How was she to bear a fortnight of this?
“Well?” she demanded, aware that she was being cutting and rude to him and yet somehow unable to stop herself. “Have you anything to say now, Mr. Nothing?”
She had been shot. She had been torn from the life to which she was accustomed. She had been forced to lie to her future husband. She had been hidden away. How could anyone expect her to be anything other than bitter and upset and ill-mannered? She was sure they could not, Devil Winter included.
“Devil.”
Thatwas what the man had to say. The curt, nonsensical insistence she refer to him as his awful sobriquet. She most certainly would not.
Evie spun on her heel and commenced pacing.
“Nineteen.”
She turned back to him. “You are counting the number of times I have paced the floor?”
He stared at her with those insolent blue eyes that saw too much and made her tingle in places she had not previously known existed. He said nothing.
Somehow, his silence was a greater rebuke than his words.
“You refuse to answer me until I refer to you as you wish” she guessed next, irritated. “I do not want to play games with you, sir.”
He grunted.
She gritted her teeth, commencing her pacing.
“Twenty.”
That was it.
She pivoted and stalked toward him. Evie did not halt until she was near enough to thrust out her forefinger and poke him in his big, hard chest. “Stop. Counting.”
Two pokes, one for each word. Emphasizing her point.
He raised a brow and said nothing, mocking her without uttering a syllable.
Her finger lingered against his chest, and it occurred to her belatedly that he had somehow shucked his coat. He stood before her in shirtsleeves and a waistcoat only, the cravat at his neck scarcely knotted. In a word, he looked disreputable.
And delicious.
No! Decidedly not that.
She banished the unworthy thought immediately. The warmth emanating from him seared her fingertip. She cleared her throat. Forgot why she was still touching him. His scent was richer at this proximity, tiny flecks of green visible in his bright eyes. Her gaze dipped to his mouth, which was full.
Fuller than Lord Denton’s. She did not think she could recall her betrothed’s lips just now.Oh, bother.
“Like what you see, milady?”
His mocking query filled her with mortification. Her cheeks were scalding. She withdrew her finger. “No. I am horrified by it. You are a dreadful, uncouth beast, sir.”
One corner of his lips quirked. “Didn’t seem horrified.”
She was staring at his dratted mouth again. And being insolent. He had cleaned her wound when she had been injured. His balm had appeared to stave off infection and was aiding in her healing. She had not required stitching after all, much to her relief.
But Evie was still in a dreadful mood. Her life had been disrupted. Upended. Her reputation was in every bit as much danger as her life. If word of her sojourn in this Grosvenor Square townhome ever reached anyone, she would never survive the storm of scandal. Diamonds of the first water did not disappear for a fortnight with the sole accompaniment of a lady’s maid and one of the East End’s most feared criminals.
“Milady?” he prompted, his voice still mocking.
What was it about him? Why could she not seem to look away, to walk away?
