A Night to Surrender by Tessa Dare Page A

plain. Bram tilted his head. From his view these treasures looked to be . . . lumps of earth. That would explain the general bemusement.
    “What on earth is that girl doing?” Colin murmured around his third bite of seedcake. “She seems to be giving a lecture on dirt.”
    “That’s Minerva Highwood.” That blade-sharp tone again. “She’s a geologist.”
    Colin made an amused sound. “Explains the six inches of mud at her hem.”
    “She’s here for the summer with her mother and two sisters, Miss Diana and Miss Charlotte.” Miss Finch indicated a group of fair-haired women at a nearby table.
    “Well, well,” Colin murmured. “Now they are interesting.”
    Another young lady rose to take her turn at the pianoforte. Colin drifted away from the table, taking the newly vacated seat—which just happened to be near Diana Highwood.
    “What’s he doing?” Miss Finch said. “Miss Highwood is convalescing. Surely your cousin doesn’t mean to pursue—” She began to rise from her chair.
    There she went, protecting again. He stayed her with a hand. “Never mind him. I’ll manage my cousin. We’re talking now. You and me.”
    As she sank back into her chair, he kicked the chair leg, turning it so that she’d be forced to face him. She glanced at his hand where he touched her gloved wrist. Just to vex them both, he kept it there. Satin heated beneath his fingertips. The row of buttons tempted.
    Hell, everything about her tempted.
    With effort, he let her go. “Let me be certain I understand you, Miss Finch. You’ve amassed a colony of unwed women, then driven away or gelded every red-blooded male in Spindle Cove. And yet you feel no deprivation.”
    “None whatsoever. In fact, I believe our situation to be ideal.”
    “You do realize, that sounds very . . .”
    She tilted her head in empathy. “Threatening? I do understand how a man could perceive it that way.”
    “I was going to say, Sapphic.”
    Those lush, currant-stained lips parted in surprise.
    Good. He was beginning to wonder what it would take to get under her skin. And by tugging that chain of inquiry, he was dredging up far too many images of her skin. The softness of it, the heat . . . those delectable freckles, sprinkled like spice.
    “Have I shocked you, Miss Finch?”
    “I must own, you have. Not with your insinuations of romantic love between women, mind. But I would never have supposed you to be so versed in ancient Greek poetry. That is a shock indeed.”
    “I’ll have you know, I attended Cambridge for three terms.”
    “Truly?” She stared at him in mock astonishment. “Three whole terms? Now that is impressive.” Her voice was a low, seductive drawl that raised every last hair on his forearm.
    At some point in this conversation, she’d ceased arguing with him and begun flirting with him. He doubted she even realized it—any more than she’d realized the danger yesterday, when her tattered frock had been one angry huff away from exposing her pale, supple breast. She lacked the experience to grasp the subtle distinction between antagonism and getting on very well indeed.
    So Bram went perfectly still and held her gaze. Stared deeply, directly into her eyes until he made her aware of it, too—this scorching-hot cinder of attraction they juggled back and forth between them.
    The air went warm with her effort not to breathe, and her gaze dipped—ever so briefly—to his mouth. The fleeting ghost of a kiss.
    Oh yes, he told her with a subtle lift of his brow . That’s what we’re doing here.
    She swallowed hard. But she didn’t turn away.
    Damn, they could be so good together. Just staring into her eyes, he saw it all. Those iris-hued irises held wit and passion, and . . . depths. Intriguing depths he very much wished to explore. A man could talk to a woman like this all night. At intervals, of course. There would need to be lengthy stretches of gasping and moaning, too.
    She’s Sir Lewis Finch’s daughter , his