For an indeterminate span of time, he could neither move, nor speak.
“Forgive me,” she was saying, her voice bearing a tinge of contrition. “That was unpardonably rude of me to say. I cannot imagine what came over me, Your Grace.”
She dropped the book she had been clutching to the cushion she had risen from. And then, she was moving, blast her. Coming nearer to him, her blue gown gliding softly about her. Bringing with her the scent of sweet summer blossoms and soft, delicious, tempting woman. Still, he could not move.
Or speak. He was beset by a strange combination of his affliction and raging desire. Why for this particular, vexing creature, he could not say.
“Oh, dear,” Miss Winter said, stopping before him. “You are pale. You are not ill, are you, Coventry?”
He was about to tell her he was not ill—or at least to attempt to tell her that—when she touched his forehead. Her hand was ungloved, and for an instant, he knew the fleeting graze of her silken fingertips over his brow.
“You are not feverish,” she said, frowning.
He could have argued that he was. But his capacity for speech was once more frozen. Just as well, for if he could speak, he was afraid he would ask her to touch him again.
“Have I wounded you so gravely with my sharp tongue that you are now refusing to speak to me?” Miss Winter asked next.
Devil take it, she had mentioned her tongue.Again.
He could not seem to stop thinking about that deuced troublesome tongue of hers. Or her lips. They were the pink of a wild rose. Bewitching and supple. Too full, really. Tipped upward at the corners, as if she were enjoying a sally at the rest of the world’s expense.
And she probably was, the minx.
“I can get you to speak again,” she announced, confidence permeating her voice. “Do not look so surprised, Your Grace. I am one of five sisters. You cannot be naïve enough to believe they have not attempted similar tactics against me, and also failed.”
He had watched all five Winter sisters closely during the course of this country house party. They were all handfuls, he had no doubt. But the Winter before him was the biggest handful of all. He had seen it clearly from the moment he had first arrived and settled his gaze upon her. Of course his gaze had found her—she was the brightest and the most beautiful of her sisters, with her flaming hair and bold, jewel-toned dresses. The way she swayed her hips, the way she cast her eye upon the company, the way she laughed, the way she danced… It was nothing short of captivating.
Shewas nothing short of captivating.
And wrong for him as a future duchess.
All wrong.
He needed wealth, not trouble.
She pursed her lips, tilting her head to one side as she considered him. “You have until the count of ten, Your Grace. At that point, I will have no choice but to use my only means of defense.”
Gill moved his mouth without impediment. Cleared his throat. The speechlessness affecting him now was different than his affliction, he realized. He could speak if he wished. But it was Miss Winter and the nearly incapacitating desire he felt for her—misplaced and wrong, but nonetheless present—that was keeping him from speech.
A new phenomenon.
He would have to write this down in his journal later tonight, all the better to examine the pattern. When his head was cleared of the fog currently inhabiting it.
Belatedly, he realized Miss Winter was counting, just as she had warned.
“…seven, eight, nine,” she paused for dramatic effect, eying him with raised brows, as if she expected him to flee at any moment.
He did not flee. Instead, he held her stare and his ground both, two feats which were not easy for him when he was in the presence of unfamiliar people.
“Ten!” she announced. “I warned you, Your Grace.”
Then, she stepped forward. Nearer still. Her gown billowed around his legs. The feminine scent of her was richer. Notes of jasmine and lily hit him. Her proximity was such that he could see the rich flecks of gold and gray in her blue-green eyes, count the number of freckles upon the dainty bridge of her nose if he wished.
He did not wish.
For in the next breath, she was touching him. Not just touching him. The mad chit had thrust her fingers into his sides and wiggled them about. The action was so unexpected, so shocking, a bark of laughter poured from him. Grinning at him in triumph, she moved her fingers higher, her touch growing firmer.
Belatedly, it occurred to him why he was laughing.
