Lisa Plumley by The Honor-Bound Gambler

feeling stung. “About the compliment?”
    “About your ability to bluff. Maybe your poker face only applies to other people, not me. Maybe with me, you can’t help showing how you feel.” Cade nodded. “You’re doing it right now.”
    She was? “No, I’m not.”
    “You are.” Another careful, interested look. “You look as though you feel...excited. Do you, Violet? Do you feel excited?”
    More than she ever had . She could scarcely keep her knees from wobbling, she felt so unendurably curious about why he was there. Had Cade only come to assuage his guilty gambler’s conscience by dropping off a contribution to the church? Or was there another reason the gambler had come there? To see her?
    “I guess it’s probably not smart to tip your hand to a renowned gambler.” Rallying, Violet smiled. “I’ll make more of an effort to be cryptic and unreadable.” She did. “See?”
    “Nice try.” Cade appeared improbably amused by her efforts—and possibly a bit charmed, too...even though that made no sense. “But even when you’re trying, you’re still you, Violet.”
    “Meaning what, exactly? Why are you here, anyway?”
    “Meaning,” Cade clarified as he came a bit nearer, all the way into a patch of October-morning sunlight, “that you’re about as mysterious as an open book on a sunny day. At least to me.”
    She couldn’t help feeling vaguely disappointed. Everyone knew that gentlemen liked pretty ladies who kept them guessing.
    “And I’m here,” Cade added as Violet pondered the devilish impracticality of that, “because I missed looking at your face.”
    She glanced up. “Oh.” That might be a good thing. It might be as good as the way he looked just then, with his dark wavy hair all burnished by sunshine and his eyes bluer than blue.
    “ You can’t stop being open to me, it seems.” Now Cade was close enough to touch her. So he did. He took hold of her elbow, then drew her nearer. “And despite my efforts to stay away—”
    “So you were avoiding me on purpose!”
    “— I can’t stop wanting to be near you.”
    Heaven help her, he looked as though he meant it. His gaze roamed over her features, full of enjoyment and remembrance and...surrender? Violet didn’t know what to make of that.
    “I won that money for your collection plate shortly after we had dinner together,” Cade told her. “I even got invited to the next level of play in the qualifying rounds for the private faro tournament. I glimpsed Whittier, too.” He dropped his gaze to her bodice. Most likely, he could see her heaving in eager, restive breaths. “But I haven’t won a damn thing since then.”
    “Oh. I’m very sorry to hear that.”
    “No, you’re not.” Cade’s eyes sparkled at her, full of mischief and something darker...something needful. “Neither am I. Because it’s brought me back here to you.” He lifted his hand to her cheek. Rousingly, he stroked her. Tellingly, his voice lowered. Huskily, he said, “You see...I need more good luck.”
    He was going to kiss her . Violet could tell. She’d not been courted much, that was true; but she recognized something primal in Cade’s eyes. Possibly because she felt a bit passionate just then herself. Her knees quaked. Her hands trembled. She needed to be kissed, it occurred to her. How else to truly know Cade?
    How else to know if she could trust him? Rely on him?
    “I need more good luck,” Cade repeated, “and it seems I can only get that from touching you. Maybe...from kissing you.”
    From the rest of the church, the sounds of her father’s sermon echoed from the pulpit. Its usual emotive vibrancy was muted by the walls that stood, quite properly, between Reverend Benson and Violet. The effect was surreal—and inhibiting, too.
    “You can’t...get your good luck here. Now ,” she breathed, thoroughly scandalized by his suggestion. “We’re in church! Everyone I know is in there, a few feet away!”
    Rakishly, Cade quirked his eyebrow.