. Kissing the back of her neck. His hands roamed the front of her body. She twisted in his grasp—she’d intended to tell him to get on with it, then—but even her foul mood couldn’t last when he held her face and kissed her as if she were some precious thing.

It felt fragile, that kiss. As if this, too, would break. As if the future could rise up and choke the life from even this mutual desire. But he pressed her against the wall, and there was nothing delicate about his want. She couldn’t envision the future, but she comprehended this now—the hard ridge of his lust against her belly, the demands of his mouth, her own lust rising, hard and fast. She brought one leg up to draw him in. “Hold me,” she explained, guiding his hands to her hips. It took a few moments for him to get the idea—a few seconds until he slid inside her once more.

Each thrust speared through her uncertainty, each kiss grounded her. His hands held her up. When she came, it shattered her anxiety, splintering dark fears away.

His orgasm followed, fierce and relentless. Jessica shut her eyes and held on to his arms, letting the fury of his pleasure sweep everything else away. When he was done, he pressed another kiss against her skin.

He was the first man who had ever cared to kiss her afterward. Maybe this would work. She opened her eyes to see him watching her.

“Mark,” she whispered.

“Yes?”

“Good morning.” And she smiled at him then.

This time, they really did manage to dress. Jessica found a threadbare cloak for Mark—one that would keep off the drizzle and simultaneously shield him from public view. And it turned out that nobody looked twice at him under his immense hat. Mark spoke to the driver outside Jessica’s hearing; the carriage jerked to life shortly after he entered. For the first ten minutes, Jessica made no sound. Their hands tangled together in slow, steady exploration.

Finally, she spoke up. “Where are we going? I should have thought we could find a private hotel not half a mile away.”

Mark ran his thumb over her fingers. “It will take longer. We’re not going to a hotel.”

“Perhaps you should have let me arrange it,” she continued. “After all, I have considerably more experience in anonymity than you.”

His fingers covered her lips. “I never said I was looking for a place where I would be anonymous. I said I was looking for one that was private.”

“There is a difference?”

The carriage jolted over a rut in the road.

“Yes. It has never been my plan to hide you away,” he told her. “You aren’t some hideous, shameful secret of mine.”

A curl of unease crept into her. Jessica shook her head. “What on earth do you have planned? Where are we going?”

There was a window in the door, but the glass did not appear to have been cleaned anytime in the past eight months. It was so smudged over that she could only make out vague impressions of shadows passing her by.

“We’re going to Mayfair.”

“Mayfair?”

Mark shot her a strangely reluctant look before he confessed. “My brother’s house.”

Jessica stood, cracking her head on the top of the carriage and biting her tongue in the process. The physical pain stung, but it only increased the abject horror that filled her. “Your brother!” Her wounded tongue didn’t seem to be working quite right. “You cannot be theriouth.”

“But I am.” He pulled her down to sit beside him once more. And then he ran his hand over her head, finding the sore spot where she’d whacked herself. He rubbed it gently, soothing away the hurt.

“Stop it.” Jessica pulled from his arms. “You’re mussing my hair. I didn’t dress to visit a duke.” Her panic was beginning to rise. “He’s going to toss me out the instant he claps eyes on me. What are you thinking, bringi

ng a courtesan to see the Duke of Parford?”

Mark simply shook his head. “You misunderstand. I’m not bringing a courtesan to visit a duke. I’m bringing my future wife to see my brother. It just so happens that he is also a duke. But Ash is… Ash is… Look, he just doesn’t care about that sort of thing. He’s not the kind of person who will toss someone out simply because she doesn’t fit some preconceived notion of his. Trust me, Ash will be delighted to be able to do something for me.”