Bewitched

by Melissa Lynne Blue

  His gaze lifted and Penelope’s breath caught. Vast obsidian eyes fixed directly on her, focused and unwavering, drawing her in. She descended the stairs as though to sink into the dark depths. He moved forward, each step fused with primal purpose. John took her hand and a shiver of awareness raced up her arm. Goodness. If she didn’t know better she might suspect her cousins had dosed her with a love potion.

  “Good evening, Lady Penelope.” He lifted her knuckles to his lips, never moving his smoldering gaze from hers.

  “Lord John,” she murmured. “I am so pleased you could come.”

  The ghost of a smile quirked his lips. “I brought you something.” He produced a palm size gilded frame with a small painting inside.

  A hand fluttered to her breast as she took the tiny picture. “They’re painted lilies.”

  “So you’ll always be reminded of your mother.”

  Penelope blinked back a slick of tears, so touched by the simple gift she could think of nothing suitable to say. Amazing, but her every conversation with this man turned meaningful within seconds. No practiced pleasantries or time filled with idle talk of weather and balls. John would have little patience for such, she realized. This man was genuine to his very core. And thoughtful despite his gruff exterior. This couldn’t all be the result of the love potion could it?

  “Thank you, my lord.”

  “John,” he returned softly. “My brother is the duke, I am John. Or Major Breckenridge if you prefer.”

  She smiled gently, noting the amber flecks lending a golden hue to his eyes. “I prefer John,” she answered boldly.

  He winked, the act surprisingly playful given his usually grim demeanor. “As do I. Tell me, Lady Penelope—”

  “I do hope I’m not interrupting,” a male voice boomed.

  Penelope startled. She’d nearly forgotten they were standing in a crowded entryway. She turned quickly. “Colonel Holbrook.” She bobbed a quick curtsey. “How good of you to come.”

  “Wouldn’t miss it for the world, my dear.” Colonel Holbrook’s gaze slid lazily down Penelope’s face, lingering on her bodice. “I have a meeting with your uncle later this week.” He reached out and snared her free hand, pressing a wet kiss to her fingers. “We will be discussing you.”

  There was no mistaking his intention. Unease slithered through her veins. It was growing ever more clear that her heart had no intention of reconciling with her mind the possibility of Colonel Holbrook as a suitor. “Colonel,” she said quickly, tugging her fingers from his grasp. “Are you acquainted with Lord John Breckenridge? He is a fellow soldier I’m told.”

  The colonel’s expression grew stern as he turned to John. “Breckenridge,” he clipped, challenge sparking in his eye. “I see you’ve finally returned to London. Finished hiding out?”

  Hiding? Penelope’s interest piqued. From what I wonder? She flicked her gaze back to John.

  Menace hardened his eyes to flint. John pulled his shoulders back, straightening to his full height—several inches taller than the colonel. “Holbrook, I see you’re still in London. How is that desk at the War Office treating you? Exciting?”

  Colonel Holbrook’s jaw clenched.

  Penelope gulped. The friction between the men was palpable. She must find Aunt Laura with all haste. Putting these men at a card table together would spell certain catastrophe. She needed to concentrate on getting John the antidote without other distraction. “If you gentleman will excuse me for just a moment.” She smiled sweetly, backing away. “I need a word alone with my aunt.”

  Neither man spared her an answering glance.

  Oh, dear. She couldn’t have them coming to blows!

  Just a few feet away the countess ushered guests toward the rooms prepared for the card playing. Penelope waved, easily catching the other woman’s eye. Aunt Laura beamed in welcome. Penelope slipped the small floral portrait into her reticule and quickly strode to her aunt.

  “I see you have two beaus in attendance. Are you ready to move into the card room?”

  “Aunt Laura, I’m not sure it’s wise that Lord John and Colonel Holbrook sit at the same table.”

  Laura flicked a hand dismissively. “Nonsense, darling, it will be great fun.” She winked. “Two men vying for your affections, you’ll be in your element.”

  Not hardly. “But, Aunt Laura—”

  “Uh, uh, uh. Not another word. The party is ready to begin. Fetch your partner and find your name cards.” She turned away, linking arms with Lady Hamlin, and making it perfectly clear that Penelope was not to argue further.

  Frustrated, Penelope resisted the urge to stamp her foot. Apparently disaster would not be averted after all.

  Within moments Penelope was seated at a card table beside John with Colonel Holbrook and the elderly widow, Lady Wheaton, positioned opposite them. Apparently Aunt Laura hadn’t wanted Penelope paired with any potential competition.

  The men glared at one another.

  “So, Breckenridge.” The colonel expertly shuffled the cards. “Could I interest you in a little side wager?”

  Seven

  “Ho!” Colonel Holbrook crowed. He swept the upturned cards littered across the center of the table into a pile before him. “It appears we’ve won again, Lady Wheaton.”

  John ground his teeth and shifted irritably in his wooden chair. He leaned into Penelope seated beside him. “I do believe we’re being cheated.” He could stomach losing so long as the circumstances were fair.

  Her gaze slid to meet his. “I’d noticed.” A cheeky smile tugged at her lips. “Follow my lead.”

  John quirked a questioning brow as she adopted a flirty air and leaned even closer, sliding her palm around his jacket sleeve just above the wrist.

  Penelope laughed lightly. “Forgive me, Major, I’m deplorable when it comes to card games.” Though speaking to John, she made firm, steady eye contact with Colonel Holbrook. “By the eve’s end you’ll wish to be partnered with Lady Wheaton.”

  “Nonsense,” John replied, suppressing a grin as she covertly slipped an ace from the cards still propped in his hand. “Just a run of bad luck. I have a feeling your luck is about to change.” He flipped the remaining cards onto the table. “Whose deal?”

  “Mine.” Penelope smiled sweetly and reached for the cards. John watched carefully as she scooped up the cards, shuffled and deftly flipped the cards out in clockwise order around the table. The ace from his previous hand reappeared along with one other and a king and queen of the same suit. Impressed, he shifted a sly gaze to Penelope. Her freckled cheeks flushed bright pink while her pale eyes sparkled with mischief. Not much of a gambling face, but would Holbrook or Lady Wheaton suspect sweet little Penelope of stacking the deck? Likely not.

  Lady Wheaton led out with a fairly weak card, and, as a team, Penelope and John won handily.

  When John scooped up the winning hand, the colonel sputtered in shock, mouth agape, the absolute shock of losing just one round evident in his wide, round eyes.

  It was enough. That one hand Penelope gave him—cheating ‘a cheat’ out of one point in cards, even if he lost the overall bet, was enough to make his entire evening. He’d find the opportunity to thank her later.

  Penelope’s blonde cousin—damned if he could remember her name—rushed to the table. Penelope rose anxiously and her cousin whispered furtively in her ear. “Gentleman, my lady, if you’ll excuse me.” Penelope cast a quick glance toward John, eyes brimming with nervousness, and swept from the room.

  “Odd girl,” Lady Wheaton said, taking a large gulp from her wine glass. “Pity. One could only hope she doesn’t take after her father.”

  John cocked a questioning brow. “What about her father?”

  Lady Wheaton didn’t readily answer. She appeared far too busy waving down a footman to refill her wine glass.

  “He’s known as the ‘mad earl’.” Holbrook scooped up the cards and began to shuffle.

  “The mad earl?” John shook his head. “Lord Blackmo
re is of perfectly sound mind.”

  Holbrook leaned forward, gaze narrowed on John. “Until recently perhaps. In the last couple of years the earl has become increasingly eccentric. Some are beginning to fear latent madness runs in his family.” He hesitated, squaring the cards and setting the deck in the middle of the table before folding his hands before him. “It severely hindered Lady Penelope’s chances at a decent match last season.”

  John returned Holbrook’s glare without flinching. He recognized the colonel’s attempt to warn him off of Penelope for what it was. “Which would explain her interest in you.” John stood. “If you’ll excuse me. I’ll have my man cut you a bank draft for our wager tomorrow afternoon.” He nodded to Lady Wheaton. “My lady.”

  John strode impatiently toward the outer wall of the room, pondering what he’d learned from Holbrook. Fickle society fools. To blame the girl for her father’s eccentricity. Is the ‘mad earl’ why Colton cast her aside? Was it all so simple? John glanced toward the door Lady Penelope had slipped through, wishing she’d return. Much as he hated to admit it, he’d had fun with her this evening.

  * * *

  “Do you really think this will work?” Penelope clutched the apothecary vial containing the antidote in her hand.

  Marie shrugged. “It certainly can’t make things worse.”

  Penelope nibbled her lower lip. “I suppose that’s true.”

  “We should be getting back. Hopefully Lord John and Colonel Holbrook haven’t come to blows in your absence.”

  Penelope rolled her eyes. “Your mother would love that. You go. I’ll be right behind you.”

  “Very well.” Marie squeezed her hand before turning to leave the library. “Good luck,” she called over her shoulder.

  Penelope sighed, leaning against a sturdy chair back. How would she get Lord John to drink the antidote? She hadn’t had any success giving the love potion to her desired target at the party, and—

  “Good luck with what exactly?”

  Penelope startled. “Lord John! Wh-what are you doing here?”

  As though conjured from her musings, John strode coolly into the library, one corner of his mouth quirking with wry amusement. “Looking for you.”

  “Oh. I see,” she said dumbly, wanting to kick herself as soon as the words left her mouth. John continued advancing on her, and her pulse kicked up a notch. “Did you require anything in particular?”

  “I wanted to thank you.”

  “Thank me? Whatever for?”

  “Cheating Holbrook out of that last point.” He stopped a few feet from her and grinned. “I had no idea you were so adept at cards.”

  Penelope laughed, a bit of the fun she’d experienced before Marie’s summons bubbling up in her chest. “The look on Colonel Holbrook’s face when we won that hand...”

  “Priceless,” John finished for her.

  Their gazes locked and together they laughed, the sound of their mingled merriment surprisingly harmonious. John’s eyes softened when he laughed, relaxing the stern angles of his face. He was really quite handsome.

  “Where exactly did you learn to play cards?”

  “You mean dishonestly?”

  “I do.”

  “My father bought me a beautiful gelding for my twelfth birthday. The first afternoon I took him out for a ride a dog spooked him, he threw me and I broke my leg. I spent the entire summer confined to bed. Our butler, Alfred, spent hours entertaining me and taught me to play cards.”

  “Taught you to cheat at cards more like.”

  Penelope shrugged impishly and John laughed.

  “I’m impressed,” he said, taking a couple of steps closer.

  “I just can’t believe Colonel Holbrook was cheating! I’ve always rather liked him,” Penelope said.

  John scoffed, sobering, a bit of his grim exterior replacing the glimpse of good humor she’d seen moments ago.

  “You don’t care for him I gather.” Curious, Penelope perched on the edge of a sofa. “Could I ask why?”

  John hesitated. “It’s personal,” he replied cryptically. Absently he plucked a book from a wooden end table. “Lord Byron.” He flipped through a few pages. “I don’t recognize this one.”

  Penelope raised a skeptical brow. “You’ve read Lord Byron?”

  John dropped onto the seat beside her. Penelope gulped as the cushion dipped beneath his weight, pulling her just a bit closer to him. He waved the book, fixing his dark gaze directly on her. He was so close. “Not I,” he said. “My wife.”

  “Y-Your wife? You’re married?”

  “Widowed.”

  “Oh, yes, of course.”

  “Rona was very fond of gothic novels. I purchased her enough books to fill three trunks before she died.”

  “I’m sorry,” Penelope said quietly. “She must have been very young.”

  “Two and twenty.”

  Not much older than me. Penelope drew a breath and regarded him thoughtfully for a long moment. The man intrigued her in no small way. “Did she pass recently?”

  “A little over five years.”

  “Is that what you were hiding from?”

  John’s gaze flipped to her, surprise lining his handsome face. “Holbrook’s comment wasn’t lost on you, I see.”

  She gave a sheepish shrug. “I’m afraid not.”

  His lips twisted cynically. “Have you truly heard nothing of me or my wife before now?”

  Confused, and infinitely more intrigued, Penelope shook her head. “I was raised in the country. I know very little of town gossip.”

  John muttered something under his breath before leaning forward, expression brooding. “You may as well hear the sordid tale from me. Now that I’m in London the old gossip will fly.”

  Penelope said nothing, merely waited quietly for him to continue.

  After a long moment John shifted back on the sofa, rolling a long arm along the back of the loveseat. She gulped. If his arm fell forward, it would rest on her shoulders. “I married young,” he began, “barely one and twenty to a woman of similar age, Lady Rona Baxter. It was a love match, or so I believed at the time.”

  Penelope nodded, finding herself scooting closer as he spoke.

  “I was already in the Army, which made for a great deal of time apart. Rona was hardly the type to follow the drum, you see. She demanded I resign my commission, and naturally I refused.”

  “Naturally.”

  John grew quiet, his eyes sober with a combination of bitterness and longing. “I returned from the Russian War to find she’d become pregnant in my absence.”

  Penelope gasped. “Oh, John…”

  John’s gaze remained steady. “For months I watched my wife grow round with another man’s child. There was no hiding that the babe was not mine, not when I’d been gone for months on end fighting, and the scandal… Needless to say it was the scandal of the decade.”

  “That’s why you left?”

  “In part.”

  “What happened?” Penelope murmured.

  “In the end I forgave her the affair, decided I couldn’t live without her. The gossip flew after that. Did that make me weak? Or show strength of character?” John shrugged. “I was accused of both by the whole of society.”

  “I should hardly think forgiveness makes you weak,” Penelope said seriously. “It takes a great deal of strength to forgive such an indiscretion. Rona was the weak one. Not you.”

  A wry smile touched John’s lips. “You’d be the first to believe so. In the end it didn’t matter, I had to go on without her anyway. Rona died in childbirth along with her babe.”

  “How very sad,” Penelope whispered.

  John bent forward, resting his elbows on his knees, raking his fingers through his thick dark hair. “Yes.”

  “Do you wear black because you still mourn for her?”

  John laughed. The sound was deep and gravelly. It resonated through her, and she was struck with the sudden desire to make him laugh more. “Nothing so d
ramatic I assure you. I wear black simply because I haven’t been to a tailor in years. There is no need as I’m usually in uniform.”

  “And black never goes out of style.”

  “Precisely.” He flashed a hesitant smile, the gesture crinkling the corners of his eyes and she sensed him relaxing in her presence.

  “I simply cannot imagine being unfaithful to a man fighting a war.”

  “She was lonely,” John replied. “I blame myself for that.”

  “That is hardly an excuse,” Penelope argued, disgusted at the other woman. “I am alone now and you don’t see me carrying on with men. It would be no different if I had a husband who was called away on duty. Rona knew you were a soldier before you married.”

  John leaned in suddenly, his gaze glowing with a different form of intensity. “What is it about you,” he murmured, searching her face as though to glean some magical answer. “I have laughed more with you in this one evening than I have in years.” He lifted a hand and stroked the calloused pad of his thumb along the line of her jaw, finally resting it in the cleft of her chin.

  Penelope’s heart hammered as warm tremors shivered from his touch along her skin and into her veins. This was wholly inappropriate. If anyone happened upon them it could ruin her, but she didn’t particularly care. His warm breath breezed over her mouth and her lips grew heavy, heated, and she knew the fleeting hope that he might kiss her.

  “Penelope,” he whispered, leaning in closer… closer still… His mouth hovered just above hers, and her eyes fluttered closed. His lips whispered against hers, the barest touch, and yet it touched her everywhere, more deeply than any other person had or could. She lifted her hands, intending to wrap them around his shoulders, and—