“Run,” he said grimly, and that’s what they did.
Down the steps, around the stone wall, and back to the road while Gertie, who likely belonged in a mental asylum for the lamb stew obsessed, fired bullets into the air.
Weston could have sworn he felt one fly over his shoulder, and he shoved Evie in front of him into a thicket of overgrown bushes. They huddled together, with Posy pressed between them, as their breathing slowed and steadied…but all it took was a quick measure of how close Evie’s hand was to his groin for Weston’s pulse rate to accelerate all over again.
Bloody hell.
What was hedoing?
Then Evie started to adjust her position but lost her balance and used Weston’s leg to regain it, her fingers burning through his trousers like an iron brand as they splayed across his upper thigh. She jerked her head up, and their eyes met, and all he could think as the air vibrated with delicious tension was what the devil weretheydoing?
Neither of them spoke. There was no need for it. Even if they weren’t supposed to be in hiding, the mutual lust in their gazes said more than any words possibly could.
He leaned towards her, his thumb gliding along the edge of her jaw as he swept a tendril of hair behind her ear.
God, but she was gorgeous. He had strolled through London’s ballrooms with some of theton’sGreat Beauties on his arm and all of them, every last one, paled in comparison to Evelyn Thorncroft.
It wasn’t just her sapphire-blue eyes or the soft pink of her lips. It wasn’t all that black, silky hair or those thick, sooty lashes. It wasn’t her high cheekbones or the tiny, almost invisible freckle to the left of her nose that he wanted to nip.
No, what made Evie exquisite–what made hertrulyincomparable–was the intimate knowledge that she possessed of her own beauty and stunning self-worth.
Even with her hat all askew, and dirt on her face, and her dress wrinkled nearly beyond repair, she exuded confidence. She flaunted grace. She held her chin as high as any queen’s, and her small, catlike smile all but dared him to try and steal her crown.
For Weston, passion had invariably been about necessity. He used it to fulfill a need, nothing more. But Evie…Evie, he wanted to savor. Like a fine glass of port or a good cigar, he wanted to linger over her until the sun faded to black and the stars scattered across the heavens.
He wanted to lick, and taste, and nuzzle.
He wanted to hear her moan, and gasp, and cry out.
He wanted to watch those blue eyes glaze over, and her head fall back, and her body arch beneath his.
He wanted all that, and more.
So much more.
But for now…for now, he’d settle for a kiss.
And pray it was enough to satisfy this acute, feverish ache inside of him.
He cupped her chin, this siren whom he desired every bit as much as he despised.
Her eyes widened with awareness, but she did not pull away.
He slowly lowered his head, and…she licked his face.
No, not Evie, he realized as he pulled sharply back and swiped the cuff of his coat across his damp cheek. That hadn’t been the sweet, seductive flick of a woman’s tongue, but rather the wet, rough slurp of a…
“Posy!” Evie scolded, wagging her finger at the lamb. “That’s quite forward of you.”
Weston, the Earl of Hawkridge and heir apparent to the Dukedom of Caldwell, had been kissed by a sheep.
To add insult to grievous injury, Evie had witnessed it.
And she was laughing at him.
It really was too much to be borne.
“Get up,” he snarled at her, all but tossing Posy into her lap before he surged to his feet. “We’ve yet a long way to walk if we want to reach the inn by nightfall.”
