Page 9 of Teach a Rogue New Tricks
He chuckled. “That’s a yes. Excellent.” He continued pacing, weaving a ring of intention around the two of them. “Your good looks are neither here nor there.” Except as a distraction. No. A temptation he would have to steel himself against. Resisting her would prove his reformation progressed at an acceptable rate.
“Pardon me?”
He waved away her words. “That you’re unattached is excellent. If you were engaged or married that would produce a moral conundrum, and this plan is already tiptoeing into a dangerous gray area, but—”
“What plan?”
He continued pacing.
She shot to her feet. “What plan, Lord Albee?”
He stopped right in front of her and smiled down at her. Confusion brought her face to life. She damn near sparkled with questions, a candle burning so brightly it would soon run itself out. Her top lip was shaped like a bow, and he wanted to lick it. He had not often denied his impulses, especially when they would bring pleasure. But to lick a lady’s lip—a maiden’s lip—on first acquaintance… even he knew that stepped much beyond the pale.
Yet even before he could finish that thought, his hand had reached out, and he found the pad of his thumb settled at the corner of her mouth.
She stopped breathing.
He pulled his thumb across her plump bottom lip and up over the curve of her cheek. Then he put his arm behind his back and manacled his wrist with his other hand, imprisoning it so it could do no more damage.
She blinked back into life, her cheeks the fiery dawn of a new day.
He cleared his throat. “As you can see, Miss Cavendish, I am in desperate need of reforming. And you… you wish for a bit of adventure. Your aunt says there’s no better way for a rake to reform than with the help of a good woman.” Since he could not let his hands roam as they desired, he let his gaze loose. It roved over her, from dark hair to sensible boots peeking out from plain skirts. “And you appear to be a very good woman indeed. What say you, Miss Cavendish? Help this old rogue learn new tricks?”
It would be a risk. But if he could resist the temptation standing before him and learn how to be a better man, he might earn a place back in his family and repair the damage he’d done to the people he loved most.
Chapter Four
Adashot to her feet and jerked out of his grasp. Backing away from his slowly, as if he were a wolf she’d stumbled upon in a forest, she shuffled through the few options before her. Leave without a word. Leavewitha word. Sit back down and wait for Lord Albee to explain. Sit back down and ask all the questions that formed in her head in a precise order to make sure she understood his incomprehensible offer from every angle.
And what he suggested sounded, well, in a word,naughty.
What tricks had a country miss like her to teachhim, and what did that have to do with reforming? She ordered her questions in her head, steadied her nerves, and approached him as she would one of the children wildly jabbering about some calamity or another with no breaths between sentences. “Lord Albee, slow down and speak with purpose. Think before you speak, if you please. Now, start from the beginning.”
The man smiled broadly and shook his head slowly. “You’re perfection, you are. That right there—the direction to slow down and speak with purpose—you know what you’re about. You’ll have me reformed in no time.”
A clue. She’d run with it. “You are asking me to reform you. Are those the newtricksyou speak of?” Yes, he’d said he needed to be reformed. But that had been before he’d caressed her lip. And frankly, after his thumb had touched the corner of her mouth, every word she’d ever learned in life had slipped right out of her head. The most basic of processes and facts—gone. The only things in the entire world that existed, had meaning, were his thumb and her lips, his naked skin tracing tingles across her own.
But now, with his hands trapped safely behind his back, sense and intellect returned. He wished to be reformed, and he wanted her to help.
He nodded energetically and pulled the two chairs they’d so recently occupied closer. He waved to one. “Sit. Sit.”
She did, slowly, eyeing him as if he might pounce.
Then he sat himself, scooting his chair even closer until their knees almost touched. “You’re right. I must explain further and in a more organized manner. The plan came upon me so suddenly, I let excitement overwhelm me. As I often do. If you must know, it’s a habit of rogues like me. We give in easily to every excitement.” His gaze slipped to her lips. “I suppose I should apologize for that.”
She waved his supposed apology away. Better to never discuss his thumb on her lips again. Better to forget it entirely.
He rested his elbows on his knees, steepled his fingers, and stared at her over their tips. “I’ve already told you I’m a villain, and you understand I wish to reform. I’ve been working toward that end, but”—he rubbed his palms over his face—“it can be overwhelming at times. It can feel impossible. Your aunt thinks I need someone to help me. A good woman.” He sat up straight and held both arms out toward her. “And here you are!”
“You think I am the woman to reform you? And how am I to go about doing that?” She shook her head, looking away. “I’m not perfect.”
“Nonsense. You’ll reform me by doing what you’ve done several times in our short conversation—teach me what I’m doing wrong, why it’s wrong, and how to do better.”
She stood. “No. We cannot. It is a foolish scheme. Dangerous, too. As you noted, I am unwed.”
“And as I promised, I will not hurt you.”
“What is it you’ve done that warrants such soul-searching?”
