If You Desire - Cole Kresley (читать книги полностью без сокращений бесплатно .TXT) 📗

Perhaps Ethan would lose interest in her over the coming days. "I know she's a friend of Jane's, so doona hurt that lass, Ethan, or you'll answer to me." He stuffed theLeabhar into his bag.

Ethan's cold expression turned menacing. "You think you can stop me if I feel like amusing myself? Go to hell, Hugh. You're smug about this subject, too," Ethan said. "But if you get Jane killed, you'll find you have a lot in common with me. Brother, you'll end upjust like me ."

Hugh cast him a disgusted look before turning away. As Ethan shut the door behind him, Hugh thought he heard him mutter, "Just doona end up like me…."

Chapter Twelve

Though well over an hour had passed by the time Hugh returned to the Weylands', their muffled argument was still going strong in the study, so he sank down into a chair outside the room. He let his aching head fall back against the wall while he anxiously brushed his fingers over the small case in his jacket pocket.

Everything in Ridergate's whisper-quiet shop had appeared breakable to a man of Hugh's size, and he'd wanted to pull at his collar the entire time he was there. But when Hugh had found just the ring for her, he hadn't hesitated to spend a small fortune on it. What else was he going to spend his money on, if not her?

He'd known what to buy her because, that last summer, she'd told him exactly what she dreamed of receiving from her future bridegroom: "A gold ring with emeraldsand an enormous diamond in the middle. It should be so heavy, I'll be forever knocking it into things, breaking shopkeepers' counters and accidentally unmanning pedestrians."

They'd been floating in a rowboat, her head in his lap as he played with her silky hair, fascinated as he lifted it to the sunlight, but he'd frozen at her words, tensing with anxiety. As a second son, he'd had no money to speak of and could never afford anything remotely like what she'd described.

Then he'd remembered that he could never have her anyway….

Now, years later, he stared at the ceiling as round and round his mind played out the same scenarios and consequences.

Far too early in life, he'd learned about consequences, both avoidable and unavoidable.

The morning after he and his brothers had found and read theLeabhar —which was thought to have been destroyed—Hugh had woken to his mother's screams. She'd discovered her husband, Leith, the clan laird and a bear of a man in his prime, cold and dead in their bed.

And then she'd shrieked her blame. Hugh had been nigh on fourteen, far too young to be saddled with that guilt.

Years later, Ethan had scoffed at the curse, calling their father's death a freak coincidence, and found a bride from the neighboring MacReedy clan who would actually dare to wed a "cursed MacCarrick son." Sarah had fallen—or, as most believed, had been pushed by Ethan—from a turret at Carrickliffe.

Then Court had lost his heart to a foreign lass and intended to marry her, though he knew that he could never give her children and would only bring her misery.

Court had been defiant, daring to challenge their fate—until his Annalia had been a breath away from being shot in the head. Court had finally left her behind, safe at her home in Andorra, though it had nearly killed him. She'd become his entire world.

Consequences.The lines within that book said Hugh was not to marry or to bind. Hugh worked to convince himself there was a difference betweenmarried andwed .

Damn it, there would be no sealed union. If Jane agreed, they would be wed, but not truly bound together. As long as he didn't claim her, she'd be safe. Surely. And God knew, he had no intentions of keeping her.

He stood when Jane came out five minutes later, her eyes bright with either unshed tears or fury. A good wager said the latter.

What's it to be, then? What's the verdict?

Weyland was right behind her. "I'll just go send a note to the minister and pick up the marriage license. Jane, you need to begin packing immediately."

Then Weyland was gone, leaving Hugh so dumbfounded he nearly rocked on his feet. "You're going tae…" he began, but his voice broke lower. "We're tae…marry?"

"Yes, I am constrained to agree to this insanity—you are not. And you will ruin my life if you don't refuse to do this for him." Turmoil and emotion rolled off her in waves. She'd always been like that—volatile, like an explosive. Yet no one but Hugh seemed to understand just howcomplicated Jane was.

So Weyland had succeeded. Hugh hadn't expected her to be happy about the nuptials, but…"A temporary marriage to me counts as a ruined life?"

Every word she spoke was clipped with her proper English accent, and dripping with outrage. "Do you knowwhy I was with Frederick Bidworth—LordWhiting—this morning?" She answered her own question, "Because I was accepting his soddingproposal today!"

Hugh's vision swam. But why should he be surprised? He'd wondered as each month went by, for years, why she hadn't married.Wait. How had Weyland not known about this? He had to have. She was about to be "settled" without any interference from them.

Bloody hell. This just kept getting better. Hugh had wanted to kill Bidworth for kissing Jane—whom the man had thought was his.

"However, my plans were interrupted when youattacked Freddie."

Jane was within her rights to be kissing her soon-to-be fiance. Just because Hugh could think of naught but her didn't mean she was affected the same way by him. She'd had a life of her own these last years, and Hugh had just been dropped in the middle of it, swinging as he landed. "You were about to accept an earl, yet your father is still insisting on me?" It was a genuine question, but she took it as a retort and glared at him.

"Why, Hugh? Why is Davis Grey doing this? You know him—is he truly so dangerous that I have to flee my home?" Her face was drawn with confusion. "Why is Father so set onyou ? Did he blackmail you into this as well? Of course he did. Why else would you agree to such a lunatic idea?"

"I've no' been blackmailed, but I have promised your father. Just cooperate with me. The arrangement will no' be permanent as long as we doona…consummate the marriage." He lowered his voice. "Rest easy, this is temporary. I have no intention of remaining married any more than you do. And you know that if I dinna touch you before, then you're safe from it now."

"As if I'd let you," she hissed.

He pinched the bridge of his nose. His head was throbbing, his neck knotted with tension, but he tried to calm his tone. His ire never daunted Jane. "Did you ever think that this is no' something I want either?"

No, he didn't want this, was never supposed to marry. But now that he'd seen her once more, he didn't want anyone else to wed her either. And he was just selfish enough to agree to Weyland's machinations. Her father knew what was best for her, he reasoned, and Weyland had chosen Hugh. "Jane, I dinna come here thinking I'd leave with a bride."

"Then why did you tell Papa tosee it done ?"

"Because I can protect you."

She advanced until she was toe to toe with him, unflinching as she raised her face to his. "If you do this, Hugh, you have no idea how much I'll make you regret it. I'm giving you fair warning right now to desist from this."

When he said nothing, making his expression unbending, her lips parted in disbelief.

"Resolved, are we? Then so must I be." She made her tone soft when she asked, "Hugh, do you remember when I used to tease you?"

As if he could ever,ever forget.

"Darling, you're going to find that I've gotten better at it." She walked her fingers up his chest, and her voice grew breathless. "You'll see that I've gathered new arrows…in my quiver." Somehow she made that phrase sound wicked, and the customary sweat beaded on his brow.