“I did not mean to offend you,” Jasper continued, urged by her silence. “Nor to embarrass you. The book is not nearly so shocking as everyone pretends.”
Her brows drew together. “It is not?”
He gave a small shrug, as if it were nothing. “Hardly. At worst, it describes a kiss. That was the page you were on, was it not?”
Heat flooded her cheeks. She opened her mouth, but no denial would come. The silence was enough, and she was certain he noticed. He did not press her, though. He only glanced away, his jaw set in that half-careless, half-guarded way of his.
“A kiss,” he continued, “is hardly the corruption society paints it to be. It is not an evil, nor a scandal. Merely… human.”
Matilda’s heart gave a sharp, traitorous flutter. She tilted her head, searching his face, but his expression revealed little. There was no smirk and no triumph, only a curious seriousness that unsettled her more than his teasing ever had.
Matilda drew a slow breath, forcing herself to recover. “You speak as though it were harmless. Yet kisses have ruined many women, Your Grace. You know as well as I that society deemsthem the first step to—” She faltered, her voice tightening. “To disgrace.”
He looked back at her then. “Society,” he said at last, “is a poor judge of virtue. It condemns women for a kiss while excusing men for far worse.”
His tone was quiet, but there was steel in it. Matilda felt her breath catch. She had expected him to jest, to brush it aside with his usual irreverence. Instead he sounded almost furious.
She tightened her shawl around her shoulders. “So you would make light of it?” she asked, though her voice was softer now, betraying her confusion.
“No,” he said simply. “I would call it what it is: a moment between two souls. It is not ruin, Lady Matilda. It is not corruption.” His mouth curved then, though faintly, not in triumph but in something nearer to sorrow. “If it were, half of England would be in rags and ashes by now.”
Matilda’s cheeks burned hotter. She turned her face away, though her heart pounded traitorously.
It was intolerable. He unsettled her even when he was serious, perhaps especially then. Because for the first time, she wondered if beneath his mocking and his charm, Jasper Everleigh actually believed the words he spoke.
Her pulse thundered, every beat urging her toward words she dared not say. If she spoke to him seriously, if she confessed even an inch of what twisted in her chest he would see too much. She would be exposed, and she could not bear it.
So she did what she always did when the ground beneath her feet felt unsteady: she reached for her wit.
“You argue so fiercely,” she said at last, forcing her voice into cool composure, “that I begin to wonder. Are you trying to convince me a kiss is not a great matter because you wish to bestow one yourself?”
The words left her mouth in a rush, sharper than she intended, but she held her chin high.
For the first time, Jasper did not meet her with a quick smile or careless jest. His eyes widened, a flicker of color rising to his cheekbones.
“I—no,” he said, the word more defensive than she had ever heard from him. “That is not what I meant.”
Matilda froze. She had expected a rakish grin, a smooth retort about temptation or opportunity, not a man suddenly unsettled, almost caught out.
“That is good, then,” she said lightly, as if nothing of importance had taken place. “For I should hate to offend your pride by rejecting your advances.”
At that, Jasper’s head snapped up, and the flash of indignation in his eyes was so sharp that she nearly laughed. He recovered quickly, of course, slipping the familiar mask back into place, but she had seen it: she had caught him off balance.
“Reject me?” he drawled, his grin returning, though it tugged crookedly at his mouth. “Impossible. No woman has yet had the willpower.”
“Then I must be the first,” she returned crisply.
His chuckle was low, infuriating, yet softer than usual. “I should like to see you try.”
She rolled her eyes, turning to start back toward the house. “You would only be disappointed, Your Grace. My resolve is far stronger than your ego.”
He fell into step beside her, every line of him deceptively casual. “Your resolve, perhaps. But not your curiosity.”
Her breath caught, but she kept her gaze forward, her lips curving with forced calm. “Do not flatter yourself. I am not curious.”
“Of course not,” he said easily.
Matilda gasped, half affronted, half flustered, and snapped her eyes to his. His were bright and teasing, but beneath the mischief lay something far more dangerous.
