Page 48 of The Forsaken

The dazzling white smile he flashed showed a man entertaining the possibility and enjoying it.

“Y-You are a horrid, hateful man.”

Tears threatened. Andromena jerked her face away, lest he see them and have more reasons to mock her.

Naturally, he didn’t allow her any pride.

Edgar dragged the rough pad of his thumb along the line of her jaw. She stiffened, locking her chin against his touch.

Andromena sharpened her eyes into a hard glare. “What—” The words died.

The slow slide of his thumb across her lower lip erased every thought in her head. His expression was darker than she had ever seen it.

“You must be guarded and watched, day and night,” the harsh rasp of his voice was more enthralling than any charming endearments uttered.

She wet her dry lips. Edgar’s gaze darkened, violent as a Scottish, winter squall. He dropped his hand and stepped back so fast she was still swaying when the heavy library door swung open to admit her uncle.

“Kerr, my lad! So good of you to come.”

Still firmly under Edgar’s trance, Andromena stared confusedly as her cheer-filled, heavily whiskered uncle approached.

Not Kerr. He greeted the older gentleman with cool, practiced ease. “A pleasure to be here, my lord.” The words fell from his lips so effortlessly that Andromena mentally added skilled liar to the viscount’s many accomplishments—a talent she knew firsthand from the night he had almost tricked her into eloping.

The kindly patriarch of the McQuoids came over and bussed Andromena on the cheek. “Andy, lass! I didn’t know you’d be here.”

“Remember, you asked me to come?”

“Oh, that’s right.” His constantly confused look said the opposite. He, of course, moved on to other things he’d forgotten—like the number of times Edgar had been a guest of the McQuoids and Smiths. “Kerr, meet my niece, Miss Smith.”

Lord Kerr offered a flat: “We are acquainted.”

This from the man who had kissed her breathless before turning on the charm for every other woman alive, making her fingers itch to jab him with her broken pencil.

He finally caved to a bow. “How are you faring after your incident, Miss Smith?”

Oh, he wanted to carry on this topic, did he?

“Given how callously I was handled, my back is quite sore.”

“How unfortunate.”

Of course, it would take a great deal more to either shame or shock the devilish pirate. “And my buttocks are badly bruised.”

He yawned—and didn’t even stifle it; the bounder.

There—a reaction. Curse him.

“My belated apologies, Miss Smith.”

At last, some sheepishness.

Naturally, the gentleman ruined it in his next breath. “It is in bad form to yawn in good company.”

“Given your reputation, my lord, I cannot imagine you are familiar with any.”

A wicked smile touched the corner of his mouth. “I’m not.”

Andromena gave up on the whole ‘show goodwill to all creatures’—she was going to hell, anyway—and searched for the flanged mace she’d spotted earlier.