“Yes, gowns, and frocks, and blouses, and bonnets, and gloves, and shoes, and—” She glanced at him. “Do you want me to go on?”
He’d like her to go on simply to hear words fall from her lips—like pearls dropping onto a silver plate. “I had no idea Cinderella was ever so shallow.”
“Oh, but she was.” A pause. “And is. In fact, I’ve always suspected that she’d gone to the ball less to snag a prince than to prance about in a new ball gown: the former is an unlikely prospect; the latter, an assured pleasure.”
“You mean to tell me gowns are more exciting than princes?”
“Oh, by far.” Her teasing expression turned rueful. “And did she not tell you? The modern-day Cinderella has recently announced a moratorium on princes, especially the amphibian sort.”
“But not on bastard brothers to amphibian princes?”
She flushed furiously. “Well, she is quite shocked about it. The brother must think very ill of her, seeing that she is obviously rather loose and easy.”
He was shocked about it too. And ecstatic. And grateful. “Easy? My God, I’ve never done so much begging in my life,” he said truthfully, stroking her hair.
And he’d been a nervous wreck. All the years of practice in concealing fears and anxieties had been the only thing that kept him from acting the blathering idiot. And she’d held herself so stiffly and had been so insulted. He’d marveled that she hadn’t realized that he was at her mercy, not the other way around. She had nothing to fear from him. He was the one who had broken a lifelong rule—never impose, never importune—to court rejection and abuse.
And yet, when her refusal came, instead of leaving immediately, as he’d promised himself, he’d parried shamelessly, buying a minute here, another minute there, stealing a few more glimpses of her at the risk of exhausting all her goodwill, arming her with knowledge that she could potentially use to bludgeon him.
He’d given her such power over him.
But she hadn’t made fun of him. She’d gifted him with her own story, a story that had made the hairs on the back of his neck rise, because it was a close thing. And when she’d described the taste of the treacle rock, her lips hovering on the edge of a smile, her eyes illuminated with the light of a long-vanished London morning, she’d been as beautiful as Hope itself.
“I believe you are as chaste as a nun, but even such virtue as yours cannot withstand the irresistible force that is my virility and charm,” he teased.
Her lips twitched, not quite allowing herself to laugh, not quite able to subdue all impulses of mirth. He couldn’t help but kiss her again, softly, making a thorough study of the contour of those lips. She was the irresistible one here. He’d never had it in him for playfulness, or for remaining abed after the deed was done, just to look at her, and to talk to her of nothing at all. Already he felt the stirring of fresh desire.
“I wouldn’t have guessed you were the kind of man given to kisses and sweet speech,” she murmured.
“And you would have been right,” he admitted. “I think kisses are a waste of time—if I ever think about them at all. And usually I find it a strain to talk to women. They are not interested in anything I find useful or important.”
“What do you find useful or important?” She cocked her head at a coquettish angle.
“Electoral reform. Working conditions in factories and mines. State schools. Foreign policy, especially toward central Asia.” He’d resigned from the army in disgust at the way the war had been handled. And Mr. Gladstone would always have his loyalty for having been a staunch, principled opponent of the war from the very beginning.
“I’m not sure I can find Afghanistan on a map,” she said, her eyes twinkling.
He laughed. “I could care less. Or I could show you, if you are ever interested.”
God, he was mad for her.
She cast him a quick glance and reached for the cake, chewing it slowly. He watched her. It was easy to tell when she enjoyed her food, as in the case of the boiled egg. She’d pressed the egg white against her lower lip, so that a few grains of salt and pepper stuck to its softness, then she’d licked her lip, seasoning the tip of her tongue, before biting into the egg itself. He’d heard the sighs she made, sensed the motion of her tongue inside her mouth, and it had been all he could do to not knock the plate aside and shove her into bed.
But now her mind wasn’t on the cake. She was eating for something to do. So she didn’t have to respond to his offer, perhaps. He let the silence elongate, until the cake had disappeared.
“Tell me your name,” he said.
“I thought we knew my name already,” she said.
“Your real name. It’s only fair. You know where I live. You can find out anything you want about me.”
“You already know everything you need to know about me,” she said.
“I don’t know where you live.”
“Somewhere in the shadow of the prince’s castle.”
“And where is that?” he asked, even though he already knew she would not answer.