Matthew Swift, the cool and self-possessed young man
Daisy Bowman's father wants her to marry, has just
forcibly removed Daisy from a scandalous parlor game. To
save her reputation, Matthew has just turned down the
opportunity to kiss Daisy in front of everyone. However,
instead of thanking him, Daisy is furious . . .

“Why did you do that?” Daisy demanded, rounding on him
immediately.

“Take you away from the games?” Disconcerted, Matthew
adopted a censorious tone. “You shouldn’t have been there,
and you know it.”

Daisy was so furious that her dark eyes seemed to be
shooting sparks. “Where should I have been, Mr. Swift?
Reading alone in the library?”

“That would have been preferable to causing a scandal.”

“No it wouldn’t have. I was exactly where I belonged,
doing exactly what everyone else was doing, and everything
was just fine until you ruined it!”

“I?” Matthew couldn’t believe his ears. “I ruined the
evening for you?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

She glared at him accusingly. “You didn’t kiss me.”

“I . . .” Caught off-guard, Matthew stared at her in
bewilderment. “I did kiss you.”

“On the hand,” Daisy said scornfully, “which means
absolutely nothing.”

Matthew wasn’t certain how he had been so abruptly
derailed from self-righteous superiority to affronted
protest. “You should be grateful.”

“For what?”

“Isn’t it obvious? I saved your reputation.”

“If you had kissed me,” Daisy retorted, “it could only
have improved my reputation. But you rejected me publicly,
which means Llandrindon and Mardling and all the rest know
there is something wrong with me.”

“I didn’t reject you.”

“It certainly felt like rejection, you cad!”

“I am not a cad. If I had kissed you in public, then I
would be a cad.” Matthew paused before adding in baffled
irritation, “And there is nothing wrong with you. Why the
devil would you say that?”

“I’m a wallflower. No one ever wants to kiss me.”

This was too much. Daisy Bowman was furious because he
hadn’t done the thing he had craved and dreamed of for
years of his life. He had behaved honorably, damn it all,
and instead of being appreciative she was angry.

“ . . . am I that undesirable?” Daisy was ranting. “Would
it have been so disagreeable?”

He wanted her for so long. He had reminded himself a
thousand times of all the reasons he could never have her.
And it had been a hell of a lot easier to bear knowing she
detested him and there was no reason to hope. But the
possibility that her feelings might have changed, that she
might want him in return, filled him with a dizzying
thrill.

Another minute of this and he would become unhinged.

“ . . . don’t know how to do whatever it is women are
supposed to do to attract men,” Daisy was saying
irately. “And when I finally had a chance to gain a little
experience, you--” She broke off and frowned as she saw
his face. “Why do you look like that?”

“Like what?”

“As if you’re in pain.”

Pain. Yes. The kind of pain a man felt when he had lusted
after a certain woman for years and found himself alone
with this woman and then had to endure her complaints that
he hadn’t kissed her when all he wanted was to tear her
clothes off and have her right there on the floor.

She wanted experience? Matthew was ready to give her the
experience of a lifetime. His body had become so
unbearably hard that the brush of his trouser fabric was
enough to make him wince. Struggling to control himself,
he concentrated on breathing. Breathing. But there was
only more arousal, until red mist had gathered at the
edges of his vision.

He wasn’t aware of reaching for her but suddenly his hands
were on her, hooked just beneath her arms where the yellow
satin was permeated with the warmth of her body. She was
light and supple, like a cat . . . he could lift her so
easily, pin her against the wall . . .

Daisy’s dark eyes were wide and startled. “What are you
doing?”

“I want the answer to one question,” Matthew managed to
say. “Why did you call my name in there?”

Emotions crossed her face in rapid succession . . .
surprise, guilt, embarrassment. Every inch of exposed skin
turned pink. “I don’t know what you mean. Your name was on
the paper. I had no choice but to--”

“You’re lying,” Matthew said tersely. His heart stopped as
she refused to reply. She wasn’t going to deny it. Her
flush deepened to crimson. “My name wasn’t on that paper,”
he continued with great effort. “But you said it anyway.
Why?”

They both knew there could only be one reason. Matthew
closed his eyes briefly. His pulse was so hot and fast
that its reckless momentum stung the insides of his veins.

He heard Daisy’s hesitant voice. “I just wanted to know
what you . . . how you . . . I just wanted . . .”

This was temptation at its most brutal. Matthew tried to
make himself let go of her, but his hands would not
release the slim curves encased in yellow satin. It felt
too good to hold her. He stared at her exquisite mouth,
the subtle but delicious indentation in the center of her
lower lip. One kiss, he thought desperately. Surely he
could have at least that. But once he started . . . he
wasn’t certain he could stop.

“Daisy . . .” he tried to find words to defuse the
situation, but it was difficult to speak coherently. “I’m
going to tell your father . . . at the first
opportunity . . . I can’t marry you under any
circumstances.”

She still wouldn’t look at him. “Why didn’t you tell him
so right away?”

Because he had wanted to make her notice him.

Because he had wanted to pretend, just for a little while,
that the thing he had never dared to dream about was just
within reach.

“I wanted to annoy you,” he said.

“Well, you did!”

“But I never considered it seriously. I could never marry
you.”

“Because I’m a wallflower,” she said sullenly.

“No. That’s not--”

“I’m undesirable."

“Daisy, would you stop--”

“Not even worth a single kiss.”

“All right,” Matthew snapped, finally losing the grip on
his sanity. “Damn it, you win. I’ll kiss you.”

“Why?”

“Because if I don’t you’ll never stop complaining about
it.”

“It’s too late now! You should have kissed me back there
in the parlor but you didn’t, and now that you’ve doomed
any chance I’ll ever have of being kissed by anyone else,
I’m not going to settle for some half-rate consolation
prize.”

“Half-rate?”

That had been a mistake. Matthew could see that Daisy
realized it the instant she had said it.

She had just sealed her fate.

“I-I meant to say half-hearted,” she said breathlessly,
trying to wriggle away from him. “It’s obvious you don’t
want to kiss me and therefore--”

“You said half-rate.” He jerked her hard against
him. “Which means now I have something to prove.”

“No you don’t,” she said quickly. “Really. You don’t--”
She gave a little cry as he clamped one hand behind her
neck, and all sound was muffled as he tugged her head to
his.