If Kenna had been thirteen Rhys would have laughed at the forlorn expression on her face, knowing it was part of her winsome charm to garner his sympathy and sidetrack him from his lecture on ladylike behavior. She would have joined him, laughing at herself, earnestly relating how this madcapped scheme had gone awry and how she didn’t care a fig about being a lady anyway. He saw something flash in her eyes, as if she were thinking how simply she could have managed him and this situation if they could only roll back the years. The look was shuttered an instant later, hidden by her thick lashes as she studied her bare feet and hugged her arms to her breasts, covering them where the sodden robe and gown were outlining her every curve.
“What are you doing here?” he asked roughly as he picked up a towel and threw it at her. “And what possessed you to hide in my tub? Couldn’t you have chosen a better place? Under the bed, perhaps. Or in the wardrobe.”
Kenna mopped her face with the towel. “I didn’t think of it,” she said into the depths of the towel.
Rhys simply looked at her incredulously, shaking his head. “You obviously weren’t thinking when you came into this room. You’re not a child any longer, Kenna. No one would believe you came here just to talk.”
“But I did,” she said quietly. She squeezed water from her hair and wrapped it in the towel. Her arms immediately came up to cover her breasts again. “I did,” she said with greater force. She looked at him then, willing him to see the truth in her eyes. It didn’t work because his stony gray gaze had dropped to her chest and was slow to lift.
And uncomfortable moment passed until he met her eyes and said, “I know you did. No doubt it will shock you that I wish it were otherwise.”
It did shock her and she could not hide it. She looked away, uneasy beneath his regard.
Rhys sighed. “Get out of the tub, Kenna. I am not going to force myself on you. Credit me with a modicum of chivalry. Here, take this.” He gave her his wrinkled shirt and she looked at it stupidly for a moment before she realized he meant her to put it on. “Go ahead,” he ordered. “Take off that wet robe and gown and put the shirt on. It’s more modest than your present dishabille. Don’t worry,” he said wickedly, intent on goading her. “I’ll shutmyeyes.”
She felt heat flower in her chest and creep over her face. “You knew all the time I was here?”
“Not until I stepped behind the screen. Did you really believe I didn’t see you?”
Kenna clutched the shirt to her, the flimsy protection giving her an inordinate amount of courage that faltered as soon as she saw the devilish glint in his eyes. “But…but you could have said something,” she stammered. “Instead you…you—”
“Took off my clothes? Is that what you’re trying to say? Tell me, why didn’t you stop me?”
“Because…because I thought I still could get away unseen.”
“You were always a horrible liar, Kenna,” Rhys admonished her, clicking his tongue. “Why didn’t you close your eyes?”
“I did! At least…at least for a little while I did.”
“And I shall do the same.” He crossed his arms in front of him and shut his eyes. “Come on. In my present condition the room is spinning madly.”
“Turn your back,” Kenna said stubbornly. That Rhys did so without protest amazed her. She quickly pulled off her robe and nightgown and put on his shirt, finding that she too had some difficulty with the buttons and nothing to blame it on but the state of her nerves and her own foolishness. Occasionally she glanced at Rhys while she fumbled with her clothes but he stood the whole while with his back to her. It wasn’t until she stepped out of the tub, wishing she had some sort of covering for her bare legs, that she saw why he had been more than happy to keep his back turned. In the cheval glass beyond him her every movement was mirrored. “You were watching the entire time!” she accused.
Rhys turned around. “I was.”
His easy admission startled her and she looked at him, not understanding why he didn’t lie. Something of what she was thinking must have shown in her face for Rhys answered her as if she had spoken aloud.
“I’ve never lied to you, Kenna.” He watched confusion register on her face then he walked over to the bed and sat down on the edge. “Now what is so important that you would beard the lion in his den?”
“Do you have another dressing gown?” She laughed nervously. “That isn’t why I came. But I can’t, you know, talk to you dressed in this fashion.”
“A pity. It’s a lovely fashion.” His eyes swept the gentle curves of her coltish legs. His shirt drooped comically about her shoulders and the cuffs covered the backs of her hands, but her legs were so long that the hem only reached mid-thigh. He felt another stirring inside him, stronger than one he had felt as he watched her undress, and he fought to tamp it down. “I think there’s another in the wardrobe.”
Kenna shot him a grateful look and crossed the room to get it before she refined too long on the cause of the huskiness in his voice. She huddled on the padded window seat, curling her feet under her and wrapping her toes beneath the hem of Rhys’s robe. The robe, like his shirt, had the faint odor of the tobacco he occasionally smoked and something else she could only identify as Rhys. To keep from thinking about it she unwrapped her hair, threading her fingers through it to untangle the knotted strands.
“It’s cold by the window,” Rhys said when Kenna seemed lost in her thoughts, far away from him. He wanted to draw her out, understand her reason for coming to see him, though he doubted he would like what he heard. “Why don’t you sit by the fire?”
“No. No, I’m fine here.”
“Kenna,” Rhys said gently as she looked anywhere but at him. “Let’s have done with this. Tell me why you’re here or take yourself back to your own room. I pray you can manage it without tripping over your brother on his way upstairs.”
“Nick hasn’t gone to bed yet?”
“No. When last I saw him he was passed out in his favorite chair in the study.”
“Drank him under the table, did you? Do you remember the time—”
Rhys shook his head. It was not the time for memories. “I won’t ask again, Kenna. What do you want?”
