Dancing With the Devil by Laura Drewry Page A

her neck pulsed harder, faster. Had it really been eight months since he’d kissed that spot? Sometimes, when he thought about the time he’d spent with her, it seemed like only yesterday. Other times, like now, when he itched to kiss that spot again, it seemed like a lifetime ago.
    With a sigh, he set her free, but she didn’t move away as he’d expected. Instead, she stood there, toe to toe with him and looking up at him with eyes that simultaneously blazed blistering fury and ice-cold fear.
    It was nearly impossible to think straight when shewas within his reach, and if she knew what was good for her, she’d hightail it out of that room and not look back.
    Deacon fisted his hands together behind his back. “Like it or not, you made me your husband, and here I am—at least for the time being.”
    “You could leave again.”
    If he were capable of human emotions, those four little words could have wounded him deeply. Luckily, it was more of a sharp, painful nick than an all-out wound.
    “I’m not going anywhere.”
    “Why?” she cried, slumping down on the edge of the bed. With a quick glance at the open window, she lowered her voice. “Why can’t you just leave? It’s not as though you’ve never done it before.”
    “Two reasons,” he said. “The first seems obvious.”
    By the way she arched her eyebrows, it must not have been obvious to her.
    “What would it do to the remnants of your reputation if I were to leave you now? Or worse, divorce you?”
    “We can’t get divorced,” she answered weakly. “We’re not really married.”
    “They don’t know that.” He jabbed his thumb toward the window. “As it stands now, the only things affording you any respect in this town are your parents’ store and your apparent marriage to me.”
    “It’s my store,” she snapped. “I’m the one who keeps it running.”
    “Of course,” he said. “But no good Christian in this town would ever do business with a divorced woman, would they?”
    Hesitantly, Rhea finally shook her head.
    “And before you even suggest the idea that I ‘die’ again,” he said, “think about how it would look if your darling husband died twice—both times quite unexpectedly. Surely someone would suspect the merry widow ofmisdoings, and we certainly don’t want them investigating you or the details of our marriage, do we?”
    “No.” She sighed, toed the floor and shrugged. “What’s the second reason?”
    “Beg your pardon?”
    “You said there were two reasons you couldn’t leave.”
    “Right.” He crossed his arms over his chest and widened his stance. “I don’t want to.”
    Who knew telling the truth could be so easy?
    Rhea shot off the bed, her voice a barely controlled yell. “You don’t want to?”
    “Correct.”
    “I don’t give a flying fig what you want,” she fumed, pushing him in the chest again. This time he didn’t move. “I certainly didn’t want the devil’s son to come into my life, but you did. I didn’t want you to”—she ground her teeth together—“touch me or seduce me, but you did. And I didn’t want you to humiliate me and then leave without so much as an apology or…or a goodbye, but you did !”
    By the time she’d finished, the fury in her voice had cracked, changed. It was a feeling he knew all too well.
    Sorrow.
    “Yes,” he admitted. “I did come into your life uninvited. And I did take advantage of you to a certain degree, but you can’t stand there and tell me you didn’t want it as much as I did.”
    “I…but…” Even in her anger, she was the most adorable creature he’d ever seen. “You still humiliated me.”
    “Yes, I did. And it’s something I’ll regret for the rest of eternity.” He couldn’t help smiling at the irony of it all. There he was, telling her the truth, and she didn’t believe a word of it.
    She dropped her hand and moved away from him, but he pulled her back. Turning her face to his, he fingered loose hair back from her face