“Leave us for a moment, Stoddard.” He nodded at his butler, who raised his brows but did not question Beau’s orders.
“I…should leave.” Philippa tried to go but he moved quickly, reaching her at the door and catching her arm.
“Stay. I have a present for you.” He pulled her into his chambers, knowing how tempting she was at that moment. Her gray eyes seemed green now, reflecting her gown, and her hair was pulled loosely back. He could imagine how good it would feel to sink his fingers into those silken strands.
“Beau, I…” But she didn’t pull away. He handed her the two black boxes from the jewelers. Her gaze became fixed on the boxes, and the memory of their earlier kiss seemed to shimmer in the air between them, taunting them both. More than anything, he wanted her to open the boxes and give him a sunny grin of innocent delight before she wrapped her arms around his neck and begged him to take her to bed. But she wasn’t that woman, the one who conducted a relationship with him based on transactions. Instead, she was the woman who appreciated a gift and her response was born of true affection for him. And that confused him and delighted him in such a way that he didn’t know what to do or say. He’d made a promise to hold his desires at bay, but at this moment, he wanted to forget he’d ever made those foolish vows.
“Open them,” he encouraged.
She pulled at the red ribbons tying the boxes together. The smaller box opened, revealing the gleaming opalescent pearl earrings. She stared in awe.
“Now the other one.” His heart was racing. Why did this feel so different from the other women? Why was she different? Why did he need to see her joy, need to feel it like the sun upon his face after a long winter?
Philippa opened the box with the double strand pearl necklace and gasped.
“Oh no, sir, I can’t. These are far too precious.” She tried to give the boxes back, but he shook his head.
“Please. Consider them a gift for saving my life.”
“But you saved mine first,” she reminded him.
He smiled and sighed. “Bloody Christ, woman, just let me give you something beautiful. I saw them and I thought they reflected your beauty.”
Her embarrassment turned to open discomfort and he realized his mistake. “Your inner beauty, darling.” He cupped her chin; remembering he was only half-clothed. Her face was bright red, like a ripened strawberry.
“You don’t know me,” she said quietly.
“No, but I am learning. Learning that you are sweet, thoughtful, amusing, and brave. You are all of those things, Philippa, and I felt these pearls reflected that.”
Her blush deepened as she clutched the pearls to her bosom and a heartfelt sincerity filled her eyes as she looked at him. It made his chest tighten. She seemed so grateful, so thankful and appreciative. It humbled him and in that moment, he felt completely unworthy of her.
“Thank you, Beau.” She stood up on tiptoe and brushed her lips on his. It sent wild bolts of desire through him, and when she tried to step back, he curled an arm around her waist.
“I warned you about stealing kisses,” he said.
Long dark lashes fanned down as she softened in his arms. “I remember. One for one.” Then she flipped those lashes up, and he saw an impish look in her lovely eyes that invited him to kiss her again.
“Good,” he murmured before he captured her mouth with his. He wasn’t gentle. He had fantasized too much about how he wanted his next kiss with her to be to allow tenderness. He wanted her wild with excitement, to be aroused and unafraid of his ferocious passion.
He lifted her up by the waist and set her on the bed. He raised her skirts and pushed her legs wide as he stepped in between them. Her thighs were smooth, and he brushed his fingertips on the outside of her knees. She delighted his mouth with the sound of giggles against his lips. It was like drinking champagne. His little ward was ticklish. He rather liked that.
“That was more than one kiss,” she teased.
“I fear it takes several of mine to equate one of yours,” said Beau. “I hope you don’t mind.”
She dropped her jewels on the bed and curled her arms around his neck as he trailed kisses down her lips to her throat. He could feel the erratic beat of her pulse under his tongue as he kissed and licked, hunting for new erogenous zones. Philippa squirmed a little and he moved closer, their bodies pressed tightly to one another.
“Beau…” She spoke his name in a tone that made him painfully hard. “I want…” She ducked her head as he returned to kissing her lips. He tilted her chin up.
“What do you want, darling?”
“I…” She licked her lips. “I don’t know.”
Beau wanted to keep kissing her, but his senses came back to him in that moment.
“We should get ready for the Essex ball.” He stepped back and pulled her skirts down. She could get off the bed on her own, but he wanted to continue touching her, so he set her down gently before he handed her the pearl necklace and earrings.
“You will look lovely tonight, inside and out.” He brushed a loose lock of hair back from her face and she smiled at him hesitantly.
“I never wanted that to matter,” she said.
“It doesn’t, at least on the outside. But you’ve been blessed with both. Don’t be ashamed of that.” He winked at her. “And any man who comes to close I shall beat him off with a stick.”
She laughed at that. “I shall hold you to that.” Then she left him alone to change for the ball.
Three hours later, Beau wanted to do just that: beat every man away from her with a stick.
Sheridan joined Beau by the refreshment table in the Duke and Duchess of Essex’s ballroom. A footman was pouring punch.
Sheridan collected two glasses and handed one to Beau. “How are you faring?”
“Is it normal to want to challenge every man in the room to a duel?”
Sheridan laughed, the hearty sound disrupting a group of young ladies gossiping nearby. They all fluttered their feathered fans in warning, but Cedric paid them no heed.
“It’s quite normal when you’re enamored with a woman.”
“I’m not,” Beau replied too quickly.
“You are.” Cedric sobered. “Every man in the room knows it. You practically growl when a man gets too close to Miss Wilson.”
“I merely want to protect her.” His eyes sought her out on the dance floor. “Any man here would take advantage of her if they could.”
“Or they might simply ask her for a dance.”
“That’s how it starts, as you well know.”
“Everything has to start from somewhere,” Sheridan said. “But sometimes a dance is just a dance.”
Beau’s eyes narrowed as he focused on one young buck clearly hoping to make his way towards Philippa. He caught Beau staring at him, and Beau slowly shook his head. The man wisely changed direction.
But dancing was inevitable, of course, and soon Philippa was involved in a cotillion dance, her energetic movements so flawless one would never have guessed she spent the morning and early afternoon with Mrs. Gronow and a few maids learning the very same movements. The Capuchin brown gown she wore tonight made her glow like an autumnal pagan goddess as she laughed and twirled beneath the gilded lamplight.
“Don’t challenge me to a duel Boudreaux, but may I ask why you don’t marry her?” Cedric then took a drink of his punch and frowned, muttering about it needing a bit of brandy.
“Don’t be daft. I’m not the marrying kind.” Beau’s eyes still followed Philippa, drinking in the way her smile illuminated her from within.
“Plenty of men have married servants,” Sheridan added. “It’s not unheard of.”
“It isn’t that,” Beau replied. “I don’t want to be in love. I don’t need that sort of weakness.”
Sheridan smirked. “Perhaps I will have to challenge you to a duel instead.”
“I did not mean to offend.”
Sheridan’s brown eyes deepened with understanding. “No, I
understand. No one wants to be weak, old boy, but avoiding love doesn’t make you strong. It’s rather the opposite. Take it from one with experience in such matters.” He left Beau to brood and stare daggers at any man who engaged Philippa in conversation now that the dance had ended.
A petite auburn-haired woman with violet eyes materialized next to him, like a fae queen summoned by his innermost thoughts. It was the Duchess of Essex, Emily St. Laurent.
“Good evening, Beau,” she said, beaming at him.
“Your Grace,” he bowed, momentarily distracted from his vigil.
“Are you enjoying the evening?” She nodded to the couples queuing up to the next dance. A minuet, Beau judged correctly by the dancers’ positions.
“I am. Please have my thanks for extending your invitation to my ward.”
Emily nodded. “My pleasure. She’s quite lovely to talk to, once one coaxes her out of her shell. She reminds me of myself when I was young and coming out.”
Beau chuckled. “You are still young, Your Grace.”
“I suppose so, but after marriage and children one can feel very old. I hope I’m wise at the age of four and twenty.” She drifted closer, her pale blue gown glimmering as she moved. They watched the dancers in silence for a time before Emily spoke again.
“She’s been waiting for you all night.”
Beau looked at the young duchess. “I beg your pardon?”
“Philippa. She’s been looking at you at the end of every dance…waiting to be asked.”
“Asked?”
Emily rolled her eyes. “To dance. She wants you to ask her to dance.”
“No. I don’t think I should,” he hedged. “It wouldn’t be appropriate.”
“Why not?” Emily asked.
“She is supposed to be my ward.”
“Oh, what rot and nonsense. A dance is simply a dance.” Emily waved a hand. “You aren’t a blood relation and she is twenty years old. She’s not a silly child. She’s a woman. A woman who wishes more than anything for you to ask her to dance.”
It was such a dangerous request to dance with the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. It couldn’t end well, yet he started moving toward Philippa anyway as the minuet came to an end. A group of ladies, mostly the wives of Lord and Lady Lennox’s friends, were ringed around Philippa. She smiled gaily and laughed as she talked. It was the most relaxed he’d ever seen her in their short acquaintance.
“Oh hush now, ladies. A gentleman approaches,” Anne Sheridan, Cedric’s wife, warned playfully and they all ceased their laughter at some private amusement once Beau reached them.
“Good evening.” Beau bowed to the intimidating group of beautiful women.
“Evening, Mr. Boudreaux,” they replied together as though they’d rehearsed it. How the devil women were able to do that, he would never know. Perhaps they practiced such things whilst the men were smoking cigars after dinner. That seemed a likely possibility.
“Miss Wilson.” He cleared his throat nervously. “Would you do me the honor of the next dance?”
Philippa lifted the tiny card tied to her wrist, examining the list of upcoming dances. “That’s a waltz?” she asked.
Lord, he thought, a bloody waltz. That meant he would be holding her in his arms, inhaling her sweet scent until he was half mad with longing. He considered asking her for the next one instead.
Instead he said, “Yes.”
“I would be delighted to accept.” She moved to take his arm, and he stole her away from her protective harem.
The musicians in the corner of the ballroom changed the sheet music in a soft fluttering sound. All the couples engaged in the next dance took their places. Beau found himself suddenly unsure of his decision as they moved onto the dance floor.
“Beau, I think you must touch me during the waltz.” Philippa’s tone was playful, but he saw her uncertainty.
“Right, touching,” he murmured as he slid a hand around her waist. His other hand clasped one of hers.
A waltz was unlike other dances. There was no set formations or participation with other couples. A man and a woman turned toward one another, keeping away from other couples and had no obligation to keep pattern with the other dancers but could spin inward in their own private universe. There was no need to converse with other dancers either. It was, as one of his mistresses had described it, the most personal and romantic of all dances. The music began, slow and gentle, and straight away Beau nearly trod on Philippa’s toes when he accidentally tried to move forward rather than back.
“Sorry,” he muttered, his face turning hot.
“You’re making me nervous,” Philippa said softly, but there was a teasing glint in her eyes.
Why did this moment feel so significant? He’d never cared about dancing, he performed them when necessary, but this felt like so much more. The feel of Philippa’s body in his arms, the hint of her scent drifting in the air between them, and the eyes of everyone not dancing upon them.
He took deep breaths, trying to calm himself as his dancing memories came to the fore and he began to do the damn thing properly.
“When one truly dances, the steps are effortless, the partner perfect, the music endless.” His old mistress, the dancer had once said when she told him tales of lavish balls in Europe. She had once danced with a Russian Czar as snow fell on a terrace outside the winter palace. The way she talked of dancing had fascinated him, and yet until this moment, he never truly understood what she’d been trying to tell him.
Dancing like this is a way for one’s soul to sing.
He’d thought his soul had no songs left, that his soul had been silenced after he’d been orphaned. He gazed at Philippa, taking in every detail about her—her ivory skin, to the delicate arched brows over emotional silver eyes that lit with lightning and silent delight as she moved with him in perfect step. Everything about the moment was right, down to the wayward curl that had escaped her coiffure to bounce against her neck. Beau pulled her closer, fearing that if he let her go it would break something inside him.
“Philippa…”
“Yes?” Her serene expression transformed into one of hope.
“You’re a lovely dancer.” It was not what he wished to say. He honestly didn’t know what he wanted to tell her.
“Thank you. You are as well.” She looked away then and it cut his heart.
Christ, the woman was doing something to him, something he never wanted to happen.
As the dance came to an end, he kept her close for longer than he should, until he heard the murmur of whispers traveling about the ballroom like a flock of starlings taking flight. When he finally let go, his hands were shaking. He rubbed them together as casually as possible to try and hide it.
“Would you like some punch?” he offered, needing to take any chance now to get as far away from her as possible, if only for a moment to collect himself.
“That would be lovely, thank you.” She stood there, looking forlorn. The snowdrop flowers tucked in her hair and sewn into her bodice made her look like a doomed princess facing a century of solitude tucked away in a tower. The tower he’d left her in because he was afraid of being her white knight.
* * *
Thomas Winthrop, the Duke of St. Albans, held his breath as he watched Beau and the maid twirl in a waltz. It was abundantly clear they were in love with each other, yet it was equally clear that neither of them could admit that fact. The maid was far too innocent and the gentleman far too jaded. Yet love had blossomed this night, taking root with every perfect spin as the couple danced.
“You are done for, my boy. And it’s about time.” Thomas’s heart soared at the thought that he finally had a way to see his boy married and happily in love.
Philippa stood alone now, her face a mask of pleasantness as Beau abandoned her to fetch punch. Such a silly thing to do. It would leave the girl open for other men less frightened of love. Yet not one man came. They had all seen what he had. The seasoned rake, Beauregard Boudreau
x, had fallen in love and no one would dare stand in his way.
The maid began to play with a loose curl of her hair, twining it over and over around her finger, spooling the lustrous dark hair tight. Then she released it. Thomas’s heart stopped. Albina used to do that when she was nervous. He had never seen another woman do it quite the same way, but the maid had.
“Papa… Be happy for me.” His child’s words drifted back to him across two decades as she begged him to forgive her for running away to Gretna Green.
How was this woman before him now such a ghost of his lost daughter? Albina couldn’t have had another child, could she?
Thomas remembered Albina, six months pregnant, explaining how she hired a midwife. What was her name? Lucy? Yes, that was it. Lucy was to be present for the birth. If there were any truths to be revealed, Lucy would have the answers. Thomas didn’t wait another minute, he left Philippa and Beau in the safety of their friends’ ballroom as he rushed out into the night. He would not rest until he knew the truth about the night Albina died.
Chapter 12
Philippa stared into a pair of dark fathomless eyes. Her heart pounded with excitement but a twinge of fear shadowed it too.
“You’re positive he won’t bite?” she asked.
The massive horse directly in front of her said nothing, which was somehow worse than any response. The interior of the rented stables near Hyde Park were dim despite the sunlight outside.
“Easy, darling. Just relax around him. Animals respond to fear. If you’re not afraid, he will have no reason to be.” Beau wound an arm around her from behind. Feeling his hard body against her back and bottom made her shiver and her womb clench.
“He’s just so large… I’m not certain I should do this.”
“You are quite capable of this, I promise you. Remember, you rode with me as we escaped Lord Sommers.” Beau gave her waist a little squeeze.
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