Page 105 of If the Slipper Fits
Her hand moved automatically to her hair. She’d forgotten she’d unpinned it.
Caden scooped the mass of it off her nape and let it sift through his fingers.
She tried and failed to suppress a shiver. “You shouldn’t be here. It isn’t proper. Someone will see you.”
“Who?”
“The maid arriving shortly to help me dress, for one.”
“I see.” He wound a thick lock of her hair around one finger, then let it fall. “I’d have sworn on a stack of bibles you’d be climbing the walls waiting to talk with me. But if you’re certain…” He half rose.
“Wait.”
With no hesitation, he dropped back onto the bed.
She nibbled her fingertip, eyes darting to the closed door. “We do need to talk. Are you aware Lady Kitty and your brother know precisely who I am?”
His face said he was. “Evidently Zeke saw the ad Bolton placed and pointed out same to Kitty. I hadn’t considered that. It rather sped up the process of explaining things, so no real harm done.”
“No harm done?” she squeaked. “You told them we were engaged. They clearly understand that to be an impossibility as I’m already married.”
A muscle ticked in Caden’s jaw. “An impossibility, you say?”
“Of course.”
“Why? Are you planning on returning to the man?”
“No, as you very well know.”
“You do mean to dissolve the marriage as planned, then?”
“Again, you’re aware that is precisely what I mean to do.”
“Why, then, call marriage between us an impossibility?”
She drew in a lungful of air. “Caden, before we bother continuing this inane argument…”
He arched his brows in silent query.
“Are you, by any chance, proposing actual marriage to me?”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “I believe I am.”
Anna searched his eyes.
He returned her gaze with an unblinking stare.
“I assumed you made the claim in order to explain my presence,sanschaperone. I did wonder how you intended to rescind your bald declaration.”
“Well, now you know.” His jaw hardened. “I intend nothing of the sort.”
Lady Kitty had been right. He wished to marry her. To make her his wife.
An image of the two of them walking hand in hand down the graveled lane leading to—of all places—the cottage where her family had summered filled her mind. Her gut twisted with a sharp, painful yearning for what could never be. Not like this.
Still, a tiny piece of her heart hoped for the impossible. “Why?” she couldn’t stop herself asking.
“Why?”
