"Oh, I doubt that very much."
"I apprehend criminals for a living. I trust I can handle a young lady," he said stiffly.
Lady Draven laughed again. Despite his simmering anger, that husky sound reached straight to his groin. His bollocks tautened; his member stiffened as if being caressed. The notion of those perfectly shaped pink lips parting to pleasure rather than taunt…
"Goes to show," she said, "how much you know about young ladies."
Hah. He had her there.
"I have four younger sisters. Trust me, I know the minds of misses." Guilt prodded him to add in gruff tones, "Indeed, I ought to have predicted Miss Fines' behavior from the way she was questioning me about the business between Hunt and Lord Harteford."
"Sisters. Ah, that explains it," Lady Draven murmured.
"Explains what?" Devil and damn, the lady's mind had more twists and turns than the streets of the rookery.
"The sense of duty that hangs upon you like a rusty suit of armor. It's rather passé, you know." She adjusted her smooth gloves. "No one likes a dull Johnny."
"What the devil is that supposed to mean?"
"Simply put? You, sir, are a snob."
For a second, he was rendered speechless. "I'mthe snob? Of all the hypocritical—"
"Oh, you're not an elitist in a social sense," she said with a thin smile. "You're the other kind. A moralistic snob. You expect perfection of yourself and others. And you take responsibility for everything—even what is not yours to take."
"I don't expect others to be perfect. And I damn wellwasresponsible for Miss Fines!"
Her creamy shoulders made an indifferent movement. "Be that as it may, you cannot control everything, Mr. Kent, no matter how scrupulous you are." While he wrestled with anger and that unpalatable observation, she went on, "If I were to hazard a further guess... you believe the weight of your entire family, four siblings and all, rests upon your shoulders. Am I right?"
"Five siblings," he shot back. "I have a younger brother as well. And it's not a mere belief—it is afact. They depend upon me for their livelihood."
"No parents?"
How did they get into a conversation about his family? Bewildered, Ambrose raked his hands through his hair. "My stepmother died two years ago. My father has not been well since."
"I am sorry to hear that." Something ghosted through her eyes. Empathy, a flash of… pain? "It is difficult to lose someone you care about," she said quietly.
He stared at her, befuddled.
Without a doubt, Lady Marianne Draven was the most infuriating, provoking female he'd ever met. At the same time, a disconcerting realization struck him. He'd never talked so much about himself before, not even with his past lovers. And that perceptive gaze of hers? It pushed him to the jagged edge of his restraint. Made him feel exposed. Off balance.
He made an attempt to even the score. "Have you any family, my lady?"
Her eyes shuttered. "No."
A glacial silence descended, during which he wondered why she was lying to him. Because he had observed the flare in her gaze, the way the clear celadon depths churned with a dark emotion. His policeman's instincts told him that she was hiding something... what?
"No parents or siblings?" he pressed.
"My parents are dead." She gave him a derisive smile. "Isn't it obvious that I am an only child?"
He tried a different tactic. "It must have been difficult being widowed at so young an age."
Her mouth took on a harder edge. "Not really."
"Being left alone in the world cannot have been easy."
Did he imagine the subtle bobbing of her throat?
