“They were frightened,” she said quickly. “I’m sure they weren’t thinking properly.”
“If their choice of activity was any indication, they weren’t thinking at all. And neither were you for helping them.”
She stopped to glare at him, her cloak whipping around her, her hair a pagan tangle around her face. “You’re not my lord and master. I don’t have to answer to you.”
“On the contrary, you do.”
He didn’t know which of them was more surprised at his declaration. Yet he couldn’t stop the damned protectiveness surging through his veins. By God, in the nine days since he’d found her again, she’d suffered blow after blow. She’d been abandoned by her smuggling kin and mistreated by patrons and competitors; simultaneously, she’d dealt with the demands of running a shop and a household.
Any other female of his acquaintance—or male, for that matter—would have buckled under the pressure. Or at least turned to drink and other vice as he, himself, had when his fortunes had circled the drain.
But not Maggie. She didn’t yield. The woman was responsible, stubborn, and loyal to a fault.
She needed someone to protect her—from herself.
Being a hero isn’t exactly your forte, his inner voice reminded him starkly.
He’d failed to protect his mama and even his dog from his sire’s brutality.
In more recent memory, his attempt to rescue his erstwhile fiancée Tessa Todd had also ended in disaster. She’d run off with a fellow named Harry Kent; masquerading as a bodyguard, Kent had wooed her from beneath Rhys’s nose. Rhys had caught up with them and exposed that Kent was, in fact, a policeman investigating her cutthroat grandfather. True, Rhys’s actions had been motivated by mercenary rather than emotional reasons—he’d only wanted Tessa for her dowry—but at least he’d been honest with her…unlike that bastard Kent.
Even so, Tessa had turned onhim, breaking their engagement and making him look like the villain. Now she and Kent were happily wed. As far as Rhys was concerned, the love-sick fools deserved each other.
Life had taught him time and again that emotional attachment led to pain. The lesson was simple: you hurt the ones you loved, and they hurt you in return. Whether it was intentional or not didn’t matter because the end result was the same. Thus, he would have to guard against the strange, foolish longing Maggie stirred in him. A longing for something he’d never experienced and never would.
On the other hand…he could still look out for Maggie. It was the gentlemanly thing to do, after all. He and Maggie were both mature adults, he reasoned; they could work and sleep together without getting unduly attached. As long as they were honest that this was just a temporary, casual affair, no one would get hurt.
Indeed, he thought, his mood brightening, there was much to be gained for both of them. Professionally…and personally.
Unfortunately, Maggie hadn’t yet reached the same conclusion. Hands braced on her hips, she declared, “You have no right to interfere with my life. Last night changed nothing between us.”
“I beg to differ,” he said smoothly.
As if his brain had been percolating all along, he had the perfect plan.
“Beg all you want.” She started moving forward again, and he found the way she was stomping through the sand absurdly adorable. “You said so yourself that it was only a night of pleasure. No strings attached.”
“You don’t have to answer to me because we’re lovers.” He paused for effect. “You have to answer to me because I’m your employer.”
She whirled to face him, her expression incredulous. “I never said I’d work for you!”
“But you will.”
“Pray tell, what makes you so certain?” Her beautiful, tip-tilted eyes shot sparks at him.
If he knew anything about her, it was this: she was proud and not one to default on a debt.
Ruthlessly, he played his winning hand. “Because youoweme, Maggie.”
His words cut through her defenses with the precision of a scalpel. It sliced through her anger, her incredulity that he would assume himself to be her employer, and cut to the quick of her.
That was the way of truth.
The fact was shedidowe him. For securing her the patronage of Pickering-Parks. For sounding the alarm and saving her brothers. For saving…her.
Last night, it had been so easy to surrender to passion. To yield to temptation in the dark. In the light of day, she saw that she’d taken a dangerous risk to allow him back into her life, even in the capacity of a casual bedpartner.
With throbbing shame, she recalled how easily she’d succumbed to him. Her eager reaction to his lovemaking and naughty words. She’d abandoned her principles, showed herself to be a wanton…and now she would have to pay the piper andworkfor the bloody man!
