Trade Winds (Choc Lit) (21 page)

She glanced over at Mrs Forbes again, then at the blur of snowy forest speeding past the sleigh. She shivered and tried to huddle further into her cloak. It was woefully inadequate despite being covered by two shawls and a sheepskin rug over her legs. She cursed her stepfather’s stinginess. He could well afford to buy her a fur-lined one if he wanted to, but he had refused. It was his fault entirely that her hands and feet were now beginning to go numb and it was a good while since she had felt her cheeks. She wondered if she would ever be warm again.

‘Are you cold?’ Mr Kinross asked. Jess was about to deny this, when a tell-tale shiver went through her. He smiled again, his eyes twinkling this time so that she found herself mesmerised against her will. They really were remarkable eyes, a clear cornflower blue and fringed with long lashes so dark they looked almost painted. ‘We should share our body warmth,’ he said, so quietly she thought she had misheard him at first.

‘I beg your pardon?’

He indicated the huge bearskin coat he was wearing. ‘If you come inside here, we’ll both be warmer.’

‘I couldn’t possibly!’ Jess looked at him again, to see if he was serious, but could see no sign of his usual teasing.

‘Why not? It’s one of the basic rules of survival, you know. Shared body heat is the second best thing for keeping warm. Here, come inside.’

He undid the fastenings and opened the coat, making room for her to sit inside. ‘Mr Kinross,’ she protested, but before she knew what had happened, he had lifted her up as easily as if she weighed nothing at all and placed her next to him. Either he was very strong or her body had been colder than she thought. Surprised, she could only muster a token resistance and once she was enveloped in the bearskin, she no longer wanted to protest.

‘Please, won’t you call me Killian? We’re in this together, so we should be on first name terms if you ask me.’

‘No, really, I don’t think this is a good idea.’ Jess felt she ought to remonstrate with him, but the truth was that nothing could have tempted her away from the blessed warmth inside his coat. He pulled her nearer to his chest with one arm, while buttoning up the garment with the other, enclosing them both in its soft heat. Jess decided that a short warming-up session surely couldn’t do any harm. There was no one to see her after all.

‘If you try to relax a little, you’ll find yourself a lot less cold as well,’ he advised in an amused tone of voice.

Jess realised that she had been holding herself stiffly upright, while arguing with her conscience. Now she saw that he had been talking sense and she gave in, tentatively leaning her head against his chest. His chin came to rest on top of her head, which felt oddly comforting. Her nose was the only thing sticking out of the top of his coat. For the first time in hours she felt her body begin to thaw a little.

She sat in his embrace for a while, feeling guilty, but snug. She even began to enjoy the sleigh ride. It was smooth and comfortable in comparison to riding in a carriage on bumpy roads which was the case during most of the year. In the gathering dusk, the trees of the deep forest all around them seemed almost magical, their branches weighed down by thick blankets of snow that glistened in the light from the sleigh lanterns. The only sounds to be heard were the swishing of the sleigh’s runners, the keening of the wind through the trees, and the jingling of the horses’ harnesses. The animals’ hooves made only a muffled crunching noise when they sank into the freezing cold road surface. The whole experience was somehow unreal. Jess burrowed deeper into the bearskin, forgetting for a moment who she was with.

Then Killian’s chin moved a fraction, rubbing the top of her head in an affectionate caress, and she remembered. Sitting there being held by him in silence suddenly seemed even more intimate, so she tried to come up with a topic of conversation. ‘Where did you get this?’ she finally asked, indicating the coat which was several sizes too big for him.

‘Won it off a gentleman who had been deserted by Lady Luck.’

‘You were gambling again?’

‘Not really, just playing a game of cards to pass the time. The gentleman in question was in his cups and insisted on a wager. Sadly for him, I won.’ He chuckled and she felt the rumbling of it deep inside him under her ear. It was an unsettling sound.

‘Are you telling the truth?’

‘No.’ He smiled. ‘Actually, my landlady gave it to me. It used to belong to her husband, but he’s dead now so he has no need of it. It would have been stupid to refuse, don’t you think?’

‘Oh, yes.’

Jess braced herself against him with one hand and looked up into his face, having just remembered something. ‘You said this was the second best way of keeping warm. What then is the best one?’

His smile turned into a mischievous grin. ‘You really want to know?’

‘Well, I … er, yes,’ Jess stammered, although she was no longer sure.

‘Very well, I’ll tell you.’ He bent to whisper in her ear. ‘Lovemaking.’

Jess’ eyes flew up to his and she gasped. But before she had time to object to his mentioning such a thing to her, he bent his head and kissed her full on the lips, his mouth moving slowly as if savouring the taste of her. Jess stiffened, her eyes staring into his, but she soon found out she should have closed them instead. He held her gaze and something in the depths of his azure eyes had her riveted. She couldn’t pull away to save her life. Just before ending the kiss, Killian ran the tip of his tongue along her bottom lip, sending shockwaves throughout her body.

‘Killian!’ she protested, so scandalized she used his Christian name without thinking. She tried to pull away from him, but his arms were around her and he held her tight, chuckling again.

‘Shush, it’s all right, I was only teasing. I’m sorry, but it was just too tempting. I won’t do it again if you don’t want me to.’

‘Most definitely not.’ Jess felt her chest heaving with what she thought must be indignation, but which could have been something else. Karl’s kisses had never made her feel even a flicker of desire. They hadn’t involved tongues in any way either, but now here was this rogue, evoking sensations she didn’t know existed. It was too much.

‘You’re sure?’ She heard the teasing note in his voice again and couldn’t resist another look, even though she knew it wasn’t safe. ‘Admit it, you enjoyed that.’

‘Never.’

‘That’s a shame. I’ll just have to try a bit harder then, won’t I,’ Killian said and bent to kiss her again.

‘No, I
−’

Her protest was lost in a maelstrom of sensations as he did a more thorough job this time. Jess was virtually paralysed while he rained a succession of butterfly kisses on and around her mouth, until she opened her lips and he could deepen the kiss. She
was shocked to the core when his tongue found its way inside her mouth. Even so, she melted into his embrace in the most unsettling manner and some instinct she hadn’t known she possessed made her own tongue spar with his.

She felt him smile again, and almost pulled away. But the tingling waves shooting through her just because of this playing of tongues were so extraordinary, she simply didn’t want them to end yet. At first she was too curious and soon she became caught up in the momentum, unable to break it off.

When he finally stopped for a breathing space, Jess’ heart was beating like a wild thing and every fibre of her being was burning hot. He regarded her with a look of satisfaction and nodded. ‘Told you so, didn’t I? You’re not cold any more.’

‘That wasn’t lovemaking,’ Jess murmured. She wanted to dent his self-assurance somehow, but she didn’t sound convincing even to her own ears. Having never experienced anything like it, she couldn’t be certain. She had a feeling Killian was very practised in the arts of seduction, but to her mind, true lovemaking was when the heart was involved as well as the body.

‘Well, whatever you call it, it does the trick. I, for one, am certainly feeling a lot warmer than I was. Now if only we could get rid of the old woman so we had more space, I could warm you down to your very toes.’

Jess felt herself blush and blessed the darkness which had now descended fully. ‘You already did,’ she muttered, and realised it was the truth. She could feel all her toes again.

‘That was just the beginning,’ he whispered and nibbled her earlobe which had somehow escaped from the confines of her shawl. ‘You really are innocent, aren’t you.’

‘Killian, no, you’ve got stop this. I shouldn’t have let you …’

‘What?’ His eyes glittered with mischief. ‘I’ve barely touched you yet. Wouldn’t you like me to show you more ways of keeping warm?’

‘Absolutely not.’ He shouldn’t be talking to her like that. She was sure Mrs Forbes would have had an apoplectic fit if she’d heard the half of it, but having allowed him such liberties already, Jess knew she had brought it on herself. She tried to backtrack. ‘I’ll have you know I’m a respectable girl and … and besides, what else could you possibly do in a sleigh?’

‘Push the old woman out and I’ll show you.’ His voice was as enthralling as his eyes, and for a mad moment Jess almost considered doing what he’d asked. Then she came to her senses.

‘For shame,’ she hissed at him. ‘That would be murder.’

‘Oh, yes, so it would.’ He pretended a look of remorse, then grinned again. ‘Never mind, we’ll just have to hope she continues to sleep soundly.’

He lifted her chin with his fingers and bent to kiss her again. Jess’ conscience was screaming at her to pull away, to tell him to stop, anything, but her brain refused to follow orders. Instead she submitted to another round of searing kisses, thoroughly enjoying every minute.
I must be a wanton,
she thought, as his hands began to roam under her cloak and she found she liked that too. He stroked her shoulders and back, then daringly, the underside of her breasts. Jess gasped at that, and pleaded with him to stop.

‘Very well,’ he murmured into her hair. ‘I won’t do anything you don’t want me to, even if it’s very tempting.’

Jess was grateful he didn’t actually ask her what she wanted, because she would have begged him to continue. Instead, he returned to their kissing game. Somehow she felt slightly safer although even that turned her limbs to liquid fire.

Some time later, through a haze of desire, she registered that the horses were slowing down. She dragged herself back to reality. ‘Killian, enough,’ she whispered. ‘We’ll be there in a moment. I must get out from inside your coat. Quickly.’

‘Hmm?’ He seemed as dazed as she was and his breathing was uneven. It took a while before he reacted to her words and followed her instructions. It wasn’t a moment too soon. Just as she had been returned to her previous position next to him and his coat closed around only him, the driver turned around and announced, ‘
Nu är vi strax framme, frun.
’

His stentorian tones woke Mrs Forbes. She spluttered to life among the shawls and gazed around in confusion. Then she erupted into a bout of coughing so violent it made Jess wrinkle her nose and move closer to Killian.

‘Told you we should have pushed her out,’ he breathed into her ear. ‘Sounds like she’ll cock up her toes soon in any case.’

Jess dug him in the ribs with her elbow, not daring to look at him in case she was overcome with a fit of the giggles. It wasn’t a laughing matter, of course, but she felt happy and carefree all of a sudden. Even the thought of the coming incarceration couldn’t dampen her spirits. She marvelled that a few kisses could bring about such a mood change.

With a hiss of the runners on the deep snow, the sleigh came to a halt in front of the steps to Askeberga’s porch. Killian jumped out and reached into the sleigh to help Jess. Instead of taking her hands, he enclosed her tiny waist with his fingers and lifted her out, depositing her on the second step up. He then offered Mrs Forbes a hand and pulled her out, steadying her when she stepped out of the sleigh. While Mrs Forbes turned to thank the coachman, Killian followed Jess into the house.

‘Let’s hope she goes straight to bed, then I can show you how to keep warm in a freezing manor house,’ he murmured from behind her. ‘It’s much more fun.’

‘Killian, don’t you dare …’

Jess marched through the door, her back ramrod straight to show him that she was once more in control of herself. A frisson still shot up her spine and she knew she would have to use every ounce of willpower she possessed in order to keep from taking him up on his offer.

Nothing had ever sounded more tempting.

Killian followed her slowly into the house, breathing deeply to regain some semblance of control over himself.

‘Hell and damnation,’ he muttered. Who would have thought little Jessamijn was such a firebrand? She looked like an ice queen on the outside, but inside there were hidden depths. He had enjoyed teasing her with the occasional kiss before, but he’d never suspected she would fire his blood to this extent. In fact, he was quite shocked at how much he wanted her. The desire was somehow different and more powerful than any he had ever felt before. He didn’t understand it, but knew it would be dangerous to continue this game.

It shouldn’t have happened at all. He had promised himself he would leave her alone apart from verbal sparring. But after three days of sitting so close to her, it had all become too much. He smiled to himself as he recalled how easy it had been to entice her into his coat and then onto the next step. She was such an ingénue, but extremely responsive nonetheless. He knew it wouldn’t take much to ignite her desire to the point of no return.