The Duke and Miss Christmas (2 page)

“Go for help, Sybil!” she exclaimed, trying to wrench the basket from his grip. “Hurry! Ride, fast!” she continued before he finally wrestled the wicker out of her hands and tossed it aside.

“Wait,” Crispin said, whirling toward Sybil. But she had already thrown her good leg over the saddle and clutched the reins tightly in her hands. Crispin reached out for her but caught only a handful of air. At the same time, the young lady had reached behind him and slapped the horse's rump. The mare took off at a trot with Sybil bouncing in the saddle but somehow managing to hang on.

Fearing Sybil might fall off and do more damage to her leg, Crispin let out a loud whistle, but the animal wasn't trained to obey the command and kept going. He started to run after the horse, but the tail of his cloak was grabbed from behind and he was yanked backward.

“You can't have my sister! Leave her alone.”

Crispin spun around so fast he lost his footing on the loose gravel and fell to the ground, but not before dragging the young lady down on top of him as he went.

He grunted.

She grunted.

Having had enough of the spirited young lady, Crispin rolled her onto her back. His cloak and her cape mingled and twisted around them, wrapping them together. Crispin grabbed the wrists of her flailing arms in his hands and trapped her kicking legs between his to stop her ineffective wrestling. His greater strength quickly and easily overpowered her, but she didn't quit trying to best him.

“Let me up, you foul beast!” She ground out a hiss as she struggled to break free.

Not a chance in hell,
he thought as his fingers tightened.

His chest pressed hard against her soft breasts. Her heavy breathing was as fast and unsteady as his. The thrashing continued. She didn't willingly surrender the fight as he'd hoped once he trapped her, and their tussle for dominance continued. Crispin appreciated her courage, vitality, and strength. He might even be a little impressed by them, but he couldn't let her win.

“Stop squirming, you little hellion,” he countered, jamming her bucking body harder to the cold ground with his weight.

But she didn't relent. This fearless young lady had no intentions of giving up her struggle.

“Be still,” he said with difficulty. “I don't want to hurt you.”

“Then let me go, you brute,” she demanded between gasps, grunts, and bumps.

Was she calling him the brute when she was the one who stole up behind him and bashed him with a basket for no comprehensible reason?

“You started this,” he countered, and shifted the length of his body on top of hers.

Crispin looked down into the loveliest face he'd ever seen. The spitfire's skin was flawless and the color of pale parchment, except for the heightened flush in her cheeks. She wore no bonnet and her flowing glorious blond hair was littered with brown grass, tiny twigs, and little pieces of gravel from their rolling around. Her shoulders were slender and straight. He felt a soft fullness to her breasts. And, despite her brazenness in attacking him, she looked wholesome, innocent, and everything else that was good about life. His muscles flexed in response to his sudden and unanticipated attraction to her.

“What did you plan on doing with my sister?” she demanded with a weakening spring against him. “Where were you taking her?”

“To her home,” he answered hotly, focusing his concentration completely on her.

“Home?”

“Where did you think I was taking her?”

Crispin watched the panic gradually drain from her wide, expressive eyes and delicate features. She blinked slowly, taking in what he'd said. Then the realization of what she suspected came to him in a rush and resentment shot through him, hot and fierce. He'd been accused of many unsavory things in his lifetime and he'd probably done most of them, but he was an honorable man and he'd never hurt a child.

There was no way he would let an accusation like that go unanswered.

“You think I wanted to—to harm her?” he asked incredulously, not wanting to even voice the outrageous thought out loud. “A little girl?”

“I heard her scream,” the lady challenged quickly. “She was crying and you were forcing her to get on your horse.”

The miss scrambled to get from beneath him again, bucking and pushing against his body, but he held her securely. His muscles wound tighter in answer to all her wriggling. She had stirred more than his ire and his curiosity. Her movements were making him highly aware that her slight but obviously womanly form was warm and supple beneath him. If he wasn't so outraged about what she'd thought he intended to do to her little sister, his mind would be traveling places it shouldn't go.

“Did you once stop to think she might be crying because she was hurt, and I was trying to help her?”

Crispin felt her feminine spine stiffen and her arched brows furrowed as she eyed him skeptically. “Hurt? What do you mean?”

His hands slackened a little on her wrists. He regarded her keenly and bent his head so close to hers their noses almost touched. “It might have seemed as if I were forcing her, but that's not what was happening. I was trying to help her. Now thanks to you, she'll probably be thrown off the horse.”

The young lady bristled and struggled against him again. “Sybil will not. She rides very well. Do you think I'd ask her to ride for help if she wasn't capable of doing it?”

“Yes. If you thought I was going to harm her or you,” he answered tersely.

“Well, if you weren't forcing her onto your horse, why was she crying and telling you to stop?”

“She fell out of a tree and hurt herself.”

The young lady gasped and her body stilled. He felt her prickle of concern. Her warm breaths continued to come heavy and deep.

“I was trying to get her onto the horse to take her to Drakestone and her injured foot caught in something on the saddle. That's why she was crying and telling me to stop.”

“Why didn't you say so?” she whispered.

Why indeed!

Crispin wondered if the young lady realized just how close his lips were to hers. The air was cold, fresh, and invigorating. So was she. Without even knowing it, the miss was alluring, weaving a sensuous cover of heat around him and drawing him into the web she didn't even know she had created.

His voice softened as he asked, “Why didn't you ask before you started attacking me?”

She quickly moistened her lips. “I was coming up the path looking for her when I heard her scream. I saw you putting her on your horse and I heard her say ‘don't' and ‘stop.' I just assumed you were forcing her to go with you.”

In this Crispin would not give an inch. “You were wrong.”

Her eyes swept up and down his face. Crispin knew it was the first time she'd actually taken a moment to really look at him. Once again, he was made very aware of the womanly body beneath him and suddenly she was aware of that, too. He couldn't help but wonder if she found him as fascinating as he found her.

“Let me up,” she demanded, and started struggling again. “I must go to Sybil.”

Crispin wasn't ready to let his captive go. “She is halfway to Drakestone by now and you've no chance of catching up to her before she reaches help.”

“How badly was she hurt?” the young lady asked, her breaths evening out as her body went slack beneath him again.

“I don't think her leg was broken anywhere, but it needs attention.”

“Oh, she was not supposed to come searching for trimmings this morning and certainly not by herself.” She let out a frustrated sigh. “Sybil was told it was too early to decorate the house for the Christmas ball. She never listens to us.”

Crispin heard distress mixed with annoyance in the young lady's voice. It wasn't difficult for him to believe Miss Sybil had disobeyed orders.

He looked down at the beauty pinned beneath him and said, “Tell me your name.”

She stiffened once again and in a stormy tone exclaimed, “I will not! I don't know who you are or where you came from. You hold me against my will and won't let me up so I can breathe properly. You won't turn me loose so my hands won't go numb.”

Her strength and self-confidence were appealing. Her anger and pluck were inviting. “I think your name is Louisa.”

A ghost of a smile twitched the corners of her beautiful mouth and he knew at once that wasn't her name. Louisa was someone else.

“All right,” he said. “If you insist on being stubborn and won't tell me your name, I'll call you Miss Christmas.”

She scoffed and shoved against his strength. “And I shall call you Sir Ogre.”

Crispin acknowledged her retort with a soft laugh. Lying on top of her as he was, he could easily become one. She might not be Louisa, but she was definitely Miss Sybil's sister. They had the same color of hair and eyes and the same impertinent responses.

Though her body remained coiled and rigid, her warmth heated him. He was mindful of every breath she took and was sensitive to every move she made. His fingers itched to reach up and remove the bits of trash from her sunset-colored tresses. Had not their initial meeting been so intense and misunderstood, he might have tried to coax a kiss from the bold miss.

But then gazing into her vivacious face, with her lips parted and her rapid breaths, he thought maybe he would anyway. He hadn't been dubbed one of the scoundrels of The Heirs' Club for nothing.

Besides, surely he deserved at least one little kiss for the burning scrape under his eye that he'd received via her hands.

Chapter 2

Gwen Prim's stomach was quaking as they continued to stare at each other. Somehow, she knew without doubt he told the truth about helping Sybil. If Gwen had taken one moment to look at him, the cut and fabric of his cloak, his boots, the way he held himself, before she attacked him, she would have known he was a gentleman and not someone out to harm innocents.

She was usually a sensible person, but she had quickly jumped to the wrong conclusion. She'd assaulted a man who was only trying to help Sybil. How was Gwen going to get out of this situation with some of her dignity intact?

Merciful goose feathers!

If she hadn't been reading that dreadful novel last night about, of all things, a hunchbacked man who was stealing children from the streets of London for scientific experiments, she wouldn't have jumped to conclusions about the handsome gentleman who had her pinned to the ground with his strong, hard, and unyielding body.

She would never read another horrid novel in her life.

Now that she understood what a terrible mistake she'd made, she wanted the earth to open and swallow her. But no such fate was likely to happen. Instead, she watched his smoky-amber-colored gaze stray leisurely over her face, causing a tautness low in her abdomen.

And, as nature would have it, she found herself studying him, too. She guessed his age to be less than thirty. His broad brow, angular cheekbones, and a square chin gave him a handsomeness few gentlemen could match. His mouth and lips were wide, well-defined, and hovering so close to hers she feared they might accidently touch if she moved her head. Thick, unfashionably long hair the color of summer straw fell attractively across his forehead. The wind, and no doubt their scuffle, had tousled it, making her want to reach up and brush the locks back into place.

Then without warning the man slowly let go of her wrists and she cautiously lowered her arms.

“If I were an ogre, Miss Christmas, I might be tempted to do something like this.”

He reached up and touched her hair. Instinct caused her to grab hold of his wrist to stop him. He slowly lowered his hand and she saw he held a twig between his finger and thumb. She let go of him and he tossed the small piece of wood aside. Uncertainty caused her to remain still, though her heart thudded wildly in her chest.

“Or perhaps I might do something like this.”

His fingers caressed down her cheek and across her bottom lip. Even though he wore tight-fitting leather gloves, his touch sent a tingling warmth throughout her body.

“Or I could do something even more scandalous, like this.” He leaned in and lightly brushed his lips across the corner of her mouth. The contact was brief, delicately warm to her cold cheek, feathery soft, and more enticing than she could ever have imagined. A shivery awareness stole over her, tightening her breasts, leaving her bereft that he failed to place his lips squarely over hers for a real kiss.

“So what do you say, Miss Christmas? Am I behaving as the ogre you think I am?”

His voice was husky and beguiling, causing her skin to pebble deliciously. Now that she no longer feared him, the weight of his strong body bearing down on hers wasn't offensive. It was pleasing. She was falling under the spell of a very seductive man and was fast losing the will to push him away. And she suspected he knew exactly how he was making her feel. His eyes, his voice, and his lips were telling her he was enjoying every moment of the seduction.

Why was she attracted to someone she knew nothing about? Someone who held her prisoner. Perhaps the cold had frozen her brain. She certainly wasn't acting like her usual prudent self.

Somehow, she had to find a way to fortify herself against her sudden attraction to this stranger. She wouldn't let him frustrate or intimidate her, but most of all she couldn't allow him to stir up more of her womanly senses. The best way to do that was to remind herself of her disastrous attraction to the handsome rogue Mr. Standish and how that had turned out.

At the moment, the only thing she could think to say to this man was, “That scratch beneath your eye looks raw. Does it hurt very much?”

He put his gloved fingertip to it and winced. “Only when I touch it.”

An amused smile lifted the corners of his lips and Gwen's heart felt as if it tripped in her chest. She wanted to smile at his humor, too, but managed to hold herself in check and remain stoic lest he think she was encouraging him.