The Passionate Love of a Rake Read Online Free PDF Page B

In a way, he almost did not wish to know. He did not want his blissful illusion shattered. No, he’d loved a fictional Jane, and perhaps he had idolised a fictional Jane all through these empty years, too. Did he really want to know the truth?
    She neither moved nor spoke, her eyes on the street, but he was certain she was not looking at anything in particular, just away from him.
    He remained silent, too. He was in no mood to be conciliatory or ease her path.
    If she’d been his intended companion, Lady Baxter, he would have had the woman pressed down upon the seat by now and his hands up her skirt.
    A smile pulled at his lips. Sometimes he did not even get a woman as far as Bloomsbury Square before he had taken what he wished and set her down.
    But with Jane, he required more than that. He intended to savour each moment, to learn every inch of her body and consign it to memory. It would take hours of slow appreciation to satisfy the thirst which had been in his blood for years.
    His mind began crafting images, the ideas, the method of her seduction, and the achievement of their completion. Oh yes, he intended to enjoy this, and he intended to enjoy it in the comfort of a bed, unrestrained by time or space. The weight in his groin grew denser merely at the thought of touching her.
    His impatience beginning to build, he reached up and tapped the carriage roof twice, ordering Parkin to stir up the horses.

Chapter Three
    The carriage lurched forward a moment after he’d tapped the roof.
    Jane grasped the strap.
    He watched her with such brooding intensity, she felt as though she’d leapt from the frying pan into the fire. Of course, she’d realised abruptly when he began leading her from the ballroom, he was
not
the man she’d known before. Yet since they’d sat in the carriage, numerous memories of him sulking as a youth had spun through her head.
    In childhood, his temper had always shown in this moody disengagement, when he’d not gotten what he wished, or hadn’t won, or been unable to have the final say.
    But surely, he was getting his way now, wasn’t he? Or did he expect her to do more? How on earth would Violet behave in this situation? Should Jane speak? Should she move closer? She had no idea what to do or say. She had never been party to anything more than the light flirtation they’d shared before.
    The silence stretched between them. She looked out the window and listened to the low rumble of the iron-wrapped carriage wheels striking the cobble, the horses’ hooves hitting the stone, the creak of the wooden shafts beneath the carriage, the encouraging call of their driver, and the crack of his whip.
    She couldn’t stand it any longer.
    Her head spinning to face him, she said, “A penny for them?”
    His slouching silhouette was etched against the passing gaslight and silver moonlight that reached into the carriage as bars of light ran across him then disappeared. He was the epitome of all she’d heard and seen of a town rake.
    “I’m sure if I spoke them, you’d blush.”
    “As it is too dark for you to see, why would I care?” Her words were braver than she felt, yet if his thoughts were of her, she wanted to know them.
    “I am thinking of how I shall make love to you. What do you like, Jane? What makes you sigh with pleasure? What brings you to conclusion?”
    His tall, lean frame unfolded from his slumped contemplative pose, and his foot fell back to the floor. Then he slid closer and leaned forward, taking her hands in his while his elbows rested on his knees. His thumbs began gently stroking across her palms. She felt it all the way to her stomach, and a deep longing, a thirst or hunger, settled in the back of her throat.
    “I shall begin by touching you, everywhere.” The movement of his thumbs slowed and became more sensual. “Then I wondered how you’ll taste.”
    Her heart hammered, and the ache in her throat descended to her stomach. She wanted all of that. Did it make her wicked?