by Julia Quinn
And then the strangest thing happened. She relaxed in his arms. A little, anyway. He felt some of the tension lift away, felt her breath as it sighed into his hand.
Interesting. She hadn’t been worried that he didn’t know who she was. She’d been worried that he did.
Slowly, and with enough deliberation to make sure she knew he could change his mind at any time, he lifted his hand from her mouth. He didn’t remove his arm from her waist, though. Selfish of him, he knew, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to let her go.
“Who are you?” he murmured, tilting his words toward her ear.
“Who are you?” she returned.
He quirked a smile. “I asked you first.”
“I don’t speak to strangers.”
He laughed at that, then twirled her around in his arms so that they were face-to-face. He knew he was behaving abominably, all but accosting the poor thing. She wasn’t up to anything naughty. She’d been playing in his family’s quartet, for heaven’s sake. He ought to thank her.
But he was feeling light-headed—almost light-bodied. Something about this woman set his blood fizzing in his veins, and he was already a bit giddy at having finally reached Winstead House after weeks of travel.
He was home. Home. And there was a beautiful woman in his arms whom he was quite certain was not planning to kill him.
It had been some time since he’d savored that particular sensation.
“I think . . .” he said wonderingly. “I think I might need to kiss you.”
She jerked back, not looking scared precisely, but rather puzzled. Or maybe concerned.
Smart woman. He did sound rather like a madman.
“Just a little,” he assured her. “I just need to remind myself . . .”
She was silent, and then, as if she could not help herself, she asked, “Of what?”
He smiled. He liked her voice. It was comforting and round, like a good brandy. Or a summer’s day.
“Of goodness,” he said, and he touched her chin, tilting her face toward his. Her breath caught—he could hear the rasp of air rushing over her lips—but she did not struggle. He waited, just a moment, because if she fought him he knew he would have to let her go. But she didn’t. Her eyes held his, as mesmerized by the moment as he was.
And so he kissed her. Tentatively at first, almost afraid she’d disappear in his arms. But it wasn’t enough. Passion swirled to life within him and he pulled her closer, reveling in the soft press of her body against his.
She was petite, small in that way that made a man want to slay dragons. But she felt like a woman, warm and lush in all the right places. His hand ached to close around her breast, or to cup the perfect curve of her bottom. But even he would not be so bold, not with an unknown lady in his mother’s house.
Still, he was not ready to let her go. She smelled like England, of soft rain and sun-kissed meadows. And she felt like the best kind of heaven. He wanted to wrap himself around, bury himself within her, and stay there for all of his days. He hadn’t had a drop to drink in three years, but he was intoxicated now, bubbling with a lightness he’d never thought to feel again.
It was madness. It had to be.
“What is your name?” he whispered. He wanted to know. He wanted to know her.
But she did not reply. She might have done; given more time he was sure he could have teased it out of her. But they both heard someone coming down the back stairs, just down the hall from the spot where they were still locked in their embrace.
She shook her head, her eyes wide with caution. “I can’t be seen like this,” she whispered urgently.
He let her go, but not because she’d asked him to. Rather, he saw who was coming down the stairs—and what they were doing—and he forgot all about his dark-haired vixen.
A furious cry rose from his throat, and he took off down the hall like a madman.
Chapter Two
Fifteen minutes later, Anne was in the same spot she’d found herself in fifteen minutes earlier, when she’d dashed down the hall and hurled herself through the first unlocked door she’d come across. Her luck being what it was (dreadful) she had ended up in some sort of dark and windowless storage room. A brief, blind exploration revealed a cello, three clarinets, and possibly a trombone.
There was something fitting in this. She had come to the room where the Smythe-Smith musical instruments came to die. And she was stuck here, at least until the insanity in the hallway was over. She had no idea what was going on out there, except that there was a great deal of shrieking involved, rather a lot of grunting, and quite a few noises that sounded sickeningly like fist on flesh.
She could find no place to sit save the floor, so she plopped down on the cold, uncarpeted wood, leaned up against a bare patch of wall near the door, and prepared to wait out the brawl. Whatever was going on, Anne wanted no part of it, but more importantly, she wanted to be nowhere near it when they were discovered. Which they surely would be, given the racket they were making.
Men. They were idiots, the lot of them.
Although there seemed to be a woman out there as well—she’d be the one doing the shrieking. Anne thought she heard the name Daniel, and then possibly Marcus, who she realized had to be the Earl of Chatteris, whom she’d met earlier in the evening. He was quite besotted with Lady Honoria . . .
Come to think of it, that did sound a bit like Lady Honoria shrieking.
Anne shook her head. This was not her business. No one would fault her for staying out of the way. No one.
Someone slammed into the wall right behind her, jolting her a good two inches across the floor. She groaned and let her face fall into her hands. She was never going to get out of here. They’d find her dried-up and lifeless body years later, flung over a tuba, two flutes making the sign of the cross.
She shook her head. She had to stop reading Harriet’s melodramas before bedtime. Her young charge fancied herself a writer, and her stories were growing more gruesome by the day.
Finally the pounding in the corridor stopped, and the men slid down to the floor (she felt this; right through the wall). One of them was directly behind her; they would have been back to back had it not been for the wall between them. She could hear them breathing hard, then talking as men did, in sentences short and terse. She didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but she could hardly help it, stuck as she was.
And that was when she figured it out.
The man who’d kissed her—he was Lady Honoria’s older brother, the Earl of Winstead! She’d seen his portrait before; she ought to have recognized him. Or maybe not. The painting had got the basics right—his coffee brown hair and finely shaped mouth—but it did not capture him truly. He was quite handsome, there was no denying that, but no paint or brushstroke could convey the easy, elegant confidence of a man who knew his place in the world and found it quite satisfactory.
Oh, heavens, she was in deep now. She’d kissed the infamous Daniel Smythe-Smith. Anne knew all about him, everyone did. He’d dueled several years earlier and had been chased out of the country by his opponent’s father. But they’d reached some sort of truce, apparently. Lady Pleinsworth had mentioned that the earl would be finally coming home, and Harriet had filled Anne in on all the gossip.
Harriet was quite helpful that way.
But if Lady Pleinsworth found out what had happened that evening . . . Well, that would be the end of Anne’s governessing, for the Pleinsworth girls or anyone. Anne had had a hard enough time getting this position; no one would hire her if it got out she’d consorted with an earl. Anxious mamas generally did not hire governesses of questionable moral rectitude.
And it wasn’t her fault. This time, it absolutely wasn’t.
She sighed. It had gone quiet in the hall. Had they finally departed? She’d heard footsteps, but it was difficult to tell how many sets of feet had been included. She waited a few more minutes, and then, once she was certain there would be nothing but silence to greet her, she turned the doork
nob and carefully stepped out into the hall.
“There you are,” he said. For the second time that evening.
She must have jumped a foot. Not because Lord Winstead had surprised her, although he had done. Rather, she was astonished that he’d remained in the hall for so long in such complete silence. Truly, she hadn’t heard a thing.
But that wasn’t what made her jaw drop.
“You look awful,” she said before she could stop herself. He was alone, sitting on the floor with his long legs stretched out across the hall. Anne hadn’t thought a person could look so unsteady while sitting down, but she was quite certain that the earl would have fallen over if he hadn’t been propped up against the wall.
He lifted one hand in a floppy salute. “Marcus looks worse.”
She took in his eye, which was turning purple at the perimeter, and his shirt, which was stained with blood from heaven knew where. Or whom. “I’m not certain how that can be possible.”
Lord Winstead let out a breath. “He was kissing my sister.”
Anne waited for more, but he clearly considered this to be explanation enough. “Ehrm . . .” she stalled, because there was no etiquette book with instruction for a night like this. In the end, she decided her best bet would be to inquire about the conclusion of the altercation, rather than whatever had occurred to cause it. “Is it all worked out, then?”
His chin dipped in a magnanimous tilt. “Congratulations will be in order very soon.”
“Oh. Well. That is very nice.” She smiled, then nodded, then clasped her hands together in front of her in an attempt to keep herself still. This was all terribly awkward. What was one supposed to do with an injured earl? Who’d just returned from three years in exile? And had rather a naughty reputation before he’d been run out of the country.
Not to mention the whole kissing business a few minutes earlier.
“Do you know my sister?” he asked, sounding terribly tired. “Oh, of course you do. You were playing with her.”
“Your sister is Lady Honoria?” It did seem prudent to verify.
He nodded. “I am Winstead.”
“Yes, of course. I had been informed of your pending return.” She stretched out another awkward smile, but it did little to set her at ease. “Lady Honoria is most amiable and kind. I am very happy for her.”
“She’s a terrible musician.”
“She was the best violinist on the stage,” Anne said with complete honesty.
He laughed loudly at that. “You would do well as a diplomat, Miss . . .” He paused, waited, then pointed out, “You never did tell me your name.”
She hesitated, because she always hesitated when so questioned, but then she reminded herself that he was the Earl of Winstead and thus the nephew of her employer. She had nothing to fear from him. At least not if no one saw them together. “I am Miss Wynter,” she said. “Governess to your cousins.”
“Which ones? The Pleinsworths?”
She nodded.
He looked her straight in the eye. “Oh, you poor, poor thing.”
“Stop! They’re lovely!” she protested. She adored her three charges. Harriet, Elizabeth, and Frances might be more high-spirited than most young girls, but they had good, kind hearts. And they always meant well.
His eyebrows rose. “Lovely, yes. Well-behaved, not as much.”
There was some truth to that, and Anne could not suppress a tiny smile. “I’m certain they have matured greatly since you were last in their company,” she said primly.
He gave her a dubious look, then asked, “How did you come to be playing the piano?”
“Lady Sarah took ill.”
“Ah.” There was a world of meaning in that “ah.” “Do convey my wishes for a speedy recovery.”
Anne was quite sure that Lady Sarah had begun to feel better the moment her mother had excused her from the concert, but she merely nodded and said that she would be sure to do so. Even though she wouldn’t. There was no way she was telling anyone she’d run into the Earl of Winstead.
“Does your family know that you have returned?” she asked. She regarded him a bit more closely. He really did look quite like his sister. She wondered if he had the same remarkable eyes—a vividly pale blue, almost lavender. It was impossible to tell for sure in the dim light of the hallway. Not to mention that one of his eyes was rapidly swelling shut. “Other than Lady Honoria, of course,” she added.
“Not yet.” He glanced toward the public area of the house and grimaced. “Much as I adore every last soul in that audience for bringing themselves to attend the concert, I’d rather not make such a public homecoming.” He looked down at his disheveled state. “Especially not like this.”
“Of course not,” she said quickly. She couldn’t even begin to imagine the commotion were he to walk in on the post-musicale reception bruised and bloodied.
He let out a little groan as he shifted position on the floor, then muttered something beneath his breath that Anne was fairly certain she was not meant to hear. “I should go,” she blurted out. “I’m terribly sorry, and . . . ehrm . . .”
She told herself to move, she really did. Every last corner of her brain was screaming at her to come to her senses and get out of there before someone came along, but all she could think was—he’d been defending his sister.
How could she abandon a man who did that?
“Let me help you,” she said, against all better judgment.
He smiled weakly. “If you wouldn’t mind.”
She crouched down to get a better look at his injuries. She’d treated her share of cuts and scrapes, but never anything like this. “Where are you hurt?” she asked. She cleared her throat. “Other than the obvious spots.”
“Obvious?”
“Well . . .” She pointed gingerly toward his eye. “You’ve a bit of a bruise there. And there . . .” she added, motioning to the left side of his jaw before moving on to his shoulder, which was visible through his ripped and bloodied shirt. “ . . . and over there.”
“Marcus looks worse,” Lord Winstead said.
“Yes,” Anne replied, biting back a smile. “You’d mentioned.”
“It’s an important detail.” He gave her a loopy grin, then winced and brought his hand to his cheek.
“Your teeth?” she asked worriedly.
“They all seem to be in place,” he mumbled. He opened his mouth, as if testing the hinge mechanism, then closed it with a groan. “I think.”
“Is there someone I can get for you?” she asked.
His brows rose. “You wish for someone to know you’ve been here alone with me?”
“Oh. Of course not. I wasn’t thinking clearly.”
He smiled again, that dry half grin that made her feel rather squirmy on the inside. “I have that effect on women.”
Any number of retorts sprang to mind, but Anne bit them all back. “I could help you to your feet,” she suggested.
He cocked his head to the side. “Or you could sit and talk to me.”
She stared at him.
Again, that half smile. “It was just an idea,” he said.
An ill-advised idea, she thought immediately. She had just kissed him, for heaven’s sake. She should not be anywhere near him, certainly not beside him on the floor, where it would be so easy to turn to him, and tip her face toward his . . .
“Perhaps I could find some water,” she blurted out, her words spewing forth so quickly she almost had to cough. “Have you a handkerchief? You will want to clean your face, I should think.”
He reached in his pocket and pulled out a wrinkled square of cloth. “The finest Italian linen,” he quipped in a tired voice. He frowned. “Or at least it once was.”
“I’m sure it will be perfect,” she said, taking it from him and folding it to her liking. She reached out and dabbed it against his cheek. “Does this hurt?”
He shook his head.
“I wish I had some water. The blood has already dried.” She frowned.
“Have you any brandy? In a flask, perhaps?” Gentlemen often carried flasks. Her father had. He had rarely left home without it.
But Lord Winstead said, “I don’t drink spirits.”
Something about his tone startled her, and she looked up. His eyes were on hers, and she caught her breath. She hadn’t realized how close she’d leaned in.
Her lips parted. And she wanted . . .
Too much. She had always wanted too much.
She pulled back, unsettled by how easily she’d swayed toward him. He was a man who smiled easily, and often. It didn’t take more than a few minutes in his company to know this. Which was why the sharp and serious edge to his voice had transfixed her.
“But you can probably find some down the hall,” he said suddenly, and the strange, captivating spell was broken. “The third door on the right. It used to be my father’s study.”
“At the back of the house?” It seemed an unlikely place.
“There are two entrances. The other side opens onto the main hall. There shouldn’t be anyone there, but you’ll want to be careful when you go in.”
Anne rose to her feet and followed his directions to the study. Moonlight filtered through the window, and she easily found a decanter. She brought the whole thing back with her, carefully shutting the door behind her.
“On the shelf by the window?” Lord Winstead murmured.
“Yes.”
He smiled a bit. “Some things never change.”
Anne pulled out the stopper and put the handkerchief over the vessel’s opening, sloshing a healthy dose of brandy onto the cloth. The scent of it was instant and permeating. “Does that bother you?” she asked with sudden concern. “The smell?” In her last position—right before she’d come to work for the Pleinsworths—her young charge’s uncle had drunk too much and then stopped. It had been monstrously difficult to be near him. His temper was even worse without the alcohol, and if he so much as smelled a hint of it, he nearly went mad.
Anne had had to leave. For that and other reasons.
But Lord Winstead just shook his head. “It’s not that I can’t drink spirits. I choose not to.”