“Oh, for goodness sake.”
She dragged herself away from his hold, and he knew he was every sort of fool for missing the feel of her in his arms.
“I was well supervised by Harriet’s brother,” she said, scowling at his raised brow.
Did she just growl?
“I might have been a little – hasty in allowing Lord Fulham to walk with me.”
He snorted derisively, earning another scowl.
She was quite beautiful when angry. Something else he felt it best not to say.
“But I wanted to see the gardens. I wanted to see the fountains, and the tightropes, and the fireworks. And you would know all that if you hadn’t run away and ignored me after we spent such a lovely afternoon together.”
Nic was starting to calm down now, and he felt the beginnings of a twinge of guilt prickle at his conscience.
Once again, fear of his own heart had hurt her.
“It was still completely irresponsible to come down here with him.”
Her jaw dropped, and she stamped her foot like a child before turning, her white skirts swirling about her feet, and marched off further down the pathway.
“Alison!” he called after her, but she ignored him.
With a sigh and a prayer for patience, Nic went after her.
He found her standing near an ornate fountain surrounded by low hanging trees, benches half-hidden against their branches.
This, Nic thought, was the perfect place for an assignation. He almost groaned aloud at the desire that unfurled in him at the idea.
Not the time, Nic, he told himself firmly.
“Alison –”
He didn’t get a chance to finish whatever he’d been about to say.
She swirled around, hands planted on her hips, glaring up at him.
“You are an overbearing, controlling, joyless bore,” she yelled at him.
She was in a towering rage.
He probably deserved it, but he couldn’t help but feel a bit affronted at her less-than-complimentary opinion of him.
“You stand there in judgment of everyone and everything that doesn’t live up to your lofty expectations,” she continued, really getting into her stride now. “And nobody ever could.”
He stepped forward, hating the hurt lurking behind the anger.
“If you just –”
“Don’t you ever tire of being so responsible all the time?” she continued, uncaring about his attempts to interrupt her tirade. “So bloody saintly?”
He was shocked to hear her swear.
And he really shouldn’t find it arousing. He knew that. Of course, he knew it.
“Don’t you ever want to break the rules? Sin just a little?”
It snapped.
The last vestige of his celebrated self-control snapped.
“Hell, yes,” he responded before pulling her against him and capturing her mouth in a searing kiss.
Chapter Eighteen
Alison froze in utter shock for a millisecond before she went up in flames.
For so long she had dreamed of being kissed by him.
Never could she have imagined it would feel like this.
Like she burned with a raging fire he awoke in her.
The fact that she had thought they’d kissed on Simon’s balcony a year ago was laughable. That had been no kiss, not if this was anything to go by.
She gasped at the onslaught of feeling, and his tongue delved inside her mouth, coaxing hers to dance with his own.
Her knees buckled, and she reached up to cling desperately to the lapels of his coat as his arms wrapped around her waist and pulled her impossibly close to the rock-hard length of him.
Alison didn’t know how long the kiss went on for. It felt like seconds and eons.
This was beyond anything she’d ever experienced, and she wasn’t sure how much she could withstand.
The heart that had been desperately trying to fly to him for weeks burst with a love so strong, so intense, that her whole world shifted on its axis.
The kiss went on and on, and she never wanted it to end.
His hands were everywhere. Holding her face, moving to her hair, then burning a trail over her back, her hips, pulling her closer still.
Her own had moved as if of their own accord to plunge into his chestnut hair.
She could die happy right here, right now.
He pulled his lips suddenly from her own but before she could protest, he moved to press them against the rapidly beating pulse at her throat.
Alison moaned in tortured pleasure as he trailed kisses across her neck, moved to bite gently on her ear.
“Nicholas,” she gasped, pleading for something she didn’t even understand.
“Nicholas.”
The sound of Robert’s voice suddenly sounded from down the pathway, and Nicholas sprang back from Alison as though scalded.
She stared at him, her breathing as laboured as his own appeared to be.
Lord, but he looked handsome. His hair was mussed, and his navy eyes were so heated she felt them scorch her even from a distance.
“I –”
Whatever he’d been about to say was cut off by the sudden appearance of Robert, whose wintry grey eyes moved slowly between them, his face stoic.
“You found her then,” he said softly.
As Alison watched, the two gentlemen stared at each other intently.
It was as though they were communicating without speaking a word.
Finally, after a tense few moments, Robert nodded and turned his gaze to Alison.
“You’re well?” he asked softly, and she couldn’t tell if he were angry with her or not.
She didn’t trust herself to speak. Not after that kiss. Not with the tumultuous emotions still swirling inside her.
Instead of attempting it, she merely nodded her head, feeling the hair loosened by Nicholas’s hands begin to fall from its pins.
She felt her cheeks heat as Robert’s eyes flicked to the blonde strands, then back to her face.
“Perhaps it’s time to return home, hmm?”
He held an arm out and she hurried to take it, afraid to look at Nicholas let alone speak to him.
“I came here on Dante,” Robert said, turning his gaze to Nicholas. “Alison will have to return in your carriage.”
Her heart flew into her mouth at Robert’s words.
She wasn’t sure if that were a good thing or not.
Nicholas had yet to even speak to Robert, let alone her.
“Of course,” he suddenly said, hoarsely. “I’ll –”
“You’ll ride Dante,” Robert interrupted smoothly. “And I’ll be taking your carriage.”
There was another tension-filled look between the gentlemen, and Alison willed Nicholas to refuse. To say he wanted to travel back with her.
But, of course, he was Saint Nicholas. He would never do that, even if he had just kissed the living daylights out of her.
“Come, Alison.” Robert’s tone brooked no argument, and she biddably hurried up the pathway, her hand ensconced in his arm.
Nicholas trailed behind them.
Though silent, she could feel his presence every step of the way.
Nicholas’s heart thumped painfully as he rode Dante home through the streets of London.
It was busy with members of the haute monde coming home from various events, and gentlemen heading away from Mayfair to indulge their proclivities.
Nicholas barely saw any of it.
He couldn’t concentrate on the sights and sounds around him.
He couldn’t think about anything but her.
The feel of her. The scent of her.
The taste of her.
Damn it.
Nic groaned aloud as his mind replayed in vivid detail every second of their embrace.
To call it a mere kiss would be inaccurate.
He had known that if he let his control slip, if he risked tasting her, just once, that it would be explosive.
But never could he have imagined the effect it would have had.
The second his lips had touched her own, the world shifted beneath his feet. What he had felt went beyond desire. Beyond lust. Beyond attraction.
It was so much more than all of that. And so much more frightening than he’d suspected it would be. Because now he knew that he would crave her with every single fibre of his being for the rest of his life.
He shouldn’t have let Robert take her away.
He shouldn’t have stood there in silence while she glanced back at him, her blue eyes filled with confusion, whilst Robert handed her into Nic’s carriage.
But what else could he have done?
Alison was an innocent. But Nicholas, though she called him saintly, was not. And neither was Robert.
Robert knew exactly what had happened at that fountain, and Nic wouldn’t insult the man’s intelligence by lying about it.
So where did that leave him?
If it had been anyone but Robert who’d walked down that pathway, Nic’s hand would have been forced.
They would have been made to marry.
The burst of elation that shot through him at the thought was frightening but now, he had to admit to himself, not wholly unexpected.
His heart knew what his mind refused to acknowledge.
But it had been Robert. And Robert would never force Nic or Alison to do anything.
Nicholas’s head spun until he felt nauseated.
What the hell was he going to do?
Now that there was some distance between them, he found it easier to remember all the reasons he didn’t want to marry. All the reasons he didn’t want to be responsible for someone else’s happiness, not in such an intimate way. Not in any way beyond the good he did in St. Giles.
More importantly, he was able to remember why he and Alison were so unsuited.
His quiet, unassuming life would no doubt be boring to her.
And though she loved her family fiercely and was kind to everyone she met, he couldn’t imagine her being involved in any real way with the work he did in St. Giles. And he wouldn’t want her anywhere near the place anyway.
He spent so much time there, was so heavily involved in it. And he didn’t want to give it up. It was the only thing that kept the guilt away. That and blocking out as many emotions and feelings as he could.
Alison – well, Alison brought fierce, unstoppable, life-changing emotions to the surface just by being in the same room as him.
And he knew that if she were his, truly his, he wouldn’t want to be away from her long enough to continue his work.
If he let her, she would consume every single part of him.
So, he couldn’t let her.
They wouldn’t suit.
This thing between them couldn’t go anywhere, and that was final.
Upon reaching his house, he summoned a footman to take Dante back to Robert’s.
He knew that he and Robert had a reckoning coming, but he couldn’t face the confrontation tonight.
Robert would want an answer, and Nic couldn’t think of one to give him.
Not when he was consumed by her.
Not when he knew it would mean losing her forever.
Chapter Nineteen
All morning, Alison had sat in the window of the drawing room, watching the road outside.
She could see Nicholas’s house from here.
See when he left.
If he would come here.
She hadn’t slept a wink last night, and she was grouchy. She knew it, and Abigail knew it, too, for she had left Alison at home while visiting Senna.
Amelia was going to join the ladies at James’s house that morning, and Alison should be there, as well.
Senna was her cousin through marriage, after all. And Lottie would be there, along with Poppy.
The ladies would all enjoy a comfortable coze and spend a wonderful morning together. Poppy would entertain them, and they could all coo over Lottie and talk excitedly about Senna’s baby.
And Alison would miss it all. A fact that she felt particularly guilty over since she’d barely seen Senna and Amelia outside of evening events, given that she tended to spend her days obsessing about the brooding duke with whom she’d fallen desperately in love.
Like an idiot.
The ride home last night with Robert had been excruciating.
He hadn’t asked her what had gone on between her and Nicholas.
He’d questioned her about Captain Billings, and ultimately been satisfied the man had done his best to take care of her.
Then he’d questioned her about Lord Fulham, which hadn’t gone well at all.
After he’d vocalised a couple of alarmingly descriptive ways to damage the man, he’d warned her firmly that she weren’t to so much as glance in his direction again.
Try as she might to explain that Lord Fulham hadn’t actually done anything inappropriate, it fell on deaf ears.
Robert was as fond of the young viscount as Nicholas appeared to be.
Robert needn’t worry in any case. She doubted very much that Lord Fulham would want anything to do with her now. There wasn’t a man alive who could stand up to the considerable power of two dukes. Especially those two.
And when James found out, he’d probably blister her ears, as well.
But when it came to Nicholas, Robert hadn’t said a word.
Not a single word.
Robert had handed her out of the carriage, sent the driver back to Nicholas’s, and once inside, had said his goodnights and disappeared.
This morning at breakfast, he’d been his usual self. And though Abigail had questioned her about the evening, it was obvious Robert hadn’t said anything about how he’d found Alison and Nicholas together.
With only a brief word of caution about Lord Fulham, and a suggestion that perhaps Harriet Billings wasn’t the best choice of friend, a sentiment with which Alison whole-heartedly agreed, Abigail had moved the conversation along.
Alison had frowned in confusion but when she’d caught Robert’s eye, she knew to stay quiet.
Abigail soon left the table to ready Lottie for their visit to Senna’s, and Robert causally announced that he would accompany them, saying that he needed to speak to James.
Alison’s stomach had flipped uneasily but Robert didn’t seem at all sombre, or that he were going over there to discuss anything serious.
Perhaps, she told herself rather unconvincingly, he didn’t notice anything unusual last night. Perhaps it didn’t look as obvious as I feared.
But it was no use.
She would worry about it until she saw them all together and could see with her own eyes that she hadn’t ruined their friendship or forced Nicholas’s hand, if Robert and James decided to insist that they marry.
Nothing in the world would mean more to Alison than becoming Nic’s wife.
But not like that. Not because he was forced to do it. Not because honour would dictate that he protect her reputation.
She loved him far too much to confine him to a life with her if he did not love her.
And given that he hadn’t called today, he was making his feelings fairly clear.
But could he truly have kissed her like that, held her like that, if he felt nothing?
A sudden movement at Nicholas’s house distracted Alison from her maudlin thoughts.
And there he was.
Her breath caught in her throat as she watched him descend the steps of his house toward a waiting carriage.
He was so handsome it made her heart ache.
His superfine jacket was a dark, rich blue, only shades lighter than his eyes.
And now she knew for sure that it wasn’t padded; that the broad shoulders and large upper arms were all him.
She watched until one shiny Hessian disappeared into the carriage, wondering where he was off to.
A servant hurried toward him, and he turned from entering the conveyance to converse with the foot
man.
She didn’t think he’d go to James’s today.
Not unless he’d been summoned.
Her stomach twisted uneasily once again at the thought and suddenly, she was on her feet.
Robert would have her head for what she was about to do.
Dashing up the stairs to her bedchamber, Alison grabbed her reticule, which always contained some of her pin money, a light pelisse in a shade of dusky pink that matched the ribbon on her white gown, and a straw bonnet with a sprig of pink and white flowers, and turned to run full pelt back down the stairs.
She threw open the front door, not even waiting for the footman to do it, and ran out to the street.
Nicholas’s carriage had only just set off, the footman who’d delayed him just now returning to the house.
She hurried quickly down the street, aware of the looks she was receiving given she didn’t even have a maid with her.
Robert and James would probably lock her in a tower after this.
With her heart thumping furiously, Alison rushed to the top of the busy street. As she hoped, she spotted a hackney.
Without pausing to check that she wasn’t recognised getting into it, she dove inside and instructed the driver to head in the same direction as Nicholas’s carriage, pointing out the rather helpful crest of Barnbury on the side of the black lacquered coach.
He was going to face Robert and James, or he was going on one of his mysterious trips that nobody ever seemed to know about.
Either way, she was going to find out what he was up to.
She sat back, willing her heart to cease its thundering.
There were worse things in the world, she assured herself, than a woman travelling by herself.
Glancing out the rather dirty window of the hack, she was both alarmed and relieved to see that they were travelling in the opposite direction to James’s house.
In fact, they seemed to be leaving Mayfair altogether.
Curious now, Alison kept her eyes on the streets outside, trepidation starting to form as they grew murkier, the buildings more dilapidated, the people certainly not the polished and pristine Peerage.
The Saint of St. Giles Page 12
