Read Cavendish Brothers 02 - To Enchant an Icy Earl for Free Online Page B

he did laugh, a full and cold
sound that left her trembling. When he looked upon her, it was with
unfeeling, hardened eyes. “You misunderstand, Miss Bartlett. What
is impossible is finding anyone on this earth who cares for me.
I’ve run them all off.”
    She’d never heard a man more sure of
anything in her life. Calista should pity him—a man so seemingly
cold and callous that no one in his life remained. Yet pity was the
furthest thing from her mind as she watched him.
    He was not as frigid as he might
appear—there wasn’t a doubt in her mind that a living, beating
heart resided in his chest. That his chest housed a passion so
intense it could scorch.
    Calista had experienced at least some
small piece of that passion firsthand.
    So instead of pitying him, she looked
him straight in the eye with a challenge. “You’re wrong. There is
at least one you’ve not yet succeeded in running off.”
    Disdain dripped from his tongue as
surely as rainwater dripped from his boots when he said, “Oh? And
who, pray tell, is this paragon of virtue who would suffer me any
longer than absolutely necessary?”
    “ Me,” she
whispered.
    As the word drifted over her lips, the
carriage jostled unnaturally. It pitched forward at an angle,
tossing Calista forward and to the side.
    Lord Fordingham’s arms shot out, and
he caught her. He tugged her to his lap as the carriage careened
forward at an anomalous angle. They still hadn’t come to a stop,
and it felt as though the carriage might flip over in its entirety.
Despite the panic coursing through her veins, and in spite of the
great, heaving breaths she was forced to take from her fear,
Calista felt utterly and thoroughly safe. Secure, even. His arms
held her tight, a resolute determination in his fear-stricken
eyes.
    When finally the carriage came to a
stop and they had not plunged fully over, he drew the palms of his
shaking hands over her hair, her face. “You’re all right? Tell me
you’re unharmed.”
    She wasn’t certain she
would ever be simply all right again, because she feared she might be falling
head over ears in love with this intractable, unfathomable,
thoroughly overprotective man.
    Nevertheless, she said, “Yes, I’m all
right,” just before his lips moved towards hers with intensity of
purpose.

This time, there wasn’t even so much
as a niggling doubt in Fordingham’s mind that fear was the emotion
coursing through his body at a seemingly impossible
pace.
    He feared that any harm
could have come to Miss Bartlett, the one person in this world who
would dare make such a bold claim as to care for him , of all
people.
    He feared that he would do something
to prove what an imbecile he remained, and in the process wedge an
impassable chasm between them as he’d already done with his brother
and anyone else who had once been part of his life.
    He was desperately afraid that she’d
spoken something less than the truth when she’d declared she cared
for him.
    There was more than merely fear,
however. Fear moved like ice through his veins, slow and infinitely
fragile, but there was also something warm. Something grander than
the fear, something broader and more all-encompassing. Something
that led him to kiss her again as he’d done last night.
    The kiss only served to warm him more.
He slid his tongue over her lips, pressing for entry until she
wrapped her arms around his shoulders. Fordingham lost all
semblance of self-control and slid his hands possessively over her
torso, his fingers coming to rest just beneath the full swell of
her breasts. That only led her to draw closer to him with a sigh
floating between her lips. He took advantage of the brief opening
and moved his tongue inside, reveling once again in the sweet taste
of her. Sherry this time and not orgeat, as that was what he’d
served at supper.
    His moment of revelry only lasted so
long, regrettably.
    The door of his carriage flew open,
allowing the watery deluge inside at an impossible pace