Winter's Whispers (The Wicked Winters #10) - Scarlett Scott Page 0,29

wiser that I am not alone.”

Relief fell upon her with so much force, she nearly swooned.

Here was a reprieve, she hoped.

“My lady?” he asked, reaching her, seizing her arms in a grip that was gentle but firm. “You are pale. You are not going to swoon on me, are you?”

She inhaled slowly. “No.”

But she swayed. Listed to the left, then the right. Everything swirled. Even his handsome face and his well-kissed mouth. It had only been a servant, she reminded herself. Not anyone who might cause them trouble. Thank the sweet heavens above. It had not been anyone who might have stormed past Mr. Winter, entered the chamber, and saw her there with her misbuttoned pelisse and kiss-swollen lips.

He steadied her, proving the anchor to her storm-tossed ship. “Calm, Lady Felicity. No one shall ever be the wiser that you were here alone with me. The servant is on his way back to the main house.”

It could have been worse.

So much worse.

And she had been selfish to conduct herself thus, with him.

So desperately, foolishly, stupidly selfish.

She had not been thinking of her sisters when she had been in Blade Winter’s arms. She had only been thinking of herself.

“I must go,” she managed to say. “This… I cannot…We cannot… What happened between us was a mistake, Mr. Winter. One I cannot afford to make again. I have far too many people depending upon me to allow myself to make such an egregious error, regardless of how much I may enjoy it in the moment.”

Because she had enjoyed it, hadn’t she? Oh dear heavens, how she had.

“What happened between us was not a mistake,” he denied softly, releasing her to trail a finger down her cheek. “You kissed me. That was not a mistake.”

“Yes,” she hissed at him, finally managing to get her pelisse buttoned in the proper order at last. “It was. One which cannot—must not—be repeated.”

“Cannot why?” he asked.

“Because it is wrong.”

“So you have said.” He eyed her calmly. “But you have not spoken a word of why.”

“I have already told you.” She glared at him, hating herself for wanting him so much. Hating him for being so deuced handsome. The inking of the blade atop his hand mocked her. So, too, his visage. Perfectly masculine. Perfect, in every sense.

Little wonder all the ladies wanted him.

Little wonder Lady Penhurst would forsake her husband.

Curse Lady Penhurst. Felicity wished she had never heard the woman’s name. Wished those sweet, hot, knowing lips that had so recently devoured hers had never known another’s beneath them.

“Tell me again, then, if you please,” he commanded, that brilliant gaze of his traveling over her face, reaching deep inside her to a place she dearly longed to keep from him.

He was getting beneath her skin, this man. He was finding his way to the deepest part of her heart. A heart he had no business invading, a heart she had no intention of inviting him into.

“I must make a match to save my sisters,” she said, desperation defeating her pride. “My father has tremendous debts, the sort which cannot be ameliorated with ease or time. I have younger sisters, Esme and Cassandra. They have no dowries to speak of, and yet they must wed. I want them to find husbands who care for them. Husbands who will be gentle and kind and considerate. Husbands who appreciate their intellects, who love them.”

He raised a golden brow, studying her closely. “And still, I do not hear a reason why you must make a match.”

“My sisters are depending upon me,” she snapped. “Have you not been listening? My father spent every guinea he possessed and then he spent more. Without a grand match from me, Esme and Cassandra have no hope.”

“And yet, if you make a match to save your sisters, you are the one without hope. Is that not so, my lady?”

His shrewd query cut too close. Because it was true. It was true, and she hated the position in which she now found herself. “This is the necessary way of things. I must marry well to secure their dowries.”

She expected Blade Winter to bow and allow her to pass, to let her run from him and the temptation he presented. To make the best choice—nay, the only choice—reason allowed. She had a reputation to preserve. All she needed to do was secure herself a husband. It should have been easy enough.

But she had not bargained for the presence of Mr. Blade Winter, or the way he would make