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“You conceited peacock!”
“Admit it. You enjoyed the view.”
“I’ll admit nothing of the sort.”
He plucked a single red rose and offered it to her through the open window. “For you, princess. It matches your cheeks when they’re flushed from my proximity.”
“You... you...” Beatrice sputtered.
“Scoundrel?” he suggested.
“Malapert rapscallion!”
He tilted his head. “That’s a new one.”
“Have you considered that your renovations might progress more swiftly, Mr. Wright, if you did more carpentering and less flirting? First Jenny and now me—don’t you ever exhaust your store of vexatious trifling?”
He propped his elbow on the window ledge and leaned closer. “I thought you weren’t spying on me.”
“I wasn’t. I was watering the roses.”
“I think you were watching.” His gaze dropped to her lips. “Because you wanted to see what a kiss from me would be like.”
Beatrice wasn’t accustomed to men perusing her with that hooded, hazy look in their eyes. She was no beauty. She never incited desire.
She never experienced desire.
And yet... the glow in her belly was spreading. She still felt the soft brush of his fingers along the edge of her ear.
“This conversation is over. Be on your way.”
“Not yet.” He wrapped his hand over the window ledge. “I have a question to ask you.”
“Well?”
“I don’t want anyone to overhear me ask it.”
“That doesn’t sound proper.”
“I’m never proper. Don’t even know what the word means.”
“It’s from the Latinpropriusmeaning ‘one’s own, particular to itself.’ It’s not until the mid-fourteenth century that we see the usage meaning ‘by the rules’ or ‘correct and acceptable.’”
“I don’t play by the rules, either.” He slid one knee onto the ledge. “I’m coming in.”
“No. Wait—!”
Too late.
Her sanctuary had been invaded by a rogue.
Chapter Two
Ford jumped down onto the library’s expensive imported carpet. Life was always attempting to bring him to his knees, but he always landed on his feet.
The duke’s sister had retreated to a shadowy niche between two bookshelves. She stood there, half-hidden, all glinting spectacles and glowing red hair.
The new-minted copper of her hair never failed to strike his mind and reverberate like a ship’s bell tolling the hour of the watch.
