Ethan flexed his tight fingers. Obligated? He hardly knew the meaning of the word. She began to pace in front of him.
“Well, I don’t need your misguided sense of honor.”
He almost snorted aloud.
“I knew exactly what I was doing last night, and the consequences.” Her voice cracked slightly on the last word, but she drew herself up again, turned to face him. “You needn’t feel obligated.”
“Good. I don’t.”
“We can call off—” Her chin shot up. “What do you mean, youdon’t?”
“I don’t feel obligated.”
“I thought—” She gestured feebly. “I thought when a man took a woman’s virginity, he—” She broke off, biting her lip hard enough that the dusky skin whitened.
“Ah.” Ethan rubbed a thumb along his unshaven jaw. “There is that. But, as you’ve pointed out yourself on numerous occasions, I’m a bad man.” He straightened his cravat. “It would take more than lost virginity to bring a debauched scoundrel like me to the altar.”
She appeared not to notice his light tone. Releasing her lip from the clamp of her teeth, she considered his words with all the gravity of a queen deliberating a state secret. Finally, her gaze met his again. “Thenwhy?”
She sounded so young and fragile that Ethan wanted to scoop her into his arms and kiss her until his lips erased the incredulity from her voice, erased her surprise at the notion that someone wanted her.
“Why not?” His voice was harsher than he’d intended, reflecting his anger at her self-doubt. Let her givehimthe reasons. She obviously thought she knew them.
“A thousand reasons.” She paced in front of him again, the embodiment of her father now. She paused and held up one finger. “You don’t want to marry.”
“I never said that.”
“Everyone knows it.” She paced across the floor again then held up a second digit. “And you don’t trust women.”
Ethan couldn’t deny that accusation. He inclined his head, but cut off her triumphant exclamation. “I trust you.”
She huffed and whirled on him. “Hardly! You—”
“I’m willing to try,” he interrupted, irritation mounting. “Stop repeating what you’ve heard about me, and focus on what’s true.”
She spread her hands. “And what is true? You don’t love me.”
“Did thetontell you that as well?”
She set her jaw, the light of challenge in her eyes. “No, but neither have you.”
Ethan winced. “Damn it, Francesca.” His cravat felt too tight suddenly, and he reached up to loosen it. “What does love have to do with anything?”
She went eerily still.
“People marry every day for property, title, companionship. Reasons that have nothing to do with love.”
“I see.” Back stiff and straight, she arranged herself gracefully in the smaller of the two armchairs. She folded her hands in her lap and looked up at him. “And why, exactly, arewemarrying?”
Ethan paused again. Why didn’t he just tell her he thought he might love her and extricate himself from this deepening morass? The words had been on his lips a dozen times as they’d made love the night before. They were there now, but no matter how he tried, he couldn’t seem to force them past the mountain on his tongue. Those simple words made him too vulnerable, and he could not allow himself to ever be that vulnerable to a woman again.
“Well?” she prodded, arching a brow.
“I want you,” he said again. He knew it sounded arrogant, dictatorial, but it was the closest he could come to confessing his love.
“What a lie.” She spat the words, fire in her eyes.
“What the devil—”
