Page 43 of The Mistletoe Dare

She turned, sent reeling off balance to find Rochford standing close behind her. He grasped her arm, steadying her, and she yanked it from his hold.

“Oh!” she said crossly, her hand pressing against her thundering heart. What on earth was he doing here? “Oh, you made me jump.”

His dark eyebrows drew together. “Well, I didn’t creep up on you, if that’s what you’re implying. I’m not exactly built for stealth.”

Georgie huffed out a sigh. Clearly he’d come with the express intention of irritating her. “No, apparently you’re built for annoying me. I thought we agreed to stay away from each other.”

He shook his head. “No, you said you’d stay away from me.”

“Well, you told me to stay away from you too, did you not?” she retorted, folding her arms. Georgie glared at him and wished his nearness didn’t have her nerves leaping with excitement. Honestly, she was an idiot to be besotted with him just because he was so big and strong and… and had the temperament of a baited badger with a naturally dyspeptic disposition, and a toothache.

“I did,” he agreed, looking strangely awkward. He rubbed the back of his neck and she studied him, realising he looked very smart indeed. His beard and hair had been trimmed and everything about him was immaculate.

“You look very nice,” she said grudgingly, partly because she suspected he didn’t get many compliments, and partly because it was true.

To her astonishment, colour tinged the crests of his cheeks. “My valet insisted I trim my beard,” he said, rubbing at it self-consciously.

Georgie clenched her fists, before the desire to reach up and stroke it herself got the better of her.

“You look very smart, very… ducal,” she added stiffly, resisting the urge to tell him he was handsome because he’d think she was mocking him. She wasn’t. Oh, she knew he wasn’t handsome, not at all, at least, not in the conventional sense. Yet there was something about him that appealed to her so deeply that it seemed to overcome his scars and his damaged skin. All she saw was his physique, his grey eyes, the thick dark hair, and that tantalising suspicion he was nothing but a big fraud underneath his angry exterior. Damnation, she was a fool.

“I’m sorry,” he said, though his words were muffled as the music swelled around them.

Georgie sighed, assuming he’d not heard her. It was very noisy with the orchestra and everyone chattering. “I said, you look very ducal,” she repeated, raising her voice to be heard over the din.

He looked perplexed. “And I said, I’m sorry.”

“What?”

“Oh, for the love of God,” he muttered. “It didn’t ought to be this hard.”

“What didn’t?”

“Will you dance with me?” he demanded.

Georgie stared at him in shock. “You made it very clear you wouldn’t dance with me. I even begged, and you still refused. You clearly have no desire to do so,” she said, waving her fan vigorously. It was hot in here, wasn’t it?

“I do. I just asked you.”

“Well, don’t,” she snapped, waving her fan harder still. “I don’t need your charity, I thank you.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake. You wanted to dance with me.”

“Yes. Wanted to. Now I don’t,” she retorted, which was a big fat lie, but she’d die rather than let him know that. The great ox.

“Please, Lady Georgina. Will you dance with me?”

The desire to say yes was burning on her tongue, but then she remembered how he’d hurt her with his accusations. He’d accused her of being the worst kind of manipulative female and… she couldn’t trust him. He was too difficult, too suspicious, too broken, and it wasn’t her job to fix him. She shook her head, not trusting her tongue to say what it needed to.

His expression was so grim she thought perhaps he truly regretted her refusal, but that was just her wishful thinking.

“I’m sorry for what I said to you. I know it wasn’t true. You were right, it was all me, my… cowardice. That’s… it’s why I came, to apologise, I mean. It’s just….”

He let out a sigh of frustration and Georgie looked up at him, stunned by his words and wanting to hear more, even though instinct told her she would be an idiot to let him any closer. She was too susceptible to him. He appealed to her on a visceral level she did not understand, and it would be so easy to be drawn in, too easy, and she did not wish to end her days married to a man who didn’t know how to let anyone close and would make her wretched.

“It’s just…?” she prompted, her desire to hear him explain overriding good sense.

His grey eyes met hers, warm and surprisingly vulnerable. “It’s hard,” he said softly. “To believe someone as beautiful as you would want to give me the time of day for any other reason than my title. I can assure you, no one has before.”