Proof by Seduction (Carhart #1)(21)

The smile slowly slipped off his sister’s face as she realized she’d been dismissed. She unlocked her arm from Jenny’s, pausing only to give Jenny’s hand a squeeze. Her brother’s visage darkened at the gesture.

He opened the servants’ door they had just come through and led Jenny a few steps down the dim hall before brushing her hand off his arm and turning to tower over her. He stood inches away, his features implacable.

“Ned is one matter,” Lord Blakely said. “He is my responsibility. Do not doubt that no matter what else may occur between you and me, I will eradicate your influence over him. But my sister…”

“Your sister seems a pleasant enough young woman.”

His lip curled. “Miss Edmonton,” he emphasized icily, “is no consideration of yours. She is my junior by sixteen years, and I don’t mean to see her hurt. I tell you this as a warning, not an invitation. Interfere with my sister, and I will destroy you.”

Jenny put her hands on her hips. “Is that what you think I see when I look at her? A potential dupe?”

“I saw the way you looked at her when she took your arm. As if she’d handed you a gift.”

Jenny looked down to hide the sharp pain in her eyes. She felt like the twisting fibers in the carpet at her feet—threadbare and a bit frayed. In Lord Blakely’s scintillating world, both it and she would have been traded to the ragman. “I bow to your perceptive talent, Lord Blakely. It takes a special sort of intellect to make out only the worst in those around you.”

“Is that what you think I’m about?” He took her chin, turning Jenny’s face toward his. She couldn’t escape that searching gaze. “I can’t risk your lies on this point.”

Lies. Jenny swallowed shame. He dismissed her so easily. In a way, she shouldn’t have been surprised. She knew how the upper classes saw her all too well.

She’d given up on being good because her behavior made no difference. No matter how kind or good or sincere she may have been, they would all condemn her just the same. No matter what she did, she would remain baseborn, her parents unknown to her. What had she to lose by becoming a fraud?

If a gentleman saw her as anything other than an extra panel on the wainscoting, he saw what Lord Blakely did—a potential vessel for his seed, worthy of his notice only for the space of time it took to use her for sexual release. She’d escaped their world, but the only thing that had changed was the face of the man making the offer.

A week ago, Lord Blakely had seen clear through to the truth of her lonely childhood. Now he deemed her unworthy. Looking up into his eyes, she felt the most awful desire to kiss him. It was like the urge to pick off a scab—painful, idiotic and sure to start the bleeding all over again. Had she really been stupid enough to think this man different?

Aside from the sheer physical heat that dwelt between them, he was exactly like everyone she’d ever known.

“Tell me,” he growled at her. “Tell me truthfully you’ll not interfere with her.”

No. Not exactly alike.

There was one way he differed. He deemed her unworthy, but she was not alone in receiving his condemnation. Ned, his sister—he’d spoken harshly of them both. To him, everyone was wainscoting. He might as well have been alone in that crowded room out there.

His fingers dug into her chin. “Say the words,” he ordered.

She wondered, suddenly, how he saw himself. Cold, undoubtedly. Different, and superior to everyone else. He saw himself as the kind of man who could make a woman scream while he experienced little more than inconvenient lust. Maybe Lord Blakely despised lesser mortals who let their control lapse into such gauche and unforgivable errors as the giving of trust, the acceptance of affection.

The poor man.

“I don’t see your sister as a potential mark, my lord. My only surprise is that you do.”

He searched her eyes in the dim light. He must have found the truth in them, because he released her chin.

Jenny rubbed the spots where his fingers had pressed. Five points were emblazoned into her jaw. It hadn’t been painful, but she felt humiliated. After all these years, she should have been used to the feeling. At least, she thought bitterly, Lord Blakely had some real reason besides her birth to believe her dishonest.

He shook his head disdainfully. “I try to see the truth even in those I care for. I have no desire to fool myself. What else should I see?”

There were a million answers. Jenny hesitated, searching for the perfect response. Finally, she picked the cruelest possibility. She picked the truth.

“I thought you would see a younger sister who, despite everything you said to her, still adores you.”

His lips whitened. His hands clenched.

Oh, he strove to hide it. But that miserable flinch showed that Lord Blakely could care about someone, much as he tried to deny it.

This tantrum, she realized, was her punishment, unjustly meted out for winning his smile. For breathing warmth into the ice of Lord Blakely. It was his rage, that he’d caused his sister pain, when he’d meant only to keep her safe. Jenny was not the object of his anger, just its recipient. It shouldn’t have made her feel better, to play the scapegoat. And yet it did.

Jenny stretched up and placed her hand against his cheek. A moment of heat; a hint of stubbled roughness.

And then he recoiled as if a beetle crawled across his skin.