Page 45 of To Dare the Devil

“You are?” he asked doubtfully, horribly aware of his untucked shirt and the fact he’d not shaved.

“Yes,” she said, moving closer to him. “It’s reassuring.”

“Reassuring?” he repeated, too aware of her proximity. “I must look entirely disreputable.”

She nodded, smiling, reaching up to touch the scruff on his jaw. Max froze, his breath catching in his throat. He ought to tell her not to do that, he thought wildly, but his body had taken control of his mind and no words came out.

“Where is your maid?” he demanded, noticing too late that his study door was closed where it was usually ajar, her maid sitting directly outside for propriety.

“Scratchy and soft,” she said in wonder, ignoring his question, her grey eyes moving over his face as her fingers traced a line across his cheek to his lips. “I have wondered if your lips are soft, too.”

Max groaned inwardly and closed his eyes as she sighed.

Don’t react. Don’t react. Don’t you move a bloody muscle, you bastard.

“So soft,” she whispered in satisfaction.

“Miss de Beauvoir,” he managed, fisting his hands at his sides against the desire to take her in his arms and hold her to him. “You must not. I’m not… not a good man. Not good enough for you. You deserve—”

“I deserve to make my own decisions, Maxwell Drake. My decisions, not my parents’, or my brother’s, or Blackstone’s. And my name is Kathleen. You may call me Kathy, if you wish.”

For a moment he was too afraid to open his eyes, in case it was a dream, in case it was like waking from the fever and he would find she had disappeared all over again. He risked it, finding her lovely face so close to his, staring at him with such trust in her eyes. No. Don’t trust me. I’ll let you down, pleaded a terrified voice inside him. I don’t want you to hate me. Not you.

He wanted to say her name, to call her Kathy, his Kathy, and to hear her call him Max, but that was selfishness, that was —

She leaned in and pressed her mouth to his, and he was lost. So soft, so soft. Impossibly sweet. How could such a delicate press of lips provoke such a maelstrom of emotion inside of him? Inexpertly, she moved her mouth over his, and he wanted to weep. The moment was so devastatingly lovely.

“Max,” she said, and he stared down at her in shock, his name on her lips, spoken with such tenderness, beyond anything he had hoped for. “Max, I love you. Kiss me. Please.”

“Kathy,” he said helplessly, astonished and overwhelmed, and determined not to mess this up, not to hurt this woman who had been foolish enough to care for him. “You don’t know what you’re asking. You don’t know.”

“I do,” she whispered, pressing her mouth to his and speaking the words against his lips. “I do.”

She didn’t. He knew that she didn’t, but he could not deny her. The enormity of her trust in him was dazzling, overwhelming, and he knew he did not deserve it, could never deserve it. But he cupped her beautiful face with his trembling hands, tilting it just so, and dared to press his mouth to hers. Just for a moment, he promised himself. He wouldn’t take more than this, just this much. She sighed, leaning into him, clutching at his shirt, her soft breasts against his chest. Longing, desire, a sense of something so perfectly right, swept him up, and he knew, at last, this was what love felt like. He loved her, would do anything for her, anything to make her happy, to keep her safe. This woman, his heart sang. This woman.

The door flew open with a flurry of skirts and a feminine gasp of horror.

“Take your hands off her, you bloody villain!”

Max jolted, dropping his hands to his sides as Kathy gave a little shriek of alarm but did not let go, still clutching his shirt.

“Grace?” she said in surprise, a trace of startled amusement in her voice. “Whatever are you doing here?”

Oh, God.

Max staggered away from her, skewered by the look in Grace’s eyes, by the accusation. She hurried across the room and took Kathy’s arm, towing her towards the door. Kathy resisted, alarmed now.

“Grace, whatever is the matter? Honestly, I don’t know why you are here, but Lord Vane did nothing wrong, I wanted him to kiss me, I—”

“Mama?”

Max’s gaze flew to the door where a little girl stood, clutching a well-loved rag doll. She was sucking her thumb, looking anxiously at the adults in the room, before holding her free hand out to her mother. His heart exploded into pieces, and he clutched the desk to steady himself. Beatrice Oak was two and a half now, and unbearably beautiful, an arrow shaft to the heart. A halo of golden curls surrounded the sweetest face in all the world, and she stared at them with wide, blue eyes.

His eyes.

Grace hesitated before letting go of Kathy and running to her child, sweeping her up. She spoke as she lifted the little girl into her arms, her voice implacable. “Your mother told me you were here, and I came at once. Kathy, he is not to be trusted. Lord Vane has not a shred of honour. He’ll use you and cast you aside.”

He saw Kathy take it all in, watched her staring at Grace, at the little girl, and then back at him. Max saw the moment when she understood, when he broke her heart, felt the shock of it ripple through him.