Page 18 of The Rake I Wished For
She flinched at the silly nickname. Another reminder of just how young and flighty he thought her to be.
“Did you rest your entire reputation on your schoolmate interrupting your tryst in the nick of time?” His words were low and rumbly, more like a growl than his normal voice.
Jane’s smile was bright as she joined them, but her eyes were full of questions Jocelyn couldn’t answer. Not with Harlow standing right there.
“Lady Jane,” Harlow said, his tone once more light, teasing, and warm as he addressed Jocelyn’s friend. “If it’s all right with you, I think it might be best if I return you ladies to your school.”
Jane cast Jocelyn a quick, questioning look, but Jocelyn couldn’t so much as wink. The way he was talking to Jane made his demeanor toward her feel that much cooler. That much more distant.
“I’d like that,” Jane finally conceded with a smile. “I’ve had more than enough small talk for a lifetime.”
Jocelyn forced a smile, but Harlow’s laughter sounded genuine as he took Jane’s arm, letting Jocelyn fall behind them. Jocelyn dutifully said her goodbyes to their host and hostess.
Or, at least, she thought she did. It was all a bit of a blur.
She barely heard a word of Jane and Harlow’s conversation as he escorted them back to the school and bid them goodnight.
And throughout it all, Jocelyn couldn’t quite bring herself to meet his eyes. She didn’t want to see that distance there again, any more than she wanted to recall the way he’d held her in his arms and made her think he was going to kiss her.
She squeezed her eyes shut that night in bed and prayed for sleep. She’d evaded Jane’s questions and had even sent her maid away. She needed the escape of sleep, but it would not come.
Instead, she found herself replaying that moment over and over in her mind. The moment when his lips were so close to hers, she could feel the warmth of his breath on her cheek.
Her head had spun, and the world had tipped upside down, and…
And that was it, she supposed. The feeling she’d thought to experience once and then never again.
She swallowed hard as she opened her eyes and stared at the ceiling. Would she feel any more contented if his lips had brushed against hers?
She twisted and turned between the sheets.
Likely not.
Finally, she flopped onto her back. It was decided, then. All that fuss about kisses and romance were just as fantastical as she’d suspected. It was a good thing she’d have none of that then.
* * *
The next day,Jocelyn found herself once more at the mercy of Jane’s knitted brow.
“But…I don’t understand,” Jane said slowly and with a shake of her head. They were meant to be working on their embroidery as they sat in the school’s small garden behind the townhome, but neither had accomplished so much as a stitch as Jocelyn finally filled in her friend on what had transpired the night before.
“What don’t you understand?” Jocelyn tried to temper her tone, but after a night of poor sleep and haunting thoughts of Harlow and his near-kiss, she wasn’t feeling terribly patient.
Now Jane’s nose screwed up as well as if she was so confused it hurt. “You merely wished for a kiss with a rake, correct?”
“Yes.” Jocelyn plucked at a loose stitch. She wasn’t in the mood to have her ridiculous wish repeated back to her either. What had she thought a kiss would accomplish?
She had no need for romance, and she never had. It was just curiosity, that was all. She blamed those silly novels her old governess had lent her.
And Daffodil.
Daffodil and the other girls with their wishes upon a maypole.
She’d been caught up in a flight of fancy, that was all. Best that she put all thoughts of kisses aside and—
“Why didn’t you just kiss Harlow then?” Jane asked.
Jocelyn’s head snapped up. “What?”
