Denial was Kell’s first impulse, but he couldn’t refute that her points were good ones.
“You appear to be regretting your offer already,” she said when he was silent.
Kell shifted uneasily, not knowing which was causing him more discomfort, his injured thigh or the knot that had formed low in his belly. “I am a bachelor, Miss Kendrick. You’ll understand if I’m not eager to hang in the parson’s noose.”
Her brow furrowed, and she hesitated a moment before asking, “Do you have someone in mind you would prefer to wed?”
“No, vixen, I don’t,” Kell said dryly. “I hadn’t intended to wed at all. Certainly not anytime in the near future.”
“I suppose you keep a mistress. Most men of means do.”
His eyebrows shot up at her plain speaking, but the flush on her cheeks suggested the topic wasn’t a comfortable one for her.
“Truly,” she added, “I wouldn’t mind if you continue to have your paramours.”
“Your generosity overwhelms me,” he drawled.
“Well, you might find our union financially advantageous. I have an adequate income of my own-a fund provided by my…father. And my grandfather promised me a significant dowry when I wed.”
“I don’t require your wealth,” Kell declared, annoyed at her assumption that he could be bought.
She moistened her lips, drawing his attention there against his will. “Well, unless you mean to withdraw your offer, I think I must accept it.”
Still fighting the inevitable, Kell narrowed his own gaze at her. “You really should consider carefully, vixen. I promise you, I would make you a terrible husband.”
Pinning her with his midnight eyes, he moved toward her.
Raven took a defensive step backward, finding his intense stare unnerving. She was still amazed by his offer. And he would no doubt make her a dreadful husband. He was a notorious gamester, a stranger who didn’t even like her. Without question, he would be disagreeable and unmanageable as a spouse. And she had deliberately shot him…
It was a marriage doomed to failure. But she had little choice in the matter. Any husband would be better than no husband at all. She needed him.
“Are you certain you want to be my wife?” he murmured. When he grasped her elbow in a velvet grip, Raven felt her breath catch.
“Well?” His silken tone made her shiver, and so did his nearness.
Her gaze focused on his scarred cheek, which suddenly made him seem menacing, then shifted lower to his striking, sensual mouth, which was even more dangerous. Did he intend to kiss her? Her pulse quickened into a rapid, erratic rhythm.
But he didn’t kiss her. Instead his arms folded tightly about her in a merciless embrace that wouldn’t permit her to move. The surge of primal heat shocked her body into stillness; the hot darkness of his gaze filled her with the stunning memory of how he’d pleasured her all through the night…
“Aren’t you afraid of me, Miss Kendrick?”
Was she afraid of him? He was an intense, dangerous man, with a hot vitality that seemed to charge the very air she breathed. She should fear for her virtue at the very least. Yet inexplicably she didn’t fear him. Perhaps because she had seen him so many times in her fantasies.
His eyes glittered darkly, reminding her so keenly of her pirate lover.
“No…I am not afraid of you,” she managed to whisper unsteadily. “Especially not when I think you are deliberately trying to intimidate me.”
He stared down at her a long moment, his eyes unreadable. “I can’t frighten you away then?”
“No, sir, you cannot.”
His mouth compressed in a sardonic line. “My name is not sir.”
“Mr. Lasseter, then.”
“My name is Kell. Say it.”
“Kell, then. I am not afraid of you, Kell.”
She felt her heart pounding as she waited an interminable moment for his response.
Cursing under his breath then, he abruptly released her and turned away. For the span of another dozen heartbeats, he stood there, his jaw muscles working as if he were struggling with himself.
Finally he shot her a hooded glance over his shoulder.
“Very well, vixen,” he said, his tone rife with resignation. “We will marry as soon as arrangements can be made.”
Chapter Six
He never should have touched her, Kell reflected darkly as he watched Raven Kendrick attempt to explain their sudden engagement to her disbelieving relatives. He’d hoped that physical intimidation might influence her to refuse his reluctant proposal of marriage, but regrettably, wrapping his arms around her had only reminded him of their feverish night together: the incredible feel of her aroused body, her passionate hunger for a man, his yet unfulfilled ache…
Bloody hell, but his ill-considered embrace had been a mistake, affecting his body and his senses on the most primal level. His body still throbbed, while his mind spun, unable to focus on the current conversation.
Moments ago they’d returned to the salon to announce their intention to marry, and for a brittle instant, both her great-aunt and grandfather had sat stunned. Then Lord Luttrell had practically exploded in protest, leaping to his feet and waving his cane in the air to punctuate his objections while Raven tried to calm him and prevent him suffering a true apoplectic fit.
His own mind distracted, Kell settled in a chair and watched his prospective bride, wondering exactly why he had felt compelled to save her. He didn’t want a wife of any kind. Certainly not a blue-blooded temptress who drove men like his impressionable brother wild. And he’d had at least one other option besides the parson’s noose. Determined to keep Sean out of prison or worse, he could have spirited his brother out of the country to avoid any retribution by Miss Kendrick or her enraged family.
There was his sense of honor, of course. Any man with a shred of decency would feel obliged to make amends for the violence she had been shown. And he actually had been the one to compromise her. It was his bed she had spent the entire night in.
But Kell suspected there were other, more profound reasons he hadn’t fought harder against having to make her his bride.
Simply put, if he didn’t wed her, she would have no defenses against society’s savagery. He didn’t want the image of her desperate and alone haunting him, the way the stark image of his mother still haunted him.
His mother had been an Irish physician’s daughter who’d fallen in love with one of her father’s patients-an Englishman injured in a hunting accident while touring Ireland. Fiona had married considerably above her station, into the wealthy English gentry, and was never accepted by the haughty Lasseters, even though her husband and her two sons adored her. Within months of being widowed, Fiona was banished to Ireland by the boys’ uncle William, who took over their guardianship, despite their anguished pleas and bitter protests. A year later she’d died in poverty.
Kell had blamed his uncle entirely for her death and came to hate William with an unforgiving ferocity. And that was before the bastard had violated his youngest ward’s innocence with his perversions…
Grimly Kell forced away the memory. He’d been unable to shield either his mother or brother all those years ago, but he didn’t intend to bear that burden of guilt again by standing idle while Raven Kendrick suffered.
For whatever reason, he felt a fierce, almost savage need to protect her. He wouldn’t abandon her now. Even if wedding her was wholly contrary to his own personal desires.
Kell gave a silent, humorless laugh. He’d once vowed he would never marry an aristocrat. Indeed, if he’d thought about it, he would have said he wanted to marry only for love; that he wanted a love match like his parents’.
But at least Raven Kendrick wasn’t the typical wide-eyed schoolmiss without an intelligent thought in her head. As husband and wife, they would doubtless frequently clash, but he would rather risk being shot again than be tied to a milksop for life. And while the singular Miss Kendrick might be virginal, last night he’d been given a tantalizing glimpse of another woman entirely. A staggeringly passionate woman with strength and fire and spirit enough to keep him constantly intrigued…