Cecilia Grant - [Blackshear Family 03]

by A Woman Entangled

  Or maybe … maybe it hadn’t been a matter of preference. Maybe simple availability, and unavailability, had driven the lady’s choice.

  Good Lord. “You blame me,” she said, letting go the doorjamb and stepping farther into the room. Suddenly his mood, his pointed incivility, made perfect sense. “You might have been the one to go with her, but for your obligation to me. You resent me for causing you to lose that opportunity.”

  “No,” he said after a moment. He turned to face the fireplace in front of him, resting his hands on his knees. “Not really. I’m put out by the inconvenience, by the restriction to my coming and going, but I recognize I volunteered for this obligation. I recognize you aren’t knowingly interfering with my … social prospects.” He brought up a hand and dragged it over his face, from forehead to chin. “Forgive me. I oughtn’t to be speaking to you on this topic. Forgive me too for my rudeness, and my language when you first appeared. I’ve had a trying night, and I forgot myself.”

  Here was an opportunity, maybe, for them to talk as friends again. It felt like a very long time since they had. “In what way has your night been trying? Besides seeing your lady friend leave with another gentleman, I mean.” She’d had a trying night, too. She could almost certainly sympathize with his.

  “The lady friend’s departure is trial enough on its own, I assure you.” Abruptly he rose from the sofa and went to lean one elbow on the mantelpiece. He stood in shadow now, and she couldn’t read his face as well as she had. “She’s an acquaintance of several years’ standing, and I was enjoying her company after not having seen her for some months.” He adjusted some object on the mantelpiece. She couldn’t see it but it sounded like something made of china. “I met with a few other frustrations besides, but I shan’t trouble you with those. Let us regret together the absconding of Mrs. Simcox with Lord John, and let that suffice.”

  Her feet carried her forward, almost without thought. “I wish you would trouble me.” Where floor gave way to the bricks of the hearth, she stopped. Now they were both in shadow. “What are friends for, if not to hear each other’s troubles, and share theirs in turn?”

  “Do you have difficulties to share?” His head tipped forward in the dimness, as though to better read her across the four or five feet of space that divided them. “I presumed your evening to be a success. You looked to be having a fine time with Lord Barclay, when I saw you last.”

  He’d opened the very subject on which she might confide, if she felt so inclined. I’m almost sure Miss Smith is fond of Lord Barclay. And she’s been so kind to me. And I fear I may be capable of nevertheless pursuing him myself, with all my arts, if no better prospect comes along. I’m heartless, just as you’ve always said, and I’m altogether weary of being so. I’m weary of everything I am.

  But to say so would risk incurring his poor opinion, and it felt like a self-indulgence besides. She hadn’t come to spill her troubles; she’d asked to hear his. And he’d unwittingly provided her with an opening on that subject, too.

  “Nick.” One foot, then the other, stepped onto the hearth. She settled a hand on the mantelpiece, which was the nearest she could come to closing the remaining distance and laying that hand on his sleeve. “You ought to know Lord Barclay asked me about you. He asked whether I was acquainted with your family.”

  “Ah.” He half pivoted, putting his back to the fireplace. He faced toward the center of the room now, where moonlight mingled with the candlelight from the hall, rendering his features readable once more. “Yes, it stands to reason that he would.” In the silence, he pressed his lips together. That was all he planned to say on the subject.

  “Can’t we speak of it?” The words crept out, low and three times as plaintive as she’d intended. She swayed a step nearer, gloved fingers trailing to a new hold on the mantelpiece. She might almost reach him now, with an arm extended. “You know I don’t judge you. How could I? Knowing what you do of my own connections, you must—”

  “No, Kate, we cannot speak of it.” He stayed still, not facing her, but she could feel the way he shaped all his attention into a kind of shield, held up to stop her in her tracks. “I’ve nothing to say on the matter, and if I had, yours would not be the ear in which I’d choose to confide. Pardon me for saying so.”

  She blinked, and nearly had to fight back tears. Why should his statement come as such a blow? Why did she care whether he confided in her? He was right: she’d never given him reason to think of her as someone to whom he could turn in trouble. She’d been a friend of gossamer substance, teasing him when he was present at the house and scarcely sparing him a thought when he wasn’t.

  Scarcely sparing him a thought until recently.

  This is the darkness acting upon you. Some part of her consciousness, still with a hold on reason, issued that reproof. Darkness, and your memories of being kissed. Also, memories of standing under the stairs with his soap-scented coat on her shoulders. And of his brisk capability on the courtroom floor. And of Believe me, I’ve never for a moment imagined I was your brother. If he hadn’t put that knowledge in her brain, those other things might have passed unnoticed and the kiss might not have happened at all.

  “Miss Westbrook?” She’d gone some time without speaking. She had perhaps been inching nearer to him in that time. No wonder he turned toward her, tilting his head to impose himself into whatever trance possessed her, and uttering her name in that wary tone.

  “Yes,” she said, because she had better speak before he resorted to snapping his fingers or waving a hand in her face. “You needn’t tell me anything if you’d rather not. Only I thought perhaps I could be of some comfort to you.” One more step, and there was no going back now. The unwinding skein of music, faint vibrations reaching her slipper soles a partial second before the notes reached her ear told her she yet had some time before she must appear for supper. She dropped her hand on his sleeve and tilted up her face, softening her eyes, her lips, her whole form into a statement of permission, while inside, her heart galloped like a racehorse under the whip.

  BLOODY, BLOODY hell. Of all the things he didn’t need on this already ruinous night.

  No dancing around it. He made his voice low, but forceful. “For the love of God, Miss Westbrook, what do you think you’re doing?”

  Her flinch ran all the way out to her hand. He felt the quick convulsion on his forearm.

  Maybe he ought to have been gentler. Rejection of any sort must come as a harsh novelty to her. But he couldn’t afford to let her proceed even an inch farther on this course. Dark as it was, the picture of her in that red gown hovered, ready to collaborate with her fumbling invitation and haul him into activities that would cost him his self-respect.

  “I thought …” Her voice trailed off, and in the silence it was evident that she had not thought; that she’d assumed, without reflection, that she had only to signal her own inclination in order to rouse all his appetites to the proper pitch.

  What could he do but laugh? It was terribly rude—guilt flicked its lash at him as she snatched her hand away—but what other earthly response could he make? Even his earlier rudeness, when she’d first entered this room, had not, after all, been misplaced. He’d suspected her of reckless intentions with a gentleman, and he hadn’t been wrong. Besides, he needn’t coddle her feelings, capable as she was of answering slight with slight.

  “Forgive my not realizing you found the prospect so laughable.” She could pass for an affronted queen dressing down her prime minister. “I do not recall your finding it so last week.”

  Good God. It was all too ridiculous. He felt in his pocket for a handkerchief and wiped his eyes. “Lord. She was right about you.” Let that teach him never to doubt Anne Simcox again. “She was absolutely right.”

  “Who was right? With whom have you been discussing me?”

  He wouldn’t let her divert him. “You tucked me neatly away on your shelf of conquests, didn’t you, and never gave me a thought until you noticed that your spell
over me had begun to wane.”

  “That’s not true.” But he could hear the sting in her voice, the shame as she realized that it was, in fact, at least a little bit true.

  “I would have courted you, you know. Honorably.” She did know. Even without reading his note that day three years ago, she’d known damned well what was in it. She’d known what the flowers meant. “I would have given you every proper attention. And after the wedding, every improper attention as well. I would have done my utmost to be a good husband to you, not just a—” He waved his hand about, to show her this dark room in which they’d withdrawn. “There’s a great deal more a man can offer a lady than a few illicit kisses in some secret room. I hope you’ll be lucky enough to find that out one day. But I haven’t the necessary feelings, anymore, for you to find it out from me.”

  He hadn’t known how much he’d wanted to say these words. They rolled forth like one of Henry the Fifth’s more stirring speeches, albeit on a pettier subject.

  He stepped away from the hearth. “I suggest you follow my example now, and return to the ballroom. If you plan to attend more parties in future, you shall have to do so without my surreptitious chaperonage. I find I no longer have the necessary feelings for that office, either.”

  He wouldn’t even wait to see whether she followed. That was her own concern. He swung out past her, and—Good Lord, the gall of the woman!—was arrested by the sudden grasp of both her hands on his arm.

  “I don’t believe you.” She stared up at him, eyes intent, whole face written over with reckless wanting. “I felt the way you kissed me. I saw the way you looked at me when I came into the ballroom tonight. You cannot convince me you haven’t any interest at all.”

  “Katherina, it’s too late. God above, does your vanity really extend so far as to blind you to the difference between partiality and simple lust?” A warning tocsin sounded in some inner recess of his brain: he truly, truly oughtn’t to be speaking to her in this way. “I kissed you indeed, because that’s what a man does when a woman offers herself on a platter.”

  “I didn’t offer—”

  “You bloody well did.” She recoiled at the language; yanked her hands from his arm. His own hands shot out to catch her by the elbows. “And I had a good look at you in this gown because that, too, is what men do.” He stood so near her now that he could look straight down at her uncovered bosom, and he did. She was breathing hard. “I’ll wager nearly every man in the ballroom looked you over. But don’t be so foolish as to take that for a sign of regard.” He let go one elbow and skated his knuckles up her arm, catching the edges of her low sleeve in his fingers. “Every last one of them, I promise you, was calculating how to peel you out of this gown.”

  He might have blocked the slap, if he’d wanted. Plenty of time. Her eyes spelled out her intention plain enough to read by moonlight even before she jerked her hand into an awkward, clearly unpracticed swing.

  He let it come. Her kid-sheathed palm connected with his cheek, knocking his head to the side and smarting just enough to goad him into one more expression of his resolute indifference: he seized her at the waist, pulled her roughly up against him, and brought his mouth down hard on hers.

  HE WAS so angry. She could feel it in the hold of his splayed fingers against the back of her head, in the tongue that had thrust itself into her mouth without any coaxing or other preamble. His other hand, without so much as a by-your-leave, snaked round behind her and pressed her, by means of an utterly indecent grip, tight against him from the waist down. And this, too, was a way to make her feel every bit of his frustration, his disgust, his regret over the years he’d wasted in harboring such futile feelings for her.

  She caught his coat in fistfuls, one at the waist and the other somewhere round back. His mood didn’t frighten her, because she was angry, too: angry at his impertinence, angry at how craven she’d become, angry at the catastrophic timing that had brought her only now to realize she wanted him. Wanted him, and couldn’t have him, not only because she had a grand plan in which a barrister with unfortunate connections had no place but because she’d missed her chance. His tendre had persisted like a stubborn desert plant, longer than it had any reason to, until finally withering for want of sustenance.

  And then she’d noticed him. It was just as he’d said, just as some presumptuous woman had said to him. She was a shallow creature capable of wanting only those things that were beyond her reach.

  Her eyes stung with tears she absolutely would not shed. She pushed up on her toes and sent her arms around his neck, to tell him she was equal to all the anger he had.

  He understood. His hand flexed and resettled its grasp on her bottom, bolder even than it had been before, and his other hand came off the back of her head and found its way—her breath caught—found its way to her bosom, where he curved his palm over one breast as though it were his to do with what he wished. And then his kid-gloved fingertips traced the edge of her decolletage, and his thumb stroked over the silk, finding the shape of her nipple and rubbing it firm.

  She nearly buckled to the floor. The kiss was no more than an expression of their anger; the hand at her bottom a mere impudence suited to their moods, but his thumb stopped her breath, stopped her brain, filled her insides with a million tiny shooting stars.

  He felt the change in her. She could tell because he slowed and softened his kiss, teasing her lips with the tip of his tongue instead of shoving the whole thing inside. And this gave her room to answer, angling her head to encourage him, venturing her own tongue from her mouth into his.

  He groaned. She could feel the sound in his belly, so close was her body pressed to his. “Katherina.” He brought his mouth clear, rested his forehead against hers, just as he’d done in that dreadful moment last week when he’d told her they must stop. “We ought to stop.” His thumb didn’t stop, though, and crushed against him as she was, she could feel the evidence of how sorry he’d be to stop now.

  “Yes. When the supper dance ends, we’ll stop.” His touch made her so bold. She let her eyes flutter open, and twisted against him like a cat seeking to be petted in the right place.

  “You know this … this whole thing is impossible.” His eyelids sank half shut, and his hand on her bottom tightened to bring her writhing more particularly against him.

  He was right. Everything about this was impossible. Yet here they were, and in an evening when her every glance, every breath had been an act of artifice and calculation, this one thing with him felt raw and ragged and true. “Outside this room it’s impossible, yes.” She had to make him see. “Here, though, there’s no reason why we cannot—” Her words ended in a gasp as he brought his forefinger together with his thumb and pinched her nipple through the fabric. There must be wickeder and better sensations than this, once the breeding organs were involved, but they were beyond her power to imagine.

  His chest rose and fell with a great breath. He was succumbing. She knew it. “Will you come with me to the middle of the room?” He kissed her before she could make any answer. “Where the moonlight is stronger? Where I can see everything that happens on your face?”

  She nodded, blood racing with equal parts triumph and apprehension. He loosened both his indecent holds on her and went to shut the door while she stepped away from the hearth, round the sofa to where light spilled through the window and made a ghostly path on the rug. The supper dance music filtered through the floor, suddenly poignant in its jolly innocence.

  He turned the door handle before closing it, and turned it carefully back, to protect their privacy by preventing any sound from the latch. When he pivoted to face her, her heart swung about in her chest like the clapper of a bell, surely colliding with both her lungs. At this distance, where she could see the whole of him, there was no mistaking the fact that his body meant to do business with hers.

  “Don’t be afraid.” He approached, each step as deliberate and sure as if they’d done this together a hundred times. “We haven’t time
to do anything irrevocable unless we hurry. And I don’t ever like to hurry. Even without I cared for your virtue and your prospects, you’re perfectly safe.”

  I’m not. I’m lost already. I’m as wrecked and ruined as a woman can be. “I know,” she said. “I’m not afraid.”

  Then he was there before her, hands rising to find a hold on her upper arms, in the space between her bracelets and the beginnings of her sleeves. He stood, merely looking. At her face, he looked, and her nearly bare shoulders, and her decolletage, and the picture she made, top to toe, when he took a half step back to get that view.

  “You’re so beautiful,” he said, hoarse with admiration, and for as long accustomed as she was to the fact, for as much as she’d grown to feel admiration was her due, his words made her shiver.

  He touched his fingers to her chin, tipping her face up to win back her gaze, and leaned in the short distance to bring their mouths briefly together. Then he kissed her cheek. And her earlobe. And a place a little bit beneath her ear, from where he started to work his way down the side of her neck, unhurriedly, as though they had all the time in the world instead of the remaining span of one dance. “So, so beautiful,” he whispered somewhere in between kisses.

  Yes. She was. How clever of him, to put her at ease by repeating a fact of which she was most sure, and how crafty, to say the words in a way that made the fact sound wondrous and new. “Will you take off your coat?” She found his buttons with her fingertips. That would tell him, in terms palatable to masculine ears, that she liked the sight of him, too.

  His fingers tangled with hers over the buttons. One hand only: he kept the other at her shoulder, and kissed his way back up her neck to her ear even as they got all the buttons undone. As though he couldn’t bear to stop kissing her long enough to give his full attention to the coat.