“Ellie!” Dade didn’t turn around, but kept his attention on Attie. “Ellie, settle down.”
Ellie settled, still seething.
Dade reached across the table and took Attie’s cold little hand in his big warm one. “Tell us about her, pet.”
Attie did so, telling the whole unvarnished truth, too, since she had already fulfilled her quota of fibs for the day.
She told them about Miranda Talbot—
“Ah, Miranda!” Archie was fair to swooning. “Prospero’s daughter, Miranda! ‘Is she the goddess that hath sever’d us, / And brought us thus together?’”
“The Tempest, Act 5, Scene 1,” Iris added brightly.
—and about her nice face and her ugly gowns and how she didn’t seem to think there was anything at all wrong with having two lovers at once—
“I’ll bet she doesn’t,” Ellie snarled.
—and how she talked to Attie like a person.
They all nodded their understanding of that, for it was a common grievance among the Worthingtons that the rest of the world found them rather disconcertingly odd and behaved accordingly.
Then Attie told them about the plan she had cooked up with Mr. Button and Cabot—
Iris clapped her hands and exclaimed, “A plot twist!”
Ellie looked smug at the mention of a Lementeur wardrobe refurbishment.
—and how as soon as Miranda went to Lord Wyndham’s ball, the problem would be solved.
Orion nodded sagely. “Not a bad plan. Not bad at all.”
Attie blushed furiously at such high praise, and scowled horribly at the entire clan, exquisitely relieved that she wasn’t going to have to kill anyone after all.
Chapter Twenty
By the time Poll made it up three floors to his bedchamber, he no longer felt particularly homicidal toward Cas.
If anyone knew that Cas was inwardly writhing in pain, it was Poll. For so many years, he’d watched helplessly from the outside while Cas wrestled with his secret demons. He’d pried deeper once, only to cause his twin to pull further within himself. He’d not asked again.
The loyalty of twinship had kept Cas’s secret anyway. It was a good thing that Dade was busy running Worthington House; otherwise, even loyal Poll would not have been able to fool his eldest brother for long. Dade was always on watch for deception. Paranoid bastard. It was enough to make one want to lie. Well, lie more.
Poll knew both Orion and Lysander believed that nothing untoward had occurred in Cas’s youth. Neither of them was much inclined to romantic pursuits. Orion was as controlled as a machine, disdaining any and all emotions, while Lysander, once returned from battle, kept far as possible from destabilizing influences.
So Poll alone had kept watch on Cas, helpless to alleviate his brother’s pain, able only to distract and entertain—which, if anyone had known, would have done a lot to explain some of their wilder adventures.
Distraction had worked, mostly. Now, however, after all these years of secrets, Poll found himself very nearly gleeful.
Cas would go to Miranda at once, Poll was sure. Nothing would stop his twin now. He, Poll, would stay away for the moment. He didn’t want to admit to himself how much the thought of seeing them together still stung.
Miranda was meant for Cas. This courtship charade would simply ensure it.
On his way to his bedchamber to change out of his soaked, bloody clothing, Poll felt the swelling beneath his eye and smiled. He hadn’t had the chance to do half the damage to Cas that he would have wished. They were too equally matched.
So why did Miranda prefer Cas? Better not to ask that question. Better to wonder why did he, having known her longer, having courted her longer, feel so little passion for such a lovely woman?
There was no point in trying to fathom the mysteries of romance. Why did anyone fall in love?
Instead he sat up by his fire, fully dressed, merely biding his time. Thinking of the marks left on her fair skin, he thought he ought to check on her after Cas was well and gone.
He finally admitted to himself that he was a little worried about her. He had never seen Cas so enraged. He feared that if Miranda thought she would be visited by a gentle and courteous lover, she had perhaps best think twice.
* * *
Cas walked the streets of Mayfair until the day waned and he continued until midnight was not far off. If asked, he couldn’t have said where he’d been. The hours ran together into misty rain and sputtering streetlights and furtive shadows in the growing gloom.
It didn’t matter where he went. The problem was, Miranda was somewhere else.
When he found himself outside Miranda’s front door in the deep night he knew for certain that he was a madman. She wouldn’t even be awake, much less ready to see callers.
There was a tangle inside him. Desire. Darkness.
Dread.
Cas tried to force himself to turn around and walk away into the mist. Poll was right about him. He was no good for the endearing creature sleeping in the house before him.
She should know that. He ought not to disappear without confessing the truth to her. The fact that this allowed him to feed his aching need to see her again did not escape him. He simply didn’t care.
In the end, it was quite simple for Cas to sneak around to the tradesman entrance and let himself into the door.
There were stirrings in the kitchen, and he heard a quick light tread above him in the house, but he saw no one as he made his way to Miranda’s room.
The room was cold and quiet. The bed was fully made, untouched by sleepers of any kind. Casting a glance about the room, he found her. She sat slumped at the dressing table, her head down on one crooked arm and the other hand wrapped about the handle of silver hairbrush.
She wore the filmy wrapper that he liked.
Waiting for me.
If he woke her, would she cringe from him? Would she gaze at him mistrustfully?
He couldn’t resist touching her even so. Her dark waving hair flowed down over her one bared shoulder. Wisps of it drifted over her lips, moving with every exhalation. He reached his fingertips out to sweep those stray strands of silk back behind her ear. She was curled up, her shoulders hunched against the chill of the room.
First Cas built up the fire, digging out the best coals from the ash and arranging fresh ones around the hottest ones. As the room warmed, he wiped his hands on the towel by the pitcher and bowl, then he knelt beside her seated form.
He took her hand, as icy as it was, and opened it against his cheek. He held it there, letting her palm take in the day’s growth of beard and his warmth.
He took her cold feet onto his lap and warmed them with his palms as he watched her face. She shifted slightly and a brief play of emotions marched across her sleeping features: surprise, consternation, sensual enjoyment.
Her feet were like ice, her hands as well, when he took them in his and chafed them so gently. Like the night in the carriage. The ache of memory was no worse than he deserved.
He slipped his hands beneath her, lifting her at her knees and one arm under her shoulders. She turned into his warmth at once, nuzzling her cool cheek into his neck and draping one arm up over his neck.
He lifted her easily and walked slowly toward the bed, cradling her soft body against his.
She looked so weary. Her face was pale, except where her cheek was creased by the fabric of her sleeve. Bluish shadows showed in the early morning light. She looked like an exhausted temptress in that barely there wrapper.
He wanted her, suddenly and fully, the way she always made him feel. His erection strained at his trousers. She was soft and pliant and entirely asleep. He longed to lay her down on the bed and enter her sleeping body, to have her wake with him already inside her.
He didn’t want Poll to have her any longer. He wanted her all to himself. For the first time in his life, he had no desire to share with his twin.
For the first time in his life, he was willing to fight his twin
to the death for something he wanted.
Of course, he didn’t really want Poll dead. Not entirely dead. He wanted him gone. Far away. Far, far from his lovely Mira.
Quickly, before he could do something regrettable to her yielding and delicious form, he slid her between her covers. Then he tucked her in, all around, until only her face showed in the large bed.
* * *
Miranda roused in the dim, predawn light to find her fireside chair had been pulled to her bed, like a sickbed vigil. She stared blurrily at the dark figure of the large, broad-shouldered man draped uncomfortably in her dainty flowered-chintz seat.
“You are here.”
He looked up at once, his gaze concerned—and a little careful. He seemed almost apologetic as he leaned forward to take her outstretched hand.
“Hello. Are you warm enough yet?”
She was quite exquisitely warm and comfortable. “No, I’m freezing.” She shivered and gave his hand a little tug. He took the hint and climbed in next to her fully clothed, although he did remove his boots.
He pulled her close. “Is that better?”
She tucked her face and hands into his chest, as she had done that chilly night in the carriage. “It will be.” It was.
“I found you sitting up at your dressing table, freezing. Why would you do such a thing with a nice warm bed so close by?”
“I was waiting for you. I worried this morning when Poll left. He seemed so angry at you. I didn’t want to go to bed in case one of you came back.”
He hadn’t come, out of shame. Poll had not come, probably out of the anger that she sensed. They’d both spun about in their own minds, full of fury and selfish sulking, leaving her to wait and wait.
He kissed her brow. “I’m sorry. That anger was not directed toward you.” That was the truth. “I am … I am so sorry I hurt you. That was not easy for me to hear.” More fragments of truth for her.
She snuggled closer. “I am quite well, you know.”
He’d been too wild with her. Yet even now he felt that wildness stirring within him.
He must be careful. No matter what, he must remain in control. Miranda tugged at his waistcoat, reminding him of her presence and pulling him back from the war within him.
“Are you listening? I am not harmed, just a bit sore.”
He stroked a strand of silken hair back from her face and nodded, seeming satisfied with her response. Then he rose to pace the room once. That didn’t seem to help, for he walked to the foot of the bed and sat there, gazing at the floor darkly.
Miranda slid out from beneath the covers and lowered her feet to the floor. It too was warm. She padded around the bed to frown down at him, one arm wrapped about the bedpost.
“What troubles you, Cas?”
He ran a hand through his hair. “I am not like Poll,” he muttered.
She almost smiled. “Yes, I’ve noticed. I like you the way you are.”
He shook off her words. “Poll is whole. He could make you happy—”
Miranda opened her mouth to tell him of the ludicrous kiss, then remembered that she had been instructed not to. She bit her lip instead as Cas hunched his shoulders, leaning his elbows on his knees.
“I’m not that sort of man.” The words came hard but Cas forced himself to straighten and meet her eyes. “I cannot … I cannot open to you. I…” He gazed into her sea green eyes and knew she did not understand. “If I were to—to fall in love, I should have to be open, to trust and share, bring that into the light. I can’t.”
“I don’t understand.” Her look was simple and direct. “I want to understand. What does that mean to you, to be open?”
“To be open means to be helpless before someone. Naked, with no lies or stories or boundaries between you. I was open once—open and young and naïve and so, so unwise.”
“Oh.” She looked thoughtful. “I wish I could be unwise. I have spend my entire life being prudent. I have been careful since I was a child. Careful of every word I say, every move I make. I dress carefully, I speak carefully.”
“You sleep carefully.” He smiled slightly. “You sleep as if someone is watching.”
Her lips quirked. “Apparently, someone is watching.”
“Just tonight. What of all the other nights of your life?”
She released the anchor of the bedpost and advanced upon him, moving slowly until she stood between his open knees. She reached a tentative hand to stroke his hair back from his temple. He didn’t pull away, although his eyes dropped from hers. “There was one time I wasn’t careful,” she said softly. “I was not careful last night. I forgot to be, the moment you touched me.
Lifting his eyes, he gazed back at her, knowing what she wanted him to say, what shone in her eyes like hope but he would not lie, not to her.
“I did not forget.” He shook his head at her disappointment. “Mira. I cannot. My heart, what … what is inside my heart—” No. “I cannot!” The dread grew within him. He wanted to stand up, to stride around the room, to shake off his rising turmoil. Her body blocked his way—and he knew if he reached out to move her, then he would touch her. If he touched her, he would never let her go.
So he flexed his jaw and stared over her shoulder, for he could not meet her deep-sea gaze. “I wish I could make you understand. It isn’t as though I do not look around me and see others with their hearts alight, with their hopes and dreams written on their faces. But I cannot. I cannot unknow what I know.”
“What is it that you think you know?” Her voice was a breath of a whisper that stirred his hair.
He closed his eyes against the need that surged into his chest. “None of it is true. What people think is love is simply desire meeting desire. Loneliness meeting loneliness, at its best. Madness meeting madness, at its worst.”
He forced himself to meet her gaze then. He looked into her eyes and told the truth to a woman for the first time in more than ten years. “There is no such thing as love.”
“I see.” She lifted her chin. “Then I suppose I must settle for unwise.”
Chapter Twenty-one
Miranda stepped closer, moving his thighs wide, and settled her hands lightly upon his shoulders. Curiosity was wide-awake with hunter’s gaze unblinking. “Show me how to be unwise, Cas. Teach me.”
“You do not wish to learn what I know.”
She considered him for a long moment, then dared. “Should I ask Poll to teach me what he knows, then?”
His entire body went tight beneath her perceptive hands. Ah. If the muscle in his jaw flexed any harder, she feared he might break his teeth.
“You are very beautiful, especially in that wicked excuse for a wrapper,” he noted. “That translucent silk shows everything.”
She could not help glancing down at herself. Arousing his interest had been her only intention in donning it.
He went on thoughtfully. “I think you would make an admirable harem slave, with a bit of training.”
She swallowed. “Training?” She lifted her head to catch his gaze and she saw it.
The fire, like glowing coals deep in the jungle green of his eyes.
He wanted to burn with her.
A shuddering thrill raced through her, straight to her lower belly. Good. She wanted to combust with him. She wanted to scorch him right back. This, then, must be something new for him to teach her. She was an excellent student, so she lifted her chin and slowly untied the closure of the barely there dressing gown. She let it slip down off her shoulders to pool around her feet. “Train me.”
His narrowed gaze was shadowed. “I will not stop once begun. You will want me to stop, but you will wish in vain. You must embark knowing this.”
Heat pooled between her thighs. “I understand.”
“No, you don’t. But you will.” He reached his hands to toy with her breasts. He took the heavy weight of them in his hands and squeezed gently, pushing them high. “Lovely Mira.” Then he slid his fingertips to her nipples and tweaked them until
they surpassed their already pointed state.
He did not stop there. When her nipples were pink and rigid, he took them in his fingertips and squeezed them, twisting slowly. A whimper of surprise escaped Miranda.
He squeezed harder, just for an instant. “Mira, do you like this?”
She nodded. She did like it, for the sweet, hot tingle afterward was like a reward for enduring the pain. He twisted again, slowly but ruthlessly, until she gasped aloud.
“Are they throbbing, Mira? Can you feel your heartbeat in your nipples?”
She shook her head, not understanding but willing to learn.
So he showed her. She stood utterly still as he took her to the edge of pain, over and over again, until her pink nipples became red and swollen and she felt the hot pulse of her heart in each of them.
The wickedness of his torture, the look of banked heat in his eyes as he watched her gasp and writhe for him, the naughtiness of standing before him naked while he sat before her clothed had Miranda’s thighs wet with arousal.
“You did very well. Do you like this now?” He brushed his palms over her sore nipples, barely touching. She gasped and quivered at the rich rush of sensation.
“Oh yes,” she breathed.
“Now you’ll feel everything,” he told her mysteriously.
He slid his hands down to grasp her small waist and pulled her into his lap.
Miranda found herself lying across Mr. Worthington’s thighs, not in a friendly, faceup, “let me kiss you for hours” way—but in a facedown, “you’ll never steal from the cookie jar again!” way.
“But—”
In a swift moment, he caught at her hands and pinned them behind her, one large hand wrapping easily around both her wrists. With no way to hold herself up, she was forced to lie with her face in the coverlet. Her hair fell about her, blocking her vision. Her throbbing nipples rubbed against the nubby wool of her coverlet, a fresh torture.
“Cas, I don’t believe I—”
His open hand came down upon her bare bottom, a light slap that stole her words with shock.
And Then Comes Marriage Page 18
