“I can only assume the three men I encountered here were meant to woo you.”
She gave him a narrow-eyed glare, and he almost laughed. The three men he saw earlier couldn’t handle a spirited girl like Catherine. Even if much of that spirit was for show, she was no shrinking violet.
“I do not think you’ll be receiving any proposals from those three.” He motioned to the stairs. “I think you may have even frightened them away.”
“Good,” she said. “If only I could now frighten you away, my work would be complete.”
He grinned. “Unlikely. I spend much of my time in Parliament with Tories screaming their lungs out, promising to incite my constituents to violence against me. I think I can handle a little girl’s tirade.”
Her jaw dropped at that. She did not like being called a little girl or having her efforts belittled.
He was about to speak again when he saw the blood trickle onto her lower lip. Without thinking, he rose and bent over her. Immediately, she pulled back, as though she expected a blow.
“I’m not going to hurt you. Come here.” He reached for her chin, but she leaned farther back.
“Please. I’d prefer you didn’t touch me.”
“Yes, well, you’re bleeding. At least take my handkerchief, so you don’t stain—” He looked at her old, dirty dress. “Just take it.” He pressed the cloth into her hand and watched her dab her lower lip with it.
She touched her lip, drew the cloth away, saw the blood, and replaced the handkerchief. She looked up at him briefly, and said, “Thank you.”
Looking directly into her eyes, he was momentarily at a loss. They were the eyes of a lioness— deep, golden-brown hazel, wide set, and startlingly clear against her olive complexion. One reason Quint had chosen Elizabeth was because she possessed the prized blond hair, blue eyes, porcelain skin, and petite form that were currently in fashion. But it was no hardship on him to do so.
He had never found brunettes particularly alluring, and he usually disliked the dark look many of his country servants had after working out in the fields, but this girl, with her dark hair and bronze skin, was astonishingly alluring. She was not beautiful, not in the way Elizabeth was. But there was something earthy about her, something raw and exotic and sexual that attracted him.
Involuntarily, his eyes traveled down the length of her throat to the small expanse of flesh revealed at the bodice of her gown. He wondered, if he’d been able to see more of that flesh, if she would be honey gold all over—breasts, stomach, legs.
Immediately, he forced his eyes back to hers.
She was still holding the handkerchief to her lip. She pulled it away again, and he saw that the bleeding had slowed. Retaking his seat, he watched her push the hair from her forehead yet a third time.
The clock on the mantel ticked off the minutes, and that was the only sound in the room until Quint could no longer stand it. “Do you think your sister will be coming back down?”
She shrugged, lifted the handkerchief, and touched her lip. It was slightly swollen now, a splotch of red radiating out from her lower lip to tinge her cheek.
“Could you be persuaded to go up and fetch her?”
The girl gave him an incredulous look. “No, I could not.”
“You don’t like your sister very much, do you?”
She gave him a long look. “Whatever gave you that idea, Lord Valentine?”
“You have nothing to be jealous of, you know,” he said, sitting back and making himself comfortable. “You’re attractive—in your own way.”
“What a compliment,” she said, tone wry.
“And I am certain you could find a suitable husband if you only applied yourself more.”
She stared at him. “I shall remember that the next time my father brings home three apes who are bent on trying to lure me into their lairs.”
“Apes sleep in trees.”
“That’s not my point.”
“I am beginning to see that.” He remembered her parting words at the ball. “You do not wish to marry, do you, Miss Fullbright?”
“A young lady who does not want to marry? Ridiculous idea, Lord Valentine.” She slanted those hazel eyes at him, and he had to cover his smile.
