‘Out of necessity, not choice.’ His fingers grazed the door knob and he had the sudden urge to clarify. ‘I’m afraid you truly did meet the true Seb Leatham at your sister’s house last March. Socially awkward and desperately camouflaging it with hostility, or else he blushes profusely and cannot converse at all. A poultry farmer’s by-blow grandson. A man who prefers to blend into the background or hide in the shadows. An all-round forgettable fellow by and large.’
Her brows furrowed as she scrutinised him again and he let her. Seb understood her trust in him was severely damaged and would take time to rebuild. As a rule, nobody appreciated being lied to. After an eternity she sighed.
‘Believe me, you are hardly forgettable, Seb. I sincerely doubt I shall ever forget you.’
As compliments went, he made the snap decision to take that one at face value and treasure it for ever. Further embellishment would likely ruin it, catastrophically, just as the real reason for her excitement at his kiss had bludgeoned a corner of his heart which would likely never repair. ‘Sleep tight, Gem. Treat yourself to a night off those rags.’
‘And appear tomorrow without my customary ringlets? I’d sooner be seen with jam smeared all over my front.’ The shared laughter felt honest and intimate. If nothing else a tenuous friendship was blossoming between them. One where they could both be themselves. He could be awkward rather than gruff and she could be less than perfect—although still sheer perfection in his eyes. ‘Tell me—if you are going to be around all day for the entertainments, talk bawdy with Penhurst’s cronies all evening and then be out all night doing Lord knows what, when do you plan to sleep?’
‘I’m a spy.’ He found himself grinning as she rolled her eyes. ‘Spies never sleep.’
Chapter Twelve
The day dragged interminably, and, thanks to a distinct lack of sleep, Clarissa was struggling to function before dinner and found herself constantly mulling. She sipped her ratafia listlessly and stared out through the French doors, allowing the ladies’ conversation to waft over her. It wasn’t as if she would miss anything. With Penny, the Viscountess Regis and Gaines’s poor wife, the conversation always followed a depressingly similar pattern. Over-bright smiles, safe and banal topics which avoided any mention of their miserable lives with their self-absorbed and neglectful husbands. The three of them, all similar in age to Clarissa, more brittle and ground down with each passing year of marital bliss. Hollow shells of the women they had been just a few short years ago. A stark warning of the perils of marrying the wrong man.
She stifled a yawn and took another sip in the hope it might miraculously restore her vitality else she’d look as battle-weary as her companions. Last night, her overactive mind made sleep impossible and she had lain on the soft eiderdown and simply stared listlessly at the ceiling until the sun rose. Hardly a surprise when her mind had been positively reeling. Was still reeling, if the truth be told. The revelations about Penhurst had whipped the floor from beneath her feet. The loyalty and worry for her friend made her hope Seb was wrong. Clarissa desperately wanted to believe Penhurst wouldn’t be involved in something so dreadful. Yet the more she thought about, the more she noticed and the more plausible the unthinkable became.
Something was very wrong in this house. The servants were too guarded, Penhurst’s fortunes were undoubtedly much improved and there were sentries on the doors when the house retired for bed.
Poor Penny.
Once again her eyes drifted to her friend and she was swamped with both pity and the crushing guilt at keeping what she knew a secret from her. More guilt came from the genuine feeling of euphoria at being involved in something so exciting. Dangerous yet worthy. Purposeful. Something other than being the flawless Incomparable, fearing her lack of attributes would imminently be discovered. Each emotion kept flitting around her head alongside the certainty that, for now, she was doing the right thing in assisting Seb by keeping quiet. For both Penny and him. What else could she do under the bizarre set of circumstances?
Not for the first time, Clarissa wished she had not followed Seb into the study last night. Ignorance was bliss. This knowledge was torture. Behaving like nothing was amiss was so hard, when everything was now amiss and in more ways than one.
Her thoughts about Seb were less decisive, yet creating more than their fair share of her current confusion. The man was indeed a bit of a mystery...and he wasn’t. She both understood him and didn’t. She trusted shy Seb implicitly because whilst the sometimes stilted, charming comments and occasional jerky self-conscious mannerisms could be all affectation, there was no way he could fake the frequent blushes which seemed to plague him at the oddest moments. Clarissa knew this because she had regularly tried to muster a becoming blush to charm the gentlemen of the ton over the years and had never managed to achieve one unless there was genuine cause for embarrassment. In fact, she blushed so infrequently that only Seb had seen one in the last Season or more, and at the time she had looked like Medusa and had been so horrified she had smeared jam down her front. Besides, his blushes clearly irritated him because he got a particular look of exasperation alongside one, as if he was inwardly chiding himself for being such a fool. Something she also sympathised with, thanks to her own incompetence at nearly everything bar being pretty and charming.
However Seb the spy—or his construction Lord Millcroft—was a wholly different kettle of fish. She was in two minds as to whether she should trust this incarnation. His icy determination to have her removed if she attempted to compromise his mission, the canny way he assessed people and stored information in his clever mind, the smooth and calculated way he could lie convincingly to do his job—well, those were things which she admired, but they also scared her. And whichever of those two contrasting Sebs had kissed her...
Her body spontaneously heated and hummed at the thought of it.
That man was deadly.
She scanned the drawing room again, looking for him, and sighed because he still wasn’t there. His absence was worrying because whatever he was doing it was probably dangerous. Not being able to see that danger, or be there to warn him of the perils, was awful. The constant, frantic worrying was draining, yet while the dratted man had been physically missing for the best part of the day he was vividly present in her mind. Largely thanks to last night. One minute she had acted on impulse to prevent their imminent discovery and the next she had melted into a boneless, wanton puddle of nerve endings beneath him, everything else a distant memory.
Who knew kissing felt like that?
Her control had certainly evaporated with Seb. In that brief few seconds—minutes?—of their kiss it was as if a hidden fuse had been lit within her, driving her to behave in a manner she had never behaved in before. She had not only welcomed his hands on her body, but tried to angle her breasts towards them, arching her greedy hips against him and clawing like a bitch in heat.
And that body!
Her hands had wandered wilfully of their own accord over his shoulders and back, far too eager to explore, and were in the midst of hauling up his clothing so she could feel his muscles and his skin unencumbered by annoyances like jackets, waistcoats and warm linen shirts when he tore his mouth from hers. For a split second, she almost pulled him back on top of her so that they could continue what they had started. In that unexpected, passionate moment she had wanted him naked; had wanted to be naked for him. Thank heavens she had a ready excuse to explain away her reactions, else he would think her a scandal. Young unmarried ladies didn’t moan for or paw and grope gentlemen. Most married ladies probably didn’t either. Her eyes slanted to Penny. Did poor Penny feel such passion for her traitorous husband? Probably not. Her friend had always been very proper.
With Seb, Clarissa had never been so unmindful of propriety before. One kiss had ignited the desire she had not known she was capable of and enlightened her body to needs she hadn’t known she needed. If that hadn’t been eno
ugh wantonness for one day, her body deemed it necessary to relive it even now. Her breasts and lips tingled, calling for his touch, her mind plagued with images of Seb, especially the glorious sight of his dark eyes almost black in the moonlight. Darkened with what she sincerely hoped was his matching need for her. Could that, too, be faked or was it like a blush? She didn’t know, but wished she did. To think her explosive reaction had been one-sided was mortifying.
He’d apologised later, of course, when he had sought her out in her bedchamber and she had brushed the incident aside—but those dark eyes had seemed wounded that she had done so and she had rejoiced to see that there, as well. If he had kissed her again, in that precise moment she would have let him. If he miraculously appeared ardent at her bedchamber later and demanded to finish what they had started, Clarissa was honest enough with herself to acknowledge she would throw caution to the wind and succumb once more. Gladly. Simply for the sake of her screaming, constantly heavy and aroused bosoms and the rampant, newly awakened need which refused to go away.
Her guilty gaze wandered to Westbridge, who was holding court at the fireplace, the limpet Olivia at his arm, hanging on his every word as if it was interesting. Part of her felt a rush of pity for the girl, as feigning interest in that quarter was exhausting. The Duke’s self-absorbed conversation could be a trifle repetitive which often made it as dull as dishwater. There were only so many times one could act intrigued about a discussion of his extensive art collection, or his latest expensive deliveries from his tailor... Good Lord! Was that lace on his cuffs? Why had she never noticed that affectation before? Like their host’s impressive displays of his new wealth, was this yet another thing she was only just seeing? Had Westbridge always worn lace? She had never seen lace on her spy. Seb didn’t do lace on anything, but then Seb was a man of adventure and intrigue, whereas Westbridge was a duke. Dukes and spies were cut from very different cloth, one clearly lacy and one not, so it was grossly unfair of her to compare them.
But she seemed unable to stop, almost as if she was now searching for faults in Westbridge to justify her new obsession with Seb. She watched Westbridge move to reach for more brandy and found herself scrutinising his arms for muscles. Another unfair comparison. Why would Westbridge have cause for muscles? He’d probably never done a day’s work in his entire life. Yet Clarissa now knew she had a penchant for them. A needy, scandalous, wanton penchant for them. Perhaps, after they were married and she and Westbridge shared intimacies, she would close her eyes and picture Seb’s muscles and imagine it was his big body covering hers...
Good heavens!
Yet another reason why she wasn’t really duchess material. Unaccomplished, academically challenged, borderline illiterate and now an outright wanton who lusted after another man. Was it that much of a surprise her Duke was looking elsewhere? He was seeking a duchess beyond reproach and Clarissa had worked hard for two years to convince him she was such a candidate. She needed to banish all thoughts of the passionate interlude she’d shared with Seb from her mind for ever for the sake of the security of her marriage.
If Westbridge ever proposed.
Today, without Seb as competition he had been as disinterested and self-absorbed as he always was. No change from that quarter. The archetypal starched and lacy shirt...
Clarissa really needed to stop thinking such rebellious and disloyal thoughts about the man she planned to be engaged to by the end of this week. Thinking about Seb was making her hot and bothered when this airless room was stifling enough. Perhaps concentrating her thoughts on her Duke might restore her temperature to normal?
Although now that she thought about it, with everything else going on she hadn’t bothered thinking about Westbridge and Lady Olivia or her plan to win her Duke at all today either, and the young usurper had been clamped to his side like a barnacle since breakfast. Perhaps she had given him some consideration over breakfast because she had noticed that much—but then Seb had strolled into the breakfast room looking all manly and commanding and utterly gorgeous and her fizzing nerve endings had developed a mind of their own as she had studied him surreptitiously while she pecked at some dry toast.
He was being Millcroft, as she supposed he would be, but it had been Seb’s ears that had reddened slightly when he had lifted his eyes to look at her. The sight of that alone had almost made her sigh aloud. Had she not been sitting, there was a good chance she would have swooned. Her body had heated, distant, shameless parts of her had throbbed with need and her eyes adamantly lingered. In fact, she had been so absorbed by watching him at one point during the meal that she hadn’t remembered smearing half a pot of strawberry jam on her unappetising slice and gobbling the whole lot down.
Anyone would think she had designs on him.
Perhaps she did? She felt safe enough to be herself around him—or as much of herself as she dared without confessing how stupid she was. During his drunken confession all those weeks ago, he had mentioned he had nothing in common with the uneducated women of the labouring classes. That comment, just as similar throwaway remarks made by others in the normal run of conversation, had reminded her of all the reasons why she hid her failings and made her feel small and unworthy. That said, she rarely felt small and unworthy around Seb now. Far from it, in fact. Maybe that was part of his magnetic appeal? Clarissa certainly lusted after him. Curiously wanted to see him naked. Completely naked. His dark eyes stormy and intense with passion once again, his big, rough farmer’s hands roving over her body, his lips driving her to distraction...
Good gracious.
Frustrated and bothered by the odd direction her imagination was taking her in, Clarissa decided to go splash some water on her flushed face before dinner, vowing to redouble her efforts to woo her Duke as soon as she had finished. She headed towards the retiring room, but heard Penhurst’s voice on the landing above. Not wanting to either see him or be forced to converse with him alone, she darted behind a suit of armour. Boots clipped ominously on the marble steps above her head, alerting her to the fact he wasn’t alone, and she found herself holding her breath.
‘What time are we leaving?’ His companion was Lord Gaines. ‘I’m as hard as a pike staff just thinking about it.’
‘They are expecting us at midnight—but I dare say we can slip out earlier once the port is done. We’ve been promised some new girls tonight.’ Clarissa heard Penhurst rub his hands in anticipation. ‘Buxom ones.’
‘You requested Celeste, didn’t you?’
‘Of course I requested Celeste. I know how much you like her.’
‘I like the way she plays my flute, Penhurst. That wench has a talented mouth. You should try it. After me, of course. I call dibs on the first round.’
‘Unless we share her? Top and tail.’
‘Now there’s an idea.’ Both men chuckled as they passed directly over Clarissa’s head and instinctively she clamped a hand over her mouth in case they heard her, her stomach roiling with disgust.
‘A message just arrived, my lord.’
The butler’s voice made them pause mid-step and wait. Clarissa’s heart thumped loudly in her ears as he walked briskly towards them while she pressed her back into the wall and prayed for invisibility. All her senses were heightened. Even the smell of Lord Gaines’s usual bay rum cologne was so cloying she wanted to gag.
She heard the faint whisper of paper as he took it. There was a pause, then Gaines grunted in acknowledgement, before Penhurst spoke. ‘That will be fine. Make sure they are waiting.’
‘Very well, my lord.’
The butler scurried away, but the two men lingered. ‘They’re early.’
‘Only by a few days. It’s a small inconvenience, I will grant you, but it doesn’t affect tonight.’ She heard the sound of Penhurst scrunching the note, then slapping his odious friend on the back. ‘Tonight your Celeste will still play her sweet, sweet music.’
To her utt
er relief, because she feared she was about to turn purple from lack of air, their heels clipped the stairs briskly while they continued their disgusting litany about their plans for Celeste. Only when Clarissa heard the footsteps disappear down the hallway did she risk peeking out from her hiding place to watch their retreating backs. With a casual flick of his wrist, she watched Penhurst toss the ball of paper into the enormous medieval fireplace that dominated the entrance hall.
Chapter Thirteen
Mindful of the busy sounds of food preparation coming from the kitchen close by, Seb quickly surveyed the main servants’ corridor. Gray had already thoroughly mapped the whole house and gardens beyond. Whilst he implicitly trusted his friend’s work, he still needed to explore it all for himself to consign the layout to memory in case he needed a swift escape route. Like all country houses, there was a warren of narrow corridors and stairs beyond those used by the family. Aristocrats enjoyed the luxury of a house full of servants, but didn’t want them getting underfoot. With dinner about to be served, the servants were thin on the ground which meant he could poke around in relative peace.
This corridor was the main artery of the house, with passages linking both the east and west wings, staircases to all floors and down into the cellar. That cavernous space was still a bit of a mystery because someone was constantly on watch within. Gray had attempted to explore it three times over the course of yesterday and given up out of fear of discovery, but it didn’t take a genius to know that a guarded cellar was an anomaly. A clear signal that Penhurst was up to no good. Seb crept passed that door without poking his head inside and continued along the route his second had meticulously recorded towards Gem’s bedchamber which was on the exact opposite side of the house to his. The safest and cleanest route to the outside and a much less conspicuous one than he had taken last night.
The Mysterious Lord Millcroft Page 13