Page 8 of A Rogue's Rules for Seduction
That hadn’t stopped him from wanting. And the hell of it was, hestillwanted, even when he had no right.
“Talking to her ain’t happening,” he said to the Ransome brothers.
“But—” Finn began.
“Let it lie,” Dom snarled. “I’m already a hairsbreadth away from chucking you both into the sea.”
“Our intentions are good,” Kieran said with his patented winning smile.
“A good intention is like foxglove—it’s meant to be healing, but too much of it is poison.”
At that, the Ransome brothers went mute. “Hopefully,” Dom went on, “your silence means you’re thinking of how the hell you intend to apologize and make good with your sister.”
“The same goes for you,” Finn noted dryly.
Dom merely stared at him, because there was no way to make good with Willa. Not in this lifetime, or the next.
“Excuse me, Mr. Kilburn.” The housekeeper appeared beside him. “I’m free now to show you to your bedchamber, if you’ll come with me.”
Without sparing a glance for the brothers, he followed Mrs. Murray up the wide stairs, noting that the banister was polished by both the labor of thestaff as well as the generations of hands that had held the railing. Back in Ratcliff, things fell apart long before they could get such a patina.
“This way, if you please,” Mrs. Murray said once they reached the landing. She gestured down one of the long, wood-paneled hallways.
They walked down the corridor, passing other bedchambers that were already occupied, judging by the personal items arranged on dressing tables.
“That’s Miss Steele’s room,” the housekeeper explained, nodding toward one of the chambers. “And over here is Mr. Cransley’s chamber. Mrs. McDaniel has this room,” she added.
“Unmarried guests share the same wing?” Dom asked.
Mrs. Murray chuckled. “Oh, Mr. Longbridge likes to keep things informal here.”
“No surprise there,” Dom said under his breath. He ought to have expected as much, given their host’s secret reputation as a libertine.
Mrs. Murray stopped outside a room whose door stood open. She waved her hand toward it. “This is where you’ll be, Mr. Kilburn.”
Dom peered into a chamber full of heavy, masculine furniture that appeared to be at least a century old, though well-preserved. His bags were already in the room, and a footman was in the process of unpacking them.
“I have a gown that needs pressing, Mrs. Murray,” Willa said, stepping out of the chamber nextto Dom’s. She carried a green frock Dom had liked, since it made her look like an elfin queen.
Yet as she came into the hallway, she abruptly stopped. Her gaze shot to Dom.
“What are you doing lurking outside my bedchamber?”
“Mrs. Murray’s showing me my room,” he answered, pointing to the place in question.
Willa frowned. “It’s next to mine.”
“What?” His body stilled.
“Oh, yes,” Mrs. Murray said cheerfully. “It’s a fine bedchamber, Mr. Kilburn. The bed is capacious and will easily accommodate a man of your, er, considerable proportions.”
Dom’sbedchamberwas to be right next to where Willaslept. Where shedisrobedandbathed. And he’d hear it all.
The very definition of torture.
“I’m moving to another room,” he said abruptly.
Willa’s frown deepened as the housekeeper looked at him with concern.
