June's pulse quickened. So he remembered. After all this time, after his casual dismissal, after forgetting her very existence, he finally remembered.
"I see you remember now," she muttered, her fingers tightening around her arms.
"The Bodleian Library. You were looking for Polybius, climbing a ladder that looked dangerously unsteady." His gaze was steady, searching. "You told me the second volume was nearly impenetrable."
"And you said you admired a challenge," June finished. She forced a smile that felt brittle on her lips. "I merely wanted to see how long it would take you to remember. A small experiment, if you will."
Dominic's eyes narrowed. "An experiment," he repeated, the words flat with disbelief. "Is that what you call it when you hide in a man's bedchamber and then kiss him without explanation?"
Heat rushed to June's cheeks. "I did not hide in your bedchamber. As I explained at the time, I was lost. And as for the kiss—" She lifted her chin defiantly. "Consider it a momentary lapse in judgment. A curiosity quickly satisfied and just as quickly dismissed."
The milk began to simmer, but Dominic made no move toward it. "We have moved in the same circles for weeks now," he said, his voice carefully controlled. "Don't you think it would be easier if we were civil to one another?"
"Civil?" June raised an eyebrow. "I have been perfectly civil, Your Grace. At least since the night in question. You are the one who seems... preoccupied with me."
"Preoccupied?" Dominic echoed, his jaw tightening. "That's an interesting choice of word."
"Is it? What would you call it, then?" June pushed away from the table, the pretense of making a meal suddenly forgotten. "You watch me when you think I'm not looking. You engage me in conversation at every opportunity. You appear in the same room, the same garden path—and now the same kitchen at midnight." She took a step toward him, emboldened by his momentary silence. "One might almost call it an obsession."
Something dangerous flashed in Dominic's eyes. June felt a thrill race through her at having provoked a reaction, at having cracked that perfect ducal composure. She had struck a nerve—good. Let him feel something of the turmoil he created in her.
In three long strides, he closed the distance between them. June found herself retreating until her back met the cool stone wall. Dominic planted his hands on either side of her head, effectively caging her without actually touching her.
"An obsession," he repeated, his voice low and tight with controlled emotion. "Is that what you think this is?"
June's heart hammered against her ribs, but she refused to show fear. This close, she could see the faint shadow of stubble along his jaw, smell the clean scent of his skin, feel the heat radiatingfrom his body. She ought to be terrified—or at the very least, outraged at his presumption. Instead, she felt electrified, every nerve ending suddenly, acutely alive.
"What else would you call it?" she managed, proud that her voice remained steady.
Dominic leaned closer, his face mere inches from hers. "Let me be perfectly clear, Lady June. I am not obsessed with you. I do not spend my days thinking about you, or my nights plotting ways to encounter you. I cannot care less about anything that has to do with you."
The words should have stung, but they were belied by the intensity of his gaze, by the slight roughness in his voice, by the way his eyes dropped briefly to her lips before returning to meet her stare.
June laughed softly, the sound catching in her throat. "Pride is a sin, Your Grace."
"One I am told you know all too well..." He brought his face closer still, close enough that she could feel his breath against her lips.
June's pulse thundered in her ears. She knew she should push him away, should slip out from his arms and retreat to the safety of her chamber. But her limbs refused to cooperate, as if they had developed a will of their own—a will that wanted nothing more than to eliminate the last few inches of space between them.
"Of the two of us," she whispered, "I doubt I am the one who has sinned the most."
Something shifted in his expression—a flash of vulnerability quickly masked by determination. For a heartbeat, June thought he might kiss her. Part of her hoped he would, if only to prove that the fire between them wasn't entirely of her imagination.
But instead, Dominic pushed himself away from the wall, the sudden absence of his warmth leaving June feeling strangely bereft.
"Very well, have it your way then," he said, his voice deceptively casual as he turned toward the now-overflowing milk. He removed it from the fire with a smooth motion. "We will see who will be begging the other for a kiss by the end of this..."
The challenge was clear between them, and her hear would not stop racing.
Twelve
"Has anyone ever told you that you look positively ghastly in the morning?" April announced cheerfully, bursting into June's bedchamber without so much as a knock. She swept toward the windows and yanked open the curtains, flooding the room with mid-morning light that made June groan and bury her face in her pillow. "Come now, you'll want to make yourself presentable. Mother and Father have arrived."
June bolted upright, all traces of drowsiness vanishing in an instant. "What did you say?"
"Mother and Father," April repeated, moving to June's wardrobe and flinging the doors open with theatrical flair. "They've just arrived. Theo is seeing to their trunks now."
"I thought they were to travel the Continent?" June swung her legs over the edge of the bed, her mind racing. After last night's encounter with Dominic in the kitchen, she'd hoped for a quietday to gather her thoughts. The arrival of her parents—especially her observant mother—complicated matters considerably.
