Sweet Deception Read Online Free PDF Page A

emotions had been long put to rest, curse them. She didn’t have the time or capacity to deal with them right now.
    Usually, whenever she wished to block such disturbing thoughts, she would seclude herself in her workroom, taking chalk to her boards and losing herself in her equations or reviewing the crime statistics she’d been compiling for years and plotting them on her maps, until the unwelcome feelings passed. But with Molly missing, that wasn’t an option.
    Perhaps she could just block him out by closing her eyes and working familiar math equations in her head. It couldn’t hurt to try. She wouldn’t miss much along the way, she knew. The stiff blanket enshrouding her face blocked most of the rain, but it also acted like blinders. All she could really see was patches of endless gray sky and flashes of the sessile oaks, birch and dogwoods that populated the area anyway.
    Emma squeezed her eyes shut. But that only increased her awareness of other things. She flinched at the terrible cracking of twigs and underbrush as the horse trampled the woodland. The earthy aroma of sodden peat and rotting vegetation mixed with the pungent scents of horse and hay from the stable blanket, flooding her nose. And though she should be freezing from the damp muslin clinging to her skin, inside she blazed with an uncomfortable heat, no doubt a reaction to the man whose arms held her so securely.
    Her eyes flew open.
That
certainly hadn’t worked.
    Emma took in a deep breath, letting it out slowly. If only Derick had stayed back at the castle, had left her to search on her own. She could have used the solitude to regain her equilibrium.
    Don’t lie to yourself, Emma. You never had any kind of equilibrium where Derick was concerned.
She pursed her lips. True, but she was no longer a lovesick girl, and she had no intention of letting herself get hurt again.
    Emma pulled the musty blanket more tightly around her, as if cocooning herself in it could provide safe haven in addition to shelter from the storm. Rain drummed against the oilskin, the rapid, irregular beat drowning out all other sounds. But it couldn’t drown her thoughts of Derick.
    Why had he insisted upon coming along? He’d trivialized her concerns, after all. And it certainly seemed he’d grown rather spoiled in his years away. One would have thought he’d prefer to wait in the nice warm castle rather than set off into this storm with her. It couldn’t be because of any desire to spend time with her, could it? Maybe—
    The roaring rain ceased abruptly, dried up in an instant, as English storms were wont to do. Emma glanced around. They’d almost reached their destination. She pushed Derick out of her mind and instead forced her thoughts to finding Molly.
    Now that nature had gone silent, the distant cries of other searchers echoed through the wood. Perhaps someone had already found her? Emma listened, hope deflating in her chest as only exploratory cries of “Moooolllyyyy” reached her ears.
    Emma pushed the blanket away from her face, preparing to dismount. A refreshing blast of clean air cleared her senses—and opened them to another scent, one of bay and bergamot and man.
Derick.
    Just like that, she could no longer block her awareness of him. Every rolling undulation of the horse beneath them translated to a corresponding brush of Derick’s hard thighs against her bottom. His nearness, his scent, his low voice murmuring to their mount, the way she sat caged in his embrace—it simply overwhelmed her. The blanket grew stifling, constricting. She had to get clear of it.
    Emma wriggled her torso out of the blanket, pushing it down to her waist to free her arms. Behind her, Derick made a strangled grunt, as if her writhing had somehow injured him. She stilled suddenly.
    His hands moved down her body, gripping her hips.
    Emma gasped at his familiarity, but before she could upbraid him, he scooted her forward on his thighs, away from his, well, his…And all of a