So long as no one, especially Mrs. Frommer, who needed no easy excuse to send her packing, discovered she and Gray were carrying on in such a manner. His thumb tugged her lower lip, and Lana had the strangest desire to draw it deeper into her mouth, taste the salt of his skin, and torture him as he was torturing her.
Stop, Lana. Focus.
The last thing she needed to do was encourage him, especially with a bed of black satin resting directly behind them. He would kiss her, and she already knew her willpower turned to mist at the first touch of his tongue. She didn’t want to imagine what she would do should he try to seduce her here in this room. It would involve things that gently bred ladies shouldn’t think about.
“Will you say it again?”
“Say what?” she asked, her mouth’s full range of motion impeded by the stalwart press of his thumb. Her breath deserted her at the languid look in those deep blue eyes. As if he could read the heated turn of her thoughts.
He brushed the tip of his nose to hers. “My name.”
“Don’t kiss me, Gray,” she said instead.
“That isn’t my name,” he teased, his thumb finally freeing her lip. “But you are right. I gave you my word that I would not.”
He took a long step in reverse, putting one arm’s length between them. The loss of his hands left her cold. She wanted their return. She wanted more than that. The desire to feel those black sheets at her back, and Gray’s warm body against her front, had to be the most scandalous desire she’d ever experienced.
Searching for something to distract herself, she took a gulp of the brandy sitting on the side table. The spirits burned a path to her stomach, forcing her unladylike desires at bay.
“Lord Northridge—”
“Gray.”
“Lord Northridge,” she said stubbornly. “I should leave. The hour is late.”
He nodded and stroked his chin but made no move to escort her out. “If Zakorov is as dangerous as you claim, then I will not rest until he is no longer a threat to you.”
He was in earnest, and the vow drew out the needle of fear that had pierced her earlier.
“Your friend, the peer. He has knowledge of Zakorov?” Gray asked next, all business now. She almost preferred the more flirtatious side of him to this grimly focused and solemn side.
Drat it. He’d root out it was Langlevit in an instant. “No.”
He quirked his lips into a sly grin. “The next time you attempt to lie, keep your chin down. You always kick it up an inch before you fib.”
She scowled at him and started for the door again. It was late. Brynn would be returning from the duke’s dinner soon, and Lana hadn’t readied her room yet.
Gray stayed where he was, as if he didn’t trust getting closer to her again. “I am going to help you, Lana. Whether you wish for it or not.”
She paused, her fingers fluttering over the doorknob, her eyes flicking over her shoulder. “I do not wish for it, my lord.”
“Yes, you do. You need me.”
Lana wasn’t sure whether he was talking about his help or something else entirely, and her tongue nearly tripped over its immediate response. “No.”
It was a lie.
Gray’s answer was a smile because he knew it was, too.
The corridor was empty when she stepped out of his room and closed the door behind her, without another word. She braced against it, her legs wanting to give way beneath her. She forced her hammering heart to slow its fevered pace. His sweet parting offer had almost been her undoing. For an instant, she felt the same tug of warmth on the other side of the door and knew instinctively that Gray stood there. She turned around, her fingers tracing a path on the burnished wood where his face would have been, dragging them across his stern jaw and the firm mold of his lips.
Lana pressed her cheek to the wood as a wave of longing overtook her. In another world or another time, perhaps she and Gray could have found happiness together. Right now, she could only offer half-truths and deceit. And he, though attracted to her, only took the liberties he did because he thought she was a maid. Perhaps he meant well offering his aid and protection. However, Lana doubted he would be so forward with a female of his own station. They would court, and dance, and exchange chaste kisses in the arbor. They would not want to tear each other’s clothes off at every godforsaken turn or devour each other with their eyes as he had done moments before.
If she wasn’t careful, she could lose her wits to this man. Or much more. He could reach deep into her soul with a single glance, strip her reason away with a whispered word. He made her want to trust him. But she couldn’t, not when her life—Irina’s life—hung in the balance. Regardless of her own desires, her sister’s safety was paramount. Lana flushed and levered her body away from the door…and from the man beyond it.
Lord Northridge may be a master seducer, but he was also a very proud man. A proud, honorable man. If he found out the truth about who she really was and the extent of her deceit, his humiliation would know no bounds.
Which was why she intended to be long gone before that happened.
Chapter Ten
It was late morning when Gray returned to Bishop House. He hadn’t slept the night before and had finally gotten dressed and gone out about town just after dawn. First, for a brisk morning ride, to attempt to alleviate the pent-up desire for a certain beautiful, and entirely off-limits, maid. Second, to hunt down information on Viktor Zakorov.
He entered the dining room, where his parents and his sister were finishing a late breakfast. A footman rushed to set another place at the table to the right of Lord Dinsmore. His father looked haggard and pale, and his mother even more so. Her eyes were red-rimmed from crying.
“I should have gone with you,” Gray grit out, taking his seat.
His Grace, the Duke of Bradburne and Hawksfield’s father, had been found dead in his study during the dinner party the night before.
From what Gray had pieced together from his family’s account, delivered when they had returned home after midnight, it appeared that a burglar had broken into the house and been confronted by the duke. A struggle had ensued, resulting in Bradburne’s death. Bow Street could not rule out that it had not been one of the duke’s own guests, and a full-scale inquiry had been ordered, led by one of their top agents.
The guests from last night had been ordered back to Hadley Gardens that morning for questioning by the Bow Street agent. Gray regretted not having been at the dinner last evening, and he had wanted to be there that morning as well. Then again, had he attended the duke’s dinner, he wouldn’t have met Zakorov or coaxed Lana to reveal a few of her secrets.
“We weren’t in danger, Gray. And as I told you, there was no reason for you to attend this morning,” Brynn replied. “Truly, you would have only made things worse.”
He snapped out his cloth napkin, offended. “How is that?”
“I fear you would have strangled the inquiry agent,” she replied.
“The gall of the man!” Lord Dinsmore exploded. “Wants to make a name for himself. His questions bordered on impertinence. The gall! As if one of us could be capable of something so horrific.”
Now Gray really wished he had ignored his sister’s protests and gone with them to the meeting. Instead, he’d gone in search of information on Baron Zakorov.
“The agent was a trifle excessive,” his mother conceded.
Lord Dinsmore choked on a mouthful of poached eggs. “Excessive? The man was atrocious. His questions to Briannon were appalling, insinuating that she had visited the duke’s rooms, questioning her virtue. The utter impudence!”
Gray set down his toast before taking a bite. “What’s this?”
“Papa,” Brynn said, her pleading gaze sliding to Gray a moment. “You’re going to give yourself indigestion,” she said to Lord Dinsmore. “He was only doing his job. After all, the criminal is still at large.”
“It really is awful,” Lady Dinsmore was saying, dabbing a snow white handkerchief to the corne
r of her eyes. “They think it was the Masked Marauder.”
“It could have been anyone,” Brynn was quick to say. “Mr. Thomson isn’t convinced that it is the work of the bandit.”
Her father’s eyes popped with affront. “Well, it certainly isn’t anyone we are likely to know. The effrontery of that inquiry agent, questioning us all, even Hawksfield. He is many things, but that boy is not a murderer. I’d stake my title and my fortune on it.”
As would Gray. Despite his personal feelings toward Hawksfield, he knew that Hawk had too much integrity to kill his own father. He was arrogant and had an ego the size of the entire country, but he was no murderer.
“Where have you been this morning, Gray?” Brynn asked. She, too, looked drawn. The past night’s events had taken a brutal toll on her.
“I was attending to some business matters,” he said with an evasive wave. “Nothing of import.”
After pacing his rooms all night, and then seeing to his parents and Brynn when they’d arrived home in a furor, Gray’s mind had been stretched to its limits. He’d needed sleep, but though he’d closed his eyes and tried, it hadn’t come.
Instead, his mind had swung back toward Zakorov at the card table at White’s. The other men had questioned him about the princesses. They had tried to make small talk with the visiting Russian. All of them except Lord Langlevit, who’d almost purposefully ignored Zakorov. At the time, Gray had put it down to the earl’s disappointment over learning Lady Eloise was not in London. But as the first streaks of dawn had reached through Gray’s bedroom windows, something continued to feel off about the earl’s chilly reception.
He’d taken Pharaoh to Langlevit’s house after his morning ride, on his way back toward St. James’s Square. Langlevit had not been available, but Gray had left his card and an intention to return later that afternoon. With any luck, the earl would help him bring the pieces of the puzzle together.
“Perhaps you should rest this afternoon, Brynn,” Gray said, eyeing her. She’d barely touched her food, and she seemed listless and distracted.
“We have an appointment at the modiste to be fitted for the appropriate gowns,” Lady Dinsmore said, dabbing at her eyes again.
He frowned. “Must you go today?”
“We were lucky Madame Despain could fit us in so quickly.” Lady Dinsmore sniffed. “No one was prepared for something like this. Such an unexpected tragedy. And, of course, we are expected to attend the funeral.”
The thought of being fitted for gowns at such a time seemed to be as distasteful to his sister as it did to him, if the look on her face was any signal. But it was a necessary evil. He nodded decisively. “Then I shall accompany you.”
“Gray,” Brynn began. “It really is not necessary.”
“I insist.”
She shot him a grateful look as she stood. Her hands were shaking, he noticed. Gray leaped to his feet, worry lancing through him. “Do you feel faint?”
“I’m fine,” she said, though her eyes did not meet his. Gray knew his sister well enough to know that she was hiding something, but he did not press her. Between last night’s events and today’s questioning, he’d be surprised if she weren’t overwrought. But he knew that Brynn would confide in him when she was ready. “I’m only tired. I promise I will rest when we return.”
“Come then,” he said, walking around the table to link his arm in hers. “Shall we fetch your cloak?”
The ride to Bond Street was one of the quietest Gray had ever experienced. Normally, he and Brynn would be amusedly rolling their eyes at each other over their mother’s incessant chatter, but today, the interior of the carriage had taken on a somber silence. Brynn seemed preoccupied with her own thoughts, and Gray couldn’t fault her for wanting a moment’s peace. She had, after all, been in close proximity to a murderer. It would surely test anyone’s mettle. His mother, too, seemed cowed. The terrible crime had been too close to home, and if there was one thing she prized most, it was her family.
Upon their arrival at the modiste, Gray escorted his mother and sister into the shop. He bowed to the owner, who knew him by name—thanks largely to his misspent past—and proceeded to ensconce himself in a comfortable chair while two assistants took Brynn into the back of the shop and set to work upon her. Her wan coloring worried him, and after a quarter hour had passed, he stood up and walked toward the partition closing off the back of the shop.
“Brynn, may I enter?” he asked.
“I am dressed,” she replied, and he stepped through the open door.
His sister stood in the center of the room upon a small dais, cloaked in a black crepe dress. Madam Despain’s two assistants were crouched at her hem. They stifled gasps and grins when they saw him.
Gray approached the dais and reached for Brynn’s hand. “Are you well?”
Her skin was chilled, and she looked ready to collapse in exhaustion.
“As I already told you, I am fine.”
He did not believe that for a second. His sister could be as stubborn as a pile of rocks when she chose to be.
“You were in the same house as a murderer last evening,” Gray replied. “You are not fine.”
The two assistants quit their giggling and exchanged wide-eyed looks of alarm. They continued to pin Brynn’s cuff, and Gray promised himself that he would bite his tongue and not make a scene.
“Yes, well, I am lucky enough to still be breathing, so I cannot rightfully complain.”
Gray let out a sigh and tapped his hat against his thigh. She was lucky. All the guests at last night’s doomed dinner were.
“You should not be in here,” Brynn said, her eyes fluttering to open boxes containing ladies’ lacy unmentionables.
“Don’t be ridiculous. I am your brother,” he said. “And besides that, I’m furious. Father told me what that inquiry agent insinuated with his questions.”
“Mr. Thomson was simply doing his job as investigator.”
“That or igniting a scandal,” he said.
“There you are, my lady,” one of the assistants said, placing one last pin. She turned her eyes to Gray, who did not notice her pointed look.
Brynn sighed aloud. “Dear brother, this is your cue to exit, as I am about to undress.”
With an uncomfortable scowl, Gray swiftly left to wait at the front of the shop again. His mind was a jumble of emotions—pulled every which way by his sister’s condition, the duke’s death, Lana’s troubles, and the mysterious and dangerous Zakorov. He wondered briefly whether the two events were connected but discarded the idea immediately. Zakorov was not here to kill a duke, he was here to find two rogue princesses. No, it was likely that the Masked Marauder, terrorizing his way from the countryside to the city, had thought to steal extra coin by attacking homes. Gray would send a warning to the Coopers, though with the bandit here in London, they were likely out of harm’s way. Still, he needed to make sure Sofia was safe.
As he stared out at the crowded street, his thoughts wandered back to Langlevit’s unnatural demeanor after Zakorov’s arrival at White’s. Gray wondered if the earl had had previous interaction with the man, which could account for his sudden shift in humor and his stony reception. It was a logical possibility, one his gut supported. Lana had suggested that the princesses were innocent and that Zakorov was the true traitor, and truth was, he wanted to believe her. But he was also a pragmatic man, one who considered all the evidence at hand before acting. A part of him had mistrusted Zakorov on sight, but that didn’t make the man automatically guilty. Gray would have to dig deeper. It was the sole reason he’d sought Langlevit out that morning. If the earl knew something of Zakorov, Gray was determined to uncover it.
Gray sat lost in thought until his sister appeared, looking far worse than when they’d arrived. Her face was pale except for the bruised, sleep-deprived shadows under her eyes. Their mother also seemed to notice and rushed over from where she and Madam Despain had been seated, their heads bent together in hushed whispers.
“It is just a headache,” Brynn said. Gray took her arm and sat beside her on the window bench.
“You never could lie worth a damn,” he muttered. Their mother chastised him for his language and left to finalize the arrangements for the gowns. Brynn seemed to avoid his stare, her attention wandering out the front window instead. Her expression went distant, then distraught. Remembering last night, he figured, or perhaps the morning’s questioning with this Mr. Thomson.
“You’ve lost more color,” Gray said, standing up and extending his arm as their mother returned. “I’ll escort you to the carriage, and do not even think to refuse.”
“I think a rest would be the best thing,” Brynn said quietly once they’d settled in and started along Bond Street, the traffic so congested the horses were hardly able to move.
Gray eyed her, even more concerned. Since when did Lady Briannon Findlay capitulate so easily? “I will ask Cook to prepare one of her draughts.”
“No, I just want to sleep,” she replied.
Gray watched her closely the rest of the ride, but true to her word, Brynn was almost asleep by the time they arrived back at Bishop House. As soon as she was escorted to her chamber by Lana, who did not meet Gray’s eyes once, he signaled for Colton to bring the curricle around and took his leave once more. A short drive later, Gray arrived at Leicester Square for the second time that day. Thankfully, the earl was at home. His butler announced Gray’s presence after escorting him to the study.
“Northridge,” the earl said with a guarded expression. “I received your card earlier. I apologize I wasn’t at home to receive you. Did we have a meeting that I forgot? My secretary has bungled a few of my appointments lately.”
“No, nothing like that. I wanted to speak on a matter. Is this a bad time?”
Langlevit shook his head. “Not at all. Please, have a seat.” He dismissed his butler with a curt nod and then went to the bar. “Is it too early in the afternoon for whiskey?”
“Not so long as it’s good whiskey,” Gray replied. “And I doubt you have anything but the finest.”
My Darling, My Disaster (Lords of Essex) Page 13
