“Why, because I’m a gambler and I’m honest all at the same time?”
“Because I don’t think you care about fitting in here at all, and yet you agree to a partnership that balances my entire future against you knowing which fork to use at dinner and are willing to call that an even trade.”
“I didnae say it was even,” he countered. “I said I’m satisfied with the arrangement. So tell me someaught I need to know about Society, and we can get on with our conversation.”
Miranda narrowed her eyes. “You’re not fitting in on purpose,” she stated. “You cannot wear a kilt to proper functions and not expect people to look at you sideways. Highlanders, especially, are… well, very nearly feared in some quarters, even now.”
“Good.”
“No, it’s not good. You claim to be looking for a bride. A young lady needs her father’s permission—and likely her mother’s—to wed. A father-in-law doesn’t wish to be frightened of his son-in-law. Or intimidated by him.”
“Och. Mayhap I’ll find an orphan lass, then.”
“You are so exasperating!” she exclaimed, thudding a fist against his chest and trying to set aside the thought that she might as well have been trying to beat a stone wall into submission. “Why is this satisfactory to you? I will not allow my future to rest on someone who thinks I’m a hobby to tease and toy with until something more interesting comes along.”
He pushed away from the wall and straightened. She was tall for a woman, she knew, but he still managed to loom over her. “If ye dunnae wish my help, Miranda,” he murmured, “tell me so. But between ye and me I’ve nae done a thing for ye to keep insulting me. I ken that ye came to me because ye reckoned I’m the same sort of villain as Vale. I’m telling ye now, again, that I’m nae a villain.”
His words made sense, but knowing that didn’t ease the heat rising through her, the feeling that she needed to do something—anything—to stop the sensation that her life was completely out of her own control. “I have to point out that a villain would say precisely that.”
He tilted his head, his dark, wavy hair falling across one gray-green eye. “Ye’re the one who’s taken to conspiring with gamblers, carrying secrets, and looking for a way to outwit someone to whom yer brother owes a legitimate debt.”
“Are you actually suggesting that I’m in the wrong?”
A slow smile touched his mouth, and her breath caught. Damn him, anyway. No man had the right to be this… devilish and look so damned handsome. “I’m nae suggesting. I’m… supposing that ye dunnae hate gamblers because yer brother lost a horse. It’s more, and I’d like to know what it is.”
And he’d surprised her again. “We don’t talk about it,” she said, trying for a dismissive tone.
“‘We’? A family matter, then. Someone who got in over his head, and the rest of ye had to pay for it, I reckon.”
Whatever second she’d spent thinking this Highlander had more bravado than brains had been seriously misguided. His insight was ridiculously keen, to the point he could likely draw blood. Miranda looked at him for another few heartbeats. She’d already trusted him with her reputation, and that was beginning to seem quite possibly the smartest thing she’d ever done.
“My uncle, John Temple, lost everything. The man who held his debt declined to take away the family home, but insisted that Uncle John repay him. The last I heard of my uncle, he was somewhere in America attempting to make his fortune. My parents are paying the taxes for his house, to support my aunt Beatrice and her two little girls. And that is why I don’t like gambling. Or gamblers.”
He tilted his head a little. “I dunnae know yer uncle, lass. I didnae take his money. I didnae send him to a club or put cards in his hand. Or is it ye worry that every man who pick up cardsisyer uncle? If I had a lass and bairns at home, I’d nae be risking my fortune on luck.”
“So you say.”
“Och. Ye’re nae so above it all, yerself, Miranda Harris. When ye were getting answers out of Vale, ye liked the idea that he didnae ken what ye were about, didnae? Ye like the idea that ye’re planning to outsmart the bastard.”
Was he intimating that she liked the risk of it all?Humph.“You’re mistaken. I don’t like being in this situation at all, and I don’t like that while you’ve tasked me with finding out more about Captain Vale, I have no idea what good that will do me. All I do know is that I absolutely do not want to marry him.”
“I dunnae want ye to marry him, either.” He shrugged. “Mayhap it’s that simple.”
She looked at him for a swift moment. Nothing was simple where Aden MacTaggert was concerned. And yet he hadn’t even blinked at learning about Uncle John. Whatever he did want from her, he didn’t seem to mind carrying her secrets. And she continued to trust him with them, for some blasted reason. “So you only want me to be free from Vale’s machinations? You have no stake in—”
Cupping her face in his hands, he kissed her. She thought her attempt at kissing him had been bold, but this… Heat speared through her, sparking along the inside of her scalp until she felt scalded to her bones. Oh, good heavens she wanted…this. Whatever it was, she wanted it. Digging her fingers into his shoulders, she leaned up along his taut body to kiss him back.
He moved her backward until her spine bumped against the opposite wall of the hallway. Lips, teeth, tongue, nipping, sucking, the parts of her that could still think wondered if she could be consumed entirely. If it all felt this… electric, she wanted to be devoured. She wanted to climb inside him, feel him all around her, wild and wanton and desperate for his touch.
When he moved one hand over to fumble at the door beside her, she moaned, shoving at his shoulders. “No.”
Aden made a sound deep in his chest, then took half a step backward. Leaning his forehead against hers, he shifted his hands to her shoulders. “As ye say,” he murmured, “but I’m going to require a minute before I’m presentable again.”
She required a few moments, herself. “Is this because you like me?” she asked, still holding on to his shoulders. “Is that why you’re helping?
With a chuckle he kissed her forehead and straightened. “It’s nae because Idislike ye, ye sharp-tongued lass. Ye’ve been stepping closer to a dark place where candles gutter and men wager their lives on a turn of the cards. Where a man sees a way to get someaught he’s always wanted and doesnae care whether his wishes coincide with anyone else’s or nae. Where yer daytime Sassenach rules dunnae apply.”
“But I don’t want to be there.”
