He hadn’t slept in two days. He was muddy and no doubt smelled. He couldn’t remember his last meal. And he’d spent the last terror-stricken, heart-stopping, god-awful hour riding hell for leather across London, thinking they would never make it in time to stop his lady from marrying another man.

Enough.

Harry strode through the mess of weapon-wielding aristocrats to his lady’s side. “If I might have a word, my lady?”

“But, I mean . . .” the skinny blond man by her side, presumably the groom, damn his hide, protested.

Harry turned his head and looked the man in the eye.

The groom backed up so fast he nearly stumbled. “Jolly good! Jolly good! No doubt it’s important, what?” He sheathed his sword with a shaking hand.

“Who are you, young man?” The vicar peered over his spectacles at Harry.

Harry gritted his teeth and pulled back his lips in something like a smile. “I’m the father of the child Lady Georgina is carrying.”

De Raaf cleared his throat.

One of his lady’s brothers muttered, “Christ.”

And Lady Violet giggled.

The cleric blinked his myopic light blue eyes rapidly. “Well, then, I suggest you indeed have a word with this lady. You may use the vestry.” He closed his Bible.

“Thank you.” Harry latched one hand around his lady’s wrist and pulled her toward the little door off to the side. He needed to make the room before his pain exploded from him. Behind them there was absolute silence.

He dragged his lady into the room and kicked the door closed. “What the hell did you mean by this?” Harry took out the legal document deeding Woldsly to him. He held it up to her face and shook it, his anger—his anguish— barely contained. “Did you think I could be bought off?”

Lady Georgina retreated before the paper, her face confused. “I—”

“Think again, my lady.” Harry tore the paper into shreds and threw them on the floor. He gripped her upper arms, flexing his trembling fingers against her flesh. “I’m not a lackey to be dismissed with a too-generous present.”

“I only—”

“I won’t be dismissed at all.”

Lady Georgina opened her lips again, but he didn’t wait for her to speak. He didn’t want to hear her reject him. So Harry covered her lips with his own. He ground down on her soft, lush mouth, thrusting in his tongue. He placed his hand under her chin and felt the vibration of her moan in her throat. His cock was already hard and aching. He wanted to pound it against her, pound it into her. Put himself inside her and stay there until she told him why she had run away. Until she promised never to do it again.

He crowded her against a heavy trestle table and felt her body yield to his. That submission brought him a small measure of control.