The Dark One by Ronda Thompson

the dowager’s frown. He lifted a brow in inquiry over his sins. She nodded in the direction he’d been staring since he first arrived at Lady LeGrande’s soiree.
    â€œYou’re causing the worst kind of speculation with the heated looks you constantly throw across the room at Lady Rosalind.”
    He frowned. “Have I been staring at her?” He knew he had been but seemed helpless to stop. She looked beautiful in a rose silk gown that set off her pale skin and dark hair. He couldn’t take his eyes from her.
    â€œMy, my,” the dowager clucked. “Armond Wulf has finally lost his heart. And about time, too. I told you the young woman would make a good match for you.”
    Her speculations snapped his head in the woman’s direction. “My heart isn’t what’s speaking to me when I look at Lady Rosalind; I can assure you of that.”
    The dowager gave him a good swat with her fan. “Naughty boy. Love very often begins with a strong attraction to the physical. You should try to control your lust in public, though. The way you’re staring at the young woman you might as well strip her bare and have your way with her in front of the whole social set. Do you do everything so . . . intensely?”
    He thought about the question for a moment. “Yes,” he finally answered.
    The dowager laughed. “Her stepbrother is growing more livid by the moment. You should tone it down at bit, Armond. You know she arrived on the rather pudgy arm of the disgusting Lord Penmore? I do hope the young heiress can do better than him. It would be a pity to see her wasted on such a scoundrel.”
    Rosalind had allowed the foul man to escort her to the soiree? She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever set eyes on. Why would she settle for Penmore? She could have any man in London. Any man but Armond.
    He forced his gaze from her. “Do not think to bait me into behaving foolishly where the young woman is concerned,” he warned the dowager. “You know that I have vowed to never marry.”
    â€œYou’re behaving foolishly enough on your own,” the woman said smoothly. “Why are you here, Armond? To see me? I hardly think so. You came to see her; admit that much.”
    He would not admit it to the dowager, even if it was the truth. Armond had suspected Rosalind would attendthe soiree. He had no business being here. He hadn’t been invited, though that usually proved no problem for him. People were afraid to turn him away. But he’d come anyway, again as if he couldn’t resist his pull toward her.
    â€œI did come to see you.” He turned his charm and his attention on the woman who had been a friend to his parents and hadn’t forsaken their children when the curse had come upon his family. “I adore you, and if there is a woman in all of London who could tempt me to break my vow to remain a bachelor for life, it would be you.”
    The dowager, long past her prime, blushed like a young girl. She quickly swatted him with her fan again. “Naught boy.”
    Rosalind’s resolve had weakened by the time she realized Armond had left the soiree. Obviously, the same as every other woman present, she found it nearly impossible not to glance in his direction. He was sinfully handsome, and as he spoke with the old dowager, his face relaxed and his smile, when he flashed it upon the woman, was enough to take Rosalind’s breath away.
    Franklin had insisted they leave shortly after Armond had disappeared. Now they rode home in silence, though her stepbrother still brooded across from her. Rosalind closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the seat, reliving the night’s events.
    Armond had ignored her once he’d joined the dowager. Although Rosalind should have been grateful his attention didn’t further enrage Franklin, she admitted to feeling a bit stung by Armond’s indifference toward her. Perhaps