Lian didn’t give him the satisfaction of swatting his hand away. It would play into his view of her as a young and impetuous brat, and she was tired of playing that game.
“I don’t need your opinion of him,” she insisted. “All I want is an introduction.”
“I can’t stand by and watch a dear friend be devoured by a wolf. Why, you’re practically like a little sister to me.”
Oh, she didn’t like that at all. “No matter, then,” she said with a wave, and continued toward home. “I’m sure there are countless places where I can run into Liu Jinhai while I’m alone and in distress...”
Baozhen caught up to her in several long strides. “All right, I surrender. I’ll introduce you to your precious prince if only to keep you out of trouble. I never knew you could be such a she-demon when you wanted something.”
“You can’t go looking like that,” Baozhen declared.
Apparently her family had immediately welcomed him into the fold. He was roaming about their courtyard once again as if he lived there.
“You’re going to be late,” she told him.
He paid no attention to her reprimand. Instead he frowned as he looked her over. She had taken care to dress in a light summer robe with many eye-catching colors. The outer layer was a hand-painted gauze which revealed the barest hint of her arms through its sheerness. The morning air was cool in the garden, with a slight breeze rustling the cypress trees. A flood of heat swept through her as Baozhen’s gaze lingered at the lowered neckline.
“Too obvious,” he declared. “Any man seeing a woman like this would know that she’s interested.”
“So?”
“A lady should be a bit more subtle. Yin is the essence of darkness and secrets, after all.”
Lian stood her ground. “Of course. It’s so much better to be so subtle and secretive that I’m never noticed at all. Not even when someone has known me for years and years.”
Baozhen’s scowl deepened as he considered her words. A look of displeasure creased his brow, but within moments it had been smoothed out to his usual careless look. The one that so easily charmed the world.
“There are other ways of being noticed,” he drawled.
The low suggestiveness in his tone took her off-balance and she scrambled to recover. “What are you doing here, anyway? Cousin Ming-ha and I were just headed out to the park.”
They were supposed to “accidentally” meet Liu Jinhai in an hour.
“I came to bring you your gift.” He produced a parcel from the fold of his sleeve. “I saw this in Suzhou. It made me think of you.”
The package was wrapped in plain sackcloth. Despite its humble appearance, the gesture warmed her, and a little shiver of excitement ran down her spine as she loosened the twine. Baozhen folded his hands behind his back and hovered to watch.
She held up the polished hardwood frame wrapped with red cord. “A slingshot?”
He beamed proudly. “You used to be quite dangerous with one of those.”
When she was twelve. “What did you get Ming-ha?” she demanded.
“A bottle of perfume,” he replied with a shrug.
Her cousin warranted a gift that was pretty and feminine, to match her pretty and feminine self, while Lian received a child’s toy. She could feel the heat rising in her cheeks. Baozhen really was insufferable.
“You don’t like it?” he asked, hurt.
“No, it’s wonderful. Perfect,” she said through her teeth.
“You’re upset.” He was following her through the garden. Still smiling. “I can bring you another gift if you’d like.”
She turned on him. “You didn’t speak to Liu Jinhai at all, did you?”
“Of course I did. I have nothing to fear from him.”
His smile widened. That devastating smile. It confused her so.
“You’ll get your chance encounter, but—looking as made-up as you do—I’m thinking you’re hoping for a little bit more than an introduction.”
She realized he was gradually backing her into the corner of the garden, behind the pruned cypress. Now he was back he was obviously looking for more conquests to add to his collection. Her hand shot out to brace against his chest, where she collided against a solid wall of muscle.
“Scoundrel.”
The scoundrel laughed. “It’s just a kiss, Lian.”
She couldn’t help the way her stomach fluttered, nor how her heart pounded. He ventured a step closer, but she held firm. She knew Baozhen too well. He had no control over his effect on women and had come to accept their adoration as a matter of course. It took no effort for him to make her feel these things. He did it without knowledge and without care, taking no responsibility for her hope, her excitement or her pain.
He was blissfully ignorant while her spirits soared or plummeted at his whim.
She gave him a little shove, though it did little to move him. “Maybe it’s not you I want a kiss from.”
“You asked me for one once.”
She froze.
Any gentleman would have conveniently forgotten her request. She had been young and had foolishly gathered her courage to ask for a kiss. Baozhen had been older and more experienced. He had refused her. Even worse.
“You laughed at me.” The sharp, piercing embarrassment came back to her. She had shrunk inside to nothing more than a wisp of smoke and disappeared into her room for days.
Baozhen looked stricken. “I didn’t laugh at you.” He paused, as if trying to recall. “Or I didn’t mean to, if that’s what happened. You surprised me. It was just that you were—”
He struggled for words, his smooth charm failing him. He seemed earnest in his uncertainty and she let down her guard.
“Perhaps I was waiting for a better time,” he said, but his tone was more gentle than beguiling.
A small crack formed in her resistance. He backed her farther behind the cover of the shrubbery and this time she let him. She let him because it was Baozhen, and it had hurt so much when he’d rejected her. She had been fifteen years old and foolish, and now she was eighteen and not so foolish—but she still very much wanted that kiss.
He didn’t put his arms around her. Instead he rested his hands over her shoulders as he bent to her, holding her carefully, as if she were made of porcelain. She couldn’t breathe. Baozhen was so close and she had imagined this for so long, in so many different ways. She could feel the sigh of his breath against her lips, and then his mouth was on hers.
His lips were softer and warmer than she’d imagined—but in no more than a heartbeat he was gone.
She was left blinking up at him. That was all? Baozhen straightened abruptly, and for a moment they simply stood there. The tingle of the maddeningly brief touch had already faded. She didn’t even have any time to consider returning his kiss.
“I’ll see you at the park.” Baozhen wasn’t smiling or teasing, or really doing anything but staring at her oddly.
“Until