by Claudia Dain
“Isn’t it? That’s what I heard you to say,” Iveston said, taking her rather firmly by the arm and nearly pulling her about the room. She cast a glance at his face.
He did not look any different than he normally did, though perhaps a bit more contained. As he was rather known for being contained, she was not at all certain how she was able to make the distinction in degree, but she was. Iveston was annoyed. Perhaps more than annoyed. Enraged?
Ridiculous. A man of his retiring nature didn’t have the necessary spirit to engage in anything as energetic as rage.
Or passion.
Where had that thought come from? It was most inappropriate and entirely off the point. She cared nothing for Iveston’s passion or rage, or more truly said, lack of either, or both. Very likely both.
She looked at him again, this time with more force, and was nearly astonished to see that the area just below his earlobe and just above the folds of his snowy cravat was chalk white. She had discovered that men, when annoyed or enraged or anything in between, had the tendency to go either red or white in their physical responses. Iveston was clearly a white. Her father was a red. Her brother was also a red. She, being a woman of remarkable composure and therefore with no occasion to be either annoyed or enraged, did neither. Her complexion was as constant as her composure.
But just looking at that tiny splash of white on his pale skin did arouse the smallest degree of curiosity. How far down did that miniscule display of broken composure descend? To his neck? To his throat? As a matter of scientific discovery, surely it was a logical question. Did Iveston even know that he was sporting a telltale mark of white? Would he care that she had seen it?
Of course he would.
And that, for entirely inexplicable reasons, made her smile.
“Find this all very amusing, do you?” he said under his breath.
“Not at all. I merely have a cordial nature. Unlike others I could name.”
“Go ahead. Name them,” he said. “I should like very much to hear your entire list.”
“My entire list of what?”
“Whom, Miss Prestwick. List of whom. I should like to know precisely which men you intend to cajole into offering for you, by way of White’s book, of course. That does seem to be your method, doesn’t it?”
“I’ve never cajoled anyone into doing anything in my life,” she said on a huff of outrage. Of all the insults! As if she would stoop to such asinine behavior. Did he think her no better than a shopkeeper’s assistant, trying to cajole the baker’s boy into marriage?
Iveston looked down at her with a very superior air and said, “Trust you to be insulted by being accused of cajolery.”
“I can see that no one has ever accused you of it. It’s demeaning in the extreme, Lord Iveston. As if, why, as if I cannot form a logical thought and see it to fruition.”
“Thoughts do not come to fruition, Miss Prestwick. Actions, however, do,” he said, tugging her around the room. They looked perfectly ridiculous; she was certain of it. “You have set many actions into play. How do you propose to pick all the fruit that shall surely come of it? And by fruit, of course I mean husbands.”
“I only require one husband, Lord Iveston, as must be perfectly obvious, even to you.”
She winced slightly as the words left her mouth. Bother it, but if one wanted to be very particular about it, and she was quite certain that Iveston was in a very particular frame of mind at the moment, one could take her remark as being slightly, but only slightly, insulting. She glanced up at him.
The white spot below his ear had grown slightly and was now very definitely trailing down below his cravat.
It was utterly fascinating. And what else to think but that she was making progress of a sort? She did enjoy making progress, in any endeavor. She wasn’t at all fussy about that.
“As to that, Miss Prestwick, I should say it’s not obvious to me or to anyone else,” Iveston gritted out, nodding politely at Mrs. Anne Warren, who was standing next to her betrothed, Lord Staverton. Staverton and Mrs. Warren nodded in reply, but said nothing. How could they? Iveston was nearly dragging her around the room. “As there are two wagers on White’s book, and as there are two names which appear, and as the odds are currently running in Edenham’s favor, I should think the only thing that is perfectly obvious is that you have a penchant for making a spectacle of yourself and that you have arranged for me to be made a spectacle right alongside you. I, Miss Prestwick, have no such inclinations.”
“Oh, now really, Lord Iveston,” she said, digging in her heels. Iveston did not appear to notice. “I think you are far too—”
Iveston stopped so abruptly that she nearly tripped. “I am far too what, Miss Prestwick?” he breathed, and not at all nicely, either. Why, he looked nearly enraged.
It was most inappropriate of her, but she did feel the urge to giggle, which would have been a terrible breach of etiquette and in the worst possible form. So she didn’t. But it was a struggle.
“Far too long of limb, Lord Iveston,” she said. “You’ve run me to ground. I can’t keep pace with you at all.” And she put her hand to her heart, to illustrate. That her heart happened to be buried beneath her very fine bosom was none of her doing, was it? That Iveston’s vivid blue gaze followed the movement of her hand and lingered was none of her doing either.
“Miss Prestwick,” he said quietly, “I think ’tis you who have set the pace.”
“I shall take that as a compliment, Lord Iveston,” she said, staring up at him.
He was a fine-looking man, white spot and all. Did he have a white spot of frustration on the other side? She’d just have to arrange for him to turn his head, wouldn’t she? Or perhaps to work his cravat down a bit so that she could see farther down his neck. That would take considerable doing, but she was quite certain she was up to the challenge. He was only a man, after all, and not even a duke yet. How much resistance could he offer her?
“I thought you would,” he said. “But as you are fatigued, certainly by the heat of the room, and as we have so much to discuss, I shall escort you out of the room, shall I?”
Naturally, he wasn’t asking at all and proceeded, under the false banner of concern for her welfare, to whisk her out of the room before she could say a word otherwise. And she was quite certain she would have, if given any chance at all. Quite certain.
“I’M back to White’s,” Lord George Blakesley said the moment Iveston swept Penelope Prestwick out of the room. “I need to get my name on that wager. He’s doing quite well, which I’m certain will surprise some, but not I.”
“Some?” Sophia said. “By which you mean Edenham? A man does tend to put more emphasis on a woman’s cordial nature and pleasant aspect than perhaps he should. Just because a woman smiles at a man is no reason to think that she’ll take him for a husband. If that were so, I’d have been married scores of times.”
George Grey looked at her and said, “And she’d hardly take him for a lover. Not a woman with her ideas.”
“Ideas?” Lord George asked, looking Grey over. Grey returned the look.
“Marriage ideas,” Grey answered. “It’s after marriage that women of your country take lovers, isn’t it?”
Lord George Blakesley, who was truly a remarkable-looking man, looked with rather a chilly demeanor at George Grey, who had only pointed out the obvious, after all, and was also not a man to be intimidated by something as inconsequential as a cool stare. Really, one would almost suppose that Lord George had forgotten with whom he was conversing.
“Not all women,” Lord George responded. “Certainly no wife of Iveston’s would ever find the need.”
“They do it for need? Not want?” Grey asked.
Sophia very nearly laughed, but as it would have made matters much worse than they currently were, and as this evening had just begun, things being worse, or better, depending upon one’s perspective, would have to wait until later. And she was quite certain there would be a later and that
things, as defined by Penelope Prestwick, would most definitely get much, much worse. Or better. Very likely both.
“Were we discussing Lord Iveston?” she asked. “Is he to soon marry, Lord George? All part of a wager, I daresay. Didn’t you have a wager of your own to put down? Something about White’s?”
Casting a final, or one hoped it was final, dim and coldly forbidding look at Grey, who rebuffed it completely, Lord George Blakesley made his excuses, casting a final look at Lady Lanreath before he made his way through the reception room and out onto the street. He would be back, of that she was certain. Lady Lanreath’s pointed stare at his back all but declared it.
“What is a London Season, Sophia?” George Grey asked her, staring at Lady Lanreath, his gaze moving casually to her sister, Lady Paignton. Lady Paignton stared at him and smiled, a slow smile of pure invitation. “Beyond a dance between beds?”
“Politics, darling George,” she answered him, “which can happen in the space between one bed and another. Do not imagine that the English cannot indulge their passions while fueling their ambitions. They are quite adept at it, I’m afraid.”
George turned his black-eyed gaze upon her. He was quite tall and looked quite well in his English tailoring and his fine cravat. He looked like every other man in the room in his dress, and nothing like them in his deportment. Which was just as it should have been.
“If I climb into a woman’s bed, it won’t be for politics,” he said.
“If you climb into a bed, it will serve someone’s purpose, political or not, George. Have a care. The lion is the totem of the English. It is apt.”
“And I am of the Wolf Clan, Sophia, as are you,” he answered with the sliver of a smile. “I am not afraid of lions, as you are not.”
Sophia smiled and nodded softly. “I am not, but have a care, George. Even a wolf is wary of the lion.”
“Or the lioness?”
“Especially the lioness.”
George looked again at Lady Paignton. Bernadette looked quite as seductive as she normally did, which was quite a lot. Small wonder that George was tempted.
As to temptations, what was Miss Prestwick doing to poor Lord Iveston behind that door?
Fourteen
THE reception room at Lanreath House was done up in ivory and rose. The drawing room was also a confection of ivory and gilding, the major difference between the two rooms being the design of the plasterwork and the amount of gilding. The drawing room had less gilding on the walls, but the chairs were gilded and upholstered in dark cream damask.
Lord Iveston, with his pale complexion and light blond hair should have disappeared against the drawing room walls, but he didn’t. He didn’t disappear in the least regard. It might have been his eyes. His eyes, so blue, so hot, looked nearly to burn a hole of outrage right through her.
Who would have thought he had it in him?
Of course, they were hardly alone. There were servants aplenty and the dining room was just beyond the door, which was also abuzz with activity. A soiree was many things in that many avenues of entertainment were offered. The three rooms which comprised the main rooms of this floor would be full of guests until dawn, once all the guests arrived, of course. They hadn’t yet. And, according to Iveston, it was all because of that tiny little wager George had made for her.
He was going on about it now, on and on, while she stared at him, not bothering to listen to his words, because she had deduced what he was going on about after the first sentence or two, but he had clearly felt the need to go on and on about the same thing, as men so often did, and so she found herself studying his face and reminding herself that he couldn’t possibly ruin her as they were not even remotely alone.
She was not entirely certain she was happy about that. Oh, she knew she ought to be happy, but she was not truly certain that she was.
How perfectly odd.
She found herself thinking that rather a lot. She’d never thought it before meeting Lord Iveston. And that caused her to ponder. She liked to ponder. She did not believe anything was ever gained by an impulsive display of emotion or raw reaction. No, the thing to do when caught unawares by a situation was to ponder it, considering all the elements.
Lord Iveston was a most unexpected element.
“I do appreciate it when I am listened to, Miss Prestwick,” Iveston said crisply, practically looming over her.
She shook her head briskly, shaking herself back into the conversation, as it were, and said, “But of course you do, Lord Iveston. I’m quite positive that could be said of anyone. I myself come perilously close to demanding it. I can’t abide being ignored.”
Iveston looked quite near to grinning. Then he seemed to get hold of himself and suppress the urge. Quite rightly, too. As he was giving a good show of being angry with her, smiling would have ruined the effect completely.
Which, naturally, made her smile, and not at all hesitantly either.
“I do think you should look at least slightly abashed, if not flatly ashamed,” he said. “I look the worst fool for having placed that wager. It was not at all what we agreed to, Miss Prestwick.”
“I am aware of that, Lord Iveston, but I found myself in a position which would allow me no other course.”
“And what position was that?” he said. As he was standing quite close to her, his head dipped down to speak very nearly into her ear, all for the servants, she was certain. He was trying to be discreet, which was very thoughtful of him, indeed.
Indeed.
The skin on the back of her neck tingled and her knees felt a bit watery. She couldn’t think why. It was only the Marquis of Iveston, and he was no man to cause watery tingles.
“Position?” she said, her voice coming out quite soft. For the servants, obviously. There were still servants in the room. Weren’t there? She couldn’t see around Iveston to find out. It had gone quiet, hadn’t it?
“Yes,” he breathed, leaning closer. “Position. Prone, were you? Unable to fight back?”
She took a firm breath, shaking her head at him in admonishment, shaking away the tingles. “I am always able to fight back, Lord Iveston, prone or not. And I was certainly not prone. How inappropriate that would have been.”
“And you never do anything inappropriate,” he said, tracing his finger down the seam in her glove.
Now her elbows felt a bit watery. Most distracting.
“I do not make a habit of it,” she said.
“But you do make an occasion of it.”
“An occasion? No, of course not,” she said.
“An exception then?” he said, slipping his finger inside the top of her glove and pulling it down an inch, then two, then three. Stupid glover, to make her gloves so ineffectual. She couldn’t take her eyes off his finger in her glove. And she couldn’t think why not.
“An exception?” she said softly. “That doesn’t make any sense, Lord Iveston. Does it?”
And then she made the mistake, the wild miscalculation, of raising her glance to look into his eyes. She floundered in a blazing blue ocean of such quiet intensity that it quite took her breath away.
“But of course it does, Penelope,” he breathed. “And I am the exception. The inappropriate exception.”
He kissed her then, having given her all the warning in the world that he would.
She let him. Worse, she participated. Not much, not to any sort of disgraceful, distasteful degree, but still. She did participate.
In fact, she raised herself up on her tiptoes and, it was horrid to admit, actually leaned in to his kiss.
He appeared to like it very well.
He placed his hands on her waist and pulled her into him. She liked it. She didn’t suppose there was anything wrong with enjoying a man’s kiss, was there? He was, something of a shock, quite good at it.
Quite good at it.
His mouth was … oh, why be poetical about it? It was wonderful. His hands felt so large on her, quite encompassing her ribs. She felt nearly de
licate.
And she felt very definitely watery. Simply and completely watery.
He lifted his mouth, nibbling at her lips, and then, every gesture declaring that he was having the most difficult time stopping completely, which was slightly charming of him, murmured, “You’ve been kissed before.”
“Which is why I do it so well,” she said, dropping back down from her toes to her heels. She felt a bit wobbly, which was completely unexpected. Watery and now wobbly. What worse could befall her?
Lord Iveston looked neither amused nor pleased by her revelation. Again, peculiar. What man of logic and efficiency would want a skittish and ignorant bride? Of course she knew very well that there were hardly any men at all who were logical and efficient in their thinking, and she was therefore almost certain not to marry one, but as she was not going to marry Iveston she did him the honor of speaking plainly to him. It was simply so like a man not to see honesty as honorable.
“What else do you do well?” he asked, looking down at her quite sternly.
This is what came of honesty with a man: stern rebuke. ’Twas no wonder that no one of any intelligence enjoyed talking to a man for any length of time.
“I could ask the same of you,” she said, sounding a bit stern herself. She did not have to answer to him. Did he suppose otherwise?
“But you won’t,” he said.
“Only because I have better manners.”
“Yet not manners enough not to go about kissing men.”
“I suppose you would prefer it if I went about kissing women?”
She’d got him there. Iveston looked thunderstruck. He was even going a bit white around the corners of his mouth. If she kept at it, she might reduce him to a pillar of salt, and wouldn’t he just deserve it? He’d been the one to kiss her, after all. She hadn’t run him into a deserted room and kissed him for no reason.
As to reasons, why had he kissed her?
Then again, why had he stopped?
“You are in the habit, Miss Prestwick, of making the most awkward remarks. I can’t think that it suits a future duchess.”
