While the Duke Was Sleeping (The Rogue Files #1)(16)

“Do you now?” He folded his arms across his chest, arching an eyebrow at her. “Are you blessed with the sight?”

She snorted. “I am no seer.”

“Ah. Just burning conviction, then?”

“It’s merely something I feel.” She pressed a hand against her heart. He casually surveyed the starched pinafore covering her chest. It was impossible to measure her assets hidden there, but it didn’t quell his curiosity to do so. He wanted to see. He wanted to peel back her layers. He wanted to know what his brother knew.

She continued, “I can’t explain it.” She shook her head, disgusted with herself or him, he wasn’t certain. “I don’t need to explain it. Not to you as you sit there laughing at me.”

He pointed a finger to the straight, unsmiling line of his lips. “Do you see a smile here?”

She shook her head. “No. I see no smile. I’ve yet to see you smile at all.”

“The same can be said of you,” he countered.

She lifted her chin with a little sniff. “We’re simply two people who don’t rub well. It happens. Not everyone can like everyone.”

“True,” he remarked, still assessing her, trying to read her, and wondering why it should bother him that she didn’t like him. Most women did. He wasn’t arrogant thinking so. It was simply truth. He’d always had a face and form women desired, even if he was rough about the edges. “How old are you?”

She frowned. “Don’t you know it’s impolite to inquire a lady’s age?”

“Five and twenty?” he baited, knowing she was younger.

Her eyes flared wide. “I am twenty!”

“So very young?” he mocked. “You seem older.”

“Why? Do I look so very haggard?”

“No. You merely act like it.”

Her lips snapped shut, and he knew she was chewing that over, trying to decide whether or not she was offended.

As they rolled to a stop, he glanced out the window at a four-storied house with a crooked sign out front that proclaimed Gibbons Lodgings.

He opened the door and hopped down before the driver could disembark from his perch. Turning, he held a hand up for her.

She hesitated before finally placing her hand in his. As soon as her feet touched down she snatched her hand back as though she feared he might wish to keep a grip on her. Was she so very assured of her allure? Had snaring his brother filled her with such confidence?

No woman was so irresistible. Just as no single woman was irreplaceable.

He addressed the coachman. “A moment, if you will.”

The man nodded.

Hot color bloomed in her cheeks. She gestured at the waiting hack. “I left my reticule back at the shop, but I should like to recompense you for the—”

Annoyance shot through him . . . along with something else. He was intrigued. No woman of his acquaintance had ever offered to recompense him for anything. On the contrary, he was a man of considerable means that they wanted to squeeze for everything they could. He didn’t even begrudge them that. He well recalled what it felt like to go to bed hungry. There was a time when he was every bit as mercenary as any of them.

She, however, annoyed him. Why couldn’t she be like every other female of his acquaintance? The more she mystified him, the more irritated he felt with her—and, to some degree, with himself.

Perhaps this is why Autenberry fancied her. For her very uniqueness? He snorted. There was no chance of that. His brother was much too shallow and concerned with position and rank to allow himself to do more than shag her a time or two. Whatever she was to Autenberry . . . she was not his future wife. He would wager his fortune on it.

“That’s unnecessary,” he said. “I don’t need your money.”

She looked on the verge of arguing and then inclined her head, clearly deciding not to dispute the point.

“Well, then. I thank you.” She shifted awkwardly. “For escorting me home . . . for saving my life.” She looked like she was sucking lemons, clearly reluctant to voice her gratitude for that latter part. She blamed him for this day’s deeds and that much hadn’t changed in their short drive together.

A wiggle of something that felt uncomfortably like guilt wormed through him. For all he felt toward Autenberry, he did not wish him dead, and he wondered if he could have done something differently. Something that did not result with the duke being unconscious in a bed right now.

Damn her for thinking the worst of him. And damn him for caring one way or another.

“I’m certain we will meet again,” he said, wondering why that rang ominously to his ears. What did he care if he ever saw his brother’s doxy again?

She nodded once brusquely and then presented him with her back. He followed her up the path to the stoop of her lodging house with measured steps. She registered his steps and whirled around. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Walking you to your door. It’s the gentlemanly thing to do. Certainly you are accustomed to such treatment from my brother.” He arched an eyebrow.

She inhaled, lifting her slight chest. “You needn’t escort me.” She stood elevated two steps above him, which enabled her to look down her slim nose at him. “You may go.”

She was a contrary female. She might be a shopgirl, but she had all the air of a queen. How had his brother ever managed to seduce someone so prickly?