“That was different! I was distraught. I needed to talk to you, to speak to you—“
“Yes. I remember.” He added, “And then there’s the concert.”
Caroline tried not to remember the concert and the kiss. He had pushed her up against the wall…
“What are you thinking of?” He asked suddenly.
“Nothing. Why?” She said feeling guilty.
“You looked guilty just then. You looked flushed.” He noted.
“I am flushed. You keep saying things and doing things that are not acceptable. And you’re wrong about Mr. Davies. He’s a man of integrity and he wishes to invest. That is all that is between us.”
Val smiled when he came towards her. “You are innocent in the ways of such things. Men are very simple creatures, Caroline. They need to eat and sleep. But the one thing that they always want is women.”
“You shouldn’t say such things.”
“You don’t like the truth?”
“Mr. Davies has never looked at me twice.”
“I’m right about this.” He insisted.
“How?” She persisted. “How do you know what a stranger thinks? How?”
He paused. “Because I’ve seen him look at you the way I feel about you.”
Caroline licked her lips and tugged at her gloves. “You shouldn’t speak to me like this. My sister’s death put me in your life and you in mine but you shouldn’t take advantage.”
“How am I taking advantage?” He frowned.
“When you look at me as you do. When you touch me, when you kiss me. You sh
ouldn’t do those things. You know you shouldn’t. Yet you do. You persist.”
“How can I not? Caroline you are lovely and so strong, intelligent. I’ve never met a woman like you. So full of life and you have things you want to accomplish.”
“It doesn’t give you the right. And you use my inexperience against me.”
“How do I do that?”
“I don’t know how to play these games. These word games that men and women play. I don’t know how to do it. And when you say things to me, I don’t know how to respond.” She looked down at her hands. “You do make me feel things. But what of it? Can’t another woman make you feel such things and another man with me.”
Val felt intense anger at her words. “I had someone in my life. I thought I loved her. We were to marry. But as much as I cared for her, I feel much more for you.”
“I must go. It’s getting late. My grandmother will worry.” She turned away from him.
“I’ll see you home.” He said collecting the files he had taken the time to review.
“Do you promise to behave?” She said in complete earnest.
Val almost groaned. What good did it get him? He wanted nothing more than to bury his nose in her hair and smell the scent of her. He wanted to kiss her again and again and hold her tightly against him. Instead he nodded.
“Yes.”
Caroline nodded. “Then I accept.”
On the carriage ride home, she sat across from him admiring him. He was a handsome man with a bearing about him. She supposed that came from his breeding and education but he also carried a strength of character that she liked.