Page 35 of Go, Rogue

Her smile dazzles him.

“And secondly, I’d like to discuss Rogers.”

He stiffens again, just as quickly as he’d melted into her smile a moment ago. He should toss Rogers overboard. Or perhaps plant a facer on the man and then toss him overboard.

“What about Rogers?” he asks, knowing that he really has to get a hold of himself.

“I think he knows I’m not really your wife. He asked me a great many questions.”

“Aye, he’s aware.” He narrows his eyes. “What kind of questions?”

“How I know you. Who my family is. That sort of thing.”

“And what did you tell him?”

She smiles, the sweet one that he knows hides a mountain of trouble beneath it.

“I told him I am Mrs. McGann. And that I felt ill the past few days, but I’m much better now and glad to be up and about. I thought you’d want to know what I said so we can keep to the same story.”

“Aye.”

And he’s just on the precipice of an exhale; the conversation going much better than he thought it would, when she says, “Captain McGann—” in a tone that makes his stomach plunge right back down to his feet.

“You ought to call me Andrew.” He’s stalling and he knows it. “If we’re to be married.”

“I suppose I should,” she says, and then she touches her cheek again, as she had below deck. “Andrew, you kissed me.”

His cheeks flame hot once more. “Aye. I apologize for it.”

“Don’t. I don’t mind. It’s only that before…”

She stops, and now she’s the one who blushes. Her pale, white skin turns a lovely shade of pink when she does, and he realizes he’s never seen her do it before. The damned woman is always making him blush. Him, the sea captain and salty tar by-blow is always tinged with the color of embarrassment around her, while she, the supposedly sheltered debutante, has never even turned the slightest shade of crimson.

Absurd.

“If the mothers of the ton are to be believed,” she begins again, “the world is full of men who want nothing more than to take unwanted liberties with unsuspecting young misses. But I must say… noting that my experience here is somewhat limited… that hasn’t been true at all. Unless, of course, it is only me with whom men do not wish to take liberties. But, drat it all, Andrew, what I am trying to say is that you kissed me and I want to know why.”

He says nothing while she stares at him expectantly. He shifts his weight back and forth on his heels. He sucks the air in between his teeth.

“Alright,” she says in the face of his silent fidgeting. “Let me ask you this way instead: why is it, Andrew, that when I tried to kiss you, you recoiled from me as if I were made of arsenic. But you seemed, just a few moments ago, to quite enjoy kissing me? I realize a kiss on the cheek is not the same as one on the lips, but…”

She’s talking about that night. That awful night. And he’s going to have to explain himself to her. He doesn’t want to. How can he explain how it felt to have her want him only for a bit of fun when he wanted her for everything? And then to have her prove it by throwing a bag of money at him.

Yes, she’d tried to kiss him six months ago and he’d refused, but that wasn’t near to the whole of the story. The whole of the story is that she’s an earl’s daughter who tried to purchase herself a bastard by-blow. Or worse than that, a daughter of the aristocracy buying the grandson of a woman formerly enslaved by said aristocracy.

He wouldn’t have it. Not then and not now. No matter how much his cock twitches in her presence. He glances down as if to warn it into submission.

“What did I do wrong?” she finally asks, because he still hasn’t spoken. “Was I too forward? Or is it that you’ve never wanted to kiss me and this morning you were only being polite?”

“Menace,” he says before he can stop himself, “There has not been a day that I did not want to kiss you since the first one I met you. Or,” he adds at her furrowed brow, “that I did not want you to kiss me.”

“Then I confess I do not understand.”

Nor do I.

He takes in a deep breath. “The last time I saw you before—” he gestures broadly to indicate her presence aboard his ship. “You were engaged to be married and not to me.”

And that’s true.