The Hellion (Wicked Wallflowers #1)(68)

Humming a tavern ditty, Cleopatra dragged her knees up to her chest and focused on the notes Phippen had sent earlier that afternoon . . . otherwise neglected by Adair.

“I haven’t seen this yet,” she correctly noted.

He clenched and unclenched his jaw. How damned casual she was. When I’m a bloody mess inside.

“Shouldn’t you be asleep?” he asked, the question coming out harshly. Stalking over, he plucked the sheets from her hands and tossed them to the corner of the desk, out of her reach.

Cleopatra dropped her chin atop her knees. “We never worked out the final terms of our agreement.”

It was official, with her ability to torture him, she was very much a Killoran. Only this form of cruelty was all the worse for the unintentional delivery of it. “You had your first waltz. No need for one from me,” he clipped out as he gathered his papers together and proceeded to set his desk to rights.

Frowning at him, Cleopatra spoke slowly. “You never said what prize you intended to claim.”

It did not escape his notice that she didn’t refute his words. All she’d sought was a dance, and Lord Landon had provided her precisely what she wished, and far better than a street tough like Adair ever could . . . or would. “No, I didn’t,” he acknowledged, not lifting his head from his task. “I’ve business to see to, Cleopatra. I lost most of the evening to Beaufort’s damned ball and don’t have time to speak about a damned pretend wager.”

Another woman would have been sent fleeing at his sharp tone.

“You’re angry,” she observed. Slowly lowering her legs to the floor, she stood.

From the corner of his eye, he caught a flash of creamy white skin before her modest night skirts hid that delectable flesh. Damning her for this quixotic spell she cast, and damning himself all the more for wanting her as he did, he paused in his task and released an exaggerated sigh. “Why would I be angry?”

Cleopatra lifted her shoulders in an uneven shrug. “I don’t know.” She lifted an index finger. “But I do know you grit your teeth loud enough when you are, and this vein . . .” Leaning up on tiptoe, she touched the corner of his right eye. “It pulses when you do. As it is now.”

She knew those details about him. Adair briefly closed his eyes. For all he’d survived, he’d always believed himself above cowardice. Only to find with his inability to mention Lord Landon’s name, and the searing jealousy gripping Adair even now, just how little strength he, in fact, had. He took several steps back, putting desperately needed distance between them. “I was going to require you accompany me to the Hell and Sin.”

Cleopatra opened and closed her mouth several times. “What?”

She was the only woman in the whole of the kingdom who would have been diverted at the mention of taking part in the business end of discussions about his hell. “That was to be the deal,” he clarified. “I’d give you your first waltz.” Which Lord Landon had instead seen to. “In turn, you were to accompany me and assess Phippen’s work thus far.”

A little gasp burst from Cleopatra, and she moved with such alacrity, her wire-rimmed spectacles tumbled from her nose. “When?”

Not even a month ago, he’d have taken that eagerness as a sign that Killoran’s sister wanted nothing more than a glimpse of the inner workings of the Hell and Sin. How odd to find this woman had been so much safer then, than she was now to him.

“Adair?” she prodded, tugging at his shirtsleeve.

“When, what?” he blurted, hurrying to retrieve her glasses. He held them over.

Cleopatra jammed the wire-rims back on. “When are we going to your club?” She chewed at the tip of her finger. “Of course, it cannot be during the day, because we’d be seen.” She jabbed that same long digit up, and he grunted as it hit his nose. “Unless we go early in the morning before the ton awakes and—”

“We are not going anywhere during the day,” he said, cutting her off abruptly. Collecting her hand, he lowered it back to her side.

She was already nodding. “Very well, the early-morn hours when the staff is sleeping and the lords and ladies have returned from their night’s pleasures makes far more—”

“We’re not going at night, either.”

She knitted her eyebrows into a single, befuddled line.

“We’re not going at all,” he clarified, and resumed straightening his desk.

Silence met his pronouncement, broken only by the noisy shuffle of parchment and vellum as he organized his documents into tidy piles.

“Very well.” Cleopatra moved to the opposite end of the desk.

Perplexed, he glanced up . . . and froze.

The bespectacled miss who’d wholly captivated him stood with her arms bent and stretched out before her.

What in blazes . . . ?

“You owe me a dance—”

“That you already had,” he said as much for himself as for her.

“And I join you at the Hell and Sin.”

He gritted his teeth. “I’m not dancing with you, Cleopatra.” Because every time he took her in his arms, he became more and more lost. He needed distance from her. Space that was safe so he could see a restoration of logic and order.

“You’re angry again.”

God, she was relentless. “I’m not . . .”