Page 28 of The Wrong Duke

“By keeping your best friend from falling in love?” She blew through her lips. “Yes, you really are the most wonderful —”

“Love?” Evan scoffed. “You don’t love Lord Malnor, so don’t pretend that you do. All you want is his money.”

“That’s what my father wants,” she said, surprising Evan in her honesty. “But do not act like that is so scandalous — every day a marriage is made for the same reason. You are aware of the world in which we exist, aren’t you?”

“So, you admit it then? Everything you’ve said is a lie.”

“I admit that my father wants me to marry Lord Malnor, but that is all I admit. I am still very much interested in Lord Malnor. I still wish to be courted by him — to have a chance to fall in love!” she snapped. “One that doesn’t see you nipping at our heels like a lovesick puppy.”

“Oh please, not this again.”

“You speak of love, but it’s clear to me that you’ve never experienced such a thing. How could you?! You’re so darn distrusting that even if a woman was interested, you wouldn’t let her in. You’d rather die alone than take a chance.”

“Don’t try and make this about me,” Evan growled as Miss Baker struck at a sore point that hurt a little more than he liked to admit.

“But it is about you.” She sat up, her eyes coming level with his.

“And what about you?” Evan shot back, face turning red as he struggled to keep his anger at bay... well, his anger and something else. A fire inside of him that sizzled when he met her dark blue eyes and felt the warmth of her breath on his lips. “Have you ever fallen in love?”

“What?” She leaned back. “No but —”

“So, you don’t know what you’re talking about either. You confuse love with lust, Madam. Stolen kisses at parties instead of meeting someone and falling for them — truly falling for them. You don’t want to fall in love. All you want is...” He smirked to himself as a most wicked comment came to mind. “Someone to set your loins on fire because you know that you’re never going to fall for Lord Malnor, so the chance for amorous pleasure in lieu of real feelings is about as good as you can hope for. Why love when you can lust?”

Her face contorted into what might have been anger. Might have been shock. Might have been something that Evan couldn’t quite figure out. “How dare you!”

“You forget, you’ve kissed me twice now, so I speak from experience.” He could see her getting worked up, back to her old self. “I know where your heart truly lies...” His eyes flicked down her body and up again.

Her lips curled. “You don’t... you know nothing... I told you already, that kiss was a mistake.”

“Both of them?”

Her eyes narrowed. “The second was you, Your Grace. Forced on me if you care to remember?”

“Oh, I remember it.” A little too well, truth be told. “But something tells me you remember it too. In fact...” He grinned to himself, sensing her anger pique, knowing that she was becoming flustered and unruly, that just a little further and finally, he would have her. “I would warrant to say that you remember it often.”

“Don’t flatter yourself.” She looked away, but Evan caught it. A slight discoloration in her cheeks. The smallest of smiles... cheeky and mischievous and daring.

It was now that Evan had a decision to make.

The last time he had tried to force Miss Baker to admit what she was doing, he’d kissed her, thinking that would be enough. But what was a kiss to a woman like Miss Baker? Nothing. She had, after all, done the same to him. And she would do it again and think nothing of it. Why, the way that she had kissed him last time, he dared to say that she even enjoyed it.

If Evan wanted to force her hand, to really have her admitting that her pursuit of his friend was nothing but an attempt to take advantage of the man — to prove once and for all that love wasn’t a concept she understood, let alone yearned for — he’d have to do something that she did not expect.

An amorous energy sizzled between them; he could feel it cracking like bolts of lightning. The way she matched his stare as she sat up and tried to meet his height. The fire that built between them. Her chest stuck out, her lips twisted into a daring snarl as if asking him to try it. Yes, it would work. Yes, she would succumb. And yes, Evan would take the risk.

And all the while he told himself this was for David, not him. That, in its own way, made it a little easier to bear. And a heck of a lot easier for him to convince himself that he didn’t want to do what he was about to.

“Is that the line you’re going to stick with?” Evan moved quickly, pouncing on Miss Baker, pushing himself up so his face was inches from hers.

Expectedly, Ameila didn’t back down. If anything, she moved closer, her face less than an inch from his own, eyes locked onto him because she knew what was coming next... or she thought he did. “It’s the truth. I haven’t thought of it once.”

“And I suppose if I was to try again,” he growled, “seeing as you desire afterLord Malnor, you would slap me across the face and storm back to the manor?”

“I wouldn’t hesitate for a second.”

Evan grinned and leaned forward, to which Amelia did the same, puckering her lips because he could read her like a book and knew that if he wanted it, she would happily kiss him. But that wasn’t what he wanted.

His hand moved quickly, wrapping under her right knee. Her eyes went wide but before she could react, his other hand had her other knee, pulling her toward him with such force that she fell onto her back. She opened her mouth to object, but he was on her before she had a chance, mounting her like a predator in the wild.

---