And yet....
And yet.
Curse her. His eyes narrowed, and he slid his hands into his pockets. Ava was the least foolish woman he'd ever met, despite her fascination with fairy tales. She was everything wrong. Against all his self-imposed rules.
"Ava, far be it from me to comment on your situation, but hopin' to find a man who tolerates your eccentricities ain't bloody good enough. You deserve better than that. You deserve a man who loves you because you babble on about bloody plants, not despite the fact you do. You deserve someone who thinks you hung the moon in the sky, and looks forward-every day-to coming home to you."
Her eyes were wide. "Thank you."
Kincaid looked away, across the foyer of the guild. "Byrnes didn't deserve you."
And now it was her turn to sound uncomfortable. "I know."
He shot her a sharp look.
"He had four years to notice what was beneath his nose. He didn't. Clearly he wasn't the right man for me. I'm starting to see that now. Maybe... maybe it was a good thing?" Her words became a little firmer. "His friendship-and Ingrid's-is important to me. But you're right-you've always been right. I deserve more. I deserve better. I deserve someone who is going to love me for everything I am."
"You'll find him," Kincaid replied, and damn him, but he felt a hot surge of... something flood up inside him.
"In the meantime, I am considering other options," she admitted.
He didn't like those words at all.
"Other options?" he ground out.
"Well, it's no secret the state of my... ah, experience, is significantly limited. And I was talking to Perry at the wedding about the sad status of my life. She proposed an experiment."
"An experiment?" Was she suggesting what he thought she was?
"Are you all right?" Ava peered up at him curiously. "You keep repeating everything I say."
Kincaid stared at her; all those layers of muslin skirts, the way her hair drooped in its chignon, the mass of curls barely tamed by her pins. Trussed up like a porcelain doll, and a thought went through his head: Ava was a pretty pigeon, ripe for plucking.
And some man would take advantage of her.
"Just what, precisely, are you proposin' to set about? An experiment in what?"
Despite her confession of gentlemen avoiding her like the plague, there were men out there who'd not hesitate to snatch her up. Men who'd lie through their teeth just to get her in bed, who'd not take the care she needed, and break her heart without a second thought.
Men who didn't deserve a woman like Ava.
"Well, you don't have to get angry," she said, looking startled. "I'm hardly going to ruin myself. I'm just... curious. I'm a virgin and a spinster, and I think I would like to relieve myself of one of those titles-"
It was exactly what he'd expected. "Are you out of your mind?"
Ava stiffened. "Well, that's somewhat hypocritical coming from a man like you. Need I point out you were escorting a rather imposing young woman in the gardens at the back of a house of pleasure when you came upon me suffering a... a hysterical moment? You might think I was born yesterday, but I know exactly what you intended with her that night."
"Is this because of the wedding?" he asked incredulously.
Now it was her turn to get angry. "It's not because of the wedding in the way you're thinking. But it made me consider where my life is heading. And do you know what the answer to that question is? Nowhere. My life is heading nowhere. All I can see ahead of me are endless years in a laboratory-which is intellectually stimulating, don't get me wrong-but somewhat lacking in warmth. Do you know how long it's been since someone touched me? Do you know how many years have passed since my last kiss? Which, needless to say was disappointing, to say the least. I want love. I want something else. And if I cannot find love, then why not settle for passion?"
Jaysus. Kincaid stared at her, the vein in his temple throbbing in time to the heated pulse in his cock. He'd always liked Ava, but to see her temper aroused lit everything inside him on fire. He wanted to kiss her.
Right here.
Right now.
Despite the fact they were standing in the middle of the guild.
"Do you have some objection?" Ava demanded, tilting that pointed chin up.
Not an objection, no. Not to exploring her curiosity, and learning what passion felt like. The problem was... where would she look for it? "How do you even know you could trust a stranger? What if the bloodlust overcame you and you went for his throat? And he wasn't expecting it?"