Riley's Sleeping Beauty Read online

  Oddly, there seemed nothing strange about finding that this stranger was the one who aroused such heart-stopping sensations, either. While they had met under the most unlikely circumstances, she was quite sure that they were soul mates. That recognition was something that had come to her in an instant. It was proof that no amount of time could make the wrong person right, while the right man was recognizable in no time at all.

  “Lady Abigail?”

  “Yes, Captain Walker.”

  “I have a very great yearning to kiss you,” he said quite matter-of-factly, though his gaze was anything but calm.

  Her pulse ricocheted wildly. “Is that so? What is stopping you?”

  “The conviction that one kiss would never be enough.”

  “I must admit that I, too, feel it would be difficult to stop with a single kiss.” She sighed, then brightened. She would not let this chance die so easily. “We could experiment and see for certain.”

  He regarded her intently. “And what if we are correct? What then?”

  Heady with her newly awakened feminine power, she said boldly, “You are a gentleman, is that not true?”

  He laughed at the suggestion, the sound echoing off the walls of the small cabin. “I am a pirate, my lady. No one would mistake me for a gentleman.”

  “But you saved me from Higgins,” she protested.

  “Perhaps it was only so that I might have you for myself.”

  “I do not believe that,” she said dismissively. “I believe you are at heart a gentleman. Therefore if one kiss should be our limit, then I am most sure you would stop with that.”

  “Then you credit me with a restraint I fear I do not possess. Under these circumstances, one kiss would be too many and yet not nearly enough,” he said with obvious regret.

  Abby refused to give up so easily. She had this vaguely alarming sensation that once before she had known a man who placed honor above passion. In so doing, in refusing to claim her out of some misguided sense of duty, he had relegated her to a life of tepid emotions with another. She would not allow the same thing to happen now.

  She had not known then how to fight for the love she wanted, and so she had let him slip away. Looking into Captain Walker’s face, catching the glint of longing in his eyes, she cursed the rare nobility that kept him from taking that first, daring kiss. She thought she could see, too, what the restraint was costing him. His hands were clenched into tight fists at his sides, to keep them from reaching out to her, no doubt. His jaw was set, most likely to prevent a whispered encouragement that would draw her to him. His entire body was tensed, as if under strictest orders to hold back.

  She ruined it all, cut through every stern defense by reaching out to caress his rough cheek. A sigh shuddered through him. Heat flared at once in his eyes, making them sparkle like emeralds in sunlight.

  “You are tempting fate,” he warned in a low, uneven voice.

  “I am,” she agreed, deliberately stepping closer, until she could feel the heat radiating from his body.

  “Why?”

  “Because I would know you, Captain Walker. I wish to see where the fates have led us.”

  With one trembling hand, he touched her hair, fingers tangling in the ebony strands, then freeing it to flow like silk. Roughened fingers traced the curve of her jaw and made her heart leap. With the pad of his thumb he outlined her lower lip in a slow, provocative gesture that made her pulse run wild.

  “I fear the fates are leading us into trouble, my lady,” he said, though he did not stop the gentle caresses that were making her knees weak and filling her with an indefinable yearning.

  “It is a journey I am willing to take,” she insisted, though her voice shook.

  “Once taken,” he reminded her, “there is no turning back.”

  Abby knew that, prayed that it would be as true for him as it was for her. She wanted the threads of passion to be woven as tightly around his heart as they were around her own. “I understand that.” She tilted her head and studied him intently. “Do you understand it, as well?”

  He looked taken aback by the question. “It is not the same for a man,” he protested.

  Her spirits sank, but she pressed on, willing him to see what she saw. “Then we do not speak of the same thing, do we?”

  His eyes narrowed. “Meaning?”

  “No doubt you are speaking of bedding a woman, while I am talking of love.”

  “I have told you before, my lady, the sea is my mistress. There is no room in my life for love.”

  He said it with an air of disdain, the protest of a man who liked his life as it was, who dismissed love as an inconvenience, rather than claiming it for the joy it was.

  “Just room enough for someone to share your bed,” she said.

  “Aye.”

  Despite the conviction with which he spoke, Abby did not believe him. Given time, she would prove to him exactly how shortsighted he was. She would find a niche in his heart and take her place there for all eternity. That long-denied kiss would be a start.

  Without speaking another word, she stepped closer still, stood on tiptoe and touched her lips to his. The gesture was cool, almost chaste, but it held the promise of fire. She heard his gasp of surprise, felt his muscles tense beneath the hands she had placed on his shoulders. And then his lips parted and his tongue found hers and her entire body turned to liquid heat. The fire raged as brightly as she had imagined.

  Somewhere, somehow she found the strength to pull away. Looking into his dazed expression, she smiled. “The deal was one kiss, Captain.”

  He reached for her again. “I told you we could never be limited to that.”

  Abby backed away. “One kiss,” she insisted, though her own breathing was unsteady and her entire body pleaded with her to capitulate.

  Apparently he saw the struggle she had with herself and recognized the strength of will it took her to say no, for he grinned eventually. “I admire a woman who knows her own mind. You will do quite nicely, Lady Abigail.”

  Her gaze narrowed. “I will do? What does that mean?”

  “It means that I shall enjoy the challenge of seducing you, my lady. It will make our time at sea pass quickly.”

  “And then?”

  His expression set stubbornly. “And then we will be in port and you will go your way and I will go mine.”

  Her heart sank. “If that is your plan, Captain, then we have nothing more to discuss. I find that I am very tired. I would like to be left alone.”

  “Sorry,” he said, sprawling across the narrow bed. “If you wish to sleep, my lady, it will have to be with me by your side.”

  There wasn’t a doubt in her mind that he meant it, either. “You are no gentleman,” she accused.

  He grinned. “At last you have seen the truth of it.” He patted the sliver of space beside him. “Come, my lady. You can use my shoulder to rest your head.”

  “I would rather die first,” she said, snatching up mounds of discarded clothes and piling them in a corner of the room to form a makeshift bed.

  To her fury, Riley laughed as she tried to find a comfortable position on the ridiculous pallet. She swore she could hear rats scurrying nearby and it made her blood turn to ice in her veins.

  “You will be cold,” he warned.

  “I would rather freeze than share a bed with you.”

  “You will be lonely.”

  “No more so than you.”

  That silenced him. “Aye,” he said at last. “No more so than I.”

  * * *

  Abby awoke to the feel of strong, masculine arms wrapped around her, the feel of rough cloth against her cheek and the sensation of a strong, steady heartbeat beneath her ear.

  Blinking, she glanced around and realized that at some point during the night Captain Walker had ignored her wishes and brought her into the bed with him. A blanket was snugly wrapped around them both, though the truth of it was that his body provided all the heat she needed.

  As much
as she longed to stay where she was, she knew she could not. Staying would cost her whatever ground she had gained the night before. Riley had to see that she meant what she said, and that she would not back down, even under the most tempting circumstances.

  She didn’t waste time trying to slip away, but roughly dislodged first one arm and then another. He awoke as she was scrambling over him.

  “What is this?” he protested, looping an arm around her waist and hauling her back.

  “I told you that I would not share this bed with you. Did your brain not grasp the point?”

  He grinned. “Do you not recall crawling into this bed yourself in the wee hours of the night?”

  She regarded him indignantly. “Most certainly not.”

  “Then surely you must have been sleepwalking.”

  Some of her certainty evaporated under his cool, deliberate stare. “I came to this bed of my own volition?”

  “So it seemed to me,” he said lazily.

  Something about his words and the glint in his eyes troubled her. “Riley Walker, did I or did I not get up from my pallet on the floor and walk to this bed?”

  “Did I not already answer that?”

  “No, you have talked in circles. I want the truth.”

  “You were there. Now you are here. What could be more clear-cut than that?”

  “It is the manner of my arrival that is in question. Was I assisted or no?”

  He shrugged. “Perhaps I gave you some small measure of assistance.”

  “I knew it!” she said and took a swat at him. “You are a liar, as well as a rogue.”

  Laughing, he ducked the blow. “There was no lie. Think back on what I said, my lady.”

  “Your silver tongue will not talk its way around this, Captain Walker. You brought me to this bed in direct defiance of my wishes.”

  “You screamed,” he countered, obviously seizing on a new tack, now that the first had failed.

  “I did not.”

  He nodded. “I am certain I heard you, my lady. You murmured something about a rat.”

  “The only rat in this room is in this bed.”

  He looked hurt. “You have such a low opinion of me?”

  “It sinks lower by the minute,” she replied.

  For some reason, the moment the words were out of her mouth, she saw them as a serious miscalculation, though she could not have explained why. Perhaps it was something in his expression, a wickedness that promised the match was far from over.

  “If that is so,” he said thoughtfully, “then it would not seem to matter much what I would do next.”

  She watched him worriedly. “I do not think I like the sound of that.”

  He grinned. He reached for her and seized her wrist, hauling her unceremoniously back atop him. “Aye, this is much better.”

  When she would have scrambled away, he held her tightly in place. “Indeed, this is the way it should be between a man and a woman,” he said quietly, his gaze locked with hers. “Spirit and passion.”

  Every last ounce of struggle in Abby died at the haunted look in his eyes. She saw hunger and need and longing, all emotions she guessed he would never state aloud. Perhaps the fact that he felt them would be enough for now.

  She allowed herself to be drawn closer. She waited with her heart in her throat for his fingers to close around the nape of her neck, for him to draw her down until their lips met in a kiss of such longing and desperation that it would seal their fate as words had not.

  The first touch of his lips was gentle as a summer breeze. But as quiet and tender as it was, it stirred a riot of sensations more powerful than the force of a summer storm. It quite literally took her breath away.

  “You are a witch, my lady,” he whispered against her lips, his own chest heaving. “Perhaps that explains how you come to be aboard this ship. You are indeed a witch of the sea.”

  Reassured by his pretty words that the effect was as potent for him as it was for her, Abby threw herself back into the kiss with enthusiasm. As if from a great distance, she heard him groan softly, felt him shift uneasily beneath her. His hand swept down the curve of her back, over her buttocks and cupped her solidly to him.

  “The game is ended, Lady Abigail,” he warned in a voice tight with tension.

  She looked evenly into his eyes and nodded. “This is no mistake, Captain Walker. I know what I am about.”

  “Do you? I wonder,” he said.

  But even with his doubts, he did not hesitate to claim her mouth again. He did not hesitate to cover her breast with a bold grasp that made her moan with the exquisite pleasure of it. Nor did he hesitate to place her hand between them so that she felt for the first time the power she had over him.

  This, surely, was what it meant to be loved. This ability to create fire and excitement, to arouse these fierce passions, surely could not be explained by a lesser emotion. If he was afraid to say the word, so be it. That did not mean he could not express it in this most basic way.

  Abby touched a finger to the pulse at the base of his throat and felt the skin heat, felt his heart race. She loved the way his skin felt, rougher than her own, hotter, more intriguing with its tiny cuts and scars that hinted of adventures past. Her hand was so pale and delicate against his tanned flesh that the very contrast became a source of fascination. She wondered how far the sun had touched. Just this place on his neck? His chest and back, perhaps? Or lower still? Intrigued, she slid aside his shirt while he watched her intently, surprise and delight in his eyes. When she reached for his breeches, however, he stopped her.

  “Enough, my lady. You would test me too severely.”

  Glancing at the distinctive bulge in his breeches, she said dryly, “It would appear that you are up to the test, Captain Walker.”

  His laughter echoed off the walls of the tiny cabin. Holding her in his arms, he rolled until she was beneath him, his legs tangled with hers, her skirts well up beyond the point of decency. The touch of flesh against flesh sent waves of pure delight rolling through her.

  She wanted more, though. She wanted to see and touch...everything. She wanted her own skin ablaze from his caresses. She ached with the very longing for it.

  His hand was lifting the bottom edge of her skirt, skimming along her thigh, teasing her with the promise of so much more, when there was a terrible pounding on the door.

  “Captain! Captain! There’s a ship coming up starboard, the one they call the ship of gold.”

  Riley was on his feet in a heartbeat, leaving her abandoned and filled with a terrible, aching emptiness.

  “Stay below!” he ordered as he ran for the door, excitement blazing in his eyes.

  As he went, without another thought for her, Abby wondered ruefully if she could ever mean as much to him as these rare and dangerous adventures that brought such fire to his eyes. How long would it be before she began to hate the competition for his attention, especially since, despite his pretty words, he evidently had no intention of sharing the actual adventure with her?

  With a sigh, she straightened her clothes and used the pitcher of water on the nightstand to freshen up as all sorts of hell raged over her head. Cannons fired. Screams tore through the early morning quiet and shattered her attempt to pretend that this was a normal, everyday occurrence.

  She pulled at the cabin door, intent on going to see for herself that the man she loved was alive, but he had guessed she would do exactly that, despite his orders, and had locked her in again. Left with no choice at all, she huddled on the bed while the terrible sounds exploded above her.

  “Riley,” she murmured over and over, part curse of frustration, part prayer. “Riley. Damn you. I love you.” On and on, she called out his name, until it was the only sound left to break the sudden, ominous silence all around her.

  CHAPTER TEN

  She was calling his name.

  Riley woke with a start to find that Abigail was whispering his name over and over. Her voice was raspy from disuse, but there was n
o mistaking that single word. Her movements were even more agitated than they had been when she’d set off her monitor earlier in the week.

  “Riley? Riley!”

  There was a frantic desperation in her tone that tore at his heart. What in God’s name could she be dreaming that had put her in so much distress? Before he could figure it out, she cried out his name once more.

  “I’m here, darling,” he whispered, brushing a strand of hair from her cheek. He allowed his fingers to linger against the pale skin in a reassuring caress. “I’m right here.”

  She quieted at once, an expression of peaceful serenity stealing over her face. He wondered at the calming effect of his presence, wondered what she could possibly be dreaming that painted him as the good guy, wondered if he could live up to her expectations this time, as he hadn’t when he’d tried to ship her home to safety.

  Since she seemed quieter when he talked, he kept at it, suddenly determined to tell her all the things he’d kept hidden in his heart.

  “Do you have any idea how much I’ve missed you? I don’t mean just these past few days. I mean ever since I left home,” he said, glad of the lateness of the hour so that he could make the admission without fear of Jared turning up at any moment to taunt him for it. Except in an emergency, the doctors and nurses paid scant attention to their patients in the wee small hours of the night. He desperately needed this privacy, needed time to make amends to her, to say all the things he had deliberately kept bottled up inside during the long, lonely years of his self-imposed exile.

  He had left Phoenix all those years ago knowing that he was falling in love with Abby, knowing that he could never give her the kind of emotional commitment that she deserved. He had been convinced he didn’t have that kind of love left in him after so many tragic losses.

  Still, he had not been able to stop himself from sending an occasional postcard. He had chosen the pictured scenes with care, searching for the most exotic or most romantic. Writing the brief messages, penned only after careful thought, had been his only link to Abby and to his past.

  “Dear Abby...Paris is exactly what we always imagined.”

  “Dear Abby...Found the most amazing ruin in Egypt. Those books we read didn’t do the place justice.”