“It explains everything. The necklace. The dress.” She tugged on the silk as if it offended her. “The kindness you’ve shown me. If they believe we’re lovers, they’ll hurt me to punish you.” A brittle laugh escaped her. “You didn’t kill my father, but you could destroy me instead.”
“For heaven’s sake, woman. Have you lost your wits?” He edged closer. She edged back. “If I wanted to hurt you, I’d give Templeton permission to pursue you.”
“Perhaps you have and he’s part of the plan.” Shemuttered under her breath, rambling like a bedlamite. “That’s why you agreed to this partnership. To trick me. To lure me into a trap.”
“A trap?” His jaw tightened. “I’d kill them if they touched you.”
He meant it. Every word.
But promises from a scoundrel weighed nothing.
“I need to leave.” Her voice broke on a sob. “Get as far away from here—from you—as I can. Is nowhere safe?”
“Take a breath,” he said, the plea cloaked as a command.
But she turned, hitched her skirts, and ran full tilt towards the garden’s edge, towards the wrought-iron gate that led to the mews.
He gave chase, boots pounding the ground, ignoring the gasping couple hidden behind the oak—the man’s pale arse gleaming like a ghost in the moonlight.
“Daphne!”
It was the first time he’d spoken her name.
He’d imagined it under very different circumstances.
She glanced back over her shoulder, panic in her eyes, and missed her step. Her foot caught on a root, and she went down hard.
“Daphne.”
Even as she fell, something twisted in his chest.
He was at her side in a heartbeat, lifting her gently, brushing dirt from her gown, tugging off her glove to examine her hand.
“You think I planned this?” he said, his voice rough with disbelief. “That I meant to put a target on your back? That hurting you once wasn’t enough?”
“What else should I think?”
She tried to pull away, but he tightened his grip on her wrist. Words he didn’t want to say clung to his tongue.
“You’ve no defence?” she asked, her anger palpable.
But all he could see were her lips wet with tears, the leaves tangled in her hair, the dirt smudged across her cheek. He should’ve let her go. Instead, he was drowning. And something inside him cracked.
“Perhaps I wanted you close so I could protect you.”
He drew her in, their mouths just inches apart, her warm breath melting the last of his resolve. “So I could right a wrong. So I could ease this blasted craving.”
She didn’t move. Didn’t blink. Just looked up at him like she already knew he was lost.
One kiss, and he could be rid of this fever.
One kiss might silence the storm inside him.
Then he could be done with this madness.
“What craving?” she asked softly.
“This one.”
