by Lisa Kleypas
Somehow Alex managed to pry himself loose from her insistent grasp. “Thank you,” he muttered, stepping back to avoid her possessive hands, “but I’m occupied with…” he floundered and finished uncomfortably, “…something. Good evening.”
Hastily he turned and nearly knocked over a slim woman dressed as a milkmaid. He reached out to steady her, and she trembled. The blue eyes regarding him through the rosebud mask were soulful and awestruck. “My lord,” she murmured fearfully. “You don’t know me, but…I…I think I’m in love with you.”
Alex stared at her dumbly. Before he could reply, a temptress disguised as Cleopatra—but possessing a round face and high voice that betrayed her as the countess of Croydon—threw herself into his arms. “Gamble for me!” she cried. “I’m at your mercy, my lord. Cast your passions to the whim of fate!”
With a harassed groan, Alex pushed through the room, pursued by a coterie of eager women. He headed for the door, where Derek Craven appeared. For a man who was supposed to represent the god of merrymaking, he looked rather morose, his face dark and surly underneath a crown of grapes and leaves. They exchanged a scowling glance, and Derek tugged him aside, blocking the women from following.
Derek adopted a twisted smile as he spoke to the fretful, excited ladies. “Easy, loveys. I beg your pardons, but the prince of darkness an’ I wants to talk. Go on, now.”
Alex watched with an incredulous stare as the women departed. “Thank you,” he said feelingly, and shook his head. “After last night, they should be denouncing me as a scoundrel.”
Derek’s mouth twisted sardonically. “Instead you became the prize bull-beef o’ London.”
“That was never my intention,” Alex muttered. “Women. God knows what goes on in their minds.” He didn’t care about any woman’s opinion of him. All he wanted was Lily. “Is Lily here?”
Derek regarded him with cool sarcasm. “I would say so, milord. She’s sitting naked at a table o’ drooling bastards, trying to scalp five frigging fousand pounds off ’em.”
Alex’s face went blank. “What?”
“You ’eard me.”
“And you’ve done nothing to stop her?” Alex demanded in explosive fury.
“If you wants ’er safe,” Derek said through his teeth, “you ’as to take care ow ’er. I’m through with this ’ole crack-brained business. Keeping ’er from trouble—like trying to milk a pigeon, it is.”
“Which card room?” Alex snapped, tearing off his mask and tossing it to the floor impatiently.
“Second on the left.” Derek smiled bitterly and folded his arms across his chest as he watched Alex depart.
“Discard two,” Lily said calmly, and picked up the necessary cards from the deck. Her luck seemed to have improved ten times over since last night. In the past hour she had accumulated a meager stash of money, which she would now begin to build on. The other five men at the table were playing clumsily, their leering gazes wandering over her transparent costume, their faces registering every thought.
“Discard one,” Lord Cobham said.
Lily took a sip of brandy and studied his face. She smiled slightly as she noticed his gaze moving once more to the green velvet leaves that covered her breasts. The small room was crowded with men. Lily knew they were all staring at her. She didn’t care. By now she was beyond shame or modesty—her only thought was money. If flaunting herself would help her get the money Giuseppe had demanded, so be it. She would do anything to save Nicole, even sacrifice the last few shreds of her pride. Later she would allow herself to shrink from this memory and blush fiercely at the exhibition she had made of herself. For now…
“Discard one,” she said, flipping down a card. As she reached for another, she hesitated, feeling a hot prickling of awareness down her spine. Turning her head slowly, she saw Alex standing in the doorway of the room. No biblical angel of destruction could have looked more magnificent, his hair and skin gleaming with the rich darkness of antique gold against the blood-red garments he wore. The gray irises of his eyes smoldered wrathfully as he looked at her barely concealed body.
“Miss Lawson,” he said in an utterly controlled voice, “May I have a word with you?”
The way he stared at her made Lily tense with unease. She felt pinned to her chair, and knew a sudden urge to bolt for safety. Instead she drew on every bit of her acting ability to appear indifferent. “Later, perhaps,” she murmured, and returned her attention to her cards. “Your play, Cobham.”
Cobham didn’t move, only regarded Alex in the same transfixed manner that everyone else did.
Alex’s gaze remained on Lily. “Now,” he said, more softly than before. There was an edge to his voice that could have cut glass.
Lily stared at him, while their audience followed the exchange with intense interest. Damn him for speaking to her in front of them as if she were his property! Well, Worthy was in the room. It was his job to ensure smooth play in the gaming rooms, and remove all sources of interference. Worthy wouldn’t let Alex do anything to her. After all, she was a legitimate member of the club. She dared to give Alex a taunting smile. “I’m playing.”
“You’re leaving,” he said curtly, and took command in a blur of motion. Lily gasped in surprise as her cards were snatched from her hand and scattered over the table. Reaching for her apple, she hurled it at his head, but he ducked it easily. Suddenly she found herself smothered in his red cloak. With bewildering swiftness Alex wrapped her until she was immobile, her arms and legs tightly bound. She shrieked and struggled violently as he bent and lifted her, slinging her over his shoulder. The long wig dropped from her head, falling to a silky heap on the floor.
“You’ll have to excuse Miss Lawson,” Alex advised the men at the table. “She’s decided to cut her losses and retire for the evening. Au revoir.” Before their astonished gazes, he carried Lily out of the room, while she wriggled and shouted indignantly.
“Put me down, you arrogant bastard! There’s a law against abduction! I’ll have you arrested, you high-handed beast! Worthy, do something! Where the devil are you? Derek Craven, you detestable stinking coward, come help me!…Damn all of you…”
Cautiously Worthy followed Alex, offering tentative objections. “Lord Raiford?…er, Lord Raiford…”
“Someone get a pistol,” Lily cried, her voice diminishing as she was carted down the hall.
Still seated at the card table, the elderly Lord Cobham closed his mouth and shrugged prosaically. “P’raps it’s a good thing,” he remarked. “I might play better now. Marvelous gel, but she’s no good for straight thinking.”
“True enough,” the earl said. He scratched his white hair and mused, “On the other hand, she does my libido no end of good.”
The men chuckled and nodded appreciatively, while fresh hands were dealt.
Over the lively strains of music in the ballroom, a shrill feminine voice rose louder and louder, shouting every conceivable profanity. A few of the musicians faltered, some of them staring down into the ballroom in confusion. At a peremptory signal from Derek they continued playing valiantly, but still they craned their necks to see the cause of the commotion.
Derek leaned against a statue of Mercury, listening to the wondering exclamations of the crowd. Couples abandoned their dancing and gambling and wandered out of the central room to investigate the noise. Judging from the fading sound of Lily’s voice, Derek discerned that Raiford was taking her down a side corridor, toward the front entrance. For the first time in her life Lily had been rescued, though she didn’t seem to appreciate it. Torn between relief and agony, Derek whispered curses under his breath that easily surpassed Lily’s in foulness.
A flamboyant buck dressed as Louis XIV came back to the central room and made a laughing announcement. “Raiford’s taken our Lady Eve over his shoulder—and he’s carrying her outside like a deuced savage!”
The scene crumbled into bedlam. A good portion of the crowd swarmed outside to see, while the rest mobbed around Worthy�
��s desk, demanding that the factotum take down bets. With his usual efficiency, Worthy began scribbling furiously in a large book and announcing odds. “Two to one he’ll keep her for at least six months, twenty to one for a year—”
“I’ll wager a thousand they marry,” Lord Farmington said with drunken enthusiasm. “What are the odds on that?”
Worthy considered the question carefully. “Fifty to one, my lord.”
Excitedly the throng gathered closer around Worthy to place more bets.
As Lily wriggled helplessly on Alex’s shoulder, she twisted to see a few well-wishers following them. “This is a kidnapping, you drunken asses!” she screeched. “If you don’t stop him, you’ll be named as accessories when I charge him with abduction and…oh!”
She gasped with surprise as she felt a hard thwack on her posterior.
“Hush,” Alex said tersely. “You’re making a scene.”
“I’m making a scene? I’m…ow, damn you!” She fell into a stupefied silence after another stinging blow.
Alex’s carriage was brought around, and he carried her to the vehicle. A footman wearing a baffled expression opened the door. Unceremoniously Alex dumped Lily inside and climbed in after her. A good-natured cheer went up from the crowd of masked guests on the steps. The sound fueled Lily’s temper to an even higher blaze. “A fine thing,” she shouted out the window, “when people applaud the sight of a woman being brutalized right before their eyes!” The carriage pulled away, and the forward jolt of the vehicle toppled Lily sideways on the seat. She labored to be free of the securely wrapped cloak, nearly dumping herself on the floor. Alex watched from the opposite seat, making no move to help her.
“Where are we going?” she spluttered, wrestling with the binding fabric.
“To Swans’ Court, on Bayswater. Stop shouting.”
“A family property, is it? Don’t bother taking me there, because I won’t set one foot on the bloody—”
“Quiet.”
“I don’t care how far it is! I’ll start walking as soon as—”
“If you’re not quiet,” he interrupted with soft menace, “I’m going to give you the spanking of your life.”
Lily paused in her squirming to stare at him in outrage. “I’ve never been struck before tonight,” she said in a muffled, accusing voice. “My father never dared—”
“He never gave a damn,” Alex replied curtly. “And he should be shot for that. You’ve needed someone to spank the hell out of you for years.”
“I—” Lily began hotly, but as she met his purposeful gaze, she closed her mouth with a snap, realizing he meant it. She concentrated on freeing herself from the confining cloak, but she was swaddled as tightly as a babe. Enraged, humiliated, a little frightened, she watched him in quivering silence. She’d thought that after last night she had nothing to fear from him. Now it seemed that nothing and no one would stop him from doing what he wanted with her.
He had destroyed her last chance of winning the money to pay Giuseppe. Lily blamed herself equally as much as she blamed him. If only she hadn’t meddled in his affairs! If she had sensibly refused Zachary’s plea for help and minded her own business, Alex would still be staying in the country with Penelope and the rest of the Lawsons, giving no thought to her existence. She thought of the way she had tied him up on her bed and a feeling of hopeless dread came over her. Alex would never forgive her for humiliating him. He would pay her back a hundredfold. He would devote himself to ruining her. She did not look at him directly, but she knew his pale silver eyes were fixed on her, and that the severe red garments he wore gave him a startling, beautiful, terrifying appearance. She doubted she could feel worse if she were trapped in a carriage with the devil himself.
Eventually the carriage lurched to a halt. One of the footmen opened the door. Scooping Lily into his arms, Alex took her from the carriage and started up the steps of Swan’s Court. The footman rushed ahead of them and knocked on the door. “Mrs. Hodges,” the man called urgently. “Mrs. Hodg—”
The door was opened, and the housekeeper regarded the scene before her with dawning surprise. “You’ve returned early, my lord. I…” Her eyes rounded as she saw the woman bundled in Alex’s arms. “Gracious heavens…Lord Raiford, is she injured?”
“Not yet,” Alex said grimly, and carried Lily into the mansion.
Lily twisted against him. “You can’t make me stay here,” she cried. “I’m going to leave as soon as you put me down!”
“Not until I make a few things clear.”
Rapidly Lily glanced at her surroundings as they went through an inner hall and up a gently curving staircase with an intricate wrought-iron balustrade. The house was cool and light, decorated in a gracious but uncluttered style. It was surprisingly modern, with large windows and expensive plasterwork. She realized Alex was looking down at her, as if gauging her reaction to the mansion. “If you intended to ruin my life,” she said in a low voice, “you’ve succeeded beyond your wildest ambition. You have no idea what you’ve done to me.”
“Taken you away from a game? Denied you the chance to flaunt your little body in front of the haut ton?”
“Do you think I actually enjoyed that?” she demanded, incensed beyond all caution. “Do you think I had a choice? If it weren’t for the—”
Horrified, she caught herself just in time, unable to believe what she had been about to say. He had made her so overwrought that her darkest secret was about to come spilling forth.
Alex pounced on her words immediately. “If it weren’t for what? Does this have to do with the five thousand pounds Craven mentioned? What do you need it for?”
Lily stared at him in frozen terror, her face turning ghastly white. “Derek told you about the five thousand?” she asked in a raw voice. She couldn’t believe it. Oh God, there was no one in the world she could trust! “I…I’ll kill him, the traitor—”
“It’s a gambling debt, isn’t it,” he said grimly. “What happened to the money you inherited from your aunt? You’ve squandered an entire fortune at the gaming tables, haven’t you? Apparently you’ve reduced yourself to a hand-to-mouth existence, supporting yourself through your winnings. Of all the irresponsible—” He broke off and gritted his teeth.
Lily turned her face away, biting her lip. She burned to tell him she had not been a spendthrift, nor had she foolishly gambled away the money. It had been drained away through blackmail and the expenses of a full-time investigator, all of it spent in the effort to regain her daughter. If not for Giuseppe’s treachery, she would have led a comfortable life. Given any choice, she’d never set foot near a hazard table again! But she could hardly let him know that.
As he stared at her stubbornly averted face, Alex longed to shake and kiss and punish her, all at once. He sensed the terrible conflict inside her. She was afraid of something…she was in some kind of trouble.
He carried her into a large bedroom and closed the door. Lily was absolutely still as he set her on her feet and began to unwrap the cloak from around her. She waited with unnatural patience, keeping herself under taut control. When he pulled the binding cloak away from her, she gave a sigh of relief and flexed her arms.
Alex tossed the cloak to a chair and turned back to her. Swiftly she lashed out with all her strength and slapped him across the face with a force that turned his head to the side. The ringing blow stung her palm. As she whirled around to leave, she felt his hand clench at the back of her costume.
“Not yet,” Alex muttered.
Lily wrenched away from him violently, and gasped in astonished fury as she felt the gossamer fabric of her gown ripping. The sheer material fell away from her, and she clutched at it in panic, backing up against a wall and covering her front with her arms. Alex approached her and braced his hands on the wall, leaning over her. It seemed as if he were three times her size. His searing eyes raked over her slim body, lingering on the pagan design of the serpent painted around her. The paint had been smeared in several places, lea
ving streaks of black, green, and blue across her white skin.
“Don’t touch me,” Lily said shakily. “Or…I’ll hit you again.”
“I’m not going to touch you,” he replied sardonically. “I’m going to wait here while you wash that…” he eyed the painted snake in disgust, “…thing off. There’s a dressing room over there, and a bathing room just beyond.”
She trembled with a mixture of fear and anger. “I have some revelations for you, my lord. I’m not going to take a bath. I’m not going to sleep in your bed tonight, and I’m not going to talk with you. I know everything you’re going to say. The answer is no.”
“Oh?” His eyes narrowed. “What am I going to say?”
“That you find me attractive, and you desire me, and therefore you want me to be your mistress, until you tire of me. Then I’ll receive a generous parting gift and be free to have a string of protectors, until my looks are faded.” Lily couldn’t bring herself to look at him as she finished. “You want an arrangement.”
“I want you to take a bath,” he said quietly.
Lily’s short laugh held a tinge of hysteria. “Let me go. I’ve ruined everything for you, and now you’ve ruined everything for me. The score is settled. Just let me—” Her words were smothered as Alex bent forward and kissed her. When he lifted his head, she tried to slap him again. He was prepared this time, his hand wrapping around her wrist before her palm reached his face.
They were both still. Lily felt the scraps of her costume drop away, leaving her naked except for the streaks of paint. She flushed wildly and tried to cover herself, but he wouldn’t let go of her arm. He kept it raised high, while his gaze wandered over her in a burning sweep. The pace of his breathing accelerated until it matched her own. He stepped forward, and she shrank back against the cool panelled wall, hypnotized by the silver fire of his eyes. She whispered a plea, a denial. He didn’t listen. She felt his gently marauding hands touch her shoulders, the shallow sides of her breasts, her ribs. His palms slid over her breasts and cupped them, causing her to shiver as her nipples hardened against the squeezing pressure. His face turned rigid with passion, his thick lashes lowering as he stared down at the slim body he was caressing.
