Page 26 of A Rogue Worth the Risk

“I think my stepmother set the blaze. She had frequent bouts of mania and depression. Kimball, our butler, overheard Florinda ranting earlier in the day about the Graystones burning in hell because of the restrictions imposed upon her to keep her and everyone else safe. Sylvia Stevens, Florinda’s maid and companion, had thrice before extinguished fires my stepmother set in her chamber.”

“How awful for all of you,” Corinna said, her voice slightly tremulous.

“Father refused to commit Florinda. I don’t believe even he understood the depths of her madness. The servants had been instructed to keep the flint and steel hidden, but Kimball suspected Florinda snuck embers upstairs and waited until everyone was asleep in the family wing.”

“Oh, Caspian.”

“I was the only survivor of my family. We lost three servants too.”

Corinna angled her head to meet his eyes. Tears glistened in hers, and one crystalline droplet leaked from the corner of her right eye.

“I am so sorry, Caspian. I know that isn’t nearly sufficient considering what you’ve undergone—your grief and loss, not to mention the dreadful false accusations.”

He caught the tear with a bent finger. “You believe me?”

She stiffened and put a palm between them, pushing herself several inches away from him.

At once, he felt bereft.

“Of course I believe you. I knew you were innocent before you shared the dreadful story.” She pressed her lips together. “Ronan wouldn’t be your friend if there were a jot of truth in it. Besides, I have a sense about people.”

“You’re far more generous and benevolent than many have been.” Corinna’s confidence in him was humbling and healing.

Caspian cupped her head and urged her to rest against him again. Her hair smelled of almonds and honeysuckle, and she fit against him as if they were two parts of the same mold.

“What sort of sense?” he asked.

She rested a forearm upon his chest and fiddled with a button on his jacket. “Mama calls it discernment. It’s just a queer, sickly feeling I get. Something inside me knows when people are not what they seem. You don’t make me feel that way.”

Caspian closed his eyes, relishing this moment. Savoring this precious, stolen time with this remarkable woman. No matter what the future brought, Corinna had left a mark on him…his heart…his spirit. She’d branded his soul.

Silence settled around them, cloaking them in a comfortable cocoon of contentment. The rhythmic tick-tock of the green marble and brass ormolu clock atop the fireplace mantel beat in time to his heart thudding in his chest.

For the first time since his family’s deaths, hope dared to bud. Mayhap, just mayhap, Caspian could dare to love. Dare to marry. Dare to have a future that wasn’t shrouded in loneliness and exile.

“Caspian?”

“Hmm?” he answered, too drowsy to open his eyes and reluctant to disturb the tranquility.

“Kiss me again.”

At once he was alert.

He would boot serenity to the other side of the world to taste Corinna’s lips once more.

Caspian shifted until she lay across his lap, cradled in his arms. “You are an absolute wonder, Corinna Brockman.”

Delight blossomed across her face.

He stared into her eyes, his heart simultaneously constricting and leaping at the adoration he saw there. Could she see the answering affection in his gaze?

A faint smile teased the corners of her lips, and her regard sank to his mouth.

Caspian needed no further invitation.

Capturing her mouth, he kissed her with the pent-up longing that had haunted him these past days. Poured all of his heart and soul into the melding of their mouths, expressing with his lips what he could not say with words.

Not yet, anyway. Mayhap never.

He lifted his head, taking in every inch of her face. Her parted mouth, her lips berry-red from his kisses. “Corinna?”

Her lashes fluttered open. “Yes?”

“May I court you?”

She cupped his scarred cheek with her soft palm. His scar had never repulsed her.

“I thought you were an avowed bachelor, Caspian.”

“I thought I was too. Until I met you.” He grazed his lips across hers. “I know you feel whatever this is between us too. Give us a chance over these next few days, and let’s see what happens. Please.”

A slow smile curved her mouth. “Lady Osborne will be impossibly smug.”

“Is that a yes?” Caspian pressed his lips to her cheek. Then her tulip of a chin. Then the satiny column of her alabaster throat.

She looped her arms around his neck and pulled him to her. “Only if you kiss me again.”