How to Play the Game of Love (Ladies of Passion)

by Harmony Williams

  When I dragged my heels, Hartfell hauled me forward. He caught me when I stumbled into his side. A ray of sunlight glinted off his grin. “How thoughtless of me. I didn’t take into account your poor ankle.”

  I drew myself up, scrabbling to put as much distance between us as possible. Which, considering he pinned my arm between his sleeve and his maroon jacket, wasn’t much. “Exactly. I can’t play while it pains me.”

  “Nonsense. You’ll insult our hostess if you sit out the game.”

  Blast. He was right. I needed Lady Dunlop on my side. Apparently she was the only person here to hold enough sway over Frederick to keep him from galloping to the continent as soon as possible.

  Loudly, Hartfell said, “If you can’t walk, I’ll carry you.”

  I gasped. He wouldn’t dare. But from the determined look in his eye, he didn’t bluff. I recoiled. My hand slipped free of his hold, and I nearly fell. This time, he made no move to help me. I righted myself.

  A touch out of breath, I added, “Come to think of it, I’m in the pink of health this morning, thank you.”

  As well he knew, considering I’d faked the injury.

  With a wolfish grin, Hartfell secured my hand to his arm. His fingers caressed the sensitive underside of my wrist, inducing a shiver.

  “Then try to keep up.”

  He steered me along the manor’s stone wall. My foot caught in the uneven ground where ivy had recently been cleared. I yelped as I stumbled against Hartfell. Dropping his hand from my arm, he steadied me by pulling my body flush against his. My right side pressed against him from shoulder to knee as his thick forearm around my waist anchored me in place. His expression turned wicked. I gulped.

  A stir emerged behind me, a frenzied rustle as stragglers hurried to find a spot to hide. Daisy must have finished counting. The sooner she turned around, the sooner she would find me and put me out of my misery. Hartfell dove into a tiny nook behind the column supporting the balcony. He drew me in after him, wedging us into the space.

  How the cramped space fit us both was a miracle. I pressed against the wall of the manor on both sides, with my back open to the air. Hartfell squashed against the back of the hovel. He pressed me against the long length of his body with his hot palm splayed across my lower back.

  When I gasped, he moved his free hand to cut off the sound, laying it over my lips. His hand was so wide it ate up the lower half of my face. I couldn’t breathe from my nose. I batted his hand away, gulping for breath.

  He glared me into silence as a girl’s giggle split the air.

  “Come,” Daisy called. “I spotted someone in this direction.”

  I froze against Hartfell. His thighs, stomach, and chest pressed intimately against my own, warming my front. The air provided a cool contrast at my back. I tilted my head, meeting his gaze. This deep, the shadows cut across his expression, veiling his eyes. I dropped my gaze to his suggestive mouth.

  I’d kissed men before. Quite a few. But never had I pressed intimately against them. I possessed some sense, after all. Until I found the one man to whom I wished to be bound for the remainder of my life, I had to preserve the illusion of my innocence.

  Those myriad kisses didn’t prepare me for the heated look Warren gave me now. His hands dipped to my waist, teasing the tender flesh over my hips, with his fingers trailing above the swell of my bottom. They anchored me in place. Too close, and yet too far.

  Daisy’s groan rent the air, so close it chased chills down my spine.

  “Where did they go? I’m sure I saw my sister disappear in this direction.”

  Lady Dunlop’s nephew, his voice amused, asked, “Were you peeking?”

  “Of course not,” Daisy said, a huff in her voice. “That would be cheating.”

  I knew better. She never played by the rules. She always made her own.

  I held my breath as she and Arthur approached. Would they discover me with Warren? With the cool air flooding my back in our precarious position, I didn’t know how she could miss us.

  If they found us, what would they think? This was a far from ladylike position. Now I understood why the party resulted in so many hasty marriages. In fact, Lady Dunlop orchestrated miracles every time no one left in scandal.

  Space. With only an inch of space I’d be able to think clearer. The position wouldn’t look so tarnishing to my reputation. I squirmed, but Warren firmed his fingers around my waist. He leaned his head back against the wall, eyes shut. The hint of a groan escaped his throat, but he tamped it down.

  “Stay still,” he mouthed. At least, I think that’s what he said. If he spoke, his words were too soft to carry to my ear.

  I trembled. Daisy never kept secrets. Just look at how soon she’d blabbed news to Mary of my being in love. She’d spread news of my damning position with Warren to every guest by the end of the game—and soon after that, to my parents.

  Oh dear. What if they forced me to marry him? I couldn’t. Even Pachycaul would prove a better choice of husband. Warren would make my life miserable.

  I squirmed again. Warren clutched me in place. He glared. Oh dear. Did I feel him stirring against my belly? My sisters confessed things, things about the male anatomy. About how men lost control when they entered a certain state.

  Don’t aggravate it. I held utterly still. I didn’t dare to breathe.

  Arthur said, “Maybe your sister took one of these paths.”

  “Let’s try,” Daisy said, her voice glum. The rustle of her skirts boomed as loud as thunder as she strode away.

  The moment I judged us safe, I shoved at Warren’s chest. He adjusted his hold on my hips. He definitely battled a male reaction to me.

  “You’re a brute. Let me go.” I raised my voice no louder than a hiss.

  “Will you be still for one moment? We may still be found out.”

  “Anything is better than being here with you.”

  A flush burned my cheeks. I ceased struggling, for fear of worsening his…state. In reward, Warren lifted one hand from my hips. My heart beat three times too fast. My knees weakened at the temptation of escaping his clutches. He raised his hand and traced circles through the hairs on the back of my neck. My lips parted, but no words blossomed to my tongue. I couldn’t think clearly. Slowly, he lowered his head. His breath ghosted over my lips as he hesitated. He started to pull away.

  Oh no, you don’t. I leaned into him.

  His lips were warm, pliant, and eager. He drew me closer, opening his mouth.

  Wait. What was I doing?

  I elbowed him in the stomach. When he loosened his hold, I shoved away. Cool air flooded down my front, burning where it touched the parts of me that had pressed against Warren.

  He rubbed his ribs. “Why are you angry? You—”

  “I did nothing.” My voice was clipped. “That was—that was your fault.” It had to be.

  I whirled, leaving the hovel behind.

  The open air nearly bowled me over with the fresh scent of dew and wild flowers. While near Warren, I couldn’t breathe properly. His scent intoxicated me like wine. I shook my head. His cologne—he must wear it on purpose to elicit that effect on all women. To make them easier prey to take advantage of. Well, he wouldn’t have me.

  What a boor. A cad. A reprobate. How, for a second, had I enjoyed that kiss?

  I sprinted along the side of the manor. I grappled for the latch of the first door I stumbled across. Warren recaptured my arm, his touch hot.

  “Have a care. If you’re caught, I’ll also lose the game.”

  “What does it matter? It’s just a silly game.”

  After peering inside, he yanked open the latticed glass door and drew me inside. The cozy parlor, crammed with plush furniture, was decorated in pastels. Better yet, no one loitered, not even the servants.

  When he dropped my arm, I whirled to face him. Although this flippant, feminine room was a far cry from the austere library, I couldn’t banish the image of Warren’s shirtless body, burnished with
the firelight. I bit my lip. It wouldn’t happen again.

  The wan daylight silhouetted his body. It cut sharp shadows across his face. “I don’t like to lose,” he said. “At anything.”

  “You’ll recover,” I snapped. My duty to my hostess was filled. Even she wouldn’t insist I play, if she suspected he’d take advantage of me. My lips still burned from his kiss.

  Stay in control.

  I shook, moments away from slapping the intense expression from his face. I fisted my hands at my side. Preparing.

  Don’t let him know how much he affects you. Act like a lady.

  That last part, sounding suspiciously like my mother, cooled my ardor. I lifted my chin. “Don’t you need a minute to get yourself under control?” When he pinned me beneath a blank stare, I glanced pointedly at the fall of his buckskin breeches—and the bulge distorting them.

  My cheeks burned. Color stained his face, too, though he made no move to cover himself.

  “Don’t tell me no other man has had that reaction to your presence. I wouldn’t believe you.”

  “Maybe I’ve only comported myself with gentlemen until now,” I shot back.

  He, on the other hand, was a barbarian. He laughed—laughed!—as if the notion didn’t signify. “They’d have to be bloody sodomites not to get aroused at your presence.”

  I gasped. How could he act so casual about the notion?

  “I have not entertained the company of…sodomites.” No such man would have reason to accompany me into the garden.

  He hemmed in my path, barring me against the pink settee. To my relief, the bulge in his breeches had deflated.

  He narrowed his eyes. “So you admit to entertaining other men.”

  I gritted my teeth. “You have no right to dictate how I comport myself.” Even though, with a few well-timed words in a gossip’s ear, he could ruin my chances of marriage. As prim and proper as if a ballroom separated us, I added, “Though I haven’t entertained men, not in the manner you’re suggesting.” When I sidled to my left, he shifted to block me.

  He captured my gaze and held it. “Oh?” he said, his expression bored. But there was an edge to his voice. “In what manner do you mean?”

  I shivered. “In a…lewd manner. Like the way you would have progressed our…” What had we shared? More than a kiss, but less than ravishment. “Encounter.”

  I flinched as the word parted from my lips.

  Warren raised his eyebrows. He leaned closer. His breath skated over my neck in a cascade of sensation. “What do you know about how it would have progressed?” The words dripped off his tongue, dangerous. They conjured images of him unclothed.

  Any minute now, and I’d burst into flame. I nibbled on my lower lip. “I have older sisters. Married sisters.”

  He raised his head a scant inch to meet my gaze once more. I lifted my chin. He wouldn’t cow me with his bullish demeanor. I could outwit him any day of the week.

  “I know what goes on between a man and a woman in the marriage bed.”

  He chuckled. The sound shimmied over my skin, coiling low in my gut like rope, tying me to him.

  “Is that so? Then why act so shocked at my reaction? You’re a beautiful woman, as I’m sure you know.”

  I knew. Men courted me for my slim figure and golden hair. The light coloring was the reason my sister Violet had found a husband much faster than my sister Lavender, whose hair darkened near to brown. If beauty courted eternal love, I would have found it a thousand times over.

  But I hadn’t.

  I cleared my throat. “Polite gentlemen curb their baser instincts when in the presence of gently-born ladies.”

  Fantastic. I sounded as prim as my mother. She drove Papa to drinking, most days.

  Warren lowered his head, his mouth almost brushing mine. I felt his words more than heard them when he said, “Such a shame neither of us meet those categories.”

  I gasped, and he took advantage, pressing his mouth to mine.

  Without the stone walls of the hovel hemming us in, the maneuver no longer felt like being trapped. It felt like freedom, like soaring. His arms enclosed me, molding me against him in the most intimate way. The contact seared me. He probed my lips with his tongue as if asking permission to enter. I succumbed to the temptation, parting my lips.

  Clarity returned like a strike of lightning. I broke the contact, gasping for breath. When he dropped his hands from my back, I teetered. I steadied myself by clasping his meaty shoulder as my head spun.

  “We can’t do this.”

  “No?” He raised his eyebrows, almost surprised. “Because you are engaged?”

  The words washed a sheet of ice down my spine. I fixed him with my glare. “I am not engaged.” Papa had threatened, but he wouldn’t dare make anything final without my approval.

  Warren shrugged. His muscles bunched beneath my hand. Although he was big, not an ounce of fat riddled his body, as he’d made abundantly clear when he’d bared his chiseled chest to me yesterday. I shook my head to banish the image. It persisted.

  At least until he said, “It’s all right. I have a fiancée, too.”

  I reeled. He’d kissed me, held me, intended more…and he was betrothed? “You do not,” I said, my voice weak. It had to be a lie. What sort of gentleman did that to a lady?

  He nodded. The strands of his blond hair tickled my hand, still anchored on his shoulder.

  “I do.” His stony expression betrayed nothing, not truth or lie in his eyes.

  “But…you kissed me. Wouldn’t your fiancée object?” I would, if I was engaged. When I finally pledged myself to a man, I expected him to be faithful until death do us part.

  A wolfish grin twisted Warren’s lips. “We have an understanding. Rumor has it she entertains other men.”

  I recoiled. My thighs brushed the arm of the settee. Warren caught me as I tumbled, clasping me tight to his body. His interest stirred against me once more.

  How…how could he?

  “She sounds like the worst sort of woman.” I battled against his chest. He didn’t budge.

  Something gentle invaded Warren’s expression. “I don’t know about that. I’m growing rather fond of her actually.”

  “Then I’d thank you to take your hands off of me.”

  His hold dissolved. Had I imagined his embrace? Cool air washed down my front as he stepped back. My head spun. I bit my cheek to keep from succumbing to the sensation. I was clear-headed, cool-headed. Not at all like Violet, who swooned at every opportunity.

  In fact, I hadn’t swooned in my life. And I was determined not to succumb to that female fallacy now.

  I raised my hands to my lips. Still tingling from Warren’s kiss—from the evidence of his betrayal of his betrothed. A woman who, evidently, defiled his trust in the same way.

  It can’t be true. “Doesn’t she love you?”

  Something sharp and treacherous entered his expression, like broken glass. “Love doesn’t exist. It’s a pretty word concocted by men to woo women into compliance.”

  Mary would agree. I didn’t. Even if it soothed the sting of his fiancée’s comportment, I refused to listen to him disparage the one ideal I’d vowed by any means to attain. I met his gaze. I pitied him.

  “You’re wrong.”

  I strode toward the door.

  “Where are you going?”

  I didn’t turn around. “To my room,” I said flatly. “Where you won’t be able to follow.”

  Chapter Eight

  By the time Emily tired of my restlessness and escaped to some other wing of the manor, I had rearranged every pair of shoes I had brought with me to the party…twice. I’d planned the order of my outfits for the next six days. I was ready to scream from boredom, but leaving this room meant encountering Warren, and I refused to do that.

  I breathed a sigh of relief when Daisy flounced into the room.

  With her mouth puckering in a scowl, Daisy jabbed her finger in my direction. “Here you are. You cheat.” />
  I rolled my eyes. “I wasn’t in here the whole time. I grew tired of the game.”

  “Well, you shan’t be declared the winner if you weren’t playing.”

  “Take the title. I don’t care.” Warren might, though. All the better if I made him suffer.

  The sun peeked through the clouds, taunting me. Had I resided on my father’s country estate, I’d be out riding instead of imprisoned in a small, stuffy bedchamber. That was impossible here, with so many prying eyes to witness my wild behavior.

  Daisy had prolonged the game for hours. She couldn’t have been searching for me the entire time. Narrowing my eyes, I shifted on the bed to view her expression.

  “Did anyone else outsmart you? Miss Johnstone and Captain Paine, perhaps?”

  “Please,” she said, flicking her hair over her shoulder. Every strand had fallen free of the coif Emily had fashioned this morning. Daisy’s eyes twinkled with glee and vigor. “I found Miss Johnstone first. In fact, I haven’t seen them for ages.”

  My chest constricted. They’d been left alone, with no one looking for them? If anything, that was worse. Miss Johnstone could be sharing a hot, intimate moment with Frederick as we spoke. Unlike Warren, Frederick seemed honorable enough to offer for her hand after such an exchange. My stomach, grumbling all morning, threatened to turn itself inside out. Had I missed my chance…again?

  Daisy issued a joyful sigh as she fluttered onto the bed beside me. She giggled, turning onto her side. Her blue eyes glimmered with barely suppressed glee. “Isn’t this the most romantic party you’ve ever attended?”

  Far from it, considering the only man to court me was betrothed to another woman. I frowned. That made no sense. If Lady Dunlop aimed to matchmake, she would never invite someone who was off the marriage market.

  “Rose?” Daisy sidled closer, her smile slipping. “Don’t you like the party?”

  I forced a smile. “It’s certainly one I won’t forget.”

  Warren had lied to me.

  The grandfather clock chimed seven of the evening. Even a floor above, the sound rattled my bones.