“Can we not discuss this?”
“He’s more like our father than I realized. Shagging with little thought to anything else. To anyone.” She glanced back at him, stumbling slightly. He caught hold of her elbow. His gaze cutting and direct, his implication was clear. With any thought to you.
“Oh, and you would never do such a thing.” Her voice trembled, betraying her. “You who claim to be no gentleman.”
His fingers tightened marginally on her. “I am no gentleman.” He tugged her closer, his mouth a hairsbreadth from her own. “But I take care of what’s mine.”
Her stomach quivered at his pronouncement. She felt his words as deeply as she had felt his teeth on her flesh.
She swallowed and twisted her arm free. He let her go, watching her as though he would very much like to take a bite out of her again. She moved ahead of him. As predicted, he followed.
It took two blocks for her to recover her voice. “Let us just forget this happened.”
He didn’t reply for some moments and she felt something akin to relief. Perhaps she need say nothing more. Perhaps they would carry on and forget that kiss—forget all of this—had ever happened between them.
“Can you do that?” He angled his head as though interested in her response. Not that he gave her time to reply. “You’re lying if you say you can.”
“I can,” she insisted.
“Then I can’t.”
She sent him a startled glance. Clearly he didn’t mean that.
She snapped her face forward again, looking straight ahead. “I am your brother’s fiancée.” Now seemed as good a time as any to cling to that particular falsehood.
“Are you?”
There he went again with the mocking skepticism. She stopped hard for a moment and glanced up at him before resuming walking, her pace as brisk as ever.
“You know I am.” She lifted her chin, hoping to appear confident and not defensive.
“Then why did you kiss me back?”
“Did I?” she challenged, and somehow didn’t choke on that prevarication.
He chuckled. “Not at first, perhaps. Once your surprise ebbed away you most definitely kissed me back. I wouldn’t call that the behavior of a woman happily betrothed to another man, but don’t torture yourself. I won’t tell anyone. And it was nice. Unexpectedly so.”
They turned onto her street. Nice.
That shattering kiss was simply nice for him?
She seethed inside, feminine pride she didn’t know she possessed stinging. It had been more than nice. Every other kiss she’d experienced paled beside a kiss from this wretch of a man.
She stopped before her lodging house and turned smartly on her heels to face him.
He was busy looking at her residence, his forehead knitting as he took it in. “This is where you live?”
She squared her shoulders, perfectly aware of her humble dwelling. But seeing it now, through his eyes, she felt suddenly embarrassed. “Yes. You know as much.”
“Autenberry lets you live here?”
“No one lets me do anything . . . even Autenberry. I make my own decisions.”
He looked back at her curiously, and she couldn’t deny that it must look odd that the Duke of Autenberry would be affianced to someone who lived in a place like this.
“Doesn’t sound much like Autenberry.”
“Perhaps you don’t know your brother as well as you think you do.”
He shot another quick glance to the boardinghouse. “I think I may know him better than you do. I know a side to him that the world rarely sees.” A strange, pensive tone entered his voice and she wondered what he was thinking. She would hazard that it had to do with whatever rift stood between them.
She cleared her throat and he turned his attention back to her. “It’s late.” She motioned to the door. “I should go in. Thank you for—” driving me mad, insulting me, accosting me, kissing me “—walking me home.”
“I didn’t give you a choice.”
“No.” She gave the barest smile. “You didn’t.”
“No more walking alone at night.”
Instead of arguing or exchanging sniping words, she lifted the hem of her cloak and started up the steps leading into the house.
“Miss Fairchurch.” She looked over her shoulder at him. He stood with his legs braced, a pirate at the prow of his ship gazing up at her. “I look forward to seeing you again.”
Her pulse spiked at his words. Turning, she ascended the final steps and entered the house, shaken, furious. Furious with herself for letting things go so far with Struan Mackenzie. Furious that she had reveled in every moment of it.
What would he think, what would he do, when he found out the truth? The prospect made her shiver. A man like Struan would not appreciate being made a fool, and she was certain that’s how he would feel. He’d feel deceived, perhaps even mocked. Her skin broke out in goose bumps.
She couldn’t see him again. Even if a small part of her wanted to.
She sighed. As long as she was living this subterfuge, it was bound to happen. She would see him again whether she wished it or not. It was the last thing that should ever happen, but it would.
She simply needed to make certain that they were never alone again, that they never did any of the things they’d already done. She’d forget what it was like to be with him . . . to kiss him, to touch him and be touched by him. And then she wouldn’t feel so shaky and unsteady inside anymore.
Chapter 14
He wanted her.
Struan gazed after her as she disappeared into the substandard boardinghouse and knew this to be true with a sense of grim disgust. It was the truth and he needed to decide what he would do about it. Rather, he had to decide if he would do anything at all about it.
His attraction to her had simmered since their first meeting, even though she was not to his usual taste. Poppy Fairchurch was much too difficult a female, and he did not make it a habit to pursue prickly women. Why bother with those who did not look upon him with invitation? Miss Fairchurch was all barbed words and glares.
Nor did he waste time on women attached to other men. There were too many available lasses eager for his company. Why trouble with the minor few who were not?
Because she’s a challenge. He shoved aside that annoying whisper wending inside his head. That was too pedestrian for him. Weak men ruled by base desires would want her for such a reason. Struan was not weak. He did not need the conquest of a woman to inflate his ego.
So then why do you want her so badly?
For a while, when he first arrived in London, he’d considered marrying. He set his sights on one female in particular—the Duke of Banbury’s sister, Lady Aurelia. She was comely and her family’s lauded position in Society had appealed to him for wholly self-seeking reasons. It would have been nice to rub Autenberry’s face in the fact that he’d wed a duke’s daughter.
He’d moved on from her, however, when it became apparent that her heart lay with another. Since then he had lost the whim to marry some blue-blooded chit simply to aggravate his half brother.
Although what better way to irk him than to seduce his woman?
Inhaling, he rubbed at his jaw where stubble was starting to grow and gave a small shake of his head. He was lying to himself if he wanted to pretend that was his motivation. There was no revenge plot tangled up in his hunger for her.
She belonged to Autenberry, and that fact should have repelled him. He didn’t long for anything his brother possessed. He had made it a point to feel that way. Struan had amassed wealth enough that he would never want for anything. He was as rich as Croesus. In good health and possession of all his teeth. He didn’t need anything his brother held claim to—especially his latest paramour.
And yet she was different.
She wasn’t a title. Or something as intangible as prestige. She didn’t symbolize acceptance into the ton. In fact, she would never bring him status.
He stared up at the house, at
the window he knew to be hers, as if it held the answer to life, the secrets of the universe.
She was in there now, readying for bed. Presumably with her sister.
Would you follow her and finish what they’d started if she resided alone?
He imagined himself walking through the front door and up the stairs as if he had every right. He envisioned himself striding unannounced into her private room, invading her sanctuary and stripping off her clothes. Invading her.
Would she demand he leave?
Of course she would, but he could persuade her otherwise. It wouldn’t be too difficult. He’d tasted her lips, felt the hitch of her breath and the press of her body. She was ripe for it. He could have her. Whether she realized it or not, she wanted him, too. She’d responded to him. She was a woman of intense passions. And he could have that passion for himself. He could. At least for one night. He could satisfy this need for her and move on.
He gave the building one last look and turned away, tucking his hand casually inside his pocket. He only had to decide if he would do it.
Was he so lacking in conscience that he would take his brother’s woman?
Poppy spent a miserable night tossing and turning in the bed she shared with her sister. She could still feel Struan Mackenzie. His lips. His hands. The way his brogue rumbled on the air, the sound infusing her body with heat.
If it wasn’t too late when she returned home, she would have dragged out the hip tub for a bath. Perhaps that would rid her of the memory of him—if she could scrub him off her body. By the time she fell asleep dawn was already tingeing the sky.
It was the only excuse she had for sleeping in so late. An hour and a half hardly amounted to a good night’s rest. She hurriedly stabbed the pins into her hair. There would be no time for breakfast. She would have to go directly to the shop.
She had just finished with the last button on her dress when the door to her chamber was flung open—no thanks to Bryony. Her sister had left it unlocked after she stepped out this morning to visit the washroom. Bryony squealed at the sudden intrusion from where she sat in front of their dressing mirror, dropping the ribbon she had been trying to weave into her plait.
Poppy spun around to face their flush-faced landlady. The woman might be a busybody, but she had always granted them a semblance of privacy and at least knocked before entering their rooms.
“Mrs. Gibbons!” Poppy planted her fists on her hips and leveled her with a stern look. Boundaries. They needed to discuss their boundaries.
The lady practically danced in place, indifferent to Poppy’s disapproving stare. “Come! Come at once!” She waved her hands furiously. She looked fit to apoplexy.
“What?” Bryony jumped up to her feet from her chair, evidently sensing something epic was on the verge of transpiring. “What is it?”
“A grand carriage with a footman riding in the back! Heavens! It has a coat of arms on it. I don’t know the house, but I’ve never been very good at keeping such things to memory.”
A sinking sensation started in Poppy’s stomach. Something epic indeed.
“It stopped here?” Bryony hopped and clapped, catching some of Mrs. Gibbons’s enthusiasm.
“Yes, and they want to see you, Poppy! They wait in the parlor.”
“They?” Bryony demanded, stopping her hopping to swing her gaze to Poppy. “They who?”
“A duchess! I confess after I was told her title I heard nothing beyond that, although there was a string of names.”
“Poppy!” Bryony clapped her hands in a frenzy. “There’s a duchess calling on you!”
Poppy nodded absently at her sister’s stupefied expression. “Yes, I heard that.” She didn’t need to be told the string of names to follow the duchess’s title. She knew who it was. Currently, there was only one duchess in her life. Poppy pressed her hands together and twisted her fingers. “I, uh, shall go downstairs, then.”
Both her sister and Mrs. Gibbons nodded eagerly. “Yes, do hurry! Don’t keep her waiting.”
She smoothed her hands over her dress and walked with far more composure than she felt down the stairs and into the parlor. Mrs. Gibbons and her sister refrained from following and she knew that must have been a true feat for the both of them.
Indeed, the duchess was there, waiting in the parlor. As well as her daughter and stepdaughter. All three were elegantly attired for traveling, their hands delicately folded in their laps.
“Your Grace. Ladies.” Poppy executed what she hoped was an adequate curtsey.
“Ah, there you are, dearest!” Her Grace rose from Mrs. Gibbons’s shabby sofa and crossed the room to embrace her, the sensation of her slim, beringed fingers patting her back still strange and bewildering.
Poppy closed her eyes in a long blink and patted the lady’s back in turn, still marveling over how she ended up in this situation.
“Poppy?”
She pulled back and turned quickly at her sister’s arrival in the parlor. Her stomach sank. So much for her staying put.
“Bryony,” she returned. “This is the Duchess of Autenberry and her daughter and stepdaughter, the Ladies Clara and Enid.”
Bryony, never at a loss for words, was speechless. She could only gawk, her head bobbing up and down as she assessed the three ladies in all their finery and elegant coiffures. They were resplendent in colorful dresses, the drab background of Mrs. Gibbons’s parlor all the more dreary as it framed them.
“I didn’t know you had a sister,” the young duchess exclaimed, stepping forward to assess Bryony with keen, interested eyes.
Bryony pressed a little closer to Poppy’s side, for once appearing almost shy. “I didn’t know you had a duchess,” she whispered for Poppy’s ears alone as she in turn assessed the ebony-haired beauty.
The Dowager Duchess of Autenberry stopped directly in front of Bryony, her dark eyes softly reprimanding as they settled on Poppy. “How remiss of you. What a stunning creature! How old are you, dear?”
“Fifteen, ma’am, I mean, my lady,” she stammered, and performed a clumsy curtsey.
Poppy leaned toward her ear. “Your Grace,” she corrected.
“Your Grace,” Bryony chirped, color suffusing her face. “I mean, Your Grace.”
The dowager clapped her hands together and held her palms pressed together. “Charming,” she pronounced in her heavy accent. “You’re near the same age as my own sweet daughter.” She motioned to Clara. “I am certain you will be fast friends.”
The girl stepped forward and nodded in greeting at Bryony. Bryony’s wide eyes traveled over the girl in her stylish pink-and-blue striped muslin trimmed with matching fur.
“How delightful,” Poppy murmured.
“It will be nice to have two girls of like age in the family.”
“Yes,” Lady Enid chimed in drolly. “Perhaps I won’t be the only one to endure the little magpie now.”
“Oh, posh! Your life would be a dreadful bore without me, Enid. You love me,” Clara insisted with easy conviction, flashing a dimple as she grinned.
“They shall have a grand time together,” the dowager continued with certainty, nodding as she looked between her daughter and Bryony. “It shall put some joy into the season. All things considered, we could use a bit of joy.”
Bryony swung her gaze to Poppy. Accusation gleamed brightly in the blue depths along with the sudden realization that her sister possessed a life apart from her—a life of which Bryony knew very little.
Bryony shook her head slightly and sent each of their guests a confusing look. “Forgive me, I don’t understand.”
Of course she didn’t understand what was happening. Poppy could scarcely understand it herself.
“Poppy!” The dowager tsked and shook her head “Don’t tell me you haven’t told your sister? Why have you kept such a thing secret? She should share in your happiness and good fortune.”
“Told me what?” Bryony demanded.
Suddenly, Poppy found it difficult to breathe. Had
the parlor become overly hot? She tugged at her modest collar.
From the corner of her eye, Poppy glimpsed Mrs. Gibbons hovering near the parlor doors. Naturally, she would want the gossip to impart later. The entire neighborhood would be told of the dowager duchess’s visit. No detail would be left out of her report.
Poppy shrugged lamely. “I wanted to surprise her.”
She had not thought her lie would ever reach her sister. She didn’t imagine it would affect Bryony, but now here she stood facing the duke’s family with her sister at her side. Her lie had caught up with her . . . had collided directly into the reality of her world. She wanted to flee upstairs and hide under the covers of her bed.
“Your sister is betrothed to my stepson, the Duke of Autenberry.” The duchess blinked, still looking mildly surprised that Poppy’s own sister did not know such a monumental fact. As she should.
The color drained from Bryony’s face. “P-Poppy? Engaged to a duke?”
Poppy glanced reproachfully at the fire crackling in the small fireplace, blaming it for the sudden suffocating heat of the room.
It was unavoidable. Lying to her sister had become unavoidable. Her lips parted to speak. “It’s true.” She smiled weakly. “We’ve made no formal announcement yet . . .”
Because there was no actual engagement. Because she was caught up in this insane deception and had promised Lord Strickland she would not reveal the truth.
“You’re betrothed?” Bryony clearly could not wrap her head around this. Poppy could not fault her for her bewilderment. “To a d-duke?”
The dowager duchess clasped her hands together before her, the light catching the gemstones of her rings. Rings that would probably see Poppy and her sister through a lifetime of meals. “The reason we’re here is because we decided to return home for the holidays. We always spend Christmas at Autenberry Manor. This year Marcus suggested we spend it here in Town, but we should never have broken with tradition. If he’d been on his way home, perhaps . . .” Her voice faded away. “That’s neither here nor there now, is it?” She smiled shakily. “Of course we want you there with us. You belong with us.” The duchess shot a glance to Bryony as an afterthought. “Both of you, of course. We’re family now.”
While the Duke Was Sleeping Page 12