The Rake's Arranged Marriage by Ruth Regan

Eliot's face was all seriousness now. In a single quick motion, he performed a quarter turn and backed her up against the wall of the corridor. The thrill settled in the secret place between her legs and she had to bite her lip to keep herself from emitting the sharp, excited cry that threatened. His face was very close to hers now and she was sure that he would kiss her again in the next second. But he didn't. He only looked at her with those piercing blue eyes of his that had been so merry just moments before. There was a hunger in them now – an urgency.
    "You're a wild little creature, aren't you?" he asked.
    Cara said nothing – only swallowed hard, waiting for Eliot to elaborate. But he didn't. He inclined his head and brought his nose very near the column of her neck and inhaled. It was a strange gesture, thoroughly intimate. She knew he was sampling her, in a way. He was taking in the smell of the light sweat that had broken in her hairline during their run through the halls...the scent of her skin and probably the soap she had used this morning during her toilette. She held her breath, wanting badly to feel his lips on her once more. She yearned to feel his body pressed up against hers, to feel that sweet, full-to-bursting sensation she'd experienced in the gallery just moments before...
    "I must admit," Lord Eliot murmured, "it's very hard for me to believe that Lord Boyle didn't pluck you on the one night you spent together."
    The statement landed on her ears with a vulgar thud. Her eyebrows contracted sharply into an upside down V of distaste.
    "What?" she said disbelievingly.
    "I said, I can't believe that Lord Boyle didn't rush you from the altar straight into the bedroom, as fast as he could." He was smiling rakishly. Devilishly.
    Without thinking, she put both hands on his chest and tried to push him away. Suddenly, she was feeling very claustrophobic indeed.
    "Do not speak of the night of my marriage to Lord Boyle again," she bit out. The excitement in her breast had turned to a tight knot of pain. What had happened? She'd been so... happy . For the first time in ages, she’d been happy. And then, there was the sudden wolfish shift in Lord Eliot and worse, the reminder of her miserable, brief marriage to Lord Boyle. It had stolen all the delight from the day and cast a gray pall over everything.
    "Come, now, I didn't mean to upset you," Lord Eliot said, stepping back a pace or two. If Cara had been able to meet his eyes, she would have seen that all the licentiousness had disappeared from them and that a truly solicitous look had replaced it. "It was only in jest."
    "Some things do not bear jesting, Lord Eliot." She fought to keep the emotion at bay. She was astounded – and ashamed – to feel tears pricking at her eyes. Since meeting Quentin Eliot, she'd been prone to an awful lot of weeping. It was a fact she couldn't help but notice now.
    Until this moment, she had almost completely successfully buried the memories of that terrible night. Whenever she spoke of her late husband – as she had on that first day at Hedgeton, at the party – it was always with the sour bite of irony. It was a type of irony that allowed her distance from the truth of what had happened. It was a truth that she hadn't even admitted to her papa.
    But something about this moment, this day... She'd let her guard down to Eliot. She'd allowed herself to experience pleasure in his company and at his touch. She'd made herself vulnerable to him, and he'd taken the unexpected sweetness of all of that and turned it sour in an instant by bringing up Lord Boyle with his crass comment.
    Cara put the steel back in her spine – not without trouble, though. Her cheeks were still flushed and her hair had come partially undone. She patted it down and brushed off her frock, trying to get hold of herself. She was striving for some detachment, for some hardness.
    Lord Eliot watched all of this with great interest and no small amount of