Bronwyn narrowed her gaze on the unfolded swatch of fabric, reality chasing the fog of sleep from her brain when the pink stain on its snowy-white surface came into focus. She wrinkled her nose as understanding hit. A blush filled her cheeks. Oh, the cloth must have been what he’d used to clean them both up after their frenzied interlude the evening before.

“Nothing gets past you, does it,” she muttered and when he kept glaring, she shrugged. “Clearly, the evidence suggests that a minuscule amount of blood was involved during the, er…deflowering process.”

“Deflowering?” A muscle throbbed in his cheek as she took in the fact that he was already dressed. “Then it’s true. What have you done, Bronwyn?”

She lifted a brow. “Are you going to go all histrionic on me?”

“I am not histrionic.”

Her brows went higher. “You sound histrionic to me.”

“You have been compromised and we shall have to marry. There’s no other course of action.” He scrubbed a hand through his hair and then over his face, which was covered in a delicious layer of bronze scruff. Then again, he wasn’t so delicious when he was behaving like an overbearing jackanapes who thought he had the right to tell her what to do.

Bronwyn frowned. She had a foul taste in her mouth, she felt dirty from the smoke and ash of the fire, and she was exhausted. But not too exhausted to take offense. “No one is marrying anyone, Thornbury.”

“We are.”

She glared and rose, fists at her side. “No, we are not. I will not. I fail to see how it was well and good for us to do what we did when you thought I had done the act before. What is the difference?”

“You were untried. And I took you like a beast up against a tree—” He broke off in horror, the normally implacable duke clearly worked up into a lather. “Like an animal.”

“And I liked it. We both needed that.”

“Bronwyn,” he began. “I took advantage of you.”

Before he could continue, she raised a hand and stalked toward him. “Enough. You give me little credit, Your Grace, to think that I don’t have my own willpower or control over my thoughts and my person. I wanted the outlet as much as you did. I took as much advantage of you as you did of me. We are equally responsible. Stop trying to assume blame for my actions.”

The muscle in his cheek flexed. “Then we must take responsibility and do the right thing here.”

“The right thing by whom?”

A scowl split his face. “By you.”