Jamintha by Wilde Jennifer;

Author:Wilde, Jennifer;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Open Road Media Romance

CHAPTER TEN

Jane,

I must say this is all a grand adventure. My first concern, naturally, is to solve the mystery of Danver Hall, but I must admit that I’m having a delicious time in the process. It’s elating to have a handsome, explosive man head over heels in love with me. I feel terribly wicked, but that’s elating, too. Poor Brence, he’s going to be badly hurt. His magnificent male ego is going to be crushed, but I shan’t waste any sympathy on him. Things are going wonderfully well, better than I expected, and I’m confident Charles Danver will play his part, too, exactly as planned … but I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me begin with Brence.

I told you he asked me to marry him the afternoon we came back in from the picnic. I laughed at him, setting a match to the fuse that caused him to explode in irate fury. He came back the next day, trying to be humble but too surly to carry it oft. He wanted to know why I wouldn’t marry him. I told him, tearing his character apart in light, quick strokes that left him, figuratively speaking, a mass of bloody shreds.

“So I’m a wastrel!” he retorted. “Very well, I drink too much, I get into brawls, and my conduct with the ladies hasn’t been lily pure! I can reform. With you at my side I could become a different person.”

“How would you support a wife?”

“I could work, dammit!”

“At what?”

“I don’t know. I’d find something—”

“What about the textile mill?”

“That’s out! I hate the place. It depresses me.”

“Why?”

“Those men! The conditions they work under, the hours—they’re like galley slaves, chained to the oars, rowing and sweating while my father stands over them cracking a whip, all for a measly pittance that can barely stave off starvation. It’s unjust. It’s inhuman. I can’t stand to see men enduring those conditions—”

“Perhaps you could improve their conditions,” I suggested.

“My father has total control of the mill. He’s not about to let anyone interfere with the way he runs it.”

“And you’re afraid to try,” I said.

“Forget the mill!” he thundered.

We had reached an impasse, but Brence was not to be so easily discouraged. He tried another tactic. He pulled me into his arms and held me in a tight grip. Lids lowered sleepily over seductive blue eyes, he fastened his mouth over mine and kissed me for a long time. It was a glorious kiss, Jane, a dazzling, heady experience that caused every fiber of my being to tingle, yet when he released me I was as cool as icy water.

“Christ!” he shouted. “You’re not human!”

“I’m very human, Brence, but you’re not going to win me the way you win your barmaids. You can’t respect me or you wouldn’t have done that. I want you to leave now.”

“Respect! I’m in love with you!”

“I don’t think you know what that word means.”

“What do you want?”

“I want a man I can look up to, a man I can respect.”

He slammed

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