His shoulders were hunched over, weighed down by the pull of her fists on his jacket, but he was more than strong enough to lift himself away.
At least he should have been.
Her grip slackened, but still he didn’t straighten. He stayed, head lowered, the hand on her shoulder sliding until it braced against her upper back, pulling her forward, closer.
Her mouth shifted against his, no longer smashing tightly against his teeth but leaving their lips connected in a way that made him forget everything else. Forget that she’d lied, forget they were crammed into a corner of a falling-down cottage with a horse that may or may not be stolen, forget that she’d made his already tenuous life more difficult.
Or maybe he hadn’t forgotten so much as he no longer cared.
The skim of her hands sliding against his face tossed his thoughts sideways again. She cupped his jaw, the roughness of the stubble on his cheeks keeping her movements from being too fluid, but the pull made it impossible to ignore. When was the last time someone had touched his face? He even did his own shaving.
Her fingers brushed his ear, the sensation strange and new enough to break through his trance and provide the presence of mind to lift his head. He didn’t go far, as his arms had done more traveling than he’d realized and were wrapped solidly around her, keeping them pressed together as their rough breathing joined the shuffling noises of the horse beside them.
Her eyes were wide and round, as if she was as stunned as he was, even though she’d initiated the kiss.
“That isn’t how I meant to convince you,” she whispered.
“That isn’t why I believe you,” he answered, knowing it was true. Somewhere in the rant of words tripping over themselves far too quickly to be false, he’d concluded that she was telling the truth.
Despite the fact that what he wanted most at this moment was to dip his head and kiss her again, removing her lips from his had allowed a trickle of sanity to return to his mind. She may be telling the truth about the horse and accepting his job offer, but she was still attempting to hide the presence of the brother.
She shifted, drawing his attention to how she was still wrapped in his arms. She licked her lips, and his senses threatened to slide away once more. He couldn’t seem to look away, couldn’t help but analyze and measure the rest of her expression to determine what she was thinking.
He could feel her too, could feel that she wasn’t trying to pull away any more than he was. One of them needed to end this embrace, and as had been the case his entire life, Aaron could depend on no one aside from himself to do what needed to be done. The effort required to ease away from her was greater than he’d expected.
“I suppose I should be outraged, but I must confess to needing more information so I know to whom to direct my anger.”
Aaron didn’t turn. He was more interested in Miss Fitzroy’s reaction to this moment than in seeing the brother. “The missing Jonas, I presume?”
Sophia winced, ran her teeth over her bottom lip, and nodded as she looked at her brother in the open area of the cottage.
Aaron turned, slowly following her gaze to the man he’d seen in the paddock behind the circus. He was a young man, but he seemed old enough to care for his sister. There was no question of the legitimacy of their claim to be siblings, either—the same shock of red hair, oval-shaped face, slight accent.
Jonas—presumably Mr. Fitzroy—leaned one shoulder against the wall dividing the two rooms. The pose appeared casual, but unless Aaron was of a mind to climb out a window, the other man was effectively blocking the only escape route.
Mr. Fitzroy tilted his head, keeping his gaze levelly connected to Aaron’s. “Protocol in this situation is, I believe, to throw a punch or two. As I’m not of a mind to bruise my knuckles and Soph doesn’t appear all that traumatized, for now I’ll reserve the right to an altercation, if you don’t mind.”
Aaron could thank his recent exposure to Trent’s ridiculousness that he could make any sense of that maze of a sentence. At least, enough to know he could ignore it. “I saw you at the circus.”
“Aye, you did.”
Assuming these two made logical choices—a dangerous assumption given his experience thus far with Miss Fitzroy—there had to be a reason this man hadn’t presented himself as the jockey. “You were injured recently.”
“Aye.”
“Does it prevent you from riding?”
Mr. Fitzroy’s eyebrows slid upward as he glanced at his sister.
“Is there any of that rambling you didn’t catch?” Miss Fitzroy mumbled.
“I might have forgotten the last bit, but not the rest of it.” He hadn’t meant to admit that her kiss had wreaked havoc with his mind, but whatever she’d said right before going up on her toes was long forgotten.
A flush flew across her skin, and though there was no additional room in the stall-like space they were in, she pressed closer to the horse, curling herself in order to fit halfway under the animal’s neck.
Now was when she chose to be embarrassed? Not when her brother revealed himself without any indication of how long he’d been standing there? He’d never been able to understand women, but Miss Fitzroy confounded him far more than the rest of them.
A quiet chuckle came from the brother. “You aren’t much of a man about town, are you?”
“Jonas, hush.” Miss Fitzroy wrapped an arm around the horse’s neck and tried to tilt her chin up in a gesture of confidence. The position looked uncomfortable at best as she twisted her neck to look at his right shoulder. “You have nothing to worry about, Mr. Whitworth. I shall not jog your memory by attacking you again.”
Aaron frowned, mentally walking back through the conversation. Goodness, had she assumed he meant he’d forgotten their kiss? He hadn’t exactly been an impassive receiver of her attentions. “That isn’t what I meant.”
“It doesn’t matter.” She looked at her brother. “What do we do now?”
Mr. Fitzroy blinked. “I don’t even know what we’ve done, but whatever it is, I don’t think what happens next is entirely up to us, Soph.” He nodded to Aaron. “And yes, until my injury heals, riding isn’t an option.”
The man seemed to move well enough. If he was lying about an injury, he’d have made it obvious to support his lie. Walking was different from riding, though. “You were working with the circus horses.”
Another short nod. “Aye.”
The brother was apparently not afflicted with the same loose tongue as his sister.
“I can find you work in a stable. It won’t pay much, but the roof won’t leak and you’ll have an actual bed.”
Mr. Fitzroy cleared his throat. “As wonderful as that sounds, perhaps you two could come out of the stall and tell me what’s going on?”
Aaron’s own face threatened to flush at the reminder that he was still crowding Miss Fitzroy’s space. He moved quickly to the center of the room. Miss Fitzroy followed, moving the piece of wood keeping the horse in the stall and allowing the animal to roam the area and nuzzle a pile of hay scraps. “She won. Not everyone is happy about it.”
Mr. Fitzroy pushed off the wall. “Well, I am.” He wrapped his sister in a hug. “Congratulations, Soph. I knew you could do it.”