Page 8 of Once a Scoundrel

Chapter Two

Stephen propped a hip against the stone balustrade on the garden terrace and stared at the glowing tip of his cigar as he waited for Faith.

If anyone happened to see him here, nothing more would be presumed than that he’d stepped out toenjoy a cheroot in peace. They wouldn’t have known that his hands were trembling or that his gut had twisted into knots. And good Lord, how hard his heart pounded! From the nervousness inside him, he would have thought he was waiting for his first assignation with a woman, that he’d never met dozens of woman privately on dark terraces before.

But then, he’d never met privately on a dark terrace with Faith. And tonight might very well change everything between them.

“Stephen?”

He turned at the sound of her voice, a faint smile at his lips. When he saw her, she stole his breath away.

She stepped toward him from the shadows, the pale sage green of her dress showing silver in the soft moonlight and her strawberry blond hair upswept. Petite and graceful, she seemed not to glide across the stone so much as float, and her green eyes were bright even in the shadows. His chest clenched hard. Dear God, she looked like an angel. No—a ghost. The same apparition who’d been haunting him for years.

When he’d walked into the ballroom this evening, he hadn’t been prepared for the mature woman she’d become. How graceful and gracious. How softly alluring. Oh, Faith had always been attractive in an uncommon sort of way, with those full lips of hers that should have been too big for her face and that pert little nose which was perpetually dotted with freckles. But now she’d become simply beautiful. To think of how close he’d come to never seeing her again, of never knowing the woman she’d become—

But that was why he was here. To set everything to rights, to the way it all should have been before he left and ruined it.

“Faith,” he murmured as she stopped in front of him. “You look beautiful.”

Instead of the embarrassed expression he expected, she frowned at the compliment. “Empty flattery won’t work on me, Stephen.”

“Empty flattery?” Is that what she thought? He’d never uttered a more honest statement in his life.

“That’s how you always used to get your way,” she reminded him, carefully keeping her distance in case anyone should happen upon them. But he couldn’t help thinking ruefully that it was more than propriety that kept her away. “Especially with women.”

“I’ve changed.” He paused pointedly. “Especiallywith women.”

From the way she stiffened, she didn’t believe that, and clearly, he had a long way to go before he regained her trust. Realizing just how far bothered him more than he wanted to admit.

He dropped the cigar to the stone and crushed it out with the heel of his boot. “You used to like it when I paid you compliments.”

She dismissingly shrugged her slender shoulders. “I used to think you meant them.”

“I did. I still do.” He fixed his gaze on hers in the shadows, hating that she no longer trusted him.. “With you.”

She laughed, a light sound that floated gently on the night air and pierced into his chest like a sword. “And I’m to believe that I’m somehow different from all the other women you flatter?”

“Yes.”

Her green eyes studied him uncertainly in the shadows. He didn’t blame her for being wary, knowing how he’d treated women before he left for India—how he’d treatedherin particular. When he’d taken nearly as much thrill in the scandal of what he was rumored to have done and with whom than in the acts themselves. When he didn’t care what women gained in their encounters as long as he found his own pleasures.

But he never would have intentionally hurt her.

“I’ve never once lied to you, Faith, in all the years we’ve known each other.” It was important that she realized that. “And I promise you that I won’t start now.”

She shook her head with an impatient sigh, as if that heart-felt admission simply proved her correct on how he was willing say anything to get what he wanted. Her reaction galled him. “Why did you ask me out here, Stephen?”

“I need to talk to you.” He hesitated. “About Daniel.”

Even in the darkness, he saw her face pale, becoming ghostly white in the moonlight. “I told you,” she whispered. “No one blames you for his death.”

If only that were true. He constantly felt Daniel’s death like a knife in his gut.

“And it was wrong of his parents to have made you swear to keep him safe.”

The knife twisted. “Faith, please listen—”

A couple laughed loudly as they stepped onto the terrace, followed by two more. The French doors stood open wide, letting in the cool air and the fragrance of night-blooming jasmine and inviting more party guests to spill out onto the terrace.