A Lady's Formula for Love

by Elizabeth Everett

  The red velvet curtains billowed in along with a gust of freezing wind. Violet turned her face to the cold. “For years, I buried myself away, hoping time would dull my rough edges or my brain might wrangle hold of my tongue, or a female chemist would cease to become anathema. None of these things happened. Life is marching on.” Her voice wobbled with uncertainty. “If I go out enough, they will become used to me—eccentric Lady Greycliff, with her grubby hands and ugly dresses. Someday, I might even win them over.”

  Arthur had spent a lifetime reading the unspoken cues of men and women around the globe, and he knew Violet told the truth. Despite her age and accomplishments, she lacked the skills of subterfuge and dissembling that her peers possessed, blithely unaware that many women of his acquaintance would have paused here, waiting for him to object to her blunt description.

  He did want to object. She didn’t have ugly hands; she was beautiful and kind. More important, she was genuine. The only time she tripped and stumbled was when she tried to be anyone other than Violet.

  “It wasn’t till Fanny mentioned the langoustines . . .” She pulled her shawl tight against her shoulders. “I supposed you’ve heard the story.”

  Arthur shook his head.

  “Daniel told me they were Lord Insley’s favorite dish, and I ordered them prepared tableside in an elaborate display. To keep them fresh until right before they were flambéed I dipped them in an anesthetic solution of my own devising.”

  She sighed. “I miscalculated the strength of the solution. During the first course, they woke up. As you can imagine, they didn’t sit around on the platter waiting to be set afire. They wandered away. The first we noticed was when one made its way up Lady Whitsley’s leg.”

  Dipping her chin, she appeared to brace herself for Arthur’s ridicule. He kept his face impassive instead, picturing how she must have reacted, her expression crumpled in dismay as she faced her husband’s disapproval.

  “It was cruel of her to remind you,” he said.

  “I am resigned to how they mock me, yet I cannot stand it when women like Fanny pick on others who cannot defend themselves. They make life onerous for a girl like Althea. Scaring her away from Athena’s Retreat, the one place in the world that can protect and shelter a girl like her, makes me so . . .”

  She sucked her lips inward to keep the word from escaping.

  He waited for the eruption, leaning forward as if to catch her words.

  “So . . .” Violet balled her hands into fists. “So angry.” She burst into tears.

  Tears.

  Arthur stared, frozen in horror.

  “I am furious.” She shuddered with emotion. “Livid. Incensed.”

  Scrabbling through his pockets for a handkerchief, Arthur tried to fathom how it had come to this.

  My God, he’d made her cry.

  “If you are angry, why are you crying?” he asked, aghast at the sobs that racked her body.

  “I don’t know,” she wailed. “I—I broke something. I never cry. Never.”

  Arthur located the square of cambric and shifted across the carriage to her side, pressing the handkerchief into her limp fingers.

  “Is this what it feels like to let go of anger?” she said. “I don’t like it at all. Help me put it back, please.”

  “Na bith a’ gul.” He patted her hand. “Na bith a’ gul.”

  As the carriage swayed, he pulled her bonnet off and settled one arm around her shoulder. Violet buried her face in his coat, and they rocked back and forth until the tears came to a stop. He’d never been so relieved as when she pulled away and dried her face.

  “Na bith a’ gul,” she repeated. “Did your mama whisper that?”

  “It’s what I would say to my wee sister when she was upset,” Arthur replied.

  Reddened eyes peered up at him, and Violet sniffed. “You must be a wonderful older brother. I always wished for an older brother myself.”

  Odd how grief could cut you open even after years. Had he been a wonderful brother? God, he hoped so.

  Violet set his handkerchief down and pulled her gloves off. Taking his hand, she laced her fingers through his.

  “Is she the person you lost?” she whispered.

  How could she know? Had someone told her?

  He opened his mouth to tell her he’d lost nothing. His history was of no importance to anyone.

  “Her name was Deoiridh.”

  A rusty lock broke open, and the terrible sweetness of memory flooded his chest. Deoiridh loved plum tarts, and her plaits were forever unraveling. Her fingers were plump, like bannocks, and she had terrified his eight-year-old self whenever she threw herself into or onto or off immovable objects.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  “Influenza.” One word. One word for devastation from which he’d never recovered. Bright red cheeks one afternoon, which wouldn’t go away after teatime. A fever that couldn’t be checked. Then racking coughs ending with a terrible stillness.

  “Was it a long time ago?”

  Lifetimes. Dozens of years and millions of miles ago.

  “I was eight, and she was three. My parents died as well.” His father gave up the day after Deoiridh passed, turning his face to the wall while great, heaving coughs shuddered through his body. Mam tried her best to hold on, but the fever’s grip was unbreakable.

  “An enemy you couldn’t guard against,” Violet said.

  Arthur took her chin in his fingers. “Death can slip past any guard.” He willed her to understand before they went too far. Before he forgot this most important of lessons, despite the pull of the sweetness and comfort she offered.

  Turning her head, she studied his face. “You’re guarding me. I’ve never been so safe and cared for.”

  He bent his head to hers. “You’re not safe.” His lips traced the words on her skin. “None of us are. This is an assignment, and you can’t matter to me.”

  * * *

  THERE WAS NO sweetness to what happened next. No tentative exploration. He shook his head in denial, but his closed lips dragged against hers until they could no longer hold back. Flames came to life at his touch. Desire charged the air between them, crackling in the wake of her thighs brushing against him.

  Raw and carnal, his kisses melted her bones. They came together, again and again, teeth bumping, tongues tangled. Tiny sparks raced beneath her skin as his fingers tightened in her hair. She bit and sucked at his mouth as though devouring him. He tasted of spice and fire.

  The heat of his body burned through the layers of cotton and canvas that stood between them. Wool brushed beneath her fingertips until she found the slick silk of his cravat. She fumbled at the knot, unwilling to stop kissing long enough to see what she was doing.

  The rough thrust of his tongue contrasted with the gentle sweep of his thumb against her cheek. Enormous strength lay in the hands cradling her face. His control excited her almost as much as his passion. His kiss was so deep it was as if she were falling into him, falling like a woman drugged, over and over until she lost sense of time.

  He broke the kiss to put his mouth at the side of her neck, and she swallowed a gasp at the throb of pleasure between her thighs when his teeth grazed the skin.

  Violet raised her arms to grasp his shoulders, but she came to her senses and put them back at her sides. It wouldn’t do to act eager.

  He turned, laying her against the cushioned carriage seat, then followed her down, his narrow hips cradled between her thighs, one foot on the floor to brace them as the carriage swayed back and forth. A dark velvet growl came from deep in his chest when she suckled his tongue, and he thrust against her, delivering a glorious pressure where she ached.

  Pulling off a glove with his teeth, he ran his thumb beneath the edge of her corset, releasing her breast from its confines.

  Violet longed to reach her fin
gers through his hair, and her hands fluttered up and then back down again. When he paused, she flinched. Had she made a noise?

  Putting her fears to rest, he set his mouth to her breast and traced the outline of her nipple with his tongue. The lick of damp heat sent shivers through her. She took a risk, fumbling her gloves off and sinking her fingers into his thick curls.

  Was she moving too much beneath him? She should stop.

  She couldn’t stop.

  When he freed her from the entire top of her dress and suckled her nipple, an exclamation of delight left her throat. Her cry sounded so desperate and wanton the sound pulled her back from pleasure and slammed her into reality.

  “Sorry. I’m sorry,” she whispered, letting go of Arthur’s hair before he complained.

  Her wet skin pebbled in the chill air when he let go. Too late. Tears of shame sprang to her eyes.

  “You are like a mad hummingbird with your hands never settling,” he said.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered again.

  “Why are you sorry? What is stopping you from touching me?” He brushed the curve of her cheek, his scrutiny stripping away any chance that she might dissemble.

  “I did not want to seem too eager. Or to raise my voice,” she said. “I apologize for the indelicacy. I won’t do it again.”

  “Breathe.”

  Not until he gave the command did Violet realize the speed of her shallow inhalations.

  “First, breathe,” he said. “What do you want, Violet?”

  What did she want? The truth pushed from the inside out, tearing holes in her fear and forcing it to the surface.

  “I want to touch and be touched. I want to want and be wanted.”

  While she spoke, his fingers toyed with her nipple. It took all Violet’s willpower not to raise her hips in delight.

  “Of course you do. It’s what we all want. There is nothing unnatural about such desires.” He spoke with the same surety that he used when he told her to stay away from windows and walk to the left of him.

  Leaning forward, he blocked her view of anything but his face. “Was it pleasurable, what I did to you, Violet?” His voice drizzled over her like thick, dark honey.

  “Yes,” she said. “No? I didn’t mind.”

  A predatory grin lifted the corners of his mouth. Dropping his head, he set his lips to the place where her neck met her shoulder, opened his mouth wide, and bit down. Heat surged through her body, and the pulse between her thighs throbbed.

  He lifted his mouth from her skin and brought his lips to her ear.

  “Did you like that?” he whispered.

  “Yes.”

  “Never be afraid to tell me when it’s good,” he told her.

  Hovering over her again, he set his forehead to hers. A stray sliver of moonlight swept the edge of his jaw. “Even more important, never be afraid to tell me what you don’t like. Pleasure must be mutual.”

  Violet had heard some men felt this way. “Do you mean it?

  The moment that the last word left her mouth, she wanted to pull it back. She sounded like a child.

  Taking no offense, Arthur cupped her chin. “Can you trust me?”

  Before they’d exchanged a single word, this man had awoken a piece of Violet she’d long buried. She’d trusted him from the moment he first touched her.

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Let’s practice, shall we?”

  Once again, he bent to her breasts. This time, he teased her nipple with the flat of his tongue until she squeezed her eyelids shut.

  He stopped. “Violet?” he asked.

  “Oh, yes. I like it. I like it.”

  Arthur chuckled against the undercurve of her breast and licked a path around to her throat.

  “Ooooooh,” she moaned. “Oh, I like that, too.”

  “I am happy to hear that.”

  “I want to touch more of you,” she told him.

  She wanted to see him, to feel the dark thrill of holding him in her hand. The prospect of exploring him with her tongue and tasting the salt of his skin dampened her drawers. She reached for the fastenings of his split-fall trousers.

  With uncharacteristic clumsiness, Arthur tried to push up her petticoats at the same time. He cursed when they fell back down again, a waterfall of frustration. The sight of this cunning predator being flummoxed by yards of lace and muslin made Violet giggle. He looked up at the sound, abashed, with a wide, unhurried smile.

  A stranger sat before her, hand halfway up her skirts, lips swollen from her kisses. An Arthur who wasn’t waiting for death to come at her. An Arthur who might laugh at a joke or stroll, loose-limbed, in the park without worrying who might follow.

  He was beautiful.

  Reaching over to kiss the laughter away, his hand paused in midair. The carriage shuddered into a turn.

  “Damn,” he whispered.

  They came to an abrupt halt. Violet turned her head in surprise. “Are we home already?”

  “I wasn’t paying attention. I can’t believe . . .” With hurried, graceless movements, he pulled up her bodice, twitched her skirts back around her legs, and moved to the seat opposite her.

  “We can tell the coachman I forgot my wrap,” she pleaded, desire throbbing still between her legs. “We don’t have to stop.”

  An instant of regret was all she glimpsed before Arthur disappeared and her bodyguard returned. An impassive, unaffected man now handed her the gloves she’d thrown to the carriage floor.

  “What if I . . . ?” Her words faltered at the grim set of his mouth.

  “I have been derelict in my duties. Please accept my deepest apologies,” Arthur said in a calm, unhurried tone as the carriage lurched when the footman dismounted. “In the meantime, we shall forget this happened.”

  Violet pursed her lips, saying nothing as the door opened and a young man pulled out the steps. Arthur handed her down and walked away, leaving her alone beneath a waning moon.

  Forget this happened?

  How?

  She made her way upstairs to her bedchamber and stood before her looking glass. Trembling, she set her fingertips to trace the swollen outline of her lips. A lock of hair had escaped her prison of pins and fluttered with her rapid breaths.

  Violet couldn’t remember the last time anyone had kissed her like she was treasured, like she was extraordinary. What had happened in that carriage was chemistry.

  Violet had no idea how to manage seduction, but she did know her elements.

  If Arthur thought to school her on when the chemical reaction between them was over, he should think again.

  11

  UP AT DAWN, Violet went to work with a vengeance. Three hours later, she’d created black sludge that smelled like beet salad and ate through her wooden table.

  “This won’t do,” she lectured herself.

  She needed a distraction from reliving what had happened in the carriage with Arthur. From imagining what hadn’t happened. Frustration had left her restless and aching.

  For once, Violet’s work could not pull her out of her head. Her thoughts circled back to the moment she’d burst into tears, when her walls had broken. Arthur’s expression was the same as it had been the night of the first explosion. He’d been prepared to save her again if she split open too wide to pull herself back together. Not a hint of disgust or pity.

  This moved her more than the delicious kisses, more than Arthur’s heated touch. Dizzy with an inexplicable lightness, she abandoned her work, roaming the house, until she found Alice tidying the dressing room.

  A dowd, Fanny had called Violet last night.

  Reviewing her wardrobe, Violet had to agree. Nothing in this closet resembled anything half so pretty as the dresses on display at the ball.

  She’d sent Alice out for a stack of ladies’ journals, and the t
wo of them now sat in Violet’s antechamber, examining the latest fashions before a small fire. Strewn with books, loose paper, mismatched furniture, and a half-constructed pendulum draped with a pink and orange lap quilt, the room had lost all traces of genteel repose once Daniel had passed away.

  “Why do the women in the advertisements for corsets have bodies that don’t actually need a corset?” Violet asked.

  “ ’Cause it’s men what does the drawings, my lady,” Alice replied.

  In her hands, Violet held a picture of a green and gold gown with daringly low shoulders, a pretty swath of embroidered vines twining around the hem. She set it aside, then picked it back up again.

  A woman confident in her power to seduce would wear that dress. Such a gown was an unspoken invitation. She traced the outline of the skirt with her finger and sighed.

  “Did you enjoy the ball last night, my lady?” Alice asked.

  “Hmm.”

  Fanny Armitage would find the green dress scandalous since most of the extra weight Violet had put on resided in her chest.

  She had a deep-seated desire to upset Fanny Armitage.

  “Mr. Kneland did not seem to,” Alice continued.

  Violet’s head popped up. “What?”

  “He snapped at Winthram something awful when you got back. He isn’t friendly, not like Mr. Thomas.”

  Violet arched an eyebrow, waiting for Alice to continue. The little maid stared at the fashion plates in front of her. “Told him I was from near Dingwall. Asked him did he have kin near there, and he frowned at me,” the little maid lamented. “Wasn’t prying. It would be nice to speak with another Scot.”

  “Maybe he is homesick as well, Alice. For some, it hurts more to speak of home than to not speak of it.”

  As Alice mulled over that concept, Violet considered her own words. What might it have cost Arthur to share the story of his family with her last night? Could it have been their emotional intimacy that had disconcerted him more than the physical?

  “Maybe,” Alice said. “Maybe he isn’t even from the north.”