A Rake's Midnight Kiss by Anna Campbell Page B

say anything about this.”
    His lips lengthened in an unamused smile. “I thought you intended to tell your father so he banished me from the vicarage.”
    Admit that Mr. Evans had caught her swimming naked on Sedgemoor’s estate? Admit she’d kissed Mr. Evans? Lord above, it didn’t bear considering. “No.”
    “Thank you,” he said quietly.
    The silence extended. She knew they both relived those heady moments. She must go. Before he reached for her. Or heaven forbid, before she sprang at him and begged him to kiss her again and never stop.
    “Good night, Mr. Evans.” The formality was ludicrous, but she desperately needed to establish some distance between them.
    When he wasn’t being superior, he had a nice smile. “Good night, Miss Barrett.”
    Dear God, what was wrong with her? She mooned after him like a twelve-year-old. She straightened and struggled to summon the scowl that usually greeted his attempts at charm. Except he wasn’t attempting charm. He
was
charming. And she was in dire trouble.
    “To Hades with it,” he muttered. He seized her shoulders in an uncompromising grasp. Before she could protest or run—not that she tried to do either—he hauled her into his arms and kissed her hard.
    That inexplicable feeling of familiarity returned. Before she could examine it, he released her and strode away under the trees, Sirius following.
    Genevieve stood trembling where he’d left her. The moon slipped behind a cloud and the night turned dark and lonely. She drew a breath redolent of clean male scent. Clean. Tangy. Lemony.
    Lemon verbena…

Chapter Nine
     

     
    M r. Evans was Genevieve’s inept burglar.
    The next morning as she struggled to work in her study, the revelation still appalled her. How she kicked herself for taking so long to realize. The clues had always been there. The height. The subtle elegance. The beautiful voice. Curse him, the confidence with women. Although he’d been masked then, and now he dyed his hair. That dull brown had always seemed incongruous on such a spectacular man.
    Now she understood why every instinct had leaped to alert the first time he’d sauntered into the parlor. No wonder his touch had always felt familiar. It wasn’t some mystical affinity. He’d held her close when he’d disarmed her.
    Last night she’d stormed back through the dark woods, determined to denounce Mr. Evans. How she loathed a thief. Her father had spent the last ten years stealing her work without an ounce of compunction. Now the first man to kiss her turned out to be a thief too.
    Yet however much the double-dealing devil’s betrayal smarted, bewilderment outweighed anger. While she mightcall him a thief, so far he’d stolen nothing except her peace of mind and a few kisses. For the life of her, she couldn’t discern his motives for leaving empty-handed and then infiltrating the vicarage.
    What did he want? Would she be better to discover his purposes before she exposed him? Even if she accused him, what proof did she have? How could she confess that she’d been close enough to Mr. Evans to recognize his scent?
    Did he want the Harmsworth Jewel? It was the only thing here worth stealing. But so few people knew she had the artifact. Dr. Partridge at the Ashmolean Museum, who considered her article for publication. Her father was so focused on his princes that she wasn’t sure he remembered Lady Bellfield’s bequest.
    Sir Richard Harmsworth…
    Was Mr. Evans’s arrival part of a campaign to retrieve the jewel? With a nasty start, she remembered Mr. Evans offering to buy the jewel. Did he want it for himself or for Sir Richard?
    If Mr. Evans worked for Sir Richard, why hadn’t he pocketed the jewel when he broke in? He must have noticed it. After these last days, she was convinced that his deceptively lazy gaze missed little. Even if he’d overlooked it that night, she, gullible idiot she was, had placed it in his hand yesterday.
    And how on earth did Sedgemoor fit into the