Hah!Poetic that.
Ethan couldn’t have that thought. Malcolm wanted it for himself.
If he wasn’t careful, he would want this woman for himself, too.
And even Malcolm knew that path led to disaster—conflict with his brother and another deep fissure in his own heart.
Because Viola Brodure would never stoop so low as to consider the likes of him.
8
Staring up at Malcolm Penn-Leith holding her hand along the lane, Viola realized that her lungs ached.
And not from an incipient asthma attack.
No, her shortness of breath was entirely due to Malcolm’s nearness.
Being with him was . . . effortless.
She had experienced a brief moment of trepidation when he stopped before her on the lane. A flitting panic that he would see her machinations written in pen across her face.
But just as before, once words were spoken between them, all her self-consciousness vanished, like fog thinned away by daylight.
Speaking with him felt paradoxical. Like the warmth of a homecoming and the exhilaration of beginning a journey.
Attraction was such an odd phenomenon, she decided.
Malcolm—broad, dark, serious—set her heart to stampeding.
Whereas handsome and charming Ethan elicited nothing deeper than polite interest. Not once had she pondered what it might feel like to hold Ethan’s hand.
But now, standing and holding Malcolm’s, she could think of nothing else. The strength of his fingers pressed against hers. The leashed muscle tensing in his arms.
And then, the natural progression of female thought—how those same fingers would feel wrapped around her waist. Or pressed to the small of her back as he lifted her up to place a hungry kiss—
Viola blinked to stop the image right there, terrified that her salacious thoughts might tumble from her head to his feet like spillikins.
And why, in all her scheming to arrange this moment, had she not considered that she might find Malcolmmoreattractive?
Unfortunately, Viola realized she had been holding the man’s hand—staring into his chocolate brown eyes while mentally rambling—for far longer than was polite.
He likely thought her the veriest nutter.
Let go of the delectable man, Viola ordered her fingers.
They did so . . . if only reluctantly.
“Thank you,” she repeated, stepping back.
“’Tis my pleasure.” He doffed his hat to her, his expression giving away nothing of his thoughts.
But then . . .
. . . he offered her his arm. As confidently as any fine gentleman.
Viola watched as if through another woman’s eyes as her own gloved hand slid around his elbow, marveling at the flex of tendons underneath her fingertips.
Malcolm whistled to Beowoof to attend them. The dog loped out of the woods.
