She could not help but scoff at the size of the building. Naturally, as an Earl, the man would have a grand manor indeed, but she had never considered how beautiful it would be, even in the black shadows of the night.
Beneath the dappling of stars across the darkness, the yellow-stone building held a breath-taking frontage with towering windows and doors. Bordered by trees and tall flowers, it made Cleopatra’s eyes widen in amazement.
Even the tall black gate with the heavy lock was ornate, swirling in metal effigies of roses and ivy. She shook off her admiration and returned her focus to the front door.
She had been standing outside for a little over an hour, waiting for the Earl to leave for the night. She was determined to discover more about the man and her next step was to sneak into his Manor and search his papers.
A man like him who held so many secrets was bound to hold the papers to many scandals in his study.
She smirked at the possibility and pressed herself further into the shadows of the neighboring manors. She pulled her slim skirts out of the pathway and the nearby orange gas lamplight, determined to stay hidden.
Nervous of a dress that would make a sound when she moved, she had opted for a slim-lined dark-green one. The thin petticoats did not make any kind of noise when she walked. The darkness of the green material cinched at the waist with a high-collared neckline that dipped down into a sharp V at her neck, promised to keep her hidden in the shadows of the night too.
She kept her darting eyes flicking between the door and the gateway, begging silently for the man to make his move.
She flicked her head to the side when noises began. Uncertain of their direction, she tried to stretch her neck to see down the side of the Manor, but the trees hid the place from view.
Is someone coming out of the side door?
She had little time to think on the matter.
She was about to step out of the shadows, thinking she could run to the gate for a better view of the side entrance, when something black and woolen was placed over her head.
Chapter Three
Cleopatra strained against the darkness – she grappled, trying to remove the hood from her face, but all she could see was black, and someone stopped her arms from moving, dragging them back down to her sides.
She tried to scream next, but her voice was muffled with the hood against her mouth. She was being forced somewhere, practically carried across the cobbles – she kicked out, scraping her boots against the cobbled street and connecting with somebody’s shin.
“Oomph!”
She took delight in the sound of pain; it encouraged her to kick out more, fear spiking inside her. Her feet then connected with something else – heavy and wooden, unmoving at her kick. When it barely rocked, horses neighed loudly.
She heard a carriage door unclick, realizing too late what she had been kicking as she was forced through the carriage door. She tumbled onto the floor of the coach, practically thrown in by her captor.
She heard a stumble of feet outside the carriage, more than one person. There were shouts, orders to ready the horses, and then one person jumped into the coach behind her.
She scrambled to her knees in her dress, trying desperately to pull the hood free, but it had been tightened around her neck.
“Good evening, Miss Beckett.” The voice shook her, making her hesitate in her grapple with the bag.
The carriage door was closed loudly and a thump against the roof indicated all was ready inside.
“Who is that? What are you doing to me?” She scrambled again with the hood, frantic to be free.
“That is the very same question I wanted to ask you. My name is Earl Alexander Trevor.”
Fear in her stomach collided with anger. They sat there together, unhappy bedfellows for a moment.
There were hands on her hood, and it was quickly released from her face. She tried to scramble away from the Earl’s hold, pulling her body back onto the seat of the carriage. She stared across the space to the person that sat opposite her.
His face was visible in the orange gas lamps from the street, allowing her to see him clearly. She had already observed him at a distance from her investigation, but it was the first time she had seen him up close. The sight of him caused a new feeling in her – something else that decided to battle with her emotions of fear and anger.
He is not what I was expecting.
She breathed heavily, analyzing his features in every detail.
He had to be tall from the way he towered over her in their seated position. He was broad, too, the shoulders set with muscle beneath the formal jacket and cravat. His hair was dark, cut short but with a couple of loose tendrils bent over his forehead.
His eyes were a misty gray-blue; they were piercing as they stared at her, making her breath hitch. His nose and jaw were angled, his mouth flat in anger.
I did not think he would look so–
She refused to let herself finish the thought.
“What do you want? You are kidnapping me, My Lord?” She pretended ignorance, but the look in his eyes showed he did not believe her.
“Do not play the fool with me, My Lady.” He lifted his hand, pointing at her in a warning.
“What fool, My Lord?”
“A fool that would pretend ignorance. I know you are the one who sold my tale to the newspaper. They paid you to destroy my reputation and I find you outside of my Manor prepared to continue your mission of ruining my life.” He was furious, gesturing toward her and his home beyond the window with ire.
“You have kidnapped me. Release me at once!”
“Not until you have paid for your crime.”
“Crime?” she repeated in disgust, wanting to laugh at the irony of their position.
He is the criminal. Murderer.
He struck the roof again, impatient for the carriage to be moving. “Go!”
The carriage leaped forward, jarring across the cobbles with the movement.
“Where are you taking me? To your gaming hall?”
“Thank you for dropping the pretense of a fool. It is so much easier to converse as true enemies.” His smirk drew her wild with fury.
To be before her brother’s killer made her angry, but to be kidnapped by him too made her reach levels she had not thought possible.
She lashed out at him across the carriage. Remembering her training from her father, she feigned a blow to his chest with her left hand – he caught it easily as was intended with her wrist in his grasp. Then she lashed out with her right hand, hoping to deliver a firm punch to his face.
Inches from where it would connect with his jaw, his other hand caught her right wrist. He was clearly too quick to be taken by surprise.
With his tight hold on both of her wrists, he dragged her from her seat toward him.
“No!” she shouted as she found herself on her knees in front of him, pressed close against him as he stared down at her.
The movement of the carriage made them even more unbearably close, his nose almost touching hers, his knees either side of her waist. Cleopatra’s breath hitched again in surprise. Her eyes were running over the features in his face, admiring them again.
She found her body betraying her. Despite her anger, it was somehow relishing the man’s touch. The hairs on the back of her arms stood on end and her breathing quickened.
He noticed it. She could see it in his eyes. She tried to turn her own gaze away, but it only found his lips as they curled into a slight smirk.
“Well, well.” At the humor in his voice, she tried to pull back, but he would not let her. He held her there, continuing to smirk as her eyes darted back up from his lips to his eyes. The gray-blue orbs were watching her closely. “You are certainly not what I was expecting, Miss Beckett.”
Cleopatra Beckett had taken Alexander very much by surprise.
When he had started tracking her movements through town, he had expected a much-older woman from Pip’s reports. Someone dowdy and a busy bod
y.
When Pip had alerted him that the woman was outside his home, he had only been able to see her slim outline in the shadows of the night. It had merely made her more vulnerable in his eyes, and it had built a hunger for retribution.
Now, with the woman on her knees in front of him, her wrists in his grasp, his eyes wandered over her repeatedly in sudden hunger of a different kind. She was a petite young woman, but the slim-line dress accentuated the curves she had.
With curly raven black hair that was currently falling out of its chignon from their tussle, she had large dark chestnut eyes in a sweet and pretty face.
Ignore it. She may be a beautiful woman, yet she has still sought to destroy you.
With those eyes staring up at him, he felt transfixed for a moment. Until he realized the way she panted and the way those eyes were flicking from his own gaze down to his lips and other parts of his body.
It seemed he was not the only one intrigued by the other’s appearance. Her attack on him he had also not expected, but it had only intrigued him more.
Miss Beckett took a minute to reply to his words. She licked her lips, drawing his gaze back down. “Oh? And pray tell what you were expecting?” Her fire only brought a greater smirk to his own mouth.
“When I heard there was a woman out to ruin me, I had expected someone old, embittered by life. Or at the least, someone I recognized. You are neither.”
She wriggled in his grasp. “Let me go!”
“I think not.”
“I will not attack again.”
“You give me your word?” He tightened his hold on her wrists for a moment, raising his eyebrows to bring home his point.
She nodded slightly, still breathless. He slowly released her, one finger at a time, to show the control he had.
She leaned away, as though she would try to return to her seat. At the last moment, she turned – lashing out with both arms again, but this time he was even more prepared for her attack.
He took both wrists again and pulled her back to the position they had been in a moment ago. This time, he brought her face closer to his.
The blush on her cheeks ran wild and her chestnut eyes darted between his. “I see your word is worth nothing,” he whispered with venom. “What else should I have expected?”
Her chest was rising and falling with her panicked breaths. It drew his gaze down to the opening of her dress above her chest.
She saw him look, that was clear by the way she tried to pull away. He would not take another chance. He reached behind him to one of the ropes at his side on the carriage bench and hurriedly tied her hands.
“What are you doing?” She grappled against him, desperate to be free.
“Call it my wish to be cautious.”
Her tussle had made him struggle, though – in the end, he brought her arms behind her back, turning her in a half-circle on her knees so he could bind the wrists in the small of her back.
She gave up the fight, allowing him to tighten the knots.
His gaze unwittingly drew to the curve of her neck as it disappeared down her dress. His eyes then followed the lines of the dress, resting on the petite waist.
He closed his eyes and shook his head, trying to tear sudden images of her from his mind. His momentary distraction was enough to give his captive time to act. With her knees bundled beneath her, she used her feet to kick out behind her – she struck his knee.
“Ahh!” Alexander winced as his kneecap bent the wrong way. His hands involuntarily went to the leg to check it was all right.
Miss Becket shuffled forward on her knees, leaping for the doorway as though she would jump out, even with the carriage now at high speed. He jumped forward, pulling her back before she could reach the door.
The movement of the carriage tossed them both. With a hand around her waist, pulling her away, they were both thrown to the floor.
Alexander fell, finding her pressed beneath him, looking up at him with those wide chestnut eyes in surprise. He braced his hands on either side of her, with his body over hers. The feel of her underneath him sent Alexander’s mind back to that hunger he had felt when he first looked at her face.
She was a beautiful and petite woman, so his imaginings ran wild with thoughts of her in a similar position in his bed. He cursed himself for those thoughts.
“What are you going to do to me?” Cleopatra’s eyes were still darting across his face.
Chapter Four
“That I have not yet decided.” The Earl smirked from his position above her.
Cleopatra bit her lip, trying to suppress her warring feelings. She was furious, terrified, and yet still allured by the man. His pressure above her had created a fluttering in her stomach.
She was painfully aware of all the places where their bodies were touching. With her hands bound behind her, it had forced her chest up toward him. Her whole torso was pressed to his. His hands were on either side of her shoulders and his knees were on either side of her legs.
Each place they were connected, she could feel the heat.
“But understand this, you are not going anywhere now, Miss Beckett.” His deep voice sent a thrill of mixed feelings through her. “Have you taken such leave of your senses that you would jump from a fast carriage in that manner?” He gestured back to the door above her head.
“I would rather die than stay in your company for a minute longer.” She lifted her head, hoping it would be threatening, but the way he kept his face still showed he was not intimidated in the slightest.
His eyes merely lowered to her lips again, making her drop her head back to the floor. “Good God! What did I ever do to you?!” he cried as he grabbed another rope from the carriage bench above their heads.
“How could you not know? I expect it is a common crime in your field of work after all,” she scoffed, scarcely believing such a killer could forget his victims.
Her stomach ached for missing Robert again. The thought of the man above her being a killer returned, and she despised her body once more for reacting to the Earl’s touch.
“What are you doing with that?” She pointed at the rope with her head. She tried to swallow past the fear she felt, but it was no good. It kept bubbling to the surface.
The man is a killer, after all. What will he do to me?
“Ensuring you do not attempt suicide again by leaping from my carriage.” He smirked as he reached behind him toward her legs. “What do you mean, Miss Beckett, of a common crime in my field?”
“It seems I am not the only one that would pretend to be a fool by pleading ignorance.” She realized he was trying to tie her ankles.
She attempted to kick out and prevent him from tying a knot, but as fast as she released one ankle from his grasp, he caught it again. His firm grasp made heat creep up her legs.
“What are you doing? Release me!”
“I think not.” He glanced back to her with raised eyebrows before returning to concentrate on his task at hand.
“Why are you doing this? At least tell me that?”
“How strange, that is the question I have been wanting to ask you.” He tightened the knots, binding her ankles together.
She brushed the toes of her leather boots, attempting to be free but without success.
“What a demon you are that you cannot recall your crime!” Her harsh words drew a darker look from him.
She tried to press herself further into the carriage floor away from him, but he had leaned down again, bracing his hands on either side of her head the better to stare her down.
“You talk of crimes, ignoring your own, and yet you believe I am the greater demon here?” He half laughed at the notion. “You have destroyed my life, and all for what, for a whim?”
“You own a gaming hall!”
“What of it? Hm?” He was so angry, it made her want to cower away, yet she could not do it.
She was drawn to the man. Unwitting it might be, but there was a tug there. Her gaze rested on his gray-blue ey
es.
“So, I led a double life, it harmed no one. I had spent years building two successful careers, two successful lives.”
“Harmed no one?”
“Yes, no one. Do you have any idea from the story you sold to The Gazette the extent to which you have catapulted my life into destruction?” His gray-blue eyes were narrowed on her.
She watched them carefully, feeling herself become strangely calm beneath him as she admired them once again. There were flecks within the color, creating the impression of the misty gray-blue.
In Temptation and Damnation with the Earl: A Steamy Historical Regency Romance Novel Page 3
