“What?” Susanah sat up and grabbed the sheets. What had just happened? What was he talking about? But then he appeared to be leaving. “No.”

He snatched his clothing from the floor and thrust his legs into his breeches without pulling on his small clothes. He muttered. “I should have known better.”

There were words tumbling around in her head, but they weren’t coherent thoughts. The shift from a pleasant haze of repletion to understanding why Evan had left her body and bed so abruptly wasn’t making any sense. “Did I do something wrong?”

Or was he just glad it was over? Nothing made sense. Except that he might have been happy to make love—or have sexual relations—love hadn’t really been mentioned. Although one time she’d thought he was going to say it, but he hadn’t. Because he didn’t love her. She had to face facts.

“What will Lord Farringate think when he finds you aren’t a virgin?” He said on a low note.

So Evan offered her no other choice. He wouldn’t marry her. Or at least not under these circumstances, where her father might not hand over her dowry. For a second she couldn’t breathe, her chest was so pained it sucked the air from her. But then she managed to sputter, “I don’t care what he thinks.”

She’d given herself to Evan unconditionally, but she should have insisted on conditions, on his being honorable. Except he was a rake. He might not have virginal ladies as his usual conquests, but he’d been too skilled, too perfect with her to believe it had never happened.

Even if he did marry her, she’d likely spend the rest of her life watching him flit from seduction to seduction. The pain would be unbearable. She’d be better off with Farringate where she wouldn’t care if he bedded other women. She’d welcome it. The idea of allowing that man to do the things Evan had done to her almost made her sick. She put a hand over her mouth holding in the rise in her gorge.

He picked up his shirt and thrust his head through the opening. But she feasted her eyes on his lean torso, knowing she would never see it again. But other women would.

“And stay away from Annabelle,” she popped off.

“What?” His gaze narrowed.

“She and Ashton are happy.” She would never have the adoring looks the two of them cast in each other’s direction when they thought she wasn’t looking. She couldn’t bear the thought of Evan coupling with any of the women she cared about. She couldn’t bear the thought of him with anyone else. He was tearing her apart as surely as horses had been bound to all her limbs to quarter her.

“Is that what you think of me?” he asked in a deadly soft voice.

“What am I to think? I saw the way you looked at her.”

He shook his head and moved out of her room into the sitting room. She rose to follow him, but she was stark naked. She couldn’t chase him through the house naked. Did she intend to chase him through the house? Was this some test of her passion? Should she tell him she loved him? Or would he only look at her in pity? She cast around looking for her nightgown, but by then the door clicked.

She tried to think of a sampler pattern, to sort out colors for leaves and flower petals for a riotous design, but she wanted ugly red slashes and black. Her emotions too long controlled refused to be held down. She didn’t even make it back to the bed before a powerful sob racked her and brought her to her knees.

There was a loud thud outside the door, but she couldn’t think about that as she felt torn in pieces. She clutched at the sheets and buried her face against the edge of the mattress stifling her wails. The sheets smelled of Evan. She didn’t want to let them go, even though she hated him almost as much as she loved him. It was as if he’d wrenched off her arm or something equally vital and taken it with him, and all she was left with was his scent on the sheets.

* * *

“Good God, man watch where you’re going,” said Lord Ashton from the corridor floor.

Evan’s clothes were scattered about and the only thing that saved him from landing on the floor was planting his face into the opposite wall. He fisted his hands perfectly willing to pummel the bastard—not that sitting just outside the doorway to Susanah’s suite was that egregious an offense. “What the devil are you doing?”

If Ashton knew the rage coursing through Evan’s veins, he wouldn’t be sitting there on the floor suppressing a grin. Not very successfully, either. Evan was of a mind to smack it off his face.

Ashton sprang to his feet and grew serious. “As surprising as it is, I’m cast into the role of Lady’s Susanah’s chaperone. My duty is to protect her. So you will marry her.”

What? He’d called her Lady Susanah, not Lady Farringate.

“She’s married…marrying Farringate.” Evan said dumbly. She wasn’t already married to him? “He can marry her.”

Ashton sighed. “I don’t want to challenge you to a duel. So let’s get this straight. You are going to marry her.”

Evan slumped, everything going out of him. If she wanted to marry him, she could have said so at any time over the last few hours, but she hadn’t. “She doesn’t want to marry me. She wants her bloody title.”

Ashton tilted his head and stared at him. “Do you really think that she would apply to me—a man who jilted her—and my wife—the woman she was thrown over for—to come all this way just for you to dance the miller’s reel?” Ashton waved his hand toward the door.

Heat crept up Evan’s neck. He hadn’t been quiet and neither had Lady Susanah. Although her softer moans probably hadn’t carried as far. But she would be mortified to know that they’d been overheard. But then Evan hadn’t expected anyone to be lurking just outside her sitting room door. But it was too much to take in. “She needed to prepare for what she’d face in her marriage bed. She doesn’t like to be touched.”

She’d said as much, hadn’t she? Did he have this all wrong?

“Could have fooled me,” said Ashton, but then he cleared his throat. “However, she assured us you had proposed to her.”

“She turned me down.” Evan would have left, but he couldn’t leave his clothing scattered about. One shoe was eluding him. His shoe was under a small table, and he bent to retrieve it. Then he could leave.

“Just now?” Ashton’s voice crested upward.

Evan looked at the other man. Could he have this wrong? But no, Susanah was telling him to stay away from Annabelle. Her opinion of him wasn’t very high. And his prospects for the foreseeable future were dismal.

Then again she had come to him. His heart gave an awkward thump at the same time his stomach burned. What must she think of him?

Ashton took his indecision as a moment to press. He put a hand on Evan’s shoulder and turned him back towards the door. “She is not the same girl I proposed to. And you look as though you haven’t slept for a month. Now, go back in there and get this straightened out. Trust me when I say, the longer you let it go, the more things will fester.”

Evan dug in his bare feet and resisted the pressure. He couldn’t believe it. He’d spent the entire evening—actually all of their time together—knowing she was lost to him. His brain would not make the transition. “If she wanted to accept my offer, why wouldn’t she say so?”

Why hadn’t she just said so instead of implying she didn’t want Farringate to be the one to take her virginity—which now that he thought about it was a big club of a clue that should have hit him over the head.

“She’s a stickler for rules our Lady Susanah. You asked, she said no. Now you have to ask again, and she’ll say yes. She couldn’t possibly ask you to marry her.”

It was too much to believe.

Ashton was reaching for the doorknob.

Evan shook his head. “I just…” he gestured toward the door.

“Showed her the heavens?” supplied Ashton. “She has no basis for comparison.”

That hadn’t been what he was about to say. Evan stared at the other man trying to get his objections in order. He wasn’t certain he could make her happy. But then his thoughts circled the concept that she might not understand how amazing their lovemaking had been. How he finally understood the biblical command to worship her with his body.

Ashton pushed his jaw up with a finger underneath Evan’s chin. “If you want I can have Annabelle speak with her, but it would be much better if you go back in there and sort it out for yourself. Women are odd ducks. They need the words.” He dropped his voice. “And just in case you do too, she loves you.”

Did she? Why, the devil, wouldn’t she just say so? Because a man was supposed to go first with declarations. How could he have been so blind? Evan reached for the doorknob himself.

“Good man.” Ashton clapped him on the shoulder. “And do not under any circumstances tell her that you have to marry her or have lead for breakfast. She won’t understand.”

Evan opened the door. Ashton gave him a thumbs up, for luck no doubt. After closing the door behind him, Evan dropped his shoes and various pieces of clothing. He crossed the empty and silent sitting room. Surely she hadn’t just turned over and gone to sleep.

“Susanah?”

A scrambling noise came from the bedchamber. He hurried forward and found her crouched on the floor trying to untangle her nightgown. Her glorious hair slid across her rounded back, but not entirely covering her nudity. She averted her head, but not before he realized her cheeks were glistening with moisture.

Something inside him broke and he hated himself in that moment. He should never have left her so soon after making love for her first time. They’d shared something beyond amazing and he’d let his temper and fears get the best of him. He grabbed the coverlet off the bed, wrapped it around her, and scooped her up into his arms. “Hush, darling.”

He moved to the chair in front of the fireplace. There were only embers left. It would be dawn soon. But he snuggled her into his lap. Her shaking belied that her tears hadn’t stopped. He cradled her close feeling his own eyes grow damp. “I’m sorry, darling. Don’t cry.”

“I feel so alone,” she sobbed.

“I’m here now. I’ll never leave you.”

She went very still. He wanted to beg her to stop him if she were about to refuse him, but that was cowardly.

He tilted her back and lifted her chin. “Don’t you know I love you?”

Her swollen, red-rimmed, not quite so lavender-colored eyes widened. Her cheeks were blotchy. Bloody hell, she must have been crying as if her heart were broken. She gave a faint shake of her head. “You do?”

He nodded and let her see the tears that had pooled in his own eyes. “I can’t bear the thought of living my life without you. So, I’m begging you to marry me. Please, Susanah, I love you with all my soul.”

“I love you,” she said tremulously.

Which wasn’t an answer. She might still think her duty precluded a marriage of the heart. “Susanah, you have to marry me. I’ve compromised you, and you’ve ruined me for other women.”

“I have?”

He gave her a little shake. “You are the only woman I want. You are all the woman I need.”

Her brow furrowed. “But…”

He nearly growled. With his history, he supposed she needed reassurance. Not to mention the way he’d just walked out on her. He needed to grovel. “I thought when you answered my question about why you were here, you were telling me you’d already married Farringate.”

Her mouth rounded. “No.” She shook her head. “I haven’t. I don’t want to.”

He almost growled. She hadn’t said she wouldn’t. But he couldn’t allow any more misunderstandings. Not on his side, nor on hers. “I’ll admit I did look most particularly at Lady Ashton. She is beautiful, but I didn’t even notice she was there at first. All I could see was you. When I did finally notice her, I didn’t feel the slightest inclination in her direction. I was too dumbfounded to grasp why at that moment. I guess I hadn’t realized that you were the only one for me, even though I knew that I loved you.”

Susanah tucked her chin down. Her voice was small as she asked, “What about that lady at Almack’s that you flirted with so outrageously?”

He had to think a minute before he blurted out, “Rebecca?”

Susanah shifted on his lap. “You called her Becky.”

“It’s a game we play. She’s my oldest brother’s wife. I would never…” Bloody hell. “I’m sorry, darling. I was trying to divert attention from my relationship with you, not hurt you. Susanah, I love you and only you.”

She still hadn’t answered, so he stood, dumped her into the chair, and then knelt on one knee. He had to reach inside the folds of the coverlet to find her hand and he pretended not to notice that he could see her bare breast. “Would you do me the great honor of becoming my wife?”

Her lips curled. “I thought you’d never ask.”

“Will you ever answer? I’m dying a very slow death waiting for your answer.”

“I will be honored to be your wife,” she said primly.

And that was that. Well, other than he was done pretending that he couldn’t see her lovely, little, exposed breast and reached into the folds to cup it. It was sometime in the mid-morning hours when they were laying naked on the bed that he realized the purple bed curtains gave her eyes the lavender cast. He admitted to a fascination with the way they could reflect her surroundings. And she laughed—actually laughed—and admitted to an equal fascination with his eyes.

Then there was the agreement with the Ashtons to return to London for a special license. Evan married her before the ink was dry. Then he insisted on buying his wife a purple dress and paints.

The inevitable meeting with her father could have been worse, but he’d survived it. He’d had some satisfaction in telling the man that he didn’t give a fig for her dowry or inheritance, and he wouldn’t take them. He’d left Lord Weatdon with his mouth agape as he’d suggested giving her dowry to Farringate if he needed a political ally so badly. Weatdon had signed over the funds anyway.

Then Evan took her home to meet Gilbert. Which went much better than he could have hoped. Her years of keeping her expressions controlled kept her from betraying shock or dismay. But then over the months, the two became constant companions while he worked. Her sweet attention on his cousin had him at times fighting jealousy. But the nights were all his—for a while at least.

The baby claimed her attention too much in the wee hours, but then she was determined to raise their son with all the love she’d been denied. Evan was determined to shower her with the affection she so richly deserved.

While their forays to the city were rare, the ton couldn’t get past how very changed they both were. She wasn’t quite as dull and proper as she’d been thought, nor was he quite as wild and wicked as rumored. And if the curiosity about how and when their courtship had taken place never ceased, they just exchanged private glances and let it go at that.

* * *

* * *

I know you have many options for spending your time and money either on other books or other forms of entertainments. I’m so thrilled and grateful you picked my book to read. I hoped you enjoyed Susanah and Evan’s story. Thank you so much! Katy

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Coming soon:

Something About Annabelle

Belles of Beak Street Book 1