Chapter Three
Finn wasn’t in the proper mood to do the pretty—now or any other time. His mother had deserted him to chat with a friend. That left him fair game for gawkers and gossips.
And apparently for women who didn’t know better.
God, how he detested conversations about the weather and the number of guests in attendance at this event. Was it too much to hope for a woman who might discuss things that mattered? He flicked his gaze to the lady who’d most recently announced that she’d had an instinct about him, or rather them. Which he still found the biggest load of gammon he’d ever heard. But her suggestion to sit with him merely to be with him had given him pause… and a myriad of questions.
“I apologize, Miss—”
“Lady,” she interrupted with amusement dancing in her pretty emerald eyes. “Lady Jane. We were just introduced, remember.”
How could he forget? Her companion had fled as soon as she’d gotten a good look at him while this one had wrongly assumed they’d been meant to cross paths as she’d indulged in inane chatter. “I apologize, Lady Jane, and I’m quite flattered you’ve followed my career—which is in itself quite disturbing—but I’m not good company tonight.” What sort of woman would do that?
Instead of taking her leave as anyone with half a shred of common sense or propriety would, the petite intruder perched on the bolstered arm of a crushed velvet sofa near to his position. The mauve color was an interesting contrast to her moss green gown. “I’ll wager you aren’t good company any night. However, you could be if you let your charm come out.”
What sort of game was this? Finn glanced about the room. No one paid him the slightest mind, yet a few men in the room cast interested looks at his temporary conversation partner. He curled his fingers into a fist upon his knee. No doubt one of those men would win her over this night, for she was a woman who needed a man. That he felt deep inside, and damn it all, it made his curiosity bloom. “How do you know I have any charm whatsoever?”
“You have that look.”
Surely she was in jest. He snorted. “Are you truly seeing me?” With some theatrical finesse, he gestured to encompass his form. “This—me—is not charming.”
She flicked her gaze up and down his person. “Of course not.”
“Beg pardon?” What the devil ailed the woman?
“Of course, you wouldn’t think yourself charming.” She clasped her gloved fingers in her lap. “You will if you change your mindset.” The woman smiled, and he stared at her lips. How could he not? He might be paralyzed, but he wasn’t dead.
Both were lush and plump and would form a perfect pout. Currently, they were curved in a relaxed sort of way while she peered at him, clearly waiting for him to respond. Before his damned injury, merely thinking about what such lips could do beyond kissing would have him hard in an instant, but not anymore. Bitterness sat heavy on his shoulders. No, now he could only imagine illicit acts such as those without the accompanying lust rushing through his member. Visual and aural stimulation no longer affected his shaft. It was both a relief and a curse.
But bloody frustrating.
With a sound that was a cross between a growl and a sigh, Finn snapped his attention back to hers. “I rather think you know nothing about it.” He didn’t care if his tone was rude or clipped. “You are fully able-bodied.” So saying, he couldn’t help sweeping his gaze up and down her person and how she easily perched there, watching him.
“That is true enough, I suppose.” Lady Jane possessed the perfect body that men would go to war to possess. Hell, they’d kill a man merely for a chance to kiss her. Voluptuous curves to tempt a monk, short enough to tuck beneath a man’s chin if he held her close, thick luxurious hair a man could tangle his fingers in, and the tresses a glorious red—fiery and vibrant. Hair a man—he—might grasp and gently tug upon until her head tipped backward and—
Well, there it would end. The thoughts as well as any such deed. He was consigned to this chair and that was all. Realizing she still looked at him, now with speculation in those eyes that glittered like jewels, he blew out a breath. “I’m sorry, what?”
“I imagine you feel your world is rather small in the present.”
“Are you mad?” He gawked at her. The woman made no sense. It was as if she’d popped out of the forest like an errant tree sprite or a fairy.
Another thought, purely random, infiltrated his brain and he cocked his head. I need to write that down for use later. Slowly, as if any fast action on his part might frighten her away, he lifted a hand and delved into an interior jacket pocket for a small notebook and the nub of a pencil. Yes, she might make the perfect inspiration for a lead in his book…
If she wasn’t insane, perhaps he was, for he now had the niggling of a character dancing through his brain, and all because of a chance meeting with this not-so-usual lady.
“I am not, but I do see potential in you. Right now, you have the air of a fish stuck in a tiny bowl after being given the run of a vast ocean. Despite everything, you’re rather too comfortable in said fishbowl, but deep down you know there is a big, bright world out there, and you remember it.”
His eyebrows lifted. “Is that so? What else do you see?” If nothing else, she gave him ideas, which he would then feed to his muse. As unobtrusively as possible, he opened the notebook to a clean page and scribbled a few thoughts.
She shrugged, which pulled her gown tight across those full breasts. “You’re afraid, both of the world and your abilities to live in that world.” When her inquisitive gaze fell to his notebook, questions populated in her eyes though she asked none of them. “You don’t wish to know what you might still do because you can’t do everything from before.”
“I… I…” The gall of this woman! Finn gripped his pencil tighter. That this petite menace thought to tell him how to live his own life… And then a rather large and hungry wolf ate the wood sprite in one gulp. Savagely, he shoved the notebook and pencil back into his jacket pocket. There was no point in remaining in her company. “Goodnight, Lady Jane.” He wheeled himself across the room without needing to weave between party guests, for they gave him wide birth. As if he could somehow transmit paralysis by touch. Bloody hell. When he arrived at one of the windows, he stared unseeing outside while annoyance seethed through his blood.
Why the deuce does she upset me?It’s not like he hadn’t fielded insensitive suggestions by well-meaning individuals before. If it was due to her being female, many others had wormed their way beneath his skin… before his injury.
“That was rude, Major Storme.”
Of course she followed him. Why not? The evening had already been trying enough.