was the honest answer. Her left shoulder hurt, her right wrist stung and her pride as a horsewoman was severely dented. ‘No,’ she said and opened her eyes.
‘Excellent,’ Lucian growled. ‘Because I fully intend wringing your neck.’
‘Why?’ Indignant, Sara moved too quickly, found several other things that hurt and was hauled into an upright sitting position. ‘Ow! What are you doing?’
‘Checking.’ His hands worked along her collarbone, wriggled her fingers and prodded her ribs. ‘Move your feet. Let me see your eyes, your ears. What day of the week is it?’
‘Thursday.’
‘Correct.’ Then he kissed her.
It was probably less life-threatening than having her neck wrung, but as she found herself flat on her back on the turf again Sara was hazily aware that it was probably more dangerous. Lucian was angry with her and she was not very pleased with him, but that only seemed to touch a flame to the tinder of feelings that had been simmering inside her ever since that kiss on her balcony.
They were both wearing far too many clothes, she thought as her hands slid into his hair to hold his head so she could kiss him back with as much fervour as he was kissing her. His mouth moved from her lips to her cheek to her ear and she arched her neck to give him better access, shifting so he was lying fully on her, his pelvis cradled against hers, the heat of his erection like a brand.
She opened her eyes on a sigh as his hand slid between the buttons of her jacket, seeking her breast, blinked against the sun dazzle and gave a yelp of alarm. ‘Lucian!’
‘What?’ He came up on his elbows, which felt alarmingly wonderful as his hips pressed down tight into hers. ‘What’s wrong?’ He looked distracted, but then she felt more than distracted herself.
‘Wrong? We are in the open, on the clifftop. There is no cover. This is a public bridleway. You are undoing my clothes. We agreed we were not going to do this! Is that enough wrong for the moment?’
‘Hell.’ He rolled off her, sat up and looked around. ‘I am sorry. We do appear to be alone, if that is any consolation.’
‘There is no need to apologise, I kissed you back. It seemed preferable to having my neck wrung.’ Which was untrue. She had just wanted to kiss Lucian, have his hands on her, put hers on him, and she hadn’t been thinking at all.
‘I’ll get the horses.’ He rose to his feet and walked towards them. Twilight was well trained enough to stay when her rider fell off and the hired chestnut was standing nose to nose with her. They allowed themselves to be caught with no trouble and Lucian led them back as Sara fumbled her jacket closed and tried to make some order out of her tangled hair.
‘Your hat.’ He held it out as he jammed his own back on his head, then held out his hand to pull her to her feet.
Sara hissed with pain and Lucian moved close to take her arm. ‘You said you were not hurt.’
‘I am bruised. I fell off a horse. Naturally it hurts.’
‘Can you ride?’
‘Of course. If you will just give me a boost.’ She settled into the saddle and managed not to wince, or to look at Lucian as he swung up on to his own mount.
‘Why did you run off like that?’ he demanded as they set off again at a walk.
‘I lost my temper with you and rather than ring a peal over you in a public place I decided to leave.’
‘I was perfectly in the right—’
‘You were perfectly within your rights as an autocratic male head of household. But you are certainly not right about how to deal with your sister.’
‘She has to accept that Farnsworth abandoned her. I refuse to believe that an able-bodied, educated young man could meet with some fate so severe that he could not get a message back to a woman he cared for, one that he had left totally vulnerable.’
‘You might feel quite secure wandering around a French city, my lord. You have wealth and power and experience. Gregory was near-penniless and, however good his French, I would wager it was his first time in that country. How could he have coped if he had ended up under arrest for some innocent misunderstanding? Or in the charity ward of a hospital after being set upon by footpads?’
* * *
Lucian could hardly throw up his hands in exasperation, not with both of them holding the reins, but he could feel his shoulders twitch with the desire to do just that. Somehow he managed to get the desire that was burning through him like a wild fire under control, but his body held the memory of hers under him, of her softness and heat where his erection had burned and throbbed. Focus. ‘You will not encourage my sister to hold on to these hopeless dreams.’
The frustration and guilt were beginning to undermine his control, he thought grimly as they rode in frigid silence. He had failed Marguerite by not protecting her against the wiles of an unsuitable man, which meant he had failed in his basic duty to his family, to protect them. Now, somehow, he had to restore her lost honour—and his—and Sara’s inability to understand that, let alone sympathise with it as she should as a well-brought-up lady, was wreaking havoc with his temper. He must be mad to think of taking her as his mistress, of allowing her any deeper into his head, destroying his single-minded concentration on his sister.
It must have been her unconventional upbringing in India, he supposed. Her father and brother had seemed normal enough in their attitudes, from what little he had seen of them and from what Sara had said, but her mother was a different matter. She was a stunningly beautiful woman with an imperious manner who struck him as more than likely to take the defence of her own, and her daughter’s, honour into her own hands. And those pretty hands, he rather suspected, would be holding something as sharp as the knife Sara had drawn on him the other evening.
But that definition of honour must be very different from his if Lady Eldonstone had calmly allowed the newly widowed Sara to take herself off and set up as shopkeeper like this.
‘What am I to say to her, then, if Marguerite speaks of Gregory?’ It sounded as though Sara’s teeth were gritted.
Lucian forced away the memory of how that mouth, now so tight-lipped, had softened under his, how her tongue had felt, impudent and demanding in his mouth. ‘You will tell her that I have forbidden discussion of him and that if she wishes to keep you as an acquaintance that subject is out of bounds.’ His mother had never defied his father, Marguerite had never disobeyed either parent. His father had acted as though opposition to his will was unimaginable and, without uncles or elder brothers to model himself on as a youth, Lucian had tried to follow his example in everything except his womanising. So, was he lacking in essential authority to have lost control of the situation like this?
The unladylike snort that greeted that pronouncement was answer enough. And I do sound damnably pompous, he thought. Good God, if looking after a sister was difficult, what would it be like when he had children of his own?
‘Why are you looking at me like that?’ Sara demanded.
‘Like what, exactly?’ Now the conversation was descending to schoolroom levels. Somewhere there were beautifully behaved, elegantly minded young ladies who behaved with perfect decorum at all times and would be charmingly deferential to the men in their
