She stared, beginning to feel as if she was in some strange and crazy dream. He was the last man she’d ever have expected to possess carnal appetites, though with his kiss still burning her lips, she could hardly deny it. He spoke of passion, and after what he had just done, she knew he must feel it, yet he looked as if he welcomed that feeling as much as he might welcome tooth drawing. And she was the object of all this? She still couldn’t seem to take it in.
But in this series of shocking happenings this evening, the notion that he had felt these things for her from that first moment in her office was perhaps the most astonishing of all. “Wait,” she pleaded, desperate for a moment to think. “You have felt this way about me from the beginning?”
His lashes lowered, then lifted. “Yes.”
She looked into his eyes, so cool, so remote, and yet, they flared the spark in her that his kiss had ignited, and her body responded at once with a strong, answering thrill. She took a step toward him. “But—”
She stopped as he took another step back.
“No doubt, this feeling I have is temporary,” he said. “It will pass, but until it does, I fear you may be vulnerable to further attentions of this sort from me, for as I said, I am finding them difficult to master. In light of that, I suggest that for the remaining time you are here, we should maintain as much distance as politeness and civility will allow.”
That was rather less thrilling, particularly since he spoke of his lack of control as if it were a compulsion to eat sour persimmons. “I see.”
“I will do all that I can, Miss Deverill, to ensure that tonight’s events are not repeated. Of course you cannot be expected to forget my conduct, but I hope you can forgive it. Good night.”
He offered her a stiff bow and turned away. Irene, stunned, bemused, and still unmistakably aroused, could only watch him as he walked toward the door, his most unaccountable admission still ringing in her ears.
I have had, from the moment we met, an ardent desire for you.
She’d only imagined such words in dark, half-formed thoughts in the privacy of her own room, and she certainly never would have thought they could come out of this man’s mouth.
He vanished out the door, and Irene stared at the empty doorway. She blinked, she shook her head, she laughed in disbelief, and only now was she able to articulate precisely why she found this entire situation so absurd.
“But we don’t even like each other.”
Even as she said it, she was acutely aware of the feelings he had brought about within her, feelings which she had never experienced before, nor had even known existed. Passion, it seemed, did not require liking.
She pressed her fingers to her lips, wincing, for they felt puffy and tender to the touch. Her plan, she noted, had gone quite awry. She’d gotten the crazy idea that it might be easier—or at least, less impossible—to reason Torquil into accepting the marriage than it would be to dissuade his mother from entering it, and encountering him here had seemed a perfect opportunity to begin implementing that strategy. She had certainly not been attempting to attract him; she’d never even thought of such a harebrained idea. Torquil attracted to her would have been a ludicrous notion ten minutes ago. And though she’d begun to discern that he had certain appealing qualities, she’d never have imagined in her wildest flights of fancy that such scorching heat existed beneath his icy surface.
I am a man possessed of deep carnal appetites.
So much for scaling the glacier, she thought wryly. Tonight, she might very well have melted it instead, something she’d never dreamt was even possible.
Life, she appreciated, was sometimes utterly unpredictable.
For Henry, the next five days were agony. Whenever he saw her, he was the perfect gentleman. His conversations with her were superficial and amiable. His manner was impeccable, his attitude toward her so scrupulously polite that no one could have faulted it.
But in his heart, he lusted.
Alone in his rooms, he closed his eyes and imagined her with him—what her magnificent body would look like if she were naked before him, her gold hair tumbled down around her shoulders. He imagined the texture of her bare skin and the sounds she might make, and the feel of her body moving beneath him—and above him, and in front of him. His imagination, the tool of his lust, seemed to know no bounds.
In front of others, he was careful. He was discreet. He never looked at her for more than a few seconds, and when he did glance her way, he made sure that his expression revealed nothing, ensuring that no one, not even those nearest and dearest to him, could guess what had occurred between him and Irene Deverill in a darkened corner of the library.
But in his mind and body, he knew.
He knew every detail because he relived it, over and over. The scent of her hair and the taste of her mouth and the tease of her foot riding up the back of his leg. Instead of the exquisite pain of his own withdrawal, he fashioned different, much more satisfying endings.
None of this, of course, made his pretense of polite disinterest toward her any easier. But he could not stop the willful licentiousness of his thoughts. He didn’t even want to.
This situation could not continue for long, he knew that. If it did, he’d go mad. But his only other option was to send Miss Deverill home, and he had no intention of doing that.
He was not ready to give up on the only means he had of separating his mother from her Italian. If anything, the incident with Miss Deverill made him more convinced than ever that his mother was making a mistake. Lust was no basis for a lifetime commitment.
Nor was he sure sending Miss Deverill away would make a particle of difference. He feared the distance from Upper Brook Street to Belford Row wasn’t nearly enough to suppress his appetite.
No, he was caught, like a fly in treacle. But he had to admit it was a damned sweet way to drown.
By the morning of the water party, however, Henry had managed to achieve a stable, if agonizing, equilibrium, and he felt that he just might be able to withstand the next eight days without ravishing Miss Deverill in a corridor or hurling himself off a cliff.
The morning was clear and warm, promising the sort of fine summer day so rare in England and so splendid when it occurred. The wind, too, seemed amenable to a day on the water, brisk enough to carry them to Kew and back with a minimum of effort, but warm enough to make the journey pleasant.
Still, the Mary Louisa was just out of dry dock after extensive repairs, and to make sure she was fully ready for the day, he arrived at Queen’s Wharf several hours ahead of the rest of the party.
It wasn’t as if he’d been sleeping much anyway, and he hadn’t been sailing since early spring, so readying the ship was a welcome distraction. He supervised Andrew and Fitz and the other members of the crew, and did his own share of work as well, for despite several days of preparation, the ship wasn’t as up to par as he’d like. When ten o’clock came and everyone else arrived at Queen’s Wharf, there was still enough to do that it was easy for Henry to stay well away from Miss Deverill, and he left it to his siblings to give her a tour of the ship, finding excuses to be busy elsewhere every time conversation with her became a possibility. If this trend could be made to continue, he might be able to get through the entire day without imagining Miss Deverill naked, and all would be smooth sailing.
They’d barely passed Battersea Park and cleared the Albert Bridge, however, before he made the mistake of taking the helm from Andrew, and his first mate had barely departed to the galley for a cup of tea before he saw the object of all his thoughts coming along the starboard deck straight toward him, no one with her and a determined look on her face. Henry glanced around, but no member of his crew was close enough that he could hand over the helm, and he knew all his efforts to avoid her had been an exercise in futility.
So much, he thought, for smooth sailing.
In the normal course of events, Irene would never dream of forcing her company on anyone who didn’t want it, and as she walked alon
g the deck toward him, it was obvious that Torquil would prefer to be anywhere but in her vicinity. He’d been making that fact plain for five days now. Given his confession that night in the library, she couldn’t blame him, and if this had been any other man, she would never dream of inflicting further embarrassment upon him by her presence, but in this case, she had no choice.
Time was going by, and she was no closer to a happy exit from this situation than she’d been when she’d arrived. Half her allotted time to find a way out of this mess was gone, and after five days of being avoided, she was determined to force her company upon him, whether it pained him or not, so that she could make him see sense.
He might have taken some comfort in the knowledge that he was not the only one who would have preferred no reminders of that night. He might have derived some satisfaction from knowing that ever since that extraordinary kiss, her nights had been restless ones. He might even have relished the fact that his voice, thick and dark, had insisted upon coming to her again and again in dreams, arousing in her all the dizzying feelings he had evoked with his kiss and his erotic confession.
I am a man possessed of deep carnal appetites.
He might have savored the knowledge of her sleepless nights, of how his lush kiss and passionate words had called to something carnal inside of her, too. But he was never going to know any of that because she’d have died rather than tell him.
As it was, by the time she reached where he stood at the helm, he was wearing his usual countenance of cool disinterest. But it didn’t matter, for now she knew what lurked beneath.
Her face was growing hot before she’d even reached him, but she could not avoid this. Plucking up her courage, she said in as normal a voice as she could muster, “I am glad to find you alone. I need to speak with you.”
“Unless the ship is on fire,” he said, “I would prefer you didn’t.”
Her face was what was on fire, but she persevered. “I have no doubt of that, and I’m sorry for it, but it cannot be helped. At some point, Duke, we must have a conversation.”
He wanted to refuse, that was clear. But in the end, perhaps due to a lifetime of civility, restraint, and politeness, he did not.
“Very well,” he said and stepped to one side. “Would you care to take the wheel?”
“I beg your pardon?” She looked at the helm, then back at him, her frustration with him momentarily forgotten in her surprise. “You’d let me do that?”
“I would.”
She frowned, suddenly a bit suspicious. “Why? Because the moment I put my hands on the wheel, you’ll dash off and leave me stuck?”
That actually made him laugh, and the sight and sound of it made her laugh, too, easing the tension between them even as the sight of his smile and the sound of his laugh made her tummy give a nervous dip. He was handsome enough when he bore his usual expression of cool indifference, but when he laughed, when the edges of his eyes creased a little and his eyes glinted brilliant gray, and his mouth curved in that heart-stopping smile . . . goodness, he was a treat to look at.
“I wouldn’t dash off and leave you, Miss Deverill,” he said.
Given that he’d been doing just that for five days, she couldn’t help raising a skeptical eyebrow.
“My ship,” he explained, still smiling a little, “is at stake.”
“It might be anyway, if you let me steer. What if I wreck it?”
“You won’t,” he promised. “I’ll help you.”
He was, at least, talking to her about something besides the weather. “All right. What do I do?”
“Stand here.” He moved aside, gesturing for her to take his place before the large wheel of smooth, polished oak. “Now, pretend you’re first mate.”
“First mate?” she cried with mock indignation. “Why not captain?”
He frowned, looking stern. “Don’t push your luck.”
“Oh, very well. I had so hoped for the chance to order you about, but I suppose it’s not meant to be.” She faced the helm. “What do I do?”
“First, determine your direction.” He put his hands on her shoulders and turned her toward a round oak stand behind and to her right, on top of which reposed a large brass device with a dial she recognized even before he added, “The compass says you’re heading southwest. But look what’s ahead of you.”
He turned her to face the bow again, then let go of her shoulders and moved to stand slightly behind her. His arm stretched out above her right shoulder grazing the side of her neck as he pointed to the shoreline, which was directly in front of them, though still some distance away. “You stay on this heading, and you’ll run aground.”
“So I have to turn the wheel to the right?”
“To starboard, yes. Chiswick is to the right of us, just there.” He pointed to the northern bank. “The river takes a turn to the northwest here, so you’ll need to alter your course ninety degrees, changing direction until the compass points northwest. Do you understand?”
She nodded, glancing ahead, then back toward the compass, then ahead again. “Yes, I think so.”
“Good. Now, take the wheel by the handles and turn it slowly starboard. As you do, you’ll feel the ship start to turn.”
She felt more than a little nervous, but she did as he instructed.
“Be patient,” he cautioned, stretching out his arm again and leaning in. His body brushed hers as he put his own hand on the wheel, and suddenly every nerve ending in her body was tingling with awareness. “We’re not in the Henley Regatta, not today anyway, so there’s no need to rush it.”
He helped correct her course a little, then eased back. “Good,” he said, his arm sliding away from above her shoulder as she let out her breath in a slow sigh of relief. “Keep turning, and keep an eye on your compass. Once you see that you’re pointing northwest, straighten out, and you’ll be fine for a bit.”
She navigated the turn as he directed, her gaze travelling back and forth between the compass and river ahead, until the ship was on a northwest course and sailing parallel to both banks. “I did it.” She grinned, glancing again at the compass, just to be doubly sure. “I did it.”
“So you did. And splendidly, too. You might be in the Henley yet.”
She laughed, exhilarated, and turned her head to look at him. He was watching her, his eyes darkening to a smoky gray, and when he spoke, his voice had a hint of dark confession in it.
“You were wrong, by the way.”
Her throat went dry. “About what?” she whispered.
“That you wouldn’t ever be able to give me orders. I can think of a few I’d comply with if they came from you. You have more power than I care to contemplate, Miss Deverill.”
Irene’s heart gave a jolt of panic. “Do I?” she said, laughing to hide her sudden nervousness. “I don’t suppose if I ordered you to just accept your mother’s marriage and give me back my newspaper, you’d do it?”
Suddenly, his countenance was the cool, remote one she’d seen in her office that very first day. “Is that why you came back here?” he asked, his voice deadly quiet. “After the admission I made the other night, you thought I might perhaps be vulnerable to a bit of persuasion on that score?”
That sent Irene’s already teetering emotions straight over the edge. “You are the most impossible man!” she cried, aggravated not only by that accusation, but also by the fact that whenever she started liking him, he managed to say something that made her feel as if tea dregs had just been thrown in her face.
“Unlike you,” she said, “I have already faced the fact that your mother will not be moved to change her mind, no matter what I say. I admit that I came back here hoping I might have a reasoned word with you on that score—though how I ever thought I could possibly reason with a man as hardheaded and arrogant as you, I can’t think!”
She paused to glance over the bow, then returned her attention to him and went on before he could get a word in, “I did not seek you out for the motive you cite. No, I ca
me back here because the only way I can discuss this topic with you at all is if I can catch you alone, something that for the past few days has proven a difficult task. So when I saw the chance to speak with you with some degree of privacy, I took it. But it was not in any way because of the other night, and I certainly gave no thought whatsoever to . . . to . . . employ feminine wiles on you.”
She paused, sucking in a deep breath before she started off again. “For one thing, I wouldn’t know how. I’ve no experience with that sort of thing, no gift for flirtation, and certainly no desire to wield this power you have laid at my door. And I should not dream of taking advantage of anyone in such a condition of vulnerability as you described. It would be cruel. Besides, if we are talking about being vulnerable, you are not—”
. . . the only one who feels that way.
She stopped, her unsaid words hanging in the air, bit back by a sudden acute need for self-preservation. She could not, she simply could not, confess to him that she was equally vulnerable to him. That his kiss had been the most exciting, extraordinary experience of her life. It would be too humiliating to admit she found this man so damnably attractive, when she was also well aware of his low opinion of her, her work, her beliefs, and her life. She hated even admitting to herself the aggravating fact of his attraction.
“You are not so vulnerable as you think,” she said instead, glaring at him as she shored up her pride. “You have your powerful position in this world and your rank, where I have neither. Although, while we are on that subject, let me say that as much as you think your position entitles you to dominate everything and everyone, it doesn’t, and you can’t. Even your mighty ducal authority doesn’t extend that far. Perhaps you ought to start accepting that fact with better grace. About your mother, and about me.”
She stopped, breathing hard, and she waited, not sure if she ought to stalk off now, while she had the last word, or wait for him to say something else equally insufferable so she could light into him again. When he did speak, it was not at all what she would have expected.
The Truth About Love and Dukes Page 19
