“That’s not what I meant. You’re very attractive, and you know it. But this running about with the Pink Ladies and playing games with me, this isn’t you.”
“How do you know what’s me? You don’t know me at all.”
“I met the real you at the seaside.”
“You met a girl who was completely under her mother’s thumb and had little idea of what freedom could be like.”
“I want you to have your freedom. But I want you to be cautious, as well. And associating with me can only be bad for you, Sandrine.”
“Anyone else I should add to my list of Forbidden Suitors?”
His expression darkened. “Go back to your friends. Don’t leave their side. And ignore me.”
“I can’t ignore you when you’re the reason Icame to London. Because you’re the owner of Squalton Manor.”
“I may have to hire someone to kidnap you, put you in a carriage, and take you back to Squalton.”
“I’m sure my mother would thank you heartily.”
He could be the one to kidnap her. He wanted to get her into a carriage. Alone.
The dangerous thought plundered his mind and made his blood pound like a pack of racehorses. Half of him wanted to whisk her away, to protect her, pack her into a carriage and take her back to the seashore and stay there with her forever. He’d become that man, the one he’d glimpsed in her eyes.
Someone who made her light up, made her laugh, a carefree man who frolicked in the surf, read out loud from history books, a simple, uncomplicated man who wasn’t running from extortionists and staring down the barrel of a dukedom.
The other half of him wanted to pack her into a carriage for a much less high-minded purpose. When he saw her, was near her, heard her voice. When his gaze filled with the decadent curves of her hips, her breasts and round shoulders, delicate fingers and ankles. When he was so close to the swoop of her lower lip, the pronounced dip in her upper lip that he wanted to kiss, to fit his thumb against. Every time he saw her he wanted to claim her.
He wanted to both protect her and claim her. Two things which couldn’t coexist.
Protect her, keep her innocent, and claim her, do dirty forbidden things with her, tie her up with silk ribbons, watch as her lips opened around his cock, feel the heat of her mouth, her throat.
Christ! What the hell was wrong with him?
Standing here with her in his arms, her back up against a tree, sweating and wanting and warring with himself.
He was trying to keep this woman safe, and all he wanted to do was paw her behind a tree at a public event. It was all wrong. He was wrong for her.
He couldn’t be anything to her.
“Sandrine. I care about you,” he whispered. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“I’m London Sandrine now, remember? I have friends, and suitors, and I can take care of myself.” She pulled away from him and left him standing there, still sweating, still burning with desire.
Chisholme returned, trailed by an attendant with a tray of lemonades.
Dane barely stopped himself from sticking out a foot to trip Chisholme and to wipe the pleased grin off his stupid face.
She’s mine, Chisholme.
No, she wasn’t. And she never could be.
When he rejoined his friends, the boxing match had gone seven rounds already. In the eighth, Tuckwell won, and Dane’s heart sank. The men threatening him were powerful and not to be taken lightly.
The threat was real. The danger to him, and anyone close to him, was real.
Chapter Fourteen
Set an example for others with the impeccable morality of your words and deeds.