Rogue Countess (22 page)

Damn his captivating smile.

“Good morning,” he said pleasantly enough.

“Do you plan to intrude on my ride every morning?” she asked peevishly.

“Absolutely.” The brief arch of his brows suggested he wasn’t the least bit put out by her rudeness.

She decided to ignore him as she readied George, an old racer that had sired a long line of winners. The task was more difficult than she had imagined. In the dark and narrow space of the stables, her senses seemed to be extra sensitive to Jude’s movements as he readied his horse. Then, when he murmured words of encouragement and praise, the softened tone lifted the fine hairs on Anna’s skin as her body reacted viscerally to the velvet quality of his voice. What would it feel like if he were to whisper love words against her skin while holding her close in a warm and intimate embrace?

Cursing her weakness, Anna focused on thoughts of horses and races and business. She had several appointments this week that appeared promising. Apparently, Lord Peney had spread word of his success on the track to other gentlemen race hobbyists of his circle. She also needed to make a point of visiting Tattersalls. She still needed to acquire a fitting mare for Charles.

She managed to keep up a steady stream of thought that did not involve Jude during the entire ride to the park. And he didn’t seem inclined to force any conversation, for which she was grateful. Once they reached the start of Rotten Row, Anna dug in her heels, leaned forward over her mount and George instantly jumped into a sprinting gallop. The old boy still had it in him, she thought with a proud smile as she reveled in the speed and power of the retired racer beneath her.

Jude rode Richard. As magnificent as the gelding was, without the proper strength and control of a highly experienced jockey, the young thoroughbred would not be able to catch up to George.

She closed her eyes and for a few brief precious moments felt liberated and in control of her destiny. Then, as she probably should have expected, Jude intruded on her reprieve.

At first, when she heard the sound of a rider approaching behind her, she didn’t consider that it could be Jude. But a quick glance over her shoulder revealed the amazing sight of Jude leaning close over Richard’s back, urging the horse to a speed he rarely achieved.

Anna was stunned.

And irritated.

She pushed her heels to George’s sides. The experienced racer responded immediately to Anna’s instruction as well as to the familiar feeling of another horse encroaching upon his lead.

The wind whipped past her face as she crouched over her mount, trusting the horse and her abilities as a rider. This was where she claimed her strength and her freedom. In this moment, as she rode full out with nothing to hold her back and no one to tell her that she must limit the stretch of her dreams or her focus.

Jude was getting close to her horse’s left side, but he had no chance of overtaking her. Her laughter was filled with triumph and delight. She pulled up on the reins when they reached the end of the long straight stretch and slowed George to an easier pace. Jude brought Richard up alongside her, expertly easing the gelding into a cooling lope.

She turned to him with a smug expression of delight on her flushed face. “I never lose a race.”

Jude was grinning as he replied, “Not a fair test, sweetheart. You started off without a shot. I was behind you from the start.”

Anna lifted her black brows imperiously. “Are you saying I cheated?”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Jude replied with a quick laugh. They turned their mounts off the path and slowed them to a walk as they crossed a sunlit stretch of lawn. “I’d be afraid of what you might do to me in retaliation for such a claim.”

Mischief sparkled in Anna’s eyes. “No need to worry, Jude. I haven’t got my whip with me today.”

He laughed again and the sound filled Anna with a sense of pleasure and contentment that was so lovely it frightened her. This was the Jude she remembered from her youth. This warm, laughing, openhearted man. Her heart thudded painfully and she became breathless with longing and bone-deep sadness combined.

“What happened to you, Jude?” she asked.

It was a willful step into dangerous territory, but the compelling desire to understand him was far stronger in that moment than the instinct for self-preservation.

His face changed so drastically at her odd question that it was almost comical. His smile tilted to one side and his blue eyes squinted as he eyed her with amusement and confusion combined.

“What? Has something happened to me?”

Anna couldn’t bring herself to smile back.

“This is the first time I’ve seen true pleasure on your face since your return. You used to laugh like this all the time before you left.”

Jude scowled. The joy faded from his expression as he reacted to the personal nature of her observation. Anna’s heart sank with guilt at how quickly she had managed to chase away his enjoyment, but she didn’t regret her inquiry.

“My return to England was not exactly what I anticipated. I have been busy dealing with a stubborn issue that is not resolving as easily as I’d hoped.”

His reply was given in monotone. There was no accusing inflection, just the simple statement of fact. Anna looked down at the reins in her hand. She rubbed the leather with her gloved thumb thoughtfully before she took a solid breath and lifted her gaze to focus on the large spreading oak tree that stood ahead of them.

“Have you hated me so very much over the years?”

When he remained silent in the minutes following her question, she glanced aside at him. He stared ahead across the park, squinting a bit into the sun that had topped the horizon only an hour before. The crow’s feet at the corners of his eyes deepened, making him look weary and strong at the same time.

She was coming to adore those tiny lines.

When he turned to glance at her, his brows had dropped even lower over his blue eyes and he slowly shook his golden head.

“Do you intentionally set out to destroy these types of pleasant moments, or do you just have a knack for awkward questions and somber subjects?”

Anna almost smiled. Almost. Then shrugged.

“A knack, I guess.”

Jude pulled back on his horse’s reins, forcing Anna to do the same if she expected to continue talking with him. He faced her squarely and the lines of his face were harder and deeper than she had ever seen.

“I barely bothered to think of you at all once I stepped foot on the ship that carried me from England. Is that what you want to hear? You were a shard of the past I fervently wished to forget. And I found some very effective ways to distract my memory. When I knew I would be coming back, I only thought of ending the marriage. I honestly didn’t consider you much at all.” Without allowing her to interrupt, he went on. “If you had been a greedy grasping parasite, I would have found your price, paid you off, sent you on your way and never thought of you again. If you had been a manipulating opportunist who begged for forgiveness and vowed everlasting devotion with false tears and scheming intentions, I probably would have taken you to bed. You are an exceptionally beautiful woman, after all. Then I would have told you to find protection elsewhere.”

He paused then and his sharp unforgiving blue eyes fell upon her. She stared back at him, silent and dumbfounded at his brutal honesty, helpless to defend herself. Her spine had stiffened painfully as she prepared herself for what he may say next, and her throat felt as if it were squeezed around a hard and gritty stone.

“Did I hate you once? With every breath. Do I hate you now?” Jude sighed heavily. His expression as he faced her was not unkind, but there was not even a hint of the pleasure he had shown earlier. “I am dumbfounded by you, Anna, but no, I don’t dislike you,” Jude confessed. “You behave in a manner opposite of what I’d expect. I can’t figure you out. And the passion in you draws me with a force stronger than I’ve ever known.”

The last was said in a low murmur that roused fine sparks of sensation across Anna’s skin and alerted her to the fact that the discussion had veered off course. The questions in his gaze and the deep investigative interest in his voice warned her he might try to ask her something about herself or their past that she could not answer.

“Is that what you were in search of when you were hopping into the perfumed beds of all those foreign princesses and actresses and dignitary’s wives?”

A flash of something brightened his eyes. Anger? Surprise?

“Don’t forget the tavern wenches and harem concubines,” he added in a cold drawl.

“Did you find passion in the arms of all those women,” Anna asked again, and was distressed to hear the emotion evident in her voice.

Her horse turned in a quick circle and sidestepped nervously as if sensing her upset. His movements brought her around to face Jude before she managed to pull tight on the reins and bring him back under control.

“What on earth does that have to do with anything?” Jude asked with incredulous frustration harsh in his voice.

“Was it worth it, Jude?” Anna asked, ignoring his question. The words that tumbled forth were edged with a rough note of accusation. “Running off. Staying away from your home and your family. No cares, no duty, no responsibility to anyone except yourself.”

“No wife,” Jude added sharply.

Anna bit her tongue to hold back the growl of pained fury welling in her throat. Instead, she lifted her chin defiantly and her dark eyes blazed with the righteous anger over what he had just said. And everything she still didn’t have the courage to say.

“Come on, Anna.” He shoved a hand through his pale curls in an agitated gesture. “You cannot possibly play the part of the betrayed wife in this.” His direct gaze challenged her to refute him. “After what you did, you didn’t honestly think I would settle into some cozy little married life with you. Such naiveté and vulnerable innocence doesn’t suit you, sweetheart.”

Anna stared at him for a moment, noting his complete lack of remorse and the absolute confidence he had in the justification of his position. The stone in her throat dropped like lead into her heart.

In truth, even at sixteen, she had not been so naïve as to think that the unusual circumstances of their marriage would not breed some serious difficulties. But a part of her had hoped that in time they might have been able to get past some of it. Theirs was not the first marriage forced by a young girl’s family when her reputation was at stake. She had figured on being able to explain to Jude that she had been a victim of the plot, same as him. She had imagined the two of them getting to know each other.

At least, that was what she had thought in the beginning, before she had realized her new husband was not going to return for her. That he had truly abandoned her. And then she had wanted to crawl into the tiniest black hole. She had dreamed of being able to fold in upon herself a thousand times until she was nothing more than a speck of lost thought. She was a bride with no husband, a girl with no family and no knowledge of what the future may bring.

Eventually, she had found her way back.

Her horses, her friends, the life she had built for herself. And she was putting it all on the line in some rebellious attempt to make her errant husband feel sorry for how his abandonment and the actions that followed had hurt her. How utterly foolish.

She wanted to hate Jude, but she never could. She knew she should release him from the marriage, but felt helpless against the knowledge that he would be lost to her forever. She was being just as manipulative and deceitful as he believed her to be.

Pulling back on George’s reins, she backed the horse up to turn him around. Before she got two steps, Jude reached out and grasped a hold of the horse’s bridle. He held tight until she lifted her eyes to meet his.

“This doesn’t have to be so difficult. It doesn’t have to be this constant war between us.”

What would happen if she stopped fighting him? If she set aside her desire for vengeance and agreed to an amicable end to the marriage?

When had she become so damned desperate to keep him tied to her, even if it were only in a struggle? It could only last for so long before a winner would have to be declared.

With a sinking heart, she fully understood the quandary in which she had securely placed herself. Ultimately, her original motivation had been the desire for Jude to understand what his selfish decision had done to her. But as long as he still believed she had been the one to drug him and force him into marriage, he would feel justified in his actions. And he would never know of the pain he had caused her if he never knew of the love she had carried in her heart from the moment she had first seen him.

Either way, she lost. There was too great a cost attached to a disclosure of the truth, and resisting him only managed to entangle her further in her own feelings for the man.

When she finally responded, she forced a note of strength into her voice that failed to reverberate beyond the words themselves.

“You make an excellent point.” Anna exhaled on a long and shaky sigh. “I am finished with fighting you, Jude. I will raise no obstacles to the annulment.” The burning pinch of tears gathered behind her eyelids and she swiftly looked away from the deep penetration of his blue eyes. “You are free,” she stated stiffly.