"Long enough for you to forget about me and look for someone else."
His breath caught in his throat. "Sarah, I'm not — "
"Looking?" Her eyes sparkled with mischief. "I beg to differ, Jays."
It took a moment for Jarrod to recover his speech. "It's not what you suppose. I'm not interested in dancing with Gillian Davies or in making her my marchioness."
"Why not?" she demanded.
"I don't happen to be in the market for a wife," he answered.
"Then, what are you doing here?" He shrugged. "Would you believe I came to dance?" She didn't believe it for a moment. "You don't appear to be dancing."
Jarrod grinned at her. "Only because you haven't asked me to."
They had danced one dance and Jarrod still recalled the sight of her in the gold ball gown with the square neckline that bared her neck and shoulders and had showed her figure off to perfection, still smelled the scent of her perfume in her skin and in her hair, could still feel his hand at her waist and the brush of her body against his.
During the past year, Sarah's image had popped into his brain at the most inopportune times, but Jarrod never dreamed the real Sarah would appear in his study in the middle of the night. Like this.
"What the devil are you doing here? Alone? At this time of morning?" Jarrod couldn't stop staring at her. Her plump lips were tinged with blue from the cold and her long red hair was wet and plastered to her head, but she was as lovely as he remembered.
"You're a hard man to catch, Jays." Sarah Eckersley stared up at him, fascinated by the wedge of dark curly hair peeking out from beneath the open front of his shirt and the velvet dressing gown he wore over it. "I read about the Duchess of Sussex's ball in the papers and I came at a time I hoped I might find you at home. Alone." She left the fire-place and moved closer to him. "You are alone, aren't you, Jays?" Sarah reached up, removed the glass of whisky from his hand, and took a sip from the same place his lips had touched.
Her provocative gesture took him by surprise. When had she learned to do that? Who had taught her to appreciate fine whisky? Jarrod narrowed his gaze at her and sucked in a breath as a certain part of his anatomy came to life, pressing against the buttons of his breeches in a powerful bid to be free of the constraints of the fabric. Reaching down, he automatically tightened the belt of his robe in an effort to conceal the evidence of his arousal. "Except for the twenty or so employees in this household and you, I am quite alone."
Sarah took another sip of his whisky, then handed it back to him. "Somehow, I don't think their presence makes much difference," she said. "I think you're always quite alone."
"Oh?" Jarrod arched an elegant eyebrow. "Have you come all the way from Helford Green to discuss my solitary state of affairs?"
"No." She shook her head. "I've come all the way from Helford Green for lessons."
"Lessons?" He was puzzled. "In what?"
"Seduction."
Jarrod choked on a mouthful of whisky and set the glass aside. "From whom?"
"You, of course."
Jarrod coughed again. "Sarah, be serious," he began, as soon as he'd recovered well enough to speak.
"I'm very serious," she told him. "I need to learn the art of seduction and I came to the most seductive man I know for lessons."
"Lessons for what purpose?" Jarrod didn't know whether to be insulted or flattered. Flattered that Sarah found him seductive or insulted because she thought he would agree to give her lessons on the subject.
"I'm not a beauty…"
Jarrod frowned. When had she gotten the notion that she wasn't a beauty?
"I don't possess a fortune or a great family name or even a dowry to offer a man," she said. "All I have is my body." Sarah reached up and unfastened her cape, then let it fall to the floor. "I need to learn how to use it."
Jarrod caught his breath. Sarah Eckersley, the rector's daughter from Helford Green, had come to him wearing nothing more than a white lawn nightgown beneath her cape. And he had
never seen anything more lovely. He leaned closer, until his lips were only inches away from hers. "Forgive me if I'm reading this the wrong way, but are you here because you're in the market for a husband?"
Sarah tossed her hair over her shoulder, then reached up and put her arms around his neck. "I'm here for lessons, Jays." She focused her gaze on his lips. "You can start by teaching me to kiss."
"I'll kiss you," he said, leaning close enough to detect the hint of whisky on her breath as he inhaled the air she exhaled. Jarrod closed his eyes. He'd kiss her. Quite thoroughly. Not because she had audaciously demanded that he do so, but because he suddenly felt an overwhelming desire to press himself against her, to taste the whisky on her lips, and to satisfy his curiosity. Because he'd wanted to kiss her the last time he'd seen her and hadn't done so. And because he wasn't noble enough to pass up a second opportunity and resist temptation when it arrived in so intriguing a fashion. "But I'm not going to marry you."