Read Online Wicked Nights With a Lover by Sophie Jordan - Free Book Online Page B

slammed shut, she fought free of her shroud. Tearing the fabric from her, she gulped air and woke to surroundings little changed from the dark world of moments ago.
    The carriage was unlit. The curtains drawn. The barest light peeped out from the part. Even blind, she whipped her head around, blowing the hair that had fallen loose from her face.
    Her fingers flexed on plush velvet squabs, digging until her knuckles ached. This was no hansom cab. The large shadow of a man sat across from her, still as marble, his eyes glowing faintly. She stilled like prey caught in his watchful gaze. It was almost as though he could see her, even in this oppressive gloom.
    Her nose flared. She smelled the faint whiff of mint. From him? And something else, something indefinable that made her quiver in a strange way.
    Oddly enough fear eluded her. She should be terrified. She’d been abducted. Instead, she heard only Madame Foster’s voice, her predictions ringing in her head. According to everything she had imparted, Marguerite would not die this day. It was too soon. Not enough time had passed, and she was unwed. She had not lived and loved as predicted. She would live through one more Christmas. This, she knew. For now, she was safe.
    Fearless and calm, she squared her shoulders.
    “No longer interested in screaming?” His voice rolled across the air like tendrils of smoke from a peat fire. She recalled that the treacherous maid had called him Ash. Fitting. Not only did his voice smolder like coals, he made her feel inexplicably warm inside.
    “Should I scream?”
    “Most women would.”
    “I’m not most women.”
    “I’m beginning to see that.”
    “You see nothing. What good would screaming do now? The only time it would have benefited me was back at Jack’s house when I was gagged. It’s pointless now and would likely only earn me a taste of your fist.”
    He chuckled softly, the low sound stroking something deep and unfamiliar inside her. “I would never strike you.”
    “No?” She angled her head. “You seemed quite threatening earlier.”
    She sensed his shoulder lift in the dark. “I needed you to fear me then. I wouldn’t have that now.”
    Her hands balled into tight fists in her lap. “So you merely seed the fear of violence. And what do you think is worse? The fear or actuality of threat?” Before he had time to answer, she rushed to say, “I’ve lived with both and I can tell you it’s a close race.”
    He was quiet for some time. She listened to the plod of hooves outside their carriage, sensing he was taking her measure. “You’re not what I expected,” he finally drawled.
    She leaned forward on the seat and asked the question that she was almost too afraid to ask. “And why should you expect anything of me?” They were nothing. Strangers. Predator and prey.
    He inhaled, the soft sound deep and contemplative to her ears. “I assure you that I mean you no harm.”
    “And why should I take the word of my abductor?”
    “Because I have never lifted a finger against a female … and I would die a miserable death before I ever assaulted my wife.”
    Wife. She jerked from the word, feeling it on a visceral level, a punch to her belly. Heat swelled over her face, making her skin itch. She fought to swallow the impossibly thick lump rising in her throat.
    Madame Foster’s voice was there again, a rushed whisper in her head, full of ominous warning. Turning her head slowly from side to side, she wet her numb lips and managed to whisper, “Wife?”
    Was this it then? Her unavoidable fate? Would he force her to marry him? Was her life completely out of her hands?
    “Yes. You and I shall marry. I’ve taken great pains to acquire one of Jack Hadley’s daughters for that very purpose.”
    “Never,” she hissed, fighting the warm wash of tremors his deep voice sent through her.
    “I’m certain you’ll come to see the advantages.”
    As suddenly as that, the fear that had eluded her, the fear that had