Moonwitch by Nicole Jordan Read Free Book Online Page B

challenging me to pistols at dawn.”
    Selena lifted her gaze to his. “I don’t intend to tell him,” she said quietly. “And I would appreciate it if you would refrain from mentioning what happened tonight, as well.”
    “You can bet your sweet life I won’t mention it! I’m not that much of a fool.”
    She stood there, silent. Kyle ran his fingers through his hair in a gesture of frustration. “Blast it, I don’t have any experience deflowering virgins, or I would have realized at the time—”
    “Please…I don’t hold you responsible. You merely did what I asked.”
    Glaring at her, Kyle took a deep swig of liquor. He didn’t need this kind of trouble. He could have—and now it looked as if he should have—availed himself of any of a dozen willing females in St. John’s, but oddly, after kissing Selena Markham that afternoon, he hadn’t quite felt in the mood for the full-blown temptresses he usually favored. He had chosen instead to sober up from his afternoon revelries in solitude. And then Selena Markham had shown up, sobbing and looking like some wild wraith in the moonlight. And what had begun as an attempt at a rescue wound up as a seduction.
His.
    It had bothered him that she hadn’t found pleasure in his lovemaking, but perhaps Miss Markham’s inexperience explained her coldness. If he had known— But he
should
have known. Now he had more to worry about than getting shackled in marriage; he could wind up with a noose around his neck.
If
Warner didn’t shoot him first.
    Kyle took another gulp of brandy as he studied Miss Markham. She wasn’t a fool; her eyes were bright with an unexpected intelligence he had recognized from the first. And she didn’t look the type to try to make her betrothed jealous by dallying with another man. But then, he was unable to comprehend why she would even want to marry a man like Avery Warner. Warner was a self-righteous prig with an inflated opinion of his own importance. But perhaps Miss Markham was attracted by his wealth or his power as a member of the assembly council. Perhaps they had merely had a lover’s spat, and she had found solace in another man’s arms. It would serve Warner right to be cuckolded, Kyle reflected nastily, if the man had upset her enough to drive her away.
    Realizing that his thoughts were futile, Kyle shrugged. The damage couldn’t be undone. And as Miss Markham had so subtly pointed out, it wasn’t his business. He didn’t know if he could believe her promise of secrecy, but he wouldn’t get any answers by browbeating her. One thing he did know, though: she couldn’t stay here all night.
    “I should take you home,” he observed tersely.
    “I can find my own way, Captain.”
    “Devil take it, I
said
I would escort you home!” He set his glass down on the table with more force than necessary, and as he relieved Selena of hers, gave her a critical appraisal. “Weren’t you wearing a wrapper or something?”
    Seeing the hard set of his jaw, Selena nodded, deciding it wiser not to argue.
    “Come on, then,” he ordered, taking her arm. “There’ll be the devil to pay if you’re seen here like this.”
    He found her wrapper lying in the sand where he had tossed it and her horse a short distance away, grazing on a patch of scrub grass. After helping Selena don the robe, Kyle lifted her onto the mare’s back and vaulted up behind her. “Which way?” he said gruffly, not liking the necessity of such close proximity. He was having enough difficulty forgetting their moonlight coupling on the beach without being reminded by the warmth of her slender body or the pale hair that was drying in fine wisps and floating back to caress his bare chest.
    Selena, too, was finding the closeness discomfiting. After giving directions to the Markham plantation, she lapsed into silence. She was riding sideways as modesty dictated, but in spite of her efforts to stay well forward, her left hip was pressed against parts of male anatomy whose