Page 16 of The Earl's Secret
“Well,” he couldn’t help but say with a wolfish grin, “not unless you ask me to. That meal has left me rather hungry.”
She shook her head. “You are insufferable.”
“Only to you. Everyone else finds me rather charming.”
She walked away from him, down the hall and toward one of the small, more comfortable parlors near the back. A fire was blazing in the hearth, and she poured herself a drink before sinking into the overstuffed blue sofa in the corner of the room.
“You forgot to pour one for me,” he noted.
She eyed him over her glass. “I do not recall inviting you in with me.”
“Cassandra,” he said, pouring his own glass and taking a seat on the opposite end of the sofa from her. He couldn’t help but note – as he always did – just how beautiful she looked. Her auburn hair was pulled back away from her face, but not too harshly as some women wore it. It shone slightly red in the firelight, which also danced across her cheeks, highlighting her magnificent cheekbones and the soft skin he could still remember beneath his fingertips. When she lifted her drink to her plush, rosy lips, he wished that he was upon them again.
But at the moment, he was fortunate if he could get a kind word out of her, let alone a kiss.
“You were saying?” she said, raising her eyebrows, and he realized that he had become so caught up he had completely stopped speaking.
“Only that this must end.”
“Your time here?” she asked, and he growled slightly at the glimmer of hope that filled her eyes.
“No. This animosity between us. Forgive me, but I fail to understand just why you hate me so. I know we should not have done what we did, but you were just as willing as I was – if not more.”
She crossed her arms over her chest, and he couldn’t help a quick smile, for the fact that she didn’t refute him told him that he was right.
“Afterward, I offered to marry you. Consequence or not,” he continued. “But you refused to see me, doing no more than sending a note stating all was well and there was nothing for me to be concerned about. What else should I have done, Cassandra? Where did I go wrong?”
Her eyes fell to rest on her drink, and all he could see was her face in profile, her long lashes hovering over her eyes. He wished she would share something of what she was feeling, let him in so that he wasn’t in the dark about what had her so overcome.
When she didn’t say anything, he found himself filling the silence. “What can I do to make things right?”
She fixed her gaze upon him. “There is nothing you can do.”
“Why have you not married?” he pressed. “What are you waiting for?”
“I am ruined,” she said simply. “What am I supposed to do?”
“You could still marry me,” he threw out, his heart leaping into his throat, but she answered before the panic could truly set in.
“No.”
“Then if not me, why not another? Only you and I know the full truth.”
She was silent for a moment, her eyes fixed upon a place across the room. Then, “I told Madeline.”
Devon’s mouth dropped open. “Why?”
“I had to tell someone. I had far too much to talk about.”
“And she shared that information?”
“No. She would never.”
“Then what has you so concerned?” he asked, wondering just how he was supposed to break through and learn this woman’s secrets.
“My mother and Gideon… know I am ruined. But they do not know it was you.”
Devon was speechless. “How—”
