She smiled. “I am quite aboveboard where Lavender is concerned.”
He stepped closer then, and his voice lowered. “You are the worst kind of scoundrel, then.”
She raised a brow. “How so?”
“You assume the mantle only when you require it. You lack conviction.”
He was very close now, looming over her. “Are you attempting to intimidate me into agreeing with you?”
“Is it working?”
She swallowed, and he resisted the urge to stroke the column of her neck. “No.”
“Men cower at the mere mention of my name, you know.”
She laughed. “The look of you now, cradling a piglet, might ease their fear.”
He looked down at the sleeping Lavender and couldn’t hold in his soft chuckle. Mara stilled at the sound, then cleared her throat. Temple found her gaze. She was aware of him. As aware of him as he was of her.
“Did you mean what you said about vengeance not being worth the trouble?”
He raised a brow. “I did not say that.”
“You said it rarely proceeded as expected.”
“Which is true,” he said, “but that does not mean that it does not end as such.” He had to believe it.
She looked straight ahead, her gaze settling at the indentation in his chin. “Where does this revenge end?”
I don’t know.
He would not admit that. Instead, he said, “It ends with me a duke once more. With what I was promised as a child. With the life I was bred for. With a wife.” He ignored the thought of strange eyes. “A child.” And dark hair. “A legacy.”
She did look at him then. “And for me?”
He thought for a long moment. Imagined them different. He a different man, she a different woman. Imagined they’d met under different circumstances. There was much to recommend her—she was brave and strong and deeply loyal to her boys. To this life she had built.
She was not his concern.
He wished that was not becoming so difficult to believe.
His free hand came to her face, tilted it up to meet him. Told her the truth. “I don’t know. I shouldn’t have come here today.”
“Why did you?”
“Because I wanted to see you in your element. I wanted to meet your boys.”
“To what end?”
He did not have an answer to that. He shouldn’t want to know her better. To understand her. But he couldn’t help himself. Perhaps because they were forever linked. Perhaps because she’d made him, in a way. Perhaps because he wished to understand her.
But he hadn’t expected to begin to like her.
And he definitely hadn’t expected to want her so much.
Knowing he couldn’t say any of that to her, he chose another path—distraction—and he closed the distance between them and kissed her.
She leaned into the kiss, her lips a barely there promise, light and sweet enough for her to wonder if it could be called a kiss at all. It was more of a tease. A temptation that rolled in, surprising him with its power. With the way he wanted it. The way she wanted it. She sighed against him, and it was precisely that for which he was waiting.
She offered him entry; he took it.
The moment her lips parted, he captured them, deepening the caress, his hand sliding from her cheek to her neck and finally down her back to wrap around her waist and pull her close. Her sigh became his satisfaction, a deep, primitive growl that surprised him. She tested his control again and again.
And he enjoyed it.
Then his tongue was stroking across her lower lip and her hands were in his hair and she pressed against him, as though there were nothing in the world she wanted more than to be close to him. As though she weren’t afraid of him.
He gathered her closer, wanting to bask in her fearlessness, wanting to block out everything that had been and would be and live only in this moment. With this woman who seemed to want the same.
That’s when Lavender protested.
The piglet offered an outraged squeal and began to squirm quite desperately in her place between them, wishing to be either released or restored to her prior state of naptime abandon.
Mara and Temple tore apart from each other, her hand at her throat, his keeping Lavender from leaping to her death. He set the piglet down, and she scurried off, leaving them alone in the foyer, out of breath, staring at each other as though they did not know whether to run from the house or back into each others’ arms.
He wasn’t leaving that house.
Instead, he came at her once more, beside her in two long strides, lifting her in his arms—loving the weight of her there, the way his muscles bunched and tightened. The way they served a new, infinitely more valuable purpose. He took her mouth again, hard and fast, and tasted a frustration there—one he recognized because it mirrored his own.
Christ. He couldn’t stay.
He released her as quickly as he’d captured her, leaving her unsteady on her feet, capturing her face in his hand, staring deep into her eyes and saying, “You are trouble,” before punctuating the statement with a firm, final kiss and stepping away from her.
Her hand flew to her lips, and he watched the movement with desperation, loving the way those pretty fingers pressed against swollen flesh. Wishing they were anyone but them. Anywhere but here.
If wishes were horses.
He turned to leave. Knowing he had to. Not trusting himself to stay.
She called after him. “Will you join us for luncheon?”
“No, thank you,” he said, at sea. “My morning is complete.” Too complete. He should not have touched her. She was his ruin. His revenge.
Why couldn’t he remember that?
“You look hungry.”
He nearly laughed. He’d never been so hungry in his life. “I am fine.”
“Are you still afraid I might poison you?”
He inclined his head, the excuse welcome. “A man cannot be too careful.”
She smiled. He enjoyed that smile. Too much.
He had to stop this.
And so he said the one thing that he knew would do just that. “Mara.”
She met his gaze, trying not to notice how handsome he was. How tempting. “Yes?”
“That night. Did we make love?”
Her eyes went wide. He’d shocked her. She’d been expecting a dozen things, but not that. Not the reminder of their past. Of their deal.
She recovered quickly—quick enough for him to admire her. “Have you decided to forgive my brother’s debt?”
Like that, they were on solid ground once more. Thankfully. “No.”
“Then I am afraid I cannot remember.”
“Well.” He turned for the door, fetching his greatcoat from its hook nearby. “I certainly understand that predicament.”
His hand was on the handle of the door when she said, “Another two pounds, either way.”
He looked back, a thread of ice spreading through him. “For what?”
She stood tall and proud in the foyer. “For the kiss.”
He hadn’t been thinking of their deal when he’d kissed her, and he’d wager everything he had that she hadn’t been thinking of it, either. The discussion of funds made the moment base and unpleasant, and he hated that she’d returned them to this place.
“Two pounds sounds fine.” She needn’t know that he’d pay two hundred for another moment like that. Two thousand. “I shall see you tonight.” He opened the door and added, “Wear what arrives from Hebert today.”