“Don’t do this,” he warned. “If you push me right now, I’ll do something brash. Something you’d only regret.”
She stepped forward. “If you leave these stables without me, I will follow you. On foot. In the rain. Without a cloak. I’ll walk all the way to Southwark, if that’s what it takes.” She blinked away a raindrop caught in her lashes. “So if you’re concerned for my health and well-being, Rafe Brandon, you had better—”
Rafe never heard the rest of her impassioned threat. He put his hands on her waist and lifted her onto his gelding.
Then he mounted behind her, circling one arm about her middle and bracketing her hips with his thighs.
As he nudged the horse into a canter, he pulled her roughly to him. Holding her not like a lover, but like a captive. She’d asked for this. Tonight, she was in his keeping, for all the best and worst of what that could mean to them both.
And she was right on one score.
There could be no going back.
Clio was soaked to the skin and shivering in the dark. She had no idea where she was, or where Rafe might be taking her.
And she’d never been happier in her life.
Never mind the cold and the darkness. His body was warm. And her heart had enough joy inside it to blaze like a lantern. She could stay forever like this—tucked against his broad, strong chest and blanketed by his coat as the horse faithfully trudged through the rain and mud.
They stopped at the first inn they came across. Rafe ushered her inside, presenting some tale to the innkeeper about newlyweds and a broken carriage axle.
Clio tried not to make too much of the fact that he’d introduced her as his wife. He was only being protective, no doubt. Trying to deflect suspicion from the appearance of a man and woman traveling alone.
Still . . . When he uttered the phrase, “a room for my wife,” she leapt at the chance to nestle close to his side.
Once they’d been shown upstairs, he gave orders to the serving girls.
Well, not only to the serving girls.
“Stay on that side of the room,” he directed Clio. “I’m only here until you’re settled. Then I’ll go down for the night.”
“That’ll be a blow to your pride, I fear. We’re supposed to be newlyweds. They won’t think the honeymoon’s going well.”
He shrugged. “I’ll tell them you’re timid due to my prodigious size.”
She smiled, hugging herself to keep her teeth from chattering. Now that he’d released her, she was so cold. “About earlier. Rafe, I just want to say thank you. That was brilliant. All of it.”
“It was stupid. And loutish and impulsive.” He pushed his hands through his hair and blew out his breath. “I shouldn’t have brought you here. I shouldn’t have hit him.”
“I’m glad to be here. And I loved that you hit him. That was the best part.”
“He’s your brother-in-law.”
“Yes. But he’s insufferable.”
He rubbed a hand over his mouth. “I could have hit him harder. I wanted to hit him harder.”
“I know.”
“Bloody hell. I could have killed him.”
The back of her neck prickled. “You’d never do that.”
His dark gaze locked with hers. So intent, she felt it from across the room. “You don’t know what I’d do for you.”
Whomp. Her heart slammed against her rib cage with such strength, she lost her breath.
“Beggin’ pardon, sir.”
Rafe moved aside as three of the inn’s serving girls entered the room. One carried a washtub, and the others held great pitchers of steaming water. Clio and Rafe stood silent as they went about filling the bath. It took them longer than it ought, because all three of them kept stealing glances at Rafe.
Even after they left, he kept his sentinel post by the door. “It wasn’t supposed to go this way.”
“I imagine it wasn’t. You looked magnificent in this.” She hugged his finely tailored topcoat around her. “I don’t suppose you went to all that trouble just to come serve my brother-in-law a mean right cross.”
He made a futile gesture. “We were supposed to dance. A proper dance. One long enough for me to tell you how goddamn beautiful you are in that gown. The way I should have done at your debut, years ago.”
Oh, Rafe.
“And then before I left, I was going to pull you aside somewhere quiet and give you . . .”
“What? Then you’d give me what?”
He nodded at her. “Check the pocket.”
She slid one hand to the breast pocket of his tailcoat and reached inside. Her fingers closed on a packet of papers.
The papers.
“You didn’t.”
“I had to. You deserve that much. I—”
“Sir, beggin’ pardon again.”
The serving girls were back. Once again, Rafe stepped out of the doorway to let them through. They brought yet another pitcher of water for the bath, an armful of towels, and a tray with a pot of tea, bread, and what smelled like rabbit stew.
“Will that be everything, sir?” the eldest tavern girl asked.
He nodded. “Ready a meal for me downstairs, if you would. I’ll be down in a trice.”
The three of them left, and the moment they disappeared, Clio could hear them giggling and whispering in the corridor.
“Listen, I can’t stay and chat. I’d wager we have about three minutes before your reputation is destroyed.”
“They don’t know who I am.”
“They know who I am. Or someone will. And it wouldn’t be difficult to find out the rest.” He shook his head. “You can’t imagine. I wouldn’t mind it if the whole world knew. I’d like to hang a sign on this door that says ‘Ruination in Progress,’ and lock the both of us inside.”
None of that sounded so terrible to Clio.
“But that’s not why I came to the ball tonight,” he said. “I wanted—”
With a glance down the corridor, he ducked under the lintel and entered the room. The door remained open.
He lowered his voice. “Clio, I wanted to give you choices. Not take them.”
Her fingers curled around the papers. “So you do mean to sign these?”
“I already did.”
She looked down at the papers, uncurling them to verify. There it was, his signature on the final page, scrawled bold and unapologetic across the parchment.
“You’re no longer engaged, as of half-seven this evening. I wanted to let you know right away. In case it improved your enjoyment of the ball tonight. I owed you more than a waltz. I wanted to you to feel free. Free to dance, to flirt, to tell the gossips to go to the devil.” He shook out his arms. “Instead, we’re here.”