A Dangerous Love

“I am hardly naive,” Ariella said.

“I did not ask for this,” he continued roughly. “I did not ask for a beautiful fairy-tale princess to appear in my life, offering me a temptation I can barely refuse. You are a noblewoman, an heiress. You will clearly wed some English Prince Charming one day—and he will take your innocence in an ivory tower. Go home, Miss de Warenne, where you belong.” He turned to go.

She was finally angry and she seized his arm. She wasn’t strong enough to detain him, but he faced her, his eyes as cold and turbulent as a winter storm. “If I refuse to judge you, why do you insist on judging me? You know nothing about me. I am not like other women of my class and age, desperate for a proper husband and home, and while it might appear I am like those ladies who wish for your attentions, I am not like them, either. I did not seek you out for a love affair!”

“No, but you did seek me out.” He folded his arms across his chest. “Let us cut to the chase. What do you want from me, Miss de Warenne?”

She inhaled. Although she instantly recalled his torrid kisses and his shockingly sensual touch, she did not hesitate. “I want to be friends.”

He laughed. “Impossible.”

“Why? Why is it impossible? I know you are leaving tomorrow, but we can exchange letters. We could even meet a few times before you leave Derbyshire.”

He choked. “Exchange letters? Meet?” He looked at her as if she were mad.

“I am interested in getting to know you, and letters are the perfect way to further our acquaintance. As for meeting, why is that suggestion so shocking? Surely you like to converse.”

“You wish to meet and converse?”

“That is what friends do.” She smiled at him. She thought her plan a capital one.

“We are not friends,” he said harshly. “I have no friends— nor do I want any!”

She was in disbelief. “Everyone has friends.”

“You do not want friendship and we both know it.” He pointed at her. His hand shook. “You are a de Warenne heiress! Your friends are tony!”

“I have all kinds of eccentric friends in town!”

“When I demanded you cut to the chase, I was merely curious as to how you would respond—and with how much subterfuge. I know why you came to the camp tonight. You sought me out for passion, Miss de Warenne, not friendship. I caught your interest and you wished to be in my arms, although not my bed. You wish to exchange letters? You wish to converse? I think not. In fact, I don’t think you very different from my gadji lovers. The difference is you only want safe kisses.” His eyes blazed. “And the kind of pleasure I so recently gave you.”

Ariella stared, taken aback, but not by his candor. He was partly right—after what had just happened, how could she not yearn to be in his arms? But why didn’t he believe that she was interested in friendship, too? She was eager to know what he thought of the world!

“I have been a sexual object for the ladies of the ton, and now, I am an object of sexual fascination for a virgin princess.” He seemed disgusted.

Ariella wasn’t quite sure what his statement meant, precisely, but she would think about it later. “I can’t possibly forget our kiss,” she said slowly. “How could I? I had no idea a kiss could be so wonderful. But I do want to be friends, Emilian. I always say what I mean. I have many unusual friends in town. If you truly have no friends—and I pray you are dissembling—then I will be the first.”

“What the hell did you mean, that you had no idea a kiss could be so wonderful?” he demanded. “I do hope you are not going to tell me that was your first kiss.”

“Why would that distress you?”

His eyes widened impossibly. “No one has ever kissed you before?”

“No, no one ever has. You gave me my first kiss. And I have no regrets—not a single one,” she cried, flushing.

He snarled, “Then I have enough regrets for the two of us.”

She inhaled. “You don’t mean that!”

“Go home and wait for Prince Charming. And stay there—with your unusual friends.”

He was rejecting her offer of friendship. Ariella was in disbelief. “But you are leaving in the morning! We can’t part this way.”

“Why not?”

She wet her lips, her heart thundering. “It isn’t right,” she floundered. “We just shared passion, Emilian.”

“We shared a simple kiss, one you will soon forget.”

She shook her head. “No. I won’t forget it. Please consider an exchange of letters!” she cried.

“Just go,” he roared.

She flinched but couldn’t tell her feet to move. How could this be happening?

He turned furiously, strode down the hill, and did not look back a single time.

AS IF A SPIDER caught in her web, he was drawn back to the bottom of the hill. He stared up at the house.

The sun had risen over an hour ago, but the camp was hardly stirring, due to the celebration the night before. He had not slept. He had not even thought to try. Emilian stared up at the de Warenne mansion. He did not want to lust after Ariella de Warenne, especially not now. He did not quite trust himself with his lust. There was too much rage.

He whirled and started back to the camp. He hoped to never encounter her again. Mariko could take care of his needs, as could a dozen well-bred Derbyshire wives. He had meant his every word. That morning had been goodbye. There would not be an exchange of letters or a flurry of meetings. He hadn’t asked for a woman like that to appear in his life, especially not now, when he was grieving and enraged.

She was the kind of young lady that no one had ever presented to him—and no one ever would—because of his tainted blood. She was beautiful, wealthy, well-bred and undoubtedly accomplished. She was even, somehow, innocent, in spite of her passionate nature—and her nature was passionate, he had uncovered that. He was deemed worthy of the fat, the aged, the infirm, the ugly—those rejected by everyone else. A lady like Miss de Warenne would never be presented to a man who had Gypsy blood running in his veins, no matter his wealth, his title. One day, Miss de Warenne would be presented to a genuine Englishman, one as blue-blooded and properly English as she. Her suitor would take one look at her and be smitten. Any sane man would instantly conclude that the beautiful and genteel Miss de Warenne would make the perfect wife.

No other man had ever kissed her before.

It was unbelievable.

He had given her pleasure for the first time. Too well, he recalled her cries. Even now, his skin was abraded from her nails and teeth.

He had wanted her attentions when he had first seen her, in spite of the fact that he had surmised she wasn’t married. He never chased unmarried women, but she was beautiful, English and above him. Perhaps because of her father, he had deliberately looked at her with sexual interest. He hadn’t been surprised when she had come to him last night. She could claim that she had drifted to their camp to hear the music, but she had come because of him. But he had assumed she was a woman of experience, a woman with lovers.

Young unwed ladies were meant to lounge in the drawing rooms of their mansions, sipping tea in the latest London fashions, awaiting their callers and suitors. She claimed she was different. Obviously, she was clinging to propriety, and he wondered if she would manage to continue to do so until her wedding night. Suddenly he hated the idea of an Englishman being the one to fully show her passion.

He could have had her; why hadn’t he taken her?

Because he was more English than Rom. As a gentleman, he had a strong sense of honor. The English valued innocence, the Roma did not. He had never dallied with a virgin, not even during his traipse with the Romany across Scotland eight years ago. It was not just because he preferred experienced women in his bed. The Englishman he had become, the man who was Woodland’s viscount and Edmund’s son, could not take or destroy a woman’s innocence. It was that simple.

Just then, he did not feel particularly English.

And he hadn’t felt English at all last night.

He had reached the outermost wagons. A baby was crying; it might have been his newborn cousin. His head was pounding so badly he thought it might split in two. His body was pulsing as terribly, a combination of desire and rage. He wasn’t even certain that he wanted to be English anymore. He only knew that he wanted to avenge Raiza, and, if he was brutally honest, a part of him was now regretting not taking the gadji princess to his bed.

But he kept thinking about her wide blue eyes, not her face or her body. Her eyes disturbed him, because she had looked into his as if she might find some ancient truth about him there.

He shook himself free of the fanciful notion. She claimed she wanted to be his friend. He laughed out loud.