No Ordinary Gentleman

Am I truly talking about love?

Folding my laptop closed, I push the thought away for later examination. Some time when Griffin isn’t staring at me like the cat that caught the canary.

Love would be . . . odd. Unexpected. Unlikely?

But it might go some way to explaining this burning sensation in my chest.

One I’ve been suffering with for days.

Or it could be heartburn, I suppose.

“What can I help you with?” I ask, refocussing my attention as I observe my brother saunter across the room, evidently very pleased with himself.

He indicates the seat with a deference I’m not used to from him, but I nod, and he lowers himself into it.

“Everything all right?” Because I know the reason he’s hanging around the castle isn’t truly Holland. I’ve been meaning to put in a call to Van to ask if he knows why Griffin is avoiding London.

“Yes, actually.” He rolls his shoulders like a boxer in the ring. “Things are really very good. Wonderful, in fact.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” While also waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“I wanted to have a word with you,” he murmurs. “About Holland.”

My heart stops.

“Holland?” Shifting in my chair, I run my thumb along the old-fashioned ink blotter, ignoring how the muscles in my back begin to tense and then clench.

“Yes. Actually, she asked me to have a word with you.” Crossing one knee over the other, Griffin opens his hands. It may be a gesture of sincerity and openness, compliance even, but not on Griffin. He’s the type of person who makes me want to check for my watch after shaking his hand. “Look, this is awkward, so I’ll just come out and say it. She wants you to stay away from her.”

“Oh, she does, does she?”

That must be why tiny shivers of anticipation run down her spine at my voice. And why she closes her eyes as though to revel in the tenor of it as I press words against her skin. It must be the reason my name sounds like an incantation on her lips and how, when I’m moving inside her, her moans are powerful enough to move the earth on its axis.

“You don’t believe me?” He almost laughs. “You’re pulling the eyebrow move you’re known so well for.” His expression twists playfully as he points at his own brow. “It doesn’t work on me.”

“I wasn’t aware I was doing anything.” I lean back in my chair and gesture for him to go on.

“Let me put it this way,” he says, opening his hands again and making me want to snap them off at the wrists. “You’re making it pretty awkward for her, considering she’s agreed to date me.”

“To date you.” The words come out clipped and slightly incredulous and not at all like a question. And not just because it’s not something I’d like to hear him repeat.

“Who could believe it? The black sheep of the family. But yeah, me,” he adds, his tone hardening. “So, I’d appreciate it if you’d stay the fuck away from her.”

“This is all a little sudden, isn’t it?” A cold hand clamps around my entrails. This is all bullshit, yet I can’t help but suffer the pain of it. The jagged edge of her using my brother to . . . to what? To keep me from her door? As if I’d put that kind of pressure on her. As if she needs the fucking encouragement herself! She burns so hot in my arms, I’m surprised I don’t suffer first-degree burns.

“Sudden? I suppose that’s one way to look at it. But if you cast your mind back a few months, you’ll remember a night in a cold lane in London. I think I made my position clear then.”

“Haven’t we already been over this, ad nauseam,” I add in a bored tone.

“Yes, you’re right. We have. So no, it’s not a little sudden, but it is convenient.”

I’ll say it is. At least for Holland. I suddenly want to wrap my hands around her but not to pull her to my chest. Not to caress her. I’m more likely right now to pull her over my knee. Spank her properly and not for kicks.

I can’t say I won’t enjoy it, but that wouldn’t be the point of it.

Why must you fight it, my darling?

Doesn’t she see that this is the last thing I ever expected to happen to me, either? She hasn’t so much unbalanced my world, setting it off kilter, as she has blown up my fucking universe!

“Are you listening to me?”

“I do apologise,” I deadpan. “Do go on.” Feed me more of your inconsequential lies. “I believe you were explaining how this is convenient.”

“Yes.” He glances down at his hands. “She’s leaving in a couple of weeks, so it’ll work out well for the both of us.”