The Wayward One (The De Montforte Brothers Book 5) by Danelle Harmon Page A

more observant than he let on.
    Dear God.
    He said nothing, just stood there looking down at her with a speculative and faintly admiring gleam in his eye that began to unnerve her even more.
    She glared at him, determined not to show fear. “I wish you would leave.”
    “I wish I could.”
    “You have two feet. Why don’t you use them.”
    “Because I also have two eyes that can’t help but drink in yer beauty, Sunshine. Two ears that enjoy the sound of yer voice. Two hands that itch to touch ye just to see if ye’re real or a vision. Two lips that ache to—”
    “Enough!”
    He stepped closer. And pushed his hand—his very strong, scarred and calloused hand—past her jaw and into the fall of thick, pale hair that had long since come loose from its pins, and with his thumb, tilted her chin up so she was forced to meet his eyes.
    She could feel the heat of his large, powerful body, could smell the sea on his clothing, on his skin. The blood froze in her veins. Sometime between last night and now, he’d loosened his hair from its queue and now it hung in disarray to his broad and capable shoulders, unruly, untamed, a fall of thick, riotous black curls that made him look like a pirate. She felt her body responding to him, her mouth going dry, and a fluttery sensation beneath her breastbone. She fought to breathe. He had no business making her feel this way. No business talking to her like this. None at all.
    And then, with his thumb, he pulled down on her lip like a buyer might examine a horse, exposing her pretty white teeth and letting his finger rub wickedly over the sensitive skin of her bottom lip before releasing her.
    Recovery was instantaneous. Nerissa’s hand flashed up to slap his face, the full force of her rage for this latest insult behind her swing. But he had anticipated her reaction and easily caught her wrist.
    Once again, she was reminded how much bigger and stronger he was than she.
    Once again, she had underestimated him.
    Caught helplessly in his unyielding grip, she glared up at him.
    “Stop it,” he said softly, his voice no longer cajoling but full of menace, and she saw the hard crystalline glitter that had come into his eyes and it frightened her. The sheer strength of his fingers dwarfing her wrist frightened her, as he could break the bones there with one savage twist if the fancy took him. The nearness of his mouth frightened her, a mouth that was playful one moment and cynical, hard, and dangerous the next.
    Everything about him frightened her.
    She jerked free of him and backed away, chafing her wrist as though she could rub away the offensiveness of his touch. Her lower lip still tingled where he’d touched it, and she realized all over again how perilous her situation was, trapped here in this small cabin with a man who hated the English, who appeared to hate her, who could ravish and destroy her without a single soul on earth to stop him.
    I will get through this. I will survive. Even now, my brothers will be turning London upside down to find me. He won’t get away with this. My brothers will make him pay. They will kill him, if I don’t find a way to do so myself, first….
    There was a knock on the door.
    “Come on in,” her captor muttered.
    A young man with light ginger hair clubbed at his nape entered. He was dressed in some sort of a blue uniform and carried a wooden tray. On it were two bowls of something gray and ugly and steaming. Another dented coffee pot, two tin mugs and a pair of pewter spoons completed this sad and very un-elegant ensemble.
    Nerissa’s nose wrinkled.
    “Thank ye, Mr. Cranton,” said her captor. “’Twill be all.”
    The young man nodded and quietly left.
    “Sit down and eat,” the Irishman said, pulling out the single chair for her.
    “I am not hungry.” She gave the contents of the tray a baleful look and turned away, her gaze directed on the horizon beyond the stern windows.
    He eyed her for a moment, then sat down in the chair