Minx

Why hadn't she told him?

"Henry!" he bellowed.

Why hadn't she told him?

He sprang to his feet and grabbed his robe. "Henry!"

Why hadn't she told him?

By the time he made it into the hall, Henry was already there, her slender form wrapped in a faded green dressing gown. "Dunford," she said anxiously. "What is wrong?"

"This!" He practically shoved the papers in her face. "This!"

"What? What is this? Dunford, I can't tell what these papers are when you've got them plastered against my face."

"It's Carlyle's will, Miss Barrett," he bit out. "The one naming me your guardian."

She blinked. "And?"

"That makes you my ward."

Henry stared at him as if a portion of his brain had just flown out his ear. "Yes," she said placatingly, "that's usually how it works."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Tell you what?" Henry looked from side to side. "I say, Dunford, do we need to carry on this conversation in the middle of the hall?"

He spun on his heel and stalked into her room. She hurried after him, not at all sure that it was an advisable idea for the two of them to be alone in her bedroom. But the alternative was to have him rail at her in the hall, and that was decidedly unappealing.

He shut the door firmly, then turned on her again. "Why," he asked, his voice laced with barely controlled fury, "didn't you tell me that you were my ward?"

"I thought you knew."

"You thought I knew?"

"Well, why wouldn't you?"

He opened his mouth, then shut it. Hell, the chit had a point. Why didn't he know? "You still should have told me," he muttered.

"I would have if I'd even dreamed you didn't know."

"Oh, God, Henry," he groaned. "Oh, God. This is a disaster."

"Well," she bristled, "I'm not that dreadful."

He shot her an irritated look. "Henry, I kissed you this afternoon. Kissed you. Do you understand what that means?"

She looked at him dubiously. "It means you kissed me?"

He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook. "It means—Christ, Henry, it's practically incestuous."

She caught a lock of her hair between her fingers and began to twirl. The movement was meant to calm her nerves, but her hand was jerky and cold. "I don't know if I would call it incestuous. It certainly isn't that much of a sin. Or at least I don't think so. And since we've both agreed it isn't going to happen again—"

"Curse it, Henry, will you be quiet? I'm trying to think." He raked his hand through his hair.

She drew back, affronted, and clamped her mouth shut.

"Don't you see, Henry? You're now my responsibility." The word fell distastefully from his lips.

"You're too kind," she muttered. "I'm not so bad, you know, as far as responsibilities go."

"That's not the point, Hen. This means...Hell, it means..."He let out a short bark of ironic laughter. Only a few hours earlier he'd been thinking he'd like to take her to London, to introduce her to his friends and show her that there was more to life than Stannage Park. Now it seemed he had to. He was going to have to give her a season and find her a husband. He was going to have to find someone to teach her how to be a lady. He glanced down at her face. She still looked rather irritated with him. Hell, he hoped whoever ladyfied her didn't change her too much. He rather liked her the way she was.

Which brought him to another point. Now, more than ever, it was imperative that he keep his hands off her. She'd be ruined as it was if the ton found out they'd been living unchaperoned here in Cornwall. Dunford took a ragged breath. "What the hell are we going to do?"

The question had obviously been directed at himself, but Henry decided to answer it anyway. "I don't know what you're going to do," she said, hugging her arms to her chest, "but I'm not going to do anything. Anything other, that is, than what I've already been doing. You've already admitted I'm uniquely qualified to oversee Stannage Park."

His expression said that he regarded her as hopelessly naive. "Henry, we both can't stay here."

"Why ever not?"

"It isn't proper." He winced as he said it. Since when had he become such a stickler for propriety?

"Oh, pish and bother propriety. I don't give a whit for it, in case you hadn't—"

"I noticed."

"—noticed. It makes no sense in our case. You own the place, so you shouldn't have to leave, and I run it, so I cannot leave."

"Henry, your reputation..."

That seemed to strike her as uproariously funny. "Oh, Dunford," she gasped, wiping tears from her eyes, "that's rich. That is rich. My reputation."

"What the devil is wrong with your reputation?"

"Oh, Dunford, I haven't got a reputation. Good or bad. I'm so odd, people have enough to talk about without worrying about how I act with men."

"Well, Henry, perhaps it is time you started thinking about your reputation. Or at the very least, acquiring one."

If Henry hadn't been so puzzled by his odd choice of words, she might have noticed the steely undertone to his voice. "Well, the point is moot anyway," she said breezily. "You have been living here for over a week already. If I had been worried about a reputa— that is to say, my reputation, it would be well past destroyed."

"Nonetheless, I will procure rooms at the local inn on the morrow."

"Oh, don't be silly! You didn't give two figs about the impropriety of our living arrangements this past week. Why should you now?"