“I said the same thing when my father informed me that you were here.”
Lady Victoria Fontaine strolled into her father’s office, her expression as calm as if she were discussing the weather. Sinclair stood. He’d meant to remain in his arrogant slouch, but as he had noticed last night, he tended to become erect in her presence.
Coming around the back of the chair, he took her hand and brought it to his lips. “Good morning, Lady Victoria.”
He liked touching her. When she didn’t pull her hand away, he brushed his lips across her knuckles again. She continued gazing at him, her violet eyes the only part of her that didn’t look completely composed. Even in a muted gray-and-green muslin gown she drew his eyes, his attention, and—even more strongly than last night—his desire. Finally she freed her hand and turned to the window, and his blood stirred as he watched the silken sway of her hips.
“My father says you accepted his terms for the marriage,” she said, leaning against the deep sill.
“They were generous.”
Victoria nodded. “He has never been one to quarrel over details.”
Sinclair looked at her for a long moment, absorbed by the fast-beating pulse at the soft curve of her throat, until he abruptly remembered that he was Sin Grafton, dedicated rake and hedonist. “You seem to make up your mind fairly quickly, as well.”
“I wanted you to drag me off to the garden,” she admitted, blushing, “but I didn’t know you were going to attempt to render me naked.”
She had wanted him. “You didn’t seem unduly disturbed by it—until your father arrived.”
The pretty color in her cheeks deepened. “I’ll admit, my lord, that you kiss well—but I imagine you’ve had a great deal of practice.”
Amused at the supposed insult, Sinclair swept a bow. “I’m pleased all my hard work’s gone to good use.”
“Too good, according to my parents.”
“I’ll apologize for the public setting of our embrace, but I won’t apologize for kissing you.” He stepped closer, as drawn to her this morning as he’d been last night, despite the marriage noose. “You’re delicious.”
She cocked her head at him. “Are you still trying to seduce me?” Victoria pushed away from the window, and walked toward the door, saying in a raised voice, “That’s hardly necessary, Lord Althorpe; you’ve already won my hand in marriage.”
Curious, Sinclair watched as she softly closed the door and faced him. “If you want to continue what we began last night, my lady,” he murmured, “I am a willing participant. Exceedingly willing.”
“The only thing I want to participate in is getting us out of trouble,” she countered, lowering her voice again. “You can hardly want this marriage any more than I do.”
“What do you propose—pardon the pun—to do about it, then?”
She clapped her hands together, abruptly all business. “You’ve spent the past five years on the Continent. No one would think twice if you decided to return there.”
So the little spitfire thought she could dictate terms. Her father was right about one thing, anyway: she was definitely trouble. “Probably not.”
“If money is a problem, I do have an independent income at my disposal. Surely you could live comfortably in Paris on, say, a thousand pounds a year?”
Sin couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing. “You want me to return to Paris.”
“Yes. The sooner, the better.”
“And you would pay for my meals, rent, clothing, and general upkeep if I were to do so,” he continued, counting the points off on his fingers.
Her expression became a little dubious. “Well, yes.”
“All that’s lacking, then, is for you to promise to come visit me from time to time and bring me chocolates.”
Victoria’s eyes narrowed. “I am not proposing keeping you, or some other sordid arrangement. Only keeping you away from me.”
“It amounts to about the same thing. Do you have any other almost-husbands lurking about the countryside?”
“I am completely serious!”
Unsure whether he was more annoyed or amused, Sinclair closed the distance between them. “But I don’t want to return to Paris. I like it here.”
She backed into the wall. “Ouch. I’m certain you’d be much happier with all your high-flying lady friends in Paris. It’s quite lovely there this time of year, anyway.”
“It’s lovely here. Nearly as lovely as you.”
“But no one in London even likes you!” she burst out, then blanched.
And no one in London knew he had damned near died for them more than a dozen times over the past five years. His chest tightening, he turned away so she wouldn’t see the sudden anger in his eyes. “They haven’t realized how charming I am,” he said smoothly, pretending to examine the view out the window.
Surprisingly, she put a hand on his arm. “I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “That was cruel.”
Brushing her hand away, he faced her again. Pity was another item for which he had nothing but contempt. “I think London will like me considerably more when I am in your company, my lady.”
“But—”
“You’re very popular—quite society’s darling.” And that could work to his advantage, he realized as he studied her smooth, cream-colored complexion. Why, he was a bloody genius! Not only would their marriage keep him in society’s good graces but it would also gain him access to places his tattered reputation would otherwise have denied him. And given her own wildness, she wouldn’t cling on his arm every moment and get in his way.
“But I am not going to get married—and certainly not to you!”
He smiled. “Then you shouldn’t have kissed me.”
Victoria flushed. “Don’t you think marriage will interfere with your womanizing and wagering and drinking?”
She sounded desperate. Sin leaned forward, trapping her between the wall and his arms. “Not any more than it would interfere with your flirting and socializing and shopping and whatever else it is that you do.”
“It won’t!” she shot back at him.
He looked her in the eyes and was surprised when she looked straight back at him. Most people didn’t do that; they had too much to hide. “Apparently,” he murmured, “we are perfect for one another.” With that, he leaned down and kissed her.
With a surprised sound that came from deep in her chest, Victoria returned the embrace, curving her neck to meet his mouth more fully with hers. Her instant, heated response aroused him, as it had last night in Lady Franton’s garden. He wanted to dislike her—to dismiss her as one of the faceless nobility who hadn’t bothered to discover who had killed his brother. But while he was reasonably sure she hadn’t murdered anyone, he did know one thing for certain: he had kissed a hundred women and never felt this way before.
Slowly and reluctantly he broke the kiss. Her long, curling lashes fluttered open, and her violet eyes looked into his. “If I marry you,” she whispered, “it would only be for my family’s sake.”
Sin chuckled. More likely it would be to escape her family. “May I take you for a picnic tomorrow?”
Victoria cleared her throat, lowering her hands from where she’d draped them over his shoulders. “I’m going shopping tomorrow with Lucy Havers and Marguerite Porter.”
“A drive in Hyde Park on Saturday, then.”
“I have an engagement.” She ducked out from under his arms, making a show of straightening her hair.
He lifted an eyebrow, wondering whether the engagement was with Lord Marley. “I am getting the distinct impression that you don’t want to be seen with me.”
Hesitation glinted in her eyes. “I still think we may be taking this too seriously,” she offered. “Perhaps everyone will come to their senses in the next week, and we won’t have to go through with this silly business.”
“Perhaps they will. But you will go driving with me on Saturday morning.”
She lifted her chin. “Or you’ll do what?”
An unbidden smile touched his mouth. Challenging him wasn’t exactly the best way to be rid of him, but she would discover that soon enough. “As I told you last night, a kiss is only the beginning of a seduction. The next step is much more…interesting.”
Before she could comment on that, he swept a bow and pulled the door open again. “I’d best inform my family that I’m getting married. Until Saturday, my lady.”
Chapter 3
“Ha, ha! Sin!”
Christopher Grafton bolted down the stairs of Drewsbury House and flung his arms around his brother. Sinclair returned the embrace, holding his younger brother tightly for a long moment before he released him again. A knot he hadn’t realized he carried loosened in his chest. He’d lost one brother, but he’d been able to return before anything happened to Christopher. And nothing would happen to him now.
“It’s good to see you, Kit,” he said, grinning as he stepped backward. “You’ve grown a foot.”
“At least a foot. I’d been hoping I was taller than you now, blast it.”
“Christopher has your grandfather’s height,” a female voice said from the morning room doorway. “I’m surprised you recognized him after five years.”
Sinclair’s heart jolted, and his sense that he was dreaming left. Now it was real. Now he was home. Slowly Sinclair turned to face the voice. “You haven’t changed a bit, Grandmama Augusta. I would recognize you anywhere,” he drawled.
Augusta, Lady Drewsbury sipped the cup of tea she held in her hands and eyed him over the rim. “Of course I’ve changed. I’ve lost a grandson.”
“Grandmama,” Christopher chided, flushing to the roots of his dark brown hair. “He’s just come back. Give him a moment to breathe before you pounce.”
Her slender shoulders rose and fell with the breath she took, while her keen blue eyes remained on Sinclair, assessing him. He wondered what she saw. This was what he had dreaded on returning to London—not the mess he’d been forced to make of his reputation, or even the prospect of ferreting out Thomas’s murderer with the trail two years old, and well-covered to begin with.
No, more than anything else he had dreaded facing his grandmother with no explanation he was free to give her for his god-awful behavior over the past five years, and especially for the past two. “No worries, Kit,” he said smoothly, those same five years the only thing that kept his voice steady. “Don’t spoil our grandmother’s fun. No doubt she’s been plotting her speech for ages.”
“Sin,” his brother murmured.
“I did have a speech,” she agreed, her tone as calm as if she were discussing the color of his coat. “Now that you’re finally here, though, I can’t see that it would make any difference. You disappointed me, Sinclair. I have since lowered my standards for judging your behavior. As Christopher said, you’ve returned. Come and have some tea.”
He bit back his cynical response to the insult as unfair. Sin shook his head. Of all the yelling and weeping and name-calling with which Augusta might have greeted him, her quiet acceptance was worse. He had disappointed her; he’d been less than she’d hoped and expected, so she now appeared to expect nothing of him. “I can’t stay.”
She nodded, apparently expecting that, too. “Very well.”
“You can’t leave already!” Kit protested. “You only just got here. Are you at least going to be in London for a while?”
“Don’t pester your brother, Christopher. No doubt his social calendar is full of invitations and gatherings.”
Finally, a little acid. It felt better than the cool nothingness of her earlier tone, but not by much. “Actually, I came to invite you to an event,” he said slowly. “On the fifteenth.”
Augusta’s expression hardened. “You are family, Sinclair, but neither your brother nor I will ever participate in some farce you and your…cronies devise.”
“Grandmam—”
“It may very well be a farce,” Sin agreed, “and I understand if you choose not to attend. I’m not entirely certain I’ll be there myself—at least not sober. The event is a wedding. Mine. Prince George—”
“What?” Christopher yelped. “A wedding? Your wedding? You’ve only just returned! Did you bring her back with you from the Continent? Is she Italian?”
“More importantly,” his grandmother broke in, “is she carrying your child?”
Augusta’s expectations of him seemed to lower each time he opened his mouth. “No. She isn’t. And she’s English. I met her…quite recently.” Good God, had it really only been yesterday? Sinclair shook himself. “I’ve been back in London a few days. I’ve just been somewhat…busy.”
“It would appear so,” Augusta said dryly. “Who is she?”
“Lady Victoria Fontaine.”
“The Vixen? You’ve caught the Vixen?”
Finally Augusta looked surprised. “Hush, Christopher. You mentioned Prince George. He is attending?”
“Yes. He has made Westminster Cathedral available to us.”
“Then we shall attend. It is a matter of family honor.”
Sinclair bowed. “Thank you, Grandmama.” When he straightened, though, she had already vanished back into the morning room. “So much for the family reunion,” he muttered.
“What did you expect?” Kit asked. “You’ve written, what, a dozen times over the past five years? When you couldn’t be bothered to appear for Thomas’s funeral…well, we—she—”
“I didn’t know he’d been killed,” Sinclair lied, returning to the foyer for his hat and cane. Silently he cursed himself. The lying had become so effortless—easier than the truth.
With the war over, he should have been free to tell his family where he’d been and what he’d been doing since he left—but Thomas had known, and Thomas was dead. As soon as he’d learned of the murder, when he could think again at all, he had vowed to tell them nothing until he was absolutely certain there would be no reprisals against his family for his actions in Europe. That was what mattered—that they remain safe, his reputation be damned.
“Sin,” Christopher continued, pursuing him to the front door, “will you call on us again?”
“I don’t know. I’m at Grafton House. Come and see me if you like. If Grandmama will allow it.”
Kit scowled. “I’m twenty years old. I do as I please.”
Taking a breath, Sinclair put a hand on his younger brother’s shoulder. They didn’t need two disappointments in the family. “Don’t desert her. You’re all she has.”
“I know my duty,” his brother said darkly. “She’d only like to see you do yours.”
“Wouldn’t we all,” he returned with a cynical smile. “Wouldn’t we all.”
Lucy nibbled on another tea cake. “What do you mean, ‘What do I know about him?’ I don’t know anything other than what everyone knows.”
Victoria sat back on the comfortable morning room couch and fiddled with her cup of tea. “I meant, have you heard anything over the past few days?” She glanced at the tall grandfather clock in the corner. He’d set this morning as their next meeting; in another five minutes it would be afternoon, and he would be late.
She wasn’t nervous or anxious about his arrival, of course. She’d merely invited her friends to call in anticipation of his failure to appear. Her hands folded and unfolded of their own accord, and she scowled down at the silly things. She wasn’t nervous at all.
Daintily, Lucy blotted crumbs off her gown with the tip of her finger. “The only thing I’ve heard is that Marley went out and got completely sluiced after the Franton soiree, and that he hasn’t sobered up yet.”
That wasn’t much of a surprise. Drinking and wagering seemed to be Marley’s favorite activities. Lucy’s comment at least explained why he hadn’t called on her, when previously he had appeared on her parents’ doorstep almost daily.
Marguerite Porter, on Victoria’s other side, picked at the pink lace sleeve of her day muslin. “Diane Addington was dying to join us today, only her mother absol
utely forbade it. She says you’re a bad influence, Vixen.”
“Hush, Marguerite. It was just bad circumstances.” Lucy giggled. “Heavens, if I could have stolen a kiss from Lord Sin, I would have done it, too.”
“Is that what they’re calling him?” Victoria asked. “See, you did know something I didn’t.”
“Well, they mostly called him plain Sin, before. It’s not much of a change.”
“I think it qualifies as a promotion, don’t you?” Victoria sighed—and realized she’d been doing a great deal of that lately. “Whatever Diane’s mother says, Marguerite, the Addingtons have already accepted the invitation to the wedding.” She rose, strolling over to look out the window. Still no sign of Lord sin.
“Well, no one wants to miss the wedding. It’s a pity you didn’t go to Almack’s last night. Everyone’s talking about it.”
Her gaze still on Brook Street outside, Victoria took another sip of tea. “I’m not allowed to go anywhere unless accompanied by my parents or my betrothed—as if that would help anything. Father must think I intend to flee or something.”
“You don’t, do you?” Lucy gave her a distressed look. “That would be horrid, if you left London.”
“Of course not. What would I do, flitting about in some foreign country with no money?” The idea had crossed her mind more than once, but it seemed utterly selfish and unproductive. Whatever her father might think, she had as much family pride as he did. And living her life in exile was not something she felt ready to face. Some other solution was bound to arise without resorting to anything that drastic—or permanent.
Marguerite shuddered. “I’m so glad it wasn’t me that he ruined,” she breathed. “Of course, he’s absolutely stunning, but I heard he actually lived in a Paris brothel for six months.”
“You’re not helping anything, Marguerite,” Lucy chided.
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