Panicked breath tore from her chest in shallow pulls. Her lungs ached. Her heart thundered so violently she was certain it would betray her to all of Lord and Lady Rutland’s guests.
He hadn’t always been a monster.
Once, August wore an easy smile for Meghan, bantered, and regaled her with clever yarns.
Well, not for her. During her sister’s courtship, Meghan had been a beneficiary—an afterthought.
The air felt too thick, too close, as though the house itself conspired to slow her escape.
She pushed herself faster.
From the moment he’d walked through their front door, bearing Meghan’s sister in his arms after a fall outside, the McQuoid ladies were smitten as kittens.
A broken heart changed a person.
Meghan knew that better than anyone.
A sharp, gnawing pain pulsed behind her breastbone.
What foolishness had driven her here this night?
Desperation.
Stupidity.
Love.
“Alas, fortunately for both of us, whether or not we like one another is irrelevant…”
Oh, how he would have laughed in her face had she done what she set out to do.
This was the price she paid for her transgressions.
“You’d love it if I told you how I want to strip you bare, lay you down, and bury myself between your sweet thighs…”
Heat lingered in that intimate place; an ache wholly at odds with the fear driving her forward. She clenched her hands into fists, nails biting into her palms, as though pain might scour the sensation from her body.
It did not.
The earl’s taunts came louder in Meghan’s mind, and she wanted to clamp her hands over her ears and scream them away.
“I might be able to work myself up to it…”
Meghan’s heavy skirts slapped at her legs, whipping her as she deserved.
“All it would take would be for you to lift your skirts and allow me to slip a hand between your legs… I’ll show you what you really want, and what I offer in return.”
Her pulse pounded at her wrist, at the very place August kissed, caressed, and nipped. Her breath hitched in remembrance.
Oh, God.
She wore August’s mark.
She would march down her wedding aisle bearing his love bite.
Her wedding…
Meghan gagged and fought the rising tide of nausea.
