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Even if she wanted him so badly that she could hardly think of anything else.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Damn Scarlett Clarke and his ridiculous attraction to her.Clink.

Damn Ethan and his nosy arse.Clink.

And damn his mother for thinking that a ball was just the thing the estate needed to “breathe new life” into it and “banish old ghosts.”

Clink. Clink. Clink.

Hudson owed his mother a great deal, but he could not give her what she wanted. Not when it would mean the suffering of another poor soul, dragged into the Wolverton curse.

He sighed, his grasp on his chisel and mallet tensing into fists. He had promised himself that he would never lose control again. All of that had been swept away the moment Lady Southford burst through his door with her duplicitous daughter in tow.

But even though he had been the target of her perfidy, he could not help the twinge of pride at the boldness it took to lie to everyone abouthim.

And that kiss.

He growled as his cock hardened at the mere memory of it. The glorious feeling of her softness pressed against him. The insistent, almost impatient, little mewls that sent lust roaring through his veins.

That kiss should have set off alarm bells in his head. Instead, all he could think of was dragging her under him and making her moan.

Hudson would like to hear his name on her lips this time.

“Damn it,” he muttered hoarsely. She was going to be the death of him.

Or he was going to be her ruination.

Or it could be both.

But bloody hell, he could not think of a better way to go, and that was how he knew that he was truly done for.

“Ow! Of all the?—”

His head snapped up when he heard the string of softly muttered curses that followed, right before a figure stumbled in. A cloud of red atop billowing white and the unmistakable, heady concoction of soft floral and warm woman.

Oh, hell no.

“What the hell are you doing here?” he roared.

Scarlett frowned at him. “Well, good evening to you, too, Your Grace.”

Good evening? Had she lost her mind?

He fixed her with his fiercest glare. “I thought I told you to stay away from this tower.”

The maddening creature merely jutted her chin in defiance. “And I thought we have already established the fact that I do not take well to orders.”

He was going to firmly establish her away from him. Preferably away from Wolverton Estate. With double locks.

“You are not supposed to be here,” he gritted out.

But that sailed right over her head as she peered over at the hunk of marble. “You have not made much progress, for all that you spend countless hours working at it.” She tilted her headand cast him a doubtful glance over her shoulder. “You must be quite the perfectionist, chipping at it in minute increments. Tell me, Your Grace, how long would it truly take you to complete a sculpture?”

“Far sooner if you did not keep disturbing my peace,” he retorted.

The censorious look she gave him told him she did not believe one word. Not that it mattered—she needed to get out of his tower, and she needed to do it about five minutes ago.