Page 26 of Her Sort of Scoundrel
“We should rejoin her,” Fiona told him softly. “I feel quite recovered from that staircase contraption.” She tried for a smile, and he tried too.
But there was still a magnetic spark of attraction humming between them.
Fiona had to resist it. Though she no longer feared Dash would bruise her ego, an entanglement between them still posed a danger.
He’d wedged himself into her heart as a friend, a confidante, years ago. If she gave in to her hunger for him too, how would she ever walk away? How would she ever maintain the independence she’d finally found after craving it for years?
CHAPTER7
“Judgingby the look of you, we should have met in a boxing ring or the fencing strip rather than the comfort of our club.” Whitmore assessed Dash from brow to boot, as if he was a physician and could determine what ailed him. “Curled fists. Crumpled brow. Good God, what’s happened to you, my friend?”
Dash shot him a look, unwilling to explain, not certain he could. Tension had tightened his jaw until it ached. He took another sip of whiskey, waiting for the heat of it to melt his muscles into putty.
“Oh no,” Whitmore said with a tone that indicated he was more amused than concerned. “It’s a lady, then, is it?”
Dash closed his eyes against his friend’s incisive perusal. But that was the wrong thing to do. In his mind’s eye, all he could see was Fiona. Hell, he could still smell her perfume on his clothes. Still taste that all too brief kiss.
“I’ve been wondering when he would resurface,” Whitmore mused.
“Who?” Dash asked before another sip of excellent, peat-tinged whiskey.
“The true Dashiel Forbes.” Whitmore tipped his head, his gaze brimming with sympathy. “I’ve missed him.”
“Are you saying I must be enthralled with a woman to be my true self?”
“No, but I do think transforming into a saint was a bit much.”
“Hardly a saint.” Dash had only planned to refrain from amorous entanglements until Aurelia was secure. He expected that to come in the form of a marriage offer next year.
Two years wasn’t so very long to go without a lover.
But, of course, his feelings for Fiona went beyond desire. They might have begun with a kind of idealistic adoration, but as soon as he’d come to know her, he’d cared for far different reasons.
“If it’s merely frustration, why not avail yourself of the Helix Club?”
The club was founded by two of their friends and renowned for its opulence and the discretion of its members. Ladies and gentlemen alike could find all sorts of pleasures within its walls—whether one was seeking a game of chance, mere flirtation, or an amorous encounter in one of its private rooms.
“I should get home,” Dash told him but made no move to depart.
“Or you could tell me what’s troubling you,” Whitmore said quietly. “I will listen, as you have done for me. No commentary. No judgement. And advice only if it’s requested.”
Dash knew there was no untangling this. No solution that would satisfy him and Fiona too.
No, that wasn’t quite true. He had not a single doubt that they could find satisfaction in each other’s arms. But afterwards? He would want things she could not offer him. She valued her autonomy too much, and he’d never met a woman so set against marriage.
He, unfortunately, owed that duty to the earldom. Or so his father and every Earl of Granford before him would insist.
Whitmore waited patiently, his hands resting on the plush arms of the leather chair he always favored in this corner of the club.
“I met her years ago when I was young buck. I was thunderstruck by her beauty, and then we became friends, and I fell in love with her fierce, passionate nature.”
“Fell in love?”
Good Lord, had he said that out loud? He lifted his glass and stared at the amber brew inside. It had been a while since he’d partaken, and apparently it had loosened his tongue quickly.
“Intense admiration,” he tried to amend, but Whitmore’s narrowed gaze told him he wasn’t buying the retraction.
“So this isn’t mere attraction,” he said matter-of-factly. “But something holds you back from declaring yourself or offering for this woman.”
