Page 47 of How to Love a Duke in Ten Days

“Two or three, if possible. Just to make certain that devious bitch never becomes a duchess.”

Alexandra frowned. “Seems like a rather spiteful reason to sire a child.”

“Spite is the only reason I have left.” He sent a heart-stopping glance toward his mother’s chamber door. Alexandra only breathed again when she verified that it remained closed and the shadows still. “My legacy has been built on spite and violence. Why not honor my savage Viking lineage, as well?”

The spark of an idea began to itch at Alexandra’s mind. One that both enticed and terrified her.

“Did you kill him?” she asked.

“No, if he wants such a faithless woman as Rose, he can have her.”

It took her a foggy moment to realize he’d mistaken her meaning. “I meant the jaguar, not your cousin. After you recovered, did you hunt him?”

A muscle bunched next to his jaw. “Oh, yes. It took me a deuced eternity to find him. But find him, I did.”

“Did you kill him?” she repeated, feeling as though a cataclysmic decision hung upon his answer.

“No.” He answered upon a long sigh. “I had him in my sights. Up in a tree. He was thin and mangy; due to his wound, he’d probably not been able to hunt for a while. But he’d blood on his mouth from a fresh kill and recent meal. We stared at each other for ages. Neither of us moving. My finger lingered over the trigger.” He caressed an imaginary gun as he stared out to the sea. Alexandra imagined he was not here in Devonshire at all, but back in that jungle in Peru. He blinked and the spell was broken.

“I found I’d lost all taste for the hunt. I no longer wanted to pit myself against predators. Not of the animal variety, anyhow.”

“You let him live,” she marveled.

“And he let me leave. I suspect we’d both had enough of the entire business.”

“That wasn’t spiteful, it was compassionate,” she said, her decision made. “And he was the one who condemned you to be the Terror of Torcliff.”

He turned to her, looming closer. Larger. “Don’t,” he whispered.

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t try to make me a good man.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it, Your Grace.” When she should have retreated, she didn’t. Instead, she finished her whisky as well, enjoying the warm languor spreading from her middle to her blood.

“Good.” He became very still, watching as she licked the last of the honeyed liquor from her lips. The cool of the night suddenly disappeared, the air turned heavy with salt, and moisture, and… something more illicit. Possibly dangerous. “Have you ever really been kissed, Alexandra Lane?”

She blinked. And froze. However, the usual paralyzing terror that would have cinched around her bones at such a predicament… didn’t. Fear was more of a faint shimmer through veins made sluggish with whisky.

It was accompanied by another, more curious emotion. Not excitement, but something adjacent to it.

Why did he want to know? What did he hope her answer would be? Indeed, what should she say?

The truth, of course. A lie would not serve her here, and besides, she’d too many of those on her conscience to bother with a flippant fib in the dark.

“N-no.” She wished her voice were stronger. That she’d had a different, more worldly experience to share. But alas, she’d never allowed a man close enough to kiss her. As far as she was concerned, men had long ago ceased wanting to.

“I thought not,” he murmured, setting his glass next to hers on the banister.

Alexandra forced another swallow. “How—I mean—why thought you not?”

And why was she suddenly speaking nonsense?

A faint hint of arrogance brushed at his lips. “Men like me can just tell.”

Her heart kicked against her lungs, evoking shorter, shallower breaths. “Men like you?”

“Hunters.” The vibration of the word spread down her spine and unfurled in the most alarming places. “Your lips, innocent as they are, beg to be kissed whenever I am near. Your tongue moistens them. Your teeth worry at them. And when I stare, as I am doing now, they soften and part, like an invitation…”