“That’s—that’s—”
“Not very sporting of me, I know.”
“Beast!”
His humor returned in the face of her rage. God, she was beautiful when her eyes flashed like that. The golden flecks seemed to blaze, to match the fire of her hair. It dawned on him suddenly that she was really in his house, in his bedroom, where he had imagined her countless times but had been unable to figure a way to get her there himself.
The grin that curled his lips infuriated her even more.You’ve come to my lair, sweetheart, he couldn’t help thinking.I have you now.
To her, he suggested, “A drink?”
“You’d drive a saint to it,” she retorted, but nodded just the same and took a hefty swallow of the brandy he handed her a moment later.
“Well?” he prompted when she did no more than continue to glower resentfully at him.
“It has to do with my grandfather, and his making me promise I’d marry as soon as he passed away.”
“I know that,” Anthony said calmly. “Now tell me why he wanted such a promise.”
“Very well!” she snapped. “I have a distant cousin who means to marry me at any cost.”
“So?”
“I didn’t say he wants to, but means to, whetherIwant to or not. Do you ken now? If Geordie Cameron gets his hands on me, he’ll force me to it.”
“I take it you’d rather not have him?”
“Dinna be daft, mon,” she said impatiently, beginning to pace a circle around him. “Would I be willing to wed a near stranger for any other reason?”
“No, I don’t suppose so.”
Roslynn gasped, catching his smile. “You think it’s amusing?”
“What I think, sweetheart, is that you’ve made too much of it. All you need is to have someone persuade this cousin of yours that he’d be healthier if he looked somewhere else for a wife.”
“You?”
He shrugged. “Why not? I wouldn’t mind doing you such a service.”
She nearly hit him. She finished off her brandy instead, grateful for its calming effect.
“Let me tell you something, Anthony Malory. This is my life you’re suggesting you gamble with, not yours. You don’t know Geordie. You don’t know how obsessed he is with getting his hands on my grandfather’s fortune through me. He’ll do anything to get it, and once he does, what’s to stop him from arranging a convenient accident for me, or locking me up somewhere and claiming I’ve gone daft or something? A little warning from you wouldn’t scare him off, even if you could manage to find him to do so. Nothing will. The only way I can protect myself is to marry someone else.”
Anthony had taken her glass, refilled it, and handed it back while she laid into him with these facts. She didn’t even seem to notice.
“Very well, now I know why you think you must marry quickly. So tell me, what’s made it immediate?What brought you to risk your reputation by coming here tonight?”
She flinched at the unnecessary reminder ofthatdanger, which had seemed the lesser evil at the time. “Geordie’s found me. Last night he managed to have me drugged and taken right out of Frances’ house.”
“The hell you say!”
She went on as if she hadn’t heard his outburst. “I woke up today locked in a strange room down by the waterfront, just waiting for the deceitful parson Geordie had found to arrive. If I hadn’t jumped out the window—”
“Good God, woman, you can’t be serious!”
She stopped her pacing for a moment to fix him with a look that was frankly contemptuous. “I’ve no doubt still got some straw in my hair from the hay wagon I landed in. It took me so long to find my way home that there was no time to brush it all out. I would show you, but Nettie’s not here to redo my hair if I take it down, and I doubt your Dobson could manage it. And I willnotleave your house looking as if—as if—”
Anthony threw back his head in laughter when she failed to complete the provocative thought. Roslynn gave him her back and headed straight for the door. He got there at the same moment, his hand sliding past her shoulder to press firmly against the only exit.
