“I see you found your donkey,” he called out.
“I did,” she returned. “But presently she’s being very much a donkey.”
“Ah,” he said, with a rueful smile that was too attractive by half.
As he closed the distance between them, one determined, intentional step at a time, her breath was taken away by the sheer gorgeousness of the man, the sun illuminating the light brown streaks in his hair and the shimmering gold of his eyes. He’d always been handsome, but with the scar on his cheek and the undefinable hardness of his person, now he was handsome in the way of a Greek heroafterthe Trojan War. He’d come through the battles, tested and weathered, and was the more appealing for it. Though he’d lost his way for a time—as all heroes did—he was moving forward again, with purpose.
She saw all that as she stood in the middle of this country lane, a dog whining up at her to one side and an admirably stubborn donkey to the other.
And she saw one thing more.
She wanted him—as hers.
The man he wasnow—not her lost love from ten years ago.
Just as there was no recapturing the young lady she was then, there was no recapturinghim, either. He was gone, and in his place wasthisman. A man she found attractive on his own merits, not as an echo of who he was ten years ago.
And one thing more—she liked seeing him here. Not just on this country lane, but at Somerton, too. A man who could hold his own with his brother and their friends. A man who was admired by them, too. In most ways, that didn’t matter to her—she’d always followed her own preferences—but in some significant way, it did.
And she understood something yet more as he approached with that smile in his golden eyes—eyes that had only recently cleared of the shadows of the past—she was going to have a devil of a time withstanding her own desire for him.
But mustn’t she?
How could she keep the full truth of the past from himandkeep him?
That crossed the line into duplicity.
Yet could she let him go?
He reached down and gave Bathsheba’s ear a stroke before turning his attention to the little donkey. “Now, who do we have here?” he asked in a low voice.
Little Lady’s ears perked forward.
He ran his hand across the velvet of her muzzle, and Artemis would have sworn on a Bible the donkey’s eyes closed in a moment’s bliss. “Hey,” Artemis exclaimed, indignant.
Bran’s brow lifted. “Yes?”
“You’re … you’re … you’re using your masculine wiles on her,” she spoke in a low hiss, rather than raising her voice.
His brow gathered in bemusement. “Wiles?Do men havewiles?”
Artemis crossed her arms over her chest. She didn’t want to answer that question. So, she didn’t.
She could only imagine the thunderous expression on her face.
Bran’s mouth twitched. “DoIpossess these masculine wiles?”
She exhaled an exasperated sigh.Yes, she didn’t say. He possessed masculine wiles in abundance. She couldn’t help wondering if shivers purled along the length of Little Lady’s spine, too, when he spoke.
And there was the feel of his large, capable, deliciously rough hand.
Oh, this man had wiles.
He dug into a coat pocket, and his hand emerged with a sugar lump pinched between forefinger and thumb. “How about some sugar for the sweet?” he cooed down to the donkey, his palm open and flat for her to take the treat.
“You think flattery will get you anywhere with a donkey?” Artemis tried for a caustic tone, but it sounded more pettish to her ears.
Wiles.
