Cold-Hearted Rake

Devon sent him a wrathful glance. “I’ll be damned if I have to win her approval before making decisions about my estate.”

“Unlike either of us, she has a conscience. It won’t hurt you at all to hear her opinion. Especially since she happens to be right.”

“You just said you agreed with my position!”

“From a practical standpoint. Morally, Kathleen is right.” West watched as his brother prowled away from the table and back again, pacing like a caged tiger. “You have to understand something about her,” he said. “She’s spirited on the surface, but sensitive at the core. If you show her just a little consideration —”

“I don’t need you to explain her to me.”

“I know her better than you,” West said sharply. “I’ve been living with her, for God’s sake.”

That earned him a chilling glance. “Do you want her?” Devon asked brusquely.

West was baffled by the question, which seemed to have come from nowhere. “Want her? In the biblical sense? Of course not, she’s a widow. Theo’s widow. How could anyone…” His voice faded as he saw that Devon had resumed pacing, his expression murderous.

Thunderstruck, West realized what the most likely reason was for all the free-floating hostility and high-riding tension between Devon and Kathleen. He closed his eyes briefly. This was bad. Bad for everyone, bad for the future, just bloody awful compounding badness in all directions. He decided to test his theory in the hope that he was mistaken.

“Although,” West continued, “she is a little beauty, isn’t she? One could find all kinds of entertaining uses for that sweet mouth. I wouldn’t mind catching her in a dark corner and having some fun. She might resist at first, but soon I’d have her writhing like a cat —”

Devon lunged at him in a blur of motion, seizing West by the lapels. “Touch her and I’ll kill you,” he snarled.

West stared at him in appalled disbelief. “I knew it. Sweet Mother of God! You want her.”

Devon’s visceral fury appeared to fade a few degrees as he realized he had just been outmaneuvered. He released West abruptly.

“You took Theo’s title and his home,” West continued in appalled disbelief, “and now you want his wife.”

“His widow,” Devon muttered.

“Have you seduced her?”

“Not yet.”

West clapped his hand to his forehead. “Christ. Don’t you think she’s suffered enough? Oh, go on and glare. Snap me in pieces like that blasted pencil. It will only confirm that you’re no better than Theo.” Reading the outrage in his brother’s expression, he said, “Your relationships typically last no longer than the contents of the meat larder. You have a devil of a temper, and if the way you just handled her is an example of how you’ll deal with disagreements —”

“That’s enough,” Devon said with dangerous softness.

Rubbing his forehead, West sighed and continued wearily. “Devon, you and I have always overlooked each other’s faults, but that doesn’t mean we’re oblivious to them. This is nothing but blind, stupid lust. Have the decency to leave her alone. Kathleen is a sensitive and compassionate woman who deserves to be loved… and if you have any capacity for that, I’ve never witnessed it. I’ve seen what happens to women who care about you. Nothing cools your lust faster than affection.”

Devon gave him a cold stare. “Are you going to say anything to her?”

“No, I’ll hold my tongue and hope that you’ll come to your senses.”

“There’s no need to worry,” Devon said darkly. “At this point I’ve made her so ill-disposed toward me that it would be a miracle if I ever manage to lure her to my bed.”

After considering the idea of missing dinner for the second night in a row, Kathleen decided in a spirit of defiance to join the family in the dining room. It was Devon’s last evening at Eversby Priory, and she could force herself to endure an hour and a half of sitting at the same table with him. Devon insisted on seating her, his face inscrutable, and she thanked him with a few clipped words. But even with that civilized distance between them, she was in an agony of nerves and anger… most of it directed at herself.

Those kisses… the impossible, terrible pleasure of them… how could he have done that to her? How could she have responded so wantonly? The fault was more hers than Devon’s. He was a London rake; of course he would make advances to her, or to any woman in his proximity. She should have resisted, slapped him, but instead she had stood there and let him… let him…

She couldn’t find the right words for what he had done. He had shown her a side of herself that she had never known existed. She had been raised to believe that lust was a sin, and she had self-righteously considered herself to be above carnal desire… until Devon had proven otherwise. Oh, the shocking heat of his tongue against hers, and the shivery weakness that had made her want to sink to the floor and have him cover her… She could have wept for shame.

Instead, she could only sit there suffocating while the conversation flowed around her. It was a pity she couldn’t enjoy the meal, a succulent partridge pie served with fried oyster patties and a crisp salted salad of celery, radishes, and cucumber. As she forced herself to take a few bites, every mouthful seemed to stick in her throat.

As talk turned to the subject of the approaching holiday, Cassandra asked Devon if he planned to come to Eversby Priory for Christmas.