Grey's Lady by Natasha Blackthorne

the stocking up in several jerks. “Certainly not.” Her pale brows drew together and she glanced up. “And, just to be clear, your life when apart from me is no more my affair than mine is yours.”
    “I see. All civilised and sophisticated.” God, he sounded like a jackass.
    As if a mask had fallen away, her eyes were stricken. “I have a duty to my family. Why won’t you understand? I cannot up and follow you about as your leman. And our association must remain private.”
    “Why must it, Beth? So your other lovers won’t know?”
    “You refuse to understand.” Her voice trembled and she closed her eyes, gripping the bed’s edge. “If you truly cared for me, you wouldn’t press me.”
    The uncertainty was intolerable. He would allow this slip of a young woman to manipulate him not one moment more. “Enough! If you won’t commit to me, then—”
    Her eyes widened and her mouth fell open. “ Commit? ” Crimson colour highlighted her cheekbones. “You demand I commit to you . But you offer nothing of yourself in return. Nothing real.”
    Nothing real? He had offered her a fortune in return for the pleasure of her company and her fidelity. “Beth, you must commit.”
    Her eyes flew open. “Else what?” she snapped.
    “We shall be at an end.”
     Her face froze into a mask of resistance. A nauseating cold in his belly warned him to say something—anything—to repair the moment. But pride pushed the impulse down.
    “Then so be it, sir,” she said. The finality of her tone reverberated in his chest with the force of a pistol’s recoil.
     

Chapter Eight
     
     
     
    “Good day, Mr Sexton.” Charlie’s cheerful voice rang out from the other side of the counter.
    Beth’s pencil froze. She jerked her head up from the row of figures she’d been calculating.
    A beam of sunlight cast the hard angles and planes of his face into stark relief, electrifying the blue lights in his coal-black hair. Her heart failed on its next beat. He was even more handsome than in the dreams that had haunted her every night in the two weeks since the awful day when he had put his need for control above his affection for her. Her throat burnt and she swallowed hard, resting the urge to run for the back room, where she could burst into tears.
    It wasn’t fair of him to be here. It was cruel.
    “Mr Sexton, we specialise in working men’s footwear. I suggest a man of your obvious means ought to take his business elsewhere,” she said.
    “I am not here for boots.” He turned to Charlie. “I am here to speak with you, Mr McConnell.”
    Charlie blinked. “Uh…yes, what can I do for you, Mr Sexton?”
    “I beg permission to court your sister.”
    Beth’s breath froze. Charlie hooked his fingers into his apron straps, glancing sideways at her, catching her eye and twittering his fingers on the stained leather. “Goodness, Elizabeth, what do you say to that?”
    His voice was strained and he had gone pale with what must be shock. She half expected him to faint.
    “I think I’d like to hear more of what Mr Sexton has to say,” she replied.
    Grey turned back to her, his silver eyes gleaming with some emotion she couldn’t decipher. “Will you walk with me, Miss McConnell?”
     
    * * * *
     
    Outside, the sunshine was glaring. Seeking refuge in the shade of the shop, she leaned against the red-brick wall.
    He took her hand and that ever-present sensual awareness crackled between them.
    “Once I left Philadelphia, I didn’t spend one single moment at peace with myself.” He brought her hand to his lips, his eyes burning into hers with emotion as he kissed it. “I acted like an ass. I hurt you, and I am sorry.”
    She stared at him, stunned. She would never have dreamt this arrogant, patrician man would apologise to anyone, least of all the soiled dove he’d shared hours of illicit passion with.
    “I admit I have been difficult as well. I owe you an apology in kind,” she said, just to play fair.
    He turned her