“Oh, no!” exclaimed Faith. “Maybe I should go check on her.”
“No!”
They all eyed Charity in surprise.
Her heart leapt into her throat, and she swallowed hard, silently wishing she hadn’t eaten those few bites of toast, since her stomach didn’t seem at all interested in retaining them. “Perhaps if we all just sat down,” she suggested. She stood and offered up her chair. “Aunt Cleo?”
While they all found places around the table, Charity walked to the doorway, nervously wringing her hands. She turned back to face her family and said, “Amity isn’t exactly here for you to go check on, Faith.”
“Well, that’s just silly,” her sister said. “I stuck my head in last night when Imogen was up, to be sure she . . .” Comprehension dawned. “Oh. You were in Amity’s bed.”
Charity bit her lip and nodded.
“Well,” said Grace. “If she isn’t exactly here, where exactly might she be?”
“She’s run off with that handsome young doctor,” Cleo announced. “I’d bet my last dime on it.”
Gareth scoffed. “Meadows? Not a chance. Good man, good doctor.”
Faith nodded in vigorous agreement.
“I’m so glad you feel that way,” Charity said, her voice tentative, “Don’t you think he’ll make a good husband for Amity?” She winced, closed her eyes and waited for the verbal barrage. When she was met only with silence, she cautiously opened one eyelid and peeked at the table. Everyone was staring at her, a variety of expressions on their collective faces. Faith looked horrified, as did Grace. Gareth and Trevor looked amused. Aunt Cleo looked positively gleeful.
Feeling a desperate need to fill the sudden silence, she hastened to explain how the elopement had come about, her words tumbling over one another in her haste. “You see, Amity and Matthew fell in love almost as soon as they met, but he didn’t know how to tell her because the Marquess of Asheburton was so persistent in his suit, but Amity didn’t really like him, and who can blame her”—Charity paused and scowled—“since he’s such a wretched bounder . . . and . . . and . . . a-a cad.”
She waved her hands in the air in frustration, especially when she noted the broadening smiles on the men’s faces. Even Grace and Faith were trying to hide traces of amusement, but Charity plunged recklessly ahead. “Anyway, we switched identities yesterday afternoon, and they’re on their way to Scotland, and they have enough of a head start that nobody will catch them now, so we might as well all be happy about it.” She ended her rushed speech, took a deep breath, and waited.
“Ashe is a cad,” said Gareth after a long pause, his lips twitching.
“And a bounder,” Trevor agreed with sham solemnity.
Charity looked from one face to another in confusion. “What is wrong with all of you?
Lachlan Kimball cleared his throat and stepped into the room. Charity, who had her back to the arched entryway, had been unable to see him appear just before her announcements, followed by Desmond, who looked less than pleased at the arrival of yet another unexpected visitor.
Charity froze at the sound but didn’t turn. There was no need. She already knew who stood behind her.
“Perhaps, Miss Ackerly, you can force yourself to tolerate my wretched presence long enough for a private word?”
Sixteen
Nobody moved. Charity refused to turn, refused to even answer. Instead, she just stood, rooted in place, a shuttered, icy expression on her features.
Aunt Cleo was the first to react. “Faith,” she said, pushing herself up and out of her chair with her cane. “You haven’t even offered me a single look at that baby, and I’ve been here for at least thirty minutes.”
All at once everyone seized on the offered activity and began a mass exodus of the breakfast room. No one said anything. Faith and Grace each gave Charity a quick hug on the way past, while Gareth and Trevor each clapped Lachlan on the shoulder.
Aunt Cleo stopped in front of Charity, gave her a stern look, and then leaned around to include the marquess in her admonishment. “Don’t you two go and mess up a perfectly good elopement.” She patted Charity fondly on the cheek, then moved past to join the others, who had gone to the front sitting room to wait for Faith to bring Imogen down from the nursery.
Silence fell. Finally, Lachlan spoke. “Charity.”
She turned, a brittle smile pasted upon her face, and politely asked, “Have you had breakfast, my lord?” She moved toward the sideboard as if intending to prepare a plate for him.
His heart wrenched. She looked small and fragile and pale, and he knew that a great deal more was weighing on her than her sister’s elopement. “I’ve eaten, thank you,” he replied.
At his gentle tone, Charity finally met his eyes. The protective look on his face was almost her undoing, but when he took a step toward her, she panicked and retreated to the other side of the breakfast table.
“I’m sorry you got caught up in our little family drama,” she began, and then stopped, uncertain where to go with that line of thought. After all, he’d been a victim of deception at her hand, too. She looked down and scuffed one of her toes along a line in the pattern on the lush Aubusson carpet.
Warmth filled Lachlan at the self-conscious little gesture, at her large and wounded eyes, and he stifled the urge to laugh. Charity looked just like a little girl who’d been caught doing something forbidden, and he imagined she must have been quite a handful as a child. Goodness knew she’d already turned his life upside down in the few short weeks since the Season began.
He walked toward her, hoping she wouldn’t look up and retreat again before he reached her. His luck held. He neared enough to reach for her chin, intending to tilt her face up to his, but she nearly jumped out of her skin and slapped his hand away.
“Good lord, Lachlan!” she exclaimed, taking a step back, not noticing in her agitation that she’d addressed him by his first name. “I see now why you reminded me of one of those predatory jungle cats I’ve read about.”
A jungle cat? “Interesting,” he said. “Would you like to know what you remind me of?”
“No,” she said, cross, and turned her back on him to look out the window.
He stepped up behind her, placed his hands on her shoulders and leaned down very close to her ear. “A kitten,” he said. His warm breath tickled. “You remind me of a kitten that has been backed into a corner, ready to burst out, claws first, hissing and scratching.”
She shrugged her shoulders, trying to shake off his hands. “Then stop backing me into corners.”
They both stared out into the back garden in silence.
“I know it was you,” Lachlan said.
Charity’s stomach twisted. She knew he was referring to their first kiss, stolen in the very location at which they both stared, but she chose to purposely misinterpret. “Of course you do. I already admitted pretending to be Amity last night.”
“I’m talking about the first time I kissed you, Charity. Right out on that lawn. That time I mistakenly assumed you were Amity, and I apologize for that.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Her voice was low, almost a whisper, and he had to lean close to understand.
It had been Charity. He was right. He was sure of it. “No more lies between us, kitten. I’d like to start with a clean slate.”
“Start?” Charity tossed her head scornfully. “Start what? Have you suddenly decided that, since you can’t have Amity, now you’ll settle for me?”
Lachlan felt his patience begin to slip. “My courtship of Amity was based on a suggestion by Huntwick and on the memory of that first kiss—the kiss you deny we shared. Had you informed me of my mistake that morning, we’d likely never have come to this point.”
Charity spun around, her eyes spitting blue sparks. “I haven’t denied it.” She tossed her head scornfully. “There’s nothing to deny.”
Eyes stormy, Lachlan’s tenuous hold on his self-control abruptly snapped. Charity knew the
instant it happened, and she gasped when she discerned his intent. Before she could move, he closed the distance between them in a single stride, snaked his arm around her waist, and hauled her against him. “Then deny this,” he growled, taking her lips in a bruising, punishing kiss intended to remind her of all that had already passed between them.
She reached up with trembling hands and pushed at his shoulders in a desperate attempt to escape. Her struggles were ineffective against both his strength and the burning glow of desire that began the instant their mouths touched. That warmth spread throughout her body, engulfing her with tingling, aching sensation. With a small sigh, she again gave up and melted against him.
Lachlan’s brief anger dissolved. Exerting supreme effort, he forced himself to let go of her, placed both of his hands on her rib cage until he was sure she was steady on her feet, and then he broke off the kiss, his heart pounding with the physical need he felt. He stepped away from her.
As Charity felt the warmth of his hands on her sides fall away and his lips leave hers, her eyes flew open. “No,” she whispered, “not yet.” She stood on tiptoe, took his face between her hands and renewed the kiss.
“Oh . . . God. Charity.” Lachlan struggled against the incoming tide of his arousal, trying to take another step away, but she followed his movement. He groaned and surrendered, suddenly slanting his mouth across hers, tracing the line between her lips with his tongue. She opened her mouth, tried to catch her breath, and he took full advantage, deepening their embrace.
For Charity, the world felt as though it had suddenly tipped sideways. She slipped her arms around his waist and held on for dear life, shyly mimicking the movements of his tongue with her own. Her fingers spread on his back, the taut muscles there rippling beneath her palms, and when he began thrusting his tongue into her mouth in an ageless if primitive suggestion, she clenched her fingers and dug them into the thick material of his jacket.
“So sweet,” he murmured against her lips, and then slid his mouth down the plane of her neck to nibble the thin layer of skin above her pounding pulse. His hand moved up her rib cage to settle on the soft mound of a breast, and he felt himself stir and harden when his palm again encountered the stiff little nubbin that told him of her equal arousal.
When she slipped her hand around and tucked it inside his jacket, he realized that if he didn’t stop this now he would take her here on the floor of her brother-in-law’s breakfast room while her family waited just down the hall. “Stop,” he said, capturing her wandering hand in his own.
She lifted her lips again, seeking another kiss, and he pushed her gently back against the wall and then braced his hands on either side of her. Locking his elbows, he forced himself to maintain some space between their bodies. He rested his forehead on the wall next to her face.
“You have no idea what you do to me, kitten,” he said.
Hot shame flooded Charity as she realized how wantonly she had just thrown herself at him even after he tried to stop her. For a second time. “Oh, God,” she said in a broken voice. She covered her mouth with her hand and ducked under his arm, walked a few steps away and then stopped. She stared blindly out the window until the beauty of the garden scene blurred. Angrily, with her back to him so he couldn’t see, she wiped away the tear.
“Charity.” Lachlan took a single step forward and then stopped. He couldn’t trust himself to touch her again.
“Just go, please.”
“We should . . .”
She turned to stare at him once more, her chin lifted and her eyes cold. “No. We definitely should not. Please go.”
He searched her face for a second but then without another word spun on his heel and left the room, his long strides echoing sharply up the corridor. A scant moment later, Charity flinched as she heard the front door slam.
Seventeen
But I don’t like him.”
Charity tossed that statement over her shoulder at Aunt Cleo as she climbed out of the Huntwick coach and walked toward the town house steps. The rest of its occupants followed suit. Everyone stepped inside and surrendered their wraps.
“I think you do,” the old woman said.
Charity sighed. Too much had happened in too short a time for her to even muster the energy to be angry with her wily old relative. She eyed the stairs, contemplating hiding in her room to escape the conversation, but knew it would just be waiting another time. “I’m sure he’s a good man, and that he will make some very fortunate girl a lovely husband. But I’m not that girl.”
Cleo snorted and went into the front sitting room, her cane hitting the floor with more force than necessary to punctuate her next words. “You certainly looked like that girl after your little talk in the breakfast room.”
Charity sucked in her breath, her face draining of color.
They all sat down, Grace taking a seat next to her younger sister on a green-striped settee. “Aunt Cleo!” She shot her aunt an exasperated look and put an arm around her sibling’s shoulders. “Whether the events of the past two days have been wrong or right, they are water under the bridge and we’ll deal with them as a family. If Charity does not wish to continue an acquaintance with the Marquess of Asheburton, she does not have to do so.”
Charity gave her a grateful smile.
“Well, if that’s the case and she doesn’t like the man, she shouldn’t come out of a private meeting with him looking like she’s been thoroughly kissed!”
Trevor laughed and then quickly tried to cover it with a cough. His wife glared at him.
“She’s right,” said Charity in a small voice. “He did kiss me. He kissed me and I liked it, and I hate that I liked it.”
Grace patted her knee. “You’ll find someone else you like to kiss.” She turned to her husband. “Won’t she?”
He looked startled at being addressed. “Oh, of course,” he agreed. “Although, I will point out that you weren’t very happy about kissing me, at first, and you have yet to find someone else.”
Grace narrowed her eyes. “Yet,” she said, warningly.
Trevor just grinned.
“I’d really just like to put it all behind me,” said Charity wearily. She stood. “I think I’ll go lie down for a bit. I didn’t sleep at all well last night.”
The assembled company watched her go. When she was out of earshot Cleo said, “I’ll take her to the Rutherfords’ ball with me tonight. Asheburton is probably still smarting from whatever Charity said to make him leave so abruptly, and will likely spend the evening playing cards, or whatever it is you men do when you can’t handle your women.”
Grace shook a finger at her. “Promise me you won’t interfere. I think we all need to stay out of this.”
Trevor snorted, making no attempt to hide his disbelief. “Since when did you learn what it means to not interfere? Your entire family thrives on interference.” He stopped speaking when he saw his wife’s face darken. Realizing he might actually have gone too far, he tossed Cleo a jaunty salute, pressed a kiss on Grace’s cheek, and beat a wise and hasty retreat to his study.
Lachlan Kimball swept into the study at his cousin’s town house and headed straight for the well-stocked liquor cabinet. Above a sideboard laden with neat rows of crystal he upended a glass, found the decanter of brandy, and poured himself a generous helping. After a couple of rejuvenating swallows, he sat down on the edge of a burgundy leather upholstered club chair and considered the events of the morning.
The entire situation with the Ackerly twins had been a debacle from beginning to end. He should have listened to Sebastian’s warning about becoming involved with any of the sisters in that family. Taking another slow swallow, he leaned back. He had options. Entire ballrooms full of options. After all, London was positively teeming with marital prospects.
It was time, he decided, to just choose one of the more pleasant girls the mamas of the ton were continually parading past him like cattle. He would simply use the process of elimination. He’d dance and converse
with them until he found one reasonably well spoken, not opposed to living in Scotland, and who, most importantly, utterly lacked a taste for drama.
He stood and walked to the desk. A stack of invitations to events taking place that evening sat neatly in the center, awaiting his perusal. He picked them up, perched a hip on the ornately carved edge of the two-hundred-year old piece of furniture, and fanned them out. After a moment’s trepidation he decided it didn’t really matter which he chose; he doubted, after what had transpired between Charity and himself over the past twenty-four hours, that she would be in the mood to leave her sister’s home this evening. Choosing an invitation at random, he tossed the rest into the rubbish bin.
Just before he stood, his eyes fell on another piece of paper in the bin next to the desk. Struck by a sense of familiarity, he bent and plucked it out. It was the list of potential marital prospects he, Thorne, Hunt, and the Lloyd brothers had created the day he arrived in London. He scanned the list until he came to the last name: Lucinda Harcourt. He tried to remember what his friends had said about her but drew a complete blank. Fairly certain he’d remember any mention of bad qualities, he decided to take a chance. He jotted a quick note and then took it into the hall. His burly valet, Niles, was just coming down the stairs.
“Oh, good.” Lachlan handed him the folded note. “Would you have a footman deliver this note to . . .” He paused as he tried to remember the young lady’s name.
Niles glanced at the name Lachlan had written on the outside. “Lucinda Harcourt, my lord?”
The valet’s gravelly voice was just as rough as his appearance. Lachlan had first encountered him in one of the dark alleys of London, defending a woman of the streets from a group of drunken men bent on obtaining her services for free. He’d prepared to step in and help but soon realized it wouldn’t be necessary. While he watched, Niles broke one man’s jaw, another man’s collarbone, and several ribs on a third. The rest ran off, including the prostitute, leaving Niles abandoned to the young Marquess of Asheburton. Upon learning the honorable pugilist was out of work and homeless, Lachlan had taken him to Asheburton Keep and offered him a position as his valet, despite his lack of experience.
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