Kate Cross - Touch of Steel

Fortunately she was not left to melancholy for long. Approximately thirty-three insanely long minutes later, there came a knock upon her door, immediately follow Siatolyed by the clanging, hissing and thumping of the locking mechanism. When the heavy slab swung open, two guards stood at the threshold.

“Time to go, miss,” the smaller of the two informed her.

How formal and polite these Englishmen were. Were she a man, would they call her “sir”? Or was it some unshakeable sense of chivalry that made them defer to her, even though she was a prisoner?

It hardly mattered. Claire rose to her feet, gathered up what few items she had and stood quietly while one of them locked shackles over her boots. Not so polite now, she thought. Then the other guard took the bag with her belongings in it from her hands. “I’ll carry that, miss.”

Remembering her own manners, Claire thanked him. Each guard took hold of one of her arms—her wrists shackled in front—and led her from the cell.

The corridor looked like something out of an upscale hotel fallen on hard times. The carpet was of good quality but a little shabby. The wood could have used a good buff and polish. She’d lived in worse.

They took her to an ascension room—or lift, as she’d heard them called over here. Inside, one of them inserted a punch card into a slot located in a box near the gate. Once they were shut in, the enclosure jerked into motion and carried them upward.

Three floors later, the lift finally lurched to a stop. The guard opened the gate, and the two of them escorted her into a vestibule that reminded her of the waiting area of a doctor’s office. There were a couple of chairs and a sofa, a scuffed coffee table—did they call them tea tables here?—and a small sideboard with a pot of water sitting on a heating coil, and all the necessary items to make a cup of tea.

But Claire didn’t care about tea, or the decor. Her attention was riveted on the man who rose from the sofa as she was led toward him. Alastair Payne. Her heart stuttered at the sight of him—one of the few men who didn’t look at her as though they’d been hit in the face with a brick, or as though they thought they might smugly charm their way into her bed. His handsome, rugged face was void of any sort of reaction as she approached—a fact that only made him that much more interesting in her eyes.

His thick, wavy hair shone with copper highlights, and his storm-cloud eyes looked all the more intense when paired with a dark teal tailcoat—a hue only redheads could wear and look good. The coat appeared to be new, and it fit his broad shoulders perfectly. His waist and hips were narrow—perhaps a little too narrow—but his trousers were snug enough to make any warm-blooded woman regard his backside with appreciation. There was nothing as disappointing as a handsome man with an unfortunate arse.

He was as pretty as a peacock, and she felt as drab as a hen.

“Take the shackles off,” he commanded with a scowl at the restraints.

“But she’s the Dove, my lord!” one of the guards replied.

Claire smiled at the man. “Flatterer.”

The guard flushed and turned back to Wolfred, who looked at him even more fiercely. “I said take them off .”

Good lord, he was stern. “Or S stled at th you could just give me the key and I’ll do it myself.”

Gray eyes locked with hers, and the smile faltered on her lips. Not since her father had any man made her feel so completely put in her place with little more than a look.

“Give me the key.” He held out his palm. Claire noted that he had faint calluses on his fingers. No idle nobleman was he.

The guard removed the heavy iron key from one on his belt and placed it in Wolfred’s hand.

The earl knelt before her, one booted foot still on the floor. The supple leather was polished so well that it shone. His gleaming hair—almost cinnamon in the light—blocked her from watching, but she felt a tug on the iron around her ankles, and she heard the clang and clunk as they slid to the floor.

“Are you certain that’s a good idea?” she asked him. He was in the perfect position to get the heel of her boot in the chin.

Wolfred lifted his face to look up at her. The sight of him, kneeling at her feet, so close, seemingly supplicant but so obviously in control . . . Damnation, but it made her tremble inside. She wanted to grab him by that gorgeous hair, pull his head back . . .

“Are you an animal, Miss Brooks?”

Claire blinked. She didn’t flush because she was not embarrassed—even if he did appear to be a mind reader. “What’s that?”

“I asked if you were an animal. Are you so ignorant and lacking in rational thought that you need to be restrained? Or are you intelligent enough to know that striking out at me would be a mistake?”

Damn, but he was arrogant. He regarded her so casually and without concern that she wanted to kick him just to prove that she was a little bit of an animal, yes.

But that wouldn’t get her to Howard, and she was so close now, she couldn’t betray Robert by letting her own arrogance get the better of her. “I am not an animal, sir.”

He unlocked the shackles on her wrists and rose to his feet, holding her gaze, so that she was forced to inevitably look up at him. “I didn’t think so.”

Was that a compliment? Who the hell could tell? They stood there, inches apart, staring at each other like two children, each determined to make the other blink first.

“We won’t be traveling as husband and wife,” he informed her. “Too many people at the house party you told us about will know me. They know I’m not married. You’ll have to be my mistress. That will provide a much more believable cover for you if you’re recognized—either as your true self or as Claire Clarke.”

“Mistress,” she sneered. “I’m sure you’ll enjoy that, won’t you?” Perhaps the earl wasn’t as honorable as she had first thought. Everyone knew a mistress wasn’t treated with the same respect as a wife. Well, he’d be sorry if he or any other man tried to abuse her. “Will we be forced to share a room as well?”

One of the guards coughed, but neither she nor Wolfred paid the man any mind. A muscle in the earl’s jaw flexed. He leaned in closer so they were almost nose to nose. She S to Wo refused to draw back. Her mother always said she was like a rat—when cornered, she decided to put up a fight.

“Trust me, woman. I’d rather put my cock in the rudder of a dirigible than let you anywhere near it. Do I make myself clear?”

Claire glared at him. “Perfectly.” Had the remark not stung so much, she might have accused him of liking boys just to bait him, but common sense told her to drop it and fast.

“Good.” Wolfred drew back and swept his hand in front of him. “Then after you.”

She kicked the shackles aside and strode past him with her head held high. For some reason she had the insane urge to smile.

Perhaps Lord Wolfred was an honorable man after all.

There had to be something wrong with him—seriously wrong.

As they boarded his private railcar for the journey north, Alastair had to force himself not to notice how Claire Brooks’s backside looked in her snug trousers. There ought to be a law against women wearing such form-fitting garb. How did they expect a man to concentrate?

Especially a man who always seemed to be attracted to the worst possible women.

There was no denying she was a beautiful woman, so he wouldn’t bother. And he truly would rather trust his privates to a rudder blade than to her person, but that didn’t stop him from thinking about it. She wasn’t overly soft, but she was firm and strong, and there was nothing demure about her. She was brash and direct, and he knew without a doubt she would be the same in bed. Of course he thought about it—how could he not? That didn’t mean he was going to allow himself to make that mistake again.