“We are not going to do anything,” he said, his voice sharpening as he spoke. “We are going to walk back to your house, where we are going to deposit you on your doorstep, and then we are going to return to my small, cramped apartments and have a drink.”

“Why do you hate him so much?” Hyacinth asked. Her voice was soft, but it was direct.

He didn’t answer. He didn’t answer, and then it became clear that he wasn’t going to answer. It wasn’t her business, but oh, how she wished it were.

“Shall I return you, or do you wish to walk with your maid?” he finally asked.

Hyacinth looked over her shoulder. Frances was still behind her, standing near a large elm tree. She didn’t look the least bit bored.

Hyacinth sighed. She was going to need a lot of peppermints this time.

Chapter 12

Twenty minutes later, after a long and silent walk.

It was remarkable, Gareth thought with more than a little self-loathing, how one encounter with the baron could ruin a perfectly good day.

And it wasn’t even so much the baron. He couldn’t stand the man, that was true, but that wasn’t what bothered him, what kept him up at night, mentally smacking himself for his stupidity.

He hated what his father did to him, how one conversation could turn him into a stranger. Or if not a stranger, then an astonishingly good facsimile of Gareth William St. Clair…at the age of fifteen. For the love of God, he was an adult now, a man of twenty-eight. He’d left home and, one hoped, grown up. He should be able to behave like an adult when in an interview with the baron. He shouldn’t feel this way.

He should feel nothing. Nothing.

But it happened every time. He got angry. And snappish. And he said things just for the sake of being provoking. It was rude, and it was immature, and he didn’t know how to stop it.

And this time, it had happened in front of Hyacinth.

He had walked her home in silence. He could tell she wanted to speak. Hell, even if he hadn’t seen it on her face, he would have known she wanted to speak. Hyacinth always wanted to speak. But apparently she did occasionally know when to leave well enough alone, because she’d held silent throughout the long walk through Hyde Park and Mayfair. And now here they were, in front of her house, Frances the maid still trailing them by twenty feet.

“I am sorry for the scene in the park,” he said swiftly, since some kind of apology was in order.

“I don’t think anyone saw,” she replied. “Or at the very least, I don’t think anyone heard. And it wasn’t your fault.”

He felt himself smile. Wryly, since that was the only sort he could manage. It was his fault. Maybe his father had provoked him, but it was long past time that Gareth learned to ignore it.

“Will you come in?” Hyacinth asked.

He shook his head. “I’d best not.”

She looked up at him, her eyes uncommonly serious. “I would like you to come in,” she said.

It was a simple statement, so bare and plain that he knew he could not refuse. He gave her a nod, and together they walked up the steps. The rest of the Bridgertons had dispersed, so they entered the now-empty rose-and-cream drawing room. Hyacinth waited near the door until he reached the seating area, and then she shut it. All the way.

Gareth lifted his brows in question. In some circles, a closed door was enough to demand marriage.

“I used to think,” Hyacinth said after a moment, “that the only thing that would have made my life better was a father.”

He said nothing.

“Whenever I was angry with my mother,” she continued, still standing by the door, “or with one of my brothers or sisters, I used to think-If only I had a father. Everything would be perfect, and he would surely take my side.” She looked up, and her lips were curved in an endearingly lopsided smile. “He wouldn’t have done, of course, since I’m sure that most of the time I was in the wrong, but it gave me great comfort to think it.”

Gareth still said nothing. All he could do was stand there and imagine himself a Bridgerton. Picture himself with all those siblings, all that laughter. And he couldn’t respond, because it was too painful to think that she’d had all that and still wanted more.

“I’ve always been jealous of people with fathers,” she said, “but no longer.”

He turned sharply, his eyes snapping to hers. She returned his gaze with equal directness, and he realized he couldn’t look away. Not shouldn’t-couldn’t.

“It’s better to have no father at all than to have one such as yours, Gareth,” she said quietly. “I’m so sorry.”

And that was his undoing. Here was this girl who had everything-at least everything he thought he’d ever wanted-and somehow she still understood.

“I have memories, at least,” she continued, smiling wistfully. “Or at least the memories others have told to me. I know who my father was, and I know he was a good man. He would have loved me if he’d lived. He would have loved me without reservations and without conditions.”

Her lips wobbled into an expression he had never seen on her before. A little bit quirky, an awful lot self-deprecating. It was entirely unlike Hyacinth, and for that reason completely mesmerizing.

“And I know,” she said, letting out a short, staccato breath, the sort one did when one couldn’t quite believe what one was saying, “that it’s often rather hard work to love me.”

And suddenly Gareth realized that some things did come in a flash. And there were some things one simply knew without being able to explain them. Because as he stood there watching her, all he could think was-No.

No.

It would be rather easy to love Hyacinth Bridgerton.

He didn’t know where the thought had come from, or what strange corner of his brain had come to that conclusion, because he was quite certain it would be nearly impossible to live with her, but somehow he knew that it wouldn’t be at all difficult to love her.

“I talk too much,” she said.

He’d been lost in his own thoughts. What was she saying?

“And I’m very opinionated.”

That was true, but what was-

“And I can be an absolute pill when I do not get my way, although I would like to think that most of the time I’m reasonably reasonable…”

Gareth started to laugh. Good God, she was cataloguing all the reasons why she was difficult to love. She was right, of course, about all of them, but none of it seemed to matter. At least not right then.

“What?” she asked suspiciously.

“Be quiet,” he said, crossing the distance between them.

“Why?”

“Just be quiet.”

“But-”

He placed a finger on her lips. “Grant me one favor,” he said softly, “and don’t say a word.”

Amazingly, she complied.

For a moment he did nothing but look at her. It was so rare that she was still, that something on her face wasn’t moving or speaking or expressing an opinion with nothing more than a scrunch of her nose. He just looked at her, memorizing the way her eyebrows arched into delicate wings and her eyes grew wide under the strain of keeping quiet. He savored the hot rush of her breath across his finger, and the funny little sound she made at the back of her throat without realizing it.

And then he couldn’t help it. He kissed her.

He took her face in his hands, and he lowered his mouth to hers. The last time he’d been angry, and he’d seen her as little more than a piece of forbidden fruit, the one girl his father thought he couldn’t have.

But this time he was going to do it right. This would be their first kiss.

And it would be one to remember.

His lips were soft, gentle. He waited for her to sigh, for her body to soften against his. He wouldn’t take until she made it clear she was ready to give.

And then he would offer himself in return.

He brushed his mouth against hers, with just enough friction to feel the texture of her lips, to sense the heat of her body. He tickled her with his tongue, tender and sweet, until her lips parted.

And then he tasted her. She was sweet, and she was warm, and she was returning his kiss with the most devilish mix of innocence and experience he could ever have imagined. Innocence, because it was quite clear she didn’t know what she was doing. And experience, because despite all that, she drove him wild.

He deepened the kiss, his hands sliding down the length of her back until one rested on the curve of her bottom and the other at the small of her back. He pulled her against him, against the rising evidence of his desire. This was insane. It was mad. They were standing in her mother’s drawing room, three feet from a door that could be opened at any moment, by a brother who certainly would feel no compunction at tearing Gareth apart limb from limb.

And yet he couldn’t stop.

He wanted her. He wanted all of her.

God help him, he wanted her now.

“Do you like this?” he murmured, his lips moving to her ear.

He felt her nod, heard her gasp as he took her lobe between his teeth. It emboldened him, fired him.

“Do you like this?” he whispered, taking one hand and bringing it around to the swell of her breast.

She nodded again, this time gasping a tiny little, “Yes!”

He couldn’t help but smile, nor could he do anything but slide his hand inside the folds of her coat, so that the only thing between his hand and her body was the thin fabric of her dress.

“You’ll like this even better,” he said wickedly, skimming his palm over her until he felt her nipple harden.

She let out a moan, and he allowed himself even greater liberties, catching the nub between his fingers, rolling it just a touch, tweaking it until she moaned again, and her fingers clutched frantically at his shoulders.