To Protect a Princess by Jess Michaels
Chapter 22
Ilaria’s ears were ringing as she backed away from Jonah into the parlor. As if she could escape what he was saying.
“Sasha,” she repeated, unable to say anything else.
Her friend, her sister since Ilaria was eight and Sasha merely six, had been harmed, perhaps even worse than harmed. God, could she be dead? Sasha, with her sweet laugh and her smart mouth and her warm embraces? The very thought tore Ilaria’s world to shreds in a horrible instant.
Jonah was still reaching to comfort her in this moment that tore her apart. “She is alive,” he said.
Relief nearly buckled her, and Ilaria leaned into his embrace for a moment. Then she straightened up. This wasn’t the end of this situation. She needed to know it all, so she retook her place on the settee.
“What else?” she whispered. “Please tell me everything.”
“There is little to the note, but that her injuries were not life threatening. She will recover fully. The family is shaken, of course. And they fear for your continued safety, since you were…” His voice broke. “You were obviously the true target of the attack.”
“Let me see it,” Ilaria demanded, holding her hand out for the letter.
He gave it without hesitation and sat down next to her as she read the short message. “It is from the king, himself,” she breathed.
“I think he wrote it more in capacity of brother than king,” Jonah said gently. “Look at how his hand shakes here and here.”
He motioned to two places in the letter and she, too, saw the tremble of Grantham’s writing. It made her heart ache for him and for all of her family, most especially Sasha.
“She was hurt because she was pretending to be me,” she whispered. “Because I ran away from my responsibilities to be your lover in the country.”
Jonah drew back slightly. “This is not your fault, Ilaria. There were good reasons to remove you from London, this very incident being one of them. It might have ended far differently for you. And Sasha has played your double for years. She knew the risks of taking your place and hoped to do her part in saving you.”
Ilaria shook her head. “But she’s still hurt because of me.” Waves of guilt washed over her one by one, and she lowered her face as tears rushed to her eyes. “These people…whoever they are…they aren’t going to stop pursuing my family, pursuing me as some kind of a message to Grantham.”
“Perhaps not, but that’s all the more reason to—”
“Return to London,” she finished.
He stared at her. “No, I was going to say stay here.”
She stood and pressed the message back into his hand. “How can you say that when almost everyone I love is in the midst of danger?”
“And I can’t take you back into the middle of that, especially if you’re the focus of the men who are doing this,” he said, grasping her hands.
She held tighter to them and stared down into his eyes. “If I’m the focus, then I could also be part of the solution.”
“That’s ridiculous,” he snapped, rising to his feet. The emotion that laced his voice was that of the man who loved her, not someone detached.
She touched his face. “I know you’re afraid for me, but please, Jonah. I need to be with my family. I need to be part of solving this problem, before anyone else gets hurt trying to protect me.”
He pressed his lips together hard, but she could see he knew she was correct, as much as he wished to deny it. Deny her. Keep her safe in this little bubble they had created where it was only him, only her, only them. The bubble she had to burst at last.
“If we left for London now, we wouldn’t be there until dark,” he said with a sigh. “And I’m not comfortable with the idea of bringing you in without the ability to see potential threats. We’ll return tomorrow morning. And I can send the man who delivered this,” he held up the folded pages briefly, “back to your family to let them know of our plans. They can increase security further overnight.”
She nearly sagged with relief, though it was tempered with fear. Jonah didn’t want her to go to London because she would be in danger, and the idea that someone wanted her dead was a terrifying one.
He lifted her hand to his lips, and it was only when his warm breath brushed her skin that she realized how cold she was. “I need to hurry to the village to send a message back,” he said, “and tell the driver to prepare everything for tomorrow morning. You should pack your things.”
She blinked. Oh yes, she would have to do that herself. An interesting exercise in independence, for certain. “I will,” she said, and then she stepped closer. “And then tonight is…it’s…”
He caught her hand. “Our last night here. Our last night together.”
“Then we had best make it memorable,” she whispered. She leaned up to kiss him and he buried his fingers in her hair, gripping her scalp with possessive heat before he drew back, panting. “Write your message and deliver it,” she said softly. “I’ll be ready for you when you return.”
He nodded and stepped away to go to his study to write the note, leaving her alone in the hallway for a moment. She drew in a ragged breath. Once she returned to London, everything would change. And she doubted Jonah would like the thoughts that were beginning to form in her mind.
But they had tonight, and she intended to make it memorable.
* * *
Ilaria stood in her chemise, standing over her open trunk in the hidden dressing room, staring at the mess she had made of her gowns. Her maid, June, would be upset when she saw how wrinkled everything was, but she’d done her best and that was all one could do. She closed the trunk but didn’t fasten it. She had a handful of things to add to it later…after…
After she and Jonah shared their last night together.
She blinked and pushed aside the pain of that statement, then walked from the dressing room and into the bedroom.
After struggling out of her dress, a feat that had taken a good quarter of an hour thanks to the buttons along the back, she had spent a long time preparing this room. She’d lit candles, she’d made the bed…well…almost. The coverlet was still cockeyed, but it was good enough. She’d taken a bottle of wine from the kitchen and set it on the bedside table with two glasses.
Everything was in place. All she was missing was…
She heard something from downstairs and peeked from the window to find Jonah dismounting from his horse below. It would take him a moment to put the animal away, so she made her final preparations. She splashed a bit of lilac water behind her ears, took her hair down and combed through it with her fingers to make messy waves around her shoulders. And finally she slipped from her chemise so she was naked.
She climbed into his bed, settled herself on the pillows and opened her legs just a fraction to give him the best view when he entered.
He came into the room, head partially bent. “We are ready for tomorrow. Baker will come to help me load the carriage at…”
He looked up and saw her on his bed.
“…seven,” he finished, his voice rough.
She leaned up on her elbows and arched a brow in his direction. “Then we have only half a day left.”
“Just enough time,” he murmured, and shed his jacket as he came across the room, purpose in each step.
He caught her thighs and used them to pull her forward to the edge of the bed. He bent and brushed his cheek against her exposed sex. She shivered at the roughness of the shadow of a beard there, abrading her tender flesh. She lifted into him, seeking the pleasure she knew he would give.
“So greedy,” he said with a rough laugh that blew warm air against her inner thigh and made her quiver again.
“With you? Always. I want it all. I want everything you have to give,” she whispered.
He lifted his head and their eyes met. “You have it.”
There was a moment of silence where the small room seemed to shrink even further, down to just them. Just this moment. Just what they could share, had shared, would always share, even when this was over.
But before the moment could overwhelm or destroy, he bent his head and languidly licked her sex. She dropped back against the bed, pushing all thought away and widening her legs to open herself to him. He peeled her outer lips back, massaging her gently with one hand as he licked her again, this time slower and more thoroughly.
Immediately, she found herself on the edge, because being near him put her there, being touched by him was almost too much to take. She rose to meet his mouth. He cupped her backside to steady her and feasted on her fast and hard, slow and sweet until her legs shook. Until she was soaked by both his tongue and her own trembling reaction to the pleasure he gave so easily and generously.
He nipped at her, scraping his teeth gently against her clitoris, and she jolted, clutching the coverlet and arching her back against the sharp blast of pleasure that he soothed by sucking the sensitive nub. Waves crested over her, building higher and higher, and at last she could hold it back no longer. She came, keening out his name in the quiet, rolling her hips against him, her vision blurring and her mind emptying of everything but this sensation.
She had not yet come down from the high of that when he stood to his full height, unfastening his fall front, and freed his cock. She wrapped her legs around his waist, tugging him, gasping as his cock nudged her entrance, and then he was sliding home.
He took her hard and fast, his expression lined with passion and desire, but also with the impending loss, the fear, the regret of all that was to come. She cupped the back of his neck, drawing his wet mouth to hers so she would see, wouldn’t feel. She just wanted this now, wanted him.
She ground up against him, holding fast to his shoulders. Her body, already sensitive from release, found the rhythm to bring her back up to the height of pleasure. This time when she came, gripping his cock as she arched her back, he let out a low, heavy groan. He pulled from her, his essence splashing across her stomach, into his hand.
She tugged him forward and he collapsed on the bed beside her, flopping an arm over her. They were quiet a moment there in the silent room. Then she turned on her side and traced his still-clothed arm with her fingertip.
“That was an excellent way to start, Captain.”
He lifted his head from the bed and stared at her. “Start, eh? Not finished with me yet?”
She didn’t wince at that statement, but it took everything in her not to do so. Instead she dragged her fingertip along his jawline, let it cross his lips. He kissed her skin and she shivered.
“Not by a very long way,” she whispered. “Now take off your clothes, Jonah. Time is wasting as we speak.”
He smiled at her, that warm and wonderful expression that he so rarely showed the world but had become hers to enjoy since her arrival in London. But as he stepped back to make a grand show of undressing for her, her heart hurt.
The fact that they had little time remaining was a fact, not part of the game they were playing here in their bed. And soon enough she wouldn’t have the delight of these moments with him ever again.
So she pushed all else aside, and decided to savor this wonderful man for all the hours they had left. Even if these last hours left her exhausted for whatever dangers she would surely face back in London.