Cloudy with a Chance of Marriage

Someone walked by the store, whistling, and they both froze.

But of course, the person walked by without even slowing at the door.

“Thank God,” she said softly.

“Yes, thank God. I haven’t had nearly enough of you.” He cast his eyes up, and she saw in them a glint of amusement vying with desire.

From the modest neckline of her gown, he released her other breast and ran a hand over both of them appreciatively. “You’re gorgeous,” he said admiringly, then raised his eyes to hers again. “I want you to remember what we did here when you come into the store each morning.”

“I will,” she whispered.

He lifted her skirt, but she didn’t care. In fact, it felt delicious to be so exposed.

Delicious and wicked.

His kisses now became even more ardent, and his hand … his hand played delightful games up her legs, all the way to her softest flesh.

And then his fingers began to move there. He made little circles with his thumb over the nub of flesh guarding her most intimate place. She groaned with delight, lost in intense, delicious feeling. She felt wild. Free. Yet also at the center of everything, as if the whole world spun around them and not the sun.

All the while he kissed her breasts, her mouth, and then his fingers began to play more. She arched to bring him closer, and as she did, she began to slip into another world.

“More,” she moaned. “Oh, please. More.”

And then she was floating free, suspended in a wave of infinite pleasure.

The front door of Hodgepodge opened and the bell tinkled.

Captain Arrow’s mouth clamped over her own, and she rode pulse after pulse of sensation, her eyes wide, staring into his—he wouldn’t let her look elsewhere.

I promised you, she saw there.

And she believed him. As she sank back down to earth, she didn’t care that anyone was at the door.

“Miss Jones?” Lady Hartley’s voice boomed.

Keep looking at me, Captain Arrow’s eyes said.

She was slack, at peace, more relaxed than she’d ever been in her life.

She smiled at him, and he smiled back.

“Miss Joo-oones!”

Behind the table stacked high with books, they maintained total silence.

“Where are you?” Lady Hartley called out.

A big sigh came from the door. “Very well, then. I won’t be coming back here to borrow a cup of sugar for our tea,” Lady Hartley tutted. “Leaving a store unattended. Only a very irresponsible person would do so.”

Captain Arrow looked down at Jilly, his eyes merry now. She bit her lip to keep from laughing.

And then the door slammed shut.

Captain Arrow ran a hand down her flank. “Well, now,” he said. “About that inventory.”

She let herself laugh then.

It was the first genuinely carefree laugh she’d had in years.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

A full thirty seconds passed after Lady Hartley departed, then Captain Arrow tugged on Jilly’s hand and pulled her up from their shelter behind the book table.

She knew her hair was a mess and her mouth was slack and her spine wasn’t as rigid as usual, but the realization of what she’d done with him still hadn’t hit her hard enough to allow her to regain her usual decorum.

However, it was coming toward her, slowly, from the fringes of her conscience, like a cat wending its way down an alley and then detouring at several more side streets before arriving home, especially when Otis appeared at the door, much earlier than expected.

“I forgot my sample handkerchiefs!” he cried, and went dashing upstairs to retrieve them.

Jilly and the captain exchanged a look as he sped by. It had been a close call. She strode to her father’s mirror and straightened her hair. She also adjusted her apron and told herself it was time to return to business.

She might be a wanton, but she was, first and foremost, a bookseller.

Meanwhile, Otis came back downstairs, mentioned that they were out of bread, a lapse he would remedy, and went racing out the front door again.

When he was gone, the captain said, “I’m going to be working on some house repairs.” He spoke plainly, leaving her no opportunity to indulge in embarrassment. “And if I have time, I’ll begin the next booth. So if you need me for anything before this evening—”

“No,” she stammered. “I’ll be fine.” She attempted a polite, professional smile, but it was difficult to look at him the same way ever again. “You take entirely too much upon yourself, Captain.”

He laughed. “Very well. I will acknowledge that you’re perfectly capable of taking care of yourself.”

He said it like a caress.

She finally blushed.

“Thank you,” she managed to say crisply. “You’ve given me my ledge.” And taken me to the moon and back with your hands and mouth. “I’ll spend part of the afternoon arranging books on it to my liking. I’m quite particular.”

“I’ve noticed,” he said, his mouth teasing.

What did he mean by that? she couldn’t help wondering.

“And then with the time I have left before the ball,” she forged on, “I’ll check on Susan and Otis, look for the diary again—I really must find it—and I might pay a visit to the Hobbs family.”

“You’d best stay out of it,” he said with no heat in his manner, which was a good thing because she would have objected strongly.

“Out of what?” she asked, attempting an equally light tone.

“Out of the Hobbses’ business.”

Hmmm. For a man who had just pleasured her so well, he was amazingly able to inflame her senses in an entirely different way.

“I don’t plan to interfere,” she said, heat rising up her neck. “I’m only offering my friendship to Lavinia. Nothing more.”

He merely gave her a look that said he knew better—and waved good-bye.

She watched him walk back to his house and felt very guilty all of a sudden for wanting to convince Mr. Hobbs—in a subtle way, of course—of the error of his ways.

And then she felt terribly alone when Captain Arrow opened his front door and shut it behind him.

When he was with her, she was so focused on him she lost all sense of reason. But when he was gone, she couldn’t ignore that voice in her head telling her that her life could go terribly wrong at any time if she were foolish.

Hector could find her.

She sighed and began to search the shop for the diary. Would she ever be able to truly relax? In the moments after she’d been suspended in total pleasure, she had. Her limbs were still weak from the captain’s caresses, but deep in her heart, she was troubled. Would every new, wonderful experience be tainted by the dread that her husband would find her?

Every day she was around Captain Arrow, her resolve to hide from life—because she must—weakened.

Meanwhile, she conceded that perhaps a small amount of her anxiety stemmed from the fact that the diary had gone missing. She couldn’t lose it—somehow, it gave her comfort. It felt like a connection to a solution of some