TheWifeTrap Read Online Free PDF Page B

heated stream. Her breath caught on a sharp gasp as he
took a bold step forward and leapt inside, and another as he slid up next to
her on the seat. He stretched out a long, muscled arm and locked his hand
around the frame of the opposite window. She burrowed backward into the corner
as he crowded her close, blocking any faint chance of escape she might have
had.
    Meeting his
intrepid blue eyes, she shivered, her blood humming with a mixture of fear and
excitement, and yes, attraction. “What do you want?” she demanded. “My money?
My jewels?”
    She knew how
his voice would sound even before he
spoke, deep and musical, filled with the
wild rhythm of the Irish hills. She waited for it and trembled in anticipation.
    “Nay,” he
whispered, the word washing over her like a sleek, silken caress. “I’ve no use
for such paltry trifles when there’s far greater treasures to be had. So, what
will it be, my lady, your virtue or your life?”
    Her lips
parted, her breath faint. “What choice do you leave me, sir? Pray do your
worst.”
    The next
instant his lips took hers, plundering her mouth with a primitive sweetness
that made her senses swim, her limbs turn hot and malleable as wax. He thrust
his tongue beyond her teeth and let her taste him, let her very pores fill with
the intoxicating scent of his skin and hair until she could no longer
distinguish her flesh from his own.
    “Kiss me
back, lass,” he commanded.
    And she did,
losing herself in a forbidden desire that she should not want but nonetheless
did. Fingers aching to touch, she threaded them into his thick brown hair and
pulled him closer, urged him on to take greater liberties, this thief of the
heart.
    He palmed a
breast, her nipple peaking in immediate response as he stroked her with a
knowing thumb. She sighed and quivered as he dropped a string of kisses along
the column of her neck. Nipping her earlobe, he laved the spot with his tongue.
    “Now, do you
know what I want, lass?” he asked, his breath warm and husky in her ear.
    She gently
shook her head and waited, legs shifting restlessly against the aching want she
needed him to assuage.
    Abruptly, he
set her from him. “You, hauling your fine backside out of this coach. Here, let
me help.”
    And before
she could voice a protest, he yanked her up off the seat, and with a push
tumbled her out of the coach into the mud. He laughed at her from where he
stood inside the barouche, beating a hand against the side of the vehicle over
and over and over again.
    The sound of his
beating hand changed and grew louder, turning into a monotonous pounding that
drew her up out of the dream.
    She groaned and
squinted against the early-morning light, sleepy enough still to feel the wet
mud, as well as the lingering desire, lying slick upon her skin.
    She cringed and
wrinkled her face against her pillow in mortification. How could she have had
such an intimate dream, and about Darragh O’Brien of all people! How could she
want such a man? What trick of her mind had led her to fantasize about him when
he was no more than a commoner and well beneath her notice no matter how
ruggedly handsome he might be?
    Well, it was only
a dream, she reasoned. Stupid and meaningless and utterly insignificant.
    The dreadful
noise continued.
    For mercy
sakes, what was that horrible racket?
She leaned up on an elbow and peered across at
the mantel clock above the fireplace.
    Seven-thirty, the
hands read.
    Barbaric.
    Appalling.
    She never rose
from her bed until ten, or sometimes even eleven if she’d had a particularly
late evening the night before. Lord knows no sane, civilized human being would
wish to wake any earlier. In her estimation people who purported to like rising
with the sun needed a good physic, perhaps even a hearty bleeding to rid them
of their bad humors and irrational behavior.
    Moaning in
exhausted misery, she stuffed a pillow over her head and tried to block out the
cacophonous
thud, thud, thud
that echoed in the air