Portia Costa - Diamonds in the Rough

Still, he opened his mouth, not knowing how, but hoping to make things better. “But that’s not quite what I meant, and you must admit I didn’t say it to her face. I—”

His cousin raised a hand and silenced him before he could get another word out.

My God, she’s impressive. Wilson’s cock lurched again, the weight of desire almost making him double over.

“No, you fobbed her off with some pretentious taradiddle of a reply. What was it...something about being ‘married to your work’?” Adela paused, her eyes narrowing, but still brilliant. “When we all know that your objection is to me, and that you were already involved in a romantic liaison elsewhere. How is the beauteous Coraline, by the way?”

For a hundredth of a second, Wilson reeled. Oh, how she wielded the knife. “Still beauteous, as far as I know,” he said, affecting a nonchalance he didn’t feel. “And please don’t tell me you don’t know she’s split from me. I’m sure the jungle drums of society have thundered out all the juicy details.”

“Ah, yes, her duke. How does it feel to be thrown over for a seventy-five-year-old in a bath chair?”

Wilson wasn’t a violent man. In fact, strange as it seemed, considering his work for the War Office, he was a pacifist. But right now he wanted to box his cousin’s ears.

“How does it feel to be out for upward of four seasons and not snare a husband?”

Adela remained impressive. Even more so now. Yet there was a flash of pain in her eyes, and he half expected her to demand, “Whose fault is that?”

And he half expected something else, too. The little gesture that more repercussions of his incautious tongue had initiated, the involuntary, yet graceful raising of her hand to her face, to shadow the slightly crooked bridge of her nose.

But she yielded to neither. She didn’t even say, “Touché.”

“I don’t think I care to discuss these matters any further, Wilson. I came here to enjoy a pleasant weekend in the country, and I’d be grateful if you’d kindly leave me alone now to do just that.”

No!

Irrationally, no, no, no! He couldn’t leave. Not with fire in Adela’s eyes and her blood up. Despite what she said and what he knew she felt, he’d never lusted for her harder than he did right now.

“Ah, but this is my pleasant weekend, too, Della. Can’t you enjoy your explorations while I’m here? This room interests me. And it must interest you, too, or you wouldn’t have employed the skills I taught you in order to gain entrance.”

He wasn’t lying when he said the room interested him. Under normal circumstances, he’d have been nose deep in one of the many, many choice volumes by now. But it was Adela he wanted to explore. After weeks of feeling sorry for himself, his cousin’s delicate flower scent and her determination to spar fired him up, too. Good Lord, he even felt cheerful. His libido surged when she nibbled her soft lower lip again, as if the sound of her pet name, and his discovery of her breaking and entering rendered her vulnerable.

Yet her head was up and her voice was smooth. “I’ll leave you to your studies and return later. You can be the one to explain how you gained entry without a key.” Abandoning the forgotten praxinoscope, she swept past him, reaching for her leather binder where it lay on the desk.

With barely a conscious thought, Wilson grabbed for her shoulder as she moved by, his every instinct commanding that she stay. They hadn’t seen each other in six months or so...and even then, when they’d flayed each other with insults, his blood had sung. More than that, it had been seven years since their fateful, carnal afternoon together. But he realized now he’d never forgotten a single second of it. While diverted by others, his memories of Adela had been haphazardly contained in one of his mental boxes, where he stored thoughts and notions for later review, or otherwise. But even during his bouts of exotic and protracted lovemaking with Coraline that box had still been there, radiant with golden, stolen moments once spent by a river with his distant cousin, its perturbations inchoate, but nagging.

Wilson held his breath. She had to stay, but she was struggling, shaking her arm wildly and jerking away from his grip. She even slapped him—hard—around the back and neck with her blessed leather portfolio.

You always were deliciously physical, cousin.

“Let me go, you insufferable oaf. Don’t paw me.” It was a low, controlled threat, not the squeal of a vexed miss. Resentment dripped from it. “You made it perfectly plain last time we conversed what you think of me, Wilson, and my family. Useless, you said, just sitting around waiting to be supported by a man or an inherited fortune, and myself, personally, neither accomplished nor beautiful enough to be worthy of either. Just as much a parasite as my mother.”

“I didn’t say that!”

Liar. Why was he denying his own bad behavior? He’d certainly implied she was no better than her mother, and just now, he’d attacked her with cutting words again. What was wrong with him? He couldn’t even blame Coraline this afternoon, because his former mistress was so faint to him now he could barely picture her.

What would it be like to go back and expunge his thoughtlessness? To be a different man? A man free to take Adela’s graceful body in his arms and gently comfort her. To kiss her and touch her... Maybe there was even some convenient river or brook nearby? A soft mossy bank where they could lie down and—

A sharp elbow gouging his ribs dissolved his wayward memories and urges. His grip loosened, and Adela raced for the door, clutching her leather folder while Wilson rubbed quickly at his rib cage, astonished at how viciously she’d jabbed him.

But he didn’t box and run and practice a little-known Oriental fighting art for nothing. He had reflexes like a panther, and he shot across the room after his cousin, catching her at the door. He grabbed her again in a light hold that wouldn’t hurt, but wouldn’t yield, either. Why didn’t he have the words to make her stay, without resorting to manhandling?

“Don’t go, Della. I know our last meeting was somewhat disastrous, and I shouldn’t have been so harsh....” He watched her face. Was she mellowing? “But let’s put that behind us, shall we? And start again... Perhaps we can investigate this ingenious toy of yours?” He nodded at the praxinoscope. “And then perhaps select a few exciting volumes from this hoard together? It seems a shame not to, now we’re here.”

She was relenting. He was sure of it. Indecipherable emotions flickered in her gleaming eyes.

Adela’s looks didn’t conform to fashionable standards of beauty, and he was only too aware that, though she wouldn’t admit it, certain imperfections troubled her. The slight crook in her nose troubled him, too, though not because it was unattractive. To him, it was piquant, almost provocative. It was only the little kink’s provenance that irked his soul.

His fault. He couldn’t be blamed for her chicken pox scars, though, even if Adela would probably have liked to pin them on him, too. The little pink marks were like a dusting of stars scattered across the apples of her cheeks that only accentuated the otherwise porcelain perfection of her skin.

But what female ever saw her flaws as assets? Adela was intelligent and pragmatic, but even the most sensible woman had vanity.

Her next words only confirmed that. “Well, if you’d stop gaping at my bent nose and my pockmarks, I might consider staying. But I’m not one of your scientific studies, you know.”

“I’m not staring.” More lies. He was staring. “It’s just that it’s, um, very pleasant to see you.”

Good Lord, I sound like a gauche youth faced with his first woman.