His frown indicated that her demand galled his sense of decorum. “Dear lady—”
She stiffened. Somewhere she’d lost control of this encounter. Which was absurd. She was the one with the gun. “I’m not your dear lady.”
As if acknowledging that she’d scored a point, he bowed. “As you wish, Miss Barrett. I’ve done you no wrong. It seems excessive to menace me with murder.”
Astonishment almost made her laugh. “You broke into my house. You threatened me with—”
He interrupted. “So far, any threats have emanated from your charming self.”
“You mean to steal,” she said in a low, vibrating voice.
“But I haven’t. Yet.” The expressive mouth above the intriguingly hard jawline curved into a charming smile. “Temper justice with mercy. Let me go free to seek redemption.”
“Let you go free to find some other innocent to rob,” she said sharply. “Better to lock you in the cellar and summon the local magistrate.”
“That would be unkind. I don’t like small, confined places.”
“In that case, you’ve chosen the wrong profession. Somewhere someone will catch you.”
Disregarding the gun, he took another step forward. “Surely your compassionate heart abhors the thought of my imprisonment.”
She retreated and realized that he’d boxed her against the desk. She tightened her grip on the gun to counteract her slippery palms. “Move away or I swear I’ll shoot.”
He lit one of the candles on the desk and blew out his own smaller candle, dropping it smoking to the blotter. “Tsk, Miss Barrett. You’ll get blood on the carpet.”
“I’ll—”
Words escaped on a gasp as with surprising speed he grabbed the hand holding the gun. A few nimble turns of that long body and he caught her against him, facing the open window. Pressed to him, she was overwhelmingly conscious of his power. His leanness was deceptive. There was no denying the muscles in the arms holding her or the breadth of the chest behind her. He embraced her firmly across her torso, trapping her arms. While she still held her weapon, she couldn’t shift to aim it.
The barbed but oddly flirtatious conversation had calmed immediate dread. Now fear surged anew. What in heaven’s name was she thinking, bandying words with this scoundrel? As if she enjoyed herself, when if she despised anything in this world, it was a thief.
She caught her breath on a frightened hiccup and struggled. “Let me go!”
His arms tightened like straps, controlling her with mortifying ease. Genevieve was a tall, strong girl, no frail lily, but the thief was taller and stronger. She’d never before measured her strength against a man’s. It rankled how easily he restrained her. She’d never been so aware of another person’s physical reality. The experience was disturbing beyond her natural terror of an intruder. “Hush, Miss Barrett. I give you my word I mean no harm.”
“Then release me.” She panted, her wriggles achieving nothing beyond the collapse of her never very secure coiffure.
“Not unless you put the gun down.”
She maneuvered to elbow him in the belly, but his grip made it impossible. “Then I’ll be at your mercy,” she said breathlessly.
A grunt of laughter escaped him. “There’s that to consider.”
He was so close that his amusement vibrated through her. The sensation was uncomfortably intimate. A few more of those blasted deft movements and he snatched her weapon. He placed it beyond reach on the desk.
“I’ll scream.”
“There’s nobody to hear,” he said carelessly, and in that moment, she truly hated him.
“You’re despicable,” she hissed, trying and failing to free herself. Her heart galloped with fright and anger. With him, and with herself for being a stupid, weak female, prey to an overbearing male.
“Sticks and stones.”
He drew her into his body and took a sliding step backward. She became conscious not just of his size and strength—those had been apparent from the moment he caught her up—but also of his enveloping heat and the way that he smelled pleasantly of something herbal. Fresh. Tangy.
This ruffian took the trouble to wash regularly.
He reversed another step and opened the door with a rattle, containing her struggles beneath one arm with humiliating ease. Fear spurred rage. She wrenched hard against him and tried without success to sink her fingernails into his forearm.
“No, you don’t,” he huffed, tugging her closer.
“I’ll have your liver for this,” she snarled, even as his scent continued to prick her senses. What was that smell?
“You’ll have to catch me first.”
She wished she didn’t notice how laughter warmed that deep, musical voice. Any angry response died in furious shock as he brushed his cheek softly against the wing of hair covering her cheek.
“Au revoir, Miss Barrett,” he whispered in her ear, his breath teasing nerves she didn’t know she possessed. Then he shoved her away from him hard.
By the time she’d regained her footing, he’d slammed the door and locked it from outside with the key he must have palmed when he fiddled with the latch.
“Don’t you dare ransack the house, you devil!” she shouted, rushing forward and pounding on the door. But the vicarage doors were of solid English oak and hardly shook under her determined assault. “Don’t you dare!”
Gasping, she stopped and pressed her ear to the door, desperate to work out what he was up to. She heard a distant slam as though someone left by the front door. Could her presence have deterred him from his larcenous plans? She couldn’t imagine why. From the first, he’d had the best of the conflict.
Her hands fisted against the wood as she recalled his barefaced cheek in holding her so … so improperly.
“Improper” seemed too weak a term to describe the sensations he’d aroused when he’d captured her like a sheep ready for the shears. Like that sheep, she was about to be well and truly fleeced. She was in no position to stop the villain from taking what he wanted. Nobody would let her out until her father and aunt returned from the duke’s, and heaven knew when that would be. The Reverend Ezekiel Barrett adored hobnobbing with the quality. He’d be there until breakfast if Sedgemoor didn’t throw him out first. She’d have to go out the window the way the villain had come in.
Tears of frustration stung her eyes. However illogically, she felt the radiating heat of the burglar’s body against hers. It was like he still touched her. She wasn’t afraid anymore, at least not for her person. If the rascal had wanted to hurt her, he’d had plenty of opportunity. Her principal reaction, now that fear and unwilling fascination ebbed, was self-disgust. She’d acted a ninnyhammer, the sort of jittery female she despised. She’d had a gun. Why hadn’t she forced him from the house?
The ominous silence extended. What was the blackguard doing? Would there be anything left by the time he finished? She glanced over to the desk and thanked the Lord that the only genuinely valuable item here had escaped his notice. For a sneak thief, he wasn’t very observant, although he hadn’t struck her as a man deficient in intelligence. Or, she added with renewed outrage, impertinence. Nevertheless, any professional would immediately purloin the gold object on the blotter.
Something landed on the carpet near the open window. Curious,