Romancing the Duke (Castles Ever After #1)(21)

So much need.

That was the most stirring, intoxicating part. Everything about his embrace told her that he needed, and what was truly astonishing—that he sought something he needed in her. He twisted his hand in the back of her nightrail and kissed her more deeply, relentless, as if chasing that something. Searching for it.

And part of her wanted nothing more than to surrender. To offer whatever he needed of her, and gladly.

Be careful, Izzy.

“Enough.” With that gruff pronouncement, he released her. So quickly, she almost stumbled.

The sounds of labored breathing filled the turret.

At length, he cursed. “That was a disaster.”

Izzy put her hand to her temple. She was alone in the dark again, and her head was spinning. This was the moment for a witty, sophisticated retort.

What came out of her mouth instead was, “You kissed me first.”

“You kissed me back.”

“And then you kissed me more.” She sighed. So much for sophisticated banter. “I won’t make too much of it if that’s your concern. I know you only kissed me to intimidate me. But you should know this. It didn’t work.”

“I think it did work.” He pulled her close again. “I felt your heart pounding.”

Well, if a pounding heart was a sign of fear . . .

She flattened one hand against his chest, covering the thumping beat there. The man must be terrified.

Izzy felt a strange pang of sympathy for him. Growing up as Sir Henry Goodnight’s daughter had taught her all about male pride. Her father had labored for years in obscurity as a poorly paid, frustrated scholar. Once the stories found success, the adulation of readers was the food that sustained him. He couldn’t last a week or more without another meal of fawning praise.

And if pride was that important to a middle-aged scholar, Izzy could only imagine how vital it must be to man like the Duke of Rothbury. How difficult adjusting to blindness must be for a man like him, young and strong and in his prime of life. For the first time, he was forced to rely on others. He must hate that feeling.

So he’d learned Gostley Castle, pace by pace, month after month, building a painstaking map of every room in his head. By now this castle was a fortress to his pride. The one place he still felt in control.

And today . . . thanks to some legal quirk, he’d lost it. To a plain, penniless spinster.

It wasn’t any great wonder he despised her.

But just because Izzy understood and sympathized, that didn’t mean she would give up. She couldn’t surrender her own interests just to soothe his pride. She’d made that mistake before, and it was why she found herself here, penniless and stranded in a crumbling castle with nowhere else to go.

She had to look out for herself. No one else would.

“You needn’t be anxious, Your Grace. We will do whatever it takes to sift through the papers and legalities. In the meantime, I promise, I won’t be much trouble.” She gave his chest a gingerly pat.

His hand closed on her forearm and pushed it away. “What you’ll be in the morning, Miss Goodnight, is gone. I will see you back to your bedchamber now. And when morning comes, I will find you somewhere else to stay.”

Izzy relented, saving her strength for tomorrow. In the morning, he would try to make her leave. He might scare her, shout at her, ply her with threats or kisses.

She would be strong as these castle walls.

She would not give one inch.

Chapter Seven

The next morning, Ransom awoke with a surplus of inches—all of them straining against his breeches falls.

Hazy, dreamlike images lingered in his mind. Images of dark hair spilling through his hands and a lush mouth moving under his. A soft hand splayed against his chest.

He turned on his side and groaned. God, that kiss. That stupid, ill-conceived, arousing, soul-rearranging kiss.

She could not spend her nights in this castle. He had to find her other lodgings. Today.

Sitting up, he pushed both hands through his hair. A bath was in order. Preferably a cold one.

“Duncan,” he called.

No answer. No valet-sounding noises, either.

He made his way out to the cistern just off the courtyard and drew a bucket of water. Then he stripped to the waist, lifted the bucket high, and poured its freezing contents straight over his head and torso.

Lust be drowned.

The cold shock of his dousing was just starting to wear off when Magnus joined him by the cistern. Ransom drew some water for the dog and gave him a scratch behind the ears.

“Good morning, Your Grace.”

Damn. One day, and he’d know that voice anywhere. Husky. Soft. Much too close. How did this woman keep sneaking up on him?

“Goodnight,” he muttered.

Her footsteps crossed the courtyard, destroying his calm beat by beat.

Ransom braced himself for his first sight of her.

No one knew it but Duncan and a few useless surgeons, but his injury hadn’t left him completely blind.

Oh, he was mostly blind, most of the time—blocky shapes and shadows were the best he could make out. And sometimes, he was fully blind. Everything was a dark, murky gray.

But then there were a precious few hours of the day when he was only partly blind.

In those hours, he had the vision of a nonagenarian with no spectacles. He could make out vague contours and a few muted colors. A tree might appear as a fuzzy, irregular patch against the sky, its foliage a gray-green shade, like mold on cheese. If he stared at the page of a book, he could force a dark square of text to separate into lines. But he couldn’t make out any words or letters. He could get a vague idea of a face—the most prominent features standing out, like the simple face of a child’s rag doll. Two button eyes, a slash of mouth. No subtleties of expression.