Meghan and Miss Fairchild should be in place. At least she prayed they were, for she wanted this over. “What word, my lord?” Normally, her voice would have held a teasing lilt, but given the circumstances, it would be too cruel to raise his hopes any further.
Lord Billings’ adoration swiftly changed to lust, the question apparently as encouraging as if she’d lifted her skirts to give him a glimpse of her ankles. “Say yes.”
“Miss Rutherford.”
Catherine stilled for a moment. She would have recognized that voice in a windstorm. She spun so quickly in the direction of the voice, she nearly fell over.
Lucas.
His stare held the warmth of a glacier.
No, colder.
“I’d intended to perform the introductions when I introduced you to my sisters, but it appears you’re already acquainted with Lord Billings, the man to whom my sister will soon become engaged.”
CHAPTER SIX
Lucas’s statement hung in the air like the silence that followed.
Catherine was too busy trying to process the position in which she’d found herself. The problem was the puzzle pieces—Lord Billings, Lucas’s sister, engagement—were an unnatural fit.
The baron was the first to break the silence, his voice a study in shock and guilt. “Er, Mr. Beaumont, Miss Fairchild.” He acknowledged the younger woman with a brief bow.
Miss Fairchild?
It was only then Catherine directed her attention to the young lady at Lucas’s side. Miss Fairchild was with Lucas? Miss Fairchild was Lucas’s sister? Lucas’s sister was to marry Lord Billings? Comprehension dawned slowly and painfully.
And where were Meghan and Olivia?
“Billings, I wasn’t aware you were so well acquainted with Miss Rutherford.” No one could mistake the hard note in Lucas’s voice for anything other than tempered anger.
Lord Billings gaze darted uneasily between Lucas and Miss Fairchild. “Miss Rutherford and I are friends.” The final word was barely audible.
Lucas’s jaw tightened. Catherine dearly wished she’d thought to bring a fan as she could use something to occupy her hands.
“Lucas, are you not going to see to the introductions?” his sister chided with a click of her tongue.
Miss Fairchild’s face possessed the fresh, gamine quality of a girl who hadn’t yet passed her twentieth year. Catherine wagered she was eighteen if she was a day. And her delicate features, blonde hair, and slight build bore no resemblance to Lucas.
How could this lovely creature be his sister?
“Pardon my manners. Caroline, this is Miss Rutherford. Miss Rutherford, I’d like you to meet my sister.”
“But you haven’t the same surname.” Catherine didn’t mean it to sound like a protest but it did.
“Caroline is my half-sister. We have the same mother.” The wintery freeze hadn’t left his eyes or his voice.
As though she was trying to make up for her brother’s obvious disapproval, Miss Fairchild chimed in, “We don’t look a thing alike, do we? Hardly any of us do. You, however, look exactly like Charlotte. When my brother informed us Charlotte had a twin, I couldn’t have imagined the resemblance would be so strong.”
Catherine could only remember him mentioning two younger sisters and a brother. Were there more? And sisters, she’d thought by the way he’d spoken of them, who were younger than the woman standing before her.
“There are four of us in all,” his sister added, supplying the answer to her unspoken question.
Well at least her count was accurate. “Miss Fairchild, please excuse my abysmal manners. It’s an honor to make your acquaintance. I’m just surprised is all. I had no idea that you were a relation of Mr. Beaumont.”
Only she and Miss Fairchild understood what that meant.
“Lord Billings, would you please take my sister back to the ball. I’d like a word with Miss Rutherford.” His voice was tight with impatience.
The baron had Lucas at an advantage in title and rank, but when Lucas spoke, his mien was that of a man who gave orders with every expectation they be followed to the letter.
Quick to obey, Lord Billings proffered his arm to Miss Fairchild, which she was slow to accept. But after a quick glance up at her brother, she smiled, took the baron’s arm and allowed him to lead her back into the ballroom. Catherine watched them until they became lost in a sea of similarly garbed guests, ever conscious of the enveloping silence and Lucas’s glower.
“May I ask what you were doing out here alone with Lord Billings?” He spoke quietly, which made the underlying fury in his voice all the more potent.
Catherine swallowed. “Nothing. Nothing. He came upon me as I was going outside to take some air.” Here, of course, the truth would never do. She sensed Lucas would neither understand nor condone the activities in which she and her friends were engaged. Not many gentlemen would.
“How well acquainted?” Steel entered his voice.
“Not like that if that’s what you’re thinking,” Catherine snapped, now beginning to take offense to the vein of his questions. They were not even married much less betrothed. He had no right to sound quite so accusatory.
“Don’t you realize the man is infatuated with you?”
Catherine opened her mouth to deny it and just as quickly snapped it shut. It would do his sister little good if she lied. “For a time, yes, but I have no interest in him. And Lord Billings is well aware of that.”
“So my sister is to marry a man who was once, and by the looks of it, still is in love with my future wife?”
“You take a lot for granted,” she replied reflexively. She did love him but they’d not been together an entire hour since his return. He behaved as if they were already betrothed and his claim on her had been publicly acknowledged.
“Christ, don’t tell me the man formally courted you?” Lucas ignored her comment, for it didn’t warrant a response. If he could convince her to marry him tomorrow, they’d be wed by nightfall the following evening.
She averted her gaze and that was all the answer he required. “I won’t have my sister married to a man in love with someone else.”
“He is not in love with me. He is…well as you said infatuated. Perhaps, when they are better acquainted things will be different.”
“In New York, the man paid her daily calls for two months straight. If that didn’t do it, nothing will. The fact is you shouldn’t encourage him. It’s obvious you underestimate the strength of you charms.”
Her denial was automatic. “I did no such thing.”
“That’s not how it looked to me. If you had been standing any closer, you would have been in his lap.” Lucas hadn’t realized he could be moved to such rampant exaggeration.
For a brief instant, surprise flickered in her eyes before she let out a laugh, a giddy swell of mirth.
Lust surged within him, his anger forgotten, his jealousy tempered. Her fingers might as well have grazed his cock such was the effect of her laugh.
“Good gracious, I believe you’re actually jealous of Lord Billings.” She appeared entirely too pleased at that.
“I wonder if you understand the effect you have,” he murmured. “The way you tilt your head and the flash of your smile is all that’s required to encourage a man. By God, you look ravishing tonight.”
“Lucas, there are people about,” she protested when he grasped her elbow to pull her closer.
Without releasing her, he followed her anxious gaze, taking note of a group of gentlemen standing by the entrance of the ballroom, their voices raised in friendly discord.
“Then let’s fetch your cloak and I’ll call for my carriage.”
“Lucas, we’ve only just arrived. And what of your sister? Are you not her escort?”
“Sisters,” he corrected. His youngest sister Lydia had been dancing when he’s spotted Catherine after having searched for her since the moment they’d arrived. “We also came with their chaperone.”
“But if
we take your carriage how will they get home?” Catherine asked logically. Lucas appreciated she was entertaining his request no matter that it was ill thought out.
“Where can we go to be alone?” he asked, instead, his voice husky with need and his body growing hard with it. He’d completed his business in London early and had returned to learn from Charlotte that Catherine would be attending the same ball as his sisters. He hadn’t been able to get here fast enough. Thoughts of seeing her, touching her tonight had motivated his every action the entire day.
Desire clouded her eyes and her lips parted.
Lucas glanced around and spied a dark alcove in the adjacent hall. He quickly ushered her there. With only a haze of light spilling from the ballroom, her face was in light-gray shadows. Although he may not be able to see her as clearly as he wanted, at least here he could touch her. He drew her into his arms and savored how right she felt there.
“Have pity on me. I traveled three hours in a hackney with inadequate springs today to see you tonight. Will you send me home without a kiss?” he asked before nuzzling the place behind her ear he knew drove her crazy with desire. God, her skin was soft.
A whimper escaped her lips. “Someone might see us.”
“No one can see us,” he assured her. He ran his lips from her earlobe down the length of her jaw to her chin. Her gloved hands came up to clutch his shoulders, her breath coming rapidly now.
“You mustn’t make any noise if you don’t want to be discovered.” He kissed the side of her mouth, edging closer to his goal.
“Lucas Beaumont, you shall be the ruin of me.” Her throaty laugh suggested she wouldn’t be adverse to ruination at his hands.
“If you mean ruin for any other man, I plan to.” Anchoring her head with his hands, he lowered his head until his lips hovered above her, their lips separated by a breath. “God you’re beautiful,” he whispered. She was so much more than beautiful. For the first time in his life, his feelings for a woman made him feel entirely too vulnerable.
“You flatter me.”
“Lord, I want to do a lot more than flatter you,” he said in a low growl. His body craved the release he would find with her. Thoughts of plunging into her, feeling the wet clasp of her milking him had fueled a year of erotic dreams.
“Lucas we can—”
He caught her remaining protest in an open-mouthed kiss and groaned when his tongue touched hers. For several seconds, he luxuriated in the wetness, the heat, and the sheer decadence of the exchange.
When he drew her tongue into his mouth and sucked it between his lips, she let out a throaty moan. She opened her mouth wider and he thought he’d lose his mind. He slid his hand down to the small of her back and then lower to her rounded bottom.
He sucked on her bottom lip and ground his hips against her. His cock was hard and aching but there’d be no relief for him this evening. Something else he’d learned about himself, these masochist tendencies he’d developed since meeting her.
With a ragged moan, she tore her mouth from his and pushed him away. “We can’t,” she said her breathing uneven, her voice the sound of unfulfilled desire.
Bereft of her touch, one lucid thought barreled its way into his lust-filled brain: not here and not now. They needed somewhere more private for what he had in mind. God, it would take a minimum of two weeks to take the edge off the appetite he’d built up for her.
“Forgive me. I lost my head again.”
“A common occurrence between us it would seem.” Her voice shook slightly.
Lucas stood motionless and stared down at her, his hands clasping her narrow waist. “You can’t know how much I want you,” he whispered. Never in all his thirty-four years had he ever felt so completely drawn, consumed, overwhelmed by a woman. “Since it’s apparent I’m to remain unfulfilled tonight, I guess I’ll have to be satisfied with a dance.”
In response, her eyes darkened in passion and he was sorely tempted to kiss her again. But cognizant that there existed a limit to what he could reasonably endure before he lost his head completely and ended up taking her where she stood, he abstained.
Reluctantly, he dropped his hand from her waist and proffered his arm. Catherine accepted, smiling shyly up at him, and accompanied him back into the ballroom.
As promised, Lucas called for her at eleven the following morning, hat in hand, a mild impatience in his manner. As if he resented the time it took the butler to accept his overcoat after he escorted him into the foyer.
Catherine had been in the morning room, where she’d sat at the bow window like a war bride awaiting the return of her soldier groom. Upon her approach, she’d expected him to smile and greet her warmly—after all, they were not alone—but the look she received was the sort that caused her belly to clench, and her breathing to lose its natural rhythm. A pool of warmth flooded between her thighs. Desire overtook her person, her citadel of reserve breached with a single heated look.
Truly, had she any defense against him? Her body told her she’d lost that fight long ago.
“Lucas.”
His eyes darkened as his gaze focused on the bottom lip she worried between her teeth. “Catherine.” The smoky resonance of her name acted like a sorcerer’s spell, causing her mind to become sluggish.
“Shall I have refreshments sent to the drawing room?” The butler’s voice seemed to come from a distance, as if whispered from the far end of the corridor.
It required considerable effort, but Catherine somehow managed to tear her gaze from the desire in Lucas’s eyes and regarded Henry, vaguely surprised to see him standing there as if he weren’t intruding on something intensely private. As if he was not the third or fifth wheel—depending on the nature of the transport.
“Uh, yes please.” He was doing his duty. She, on the other hand, was being deluged by impure thoughts.
With a deferential nod, he departed, disappearing down the carnivorous hall. For a time, his fading footfall clicked in tandem with the stroke of the longcase clock.
“Shall we adjourn to the drawing room?” Only after she spoke, did she realize her voice, much like her emotions and thoughts, wasn’t altogether steady. He is just a man, she admonished. Indeed, the only man who had the power to render her breathless and tongue-tied, but a man nonetheless.
And he loved her. Her.
“Does the door have a lock?” he asked with studied nonchalance. He pointed his chin toward the room in question. “I know the library does.”
Catherine halted. What a question, was her first thought; the second one heated her face. She vividly remembered exactly what they’d done behind the locked library door.
Lucas paused and looked down at her, his eyebrow raised in question.
What a very wicked man.
A more fragile woman would have swooned. Catherine merely teetered, her equilibrium at risk for a breath-stealing moment.
Steady again, her throat closed up on her reply. “No.”
“I’d prefer a room with a lock.”
“Lucas, the servants are about.”
Lucas muttered something intelligible beneath his breath. “Then let us go outdoors. You can show me the gardens.”
“Lucas.” At best, it was a weak protest. If he had taken her by the hand and led her outside where the sun hung hidden behind bilious clouds of gray, he would have found her will as weak as her words.
He lowered his head and whispered into her ear, “I’m giving you fair warning, I am going to kiss you and I’m going to take my time about it. And I can’t guarantee that certain pieces of clothing won’t be removed from your person.”
As warnings went, it must not have carried the proper cautionary note, for it didn’t send her running in the opposite direction. Instead, all she could think about was the kiss and which piece of clothing would be removed first.
Catherine intended to laugh, to ease the tension between them to something bearable. However, the sound that passed her lips told an altogether different story. Throaty
and low, it brimmed with a promise of carnal delights. Her hand clapped over her mouth. Good Lord, where had such a sound come from? Next thing she knew, she’d be purring like a cat and rubbing herself against him.
Someone had to think straight. Lucas made it clear he would not—could not—comport himself with the required propriety and discretion. That burden now sat precariously on her shoulders.
“Perhaps it best we go to the drawing room. Would you care for a cup of tea or coffee?” Given the mad beating of her heart, Catherine was proud at how composed she sounded. Had he an inkling that it would require only the smallest provocation for her to crumble?
His gaze narrowed. “Are you quite certain?” he asked quietly, as if she’d just accepted the most foolhardy dare.
“We are only going to take a cup of tea and converse.” Not even she believed her words as she spoke them, her conviction merely the wishful thinking of someone who believed one could fight both mind and body and emerge victorious.
He observed her for several long seconds, before his mouth slanted in a half smile as if he knew something she did not.
“Indeed, then let us adjourn.” He made a sweeping gesture toward the drawing room with his hand.
Before she could move, the sound of approaching footsteps drifted from the entryway behind her.
Catherine turned expecting to see one of the servants going about their daily duties. Instead, the sight of her brother-in-law striding down the hall filled her vision.
Anxiety overtook her emotions but she managed a warm smile. Alex returned the greeting with a flash of white teeth and dimpled cheeks. His gaze then drifted to Lucas, who now faced him directly. Alex came to an abrupt halt, the kind that would have sent a person crashing into him had they been following too closely.
“Alex, we weren’t expecting you and Nicholas back until tomorrow.”
He glanced at her but quickly shifted his gaze back to Lucas. “The meeting took less time than I’d anticipated,” he replied shortly, continuing to stare at Lucas.
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