“Apparently she wanted my child.” I crossed my arms over my chest. It felt so damn good to tell someone the truth. “I haven’t the slightest idea why. Perhaps she wanted to sell the baby, or maybe she was merely lonely and planned to keep her for herself.”
His jaw clenched. “She was going to take our child?”
I nodded.
The look in his gaze worried me. Fury. Pure and heated. “And Mr. Wrolf, what did he want?”
I shrugged. “Me. Apparently.”
I didn’t miss the tremble of his hands as he uncurled his fingers. His breath had gone harsh. “Did he touch you?”
“No.” I shook my head. “I…I hit their housekeeper with a candlestick when she tried to stop me from escaping. I thought I’d killed her, but Mr. McKinnon checked, and apparently she lived.”
He turned around and started toward the steps. “When I find out who they are, I’ll kill them.”
For one stunned moment I merely stood there. I had no doubt what so ever that he meant what he said. If Gabe murdered them, he would hang, titled or not. If he hung, Ginny would not have a father. Damnation, when had I started to think of him as her father?
“No!” I raced after him. “Gabe, don’t!”
He reached the top of the steps. I grabbed his arm. He paused, but I could feel the tightness in his body, a tiger ready to pounce. When he looked back at me, his eyes were dark flames of pure determination. I’d never seen a man look so cold. “Ginny, let me go.”
I hadn’t forgiven him, but I didn’t want him to hang for murder, and I didn’t want him to ruin the life I had managed to scrape together. “Gabe, don’t.”
“Ginny, let me go.”
Shite, he wasn’t going to relent. It was as if the rational, calm man I knew had fled. In his place was a monster full of vengeance and retribution. Blasted idiot would get us both in trouble.
And so I did the only thing I could think of doing.
I threw my arms around his neck, and pressed my lips to his. For one long moment he didn’t move. And I knew. I needed to do more. Desperate, I slid my tongue between his lips, kissing him in the way he’d taught me that year ago.
His muscles turned to steel. With a groan, he clamped his arms around me and jerked me impossibly close, crushing me to his body. Tight. Almost too tight. I could barely breathe. Yet, I didn’t dare complain. This is what I’d wanted. This is what I’d been hungering for, yet hadn’t known I needed.
It was instantaneous, the burning desire that speared my body. He smelled of autumn leaves, of spicy male and warmth. Slowly, I lifted my hands and unbuttoned the neck of his shirt. Farther, button by button, until his shirt fell open, and I could touch his muscled chest. Boldly, I slid my hands down his warm body, reveling over the feel of his skin. Down, my fingers tip-toed, over the dips and mountains of muscle.
“You are stunning,” I whispered against his mouth.
He gripped my bottom and pulled me to him. His cock throbbed hard and demanding against my lower belly. I needed him inside of me. Desperately. Needed to know if the intense pleasure I’d felt that year ago had been imagined, or true.
“Gabe, please,” I gasped.
With a growl, he scooped me up and carried me toward the bed. The possessiveness in his gaze frightened me as much as it excited me. He released his hold and I slid down his body. I wasn’t supposed to fall for him so quickly. To forgive him so easily.
“Tell me you want me.” He jerked my skirts up my thighs, his movements determined, demanding. “Tell me, Ginny.”
“Damn you,” I hissed, running my hands over his chest. “I hate you.”
“Yes, I know.” He pushed his knee between my legs, pressing his muscled thigh to my throbbing center. “Tell me you want me.”
He rocked his thigh forward, and the friction almost sent me over the edge. I gasped, arching my back. Damn him! Damn him to hell! Nothing had changed. Nothing. He still made me burn. Still made me hunger for him in a way that would ruin me. And in the moment, I still didn’t care.
“Answer me,” he demanded.
“Yes!” I gripped his shirt in my hands and glared up at him. “Damnation! I want you!”