Lord Beast

by Ashlyn Montgomery

  “What are you doing?” she mumbled, her voice thick.

  He looked at her, marvelling at the blueness of her eyes, the slumberous dilated look of a woman lost in a world of passion and need and desire. A pulse throbbed from the points their bodies touched, hot and demanding.

  “What does it feel like?”

  Those eyes… and that dress. What a little minx she was. She could drive a man wild with the look she had on now. Wild.

  “But… The cloak…”

  “You don’t need to see me,” he urged raggedly, his hand mindlessly stroking her arm in a repetitively deliriously rhythm.

  A small, incoherent sound escaped her slightly parted mouth and she seemed to sway towards him. He could feel her about to relent, about to relinquish control of that wondrous body to him. Her eyes were half-shut already, unfocused and dazed with need, and the heat… Lord, she was on fire. He could devour her for days, sate himself over and over-

  “Danielle!” Her Aunt Fiona hollered from within the cottage. “Have you gotten rid of the tramp yet?”

  Chapter 15

  Dani lurched away from Rhys, her breath escaping from her in one long hiss as if she had been holding it for a long time. She stumbled slightly, toppling a cup from its saucer in the process.

  “Danielle?” Fiona stuck her head out the window. “Oh, I see he’s still here.”

  “I assure you, madam, I was just leaving,” Rhys told the old woman witheringly.

  How could he be so cool and composed when she felt as if she were about to disintegrate into a cindering pile of ashes? Her equilibrium was thrown off-kilter and her mind still clung to the blurry daze of passion that had consumed her but moments before yet he reclined there, completely at ease in his surroundings, as if nothing had occurred at all.

  “Good, good,” Fiona mumbled as she began to turn away. “You wouldn’t be the first tramp our Danielle has given food to, but you’ve certainly loitered the longest.”

  “Pay her no heed,” Danielle said suddenly, unable to stop the smile sweep across her lips.

  Rhys grunted humourlessly.

  “You shouldn’t do that, you know,” Dani said, quietly as a blush crept up her cheeks.

  “What?”

  Dani knew that he knew exactly what she meant and that he was deliberately playing coy just to irk her and make her uncomfortable. She gave him a glare. “That,” she snapped, gesturing vaguely at the air that separated them. “Taking advantage of my conditions.”

  “Your conditions?” he asked incredulously.

  “The hood, Rhys,” she told him dryly, staring at the offending cloak grumpily. “I’ll willingly, er… I’ll… I will-”

  “Succumb to me?” he provided, his voice dripping with patient humour.

  Her cheeks flamed. “Yes,” she concurred, none to happily. “But only if you burn that cloak.”

  “That’s just irrational,” Rhys chuckled. “I’m not going to burn my cloak.”

  “You don’t trust me.”

  “How did you get that from what I just said? The mind boggles.”

  Dani looked at him challengingly. “Why don’t you want to show me your face, Rhys?” she demanded in a stern voice.

  “You won’t like what you see,” he told her roughly, “trust me.”

  She sighed impatiently. “I think you’re scared that I will like what I see.”

  “No, you won’t.”

  “I will.”

  “Danielle, this is ridiculous.”

  “I agree fervently.” She crossed her arms over her chest and gave him a slightly stern, slightly petulant look. “You think you know what I will think, but you’re wrong. You’re just afraid to trust me, or anyone for that matter, and that’s the saddest thing of all.”

  He didn’t say anything. Instead, his response seemed to involve cramming little sandwiches into his mouth two at a time. At least, she supposed, he didn’t seem inclined to shout at her anymore. Dani could notch that up as a point for her.

  “Fine, ignore me,” she told him childishly, “but if you think that I’m going to let this go-”

  He simply rose to his feet and began to walk away, leaving Danielle sitting there with her mouth open. How dare he?

  She followed suit as quickly as her back would allow her and skidded after him, dogging his heels. “You’re leaving?” she asked him angrily. “Without a goodbye or a thank you, seeing as you ate all the sandwiches!”

  “I am leaving,” he confirmed succinctly.

  They cleared the property of the cottage and began to walk rather fast down the gravel road leading toward Falmouth Castle, Dani one step behind him.

  “Why? What’s the rush? Why won’t you tell me why you won’t remove your cloak?”

  He didn’t answer immediately but continued to walk at a brisk pace. His strides were long and purposeful and Dani found herself struggling to keep up. “Go home, Danielle,” he said at last.

  It was not the response she was looking for. “You are impossible!” she told him furiously. “Why won’t you tell me?”

  He stopped abruptly and turned to her so suddenly she almost collided into his broad chest.

  “And then what?” he asked savagely. “What, Danielle? Do you expect me to show you?” Dani suspected he was physically restraining himself from shaking her. “And then what if I do? You’re compromised. We’ll have to marry-”

  “No-”

  “Yes, Danielle, we will.”

  She glared up at him thunderously, hurt and humiliated. “Is the thought of marrying me so nauseating?” Dani hissed, infuriated.

  “That’s not what I said,” he barked. “It’s not about you!”

  “I fail to see the problem then,” she told him bitterly. “It’s all right, you know. I wouldn’t expect you to marry me. I don’t expect you to. I’m perfectly happy to be a spinster for the remainder of my life.”

  “You’re feeling sorry for yourself and I refuse to play along.”

  She gave him a hurt look. “Am I not allowed to feel sorry for myself?”

  “It’s unbecoming.”

  Dani balked. “What about you?” she retaliated. “Isolating yourself from your friends just because of an accident? You’ve been feeling sorry for yourself for five years!”

  “For me it is acceptable,” he said sharply. “You… God, I’m about to make an idiot of myself.”

  “Go on.”

  He sighed raggedly. “You needn’t feel sorry for yourself,” he told her sourly. “As I have made it potently clear today, I want you beyond all clear and rational reasoning.”

  “Oh.”

  “Be assured, it won’t happen again.”

  She felt crestfallen at his words but at the same time a little euphoric. Hadn’t he just admitted to being unable to think straight around her? That must be a good thing.

  A breath of wind picked up and cooled her skin, teasing the edges of his cloak promisingly. She suddenly wished a large gust would blow it from his face but he seemed to have it so secured and pulled so low, nothing could remove it but his own will. She would just have to be patient. After all, he had visited her of his own prerogative and had admitted on several occasions that he wanted her. It was a start and Dani could accept it for what it was.

  Contemplatively, she turned her head and stared at the looming spires of Falmouth. The castle seemed to be glaring ominously at the churning mass of greyish ocean. Ensconced by a protective ring of forest, Falmouth seemed isolated and formidable, its towers stretching into the sky and the dark walls and crenelated parapets catching and absorbing the sunlight as if thirsty for its warmth. Despite its hostility and apparent undesirability, Dani was coming to love that castle. It represented something deep and blooming and wonderful, warm inside where all contentment hid, waiting to be released.

  “When will I see you again?” she asked him.

  She felt him shrug from beside her. “When do you want to see me?”

  Dani turned to him hopefully. “Tonight?
”

  “Danielle…”

  An annoyed breath flew from her lips and she plunked her hands on her waist. “Tomorrow, then?”

  “I’ll send word.”

  She gave him a grin.

  “But I’m not making any promises,” he added irritably.

  “Good heavens, of course not,” Dani said with mock gravity. “Then you might as well come out and say right to my face that you actually like me.”

  “Preposterous.”

  “Oh, you say that now but I know you do,” she teased.

  “I like that dress,” he growled, taking a step closer to her, “and the way it makes your-”

  “-eyes stand out?” Dani finished for him, her lips quivering with an effort to hide a smile. “Why, thank you for saying so.”

  “That’s not what I was going to say.”

  “Let’s pretend it was, shall we?” She bit her bottom lip. “It’s so much more romantic that way.”

  “We are not courting.”

  Her eyes were innocently wide and intuitive as she stared into his hood. “Of course not, my lord.”

  On his return to Falmouth Castle, Rhys had to practically wade through the enormous piles of correspondence and invites that had been arriving in shiploads since yesterday. Grayson had taken to discarding the envelopes and letters in the entranceway in blatant pursuit of annoying his employer. He claimed it was easier just to leave them there as they came rather than go through the pains of burning them or bothering to bring them up to his study. Rhys knew better, though. It was the butler’s sole purpose in life to make Rhys as ornery as could be.

  “Lord Sinclair is here,” Grayson told him as soon as he pushed his way through to the grand staircase. “He’s enquiring about the liquor cabinet.”

  “Did you inform him that my own butler has turned mutinous?” Rhys grumbled acidly, kicking at a piece of parchment that had stuck to his boot.

  Grayson looked at him as if he had no idea what Rhys was talking about.

  “Where is he, Grayson?” Rhys demanded.

  “The study, my lord, trying to pick the lock on the cabinet.”

  Rhys didn’t bother thanking Grayson. The less time one spent conversing with that man the better.

  Gabriel had procured himself a glass of brandy by the time Rhys arrived in the study and was thoroughly absorbed in staring out a window that looked towards Dani’s cottage atop the Falmouth village’s hill. It was probably the reason why he had spent so much time in this particular room of late- the view.

  “Making yourself at home, I see,” Rhys said dryly, causing the other man to turn and plaster him with a dry smile.

  “Naturally,” Gabriel told him, lifting his glass in a somewhat mocking salute. “Good stuff, this.”

  “Dare I ask how the devil you managed to pick that lock?” Rhys grumbled. “And why would you need to have ever acquired such a skill?”

  Gabriel grinned crookedly before setting his glass of amber liquid down on Rhys’s desk. “Once had a mistress who adopted the bothersome habit of barricading herself in her room when I didn’t bring her flowers,” he explained. “After a few tries at the lock with a hair pin, I got it right.”

  Rhys snorted disparagingly. “I’m surprised more women didn’t take her lead.”

  “Strangely, the wife locks me out whenever I do bring her flowers,” Gabriel said speculatively.

  “Why?”

  “She believes that I’ve done something wrong.”

  Rhys chuckled and reached for the decanter of brandy Gabriel had pillaged from his cabinet. “What are you doing here, Sinclair?”

  “Can a friend not call on another friend?”

  Rhys let a thick silence settle between them.

  “Alright,” Gabriel admitted cheerfully, “there is a greater purpose for my visit but I’m not sure you’re going to like it.”

  Rhys groaned. It had been a trying day and now this. Dreading what was about to foul his already tapering mood, Rhys said, “Christ. Get it over with then.”

  Gabriel was grinning, however, when he reached into the pocket of his immaculately tailored coat and extracted an elaborate little box. This was placed heavily next to his glass of brandy on the desk and Rhys stared at it as if it were a deadly serpent, poised for attack.

  “No,” he stated emphatically, “I won’t have it. Take it away.”

  “Just hear me out-”

  “You have a lot of nerve-”

  “For God’s sake,” Gabriel said forcefully, his green eyes flashing with annoyance and impatience, “will you listen to yourself? This,” he gestured to the box, “means nothing. Will you stop being such a coward and just look at it?”

  Rhys took a deep breath and considered the box on his desk. His heart clenched in his chest and he forced himself to act reasonably. It wasn’t as if Gabriel was forcing him down the altar. No, that wasn’t the case at all. But it was a clear enough suggestion, a shove in the direction Gabriel thought Rhys should take.

  Using his silence as incentive, Gabriel stepped forward and quickly flipped the neat golden latch on the box so that it was unclasped. With a flick of his finger, the lid fell open. Centred on a bed of smooth creamy velvet was a ring- an engagement ring- encrusted with diamonds and sapphires of the finest cut.

  “It belonged to my great-grandmother,” Gabriel explained. “By the time it came to my mother’s engagement, the old bat was half-mad and lost it. I gave Victoria my mother’s ring and this… well, I didn’t want it to collect dust. We both decided that it would be an honour if the ring remained in the Ashcroft family.”

  “This is absurd,” Rhys rasped. “Who is supposed to wear that?”

  Gabriel gave him a very condescending look. “You really have to ask that? I thought it would have been evident by now.”

  “Danielle?”

  “Not that we have any particular favourites for the bidding,” Gabriel said dryly, “but, yes, she is the preferable candidate.”

  “I couldn’t possibly,” Rhys interjected angrily. “Firstly, this is too much to accept-”

  “Consider it a loan,” Gabriel told him breezily. “Pay me for it if you like.”

  Rhys gave him a dark look, even though he knew Gabriel would not be able to detect it. “Secondly,” he continued, “she would never accept.”

  “Oh, I think she would.”

  Ignoring that, Rhys finished with his third and most important point. “Thirdly, I do not intend on marrying the little chit.”

  Gabriel cocked an annoyingly arrogant brow. “Really? You’re certainly acting like you do.”

  “What exactly do you mean?” Rhys asked threateningly.

  “You really expect me to believe that you haven’t done anything to compromise that girl’s reputation?”

  If there wasn’t a hood covering his face, Gabriel would have witnessed the first ever blush to steal across Rhys Ashcroft’s cheeks. For if anyone knew Rhys, it was Gabriel. They had drunk, gambled and whored together when Rhys had first come to London, sculpting the ultimate rakish reputations. It was no surprise that Gabriel had decided upon the worst sort of conclusion from Rhys’s enamoured behaviour with Danielle.

  “And if I haven’t?” Rhys protested lamely, knowing full well that the liberties he had taken with Danielle were inexcusable. Any other debutante at any other time and he would have either been forced to marry her or face an irate father down the barrel of a pistol at noon.

  “We both know that you have,” Gabriel told him caustically. “Even if you hadn’t, you should still consider the possibility that Danielle would make you, well, happy. God knows this castle could do with a woman’s touch.”

  Rhys briefly and critically examined the room around him. “There is nothing wrong with this place.”

  “You only say that now because you have not experienced what the presence of a woman can do to a place.”

  “Do you realise how ridiculous you sound?”

  Gabriel’s smile was lop-sided with intros
pection. “Perhaps,” he said wryly, “and I look forward to the day that I can mock you for sounding similar.”

  “You’ll be waiting a long time.”

  “Maybe.” Gabriel shrugged, picked up the box, and put if firmly in Rhys’s palm. “Think about it. That’s all I’m saying. You might find you could come to like the idea.”

  Chapter 16

  Rhys did think about it.

  He thought about it all God-damned night.

  Danielle Carmichael had not been far from his mind since the day she had stuck her snooping little foot in Falmouth, but the thought of her recently had been even more invasive and persistent. He hadn’t even bothered retiring for the evening, preferring the view offered to him from the window of his study and the occasional glass of port or brandy.

  The box… the ring… Curse Gabriel for giving it to him. Rhys was tortured with what if’s and maybe’s, alternatives to the solitary world he had created for himself and had been quite content with until… until Danielle. The thought that all this, all of Danielle, might go away one day or change hadn’t yet occurred to him. If it did all just disappear… well, he sensed that he would yearn for something. If he were honest with himself, and he wasn’t quite yet ready to be, he would realise that he didn’t want Danielle to go away, to disappear as if she had never existed in his life in the first place. She was an amusing little morsel of warmth, kindness, and levity and (oh, God) he liked her. He admired her perseverance, her determination to thaw his heart, to make him laugh. He admired her ability to stand her ground when most grown men would run for cover at his palpable bursts of fury. He admired her wit, her candour…

  Rhys groaned and dropped his head into his hands, elbows propped against the surface of his desk. It was bad enough he had to constantly curb the riotous way his body behaved at the sight of her, but now that he actually found her personality appealing?

  The thought caused a shudder to unfold through his body.

  It was madness. He had been happy… well, maybe not happy, but at least content with his privacy at Falmouth. From an early age, Rhys had learnt to place little dependency on the people close to him. Having a father who abandoned both mother and child, and a mother who was abusively cold and distant until the day she died, he adapted quickly to thriving solely on his own independence. He was cruel and calculating, insusceptible to human nuances that contributed to the wrong decisions made by other men. At the same time he had learnt that one didn’t need love or affection to survive, having received neither from either father or mother.