Divine retribution for being a rake.
A cad.
A libertine.
I would have traded every encounter I’d ever had—every fluttering debutante, every eager widow—just for permission to put my face in her neck. To breathe her in at the source. To touch those red curls with my bare hands.
The flame.
The whisper curled through my skull like heat along bare skin.
“Stop it,” I snapped, fists clenching.“You are making it worse.”
It didn’t listen.
It never listened.
The creature twisted beneath my ribs, impatient, prowling, pacing—until suddenly it stilled.
My eyes snapped open.
I blinked hard, rubbed at them, and leaned closer to the window.
The giant brute—her uncle, no doubt—and her. Walking across the grounds.
My gaze lifted to where the path curved.
Toward the loch.
I saw the bundle of clothes tucked under her arm.
My pulse thudded.
A slow, wicked smile spread across my lips before I could stop it—dark, involuntary, shameful.
Bathing.
She was going bathing.
The creature inside me purred, stretching like a satisfied fiend.
And I—God forgive me—pressed my nose to the cold windowpane again.
No.
I needed more than a scent trapped behind glass.
I needed to see her—up close, unguarded, real.
If I cut through the wooded area, they would not see me.
She would not see me.
I spun from the window and ran.
The beast surged upward, rising like a tide beneath my ribs, silently urging me forward.
Mate, he sighed, low and delighted.
