“I’m sorry.” She gasped, flushing.
“I’m the one who killed my wife?” It was a purr.
Jane started. “No! I mean, I wasn’t even thinking that!”
“No? You would find fault with all of my behavior except the most critical?”
She bit her lip, desperately sorry for fighting back and, apparently, hitting the earl where it hurt.
He smiled, with no mirth, and released her. “As an adult, I can damn well do what I want, when I want, and frankly, my dear, I’ve long since ceased to give a damn about propriety.” His tone went hard. “But you are another matter. Do you understand that, Jane?”
“That’s not fair,” she began.
“Don’t you dare speak back to me.”
“But you treat me like a child!”
“You are not a child, God damn it, didn’t you look in the mirror?” he shouted.
Jane blinked.
He paced away, pouring himself a stiff drink. Jane felt a surging of excitement. “No, I am not a child,” she said softly to his back. “I am seventeen, and a woman.”
He made a sound, not a polite one. “You are not quite a woman—just close enough!”
Joy vanished. “I am not a child! When will you realize that!”
“When you stop acting like one,” he said cruelly.
She felt the heat of tears. Jane folded her arms, upset, hurt. Then she saw where his gaze was, upon her breasts again. He turned away quickly. But not quickly enough. Jane stood very still, thinking. He says one thing, she thought, but does another. He has noticed that I am not a child. Maybe he does not know how to be anything other than insulting. He is aware that I am a woman. He was looking at me. He was looking at me the way that silly redhead was looking at me.
She trembled.He knows—he just won’t admit it
He turned to her. “I want you to understand. As a young woman”—he stressed the adjective—“you cannot roam around the woods unescorted. There are unemployed riffraff everywhere these days. It is not safe.”
She nodded, her eyes glued to his face.He has finally seen that I am not a child!
“And as for this afternoon, Jimmy’s cousin may be younger than you but he is nearly a man, bigger than you, and nothing more than a farmer. When faced with temptation such as you offered, his needs will be more enthusiastic than his common sense. Do you understand?”
“Yes.” She understood—she understood that now she had a chance.
He breathed a sigh of relief. He kept his regard carefully trained above her collar. “Supper is at eight.”
Jane started. He was expecting her to dine with him. This was a far cry from his attitude when she had first arrived. Everything was a far cry from her arrival a few days past. She hid a smile. Maybe he didn’t just expect her presence at his table, maybe he actually wanted it. There was one problem, and gracelessly she blurted, “What about Amelia?”
“Amelia is gone.”
Their glances met, hers wide and elated, his hooded and unreadable.
Jane nearly skipped from the room.
The earl made a dashing figure in black trousers and silver waistcoat. He had not bothered to don a jacket, but Jane admired him just the same. He paused in the midst of a mouthful to meet her bold stare. Jane smiled. “You look very handsome tonight.”
He choked.
Alarmed, Jane jumped up and began pounding his back. Outside, the hounds were baying. The earl reached for his water glass, Jane kept hitting him. The water spilled over his wrist. “Ooh!” Jane cried, ceasing to pound him. But her hand lingered upon his back, and she was standing so close to him her dress touched his left thigh. That was how the Earl of Raversford found them.
“Hullo, Shelton,” he said cheerfully, walking in unannounced. He froze, taking in the scenario. “Well, what have we here?” He grinned.
