Page 18 of Once a Scoundrel

But he’d played with her affections once. She refused to let him do it again.

“Dunwich and a Strathmore daughter? It’sexpected.” She shook her head with a dismissive laugh and repeated his words from last night, “And you never do the expected.”

She darted a glance in his direction and found his eyes narrowed and fixed straight ahead, his shoulders stiff, and his jaw clenched tight. Oh, he wasnothappy that she’d laughed at him!

But it was nothing less than the rascal deserved. What had he expected, for heaven’s sake? Did he really expect her to take him seriously? Most likely he thought she’d fling herself into his arms and beg to be kissed, grateful for whatever scrap of attention he paid her.

She couldn’t blame him for thinking so. After all, she’d once done exactly that.

Butneveragain.

A line of demarcation needed to be drawn. “You’re the same man you’ve always been, eschewing the expected in favor of the unpredicted. For example, kissing me back there,” she announced with a nonchalant wave of her hand, as if he hadn’t shaken her to her core and left her longing for more. “That was very unexpected.”

“Not for me,” he drawled. “I’ve wanted to do that since the moment I walked into the ball last night and saw you.”

His words sent heat twining down her spine. “Well, it was for me.” In more ways than she was willing to count. “You shouldn’t have done that.”

Taking her shoulders, he stopped her and turned her to face him. “Why not?” His eyes gleamed, as if he wanted nothing more than to pull her back into his arms. “Didn’t you enjoy it?”

So much more than I should have. She shook her head to fight back the rising blush. “It doesn’t matter if—”

“Because I certainly did.” He drove her to fresh distraction with the breathy purr of his voice. “A great deal.”

“That’s not the point,” she dodged.

“I think it’s a very important point.” He slid a heated gaze down at her mouth, and for a moment, she thought he might just kiss her. To prove his very important point. “Because you deserve to be kissed, Faith Westover,” he murmured, lowering his head until his breath shivered against her lips. So close to touching, yet so frustratingly far away...“You deserve to have a man hold you in his arms, to be touched and caressed. To be assured of how desirable you are, the kind of woman who invades a man’s thoughts and haunts his dreams.” His eyes darkened as he stared into hers. “To realize exactly how much power you hold over him, and how desperately he wants you.”

A longing flared hot inside her. “Oh,” she whispered breathlessly.

“Yes.” His lips curled into a crooked grin. “Oh.”

She held her breath, waiting for his mouth to seize hers in another gut-twisting kiss—

He suddenly released her shoulders. Turning away, he walked on down the lane, whistling to himself as he went, with the horse sauntering along behind.

Left standing in the middle of the lane, Faith blinked in utter bewilderment at the sting of not being kissed, even as confusion swirled inside her. Because she didn’twantto be kissed, certainly not in that scandalous way he’d suggested. In that wanton way that would make her feel beautiful and desired, an object of passion and love. That simply wonderful, thrillingly exciting way—

Oh, the devil take him!

She ran to catch up with him, then sniffed haughtily as she fell into step beside him, as if she wouldn’t deign even to give him the time of day except that they were walking in the same direction. As if her heart wasn’t slamming against her ribs with each pounding beat.

“You shouldn’t tease me like that.” But her scolding emerged as a throaty murmur.

“I’m not teasing, Faith. Far from it.” It wasn’t amusement that shone on his face. It was raw determination. “Every night during the past two years, I lay in bed and thought about you, wondering what I could do to make amends for the way I treated you. What it would feel like to kiss you again, to hold you...to hear you laugh or see one of your smiles. And every thought of you made me realize what a damned fool I was to leave you.”

She stopped in mid-step, so suddenly that the dog smacked into her legs. The hound fell back onto his haunches and looked up at her, shaking his head with dazed bewilderment. And she stared at Stephen, the same dazed bewilderment clouding her face.

*****

Stephen watched her curiously, waiting for her reply to that wholly improper confession that had left her momentarily speechless and charmingly flustered.

“I don’t believe you,” she finally said through her stunned surprise, which he was certain she’d meant to utter with all the frosty haughtiness of an octogenarian governess but which actually emerged as a husky purr. “You didn’t write, you didn’t say of word of this until now...”

“Because you weren’t ready to hear it.” He still wasn’t certain she was, even now.

She gaped at him silently for a long moment, as if she simply couldn’t fathom him. Then with an irritated scowl, she scurried away, the dog once more loping behind at her heels.

Stephen stared after her. So, he’d rattled her. And quite thoroughly, too, judging from the way she kept her back ramrod straight as she hurried away and refused to look back at him.