with me, sir?”
“No.” His smile disappeared, and he looked down at her with darkened eyes. “I am—how do you say?—propositioning you.”
Her cheeks flamed. He should not say that—not to her, not to the unmarried daughter of a baronet to whom he’d not been introduced. She must stop him, explain to him that perhaps where he came from such things were done, but not in England.
But her skin prickled with sudden and forbidden delight, and dark places inside stirred to life. A gentleman did not simply ride to Penelope Trask and say those words in a silken voice, with promise in his eyes.
She remembered Magnus, her second betrothed, and his drunken slurs that he wanted to grope her—she was going to be his wife after all, what ails you, gel?
This was not quite the same. This man was not drunk. His eyes were steady, his dark blue gaze holding something from her, she could not tell what. He smiled, but he was watchful.
“I think you are not familiar with English ways, sir,” she managed.
“I have been to England before.”
He halted the horse. They rested in the silence of the meadow, the quiet broken only by the drone of bees, and birds calling to one another in the sleepy heat.
“Penelope,” he said softly. “Since I have left my home, I have not seen anyone like you.” He touched his breastbone. “You have given me a pain, here.”
She felt as though a fog were coming over her mind, as though he had cast a spell, like the magicians in her stories. “How could I? I am nothing remarkable.”
“You are wrong.” His breath touched her cheek. “All my life, Penelope, I have existed inside a fairy tale. I have lived an empty life and done empty things. Now, everything is real, and I must face it.”
His eyes were not completely blue, as she’d thought, but flecked with black. They darkened further as he spoke, pressing back the flash of bleakness she had glimpsed before.
“Let me have one more page of the fairy tale, Penelope,” he said. “Before I must close the book.”
She could not imagine what he meant. She did know that if the gossipy ladies of the village learned that she’d come back here all alone with a handsome stranger, she’d be ruined.
A very naughty part of her, which had never spoken before, whispered, Then why not enjoy it?
Was she mad? He must have cast a spell on her. She thought of the villagers, dancing in a line down the high street. He must have done that, as well.
“What did you do to them?”
He looked momentarily puzzled. “Who?”
“The villagers.”
“Ah.” His smile returned. “I bought them ale. I made many friends.”
Now for some reason, she wanted to laugh. “You must have.” She looked at him in exasperation. “Really, who are you?”
“Just Damien. For now.”
“Who will you be later?”
“I do not know.” He looked off into the distance. “I do not know, Penelope. Someone you will not like, perhaps.”
She gave a weak laugh. “I have known you ten minutes, and already you are the most baffling man of my entire acquaintance.”
His gaze returned to her, a sharp focus like a wolf on a rabbit. “And you are the most beautiful woman of mine.”
She so wanted the words to be true. Everything within herself wanted to be beautiful for this man, though deep inside, she knew she was plain Penelope, with wheatcolored hair and green eyes and a figure not willowy enough for London standards. This man likely had the pick of beauties wherever he went. He had to be flummoxing her.
“I cannot possibly be,” she said.
“I am afraid you are. And I believe I have fallen in love with you.”
“In ten minutes?” she asked, amazed.
“I think it would make no difference were it ten minutes, ten hours, or ten days. I am in love with you. Which makes what I must do very difficult.”
“I think,” Penelope said, “that you are completely mad.”
“As do I.”
He gently untied the ribbons of her small bonnet and pushed it from her head.