A Woman Scorned by Liz Carlyle

desperation, praying it was nothing more perilous—such as true attraction. But from the look of him, it would be no great sacrifice to seduce Cole Amherst, save for the fact that it would be another black mark on her soul. But Jonet was long past counting, when she had so much at stake.
    She looked at him again and saw that his eyes were no longer heavy but keen and quietly watchful. It felt as though Amherst could see right through the wall of her charade and into her heart. Could he? Could he even, heaven forbid, sense the inexplicable attraction she felt for him? That capricious piquing of her desire, those shards of sweet memory, which had caught her unaware, then melted through her with a hungry need? Almost absently, Jonet gave herself a little shake. Dear heaven, she often felt alone, but when had she become so pathetically lonely?
    “Lady Mercer?” Amherst’s deep, smoky voice cut into her unease. “Believe it or not, some of us do not live a life of indolence. If I can be of service, might we get on with it?”
    “Get—
get on
with it?” She dropped into her chair.
    He nodded curtly. “Yes, if you please. And if you have no interest in my assistance, I must take myself home now, for I have other plans for the evening.”
    His mood increasingly sullen, Cole studied the woman seated across from him. He was beginning to think that for once in his narrow-minded life, his uncle had been even-handed in his judgement of another human being. Lady Mercer was something of a hellcat. She reminded him of a cat, too; long and sleek, with motions so sinuous they could not possibly have been bestowed by the Divine Creator. Indeed, it was entirely possible that she was the slut James had called her.
    She obviously took pleasure in teasing and tormenting men. Certainly, she was tormenting him. Lady Mercer’s pale, slender hand rested casually upon the arm of her chair, but the rhythmic motion of her fingertips as they caressed the leather, absently rubbing back and forth across the brass studwork, was wildly entrancing. It was a sensual, hypnotic, and very feline motion. Ruthlessly, Cole pulled his eyes from her hand, taking some measure of satisfaction in his ability to do so. Circumspectly, he took in the unrelieved black of her gown, which was plain to the point of severity and provided the perfect foil for her flawless ivory skin. From a single strand of jet beads, a cross hung suspended between breasts that were high and rounded.
    Her hair was dressed in a fashion that perfectly suited her delicate face, yet the arrangement was unfashionably soft and loose, silently inviting a man to slide his fingers through it, to pull out all the pins and let it tumble to her waist. Cole swallowed hard and jerked himself back to reality. For pity’s sake, there was really nothing all that extraordinary about the woman’s hair. Indeed, she was dressed with all propriety. Four months into her widowhood, Lady Mercer’s attire still gave every indication that she deeply mourned the loss of the man who, were the gossips to be believed, had been nothing but an inconvenience.
    Cole found it strange that he now remembered every detail of how she had looked on her wedding day, which had occurred but a few short months before his own. Lady Jonet Cameron she had been at that time. Uncle James had insisted that the entire family be present at the auspicious occasion of the marquis’s second nuptials. Even Cole, a distant relation, had not escaped his uncle’s edict. And so he had reluctantly set aside his research, left his offices in Cambridge, and gone down to London for the festivities, only to spend the better part of the day hanging back from the crowd as best he could. And still, he remembered her.
    At eighteen, Lady Jonet had been little more than a thin, almost frail girl, swathed in expensive wedding finery. Cole recalled with perfect clarity the profound sorrow he had felt for her, a lovely young woman he had not known at all. He