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must be grasped, seized, before it was too late.
“Contrary to what you may think of me, Your Grace, I am not one of your London trollops!” Anna snapped as she turned her back on him, obviously waiting for him to refasten her gown.
Rufus frowned as he slowly refastened the tiny buttons. “I would never think that of you…”
“Nor,” she continued firmly as she stepped away from him, “am I a country bumpkin, who would feel so flattered and grateful for the attentions of a duke, that she would simply throw herself down and worship at your feet.”
This was why he wanted her, Rufus acknowledged ruefully. Because Anna, and damn it she would be his Anna, had shown him again this evening that she was not in the least in awe of him or his title. Instead she had treated him as if he were just the wicked gentleman she had met in the woods six days ago.
Rufus could not hold back a smile. “I believe I had in mind another part of my anatomy entirely which you might go down upon your knees and worship.”
She drew in an indignant breath, even as her gaze moved to the front of his black pantaloons, where the evidence of his arousal was unmistakeable.
Her mouth firmed as she glared at him. “You, sir, are a cad. A lecher. A despoiler of innocents— I fail to see what is so amusing!” she snapped as he began to laugh.
“Ye gods, Anna,” Rufus continued to chuckle. “I cannot wait to take you to London and introduce you to my friends, and most especially to my cousin Zachary!” He had no doubts that his cousin, of all the Dangerous Dukes, would understand exactly why and how this young woman had burrowed so deeply beneath Rufus’s skin in so short a time.
Anna was a prize beyond any jewels, or any amount of money, was beyond freedom, beyond anything that Rufus had previously so highly valued in his life.
“What are you suggesting?” Anna looked at him in alarm. “That you would like to take me to London with you when you leave so that the two of you might share me in your bed?”
“Absolutely not,” Rufus’s humour faded as quickly as it had arisen, his expression grim as he stepped forward determinedly before once again placing his fingers beneath her chin and tilting her face up towards his, his lids narrowed in warning. “You will never be with any other man, Anna. No other man will ever be allowed to see your nakedness but me. Do you understand me?”
No, Anna did not understand him at all. She knew she had been playing with fire when she had thought him merely a gentleman passing through the area the day they met in the woods. She had behaved even more recklessly this evening, when her longings had allowed him to make love to her so pleasurably.
But this man, the arrogant words of this duke, were surely beyond her comprehension.
Except he seemed to be suggesting he would happily take her back to London with him when he went. As his mistress?
And perhaps she deserved such disrespect from him. Perhaps her shameful actions this evening had led him to assume, to believe, that she would accept such a role in his life.
“I understand you perfectly,” she nodded abruptly.
Rufus looked down at her searchingly. “Do you?”
“Oh yes,” Anna acknowledged dully. “I do not believe I will wait for your carriage to take me home. It is a warm and sunny evening, and I would prefer to walk.”
“Anna—”
“Please do not say anything more to me this evening, Rufus.”
Tears stung her eyes as she looked at him pleadingly. “I could not bear it.”
Rufus frowned as he saw how deeply upset Anna was. No doubt because of their lovemaking earlier; he should not have allowed things to go as far as they had. Except he could not regret having touched and caressed her, having made love to her. Or deny the need he felt to caress and make love to her again as soon as was possible.
But not like this. Not with these misunderstandings standing between them.
He nodded abrupt acceptance of her decision to leave. “You will return to the parsonage in my carriage, as I assured your brother that you would.” He rang for Watkins. “I will only agree not to accompany you,” he continued as she seemed about to protest yet again, “on the condition you agree to meet me at two of the clock tomorrow afternoon at our pond—”
“No.”
“Yes, Anna.” Rufus knew that his own eyes must be as fiercely determined as her own.
He may not have wanted to become a duke, but there was no denying he was one, and in this particular instance, he intended to behave like one.
“Be there at two of the clock, Anna, unless you wish for your brother to know the extent of our friendship,” Rufus’s tone was soft, but nevertheless brooked no further argument.
Watkins knocked quietly on the door before entering the room. Rufus issued his instructions for the carriage, and waited for the other man to leave before turning back to Anna.
She frowned. “You would not really do that?”
No, of course Rufus would not do that, but he was determined that Anna would meet with him tomorrow. “Do not press me, Anna,” he advised gently.
She looked at him searchingly for several long seconds before her lashes lowered and she gave a slight nod of acceptance. “Very well. I will meet you at two o’clock tomorrow afternoon.”
“At our pond,” he pressed.
“At the pond,” she corrected purposefully.
Rufus stood at the window and watched a few minutes later as Anna hurried down the front steps of the house before stepping quickly up into his carriage.
As if the Hounds of Hell were at her heels.
Or the man who was determined to have her for his own.
The challenging expression on Anna’s face when the two of them met at the pond the following day was not at all encouraging to Rufus in regard to his hopes of a successful outcome to the conversation to come.
He felt a clenching in his chest at how distant Anna seemed to him today, not in proximity, but in every other way that mattered. She looked beautiful of course, ethereally so, in a cream gown with her curls pure gold beneath the sun’s rays. But her eyes were a dark and wary blue in the pallor of her face as she looked up at him, her mouth unsmiling.
She set her chin stubbornly. “Could we please get this conversation over with as quickly as possible?” her voice was brittle, as breakable as she appeared to be. “I have visits to make in the village this afternoon on my brother’s behalf.”
Rufus eyed her quizzically. “Why are you lying to me again, Anna?”
Colour suffused her cheeks. “I am not.”
“Yes, I am afraid you are,” Rufus rebuked gently as he crossed the short distance between them to stand directly in front of her. “My conversation this morning with your brother would have ensured he did not send you off on errands today.”
“You have spoken to Mark?” she gasped, the colour once again draining from her cheeks. “But…I did not see you at the parsonage.”
“We met at the church.”
“Why?” Anna gave a pained groan. “What did you say to him? Did you complain of my behaviour yesterday evening? Tell him of my wantonness?” Tears stung her eyes at thoughts of that humiliation.
The same tears that had been falling down Anna’s cheeks for all of the night and most of this morning. Tears of humiliation