A Spinster's Awakening (A New Adventure Begins - Star Elite 2)

Angus cursed bitterly when he was hit with a heavy object. Pain shot up his arm. With a snarl, he snatched the damned stick off her and threw it onto the floor. Angrily, he reached out to grab her, but she was already racing Hell for leather back toward home.

“That should teach her,” Jasper grunted in satisfaction.

“Look,” Aaron whispered. He pointed toward the woods, at the exact point Charity had been staring.

“It’s the neighbour,” Angus growled. He barely gave the man a second glance, though. He was too busy staring at Charity’s rapidly retreating back and plotting all the things he was going to say to her when they came face-to-face again.

“Go and make sure she gets home,” Aaron growled.

“Don’t accost him. It isn’t Lawrence, but I want to know what he has gone out for. Nobody should be out at this time of night,” Angus snapped, and with that set off in pursuit of the person he really was starting to suspect he wanted to capture.

Charity was struggling to contain her shakes by the time she yanked open the gate at the end of her garden. Her fingers fumbled with the bolt, making it clang loudly in the silence of the night. She froze and looked up, but her heartbeat didn’t stop thundering. She suspected it wouldn’t stop thumping for a long time yet given whoever had just chased her was most probably watching her right now. With a shiver, she turned toward the sanctuary of her nice, warm home, only to slam into an immovable object – a very tall, very commanding, and very, very, angry Angus.

“Do you want to tell me what the Hell you think you were doing?” he snarled in a voice barely above a hushed whisper.

Charity’s mouth opened and closed. She glanced around the empty garden but knew there was nowhere he could have hidden.

She pointed one long, trembling finger at him. “How did you get there?” she gasped.

“Don’t change the subject,” he bit out.

Furious, at her, at himself, at the kidnapper, at Mr Lawrence’s neighbour, whoever the Hell he was, Angus grabbed Charity’s arm and began to propel her down the path toward home like a recalcitrant child.

Charity glanced over her shoulder worriedly. At any other time, she would have protested at Angus’s physical determination to get her indoors, and his manhandling of her. As it was she was just glad he was there – at least until she reached the kitchen.

Once the door had closed behind Angus, and she felt safe once more, Charity turned to glare at him.

“Just what do you-”

She got no further before she was hauled bodily forward and propelled into a solid, masculine frame that remained unmoved. Charity found herself engulfed in Angus’s hard arms which held her firmly against his solid length. Her gasp of astonishment was swiftly swallowed by his hungry lips, which effectively silenced any further protest she might make.

What startled Charity even more was that she wasn’t angry, and didn’t protest, against the force of his kisses. In

stead, she leaned against him, and bolstered by the success, if not the fear of her little adventure, began to return his kiss with a hunger that shocked her just as much as it left him speechless.

CHAPTER SIX

“Damn it,” he growled when he finally lifted his head.

Dumbfounded, all he could do for a moment or two was stare blankly at the door above her head and will his senses to cool.

“I refuse to apologise for that,” he eventually growled.

Charity tipped her chin up. With a boldness that was completely uncharacteristic of her she lifted her brows at him.

“I cannot believe I asked you to,” she retorted crisply.

At least now I can say to Mrs Applebottom that I have been kissed – properly – by a man not one of those boys she keeps trying to palm me off with, Charity mused.

She was a little awed by what had just happened despite her false bravado.

With a curse that made her cheeks blush, Angus grabbed Charity by her shoulders, but with startling gentleness, nudged her away from the door. Once he had a clear exit, he took it, but had to force himself not to slam the door as he so desperately wanted to do. Instead, he closed it so very carefully that the quiet click of the catch snapping into place was as effective as gunshot, it was no less sinister.

Charity couldn’t believe he had just left; walked out without an apology, explanation, or a backward look. Insulted, and embarrassed at her own waywardness, she nonetheless refused to allow him to get the upper hand. She suspected that if he did, Angus would believe he had every right to manhandle her to get what he wanted. There was no earthly way she was going to allow that to happen, not after what she had faced tonight – and survived.

Without thinking about what she was doing, Charity yanked open the kitchen door and raced after her quarry for a second time that night. This time, though, the man she was after was someone who wouldn’t escape her, no matter where he tried to hide.

“Where are you going?” she gasped when she caught up with him, half-way down the lane at the back of her house.