nothing to give, “you need only ask for it. I may or may not tender one upon demand, but you should know that I certainly don’t appreciate the passive-aggressive approach. Ever.”
He imagined he could hear her heart beat then, loud and fast in the hushed quiet of the hall, or possibly he only wanted to believe he affected her in such a way. That she reacted to him at all. He took far more satisfaction than any kind of good man would have in the faint color that stained her cheeks.
“I think this is our first argument as an engaged couple,” she breathed, and he had the sense that she was far angrier than she was letting on. That she was hiding all manner of things beneath that tough exterior of hers. It should have concerned him—but instead, he found he only wanted to see what was underneath. “A milestone.”
He wanted to see what was behind her breezy manner, her seemingly effortless confidence. He wanted to see her. He wanted to see her in a way he’d never wanted anything, not in more years than he could recall. He hardly knew what to make of it. Maybe that was how he found himself moving from the doorway and into the hall, until he was standing much too close to her.
And it was still not enough.
“I told you how little interest I have in masks,” he heard himself say.
“We all wear masks, Rafe,” she replied. Was that temper in her breathless voice? Or was she warning him that she already saw through his mask of scars to the far uglier parts of him that lay beneath? “Some of us have better reasons for that than others, but the most you can expect is that people try to be honest with you despite whatever things they might need to hide behind. Or you might find you have to explain your own mask.”
He didn’t want to talk about masks, especially not his own. Her blue eyes seemed to darken the closer he stood to her, and once again he had the near-uncontrollable urge to bury his hands in her short, choppy blonde hair and drag that mouth of hers to his. He wanted to take and take. He wanted to glut himself on her.
Hell, he just wanted her. However he could get her.
He had been furious at himself for that since that night at the Palazzo Santina. He was no less furious now. He wondered what, exactly, showed on his face, because she swallowed then, and he had the sense she forced that cocky little smile of hers.
“I’m speaking figuratively, of course,” she said softly. Lying. He was sure of it, and he couldn’t seem to care as he should. He wanted her to participate in this dance, this delusion. He wanted her to be a part of it too. “The figurative you. Not the actual you.”
“What a great comfort,” he said, his own voice dry.
He wanted to reach over and pull her into his arms. He wanted to strip away her clothes and test the perfection of her curves with his palms. He wanted. He was all too aware that she was prepared to fulfill certain obligations in this cold-blooded marriage of theirs—and that none of those obligations had anything at all to do with this need that rolled through him, distracting him and infuriating him. He contented himself with the smallest touch, just the finger of one hand, tracing the bloom of color against her cheekbone. He felt her slight shiver, quickly checked, like a dark triumph deep inside of him.
“And is that what I can expect then, Angel?” he asked quietly, his voice a low rasp. “Your honesty?”
“Of course,” she said, her voice little more than a whisper, her eyes wide and locked to his.
He wanted that to mean more than it did, more than it could. He wanted that faint shiver he felt to be all of the things it could never, would never, be. She treated him not like a monster, but as a man, and he found that was more dangerous, more potentially ruinous than all the other women who had recoiled in horror at the sight of him. They’d been fooled by the ugly surface into thinking that was what made him monstrous. But Angel ran the risk of learning the truth.
He should never have let this get so far. He should end it now.
But instead, he traced a pattern along her cheek, and pretended he was whole.
“I’m sure I signed something to that effect,” she said.
Those perfect brows arched high. Again, that easy, insouciant smile that captivated him far too easily. That made him believe in all manner of things he knew better than to trust. That made the little flare of hope light anew, small but sturdy. And brighter all the time, heaven help him.
She smirked. “In triplicate.”
Angel Tilson married Rafe McFarland, the Eighth Earl of Pembroke, a man she wondered if she knew less now than she had when she’d met him, if that was even possible, on a gray spring day that was wet and dark and the precise color of his cold eyes.
It was precisely three and a half weeks since the day she’d met him at Allegra’s engagement party in the Santina royal palace. She wore a dress of deep, midnight blue, like the summer night sky far in the north, far away from this quick, quiet ceremony in a London registry office. It was the least bridal, least gold-digging sort of garment she’d been able to come up with from her closet, having declined numerous offers from Rafe’s staff to find her something appropriate to the occasion. Angel had been determined to go to her wedding, at least, in a dress that was entirely hers. As nothing else would be when this day was over.
Rafe was dressed in another glorious, obviously hand-tailored suit, all somber colors to match the fierce expression he wore on his scarred face. The suit clung to the hard planes of his body and shouted to all and sundry that he was exactly who he was: the head of a great family, steeped in generations of wealth and privilege. More than that, there was a soldier’s hard steel beneath it all, that seemed stamped into his very bones. The way he stood, still and sure. The way his gaze met hers, demanding and challenging.
Angel didn’t look away. She hardly heard the words the registrar spoke; she barely registered the presence of the two members of Rafe’s legal team who stood by as their witnesses. But she was aware of him, of Rafe, as she’d never been aware of anyone else in her life. She saw every one of his scars, saw the flat line of his hard mouth, and understood with a deep certainty that this was an irrevocable act. That no matter what happened from this day forward, she would never be free of this hard, watchful man, not really.
She supposed that should have terrified her, but it didn’t.
That, in turn, did.
As if he could sense it, his mouth curved slightly in the corner as he spoke the necessary words.
“I do solemnly declare that I know not of any lawful impediment why I …” and he intoned his full name then, with all his unnecessary middle names, the ones his solicitors had insisted she learn in their precise and proper order. His eyes never left hers. Daring her, Angel thought. Daring her to give in to her fears and end this right now.
Would she? For an impossible, breathless moment the panic surged through her and she almost turned and ran for the door.
But she didn’t. She only pulled in a breath as Rafe continued.
“May not be joined in matrimony to Angel Louise,” he said, finishing his part of the declaration. His dark eyes said something else entirely, something Angel was afraid to translate.
Angel repeated the words back to him, aware now of the heat in her, the flush across her cheeks and even lower, making her breasts feel heavy. Making her whole body feel hectic.
