Page 22 of His Scandalous Viscountess
“Well, it is a comfort to know you are not so dissolute as to engage in debauchery at all hours of the day or night.”
Her playful wink removed any sting her words might have contained.
He chuckled. “I am merely your basic debaucher of women. I stick to the night shadows for my business.”
They both laughed for a second.
Then he pulled a chair out for her. “May I pour you a drink? Dinner should be served any moment.”
She took the offered seat with a shy smile. “Thank you.”
Once her drink was poured and dinner served, he settled into the comfortable quiet. From the first moment he’d seen her parading around downstairs, he’d been plagued by the urge to revisit the past, if only to heal old hurts—mostly those he knew he’d caused.
“Jules, I owe you an apology.”
She stopped eating, clearly a little surprised by his statement. “For what, exactly?”
He swallowed his pride, or at least what he could manage of it. “For leaving you alone on a London street corner in the middle of the night when we were to elope. I wasn’t the man you required me to be at the time, and it still discredits me to this day.”
He could not look at her as he said the last part, unwilling to let her see the full scope of his shame. The rumor of his being a bastard she would likely learn soon enough, as she moved among their peers, but one only he or his father could corroborate it. And neither had done so as yet, though each for their own reasons.
The warmth of her touch as she laid a hand over his drew him from his own bleak musings.
“I must admit I was shocked by the surge of anger upon seeing you again the night you won me. Everyone I loved and trusted failed me where Wallthorpe was concerned. You, my parents, and even myself. And while I could wish that things had been different, I won’t deny that I have led a life that many would envy as a result of the path I was thrown onto. I do not regret the life I’ve lived.”
Wolf was snared by the sincerity in her gaze, and what he could only call an echo of old love. Was there some chance that they might resurrect what had once existed, and fan the flames anew?
“Such sanguine thoughts on our tumultuous history. But then, you were ever the one to find the positive in any situation.”
She smiled ruefully, while letting her hand slip away from his as her gaze dropped. “Perhaps noteverysituation.”
Cold swiftly chilled his skin, where she had just touched him with such care. To distract himself from the loss, he reached for his glass of wine and took a sip.
“I can remember a late summer day when we visited the river not far from your house. It was so hot we decided to cool off in the water. I was about twelve, you were nine, and Ros was seven.” The memories flooded back to him and made him happy, as they often did when he let them come. “You were so very careful of your new dress, taking it off and setting it to hang on a branch, so it wouldn’t be dirtied. Ros refused to come in with us, but she happily stood on the banks as we played in the water. When we crawled out of the river and realized how dirty our underthings had become, there was no question that we were going to be in trouble. But you, Jules—you assured me your mother would be pleased that you had been careful with your new dress. You even made Ros carry it home, so as not to damage it in the slightest with your muddy, wet underclothes.”
She chuckled, her smile lighting up the room far more than the candles he’d lit. “You know I missed dinner and breakfast for that stunt? I swore she was never going to let me run off to play with you again after that. Strangely, my father intervened, pointing out to her the fact that I had been so careful with my dress. Though I did have to promise never to go swimming again.”
Wolf grinned. “Which you promptly did the next day, as I recall.”
“Of course! I was simply much smarter about it. I secreted the required accessories to ensure I could repair myself well enough not to get caught.” She matched his grin with one of her own. “We did have wonderful times together. Who would have thought we would be such good friends?”
Leveling his gaze on her, Wolf allowed some of what he was feeling to be seen on his face. “We were well matched then, as we are now.”
She drew a deep breath, one that caused her breasts to rise and nearly spill from the low neckline of her dress. He was captivated both by her sensuous display, and by the blatant desire he could see lurking in her green eyes.
“I cannot disagree, though I like to think I am conceivably more of a leader and less of a follower now.” She let her gaze dip down before looking up at him again. “I’ve been my own master for nearly a decade, and I can tell you, I’ll never give that up again. Not for any man.”
Wolf tried to tamp down the urge to challenge her then and there. He wanted to prove to her how good it could be. Withhim.
He’d never been the most dominant of his friends—Stone carried that title without a doubt—but something about Jules roused the protector in him. Drove him to try to shield her, to swaddle her in the softest cotton, and ensure that nothing and no one could ever hurt her again. It was entirely possible that made him the biggest hypocrite in history, since he knew he had hurt her so terribly ten years before.
He held her gaze steadily as the silence drew out between them. “With the right man, you wouldn’t have to.”
“Be that as it may, I still have Wallthorpe to deal with. And deal with him I shall. In the meantime, I do appreciate the breathing room you’ve given me with our false engagement.” Relief shone in her eyes.
“It doesn’t have to be false, Jules. If you’d marry me, you would be fully protected. Safe.”
Anger unexpectedly welled up from deep within him. She shouldn’tneedprotection. She shouldn’t have to be fending off the attentions of a man who wouldn’t take no for an answer. But then a wrenching dose of shame and sadness punched him in the gut. She shouldn’t have had to marry a doddering old man ten years before, either, but she had. And he had only himself to blame for not saving her then, no matter what she said now.
