Excerpt of Heiress in Love by Christina Brooke

JANE OPENED HER EYES and a large form filled her vision—or
at least, he filled the doorway—dark hair tousled beyond any
recognizable style, heavy-lidded eyes trained on her, and a
cigarillo clamped between very white teeth.

She gasped. The rider she’d seen from the upstairs window.

Now, he was close enough to reach out and touch. He smiled
at her around that horrible cigarillo, Jane realized with
dismay. Her heart lurched into a frantic dance.

Jane’s mind fixed on the source of that smoke as a drowning
woman might clutch at a rope. She shoved Rosamund’s
handkerchief into her pocket and scowled up at him. "I hope
you aren’t going to puff on that disgusting thing in here."

The man’s green eyes narrowed, observing her for a moment.
Then his lips closed around the repellant object. The
hollows in his cheeks deepened; the end of the cigarillo
glowed amber. Deliberately, he removed the cigarillo from
his mouth, tilted his head and blew smoke upward. The stream
of cloudy gray passed between his well-formed lips, lifting,
clouding, curling in tendrils to caress the plasterwork.

In that attitude, the slightly stubborn jut of his chin
became pronounced. Despite her annoyance at his studied
disregard for her wishes, Jane’s fascinated gaze traced the
strong lines of his throat as they disappeared into a stark
white cravat.

The stranger turned and pitched the butt off the terrace in
a sailing arc, into the rain.

As if the heavens resented this wanton act, they opened,
hurling water down in sheets. The wind gave a ghostly howl.
Blood red curtains billowed around him, and the fanciful
image of a devil stepping out of hell popped into her head.
The gentleman moved inside and closed the long window behind
him, shutting out the storm.

Jane shot from her chair, which brought her within
discomfiting distance of the stranger’s tall form. He
smelled—not unpleasantly—of horse leathers and rain and the
exotic hint of Spanish smoke.

They both moved at once, and she fetched up against him in a
heady brush of palm to chest, side to muscular thigh. Two
large, strong hands gripped her upper arms to steady her.
"Whoa there."

The heat from his palms and fingers seeped into her chilled
skin. He seemed even larger than he’d appeared from beneath
her window. She had to crane her neck to look up at him and
his decided chin.

A sudden fire glinted beneath those lazy eyelids. She almost
expected him to hold her longer, but he unhanded her almost
before she’d regained her balance. She took a hasty step in
retreat and the backs of her knees hit her chair.

The stranger smiled, another flash made brighter by the
contrasting swarthiness of his face. "No, no! Don’t go on my
account." His voice, a husky tenor, plucked its way down her
spine.

Jane frowned. Who did he think he was? A gentleman did not
barge into private rooms without an invitation. "Oh, I’m not
going anywhere. You’ll find the other mourners in the
drawing room, sir."

"I know. That’s why I’m in the library." The corners of his
eyes crinkled. "You don’t have the faintest idea who I am,
do you?"

She was beginning to think she did. "Of course not. We
haven’t been introduced." Despising her priggish tone, she
turned slightly and picked at the armrest of her chair with
fingers that weren’t quite steady.

But surely he wasn’t… He couldn’t… If the stranger was
Roxdale, he’d have attended the will reading, wouldn’t he?

Before he could speak again, she said, "I don’t care who you
are. It’s improper for us to be here alone together. You
must go."

"Must I? But we are getting on so famously." Without a
by-your-leave, he reached past her to move her chair from
where it blocked his path and stepped farther into the room.

Prowling by bookshelves and globes and maps, he rounded a
large drafting table and homed in on the drinks tray that
sat, stocked and ready, on the sideboard. He poured himself
a brandy from one of the crystal decanters.

She marched after him, blustering. "Just what do you think—"

"It seems I have the advantage." Turning, he wrapped his
long fingers around the glass and tilted it toward her. "For
I know who you are."