50 Ways to Ruin a Rake by Jade Lee Read Free Book Online Page B

After all, he was half ready to leap upon her and damn the consequences. That ought to give him pause. Some things could not be forgiven, and this was one of them. And yet, he looked at her with her wide eyes and disheveled skirts, and he wanted her as he had never wanted a woman before.
    â€œYou have done this before,” he said, his words harsh. He did not intend to accuse her. Indeed, his fury was all for himself, but she took it as the words sounded.
    â€œYou attacked me!” she shot back.
    â€œThat was hardly an attack,” he returned, a sneer entering his voice completely unbidden. Sometimes his grandfather’s voice came out of his mouth at the worst possible times.
    â€œDo not blame this on me!” she said, her voice growing stronger and her hands steadier as they smoothed her skirts.
    He didn’t. He couldn’t. And yet, he didn’t feel entirely to blame either. After all, her kiss had been incendiary. He took a moment to steady himself. He needed to take stock before he further aggravated the situation. He straightened his waistcoat, he fixed his cravat, and he did his best to hide his erection from her view. She didn’t appear to be looking in that direction, but damnation…her kiss. That was no maiden’s kiss.
    â€œWhere did you learn to do that?” He tried to keep the hauteur out of his tone and succeeded for the most part. But he had to know just how seasoned she was.
    â€œDid you think I could age to four and twenty and not experience a kiss or two?” Scorn dripped from her words, a match for his earlier hauteur.
    â€œA kiss or two? Balderdash.” He had kissed courtesans who had less skill. “What the devil is your father about, letting you learn such a thing?”
    She snorted—a most unladylike sound. “My father is about his bugs, as you well know. I have been in charge of my own education since I was eight.”
    â€œThat is not the sort of thing a gently reared girl should learn.” He didn’t know why he was arguing the point. Only that he was unsettled, and harsh words were his only means of release. Which was ridiculous. Before today, he’d never really thought twice about her. This was the place he came for science, not dalliance. And she usually busied herself with other tasks when he visited. Since he and her father were wont to take their meals in the laboratory, he had barely been in her company at all since she was twelve.
    How he came from barely noticing her to being a hare’s breath away from ruining her on a settee was beyond his powers of understanding. And yet it was true. Indeed, part of him was insistently pushing him to finish what they had begun.
    â€œWhy did you kiss me?” she asked, her voice betraying true distress. “Especially if…if…”
    He looked at her, seeing her beautiful mahogany eyes shining too bright in the moonlight. “If what?” he asked quietly.
    â€œIf you did not want me to kiss you back?”
    He had no answer for that, and so he turned the conversation back in on itself. “How did you come by this skill, Mellie?” He used her father’s nickname for her because he thought it would help ease the personal nature of the conversation.
    â€œWas I…was I very good at it?”
    How to answer that beyond the obvious? “Yes.”
    She nodded once to herself as if confirming a suspicion. “I have kissed three boys in total. Two are inconsequential. The third, however…” A fond smile played about her lips. He made a strangled sound, and she glanced his way, her cheeks heating. “I was sixteen, and he was the chandler’s son.”
    â€œYou kissed a candle maker?” The words were strangled as he fought an irrational fury.
    â€œA great many times. It was summer and…and I don’t know. He was fun. He called me pretty. I think I would have married him if he’d asked.”
    â€œHe