Everything except her.
Connor’s voice lowered. “I would never have danced with another woman on me wedding day.”
The words unsettled her more than any accusation.
She swallowed. “I didnae ken that.”
“Ye could have asked.”
“Asking would have implied I cared.”
“Do ye?”
The room fell too quiet.
Violet continued to hear the cèilidh through the door, the scrape of a chair somewhere in the hall, the bright rise of a fiddle. She heard her own breath, shallow and unsteady.
The answer should have been simple. It should have come at once, sharp and useful.
It did not.
Connor’s eyes flickered. That should have made her angry enough to recover. He looked as if her silence had told him something he intended to handle carefully. Instead, he stepped closer.
There was still room to move away. She saw it clearly. If she shifted left, she could pass the desk. If she stepped back, she could put the chair between them. And if she wished to leave, he would let her. She knew it with a certainty that frightened her more than being trapped would have. She could leave. Sheshouldleave.
Instead, she stayed.
“Ye ken, ye get on me nerves a lot. I can never guess what ye are up to,” he said.
Violet forced her voice to remain steady. “Does that disappoint ye?”
“Disappointment has never made me want to kiss a woman senseless.”
Heat surged through her so quickly that she nearly stepped back. She should have scolded him. She should have reminded him oftheir arrangement, John, distance, the entire sensible structure she had carried into this room and frankly thought she could stand ten toes on, abandoned piece by piece.
Connor’s voice lowered. “Ye keep making rules. I keep wondering which one ye want broken first.”
“This isexactlywhy we need them.”
“Name the next one, then.”
“I…”
“Aye?”
“I was about to.”
“Before I stood too close?” he asked, his mouth curving in a slight, devastating smile. “That one may be harder to mend.”
Violet should not have looked at his mouth. It happened once, swift and foolish, before she dragged her gaze back to his eyes. Connor saw it. He saw everything she wanted hidden.
Then he leaned in, and his mouth touched hers.
Her whole body answered before she could stop it. His lips moved over hers with a restraint that drew her forward instead of forcing her still. Her fingers left the desk and caught in thefront of his coat. She felt the bulge in his trousers, the steady rise of his chest, the sudden tension he held in check when she opened to him and he made a low sound against her mouth.
She kissed him back with a need that terrified her. Her hands tightened in his coat, and for one foolish, honest moment, there was no widow, no hall, no rule strong enough to stand between her and the heat of his mouth.
Then sense struck late and clumsy.
