Page 116 of Her Beast

Julia rejoiced inside at his admission, but she could see from his face that he wasn’t finished.

“But I’m not going to do those—or any other things—to you.”

Julia felt as though he’d slapped her.

“I apologize for what you saw and—”

“No.” She pushed up out of her chair. “Don’t apologize for somethingIdid.I’mthe one who came back again and again.”

“Julia, this isn’t—”

“Stop treating me like an ignorant child! You didn’t shock me”—she stopped, pulled a face, and then said, “Well, truthfully, youdidshock me,” she admitted, “but you didn’t disgust me or—or damage me.” She made an exasperated noise. “Don’t you understand? I came back time after time because I want you to do all those things to me, Malcolm.”

Thankfully, Malcolm didn’t laugh at Julia or mock her for her embarrassing confession.

Indeed, he didn’t respond in any way other than to stare at her with his opaque gaze.

The uncomfortable silence stretched and stretched, until she was in agony.

And then the truth smacked her in the face like the backlash of a tree limb, stinging and painful. Julia had obviously misread his earlier expression; it wasn’t desire she’d seen on his face, it was discomfort.

Malcolm was not rendered speechless by lust; he was trying to contrive a way to reject Julia without hurting her! After all, why in the world would he needherwhen he apparently had unlimited access to beautiful and skilled women?

Julia had been a fool.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbled. “I need—I need to leave.”

She took several steps toward the mirror but then realized she didn’t know which of the wall sections led to the corridor. There was a proper door, of course, not that she knew where it led. But surely anywhere was better than where she stood right then.

She darted toward the door but his hand closed around her wrist and he jerked her back, roughly turning her to face him.

Julia flinched at the harsh expression on his face as he glared down at her. “You havenoidea how much I want you,” he said grimly.

She swallowed hard and his eye dropped to her throat to track the motion.

“More than any woman in years. Maybe more than I’ve ever wanted a woman in my entire life,” he sounded as if he was speaking more to himself and the admission stunned him.

They stunned Julia, too.

Hadn’t he said he loved his wife? Did he mean—but no, he’d said thatwantedJulia,not that helovedher.

“What are you saying,” she asked.

His eye moved slowly upward, until their gazes locked. “It doesn’t matter what I want, Julia, because when this is all finished—what I’m doing to your father and your family—you will hate me so much that you’ll never want to see me again. And even if you don’t,” he said when she opened her mouth to argue, “this”—he waved a hand between them—“whatever you think there is between us, it canneverhappen.”

“Why? Tell me why it can’t?” she begged, hating that she sounded like a whiny, sniveling child but unable to stop herself.

He gave a frustrated groan and shoved his fingers into his hair hard enough to make him wince. “You are making itvery hardfor me to do the decent, honorable thing, Julia.”

“Then don’t do it!”

He backed away from her, as if she were some sort of contagion, and yanked out his pocket watch, glaring at it. “I can’t do this right now, Julia. I have to go somewhere—”

“Now? But it’s two-thirty in the morning!”

He stalked over to the wall that held the window or mirror or whatever it was, and pushed on the upper panel, opening the door with a soft click. “Go back to your room, get some sleep, and pray that you wake up tomorrow having come to your senses.”

Julia did some stalking of her own but stopped in front of Malcolm instead of the door. “Iamin my senses. It isyouwho are behaving irrationally.”

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