Page 79 of The Dueling Duchess

Once the door closed, Guy turned back to Cecile. “I take it you wanted to get me alone? What can I do for you, Mistress Tremblay?”

Cecile ground her teeth; she had wanted to get him alone. But she hardly wanted to admit it. Instead, she turned away from him and busied herself with her guns but could feel the weight of his gaze. “Are you finished practicing? Or would you like my assistance?” he offered.

“That’s probably not wise right now.” Cecile felt the dull thud of his boots on the stage and then the heat of his body when he stopped beside her.

He traced a finger from the corner of her eye down her jaw.

Rather than slap his hand away or tell him to stop it, she froze like a startled rabbit and reveled in even this barely-there touch.

“How long are you going to keep me at arm’s length, Cecile? How many times do I need to admit I was wrong and beg your forgiveness?”

“I’ll tell you when it’s enough.”

“I was terribly, terribly wrong. And conceited and stupid.”

“Keep going.”

Warm, slightly calloused fingers slid beneath her chin, his thumb brushing her lower lip.

Finally, she did what she should have done right away and slapped his hand away. “I didn’t mean keep going with your touching; I mean with your apology.”

Rather than look offended or hurt at being rejected, he said, “I never should have made such an insulting offer. It was wrong, but it would be a mistake for you to believe that I did it because you weren’t good enough for me or because I didn’t value you.” He stroked her jaw with the back of his knuckles. “I did it because I couldn’t bear to give you up.”

“And yet you did give me up.”

He groaned, the sound so low and intense that she felt it in her own chest.

“I was wrong—terribly wrong. I realized, almost immediately afterward, that I’d never felt about anyone else the way I felt about you.”

She shoved his hand away and pushed past him, prudently leaving her pistols on the cleaning table and thinking to put some space between them, but he followed her.

Cecile spun around, only to discover he was standing so close they were almost touching. At five-foot-eight she was tall for a woman, but he was tall for a man, and she had to crane her neck to glare up at him.

“This is a business relationship, Mr. Darlington. Or have you forgotten what you promised already?”

“No, I haven’t forgotten. I lied to you when I said that.”

She gave a bark of laughter. “You lied about what, exactly? Wanting to work? Wanting this job?”

“No, I lied about my reason for wanting this job, about its being only business. I’m here because of you, Cecile. Only you.”

Her lips parted, but no words came out.

His normally pleasant features were brooding and intense, the deep commas around his full lips and the lines at the corners of his eyes the only evidence that he had ever smiled. His jaw flexed as his dark gaze traveled over her face, settling finally on her mouth, the raw, hot need in his brown eyes intoxicating.

He had the most beautiful eyelashes of any person—man or woman or child—that she’d ever seen. Lush and dark and so long the upper set often tangled with the lower.

“I was wrong, Cecile, so very wrong. I can see that, now—”

“You were betrothed, Guy!” she hissed, and then wanted to bite off her own tongue for allowing those words out. But now that she’d begun . . .

“If not for the arrival of your cousin, you would be married right now instead of standing in front of me declaring how much you want me.”

A muscle jumped in his temple, and he nodded. “That is true. I would have married her.”

“You sent me a letter after I read the announcement of your betrothal in the newspaper,” she said.

“A letter you never answered,” he retorted.