The Christmas Spirit by Patricia Wynn Page B

hurt if he knew she had lied. And, she found, she did not wish to hurt him.
    Feeling guilty for perhaps the first time in her life, Trudy saw that Matthew's eyes had narrowed, as if the evidence of her crime could be read on her face. She recovered and treated him to her most bewitching glance and was relieved to see him blink.
    Pulling his gaze from her as if by force, Matthew shifted awkwardly on his bench, and Trudy dared to hope that a fleeting thought of ravishment had crossed his mind. Francis had been right when he'd said that Matthew would be a tough nut to crack. Any other man would have done his best to capture her after one of her saucy glances.
    "Are you certain you are quite comfortable?" she probed, perversely determined to get confirmation of her hopes.
    A grin quirked his mouth, but "Quite," was all he said.
    "Tell me," he added, once they had gone a few more blocks, and his mood had become pensive. "Why do I get the feeling that Mr. Waite scarcely knows you?"
    Trudy's heart dove into her stomach again. The vexing man! Did he notice everything?        With a genuine sigh, she tried to explain his suspicions away. "Mr. Waite is a worthy individual in many ways, but I fear my free-thinking manner shocks him. Perhaps you noticed that he seemed almost afraid of me. I fear my independence is quite beyond his experience of females."
    "As it is of mine. Not that I censure you for it. But I cannot help wondering how it came about."
    "Oh, that is quite easy." Her words, when she produced them, had more than a hint of truth. "My parents both died very young." For elves. Though both would have been considered ancient by human standards.
    "And have you no brothers or sisters?"
    Trudy hesitated, but this telling the truth was addicting. "I have one brother, but we do not live together."
    Seeing that some elaboration was needed, she continued, "My brother prefers the country. He is not fond of human company, whereas I--"
    "Whereas, you devote yourself to worthy causes?"
    "Yes."
    "Which suggests that you control your own fortune."
    She searched for the mot juste. "Let us simply say that I have resources under my own governance and may do as I please with them."
    "What does your brother have to say about these activities--calling on strange gentlemen, walking the streets without an escort?"
    Trudy gave an impish shrug, accompanied by a laugh. "I fear he knows very little about them, though he would undoubtedly disapprove. He's very stuffy."
    "Stranger and stranger still. And have you no thought to your own danger?"
    "No." Trudy drew herself up and folded her hands in her lap with a smile of the purest satisfaction. "I am entirely fearless."
    Matthew's brows arched, and he slowly pulled back in his seat as if he did not quite know what to make of such a remark. Trudy feared that she might have given him reason for disgust. She had been carried away by the freedom that comes from telling the truth, but truth was a sticky business, one she had better have more care to.
    "Have I shocked you, Sir Matthew?" Anxiety tightened around her heart. They had made two rounds of the park now, and she feared their ride would soon be over, and she wondered whether he would ever want to see her again. She could always appear to him at night and try to engineer his desires, but she had far rather the idea come from him.
    "No." He relaxed his challenged posture. "I simply have never met a woman quite like you, with the exception, perhaps, of one African princess, the wife of a vizier."
    "Was she beautiful?" Trudy didn't know where the question had come from.
    "Yes. Very beautiful. And intelligent, too, which is much more important. She saved my life more than once with her advice and intervention."
    "Did you love her?"
    "Completely, but not in the way you mean. My feelings were greatly tinged by respect and a healthy dose of fear for the power she wielded."
    "Oh." Trudy sighed, inexplicably relieved. "Then, what you felt, Sir Matthew, was