He should not have uttered the word lips. Because now, he could not resist looking at hers once more, and this time, God save him, he wondered how they would feel beneath his.
He banished the unworthy thought immediately. There were scores of women in London, and kissing any one of them would be an infinitely better choice than kissing the frowning creature before him. Why then, was he still thinking about it, curse him?
“You may not have held the glass directly to my lips, but you knew what you were about, filling my glass whenever it was nearly empty. I do hope you are ashamed of yourself, though thus far, you have only seemed pleased.” She finished delivering her impassioned chastisement as she worked her way into a sitting position.
Although the color had returned to her cheeks in full—owed to her dudgeon, unless he missed his guess—she was still weak. And she was not going anywhere until she bloody well broke her fast and drank some water.
He placed his hands upon her shoulders, staying her. “You will remain where you are. I have sent for a tray, which should be here shortly.”
“I do not require a tray to be brought to me as if I am an invalid,” she protested, but her voice was weak and tired.
Her mind was at war with her body. He had no qualms deciding the victor on her behalf. It would be her body, and she would eat the damned food he had procured for her.
“Whether or not you require such a thing, you are a guest in my home, and I cannot, in good conscience, allow you to go traipsing about in your weakened state.” He kept his palms where they were, firmly pressed against her clavicles.
Such a position ought not seem intimate or incite any untoward sensations within him, and yet it did. She was warm and supple beneath his touch, and for a brief, maddening beat, he longed to run his hands over her without the barrier of her dress and undergarments between them.
“I do not traipse,” she informed him with a raised brow, because she was the argumentative sort, this strange American conundrum.
“Very well, Miss Montgomery,” he allowed, bending down even farther and lowering his head so they were eye to eye. Also a mistake, he realized at once. But it was too late to turn back now, for the damage had been done. “You do not swoon, and you do not traipse, but what you will do is listen to me. You require sustenance and rest, and you will have both.”
She said nothing, her eyes going wide.
His grip on her shoulders tightened. “Do you understand me, Miss Montgomery? I have kept my silence, but I will do everything I have threatened you with, if you do not keep your arse planted upon that seat and eat the food that is brought to you. I will inform Winchelsea that the famed H.E. Montgomery is naught but a drunkard, who tippled so much port, she could not reach our meeting in time because she had spent the morning vomiting into my chamber pot. After she lied to me about her hotel being unsafe, and the Home Office demanding she stay as my guest here at Lark House.”
“Mr. Arden, I am—”
“You are remaining precisely where you are,” he interrupted in the voice he had often used with his headstrong sister, Violet.
Ah, Lettie. He hoped he could one day restore his relationship with her. That it was capable of being restored, after the damage he had inflicted upon it with The Incident. At least he knew she was happy now, and Strathmore, to his credit, seemed a doting and loving husband. Then again, he was required to be, else Lucien would feed him his own ballocks.
“How dare you presume to order me about?” Miss Montgomery demanded, pique making her cheeks flush even further.
Damn it if she wasn’t lovely in her fit of irritation.
“I dare everything, madam,” he informed her.
She was beneath his roof after all, and it was his rule here. Not hers. She struck him as a woman who was well-accustomed to not just being on her own, but to commanding all others in her presence. Perhaps that had worked well enough for her in America as a Pinkerton, but it would not work here at Lark House. These walls were his territory; this country was his to protect.
A knock at the door heralded the arrival of the tray he had requested at last, along with a reprieve for him from his ruinous, foolish path of thoughts. He accepted the tray from the servant and dismissed her, turning back to Miss Montgomery, who was already standing.
Until her face went ashen once more, and she flopped upon the divan in typical, graceless Miss Montgomery fashion. Somehow, she had ceased to be The Abomination, and this realization disturbed him. She had slipped past his defenses. He would rebuild his turrets, and build them higher.
He stalked toward her with grim intent, the tray outstretched, as if it were a weapon. When he reached the divan, he seated himself alongside her, resting the tray upon her lap.
“Your repast, Miss Montgomery,” he announced.
She stared at him for longer than necessary, her gaze unfathomable. He wondered what her agile mind was thinking. What attempts to overpower and disarm him she was already formulating. Regardless of what they were, no matter how clever, she would never beat him. He would always win.
He was the Duke of Arden.
And the Duke of Arden did not lose.
Mistakes? He made them. Far too many to count. But defeat was not and had never been an option. Defeat by Miss Hazel Elizabeth Montgomery? Never.
“I am not hungry,” she announced, stoic.
“You do not think you are,” he corrected her, for he had given the bottle a black eye many a time in his younger days. He was more than familiar with the aftereffects of overindulgence the day after making merry. And he knew the best cure for what ailed her was food. Food, water, and rest. Also, bed sport. But that was not going to happen.
No bloody chance.
Unless the Duke of Winchelsea clambered into her bedchamber window later on. Which was unlikely indeed, for many reasons. First, Winchelsea was too dignified for clambering. Second, the likelihood of the duke surviving such a clamber was poor, since Miss Montgomery was staying on the second floor, and Lark House did not possess any architectural marvels which would facilitate such an endeavor. Lucien knew, because his younger sister was beautiful, and he had been acting as her father for many years. A man who had been wild himself in his younger years knew what to look for when protecting his women.
And third, if Winchelsea attempted to bed Miss Montgomery beneath Lucien’s own roof, Lucien would take great joy in beating the man to a pulp, regardless of whether or not he was Lucien’s senior in the Home Office. He had little left to lose.
“I know I am not hungry,” Miss Montgomery interrupted his tumultuous thoughts then. “I thank you for this tray, truly I do, but I cannot force myself to eat a bite.”
Disturbed by the vein of his thoughts and the protective urge he inexplicably felt for the maddening woman at his side, Lucien clenched his jaw. Counted to fifteen. Inhaled, then exhaled.
Felt not at all like himself. But that was rather too bad. He was beginning to realize everything about Miss H.E. Montgomery left him bewildered, frustrated, and filled with…yearning.
No. Good God, no. Irritation. Yes, that was more apt. Far more apt. She filled him with irritation.
But he still wanted her to eat. She had to eat.
He picked up a cherry tartlet, then raised it to her lips. “A bite, Miss Montgomery.”
“My fingers are in functioning order, Mr. Arden.” She frowned at him.
Unmoved, he pressed the tartlet to her mouth. “Open.”
To his amazement, she did, revealing a neat line of even, white teeth. And she took a bite. Her surrender should not have an effect upon him. But there had been something unbearably erotic in the way she had opened her mouth at his directive, accepting the tartlet. The manner in which she obeyed him. This somehow felt like more of a victory than tricking her into drinking too much port had.
He watched her chew the confection slowly, then swallow.
“Better?” he asked.
Her lips pursed. “Do not pretend as if you care.”
Her sharp retort almost made him smile. “I do care. I have no desire to be covered in your vomitus.”
Desire. There was another word he should never utter in Miss Montgomery’s presence. For even though it shared a sentence with vomitus, a splinter of warmth pierced him anyway.
“No one would deserve it more,” she said sweetly, before reaching for the tray and seizing the glass of water.
She gulped down the contents with a gusto that did not surprise him. More tendrils of hair had escaped her chignon, framing her face in wild little curls. The sight of them entranced him. For some reason, he had supposed her hair to be straight. But now he wondered how the glossy mahogany strands would appear, unbound down her back. A riot of rebellious curls? Soft waves?
And then he reminded himself he must cease all such unwanted mental inquiries into Miss Montgomery as a woman. He was aiming to rid himself of her, not to seduce her, for God’s sake.
She settled her water back upon the tray with a lusty sigh. “Not lemonade, but far preferable to port.”
Lemonade. Of course she would prefer a drink which was tart. He ought to have guessed.
He held up the tartlet. “More?”
She eyed him warily. “I think I like you far better when you speak in one-word sentences, Mr. Arden.”
“And I like you better when your mouth is otherwise occupied,” he returned, only realizing the double entendre too late.
Devil take it, what was the matter with him? And why was he suddenly plagued by the notion of her mouth occupied by his? Or, even more wicked, by another part of his anatomy entirely?
She did not appear to take note of the secondary meaning however, simply giving him an admonishing look, before reaching for another tartlet and plucking it from the tray. Raising her brows, she took a bite.
He still held the half-eaten pastry he had fed her in his hand. It was apparent she had no intention of consuming the rest, or allowing him to feed it to her. He had to admit doing so had been a grave lapse in judgment. Because performing any task which required him to not just look at Miss Montgomery’s mouth, but to get near enough to touch it was a horrible, disastrous idea.
Still watching her, he popped it into his own mouth. Her eyes dipped to his lips. A flush stole over her high cheekbones. He felt that gaze as if it were a touch. The steady thrum of longing, which had first struck him in the carriage on their return to Lark House, returned. Only this time, it was stronger. More insistent.
He swallowed. Miss Montgomery reached for her water. An uneasy silence settled between them which was far too intimate for his liking. What in the hell was he doing, sitting here mooning over the partner he did not want?
Turrets, he reminded himself. He needed to rebuild his. At once. He could not allow this maddening woman to storm his battlements and overtake the castle. He had worked far too hard, for far too long, to gain his position as the leader of the Special League. Commanding the agents charged with keeping England safe was everything he wanted. All he needed.
Lucien cleared his throat and stood. “I will leave you to finish your repast in peace, Miss Montgomery.”
He offered her a bow, then began stalking from the room.
“Arden?”
Her drawl halted him. He turned back, taking in the sight of her, all disheveled and adorably rumpled, a tray laden with tartlets at her side. She had not called him Mr. Arden, and he rather wished she had. When she nettled him, it was much easier to recall his dislike for her.
“Yes, Miss Montgomery?” he demanded, when she said nothing more.
She smiled, and that simple curvature of her lips was a revelation. When she smiled at him in such a fashion, he found it difficult to not only think, but to breathe. Even in her horrid dress, with all her odd mannerisms and strange brash ways, she was bloody gorgeous.
“Thank you,” she said.
Turrets.
He nodded. “You are welcome, Miss Montgomery.”
Then he did the only thing he could do. He gave her his back and strode from the chamber, before he did something exceedingly foolish, such as sinking back into the divan and hauling her to him for a kiss. Licking the sweet taste of cherries from her lips and mouth. Discovering for certain whether or not she wore a corset today.
This would not do. Not at all. He increased his pace, fleeing as if an invading army followed in his wake. And in a manner, it did.
Turrets, he reminded himself grimly. Turrets.
Chapter Five
The Duke of Arden confounded her.
And Hazel did not like being confounded. She liked answers. Knowledge. She liked plans and lists, and people who acted exactly as she expected them to at all times. People who did not act out of character. People who did not surprise her with sudden kindness.
She did not like men who were supercilious and patronizing one moment, then tender and considerate the next. She did not like men who had tricked her into drinking so much port, she’d spent the next morning feeling as if she’d been run over by a railcar, then fed her cherry tartlets and stared at her lips.
She examined her reflection in the looking glass, nodding at herself. The ragged-looking waif of the day before was no longer in evidence. She had refreshed herself with a bath and had scraped her wayward hair into a neat braid pinned at her nape. Bunton had offered assistance once more, but Hazel had declined. She was self-sufficient, and she needed to remember that. It would not do for her to grow weak and complacent, accustomed to having someone wait upon her, as if she were a lady to the manor born.
Hazel Montgomery was not a lady to the manor born.
She was an orphan, who had been raised in squalor with other orphan children whose parents had either died, did not want them, or could not afford to feed them. Her childhood had unfolded beneath the dark cloud of civil war being fought all around her. She was a woman who had taught herself everything she knew, from reading and writing to shooting a pistol. And she could damn well dress herself.
This morning, she was dressed for battle, wearing the divided skirt she’d had made for herself in New York, and a fitted bodice covered by a jaunty jacket. It would not do for the Duke of Arden to think of her as a female, and neither would it do for her to think of him as a male. These garments were her armor. She had donned them often when working in partnership with her male colleagues, and while the trousers inevitably shocked, they also served their purpose, reminding her fellow agents she was an experienced detective worth her salt.
And she would remind the Duke of Arden of that too as they began their work together today. More importantly, she would eradicate from her mind the memory of the way he had looked at her mouth the day before. She would forget she had imagined, for one wild and foolish moment, what his lips would feel like moving over hers.
She would banish all such wayward thoughts and impulses, for they were beneath her. Her post was important, after all, in myriad ways. For Hazel, it was a much-needed increase in pay as much as it was an affirmation. Her case history spoke for itself, and though she had worked herself to the bone on those cases, she was proud of her work. She knew she was a damned good detective. But the Home Office had requested her specifically, and she considered that proof to all the men she had worked alongside who doubted her abilities.
Not only was she earning a greater salary, but she was also the agent who had been chosen from all the rank and file to represent the agency abroad. Although Pinkertons were regularly consulted by the English Home Office and their Special League devoted to Fenian containment, no Pinkerton before her had ever been asked to partner in leading the League itself. Had others before her been asked to provide consultation? Yes. To provide intelligence? Also, yes.
Lead the ranks of their London agents?
Impossible.
But she had. Hazel Elizabeth Montgomery, who had been fighting and clawing her way through life from the moment the mother she could not remember had abandoned her on an Atlanta street, had been asked—a woman, and one of f
ew lady Pinkertons—to aid the League. Her reaction to the Duke of Arden was an aberration.
She was here not just to provide the intelligence she had sourced in New York, but to help guide the League’s investigations in England accordingly. She would not allow herself to become distracted from that all-important duty. Because if there was one thing she wanted in her life upon the Lord’s great earth, it was to prove to everyone that a woman could perform a job just as well as any man could.
Hazel had been doing so for ten years, and she intended to continue doing so for the next fifty, God willing.
She consulted the pocket watch she carried with her. Five minutes until her first true meeting with Arden. This time, she would be early. And this time, she would be well-armed, prepared for whatever nonsense and trickery he had in mind. She had kept her distance yesterday following her ignominious collapse, regrouping herself.
Briefly, she wondered whether his concern for her the day before had been feigned. Then, her overactive mind—restored, now that she’d had a restful night’s sleep—began churning. And she wondered just how devious he was, how malicious his intent. Had his masculine interest in her been contrived? She had dealt with overtures often enough over the years to know when a man was attracted to her, and judging from his gaze, his intensity, and his mannerisms, Arden was very drawn to her.
Unless his interest had been merely a further attempt at her manipulation on his part? She wondered, not for the first time, how she had wound up on the divan. One moment, she had been walking at his side in the marbled mausoleum that served as an entry hall to Lark House, and the next, she had awakened laid out on a piece of furniture, a distraught-looking Arden hovering over her.
The notion of him carrying her in his arms made her uncomfortably aware, all over again, that she was a female and he was decidedly a male. It made her stomach tighten and tingle, made an insistent ache pulse between her thighs. But that sensation would have to go, because she could not abide being late, and she was scheduled to meet with Arden in his study in their first official capacity as partners in precisely—she checked her pocket watch again—two minutes.
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