How to Capture a Countess (Duchess Diaries 1)

by Karen Hawkins

  Rose stiffened. “Her grace is your great-aunt? And my godmother?”

  “Apparently so.”

  Does that explain the unexpected invitation? A flicker of disappointment settled over her. Until hearing that, she’d rather liked the duchess. Had soft-spoken Lady Charlotte been in on the plot, too?

  Sin walked forward with an ominous smile. “So, Miss Balfour, we meet again. Aren’t we fortunate?”

  Politeness bade her to come down from the ladder, but it seemed safer up there, away from the simmering storm of a man crossing the room toward her. She tried for a casual tone. “I hope you’re well. It’s been a very long time since we last met.”

  “Six years. Six very trying years.”

  His smoldering anger jangled along her nerves and she had to fight the urge to climb farther up the ladder. “I’m sorry to hear that you’ve had a trying time.”

  His brows snapped together. “Don’t pretend you thought it would be otherwise.”

  She blinked. “Why would I know anything about your life after we parted? I haven’t seen you since.”

  His mouth firmed into a straight line, his eyes blazing hotter now. “Don’t play the innocent with me. I know you.”

  Good heavens, what is this all about? It was true that she’d caused herself and her family a good deal of embarrassment, but he, like all rakehells, was immune to scandal. Unless a man stepped firmly over the boundaries of society, like Lord Byron in sleeping with his half sister, very little could sully their names. A woman, meanwhile, could be ruined by something as innocent as a kiss.

  The whole thing was grossly unfair, and Rose didn’t appreciate Lord Sin’s obliviousness to that fact. But it wouldn’t help to confront him; he was obviously in no mood for calm, reasonable discourse.

  Perhaps she should just offer him the apology she’d wished to offer all those years ago. At the least it would make her feel better, for she owed him one.

  She cleared her throat. “Lord Sinclair, I’m glad you’re here.” She began to climb down. “I’ve been wanting to apologize to you since our last meeting and—”

  “Stay.” He now stood at the foot of the ladder, one large hand resting on a rung by her ankle. The glint of an emerald ring on his left hand was echoed by his tie pin.

  “Stay? Here on the ladder?”

  “Yes.” He stepped onto the lowest rung.

  “Oh no, that’s not necessary. I will come down and—”

  He took another step up, his shoulder brushing against her calf.

  Rose clung tightly in place. “Lord Sinclair, please! We cannot talk here, it’s— For heaven’s sake, we’re on a ladder! We can speak at dinner, perhaps, when we’re both—”

  “Oh, no. We will not put off this meeting one moment more.” He took another step up, his eyes locked with hers, every movement a threat.

  Her mouth dry, Rose took a step up the ladder, her chest so tight she could scarcely breathe. “Lord Sinclair, if you’ll return to the floor we can sit by the fire, which is much nicer than trying to balance while—”

  “No.” His expression was unyielding as he climbed another rung, his hands firmly gripping each side of the ladder about her knees and blocking any desperate exit she might wish to make.

  “That’s ridiculous!” She steeled her crazed heart, which was beating even harder now. “Lord Sinclair, please. This is most unusual.”

  He laughed, low and ugly. “Don’t put on your missish airs for me. You are a tease of the worst kind, and you made me the laughingstock of London.” The words crackled with fury.

  She wet her lips nervously. “You’re exaggerating.” Who would dare laugh at him?

  “No, I’m not.”

  She tried to calm her thoughts, which would have been much easier if he weren’t leaning against her legs, his blazing gaze far too close for her comfort. She didn’t dare look away, for it seemed that looking directly at him gave her some modicum of control.

  To discourage him from coming any closer, she slipped an arm through the closest rung and twisted a bit so that—should he dare climb any higher—her shoulder would be at a right angle to his chest. It was a small protection, but it was all she had while on the ladder. “Lord Sinclair, however you feel about what happened all those years ago, I doubt anyone—other than us—remembers it.”

  He couldn’t have looked more incredulous had she told him that she’d just taken a walk with a minotaur. “You cannot believe that.”

  “Who would bother to remember a few moments at some ball six years ago? I do, of course, since I made a fool of myself. I’m truly sorry that you were a victim of my very youthful and painfully impulsive nature. I cannot tell you how often I’ve wished to take back my actions of that night.”

  A flicker of surprise crossed his face. “You’re apologizing.”

  “Yes. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

  His jaw tightened. “An apology isn’t enough.”

  She met his gaze steadily. “Everything that happened that night was my fault, but there’s nothing I can do to change it now. The best thing we can do is to leave it in the past where it belongs, and move on.” When he merely continued to stare at her, she frowned. “Lord Sinclair, I wrote you a letter that very night and explained—”

  His laugh was full of derision. “Oh yes, your letter. You humiliated me in front of the biggest gossips of the ton and then sent me a few scrawled lines as if that made up for it.”

  “It was over by then, and—”

  “Over? Miss Balfour, the scandal had just begun—and you just walked away, instead of staying to face the gossips. After you left they were like vultures, tearing my name apart a piece at a time.”

  “But you didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “That’s not what people believed. Everyone thought I was the aggressor in our little encounter and that it had shaken you so badly that you’d run off to the countryside, terrified by the thought of spending another moment in my presence.”

  “But that’s not why I left at all! I didn’t wish to cause you any more trouble, and I thought that was the best way to avoid an unpleasant aftermath.”

  “It was the worst way. There was quite an aftermath, my dear Miss Balfour.” He leaned forward, his chest against her legs. “For me.”

  She felt like a butterfly pinned in a display box. “Oh dear.”

  “People talked about what they had seen, and made up what they hadn’t. Within a fortnight the story went from my attempting to kiss you to the full-blown attempted seduction of an innocent. And apparently I was so violent in pressing my unwanted attentions on you that you were forced to go into seclusion.”

  “That’s ludicrous!”

  “Oh, it gets worse. Weeks after the event, details emerged that were not evident at the time—your gown was ripped, the pins torn from your hair, one of your shoes lost when you’d tried to flee and I’d held you against your will. Afterward, no gentleman, however desirous of a connection with my family or fortune, dared leave his daughter within talking distance of me, a man so depraved that he had violently attacked an innocent in a nearly public place.”

  “You must be joking. Not a single word of that is true! The people there must have seen that I was perfectly fine and that my gown was never torn nor my shoes missing nor—nor any of that drivel.”

  “They were there, and they did see. And then, as they repeated the story over and over, they added whatever incriminating details they could think of to make their version of the story more delectable.” He eyed her coldly. “Had you been there, you could have set the rumors straight. But you weren’t there. You’d fled and left me to deal with a growing assault of scandalous rumors.”

  “I had no idea! My aunt was insistent that I leave town until the talk died down. My only intent was to minimize the damage I’d done and—”

  He climbed to the next rung, his chest now against the side of her thigh.

  Rose’s heart thudded against her collarbone, a wild tingle racing through her
, as intoxicating as champagne. This was the exact feeling that had gotten her into such a mess to begin with. For some reason she still couldn’t fathom, being near Lord Sinclair caused her to experience the oddest, most restless urge, and sent her usually calmly ordered senses reeling. It was a feeling she’d both loved and feared, even now.

  She’d remembered the feeling well, but not the intensity, nor the fact that his proximity made her entire body burn. That was a new symptom of what was surely some madness.

  “For the record,” Sin said, “I hold your aunt responsible for the events of that night as well as you.”

  “My aunt wasn’t even in the garden.”

  “Exactly. Had you been on a leash as you’d deserved, the events of that night would have never happened.”

  Rose’s temper flared. “My aunt had nothing to do with this.”

  He sneered at her. “Your aunt is as unprincipled as you.”

  It took all of her strength not to smack his head with her book. How dare he? “Do not pin your—nor my own—weakness upon my poor aunt. Your reputation was hardly unsullied to begin with, Lord Sin.”

  “Until you came along, people spoke of me as a Corinthian, but no one thought me a seducer of innocents.”

  She’d already opened her mouth, but at his words, she paused. There was indeed a difference between the two. And in accepting that fact, Rose saw the tableau from a new perspective, and her heart sank. Good God, it had looked like a seduction. There they were, Edinburgh’s most elusive bachelor in a fountain and a shaken and red-faced debutante wringing her hands nearby.

  And then I just left him to face the whispers. She bit her lip. For the last six years, she’d told herself that she’d left to allow the incident to blow over faster, but if she were honest, she’d admit there was another reason she couldn’t wait to leave town—she’d been shocked at her own reaction to Sin’s kiss.

  It had been the coward’s way out and apparently Sin had paid the price.

  She took a deep breath. “Though I wish I could, I cannot go back in time and repair the past. But I have apologized and very sincerely, too. As sad as it is to say, there’s nothing more to be done about it.”

  His gaze narrowed. “So little, so late.” He climbed another rung, his chest brushing her hip in an alarmingly intimate way.

  Rose tightened her grasp about the side rail and held her book to her chest like a shield, her traitorous body tingling alarmingly. Gulping, she took a nervous step up the ladder, away from the six-foot-two temptation.

  Undeterred, Sin followed. “The world would be shocked if they only knew what really happened that night, wouldn’t they, Miss Balfour?” He climbed up another rung and suddenly his face was level with hers, his chest against her shoulder.

  She looked directly into his eyes and any words she might have said in her own defense were lost. His eyes were streaked with gold that gave him a faintly lionlike appearance. And as she looked into his eyes, she was torn by two desires: to run away from him as fast as she could, and to lean against him and absorb the shivery pleasure simply touching him gave her.

  She was astounded that being close to him still had that effect on her; she had to fight the impulse to press against him and once more feel his lips on hers—

  Stop that, she told herself severely, her face heating at the boldness of her thoughts. If only she could take another step up the ladder—but his arms were now on either side of her.

  Trapped, she cleared her throat. “People didn’t cut you direct, did they?”

  “They didn’t shun me completely, since I’ve a title and a place in society, as well as a fortune.”

  “Then why do you even care—”

  “Because they mocked me, Miss Balfour. For months after, I was called Lord ‘Fin.’”

  Rose had an instant memory of him climbing out of the fountain, a lily pad upon his head, water streaming down his face. To her horror, from deep inside her rose a giggle.

  She didn’t mean to laugh, but being nervous always gave her the giggles, and the thought of this powerful, seductive man being called such a ridiculous name tickled every bone in her body.

  As she giggled, Lord “Fin” glared all the more, which made her even more nervous and made her laugh even harder.

  “Oh yes, laugh, Miss Balfour,” Sin snapped. “Laugh as you did that night. For it is that very laughter that revealed you for the scheming harpy that you are.”

  His icy tone sobered her laughter back to a faint but persistent giggle. “I’m very sorry to hear about the Lord F—” She waved a hand, not trusting herself to say it out loud for fear it would set her off again. “Truly, I had no idea.”

  Sin didn’t know what offended him more: the fact that after shoving him into a fountain and then laughing in his face, Rose Balfour had blithely left him to face the mess made by her actions, or that—after learning of the indignities he’d been forced to suffer—she had the audacity to stand here now and laugh again.

  “Just as I thought,” he snapped furiously, wishing he could simply throttle her and be done with it. “Your actions were deliberate; you knew what you were doing when you left me to face the scandal. You knew your absence would look damning!”

  Her laughter faded, though her eyes twinkled as she said with a bit of exasperation, “I knew no such thing! What on earth could I hope to gain by such a stratagem?”

  “Revenge, Miss Balfour. You were angry that I didn’t respond to your childish attempts to seduce me.”

  “Of all the silly— Lord Sinclair, you are being far too dramatic. I didn’t plan on embarrassing anyone. All I wanted was to kiss you. That, I’ll admit to doing. If it makes you feel any better, I’ve regretted it ever since.”

  He stiffened. She’d regretted it? Meanwhile, he was being dramatic? He was so furious he didn’t know what to say. For years he’d been imagining the satisfaction he would feel at hearing her admit her fault, but she’d stolen even that with her unaccommodating attitude.

  Bloody hell, she’s the most infuriating woman I’ve ever met. Infuriating and impossible to understand. He wasn’t quite sure what to make of her; he never had been. Her constant juxtaposition of flashes of bold sensuality and pragmatic common sense, interspersed as they were with moments of seemingly breathless innocence, confused the hell out of him.

  He eyed her critically, wondering how she’d lured him into the garden to begin with. Her eyes were still the only feature one could call “beautiful,” as they were a vivid blue surrounded by thick black lashes; the rest of her was merely average. Though she had a heart-shaped face, her mouth was too wide and her too-brown skin was yet marred by a faint dusting of freckles across the bridge of her pert nose. She was thin and had no real figure to speak of, her breasts quite small and her hips lacking the flared shape one expected in a woman. Worst of all was her unruly hair.

  She was plain, unremarkable, and unmemorable. Which was why it irritated him that he couldn’t be near her without his body reacting as if she were Aphrodite.

  Even now, a pure, hot surge of lust made him lean forward so that more of his body touched hers. Damn it, what is this? She’s not the sort of woman I’ve ever been interested in, not in looks, nor action, nor temperament. Had he any sense, he would leave right now and return to the safety of his bedchamber. Instead, he was holding her firmly caged within his arms, his body aching for more of her.

  As stirred as he was, she didn’t seem at all affected by his presence, for she arched an eyebrow at him. “That’s close enough, thank you. I would like to point out that you had a horrid nickname before our little incident. If you hadn’t been called Lord Sin to begin with, no one would have thought to call you Lord Fin.”

  He opened his mouth to reply, but she continued without heed, “And don’t tell me that you were truly distressed by being cut socially, because I know that you rarely attended social events to begin with. I’m surprised to find you here at your aunt’s, for this seems like a far tamer amusement than you usuall
y enjoy.”

  He scowled. “Don’t push me, Balfour. That would be most unwise.”

  “I’m not pushing you; I’m disagreeing with you. But perhaps you prefer biddable women who just agree with your every word.” She pressed her book to her chest as if it were a prayer book, attempting to look demure as she said in a theatrical falsetto, “Yes, Lord Sinclair. Whatever you say, Lord Sinclair.” She tittered in a way that made his teeth ache. “Oh, Lord Sinclair, you’re so funny! I vow, but you’re the smartest peer in all the realm! You’re the most—”

  “Stop that. Before you make more of a fool of yourself than you already have, I should tell you that I had a purpose in bringing you to my aunt’s house. A very specific one.”

  A look of wariness entered her blue eyes. “Oh? And what is that?”

  His feet now rested on the rung below hers, his hands to either side of her. He leaned forward and lowered his voice seductively. “I remember that kiss, Miss Balfour. Do you?”

  Her heartbeat fluttered in the delicate hollow of her neck, like a bird caught in a cage. “Of course I do.”

  “I also remember how it affected you.”

  She flushed. “Affected? I wasn’t— That is to say, I thought it a very nice—”

  His lips brushed the delicate shell pink of her ear and she shivered. “If I’m to be condemned for seducing you, then I should be granted the pleasures of that seduction, not just the pains.”

  “Th-the pleasures?” Her voice was breathless.

  He smiled then, his first genuine smile of the day. His hips held her soft body captive against the rungs of the ladder, making him instantly aware of how much more he wanted from her. “Oh yes.”

  She blinked as realization slowly settled on her face. “You’re going to seduce me?”

  “Oh yes, my little Rose. You’ve owed me that pleasure for six years, and the time has come for you to pay.”

  Four

  From the Diary of the Duchess of Roxburghe

  Charlotte and I oversaw the seating for dinner and are satisfied we’ve given Sin every advantage possible. I can tell that he believes he has the upper hand in this little game, but after meeting Miss Balfour, I have to wonder if his confidence might be misplaced.