He seemed to study her for a while in that enigmatic way of his before he smiled gently and caused her heart to stutter.
“I’m afraid that is rather optimistic thinking, Miss Spencer. The highway — er — man did not achieve any success with us last night, but I doubt he would give up so easy, especially if he encountered no other victims after or before us.”
Evelyn’s heart sank with his words, even though she had known it was unlikely that his answer would be any different.
She chewed her lip and frowned. It seemed her only option was to rob again.
“Are you quite well, Miss Spencer?”
“Hmm? Oh, y-yes, thank you, my lord. It’s just all so — exciting,” she finished lamely.
Lord Ashdon urged them to a walk again, and Evelyn automatically fell into step beside him.
“You know,” he began conversationally after a moment of silence, “I am considered to be quite an excellent judge of character.”
“Really?” she mumbled distractedly, her mind filled with her plans for that night. It felt like she had aged decades since this all came about.
“Yes, indeed. I have an uncanny knack for telling whether people are good, bad, honest, dishonest. Or even hiding something.”
Something in his tone caused Evelyn to stop once again and look directly at him. Though his face was an expressionless mask, his eyes were shrewd.
“R-really,” she repeated and, inevitably, there was the squeak.
“Mmm. Really. Which is why I know, without a doubt, that you, angelic as you seem, are hiding something.”
Evelyn’s heart quite literally stopped beating at his words.
She’d known the man was far too astute by half, but for him to confront her? What on earth was she to do? To say?
Her mind screamed at her to turn tail and flee as fast as she could, but it was futile. For one thing, he was a bloody giant of a man who would catch up to her in a few strides. For another, he was staying in her house, and running now would not prevent her from seeing him again.
Besides, to run would be to admit guilt. Admit that he was right. And she couldn’t do that.
So, garnering all her courage, she looked him dead in the eye and raised what she hoped was a terribly haughty brow.
“I beg your pardon?”
“You heard me, Miss Spencer,” he answered softly.
And suddenly, with his tone so gentle, his face so impassive, no judgement just curiosity, Evelyn wanted to spill her heart out. Wanted to tell him all her burdens and let him help her carry them on those big shoulders of his.
Without rhyme or reason, Evelyn felt safe with him. Madness, considering he’d been about to shoot her last night, but then, she felt like she’d been going slowly mad since she first found those letters in Uncle Geoffrey’s study.
“I—“ She froze.
“You what?” he asked, stepping closer.
“I—“ Tell him! her heart yelled. Tell him, and let someone help you. You can trust him.
But how could she? She barely knew him. And this strange pull she felt toward him should not be mistaken for trust. That would be foolish in the extreme.
“I don’t know what you mean,” she mumbled, and, for a brief second, she thought she saw disappointment flash through his eyes before he schooled his features once more.
“You’re sure? I could help you.”
Oh, how tempting that was. But there was too much at stake to blindly trust a virtual stranger. No, she must do this alone.
Taking a deep breath, she smiled as brightly as she could.
“There is nothing to help with, my lord.”
Her words seemed to snap some of his control, and he suddenly grabbed her by the shoulders, pulling her closer to him.
“For God’s sake, Evie. I know there is something going on. Whatever it is you’re involved in, it cannot be good.”
His anger surprisingly did not frighten her. Rather, it raised her own temper.
“Remove your hands from me at once,” she huffed. “You have a vivid imagination, my lord. That is what is going on. And do not call me Evie. You do not have permission to use my name, and, even if you did, I hate that one.”
Now where had that come from? She was irrationally angered by the fact that he used her childhood pet name. It made her feel like an inconsequential girl, and though it was beyond ridiculous, she loathed to think of his seeing her as a girl and not a woman full grown.
Her words, strangely enough, seemed to diffuse some of the tense atmosphere between them. He loosened his hold, though he did not let go completely.
“Why should you hate it?” he asked curiously, all anger and suspicion seemingly forgotten.
“Because…” She was embarrassed by her outburst and felt her cheeks warm. “…because it makes me sound like an infant, and I am not a child. I am a grown woman,” she finished defiantly, her eyes boring into his, daring him to mock her.
But rather than laugh at her, his eyes made an agonisingly slow perusal, from the tips of her kid boots to the top of her bonnet and back to her face.
“Nobody could argue that you are anything other than a grown woman, Evelyn.”
His voice sounded rough and coarse, and it, coupled with his wandering gaze, caused her entire body to heat and a strange not unpleasant tingle to dance along her nerves.
Good Lord. What was happening to her?
“Be that as it may,” she said rather hoarsely, “I do not like the name.”
“Well, why do you let them call you it then?” he asked, his hands still clasped about her arms, his thumbs rubbing gently across the velvet of her pelisse and causing her legs to turn to jelly.
“Be-because, they, I — well, it’s always been that way, and arguing with any of my family is rather futile.” She refused to look him in the eye, concentrating instead on the intricate knot of his cravat.
His large hand moved to her face, and Evelyn’s breath caught in her throat. When his thumb moved to her chin and gently lifted her face toward his, she was powerless to stop it.
“How would you have me address you?” he whispered, and Evelyn, who Aunt Millicent had always said had the consistency of an ox, almost fainted clean away.
“Miss Spencer,” she answered piously, if rather high-pitched.
“Too formal,” he stated firmly.
What she should do, really, was smack his face for him for taking such liberties.
Aside from which, hadn’t she tried to rob the dratted man last night? And hadn’t he been the one to scupper her chances of getting her hands on those papers? And the fact that he had apparently convinced Uncle Geoffrey to return home last night, meaning the papers were actually still here and not gone forever to London was completely beside the point.
But the man was clearly some sort of sorcerer, and he had weaved a potent spell on her so that she was powerless to do anything but gaze up at him and allow him to take liberties with her name and anything else he wanted.
“Evelyn,” she offered then, suddenly desperate to hear her name on his lips.
He frowned in concentration then shook his head.
“Too stuffy,” he said.
“Well, we are out of options, my lord, since I won’t allow you to call me Evie.”
His hand hadn’t left her face, and it remained steadfastly there as he stepped closer still, leaving mere inches between them.
“I have it,” he said, his eyes sultry, his tone pure seduction.
Granted, she’d never actually been seduced, but she imagined it felt very much like this.
“Oh?” Was all she could manage. Pathetic really, but he didn’t seem to mind.
“Eve,” he answered with a heart-stopping smile. “The very embodiment of temptation. A woman who would tempt a man to sin, to… anything. Perfect.”
Evelyn actually swayed toward him at his words, and she would have given the sun, moon, and stars for him to crush her lips beneath his own in that moment.
“Now,”
he whispered, his mouth edging ever slowly toward her own, “won’t you tell me what you’re embroiled in?”
Her eyes, which had been closing in anticipation of the touch of his mouth, snapped open. The devil take his eyes! Was this all just to get her to talk?
Her temper flared again as she realised he’d been using her like a puppet on a string.
Why couldn’t he just mind his own business?
And now he’d left her hot and bothered, frustrated and unsatisfied.
Well, he owed her a kiss, and she was going to get it.
Without giving herself a chance to be cowardly or even rational, Evelyn grabbed the back of his neck and pulled his head toward hers, pressing his lips against her own.
Perhaps it wasn’t the romantic first kiss she’d dreamt of as an impressionable girl, but it would do. If anything, it would serve to distract him from his questions.
Andrew’s eyes widened in shock at Evelyn’s bold move before instinct and his ongoing attraction to the woman took over.
Oh, how apt the name Eve. The woman would tempt a saint. And he was no saint.
Forgetting all about the enigma surrounding her, forgetting the questions unanswered and the erratic behaviour, something he never did, Andrew gave in to temptation and crushed her to his body, almost groaning at the sheer perfection of her soft, curved body pressed against his own.
Her lips were as lush and soft and damned kissable as he’d been imagining every night since he first laid eyes on her.
He felt her shock as he took control of the kiss and then, to his immense relief, she melted against him with a sigh, and he was lost.
Don’t lose control, he told himself as he parted her lips and delved inside.
Whatever else she might be, he had no doubt that she was an innocent when it came to making love, and he was suddenly, fiercely glad of the fact.
He’d been with countless women, some probably more experienced than he. So how was it that he was being utterly captivated by the kiss of an innocent who was keeping secrets from him?
Andrew had to work harder than ever before to hang on to his control as the feel of her, the scent of her skin, the touch of her lips threatened to overwhelm him.
If he didn’t break the kiss soon, he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to.
Gathering the slowly fraying threads of his gentlemanliness, he wrenched his lips from hers. He leaned his forehead against her own as he tried to muster some semblance of restraint.
Her rapid breathing matched his own and, lifting his head, Andrew couldn’t help the swell of pure, male pride at the dazed look in her dark-as-sin doe eyes.
Right, well, looking into her eyes was doing nothing to stem the tide of wanting that threatened to drown him, so he stepped back and looked away, giving her a moment to fix herself and giving himself a moment to get a handle on his body, which wasn’t keen to cooperate apparently.
The situation had veered wildly out of his control, something he wasn’t used to.
Not only had he failed to get her to confess to whatever she was embroiled in, and he was now more convinced than ever that there was something, but he’d gone and kissed his best friend’s cousin, who might as well be his sister, and very nearly lost complete control of himself in the process.
He understood now how Jonathan had so nearly ruined his reputation, his career — hell — even his life, because of Gabrielle.
Andrew could all too easily see himself doing the same over his very own Eve.
The snapping of a twig caused him to spin around, and he saw with some frustration and admittedly some amusement, Evelyn — or Eve as he would always think of her now — dashing away from him as if the very hounds of hell were at her heels.
Perhaps she was wise to do so.
Frankly, he had no idea how he would be in her presence in the future without ravaging her on the spot.
CHAPTER NINE
Evelyn patted Midnight reassuringly, not quite believing that she was here again.
Tonight felt colder and infinitely longer than the night before. Perhaps that was because she knew now how bad she actually was at this.
Although, if she made as much a mess of it tonight as last night, perhaps it would be more believable that the highway robber had given up and moved on somewhere else.
Evelyn hoped against hope that this was the case, for she would need her wits about her to commit such a crime, and her wits had most definitely abandoned her and stayed firmly under the oak tree in the gardens where Lord Ashdon had kissed her.
Her sense of fairness prompted her to admit, even to herself, that she had in fact kissed him, but he had most definitely taken control of that kiss and turned it into something she had never expected. Something glorious and wonderful and altogether inconvenient, since she had been able to think of little else.
She huffed out a frustrated little sigh, and Midnight pranced beneath her, sensing once again her uneasiness.
“Easy boy,” she whispered. “We shan’t be long. One more botched robbery, and we can both give up on this blasted charade forever.”
Being alone with her thoughts on a darkened, rarely used road was not good for her frame of mind, Evelyn decided.
For one thing, it left her to stew over her uncle’s horrid betrayal and her complete inability to do anything about it.
For another, it gave her far too much time to remember every tiny detail of her encounter with Lord Ashdon and his magical lips, the touch of which still felt imprinted on her own.
Evelyn lifted a hand to her mouth and pressed her fingers to the spot that still tingled in remembrance of his touch.
Perhaps she hadn’t handled the aftermath in the sophisticated, worldly way she would have liked.
Sprinting back to the house, nearly bursting a lung in the process, then barricading herself into her room with another faux headache was neither sophisticated nor clever, as it turned out, since she had both Anna and Jonathan demanding that Mr. Carver, the aptly named surgeon be called.
It took so long convincing them that she was perfectly fine, that she’d had a genuine headache by the time they left and she’d been grateful for Molly’s herbal remedy and insistence that she be left alone in a darkened room.
Lord Ashdon hadn’t asked after her welfare at all, she thought snippily.
Which just went to show; the man was a veritable rake who had felt nothing when they’d kissed and should be avoided like the plague.
And Evelyn had every intention of staying as far away from him as humanly possible from this day forward.
“Lovely evening for a robbery, my lady.”
Evelyn screeched in fright as a deep, mellifluous voice penetrated the still night air, and she nearly fell off her horse as she spun to see to whom it belonged.
But of course. She already knew, didn’t she? Nobody else’s voice had the power to completely steal her breath away.
And wasn’t that just the way her luck had been going anyway? When she’d decided to avoid him, lo, here he was, ruining her robbery again.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded indignantly as she tried to keep control of the stallion who she’d once again frightened half to death.
I’ll make it up to him, she assured herself, choosing to ignore the fact that the list of living things she was having to make things up to was growing steadily by the day.
“Oh, I’m just out for a night-time ride. May I enquire as to what you’re doing?”
His faux politeness was stirring her temper, but she refused to give in to it. The best way to deal with the interfering cad was to coolly dismiss him, then ignore him.
“You may not,” she snapped, her tone as freezing as she could make it. “Good evening to you.”
“Oh, come now, my lady. What harm in having a friendly chat?” he asked jovially as he moved his horse to stand beside hers.
Bloody nuisance.
“I am not your lady,” she retorted. “I am a dangerous, hardened criminal, and you
are interfering yet again in my robbery.”
“But, of course. A thousand apologies.” He swept his hat off his head and executed a dramatic bow that almost unseated him from his mount.
Evelyn gave a regal nod of her head, which she hoped was dismissive enough for even this most obtuse of men, then turned again to concentrate on the empty road.
“And how is the business of robbing passing carriages? Slow? Lucrative?” he continued in that polite tone that would have been better suited to a ballroom in the height of the Season.
Evelyn took a calming breath and pointedly ignored him.
“Of course, I, myself, would never rob someone. Too ethical, you understand. But I can appreciate that some highwaymen do quite a trade in the area.”
Evelyn clenched her teeth so hard she was afraid she’d never pry them apart again. Still she remained silent.
“But then,” he continued, and she wanted to smack him again, all thoughts of their earlier kiss forgotten in her rage, “I have never known a woman to be involved in the business. You’ll forgive me if I think that rather singular.”
Evelyn gazed at the stars and counted to ten, trying desperately to calm her beating heart, to unclench her death grip on the reigns. Poor Midnight was having a horrid time of it with her. There weren’t enough apples in the world to make up for it. Not if she were to bake John Coachman’s pies too.
“And, you must admit, my dear, you aren’t very good at it, are you?”
“That is it,” she snapped and whirled round to face him. “Whatever is the matter with you?” she began. “I’m not going to rob you, and I want absolutely nothing to do with you. Nothing,” she emphasised as she leaned toward him. “So why do you insist on bothering me?”
He merely smiled as though he found the whole thing vastly amusing.
She growled low in her throat.
“Pardon me, my dear, but did you just growl?”
“I am not your bloody dear,” she exclaimed. “For heaven’s sake. Just leave me alone. You go your way, I’ll go mine, and that will be that.”
With that, she turned her horse once more and pointedly ignored him.
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